I Am The Young Master

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——(POV third person)——

Li Huang and Cai ZhenKang continued on their way to the entrance of the heavenly sword sect, where every disciple who wanted to come to this auction had gathered. They were going to use a flying treasure from the sect to get to the [Golden phoenix auction] as they had elders accompanying them and heavenly sword sect as one the seven holy lands had a reputation to uphold, so they couldn't just send them to the auction.

""Senior brother!"" Mo Hui and Dai Bao said in unison. They have got to know each other after the trial as they both were training, so that if they were put in the same position as in the trial, they don't get overwhelmed by the situation. This shared interest resulted in a bit of friendship as Dai Bao now had a better grasp on why Li Huang is hailed to be the number one candidate for the patriarch's position. The trial humbled him a lot and he now focuses on his training first and thinks about the matters about the patriarch position when he has enough power to be considered an opponent to Li Huang and other candidates.

Li Huang cupped his fists and smiled at them. This trial was a blessing in disguise as they now have forged a closer bond as they fought together in the trial space.

Soon after them, Li Huang located Hu Anjing who was surrounded by her fellow female disciples, who were asking her questions on their sword training and cultivation. Hu Anjing was more of a natural so it was a little difficult for her to give them good pointers, but she would demonstrate her methods so that others could understand it easier in a visual representation.

Some of the female disciples had some questions and some others just wanted to know their matriarch's disciple who is known for her strength in the sect. As the entrance is near the outer court, these disciples are mostly those of the outer court who only heard stories about Hu Anjing.

This is exactly why there is not a single male disciple near Hu Anjing as they know about other male disciples who tried to court her. They didn't want to be near her, in the fear that she might think that they are trying to get near her emotionally.

Around her were Ye Ling, who know her the best in this group as she worked with her in the fort, and Lai Xinyue who was going to the auction to see if she can sell some of her items. She wanted to sell them so that she can send more money to her parents. She has already exchanged some of her items at the sect as they could do so but the elder there suggested that she sell her remaining items in an auction as they might give her higher prices from what the sect would pay her.

Li Huang gave a nod to Hu Anjing who had just seen him, and she returned the gesture. Within a couple of minutes, six elders came toward the sect's entrance, and leading them was Zhong Zedong, the elder that Li Huang got to know in the outer court's training grounds.

He nodded to Li Huang as they made eye contact. He then turned to face every disciple who was standing in the surroundings to garner their attention.

"Disciples, I will be the one in charge of this trip to the [Golden phoenix auction]." He said and you could see that almost every one of the disciples were shocked to see an outer elder having such a task. f𝐫𝑒𝗲𝙬𝒆𝚋𝐧૦𝘃𝗲l.c𝚘𝘮

Almost everyone was shocked but Li Huang only raised an eyebrow as he was only surprised that elder Zhong Zedong is the one who is chosen for this matter. Li Huang and Li Long talked about their plan time and time and one of the main factors was to show a slight opening to the Xu family and one of such attempts was to use an elder with low authority and strength to lead this team. This was a good plan put if the elder was not chosen carefully, it would scream setup and the Xu family would know that the Li family somehow knows about this matter. Li Long said that he would find an outer elder that should have a bright future this chance and give him some pointers in the month so that it would seem to others that he is grooming that elder for the future. If he establishes such a picture, no one would be surprised when he is chosen to lead disciples on this trip.

"Any one of you who has decided to come to this auction can enter our sect's flying treasure." Zhong Zedong said as he lead the other elders outside of the sect. There, he took out a flying ship from his storage ring that was big enough for 200 people to travel with.

About 30 disciples came forward to exit the sect and a big portion of them were the disciples who were from the core court as they had more money than others.

Li Huang came closer to the flying ship and unknowingly stood close to elder Zhong Zedong.

"This is no hidden delight…" Elder Zhong Zedong said as he remembered the flying treasure that they used to go to the eternal wail chasm.

"It certainly isn't." Li Huang could only nod. They both had the same opinion after they have experienced traveling with hidden delight, this ship can not even compare to that.

Shaking their head, they both walked and entered the flying treasure and started going to the five river city that was home to the Feng family's auction.

…

The flying treasure was high-grade so it didn't take long for them to get to the five river city and as everyone was training along the way, they didn't feel much of time's passage when they were on the flying treasure for 7 hours.

The five river city is a city that is centered around commerce as ease of access, so the city is almost at the perfect location in the continent as it takes relatively the same amount of time to reach it from each and every corner of the continent.

The city walls were not high but they were highly protected as the merchants could afford to pay for high-grade guards for their services.

Some families who were experts in creating pills would use them to lure cultivators into their services as they would offer them pills that would help everyone in their cultivation. Like this, every single family in the five river city could employ the best practitioners for a very small fraction of what they create from pills and potions to weapons. 𝗳𝓇ℯe𝓌𝚎𝚋𝓃𝚘𝚟𝘦𝑙.𝑐𝚘𝙢

There are also strict laws on fighting in this city as any fight could cause a big continental incident where multiple families would go to war to punish the ones who broke these rules. Even the big families would not break these laws as they need these products so although they are able to contest with these merchant families in a head to head fight and could even pinch them to death, if they were to use their products to absorb mercenaries even the big families would be in a problem.

The city is controlled by all the families in the city and they have voting power based on how big their sales are in the city. In a merchants city, it doesn't matter how much physical power you have as money is the real power.

The flying ship entered the city and most of the disciples were looking at the five river city for the first time in their lives. The dense buildings in the city and the crowded streets didn't fail to amaze the cultivators who were used to solitude. There were a few who were excited about this, Li Huang and Hu Anjing were from this group. Hu Anjing who had traveled far and wide for her assassination missions had experienced such cities, if not at this scale and grandeur. Li Huang on the other hand has never seen such a thing but could feel that he has seen something similar to this city before.

'It seems that my memories are slowly coming back…' Li Huang said as he hypothesized that for him to have this sense of familiarity with this city, he must have seen such a thing in his previous life.