𝚘𝗏𝗅xt.𝗇𝓔t

All the eyes fell on Edward who remained silent with an unsightly expression on his face, maybe if only there were elders present, he wouldn’t be so apprehensive to answer.

But there were juniors from practically all the peaks that stayed behind to watch the show, as they were waiting in line previously.

“So, are you going to speak or not, I’ll reach the end of this matter and believe that the punishment will be worse the more time you make me waste”, said Salazar.

Cheating on a mission is punishable in terms of merit points, the offender will not only lose the points earned by cheating, but will be penalized with the same amount but in negative terms, as punishment.

Also, there is a penalty of not being able to accept public missions from the sect, of course if the offender is personally requested by an elder, the sect won’t interfere, but under normal circumstances who would like to hire someone that can’t complete a mission properly.

What was making Edward grit his teeth was mainly the humiliation he knew he will suffer if he spilled the beans, that was all, so he turned to see the Supreme Elder with pleading eyes but was met with an annoyed gaze.

Even the Supreme Elder couldn’t interfere so directly, when there is a solid argument, and what can be more solid that someone making a Soul Oath accusing you, if the accuser was lying then it would suffer the retribution from the oath.

“I… wasn’t able to find the White Silicon Ore during my mission”, he limited to say, but of course Aster wasn’t going to let him off the hook so easily.

“Then where did the White Silicon Ore you used to complete the mission came from?”, he asked.

Edward whose eyes seemed to spit fire glared at Aster, but what could he possibly do when he was being watched by Salazar, the Supreme Elder snorted and actually left, not before saying.

“I have other things to tend to, once you finish here you can return to the valley”.

Edward knew he was left to handle his mess, because he was the one to ask for it, at this point he could only confess and hurry up to get the hell out of here.

“I asked the Supreme Elder to give me some of the White Silicon Ore she had on storage, so that I could complete my mission, that is the truth, now can I leave!”, he shouted.

The junior disciples that were observing the situation, gave Edward gazes of disdain, failing one mission or two is something common, the sect views it as part of the process of growth, unless it is a really important mission there isn’t really a penalty involved.

Of course, that means there is no reward of merit points as well, but this so-called Holy Son decided to use such a cheap trick just for some merit points, it was a disgrace.

“I see, the merit points obtained through this mission are hereby nullified and you will lose twice the amount as a penalty, you are also prohibited from taking public missions for the next three months”, said Salazar before he turned to see the Core Elder Olivia.

“As for you, as an elder from the Blacksmith Peak, you should have noticed that the Silicon Ore wasn’t mined recently and you still accepted it, as punishment you’ll lose your mission slots from the sect, of the year and the fraudulent material given to you will be confiscated, and as for the claim of the Lord of the Twin Sword Valley, six months of your salary will be used as compensation for trying to elude the proper payment”.

Olivia’s face paled, each Core Elder is given a turn every year, and they rotate the high ranked places to which only the young generation can access, like the Silicon Forest, so losing her chances to create missions meant she’ll have to wait till the next rotation.

While a few years of life are nothing for a Void Manipulation cultivator, a few years of training are a completely different thing, wasting time means increasing the difficulty for later advances, which for people that is close to the peak of the Transcending realms is a rather stupid thing to do.

“Wait, I wasn’t involved in all this, they told me it was from the Silicon Forest and the aura it radiated matched, so I didn’t pry too much into it, the Supreme Elder acted as the guarantee of it, I was a victim!”, said Olivia.

She needed the White Silicon Ore for her advance, she already had a part of the required material, but was lacking a few more kilograms, even after looking all over the place, buying from small merchants and using a lot of money, she was still lacking around one kilogram, she used ten years to accumulate what she needed.

Being short one kilogram that prevented her from advancing under the best conditions, would make her go crazy, unfortunately for her, Edward heard Olivia trying to put all the blame on him and he snorted.

“She didn’t even check the ore and just accepted it before marking the mission as completed in a rush”.

“Y-You!”, Olivia listened to Edward telling on her, and she turned around with fury in her eyes.

“My decision is final, hand over the confiscated item, I’ll handle the rest”, said Salazar with an iron expression, as the one in charge of punishment in the sect, how could he not recognize someone trying to blame everyone but itself, even if Edward didn’t talk, he wasn’t going to change his verdict.

The elder Olivia gritted her teeth, she threw a bag that she took out of her ring, at Salazar then gave Edward a poisonous gaze and then left.

Edward didn’t put Olivia in his eyes, the neutral faction couldn’t openly support him anyway, that is in part why he suggested this little trick to get the merit points he desperately needed to raise in the Heavenly Ranks.

He instead glared at Aster, as he spat on the ground.

“You can keep hiding behind those women and the formation of your valley, but you better watch your back later, Lord of the Twin Sword Valley…”, but before he could finish his threat, to save some of his dignity, Aster struck once again.

“Let’s put an end to this, I don’t have time to waste on a clown like you, I challenge you to a life and death battle right here right now, though my rank is way higher than yours, your cultivation is higher than mine, and the formation won’t help me in the life and death arena, so you won’t refuse right?”, Aster said with a smirk.

Edward’s words stuck in his throat, the last time he was forced backwards in the small clash he had with Aster, before he advanced to the Star Tribulation realm, he didn’t have the confidence to fight with Aster.

Edward is a middle stage Star Axys body path cultivator and a peak stage Earth Origin energy path cultivator, but he also had his body constitution, the problem is that only recently he awakened his ability which was when he was noticed by the Supreme Elder, he hasn’t exploited his potential yet.

Aster naturally knew Edward wasn’t going to accept the challenge, and that made everyone mark him as a coward, because his realm was higher than his and the formation in which Edward claimed he was relying won’t activate, others won’t be able to interfere as well.

Edward felt the countless gazes looking at him with disdain, the junior disciples were gossiping and the words “coward”, “disgrace” and “bastard” could be heard even from afar.

Ultimately Edward only gave everyone a resented gaze and then he left in disgrace followed by Julia, as well as the elder from the Red Sword faction, because apparently, they were backing him now too, which reminded Aster of the sword maniac red haired Iris.

She previously sad she was going to visit the Twin Sword Valley but haven’t come even after around a month has passed, the last thing he knew about her was that she raised to the top five and gave him the credit for her improvement in using Sword Intent.

‘I guess I’ll give her a call later, for now let’s deal with this mess’, thought Aster as he turned to see the junior disciples that have experienced two attacks from those idiots in front of his store.

“Sorry but we’ll be closing early today, as a compensation all the ones waiting in line will get a 10% discount in their next purchase”, Aster’s words made the eyes of all the girls sparkle.

As new disciples they only had the money they brought from their families, some came from the weak Star Clusters and though were talented, their families weren’t that much, even the cheapest and most basic weapon costed a few millions of spirit jades, but they needed one to go into missions to earn money.

“I’ll take my leave first, miss Helena please take care of the rest”, said Aster, Helena nodded and then she approached the girls on the waiting line to get their information, so that they can be listed for a discount the next time they come.

The four Core Elders also nodded at Aster, they have finished their business here and now needed to return to do their own factions, as for the deal they made, they will come later to see Helena to hand over the payment in exchange for the material they bought.

“Do you want to return with me now?”, asked Aster to the girls, Aria was of course coming because she knew what was about to happen.

But Eris and the others weren’t included on that, so they could stay to hang round in the Central City if they wanted to.

“I’m tired from the travel and cousin isn’t in the sect, so I’ll stay with you if you don’t mind”, said Agnes.

“Same here, Eric is arriving in a couple of days, so I’ll stay with Tia in your castle, besides someone has to make little Kana company when you are busy after all~”, jokingly said Felicia, which made Tiana’s face redden knowing what her mother meant.

“Mm, I also want to have a nice rest… I already told Sarina I’ll prepare the dinner today”, shily said Camilla.

As for Eris she had many things to discuss with Mylene, so she also wanted to return now, the only one left was Nerissa, who doubted for a moment before saying.

“Master told me to stay in the Twin Sword valley until she returned, so if you accept me, I will like to be a guest there”.

Aster nodded in response, Valentina came to lend him a hand, sure he had Lilia who was more than enough to pull through any trick that Sean Frits could try, but others didn’t know it, and Valentina’s interference made it so it was kept like that.

Also, the blue haired top disciple of the Black Sword faction was trustable and she has already seen a lot of what Aster is capable in the previous mission, it was late to exclude her now and Agnes also seemed happy that she joined.

“Let’s go back then”, said Aster, he waved his hand and using his authority the whole group disappeared.

The scenery changed from the Central Capital, to the inside of the castle, the moment Aster appeared in the living room, he felt a few predacious gazes falling on him, one of them was different though.

It belonged to the Ligress girl Mira, who was softly growling at him.

“Can’t you tell that stupid tree to leave me alone, its voice is giving me a headache”, she said with an aggrieved voice.

The tree was a chatterbox and once someone drew its attention then that person could give up hope on having a peaceful evening at least, unless something more interesting for Nim suddenly appeared.

Aster was amused to see the Ligress girl defeated by Nim in such a way, but he still said.

“I’ll tell Nim to not bother you that much, how was it, did you met Espi already?”, said Aster, which made Mira’s eyes glow.

“Yeah, I wasn’t too eager at first since you mentioned it was a Sand Wyrm, a degraded subspecies of rock Lindwyrms, but to think you actually found an attribute less variant… and not only that but you managed to tame it, I don’t know if I should call you lucky or simply a cheater”, mumbled the Ligress girl.

Aster chuckled, he knew Espi was special since the moment the little Wyrm approached him out of its own will, regular spirit beasts don’t have wisdom until they reach the late Transcending Realms.

As a proof of it the other wyrms that ended up stranded in Esmeralda’s secret realm, were found and captured, but Espi eluded everyone, and based on the way it hit itself others wouldn’t have noticed it.

“We’ll discuss about that later, feel free to enjoy the commodities of the castle, just choose a room of your preference, if you have any questions feel free to ask Camila and the others”, said Aster, referring to Nerissa and Mira who were new to the group.

Nim didn’t count because it said it wanted to live on the valley, after being trapped in a place with a fake sky for so many years, it wanted to enjoy the real sunlight, Aster promised to take its real body out of the mind space later, in the meantime its consciousness stayed in its copy.

Lilia could have done it today, but right now there was a much more important matter she needed to tent to.

Camila and the others saw Aster leaving the living room, followed by Aria, Sarina and Lilia, not to mention Alice who was happily humming while she hugged Aster’s left arm, and their pretty faces reddened a bit.

“Are they really going to… do that in broad daylight”, mumbled Camila, which made Felicia giggle.

“You don’t understand it Cami, when two lovers are separated and then reunite it can only have one result, didn’t you saw it with the parents of that girl”, she said as she pointed at Alexandra, who felt a bit ashamed.

The moment Aster left, her mother dragged Tomas with her and the two have been gone since then, leaving her alone, she didn’t complain because her father will leave for a long time soon.

…

At the other side of the castle, Aster reached the entrance of his room, and he was soon surrounded by Alice and the others, it was as if they were just waiting for him to open the door so that they can jump onto him, especially Alice, whose red eyes were glowing with a dangerous light.

And he was right, the moment he closed the door behind of him, Alice jumped into his arms and pressed her lips against his, not even a second later, Aster saw her tail wrapping around him.

“Mmm~”, she was in a daze as her tongue entangled with Aster’s.

Even the normally calm and composed Sarina, undressed pretty fast and then hugged him from behind, pressing her large breasts against his back, which made Lilia pout, but apparently she had made a bet earlier during the food war and she lost, so she could only temptingly bit her lower lip while she saw her daughter and Sarina get all the fun, Aria just returned from the mission so she knew her turn will be last by default anyway, so she just calmly took off her clothes and then laid down on the bed.