Chapter 33 Sect Master's order
In recent days, various Huashan branch division had been sending reports that they were discovering traces of demonic cult members. These were signs that the demonic cults were getting close to staging a comeback and challenging the righteous sects once again. They also discovered much more demonic cult members in areas controlled by the minor branch divisions rather than the 36 major divisions.
Although the demonic cults did not take action directly on the major righteous sects, but the security in areas controlled by various branch divisions were beginning to be seriously threatened.
The demonic cults had finally made their reappearance in Jianghu.
In areas where the situation was getting serious, the lives of common people were in peril, and even Jianghu people armed with martial arts were not spared from danger.
Obviously, the ruling power of the major righteous sects was currently seriously challenged.
Dozens of minor sects and families from all over Shenzhou that relied on Huashan started sending requests for assistance, stating that they were in danger of being massacred by the demonic cults. Huashan major branch divisions therefore became incredibly busy spending great efforts and resources into providing assistance.
The situation was similar for other major righteous sects besides Huashan as well.
All evidence pointed towards the demonic cults desiring to start a war with the righteous sects once again as they desired taking control of Shenzhou just as they did in the past.
Ouyang Ming clearly understood their motives. Any sect in Jianghu that wanted to grow would require various resources as well as expand their area of influence and rule.
The demonic cults had suffered a terrible defeat in the war between righteous and demonic cults a hundred years ago. Following the defeat, they made a complete retreat to their headquarters in the wastelands at the border. One of them was the Bright Peak located in the western region, the other was the Black Woods Cliff located in the extreme north.
These areas were extremely remote and lacking in natural resources and even manpower. As a result, the demonic cults resorted to kidnapping and force in order to increase their members.
They had been recuperating for the past hundred years. Gradually the demonic cults recovered their strength, and in the harsh environment even managed to nurture many martial art geniuses as well.
For instance, the four Dragon Kings of Ming Cult and the eight Great Elders of Sun Moon Holy Cult, all of them were hugely famous in Jianghu and even the weakest among them were the best among the first-rate experts. Even more among them were peak experts who had cleared twelve primary meridians, eight extraordinary meridians and developed internal circulation.
The presence of these peak experts meant that the demonic cults already had the strength to challenge the righteous sects.
In order to further develop, the demonic cults would obviously be unsatisfied with the harsh environment that they were stuck with and therefore desired to start a war with the righteous sects for more ruling power and territory.
It can thus be said that a war between the demonic cults and righteous sects was inevitable, with no possibility of negotiations!
What made Ouyang Ming feel powerless was the fact that even though many of those from major righteous sects understood the intentions of the demonic cults, even more of them were turning a blind eye to the situation. They felt that demonic cult members were the common enemy of everyone in Jianghu and definitely would not have the ability to challenge the major righteous sects. Thus, they continued to fight among themselves over personal interests and profits. Regarding this issue, Ouyang Ming could only look on helplessly.
Were those that turned a blind eye to the demonic cults a bunch of stupid people? Not at all! In fact, they were even more cunning and calculating than the rest, and would never easily give up any sort of benefits that they could obtain.
The ruling power was split among the righteous sects located all over Shenzhou, and the imperial court was a tool that they created to better manage the common people and gather taxes from them.
Training martial arts required vast amounts of time and effort as well as various resources. Where would these resources come from? To put it simply, money. A practitioner of martial arts spends a huge amount of money. Food, lodging, tonics, weapons, armor, horses, etc. Which one of these did not require money? Where would the money come from then, since martial artists do not participate in production? Naturally it came from the common people in the form of taxes. In all of Shenzhou, hundreds of millions of common people work hard every day to support these martial artists that lorded over them.
In order to increase profits, every major sect employ all sorts of methods possible to increase their power ranking so as to obtain a greater share of the taxes. For the sake of profits, the relationship between various major sects may appear to be harmonious on the surface but in fact there is a huge amount of vying and strife under the surface.
The large amount of sect matters to take care of together with various layers of stress all took their toll on Ouyang Ming, giving him no small amount of headache and frustration.
"Jianghu is descending into disorder, and the world is in chaos!"
He sighed greatly once again and truly felt that he did not have the energy to face so many things at once.
"Maybe the suggestion from the elders was right, there really is a need to reactivate the Chief disciple plan so as to assist me in the current situation." As he secretly thought of it, he increasingly felt that it was feasible.
Due to the increasingly chaotic Jianghu, he already had insufficient energy to handle everything by himself. As the top leader in Huashan, he had started to feel halfhearted at taking care of the workload that he faced. Perhaps he truly needed someone to share the workload so that he could focus more of his attention on the incoming drastic event.
As the Huashan Sect Master, he deeply understood. In every time of war, there would be major sects that disappeared in the river of history. Even if they did not disappear, they would be greatly weakened. For instance, the Beggar Sect and the Quanzhen Sect both used to be the greatest sect at one time, but now they have faded greatly from Jianghu and there are rarely news about their activities.
The only two sects remaining that have managed to always hold on to their strength and status are the Shaolin Monastery and the Wudang Sect. These two sects are full of disdain for the demonic cults, and probably even consider the incoming war a good opportunity to grow even stronger.
But Huashan is not capable of doing the same and has on multiple occasions nearly lost their status of a major sect. More importantly, Huashan belongs to the Five Mountains Sword Sects, which has always been at the forefront for resisting the demonic cults, having great enmity with each other. Likewise, the five mountain sword sects are also the first to be targeted by the demonic cults.
"In the impending drastic event, it will be as if Huashan is dancing on the edge of a sword, full of peril at every step!" Ouyang Ming smiled bitterly, deeply feeling the great stress upon him nearly crushing him, despite the fact that he had practiced Violet Mist Divine Skill, famed for giving the practitioner great internal strength.
He leaned onto the chair with a tired face and slightly closed his eyes, enjoying the massage from the maids and tried to relax his burdened soul.