Chapter Thirty-Five: Family Secrets

The next day, Yang Cheng set out for Baixi Village. This matter required his personal verification; once the source of dairy products could be confirmed, it would greatly aid future food development, for dairy could be used in countless products.

Beyond the city-state, dangers abounded. The authorities could not maintain control, prohibiting neither private disputes nor the rampant bandits and beasts lurking deep in the forests. Fortunately, Baixi Village was not far from the city-state, still removed from the territories where beasts gathered. This time, Lu Baichuan personally escorted him for safety, bringing a small team of guards along. Should he become entangled in battle, there would be others to protect Yang Cheng.

The leader of the seventh team was named Murong Tie, a mid-stage Foundation Establishment martial artist from a collateral branch of the Murong family in Qingshui City. As a member of a branch unworthy of the family's attention, he fit the very definition of expendable, and his current circumstances reflected that. Disillusioned with his family, he no longer carried the burden of familial obligations nor suffered the sneers of the main branch; instead, he found himself unencumbered. Except for the months of torment in the prisoner camp after being transferred to Wuzhou City, he considered himself fortunate.

Murong Tie was an optimistic martial artist. Last night, when the family head announced arrangements for the Yang residence staff and their families, many guards, himself included, were excited. Since he had no intention of returning, he planned to bring his wife and children to reunite and live apart from the family, seeking a peaceful life. Though the Yang family was far less powerful than the Murong clan, the Murong family’s strength mattered little to him. As a mere collateral member, he was but a blood-bound enforcer.

Staying with a small family like the Yangs offered little prospect, but ambition was not his concern. To spend a tranquil life with loved ones was, in his view, a fulfilled destiny. In the Yang family, he sensed a unique atmosphere where everyone was respected as a “person.” The family head was approachable, often dining and chatting with them when free, earning everyone’s affection.

Today, his squad was assigned by Elder Lu to escort the young master out of the city. Murong Tie was both nervous and excited, determined not to make a single mistake. He hoped to distinguish himself, for he had heard the young master was generous with rewards. If he could seize this opportunity, he could formally request to join the Yang family as a martial artist and bring his wife and children sooner.

Yang Cheng, Lu Baichuan, Xiao Wu, and the seventh squad of guards—ten in all—headed toward the southern gate.

As they reached the gate, a large convoy of carriages was preparing to depart. Compared to the caravan, Yang Cheng’s group seemed insignificant, forced to step aside and let them pass.

The carriages were crowded with the elderly, women, and children—numbering around a hundred. The adults' faces were mournful, and the children wailed without cease.

“Did you see them? Those are the clansmen expelled by the Bai family of Wuzhou yesterday,” whispered a passerby.

“Which Bai family?” asked another.

“Which else? There are eighty or a hundred Bai families in Wuzhou, but only one dares to call itself the Bai family of Wuzhou—the city’s number one clan. Apparently these people committed a minor offense, and the family head, Bai Muyun, the ‘Jade Sword Silver Thread,’ personally ordered their expulsion. He decreed they must never return to the city,” the first answered.

“Tsk, indeed, the Bai family head is Wuzhou’s foremost cultivator: cold-blooded, decisive, ruthless. To drive out so many at once, with beasts and bandits outside, their chances of survival are slim,” the questioner remarked, clicking his tongue.

Everyone sighed. “Indeed, a perilous fate.”

Yang Cheng and his companions did not know the Bai family and did not approach them, instead trailing behind for a while before their paths diverged.

The sky was clear, the air gentle.

Outside the city, vast farmlands stretched to the horizon, with mountains beyond. Powerful families occupied prime land to cultivate medicinal herbs, and deeper still, tens of thousands of great mountains marked the domain of beasts, where only the largest sects could survive.

Baixi Village was not remote, fairly near the city, plagued only by petty thieves. Once outside the city gate, Lu Baichuan was no longer restricted by the ban on flying and soared alone on his Cloud Sparrow sword, arms folded, standing proud in the air, his robes billowing—a true immortal’s demeanor, drawing envious glances from those below.

Yang Cheng longed for such grace; watching sword flight inspired him to cultivate harder. If he could reach the Golden Core stage, he would roam freely wherever he wished—a marvelous prospect!

He called out, “Brother Lu!”

Lu Baichuan looked down, “What is it, Brother Yang?”

“How is the air up there, better than below?”

Lu Baichuan was speechless.

With Lu Baichuan’s presence deterring trouble, most bandits dared not challenge a Golden Core cultivator. The journey wound through twists and turns without incident.

Xiao Wu drove the carriage, and Yang Cheng invited Murong Tie aboard to learn about the workings of great families, keenly interested in how they were managed.

Murong Tie also wished to grow closer to the household for future prospects. Of course, he could not reveal core secrets—fortunately, as a peripheral member, he knew little and spoke freely about what he knew.

The strength of great families often rivaled that of sects. Sects united through master-disciple bonds, while clans relied on blood ties. The Murong family, like the five great clans of Wuzhou, numbered in the tens of thousands, almost all cultivators, their power formidable—admired even in Qingshui City.

The current royal family was, in fact, a great clan seven centuries ago. When the previous dynasty collapsed, the Zhu family of Zhongdu rose to power, seizing the realm and founding the new dynasty, becoming the imperial house. As a clan themselves, the Zhu family understood the threat posed by powerful families and feared being replaced, so they imposed restrictions everywhere.

Sects posed less concern, as their mountain-bound existence made them less covetous of power. Most sought the Dao and rarely meddled in worldly affairs. The imperial house was lenient with them, requiring only annual tribute of resources.

But for clans, it was different. For instance, aside from blood relatives, clans could not maintain private armies; even their guards were capped at two hundred. Where once thousands of private soldiers existed, now they had to be cut, weakening their armed power considerably.

Yet clans had many martial artists among their own blood, which could not be reduced. Even the imperial house could not interfere in family affairs or separate kin; that was the bottom line. With so many clans, if the imperial house went too far, a mass uprising would overwhelm imperial forces.

Large clans had tens of thousands, divided into main branches and collateral lines. Over generations, as family heads changed, the main branch of one head became collateral under another, and collateral lines grew even more distant. As blood ties diluted, so did the closeness, and resource allocations differed greatly. Murong Tie was a collateral of a collateral, receiving scant resources, weak in power, and ignored by the main branch.

The backbone of every great family was their Integration-stage experts. The Golden Core stage marked the leap from mortal to near-immortal, and few ever achieved it. Even in families like the Murongs, Golden Core experts numbered only a dozen or so. Integration-stage cultivators, however, were more numerous and powerful.

Families without spirit mines relied on their own businesses. The Murongs specialized in pill-making, focusing on medicinal cultivation and selling pills for immense profit. But with so many mouths to feed, expenses were vast.

Clans were not monolithic; internal strife for power and resources—brother against brother—was common. Murong Tie recounted several bloody episodes, leaving Yang Cheng astonished—these were living palace dramas.

Between clans, the struggle for business and resources was fierce, both overt and covert. A clan could fall, its business devoured, never to rise again. After a few generations, most collateral lines sank into the ranks of commoners. To protect their businesses, clans needed strength, requiring copious resources to nurture their descendants, and the more kin, the greater the consumption—a vicious cycle.

Yet, to ensure the clan’s survival, they had no choice but to perpetuate it. In every city-state, new clans rose daily while weak ones were devoured. Survival was the law of the strong.