Although William would have liked to leave immediately, there were many things involved in going on a long trip. Especially one where you may never return, at least not for many years. There was still the matter of The Order of the Watchful Sentry. William didn’t have any need to personally get involved, but he did need to know that they were on the right track. Thus, William discussed with Yu Jian and Dong Xin all of his reasons and what he thought they would need to know. Many things they understood already, but William also shared his account of fighting the army of the demon lord. It wouldn’t prepare them for everything that would happen in a war with the Demon King, but it would give them perhaps some idea of what to expect.

As for Big Sister Li, it didn’t take any convincing to get her to agree to come with him. She wasn’t particularly looking forward to getting married to someone not of her choice. Even if that didn’t happen, her future here wasn’t great. Even though it was now known that she could use magic, she wouldn’t particularly be seen as a useful asset, but rather just a strange anomaly. Though she was now treated much better by the family, that didn’t make her want to remain. Instead, she preferred to stay with the only one who had treated her like family. Yu Jian treated her well, but had been absent during important points in her life.

It also took some time to arrange the actual journey. Although the Shengrui trading group had frequent caravans, they weren’t constant. It wasn’t like William could just take the next flight over to Ostana. That was one thing William definitely missed from Earth, the speed of air travel. Though, not the traveling itself. He suspected that travel by trade caravan wouldn’t be particularly comfortable, though, so it probably wouldn’t beat air travel in that regard either.

As for what he was bringing with him… William still had almost nothing. He had a nice solid staff, clothes, and other basic necessities. He wouldn’t be able to bring any books, since they didn’t belong to him, and that went even more so for the scrolls containing ki techniques. This meant he wouldn’t be able to learn anything new, but he already had a variety of techniques he had learned but not yet trained to their limits. He also had memorized another cultivation technique for when Rotational Soul Pressure reached its limit. If William really wanted to master everything he currently knew, he could easily spend a decade or more. Plus, it wasn’t like he couldn’t create a new technique on his own- that did happen. It’s not like all of them appeared from nothing. Creating a new technique would be difficult, especially one that was good, but William was beginning to get a grasp on the way ki fundamentally worked. It followed different rules than magic, certainly, but was still bound by physics. With the possible exception of things relating to the soul, since William wasn’t sure how that fit in.

As for the Yu clan… nobody was particularly disappointed to see William go. He had caused more than his fair share of change, and people didn’t like that. He had gained some face for the clan, and at least most were appreciative for that. However, their previous prejudices were still around, and they felt that things would be more stable with him gone. Not that anyone would say that directly. From William’s perspective, things would probably not calm down all that much. Yu Huan was still around, and she wasn’t going to be easy to handle. Though she was quite good at making people underestimate her, William thought that people should eventually figure it out. Then again, in William’s experience, humans were as dense as rocks, so maybe they would manage to forget how exceptional Yu Huan was every year after the family tournament. William had no doubt that she would beat everyone in the fifteen through eighteen range at sixteen, and from there… he wasn’t sure, but it would be interesting. He knew she had already learned a technique to defend against soul attacks, so she wouldn’t lose the same way twice. Not that many people could even use a soul attack.

William had briefly considered asking her to come with him as well, but he realized that it was a silly idea. She would develop much better in Liaoyang, and would be able to take care of herself just fine. There was no point to travel with William. Though he would like someone of her talents to join in the fight against the Demon King, once word of him actually came, the nations would once again unite together, however grudgingly. At least, William hoped they would. This would be the absolute worst time to fail at that. Perhaps he would need to check out the political landscapes to make sure there wasn’t a stupid failure in the next war, which William thought would be the most important one yet. If they won this one, but failed to destroy the Demon King… there might not be enough wizards left to make any difference in the following war. The same might be true of martial artists. While William certainly didn’t want to disparage knights… only the best of them could match the demons in terms of bodily strength, and those were just the regular foot troops. They would be lacking the firepower and tactical variety offered by wizards and martial artists, and that was the most positive possibility William could think of.

Perhaps the war might not happen until William was an old man, or even shortly after that, but it would be coming. William felt, for no sustainable reason, that it would come sooner rather than later. At the very least, it wouldn’t hurt to go around fostering peace and unity between the nations and making them aware of the possibilities. If there was a war between two nations just before the Demon King showed up… it would be disastrous. Though it was a terrible thing to think, William was glad that there had been some minor wars while he was dead. Maybe that would help keep people calm enough to last until the most important time. William couldn’t stop thinking about everything that could go wrong, and sighed. Perhaps the journey would calm him down.