Liu Xing blinked several times, then fully turned his body, facing the women huddled together. The girl who had just spoken wore a blue dress that was quite revealing by this world's standards, showing much of her neck and collarbones, but the one that caught his eye was floating between him and the women. It was a little white shark. As Liu Xing observed it, the little white shark, swimming in the air, revealed its teeth, seemingly smiling at him. Seeing this expression, he slowly raised his hand and placed it atop the shark's head, caressing it. The shark let out a strange purring sound, much like a cat. Liu Xing could not help but smile. This white shark suddenly seemed quite cute.

"What are you doing here, little buddy?"

The shark circled him, like an excited dog eager to go outside and play. After circling him several times, the shark rubbed its head against his cheek, and Liu Xing could not help but laugh.

As he laughed, the swirling emotions inside his heart began to subside. The anger and disgust toward the red-haired man lessened, and the frustration, as well as a well-hidden anxiety about letting Han Jiulao escape—and the mark inside him, which had stopped sending out smoke from his belly—began to dissipate slightly. The shark felt like an absorbent sponge for negative energy, leaving him feeling only happiness and contentment.

After several moments, he noticed all the women looking at him with various expressions. Some were blushing, some smiled sweetly, others fondly, and a few even seductively. Seeing this, Liu Xing cleared his throat and controlled his expression. His face was quite handsome. Cultivators generally were, though some more so than others. While Liu Xing wasn't the handsomest in the sect, he was certainly more attractive than many. To mortals, he would likely be considered beautiful.

After calming a bit more, he cleared his throat and said, "My name is Liu Xing. As you know, I'm a cultivator. The reason I came to this place was to complete a mission, but along the way, I met a girl there," he pointed toward the land they were heading, "and heard that her mother and her sister had been kidnapped."

A woman suddenly came to the front of the crowd. She looked like one of the older women there, wore her hair in a braid, and had dark eyebags, yet she was still beautiful. Another woman followed behind her. She was young, younger even than him, and a little chubby. Both of them, while different, had many similarities, like their noses, eye color, brows, and hair.

"D-does she have short hair and wear a green dress?" The older one said.

"Yes," Liu Xing replied. Comparing the teen to both of them, he realized that these were the mother and the older sister who had become the main reason for him to attack the ship.

After they heard his answer, both of their eyes lit up. The older woman said, "My little daughter! She is safe!"

"Thank you!" The younger one, presumably the elder sister, bowed so low to him that tears and snot began streaming down her face. Her mother hugged her, and both of them began to cry together.

The other women had mixed expressions. Some smiled sadly, some had blank and glossy eyes, and some were downright trembling and terrified, as if struck by repressed trauma. As Liu Xing saw their expressions, he inhaled deeply. "I assume the cultivators that kidnapped all of you... didn't show restraint, am I right?"

The woman wearing the blue dress, the one closest to him who had alerted him to the shark, clenched her fist. "Indeed. My entire village was slaughtered by them. I saw, with my own two eyes, my father, my mother, my sister, my neighbors, and everyone in the village burned to charcoal. Even now, I can still hear their screams." She looked behind, toward a girl farthest in the back, who had begun to sob slowly, trembling. "Only she and I were spared."

"I was living on the outskirts of a village," a girl wearing brown and muddy clothes said from the middle of the group. All the women threw a glance at her. "My family were farmers. We were tending our farm when the man with long hair came. In an instant, he turned my family, except for me, into mincemeat. I thought the village was safe, but," her eyes glistened, and several tears escaped her eyes, "My family... they are dead."

As the turtle floated steadily toward the land, more and more women recounted their stories. There was a girl from a fishing village where all the villagers, except her, suddenly had their heads encased in balls of water and were promptly drowned right there on land. Some were merchants who were boarding a ship and had their ship sunk by an island of hair. The mother and older sister were kidnapped from their village in the middle of a wedding party. Almost all the villagers attended that party, but her youngest daughter felt rebellious and decided to fish instead. That decision alone had ensured the girl's safety. Their backgrounds were diverse, yet each of them shared similar experiences. It seemed the Nether Lotus Sect elders hadn't held back, slaughtering everyone besides their targets.

As they began to huddle together, they finally arrived at their destination. When the turtle landed and Liu Xing set all the women down on the ground, the girl that he had saved from a lightning strike jumped toward her mother and her sister, making the three of them, as well as almost all the women he had rescued, cry.

As he stood to the side, leaning into a tree, the little shark decided to use his hair as a nest as if it were a bird. As he observed the women consoling each other, his mind began to sort the information he had gathered.

The first thing he thought was how absurd the situation felt. Han Jiulao had confirmed that the ones who wanted all these girls were the Patriarch of the Nether Lotus Sect directly, as well as his son, the Young Master. It made sense why Han Jiulao, Hou Qiang, and Wei Shuren were kidnapping these women, since it was a direct order from their Patriarch. But was the kidnapping really only to satisfy twisted lust?

Cultivators were usually driven by a motivation to advance. If there was a benefit to something, they would pursue it. It was generally the most common motivation among cultivators. Still, it didn't mean that cultivators only pursued things that would strengthen them. He didn't know about the Immortals, but cultivators were fundamentally still human, and so, things like lust, greed, hatred, and many other emotions could drive them.

If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

Still, for a Patriarch and a Young Master kidnapping mortal girls, it felt a little strange if what they pursued was mere emotion. He suspected that there were several layers to this mystery.

His mind then began to think about the Nether Lotus Sect as a whole, and he pinched his chin.

A demonic sect was not unheard of. There were many of them scattered across the world, whether their bases were in random places or under the territory of the five great sects. But there weren't many demonic sects—he had actually never heard of one—that operated so openly like the Nether Lotus Sect. A demonic sect like that was bound to be destroyed sooner or later, so why had the Nether Lotus Sect decided to subjugate nations inside the Wild Tide Region? Was the Purple Moon Sect truly backing them? If so, it would explain why they dared to operate openly. But still, while it would allow the Nether Lotus Sect to dare move under the sun, it was still fundamentally a strange move to make.

As he had thought before, openly supporting a demonic sect could make the other four great sects band together and declare war on the Purple Moon Sect.

"It's all wrong," Liu Xing muttered. He knew that his sect was not entirely clean, but supporting a demonic sect felt like too much. Officially, that is. He could not dismiss the possibility that the one backing them was not the Purple Moon Sect directly, but elders or even disciples from his sect. This raised a question about the Immortal from the Purple Moon Sect. There wasn't much information about him, but one prevalent story was that he was a being who knew everything. If even a fraction of this story was true, then there was no way elders or mere disciples could move behind his back. If people from his sect were supporting a demonic sect and the Immortal did nothing about it, did that mean he agreed with them?

A thought came to him, and he muttered, "Does the Patriarch even care about us?"

In the end, he was an Immortal. For him, Liu Xing and the other disciples might as well be ants. Could a human care about ants?

More and more questions came to his mind. Thoughts and theories swirled, attempting to drown him, and so, he decided to take a step back and inhaled deeply.

"There was also the possibility that Han Jiulao had been bluffing."

Han Jiulao didn't know that Liu Xing was a Purple Moon Sect disciple, and perhaps he had just said that to make him lose focus. For all Liu Xing knew, perhaps there were several elders and disciples from his sect on the mission to destroy the Nether Lotus Sect.

Nodding, Liu Xing decided that while the implication of the Nether Lotus Sect moving openly was troubling, there wasn't much he could do with the amount of information he currently had. What he knew was that the demonic sect was a threat to the whole region as well as himself. They made his mission harder to complete in time, and letting a demonic sect rampage unchecked left a bitter taste in his mouth. He had only arrived at the outskirts of the Wild Tide Region, not even entered it, yet so many people had already been killed. He suspected that once he entered the region fully, he would see more and more blood spilled, not to mention that sacrificing, refining, and eating humans would be more prevalent there.

Liu Xing inhaled deeply, trying to rein in his emotions. The white shark nestled atop his head nuzzled its body, as if sensing his distress and trying to console him.

"Thank you, little buddy," Liu Xing said, caressing the shark, which in turn made it nuzzle into his hand. For a moment, he felt content. His heart beat steadily, his qi moved like a river inside him, and his body felt a little lighter, somehow. Was this the effect of the cute little shark, or did the shark actually have some ability to calm people? At that moment, he remembered that this shark was not really a spirit beast but rather a spear. A treasure. That red-haired man would be pissed when he realized his treasure was suddenly gone, and the image actually made him smile. Served him right. Perhaps this shark had also felt disgusted by him and decided to come with Liu Xing instead.

Deciding to be a little more serious, he pulled out his token and sent some of his qi into it. He wanted to confirm his suspicion about the spear currently transformed into a shark and open the page listing all the treasures that the outer disciples needed to retrieve.

The list sorted itself, but the number one item was not a spear. Rather, it was a seaweed herb that could enhance one's water affinity. The effect was quite good, and there was additional information about it, one piece of which was that it was also guarded by a spirit beast. Yet, Liu Xing decided to close that page and go back to the list of treasures. While it was interesting, it wasn't the one he was looking for.

He checked the list, but the first spear on it was number twelve, and it was called Flesh Eater, one that could eat the flesh of its victim.

"Maybe, this list didn't show treasures already held by disciples?

Curious, he searched for Thunderstrike Gauntlets, but after several minutes tinkering with the list, he could not find it. This proved that he was correct.It also made sense. The list was not static. It was reactive. It could change the order of items based on proximity. Also, since he knew the token actually had some communication capability, it meant that it could probably synchronize with other tokens or perhaps to a main database held by his sect. At this point, the token was akin to a mini-computer with limited internet capabilities.

Now, how could he display the list of treasures he was holding right now?

The leaderboard was dedicated to displaying the disciples who had returned to the sect with their treasures. So, he deduced that if the page he was looking for existed, it needed to be on another page. Liu Xing decided to send qi from his Ethereal Pearl—which was currently channeling Wei Shuren's qi to his consciousness—into the token. As the token was washed by the qi, he focused his intent and willed the token to display the page he wanted. This token was akin to a computer with limited capability, but it wasn't because the token was lacking. Instead, it seemed the token's features were locked behind some kind of privilege.

A little "ping" sound could be heard, akin to that of a phone notification, and a page popped up from the token. Upon seeing the page, which consisted of a small table, he nodded to himself. There were the Thunderstrike Gauntlets, the Ethereal Pearl, and other treasures that he possessed that were on the list. And below, he could see one he had never seen before.

"Tide Walker," Liu Xing muttered its name. "What a cool name."

The shark decided this was praise, flew from his head, and circled him as if pretending to be a tornado.

Name: Tide Walker

Location: South side of Wild Tide Region

Description: This spear was created by a master blacksmith by a loose cultivator who called himself Bone Singer. Bone Singer loved seas and everything inside them, and had written dozens of books about several different topics, from books talking about exotic fish, herbs that could grow within specific seas, and many more. At first, Bone Singer was not renowned for his blacksmithing capability, but at the end of his life, he decided to create five treasures, which he scattered in various seas around the world. One of them was Tide Walker.

Tide Walker was a white spear that had the capability to control water as well as allowing its user to move in the water freely.

Additional Info: The treasure was previously held by a cultivator from the Raging Wave Sect.

As Liu Xing read the description, one of his eyebrows rose higher. After he finished reading, the little shark floated in front of him, its face excited, as if it were a dog waiting to play catch.

"You're Tide Walker, right?"

The shark let out a little growl, one that felt like confirmation.

But the information he had read made no mention of the spear transforming into a cute little shark.

"What was going on?" he muttered.

This little shark was a mystery.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.