"Reporting to Lady Changyao: The Peak Nascent Soul Guest Elder of the Nangong Family, The Hundred Treasures Pavilion, has left their estate.
Thirty-six Golden Core cultivators from the Nangong family are using Rank 7 illusion formations and a total of six supreme-grade spirit artifacts to shield their spiritual sense.
We can no longer accurately track their positions within a 50-mile radius. A total of four individuals are unaccounted for."
"The Red Star Fort held a gathering attended by nearly all the major and minor powers under its jurisdiction. On the same day, over a hundred spirit arks departed from the Red Star Fort to confuse our surveillance.
The Red Star Fort is aware that we have planted spies within their ranks. The Shadow Division is currently investigating who they have secretly dispatched."
"The True Yang Faction has issued tens of thousands of True Yang Tokens, which can be used to summon scholars from all around the world.
We have intercepted fifty to sixty percent of these tokens.
Most contained trivial matters, but two of them ordered a pair of Golden Core cultivators to attack the commercial shops of our Hall of Heavenly Principle's Light Division!"
"The Great Ming..."
"Within Eternal Sun Prefecture, the commercial shops of the Hall of Heavenly Principle's Light Division have received their orders to consolidate resources and close down!"
A supreme-grade spirit ark of the Li family sailed through the sky.
Li Changyao sat within the spirit ark as a black mirror rose and floated beside her.
It then split into fourteen phantom images, and from within the mirror, a continuous stream of intelligence from the members of the Hall of Heavenly Principle's Shadow Division flowed forth.
[Shadow Nest]
[Grade: Low-Grade Dharma Treasure]
[Origin: Obtained from the inheritance of Shang Mi, the former Prefecture Lord of Eternal Sun Prefecture.]
[Effects: This mirror can block the scrying of Divinity Transformation cultivators and is immune to their fate techniques. It contains an artifact spirit, the 'Crow King.'
Every hundred years, it creates one Dark Crow, used for long-distance communication, with a lifespan of three hundred years.
Alternatively, large quantities of spirit stones and ore can be used to accelerate the birth of new Dark Crows.
Dark Crows transmit messages to the Shadow Nest by sacrificing their life force.
The cost depends on the distance: one year of life for every 5000 miles traveled.]
[Dark Crows Possessed: 1,034]
[Dark Crow]
[Abilities: Consumes the spiritual qi of heaven and earth to travel at extreme speeds, unreachable by ordinary Golden Core cultivators. It can transform into a talisman tattoo to hide on the body. Possesses the spiritual power of a Peak Spirit Beast. Can use the technique 'Dark Crow's Final Demise' to kill enemies.]
[Notes: The owner can feed a Dark Crow with spirit ore and have it fight alongside them. Its potential can reach the early Nascent Soul stage, but it has no potential to take human form, and its intelligence is average.]
This black mirror, the Shadow Nest, was the most important Dharma Treasure of the Hall of Heavenly Principle's Shadow Division.
As its members traveled the world, the Dark Crows were their method of communication. A Dark Crow could travel 5000 miles in half a day.
These Dark Crows were exceptionally convenient, and most members of the Hall of Heavenly Principle considered it an honor to possess one, as it signified their status as elite agents.
At this moment.
Message after message arrived, each one consuming the lifespan of a Dark Crow, leaving Li Changyao completely overwhelmed.
Even sitting inside the spirit ark, Li Changyao could feel the gravity of the crisis; it was truly a situation of being besieged on all sides.
Within the spirit ark with her were six commanders of the Hall of Heavenly Principle's Shadow Division.
So many years had passed, and the Shadow Division had already grown to a considerable scale under Li Changsheng's leadership.
During the years the Li family was gone, the survivors of the Hall of Heavenly Principle had already developed their own methods of survival.
They had expanded their numbers to ten thousand.
Regarding Li Changsheng's duties as the head of the Shadow Division, in his absence, Li Changyao, Li Yaowen, and Li Tianyue can all assume command.
Below them are thirty-two Commanders.
Each of them manages the Shadow Division's members throughout the various regions of the Azure Dynasty, and they also have the autonomy to decide how to train and develop their own agents.
Below the Commanders are the Captains, each of whom is in charge of their own Squad of agents.
The salaries for the members of the Shadow Division come from the Hall of Heavenly Principle's Light Division.
In addition, the Li family provides them with status, cultivation manuals, and techniques.
When they are on the verge of a breakthrough, they will receive assistance from the Li family.
The Shadow Division's hierarchy is strict and rigid, so strict that some agents don't even know who their direct superiors are. Even if they are captured, it is very difficult to trace anything back to the Li family.
Not to mention those at the rank of captain and above. Most of them have families and careers, living under hidden identities. When there are no missions, they are nothing more than ordinary cultivators, leading their own lives.
But if a mission comes...
They don the black robes, and their side job becomes their main profession.
The Wine Maniac, who used to wander around begging, was one such captain in the Hall of Heavenly Principle. It wasn't that the Li family was unwilling to give him more authority. In the Hall of Heavenly Principle's Shadow Division, strength reigns supreme.
When all those geniuses poured into the Hall, which one of them wasn't a powerful figure? As an old friend of the Li family, his position as captain was enough to command respect and prevent him from being secretly killed off by one of those arrogant, natural-born killers.
At this very moment, the Wine Maniac was also inside the spirit ark, sitting as an equal with the six commanders.
Seeing the numerous urgent intelligence reports, he leaned against a wall, took a swig of wine, and said in a low voice, "We've fallen into an encirclement. Sixty to seventy percent of the powers in Eternal Sun Prefecture have made their move, and all of them have activated their formations."
Hearing the Wine Maniac's words, the commanders frowned, but no one interrupted him.
Firstly, the Wine Maniac was highly trusted by the master of the family.
Secondly, they were all 'caged birds' who had been locked away for a long time and, even after so many years, were still adjusting to their new identities. The Wine Maniac had been carrying out missions in Eternal Sun Prefecture for years, so he knew far more about the situation there than they did.
"This is a vertical (pacts between weaker powers to resist a powerful, conquering power) and horizontal (pacts where a power would ally with the powerful power to attack others for its own gain) alliance.
Have you ever been stung by a bee? They are the bees. As long as they're fast, they can sting us from anywhere. If we try to swat even one of them, the hand we swing will leave a vital spot exposed, revealing an opening."
The Wine Maniac, his eyes heavy with sleep, said, "Lady Changyao, they may be bees, but they're also prey. The right path is to make an example, so the rest think twice."
"And how do we make an example?"
---
1/2