Chapter 115 (1): Forced Marriage

Zhou Mei'er's reaction instantly confirmed Zheng Yunqi's suspicions.

"That had to have been Pope Yin of the One Heart Church! I don't think our helmsmasters would've behaved that way with anyone else, even an envoy from the main church!"

The three of them exchanged a fearful glance with one another, and they could feel their hearts pounding in their chests.

For people who had grown up in the clans of the main church, they had always been taught that the subsidiary churches were completely beneath them, and that even their popes were nothing to be concerned about.

However, they had experienced a rude awakening when they discovered that even a mere helmsmaster of the One Heart Church was so much more brilliant than all of them!

In terms of practical ability, they felt like Starlight was far superior to the vast majority of the so-called prodigies of the main church, yet he was only a helmsmaster!

By that logic, just how extraordinary did the pope have to be?

Furthermore, they were all currently on the One Heart Church's territory, so they were completely at Yin Shengong's mercy, and he could easily decide their fate.

***

After leaving the escort agency, the five of them parted ways.

They all knew where the Virtue Manor was anyway, so there was no need for them to travel together, and Fang Che had proposed that he would take a shortcut home to wait for everyone.

By the time he returned home, the sun still hadn't even set yet, and he immediately had a change of clothes and reverted back to his true appearance.

It was the same gold-embroidered black robe that he wore during his time at White Cloud Warrior Academy, and he was looking as dashing and handsome as ever.

Shortly thereafter, Yin Shengong and the three elders arrived, and Fang Che hurriedly rushed out to greet them.

"Master..."

"Shush!" Yin Shengong immediately silenced him with a stern glare. "I can finally bear to look at you now. I almost threw up earlier at the sight of you!"

The three elders nodded in agreement.

"Please come in..." Fang Che said with a sullen expression.

After entering the guest hall, Fang Che immediately called for Ye Meng to brew some tea.

At this point, he had to present Ye Meng out in the open. If he were to continue to try and hide Ye Meng from Yin Shengong and the three elders, then there was a very good chance that things could go awry.

Ye Meng instantly drew Yin Shengong's attention as she walked in with cups of tea.

"That's your maidservant?" he asked as he looked her up and down with a hawk-like gaze.

"That's right! What do you think, Master?"

"This is certainly quite a shock!" Yin Shengong remarked. "Even I don't have a fifth-rank Lord tier maidservant."

A wide grin appeared on Fang Che's face as he said, "Back when she first became my maidservant, she wasn't even a warrior. I felt like she was weighing me down, so I forced her to cultivate, and..."

"Hold on a second, this is the same girl that you brought with you from Green Wave City? Yin Shengong asked with a stunned expression."

"That's right! I did a good job training her, didn't I, Master?"

Yin Shengong turned to Mu Linyuan with an astonished expression, and the latter nodded with a smile as he said, "Yes, she's the same girl from back then. She possesses great aptitude. Back when I first met her, she was only a Warrior Disciple, but it didn't take long for her to become a Warrior Master.

“During the time that I was staying here to recover from my injuries, she improved every day, and I gave her some guidance to get her to the Lesser Grandmaster tier. To think that she's already a Lord. It's a shame that you ruined such a prodigy."

"That's too harsh, Old Man Mu," Qian Sanjiang opposed. "Back then, her cultivation base was too low for her to be of any use. There was no way she would've been able to keep up with Night Demon's rate of progression had her cultivation base not been artificially inflated somehow, so it was a necessary evil.

“Besides, all she's doing is staying by Night Demon's side to look after his daily needs, so it hardly matters if some of her future potential is sacrificed for short-term growth."

"Give me your hand," Yin Shengong demanded.

Ye Meng did as she was told, and Yin Shengong laid two fingers on her wrist to feel her pulse for a moment, following which he turned to Fang Che and sighed, "Old Man Mu is right. You were a little too impatient.

“Given her rapid progress, she's definitely cut out for cultivation, but she's taken too many pills. As a result, there are too many impurities that have accumulated in her body, and that's going to prevent her from reaching her full potential. What a shame."

This was not an incorrect assessment from Yin Shengong.

Back in the Protectionist training facilities, she had indeed taken many pills to enhance her cultivation base as a child, right when she was supposed to have been forging a foundation.

For the prodigies of prominent clans, taking pills was strictly prohibited before reaching a certain cultivation base, but for the average warrior, they couldn't afford to take pills even if they wanted to.

There was simply no comparison between the two.

Yin Shengong couldn't help but heave a forlorn sigh. If he had discovered Ye Meng's aptitude earlier, perhaps he could've given her a helping hand and molded her into a warrior that could've truly been a useful ally to Night Demon.

"I don't think this is too much of a problem, Master," Fang Che said. "All I have to do is find a natural treasure that can help her cleanse the impurities from her body, and the negative side-effects from taking too many pills will be erased."

"That's much easier said than done!" Yin Shengong chuckled. "Such precious natural treasures are not so easy to come by."

He waved a hand to dismiss Ye Meng, but she departed, he continued watching her with a contemplative look in his eyes.

Meanwhile, Fang Che heaved an internal sigh of relief. He had been anxious at the possibility that Yin Shengong could've been suspicious of the rapid progress that Ye Meng had made, but it seemed that Mu Linyuan's assurances had laid any potential concerns of his to rest.

"You did very well with the branch helm," Yin Shengong said after taking a sip of tea. "In its current state, it's worthy of being promoted into a branch hall. In fact, it's already gone beyond what's to be expected of the average branch hall."

Fang Che was ecstatic to hear this, but before he even had a chance to open his mouth, Yin Shengong already knew what he wanted to say, and he snapped, "Settle down! It's still far too early for you to think about becoming a hall master!"

Fang Che lowered his head in a sheepish manner.

"How did you accomplish all of this?" Mu Linyuan asked.

Fang Che was more than happy to tell his success story, and an animated look instantly appeared on his face as he said, "Everything that I've managed to accomplish with this branch helm is all thanks to Master's guidance! In the beginning, I had no underlings or subordinates, so even if I had found a suitable location for the branch helm, I couldn't really do anything on my own."

Yin Shengong took a sip of tea to hide the sheepish look that had appeared on his face.

Indeed, at the time, he had appointed Night Demon the helmsmaster of a branch helm that had zero members.

"Right as I was at a loss for what to do, those people came to my branch helm to try and intimidate me, and I was able to use Master's authority to turn the tables on them and place them at my mercy instead. Even though Master played a much more instrumental role there than I did, I'm going to give myself a pat on the back for my quick thinking."

"Shameless as always," Yin Shengong remarked drily with a roll of his eyes.

"From there, I coerced those from the main church into submission, and I also extorted the other helmsmasters for huge sums of wealth. In doing so, I was able to kill two birds with one stone, recruiting members for the branch helm while also accumulating funds," Fang Che continued, evidently very pleased with himself.

"You certainly made the most of that situation," Mu Linyuan chuckled.

"After I recruited those people from the main church into the branch helm, the first thing I did was beat them into submission."

"What if they refused to submit to you?" Qian Sanjiang asked.

"Then I would kill them!" Fang Che replied. "I've already killed so many people from the main church, I had no qualms about killing a few more."

Yin Shengong choked on his tea and erupted into a coughing fit at this straightforward response.

"After that, I employed a bunch of different tactics to make them bend to my will, such as forcing them to memorize the legal code. Any resistance or mistakes were immediately met with harsh punishment, and over time, they completely lost their will to oppose me. From there, things became very simple. All I had to do was arrange a few people to report them as Administrator Fang, then encourage them to retaliate and counter-report those that they believed wronged them.

That put them on a path of no return, and they had no choice but to rely on me to bail them out. After that, I used my identities as Administrator Fang and Helmsmaster Starlight in tandem, killing the people from the main church reported to me by my newly gained subordinates to earn merit points at the Hall of Protectionists, while simultaneously recruiting more members into the branch helm.

“The more people they reported, the more blood they had on their hands, and the more they had to turn to me for their protection."

"That's something that I've always been curious about," Yin Shengong interjected here. "Given how many people you've recruited into the branch helm, there must've been some who refused to obey you or were liabilities that could expose the branch helm. What did you do with those people? Surely, you couldn't have just killed them all."

"Night Demon killed them for me," Fang Che replied with a smug smile, and the four old men instantly erupted into laughter.

He was truly playing his three identities to perfection!

One was getting merit points, another was strengthening the branch helm, and the third one was taking care of the unwanted trash! It was a perfect system!

"Of course, the most important part in all of this is that I made them swear vows in the name of the Heavenly Centipede Deity. After that, I reaffirmed their loyalty to me by placing myself on the same side as them. Starlight has never taken part in the Parasite Ascension Project, so I told them that I was just like them, someone shunned and neglected, with no place in the official hierarchy.

“On top of that, I saved their lives during the attack staged by the Night Demon Church, so they became extremely grateful to me. At this point, I've earned their full loyalty, and I think it's no exaggeration to say that they'd be willing to lay down their lives for me. In the beginning, they were rather opposed to all of the strict rules I put in place for the escort agency, but since then, they've gradually grown accustomed to it, and thus, I've been able to get even stricter.

“Once they get used to those standards, I can get even stricter than that, and the cycle repeats itself."