Chapter 98: An Alluring Future

Everyone listened with a heavy heart. They had never seen Starlight look so downtrodden and defeated, and they couldn't help but feel a sense of sympathy for him.

"Hence, it's perhaps a little too early to be discussing the future now, but for me, opportunities are very difficult to come by, so I must consider the future," Starlight continued with a wry smile. "Zheng Yunqi is right in that I have my own selfish motive for encouraging all of you to work harder in your cultivation. My hope is that if I am somehow able to climb to greater heights in the future in this lifetime, then I can call upon all of you to support me.

“However, if all of you remain as incompetent as you are now when that time comes, then I will have no one to support me. Alternatively, there could come a day when a golden opportunity is presented to us, but we lack the power to capitalize on it. If that happens, then what will be the point of our collaboration here? We may as well just disband now!"

It was very rare to see Starlight being so sincere and candid, and everyone listened in silence.

𝒻𝓇𝑒𝘦𝘸𝑒𝒷𝓃ℴ𝑣𝘦𝑙.𝒸ℴ𝘮

If it weren't for the near-death ordeal that they had just suffered, perhaps they would've never been able to see Starlight open himself up to them like this.

The future that Starlight had described was one that was very bleak, but also very realistic for everyone present.

"Regardless of whether it's a case of all of you following me, or my ascension to greater heights thanks to your support, we have to do something with our lives. I'm certainly not content to serve as a lowly helmsmaster for the rest of my life. Similarly, are all of you content to be looked down on your entire lives by the main branch counterparts of your clans?

“We only get to live once, why not do something with our lives? I have higher ambitions for life, and I want the same for all of you. Otherwise, if you're all content with what you already have, then all my efforts will have gone to waste."

Zheng Yunqi and the others lowered their heads as a complex mix of emotions welled up in their hearts.

"Do you think I recruited all of you just to prop up this branch helm and establish an escort agency? You think I gathered all of you just so I can potentially become a hall master in the future? You think that's the limit of my ambitions? I went to all of this effort to make you my subordinates, then gave you these legitimate identities and encouraged you to retaliate against those who wronged you, and I've even saved your lives on multiple occasions.

“You think I did all of that just to pave my way to become a hall master of the One Heart Church in the future? If you truly believe that, then it's honestly an insult how little you think of me. You think I'm so desperate to establish ties with the main church that I would settle for a bunch of people from the side branches of their clans who won't amount to anything in the future? Even if we weren't attacked today, I would've brought up this problem in the near future.

“All of you are too weak, and you're weak because you don't even dare to harbor any ambitions! You don't even dare to compete! Why do you always feel so inferior in the presence of the main branch counterparts of your clans? Because you're weak! I have no time for weaklings! I want all of you to be ambitious, to be demons among demons! Even if you don't become the leaders of your clans, you must strive for positions of power and amount to something!

“That is my objective. I want to raise you all so that you'll be able to face any situation with confidence and composure. Right now, we're facing the Hall of Protectionists, but in the future, you'll be facing your competitors in the main church, and it's all the same in principle! I will do everything in my power to help you grow, but I hope that the survivors among you that manage to return to your clans can turn your lives around!

“I want you to compete, to strive, to take what's rightfully yours and more! I want you to make a name for yourselves, whether it be in the main church or elsewhere, and when we come together again, we will be a force to be reckoned with! All of you will eventually leave, and I will be left to toil away on my own. If I die, then that's it for me, but all of you can continue to strive for greater heights.

“What you make of your future is up to you, and all I ask is that you don't resent me for how harsh and demanding I've been to all of you. However, if I live, then I will be sure to call upon you someday, and I don't want to see that you're still as worthless as you are now! Fight! That's all I ask of you! You see the thirty-two bodies lying over there?

“Nineteen of them were once just like you, and perhaps you will also be laid to rest like them during your time in the White Cloud Prefecture! However, if you don't compete, you don't fight, you don't strive, then eventually, you'll be reduced to a lifeless body elsewhere anyway. How can you be content to be beneath others for the rest of your lives?

“I want to see what the scenery is like at the top, and not only do I want you all to support me on my rise to the top, I want all of you to join me at the summit!"

A faint smile appeared on Starlight's hideous face as he concluded his rousing address, and it was such a radiant and reassuring smile, one that instilled everyone with a sense of warmth and confidence.

Everyone felt extremely moved, and they fell into deep thought at the possibilities that they had been presented with.

They were accustomed to hearing fancy and embellished words of praise back home, and they often delivered the same words to those they felt to be above them, but it was very rare to hear something so raw and genuine.

It was an especially moving experience, particularly with those nineteen bodies laying nearby.

"You can all go now," Starlight said with a weary wave of his hand. "Ask the clans of the deceased what they would like to be done with their bodies. I'm not familiar with the customs and traditions of the main church in this regard, so I'll leave it to all of you. I'll give you all two days to sort this matter out. I still have to report to Pope Yin, so I'll be leaving now."

Right as he stood up to depart, a menacing look suddenly appeared on his face as he growled, "Don't delude yourselves into thinking I'm an easygoing guy just because I said all of this stuff to you today! If you step too far out of line, I won't hesitate to kill you!"

With that, he vanished from the spot in a flash.

***

Even after Starlight's departure, everyone remained silent.

Only after a long while was the silence broken as someone sighed, "I've learned more from today than the past two decades of my life. Helmsmaster Starlight can be cruel and ruthless, but he's shown us a completely different side to himself today."

"Helmsmaster Starlight can seem like a terrible person at times, but he's never made any secret of what he wants," Zhou Mei'er mused. "We don't believe in virtuosity in the Church of the Self-Righteous, but at the very least, I think he's a man of honor."

"I wouldn't go that far," Zheng Yunqi chuckled. "Having said that, I agree that Helmsmaster Starlight is a very earnest man, but even so, I'm very surprised that he opened up to us to this extent tonight. In spite of the parting threat that he made, I have a feeling our lives are going to be a little easier under him from now on.

“Now that Helmsmaster Starlight is gone, we have to consider the important matter at hand right now. The nineteen people that we recruited to our branch helm had all informed their clans, so we need to be very careful in the wording of the letters that we send to their clans to break the bad news."

"But they were killed by another subsidiary church, surely their clans can't blame us!"

"I wouldn't count on those in mourning to keep a level head," Zheng Yunqi said with a wry smile. "Their first instinctive thought will be: how come all of you are alive, while my son died?"

Everyone was stunned into silence by this absurd notion, but upon some thought, they realized that Zheng Yunqi was right.

They were all at similar cultivation bases, so why was it that some had died, while others had survived.

Mourning parents certainly weren't going to be willing to listen to rational explanations.

"Hence, we have to send out many letters, one to each clan, and every single one of you has to write a letter to your clan as well. Otherwise, the backlash from this incident would be too much for us to handle. Also, just as Helmsmaster Starlight said, we also have to take this opportunity to shift the blame of the people that we reported."

"That's most likely not going to be an easy task."

"No. On the contrary, it'll be very easy! You simply don't understand the intricacies of human nature!" Zheng Yunqi said. "As long as we all tell the same story and are tactful with our wording, it'll be very easy to convince them.

“This is our best and perhaps only opportunity to shift the blame onto someone else, so we have to work together. I'll write a general letter that all of you can edit according to who the letter is to be sent to. After that, I'll examine all of the letters, then send them out via Five Spirit Parasite."

Zheng Yunqi's eyes were glowing as he spoke, and he felt as if he could see a radiant path leading up to the heavens laid out before him.

It was still yet to be seen whether this path actually existed and whether it was a feasible path to pursue, but at the very least, he had been given a sense of direction in life.

The future seemed very alluring.