***
"Of course Martial Uncle can do so."
Yes, yes, you can do it, you can do it, fine.
"Then Martial Uncle, the mission for this journey has been completed, and I shall return first to report my success. That old devil is utterly devoid of conscience, so I intend to request a Martial Uncle to take action and deduce his location."
Since he could not be persuaded, Immortal Xiaoning stopped trying; in any case, the mission for this time had already been finished.
"..."
The Dao Integration powerhouse frowned slightly; he had wanted to have Xiaoning help with the search, but for a moment, he lacked a sufficient reason to make him stay.
"Very well, if you wish to return, then return."
Although he was a Dao Integration legal cultivator, he was not skilled in deduction or divination.
Even with that old devil’s severed arm in his possession, he could not calculate the exact location of his whereabouts.
"Many thanks, Martial Uncle!"
Immortal Xiaoning cupped his hands and turned to walk into the villa.
In truth, at the very beginning, there was no such thing as the Ancient Cultivator Response Department.
Ancient cultivators who emerged from seclusion within the territories governed by each sect were all the responsibility of those respective sects to receive and guide.
This continued until an ancient cultivator from the He Huan Sect emerged.
That particular ancient cultivator had failed to advance to the Dao Integration stage, resulting in a deficiency of his blood essence, divine soul, and magical power.
Seeing that his realm was about to drop, he directly harvested an entire city with a population of three million people.
All three million people died completely, yet the Dao Integration practitioner within the He Huan Sect responsible for the matter happened to be a close friend of that emerged ancient cultivator, and thus helped him conceal the event.
He even went to that city in person to strangle the surviving wandering souls.
In a single city, three million people not only suffered the destruction of their physical bodies, but even their souls were completely dissipated, leaving no possibility of rebirth.
After this, that Dao Integration practitioner displayed a great divine ability, causing anyone who approached that city to subconsciously move away and gradually forget everything related to it.
All of this was done quite perfectly, and had it been placed in ancient times, it likely would have been successfully hidden.
However, it was simply such a stroke of misfortune that the Sacred Emperor Abyss had tinkered with something at that time called—a camera.
In this world that already possessed a series of recording methods such as the Profound Light Technique and shadow-retaining magical treasures, the effect of a camera was not considered very good, so he had only made a few of them casually.
Furthermore, because the craftsmanship was not yet mature, most of the components still utilized the spiritual materials of this world.
The cost was high and the effect was average, so there were not many people who bought them, though some fanatical worshipers of the Sacred Emperor Abyss had collected a few.
But as luck would have it, within that city where the traces had been erased by the Dao Integration powerhouse of the He Huan Sect, someone happened to have collected one and was recording the beautiful moments of life with their family on that very day.
In this way, that camera was left behind, and its storage components were swallowed into the stomach of a beast that was wandering through that city.
Later, that beast unexpectedly developed spiritual intelligence; having transformed into a spirit, it was affected by the divine ability and left that city, eventually being killed by several rogue cultivators, which led to the discovery of that component.
After those rogue cultivators cracked the images within, they directly posted them onto the Spiritual Network, which drew the attention of the Sacred Emperor Abyss.
How high and peerless was the cultivation of the Sacred Emperor Abyss at that time; even the Grand Elders of the various immortal sects were not necessarily his match.
Using the divine ability of tracing causes from effects, he directly broke the divine ability of that He Huan Sect Dao Integration practitioner and learned the truth of the death of those three million people.
The evil committed by the He Huan Sect ancient cultivator finally appeared before the eyes of the world!
For a time, the entire central continent of the Great Profound World was in an uproar!
Among the Six Great Immortal Sects, there were already many people who were quite dissatisfied with the matter of the He Huan Sect attempting to wash away its past reputation, and this incident directly became the fuse.
The Sect Masters of the Sword Sect, the Dragon Elephant Sky-Holding Sect, and the Supreme Dao Sect joined forces and fought their way directly to the mountain gate of the He Huan Sect, forcing even the He Huan Patriarch to make an appearance.
However, with the Dragon Elephant Sky-Holding Sect acting as the representative of brutes and the Sword Sect acting as the representative of relatively handsome brutes, they were completely without fear and also summoned the patriarchs of their own sects.
At this point, the He Huan Sect finally compromised.
The Dao Integration practitioner involved and that ancient cultivator who had emerged were directly beaten to death by the He Huan Patriarch, and all those involved were either killed or punished according to the severity of their circumstances.
Furthermore, they promised to provide compensation to the relatives of the victims, and only after agreeing to a series of conditions was this matter considered settled.
There was no choice but to settle it; although the He Huan Sect was not difficult to deal with, the He Huan Patriarch was different—that was a figure who truly stood at the pinnacle of the Great Profound World!
Following this incident, the Ancient Cultivator Response Department was established, with branch offices set up in the territories governed by every immortal sect and the Righteous Path Alliance.
The person stationed there could not be a member of the local immortal sect, and they would be rotated every so often, all for the purpose of preventing such incidents from occurring again.
The camera also became well-known to people after that event, and more and more people joined the ranks of its development, eventually perfecting it into its current form.
In the night, Zhang Yunlu was alone on the rooftop, holding a three-foot long sword in her hand.
The blade was covered in a thin layer of spiritual light, and the sword moves were elegant and agile, flowing without end, yet one could still clearly see the greenness of the person wielding the sword.
"Whew~"
Exhaling a long breath, Zhang Yunlu stopped her movements; that thin layer of spiritual light atop the blade had already vanished, as her spiritual power was clearly exhausted.
The strands of hair on her forehead were wet with sweat, and her right hand was especially aching and sore.
What she was practicing was the first style of the Flowing Cloud Sword Technique; she had begun practicing as soon as she returned and had continued until now, but the results were unsatisfactory.
According to this kind of progress, let alone learning it before the day after tomorrow, even a month’s time might not be enough.
She was not some hidden genius of the sword dao; she recognized this point with incomparable clarity.
For a moment, she was somewhat dejected, walking to the side to sit down and taking a sip of Essence-Returning Spiritual Liquid.
"Xiao Lu."
Zhang Xiu walked out from the door, still holding a jade box in his hand.
"Brother."
Zhang Xiu came to her side and handed her the jade box.
"I see that you have reached the ninth level of Qi Refining, so it is time to give this to you."
"What is this?"
She opened the jade box directly after receiving it.
"It was left behind by our parents; they said to give it to you when I felt the time was right."
"Parents..."
To her, this was a very distant word; she had been too young then and did not remember much, so much so that when she tried to reminisce, she found that the appearances of her parents had become blurred.
Her gaze was fixed intently upon the object within the jade box.
It was a piece of red jade, shaped like a water droplet, bright and vivid with a full color, as if it had been soaked and stained by the blood of immortals and gods.
Taking it out and holding it in her hand, it felt warm and delicate; a gentle current of warmth surged in from the palm of her hand and flowed toward her dantian.
The less than one-tenth of spiritual power within her dantian was recovering at a speed visible to the naked eye.
"You have been practicing all afternoon, go back and rest early; there is no need to be in such a hurry."
Zhang Xiu said.
"I still have to go out once more in a while, so remember to lock the door well and do not pay any mind if a stranger knocks; I have brought my keys..."
He prattled on, speaking entirely of things that even a small child would understand.
In just this short amount of time, Zhang Yunlu felt that her depleted spiritual power had already returned to full capacity.
"I know, brother."
She held the red jade in her hand.
"But what exactly is this?"
"...I do not know either; our parents only said it was a treasure and told me to hand it to you when you reached the ninth level of Qi Refining."
Zhang Xiu explained.
He also had a piece, but even though his realm was no longer considered low, he still had no clues.
He only knew that the fall of their parents was related to this red jade, and those people had also come chasing after this.
Zhang Yunlu’s heart felt somewhat complicated.
"Alright, if I do not go now, I will be late; you should also rest early, as you still have classes tomorrow."
A dark red, simple and ancient long sword flew from downstairs and hovered beside him.
Zhang Xiu stepped onto the blade, and as spiritual pressure erupted, his whole person shot into the sky, vanishing in the blink of an eye.
***