Sister Ilya is doing something strange. The corpse puppets on the screen stopped moving, and more corpses appeared inside the room. Sister Ilya was carving formations onto one of them. Ri woke up, and immediately fainted upon seeing the sight. At a time like this, how can Sister Ilya divert her attention like this? What is she planning?

“Ilya! Ilya, Ilya, Ilya! Are you still there?” Lucia asked. She was looking around herself inside the room with Kuang Feng. “Are we trading Baldie for the cooking pot or not?”

“Yes,” Ilya said without taking her eyes off of her corpse. “Make sure you make the cooking pot yours first. Most likely, Kuang Feng has a way to manipulate it with his spiritual energy because he established a connection to it. I don’t know the exact process, but you’ll figure it out, I’m sure.”

“Make this cooking pot mine before giving him Baldie, got it,” Lucia said and nodded. “You heard that? We’ll hand you the person you’re looking for as soon as you tell me how to make this cooking pot mine.”

Sister Ilya is giving up Fairy Lin that easily? However, she has the memories of Fairy Lin and Bloodmoon; I don’t believe she doesn’t know how to form connection with tools from the immortal realm. I’ll ask her, but I’m not sure. “How do we speak in a way Lucia can’t hear us?”

Sister Ilya snorted. “I have to activate the formation with my magic for her to hear us. If you want to say something without her hearing, then you can say it right now.”

That’s convenient. “Don’t you know the method to communicate with tools? Why didn’t you tell Lucia?”

Sister Ilya sat up, and at the same time, the corpse in front of her sat up as well. Ri let out a small sound. It seems like her constitution is pretty good, allowing her to wake up quickly after fainting. It’s not helping her much though considering she fainted again. “Haven’t you ever heard of stalling for time?” Sister Ilya asked and pulled another corpse towards herself. The corpse she had just turned into a puppet did the same. “With how long it takes Lucia to figure things out, I’ll have earned us a solid hour or so.”

“What good will an hour do us in a situation like this?” Unless Sister Ilya can make an army of corpses capable of defeating immortal sect elders, I don’t see how this is being productive. “You still haven’t explained why there’s a problem with the legacy.”

“If I explained to you, the problem would grow even larger,” Sister Ilya said. “That’s why, you’ll just have trust me.”

“Entrust you with all the lives of everyone on the Immortal Continent?” Sister Ilya and I can’t see eye to eye on many things, but I do trust her. However, trusting her with this….

“Listen,” Sister Ilya said. She and her puppet finished drawing formations on the two corpses. All four of them stood up at the same time, and two of the three corpse puppets approached the remaining corpses on the ground. “If it weren’t for Lucia and me, you wouldn’t amount to much. You’re the vice-sect leader of the Righteous Holy Sect, but ask yourself, are you really capable of holding that position without us? As of now, there are around eighty quasi-immortals who are elders in the sect, nearly all of which have experience in leading. Can you say with honesty you deserve the position of vice-sect leader over them?”

That’s…! “What are you trying to say?”

“You’ve always left the big decisions up to me,” Sister Ilya said with an expressionless face. “Just continue doing so, and everything will turn out alright, okay? Here, get in this life pouch.”

It’s true that Sister Ilya plays a tremendous role in managing the sect, and it’s true that I’ve happily been living off of her hard work without even thinking about it, but does she have to be so mean about it? “What does that have to do with getting into a life pouch?”

“I’m about to do some things,” Sister Ilya said. One of the corpse puppets grabbed Ri. Her eyes fluttered open, and she let out a shriek upon seeing the corpse’s face. Without saying a word, the corpse puppet tossed her at Sister Ilya, who held open the life pouch, catching Ri inside of it. “If anyone learns about what I’m about to do, it’ll put the whole continent in danger. You’ll help the sect out by knowing less. I wouldn’t put it past these seven great sects to teach their disciples Soul Scour.”

That makes sense. “Alright, come along, Sophia. You heard Sister Ilya.”

“Not yet,” Sister Ilya said. “She goes in last. You first, then Mrs. Feathers, then Ri.”

“Is that really necessary?” Is Sister Ilya trying to imply Sophia is more important than me? No, perhaps it’s something innocuous like she wants me to show Sophia it isn’t scary to enter a life pouch, but I already know Sophia enters Lucia’s life pouch all the time to see Mrs. Feathers. …Maybe I’ll never understand Sister Ilya’s train of thought, but I’ll listen to her for now. If the fate of the Immortal Continent truly rests on me not knowing what she’s about to do, then I’ll shoulder that fate by turning myself ignorant. However…, why does it feel like she’s trying to store me somewhere I can’t bother her?

Sister Ilya’s life pouch was … not filled with life. There was absolutely no life here at all. There are many, many weapons, and are these alchemy stoves? I remember Sister Ilya once telling me there were brains inside of these alchemy stoves or something along those lines. Is that why she has to store them in here? An interspacial ring probably can’t accommodate them.

“This is the grimmest place I’ve been to yet.” Mrs. Feathers’ voice came from behind me. “And I’ve been to a lot of places.”