Jian Huiyin, the leader of the Bamboo Sword Sect, was at that moment alongside the elders of the Infinite Dao Sect, waiting at the entrance of the sect for the arrival of the ship carrying the new disciples.

Normally, as the leader of a sect, she wouldn’t attend such a reception. However, besides being the leader of the Bamboo Sword Sect, she was also an inner elder of the Infinite Dao Sect, so she shared certain responsibilities and duties, and couldn’t just receive an elder’s salary for free.

Besides her, there were also elders and disciples of the Bamboo Sword Sect waiting a bit farther back from where she stood with the elders of the Infinite Dao Sect, all awaiting the return of the recruitment expedition.

Jian Huiyin stood there calmly, her silver hair fluttering as her gray eyes remained fixed on the horizon.

Since the Infinite Dao Sect’s arrival seven months ago, not only had she managed to break through her bottleneck to the 4th level of the Golden Core realm using the energy from her elemental stone salary, but she had also greatly strengthened herself with the Founder-Tier techniques from the Sword Pavilion that had been made available to her months ago.

Her combat experience had also grown with the constant sparring matches against the powerful elders of the Infinite Dao Sect, which made her quite happy. And over time, she came to better understand just how terrifying the sect she now belonged to truly was.

Thus, when she saw on the horizon the gigantic ship that looked more like a floating city, although shaken and amazed, she wasn’t in disbelief.

But the elders and disciples of the Bamboo Sword Sect didn’t show the same composure.

“H-How is this possible?! How can a ship like that exist? How many spirit stones does it burn per second?!”

The Grand Elder of the Bamboo Sword Sect muttered in disbelief, his eyes nearly bulging out.

“T-This isn’t even a matter of spirit stones anymore… Even if it consumed a spiritual mine per second it wouldn’t be enough to fuel that monster. Not even the richest sect could maintain something like this for a few hours… And how many materials would it take to build it?!”

Others also commented in shock, completely incredulous, as the enormous shadow of the ship — which was advancing at high speed — began to slow down as it approached the sect.

Soon, the colossal shadow covered about a tenth of the vast mountain of the Bamboo Sword Sect.

The ship slowly hovered over the mountain and began to descend, approaching the ground as much as possible.

An immense ramp of light projected downward, descending to the entrance of the sect. It truly looked like it was made of light, and upon touching the ground, it made no sound, remaining static in contact with the earth.

From this ramp, led by Lie Zheng, the elders in purple robes, followed by those in red, began to descend.

Next came disciples in black robes with gray accents, led by a few wearing black robes with white accents.

As they descended, some of the gray-accented ones positioned themselves at strategic points along the bridge.

These were the disciples of the Punishment Pavilion, carefully selected by Lie Zheng — or rather, by Aotian — from among those who had shown the greatest sense of justice and courage during the recruitment tests, and were later invited into the pavilion.

Of the nearly 14,000 disciples recruited, just over 5% were directly affiliated with the Punishment Pavilion, totaling around 700 disciples. Those with gray-accented robes were outer disciples, responsible for maintaining order among their peers. Those with white accents were inner disciples, tasked with maintaining discipline among the inner ranks.

Leading all of them was, ironically, Bai Yan, the former swindler, who was now a direct disciple of Lie Zheng. His robes were black with gold accents, signaling his position as a core disciple of the Punishment Pavilion.

The disciples of this pavilion were the only ones to wear such black robes, as they were, in practice, the sect’s law enforcement force.

With the “police” in position, the other disciples could descend in an orderly manner, avoiding any kind of commotion.

In truth, it was perhaps a bit excessive. It was unlikely there would be any confusion, but with a sect of 14,000 people, there was no way to guarantee everything would go off without a hitch.

Then, from the top of the immense ramp of light came the remaining disciples, led by the core disciples:

– Xiao Ling, of the Treasure Pavilion;

– Lin Xiaoxue, of the Refinement Pavilion;

– Bai Jingjing, of the Formation Pavilion;

– Cang Song, of the Alchemy Pavilion;

– Hui Lang, of the Talisman Pavilion;

– Liu Rihai, of the Sword Pavilion.

And lastly, but by no means least, leading all of them:

Long Aotian, of an unknown pavilion.

Although he wore white robes with golden accents, typical of a core disciple, no one knew to which pavilion he belonged. When asked, he only smiled mysteriously.

The only one who knew the truth was Rihai. And she felt powerless about it. All the caution she had shown in the beginning had gone out the window since the two of them had become inner disciples.

When Aotian suggested that she choose to become a disciple of one of the inner elders, she could only follow what he said.

By this point, she knew there was no point in hiding anymore. Everyone knew they were the strongest disciples in the sect. There was no reason to pretend to be just regular inner disciples.

With no other choice, she could only embrace the situation and move forward.

But there was something that partly amused and partly left Rihai feeling powerless. It was the fact that Aotian used his authority in the sect to let her choose whoever she wanted as her master — and not the other way around, as it usually was, with masters choosing their disciples. And among the options were even the sect leader and the ancestor Bao Wuji.

Of course, she felt uncomfortable with the idea of forcing someone to accept her as a disciple just because of Aotian’s influence. But he insisted that everyone would be more than happy to be chosen by her, and that, being a genius anyway, she would never be a loss to anyone.

After much insistence, and personal visits from the elders, she, powerless, chose the inner elder of the Sword Pavilion as her master, becoming a core disciple.

Although she feared her new master had been forced to accept her because of Aotian’s importance, she simply sighed and accepted the situation. Fortunately, after getting to know her master better, she felt he was apparently sincere, and not forced by circumstances.

Aotian kept wondering how she would react if she found out that her master was actually her own beloved. He imagined that, at the very least, it would be interesting.

Other than that, Aotian also became a core disciple, and even though no one knew which pavilion he belonged to, that didn’t stop them from becoming the most respected couple in the sect.

Back on the ship’s ramp, under the leadership of Aotian and the others, the rest of the more than 10,000 disciples began descending the bridge, startling the members of the Bamboo Sword Sect with the overwhelming number.

Even Jian Huiyin was stunned.

It’s worth noting that the Bamboo Sword Sect, being the dominant force in the region, held annual recruitment events, accepting hundreds of disciples each year — including some less gifted individuals who ended up as menial disciples.

In other words, for thousands of years, the sect acted like a sponge, constantly absorbing the region’s talents. And yet, the Infinite Dao Sect had, impressively, managed to gather such a large number of disciples in a single expedition.

And the surprises weren’t over yet.

With the last disciple exiting the ship, the energy ramp dissipated. Then, the ship began to shrink before everyone’s eyes.

‘What kind of artifact is that flying boat?!’

The question hovered in the minds of all present.

Formations could, in fact, shrink or expand materials, but there were limits. It wasn’t possible to change scale so extremely, hence the shock.

What no one knew was that, in the ship’s command cabin, Bai Wuji stood before formations that expelled materials in absurd quantities as the ship shrank. He was struggling to store everything using his storage ability.

Aotian’s formation and forging skills weren’t strong enough yet to create a ship so large that it could expand and shrink like that. So he relied on cleverness.

Instead of building a huge ship all at once, he set up formations that devoured materials and assembled them as the ship expanded.

The problem with this approach was that assembling materials via formation, instead of forging, made the ship more fragile and less reliable.

Another obstacle was the ship’s size. Aotian simply didn’t have enough spiritual materials to build a ship comparable to a flying city. So he resorted to common materials, like regular wood that existed in large quantities anywhere — which once again compromised the structure’s durability.

In the end, the ship was basically a colossal pile of junk glued together pretending to be an imposing structure.

And the glue? Spiritual energy. In absurd amounts.

If it were a real floating ship, properly forged, it would still have an extremely high energy cost due to its massive size. But being a pile of rubble held together by energy, the consumption was a thousand, ten thousand, maybe even a hundred thousand times higher.

If not for Bao Wuji’s equivalent exchange ability, capable of producing perfect-quality spirit stones, Aotian would never have attempted something so insane. Moreover, maintaining the cultivation environment inside the ship also required an absurd consumption of elemental stones, which in turn also needed spirit stones to be created.

The amount of spirit stones used in the project made Aotian feel a slight toothache just remembering it.

But thankfully, the investment had been worth it.

The proof? The stunned look on Jian Huiyin’s face, which broke her usual indifferent expression.

With her eyes slightly trembling, she could only think one thing as she stared at the crowd of disciples before her:

‘Foundation Establishment… over ten thousand of them…’

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Aotian and Rihai are finally wearing the outfits from the story cover.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep