Chapter 8

“Little Jie! Little Jie! Hey, are you ignoring me? Heyyyy...” A female voice called out from a few meters away.

Li Jie found himself staring at a clear, slow-moving river. But staring back at him was an unfamiliar face. The same fiery red hair. The same piercing sky blue eyes. But his face was now a few years older. His rough, sun-tanned skin had been replaced with pristine, milky white skin. He was utterly confused. He felt like he had just woken up from a long dream where he was a 14 year old kid taking an exam for some sect. In the dream, his name also had been "Li Jie". The memories from that long dream mixed with his current ones, causing his brain to become muddled.

"Don't ignore me!" The female voice now directly behind him.

A heavy boot abruptly landed on his rear, pushing him into the river.

*Splash*

The panic of sinking into the water shocked him awake. The memories of the dream began fading away like melting snowflakes on his skin. He immediately stood up in the shallow river and looked around angrily for the owner of the boot.

Glaring at him with a familiar pouty face was a rather muscular girl about the same age as him. She had her raven colored hair tied back in a short ponytail and strapped to her back was a two meter tall greatsword that emitted a dreadful icy aura. When Li Jie saw her, for some reason he felt like her hair should have been orange.

‘What was her name?’ Li Jie thought, the memories almost entirely gone, ‘Was it... Lily? No. Her name was Song Xia, but everyone just called her Sasha. She likes to call me Little Jie just because she’s a half year older than me.’

“You crazy violent girl, take this!” He shouted as he splashed water towards Sasha. It seemed his mind was still stuck at the Nascent Realm as he surprised himself with how much strength he had. The water cut through the air with enough power to rip iron shields to shreds. But Sasha didn’t even blink as the deadly projectiles harmlessly slammed into her body. To her, it felt like a baby playing in the bathtub had splashed some water onto her.

Now soaked in water from head to toe, one of Sasha’s eyebrows twitched. Li Jie, the deepest parts of his soul now filled with fear, knew very well what it meant when Sasha’s eyebrows twitched. He immediately tried to activate a movement martial skill to get out of harm’s way but Sasha was faster... much, much faster. Her greatsword had already smashed into the riverbank in front of Li Jie.

He could only watch in horror as the dreadful ice aura expanded faster than the eye could follow, freezing absolutely everything in its path, including Li Jie. For kilometers both ways, the idyllic river had been completely frozen in an instant.

“Hmph! Serves you right!” Sasha said, sticking out her tongue at the popsicle Li Jie. To her, it wasn’t the fact that he had splashed water on her, but rather the fact that he called her violent that pissed her off. A violent girl who became even more violent when you called her violent--that was the Sasha that Li Jie knew and loved.

Li Jie, who would be shivering if he could actually move, circulated his cultivation of the peak of the third realm, the Forging Realm. With Li Jie as the source, a tyrannical flame dragon exploded towards the sky, expanding to become 100 meters long and sublimating all of the ice surrounding him. A dragon’s mighty roar could be heard for kilometers, startling many of the commoners going about their daily lives.

The two young cultivators suddenly heard a voice directly in their minds yelling at them, “Hey you two! Did you just cause that ruckus? Dammit, will you two devils at least try to keep it down while the emperor’s visiting the headquarters? I’ve got enough to deal with as it is!”

“Haha your dad’s angry at us again. Anyway let’s head back to town, if that old geezer is here, then ‘he’ must be here as well.” Li Jie said, unable to contain his anticipation.

Sasha, already back to normal, nodded with excitement and took off into air after dispersing her ice qi. Li Jie quickly followed her.

-----

Cultivators filled the airways leading towards the royal capital’s gates before landing in front of them as they neared the city. The city’s grand walls soared over 50 meters into the air with an Immortal Realm cultivator standing at attention every few meters, their pure white robes emblazoned with a mighty flame dragon fluttering lightly in the breeze. Only strong, influential, or well-connected cultivators could directly fly over the city walls. Sasha, as the heiress to the most wealthy clan in the city, naturally fell into this group of cultivators. Anyone who was with her, of course, would receive the same privilege, but Li Jie didn’t need to take advantage of her position. After all, the #2 person on everyone’s do-not-piss-off list was Li Jie’s father, the #1 obviously being the emperor himself.

Passing over the wall and through the translucent protective shield that surrounded the city, Li Jie sent out his spiritual sense, scanning for a person. Within a minute, he locked onto his target and accelerated in its direction. Sasha followed right behind him. Below them, millions of people filled the wide, paved streets of the royal capital, every single adult at least in the Flowering Realm, with many Forging Realm and Refining Realm cultivators among them. Squads of soldiers in polished silver armor each led by an Immortal Realm cultivator captain patrolled the streets.

This awe inspiring display of power by the royal capital of the Immortal Tiger Empire led to the city being known as the “Jewel of the Continent”. Artificial lakes and rivers along with soaring cultivator towers that seemed to touch the clouds dotted the city’s landscape.

The city was bustling with activity in preparation for the celebration of the successful campaign against neighboring Azure Dragon Empire. The emperor’s only son had commanded one of the Immortal Tiger Empire’s legions to completely annihilate an army 5 times its size. Immensely happy at his son’s victory, the emperor declared today to be an imperial holiday and sent out an imperial decree calling all persons of any caliber to attend the celebration.

Right now the emperor was visiting the Song Clan’s headquarters in order to pick out a gift for his son. Numerous precious treasures had been laid out on golden tables in the clan’s great hall, each one of these treasures possessed enough value for normal empires to fight wars just to obtain one.

Picking up a curved silver sword engraved with numerous golden runes that seemed to twist the air around them, Sasha’s father explained, “Your majesty, that sword is forged from the core of a star that fell from the Heavens. The runes were engraved by Grandmaster Jiang Zhao Hui who was reported to have consumed over half of his life force creating the runes because they were so profound. It was used by a Immortal Realm cultivator a few hundred years ago to single-handedly slaughter 100 other Immortal Realm cultivators!”

The emperor showed no amazement in his eyes; he simply stared at the sword for a few seconds before muttering, “It might make a good toothpick.”

He nonchalantly tossed the sky-shattering sword back onto the table and continued searching for a present. Sasha’s father, used to the emperor’s overbearing demeanor, simply continued to follow behind him.

They kept looking through the treasures.

“Your majesty, that is an egg from the peak Immortal Realm beast, the Ba Snake. One of my Exalted Realm cultivators confirmed that there is a soul within the egg and it will hatc-”

“Might make a good omelette I guess?”

And kept looking...

“Your majesty, these gauntlets were forged inside an undersea volcano using the titanic core of a fire giant...”

“Goodness, look at how ugly those are!”

And looking...

“Your majesty, this robe is made from the leather of a Divine Tri-horned Bull slain during the height of a solar eclipse while...”

“It could be suited as pajamas maybe?”

Right when the Song Clan Patriarch was at his limit, the doors to the hall burst open. Sasha’s father spun around, furious at the one who would dare interrupt him and the emperor. His face expression relaxed when he saw it was just Li Jie and his daughter.

“Hey old man stop being so nit-picky. My brother doesn’t need any of that fancy stuff.”

“Yeah, can’t you see you’re annoying father, stupid geezer!”

The father in question suddenly adopted an absolutely tranquil expression on his face, ready to accept the fact that his entire clan was about to be wiped out due to his daughter’s careless words.

The emperor of the strongest empire in the entire continent, with numerous Exalted Realm cultivators and millions of Immortal Realm cultivators ready to die for any of his commands, slowly turned around to look at the two young adults.

All was silent in the hall except Sasha’s father mumbling some death prayers to prepare his soul for the afterlife.

Unexpectedly, the emperor began smiling brightly, walking past Sasha’s father whose soul had pretty much already left his body, and opened his arms wide. He embraced both Li Jie and Sasha quickly and then rubbed their heads with affection.

“Hahaha, it’s just as you two say. I think I’ll try making something myself! I’m sure my son would love that.”

He turned back to the shocked father, “Song Cheng, you have raised a fine daughter! I shall take my leave for now, sorry to have bothered you with my silly requests. Li Jie, thank you for always keeping my son company. You should be able to find him in the main gardens.”

With that, the emperor departed, his luxurious robe waving grandly with each step despite the lack of any apparent wind.

Song Cheng, disregarding his status as a peak Immortal Realm cultivator, sank weakly to the ground with relief. He suddenly realized something, “My daughter, don’t tell me the ‘old geezer’ you’re always talking about was the emperor?”

Sasha, distracted by something else, absent-mindedly replied, “Huh? Oh. Yeah I guess so...”

Li Jie, distracted by the same thing as Sasha, gave a bow to Song Cheng, “Please excuse us Patriarch, there’s something important we need to attend to.”

He grabbed Sasha’s hand and rushed over to the main gardens, leaving the dazed Song Cheng behind.

-----

In the middle of the largest pond of the main gardens, a young man was lying down in a beautifully crafted gazebo, completely isolated from the world. A jade slip covered with dense political text covered his face and blocked the sun from getting into his eyes. Distinctive silver hair could be seen poking out from above the jade slip. Suddenly one of his ears twitched as he heard familiar footsteps crossing the bridge to the gazebo. Of course, he had detected them with his spiritual sense far before they even reached the bridge.

Deciding to feign sleep, he heard the footsteps get louder and louder, until they stopped right next to him.

“Is he sleeping?”

“No way! He’s just messing with us again. I’ll wake him up!” He heard a familiar female voice say.

Immediately he panicked, instinctively knowing what was about to happen. But as always when dealing with Sasha, everyone reacted a step too slow.

Sasha’s fist descended from the heavens like a falling meteor on its way to destroy the earth.

“Sasha punchhhhhhh!!!!” She yelled as the strike made contact with the silver-haired man’s stomach.

“No wait!” He managed to say before the unstoppable force came crashing down. He found himself in a meter deep hole after he opened his eyes, a massive dust cloud expanding into the air. Looking up, he saw Li Jie trying to hold back his laughter and failing badly. Sasha was standing with her arms crossed, frowning at him as if to say, “This is all your fault for pretending to be sleeping!” Her eyes betrayed her though, since anyone could see she was truly happy to see him.

Finally after getting his laughing under control, Li Jie reached out his hand which the man accepted. He leaped out of the hole and pulled Li Jie into an embrace.

“Little bro! Good to see you again!”

“Hahaha big bro, you too. Congrats on your successful campaign!”

They released their embrace and turned to the still frowning Sasha.

“Zhu Lei, still acting like a kid even after becoming a the youngest general in the empire’s history and defeating the enemy in a heroic battle?”

‘That’s the last thing we want to hear from you!’ both Li Jie and Zhu Lei thought.

“I see you’re as beautiful as ever, Sasha. You and Li Jie kiss yet?” He replied with a wide grin on his face.

He swiftly dodged the ferocious fist aimed directly at his head and took to the air, laughing wildly as he performed all sorts of aerial maneuvers to shake the furiously blushing Sasha off his tail. Li Jie simply sighed and followed after his two best friends. The three friends shot through the air over the city, shooting stars that would burn brighter than anything else in the sky.