Kong Kong's heart gave a jolt. So it begins. He forced a smile to remain and asked respectfully, "I, Kong Kong, am Patriarch and can still make some decisions. Zūnshàng, please state your will."
Holding her fan, Jian Dan smiled sweetly. "Your Kong clan has raised a fine junior indeed. Kong Xingkun secretly tracked the movements of the three of us. That alone I could have ignored. Yet he even wanted to take us as his concubines. I do not know who gave him the courage. Your Kong clan surely has a mighty face."
By the end, a chill threaded through Jian Dan's smile.
Startled, Kong Kong turned toward Kong Xingkun, hoping for a denial. But Kong Xingkun's head was buried so low it might touch the floor. The maids behind him looked ashen. Clearly, what she said was true.
The Patriarch seethed. Hadn't he arranged for Kong Hui to bring the boy back? How had he been delivered back by someone else.
"What does the Patriarch intend to do?" Jian Dan asked on, offering no harsh words, only releasing a strand of killing intent to curl once around Kong Kong and Kong Xingkun.
Kong Xingkun was a pampered scion who had never faced true slaughter. The killing aura made his hairs stand on end. He began to tremble. Kong Kong fared little better. Though both he and Kong Xingkun were mid Divine Soul, he could not endure that sliver of killing will.
"Zūnshàng, please show mercy. I will go at once—"
" We will wait here. Go." Jian Jing's voice was cool and level.
Jian Dan flicked her fan and spoke to her Senior Sister. "Senior Sister, no need for the trouble. I will invite their Ancestor out myself."
Before Kong Kong could respond, divine sense swept the Kong clan grounds, laced with a hint of killing intent. A clear voice rang through the entire domain. "Kong Qingzhu, where are you. Come out and face me."
Kong Kong had no chance to stop it. Within five breaths, the Kong Ancestor, Kong Qingzhu, appeared in the hall. "Who dares shout in my Kong clan's territory."
A figure clad in green had arrived.
"It is I, Jian Lu. It is truly difficult to secure a meeting with you." Jian Dan's reply was crisp and entirely unapologetic.
With Kong Qingzhu's arrival, the Kong clan's high-level cultivators at Void Refinement and above gathered one after another in the hall, thirty-four in total.
Kong Qingzhu glanced at Jian Jing seated at the head and at Jian Lu who had spoken. He stroked his black beard and finally said, "And what brings the two of you here in this manner."
"Ask your good grandson."
Unhurried, Jian Dan idly waved her fan and jerked her chin toward Kong Xingkun, who still dared not move as the killing aura clung to him. Then she flicked the fan again and drew the aura back.
"Ancestor."
Kong Xingkun's face crumpled. He managed that one word and no more. Kong Kong steadied his breathing, stepped close, and murmured a quick explanation into the Ancestor's ear.
Now even the Ancestor's face could not keep composure. He understood better than anyone that Kong Xingkun had handed these women a handle. If this escalated to the sect level, the Kong clan would have no ground to stand on.
"Wretch."
Kong Qingzhu's sleeve snapped. Kong Xingkun slammed into a hall pillar. He spat a mouthful of blood. His eyes glazed and he slumped into unconsciousness. The maids behind him moved to help, but the Ancestor barked, "Do not touch him."
Jian Dan traded a look with Jian Jing, her eyes cool and flat. A Mahayana early-stage Zhēnzūn could erase a city with a flick of a sleeve. Making Kong Xingkun cough blood was mercy. For whose benefit, she could not say.
Only then did the Ancestor sit. He looked between Jian Jing and Jian Lu. "What do the two of you intend."
"Zhēnzūn, what do you mean. Should it not be your Kong clan giving us an answer." Jian Jing countered.
"In this matter, Kong Xingkun is indeed at fault. His words offended the two of you."
In a single sentence the Ancestor had smoothed Jian Po out of existence, as if she were not present. The peach-blossom eyes of Jian Po flashed with killing intent. She said nothing. She trusted her Zūnshàngs to decide for her.
"Tsk tsk. Brushing it off as mere offensive words is quite light, Zhēnzūn." Jian Dan's retort was razor-thin.
Kong Qingzhu frowned and sent the pressure of his Mahayana early-stage realm toward her.
Jian Dan had been waiting for it. Her fan stirred once. The weight of a Mahayana mid-stage aura rolled back and crushed his pressure flat, spilling over the gathered elders. Shields snapped into place up and down the hall. Several involuntarily stepped back in unison.
Kong Qingzhu's heart lurched. Her divine sense suppression exceeded his. Yet to his eyes she was only at the peak of early Unity.
"Junior Sister." Jian Jing's soft call cut the air.
Jian Dan took the hint and withdrew the fan. What she needed to do had been done. Let the Kong clan pray to their fates.
"How would you have me proceed. We all come from the Heavenly Sword Sect. Making this too stiff does no one any good."
The Ancestor finally softened a little, offering a ladder for them to step down, hoping they would not push too far.
Jian Dan snorted inwardly but gave Jian Jing a blink and a smile. "Precisely because we come from the same sect, my Senior Sister and I came in private, rather than taking this to the Law Enforcement Hall."
Kong Qingzhu held his tongue.
"Since Zhēnzūn is present, you can decide. Kong Xingkun is so keen on taking concubines. Let him come to my cave-dwelling as a page. That will fulfill his wish."
"Ancestor—"
Kong Xingkun abandoned his pretense of fainting and scrambled up to beg.
Faces darkened across the hall. A few elders glared openly at the useless boy.
Kong Qingzhu knew full well this was retreat to advance. Jian Lu was a high-level cultivator. If she truly wanted Kong Xingkun as a page, no one could say she was wrong. The one to suffer would simply be Kong Xingkun.
"That matter requires mutual consent. Jian Lu Xiaoyou, could you consider another request." For the sake of his last promising sprout, Kong Qingzhu had no choice but to yield.
Jian Dan knew she had pressed enough. Any further would be too much. "For Zhēnzūn's face, let us keep it simple. Produce spirit stones to salve the insult to our dignity."
Her answer was so forthright that even the Ancestor blinked. So the earlier parts had been staging. The goal was to make the Kong clan bleed.
Kong Qingzhu waved to the Patriarch. Kong Kong turned and left the hall to prepare the payment.
In that pause, Jian Dan continued, "I like quiet. I do not enjoy filthy rumors. When I become the subject of rumors, my mood turns poor. When my mood is poor, the one to suffer will certainly not be Jian Lu."
That seemingly offhand remark made every Kong elder in the hall shift their thoughts.
"Zūnshàng Jian Lu, what do you mean. Are you implying that our Kong clan has spread slander against you."
A woman's voice rose, displeasure unmasked.
"What is it. Do you think that simply because I am no longer acting as the Law Enforcement Hall's deputy head, I cannot mobilize the Intelligence Hall to trace the source of rumors."
Silence settled again. Jian Dan went back to idly waving her fan, saying nothing more.