Early the next morning, under the leadership of the Venerable Dragon Sword and the Melody Empress, thirty-three intermediate students arrived at the teleportation array.
Holy Spirit Island is located overseas.
It’s extremely far from the Human Race’s Holy City, so you can’t teleport there all at once—you have to transfer through several arrays to reach it.
After several transfers, everyone finally arrived at Kirin City, one of the sub-cities of the Human Race’s Holy City.
There are nine sub-cities around the Holy City, arranged like nine stars encircling the center. Each one is named after a divine beast: Azure Dragon City, White Tiger City, Vermilion Bird City, Bi-Fang City, Black Tortoise City, Phoenix City, Kirin City, Golden Crow City, and Taotie City.
Although there are teleportation arrays inside the Holy City, they’re always sealed and only open during special times. So, to get to the Holy City, you have to transfer to one of the sub-cities first.
Kirin City may just be a sub-city, but it’s way bigger than other major cities, with a permanent population of fifty million.
It’s said that the total permanent population of the nine sub-cities is nearly five hundred million, while the Holy City itself is even bigger than all nine combined, with a terrifying eight hundred million residents.
Every inch of land in the Holy City is worth a fortune, and the cost of living is sky-high.
For the next few days, everyone from Sanctum Martial Academy will be staying in Kirin City. Only on the night before the Martial Soul Hall opens will they move into the Holy City itself.
Cloud-Guest Inn is only considered mid-tier in Kirin City, but the prices are outrageous—a top room costs twenty taels of silver per night.
I heard that in the Holy City, even the most basic inn charges fifty taels of silver per night for a top room.
Once everyone settled in...
Venerable Dragon Sword and the Melody Empress gathered everyone to remind them: best not to stir up trouble when going out, but if someone provokes you, don’t let Sanctum Martial Academy’s reputation get trampled.
It was still early before noon. After the two vice deans finished their talk, everyone got ready to go out and explore Kirin City.
There were thirty-three people in total this time—twelve female students and twenty-one male students.
Even though Sanctum handled the Easton Yan incident pretty quietly, word still got out. So, most of the intermediate students either kept their distance from Ian Song or acted all superior and looked down on him.
Even Harriet Gu got dragged into it. Soon, the students broke off into little cliques and left together, until only Ian Song and Harriet Gu were left.
"Let’s go too."
Ian Song reached out and took Harriet Gu’s soft little hand. The other students’ cold shoulder actually worked out for the two of them, so Ian didn’t mind at all.
"Mm."
Harriet Gu nodded, interlocking her fingers with Ian Song’s.
With Ian leading, holding hands in public was no longer something she felt shy about—in fact, she’d gotten used to it.
Kirin City is enormous. If you tried to walk the whole thing, even three days and nights wouldn’t be enough.
The Holy City is the Human Race’s sacred ground, the gathering place of its destiny, and home to countless experts.
In remote areas, a Grandmaster is qualified to be a city lord; but in the Holy City, Grandmasters are everywhere.
Even in Kirin City, which is just a sub-city, you can spot plenty of Grandmasters on the streets, and even Great Grandmasters show up from time to time.
Of course, the true top-tier Martial Saints are still rare—but supposedly, all nine sub-cities are ruled by Martial Saint-level city lords.
Walking down the street, you could see martial artists dressed in all kinds of styles—a real eye-opener.
Even with fifty million people, Kirin City’s streets and buildings were impressively clean and orderly, with squads of armored patrol soldiers passing by from time to time.
Fighting is strictly forbidden inside the city. If you do, you’ll face a huge fine—and if you damage property, you’ll have to pay even more.
So, no matter how much silver someone has, nobody’s willing to pick a fight in the city.
Ian and Harriet wandered aimlessly, checking out anything that caught their eye—but they didn’t buy much. After an hour, they’d only spent a little over ten taels of silver.
"Senior Brother Sun, do you think those two are Ian Song and Harriet Gu?"
Not far away, under a tree, two young men stood. One of them pointed at Ian and Harriet.
"It’s them. Come on, let’s go say hi!"
Senior Brother Sun stared at the pair for a moment before confirming their identities.
Actually, when the other young man pointed at Ian, Ian had already noticed them. But since they didn’t seem hostile, he ignored them—until they quickly walked over, which made him guess they were acquaintances.
"Junior Brother Ian, Junior Sister Harriet, what a surprise running into you here!" Senior Brother Ethan greeted them warmly.
"And you are...?" Ian asked, a bit puzzled.
"We’re elite disciples of the Pristine Way Sect. My name’s Ethan Sun, and this is Drake Long. Here are our identity tokens."
As they spoke, the two took out their identity tokens.
Identity tokens are hard to fake, and since their expressions were genuine, Ian Song was almost certain they really were elite disciples of the Pristine Way Sect.
"So it’s Senior Brother Ethan and Senior Brother Drake. My respects!" Ian Song said politely.
After checking their identity tokens, Ian Song quickly offered a respectful greeting.
"Haha, we’re all fellow disciples—no need to be so formal!" Ethan Sun laughed heartily. "Junior Brother Ian, Junior Sister Harriet, if you don’t mind, let’s find a teahouse and chat for a bit."
"Sounds good!" Ian Song replied with a smile.
So the four of them found a nearby teahouse and got a private room.
They ordered a pot of tea and some snacks, then each took a seat.
"Senior Brother Ethan, how’s the sect doing lately?" Ian Song asked. He’d been away from the Pristine Way Sect for half a year and wanted to catch up.
Hearing this, Ethan Sun’s face darkened. "Things aren’t looking good. The Sea Emperor Sect has teamed up with two other sects to target us. In just a few months, we’ve lost seven Grandmaster-level elite disciples."
Ian Song frowned. He’d never liked the Sea Emperor Sect. He asked, "How are our sect leaders responding?"
Ethan Sun sounded frustrated. "They’re too strong. The sect master told us to hold back and not stir up trouble."
"Damn it! If you ask me, we should fight the Sea Emperor Sect to the bitter end!" Drake Long slammed the table, eyes blazing with anger.
Ethan Sun shot back, "How? The two sects allied with Sea Emperor are just as strong as us. If we fight, Pristine Way Sect could be wiped out!"
"Still, we can’t just play the coward forever!" Drake Long retorted, still fuming.
"There’s nothing we can do. The three sects are just too powerful. Even if we have to play the coward, we have to endure it," Ethan Sun said helplessly.
"Enough about that. Junior Brother Ian, Junior Sister Harriet—let’s toast you with tea instead of wine!" Ethan Sun raised his cup, and Drake Long quickly did the same.
"Cheers! We’ll toast you both as well," Ian and Harriet replied, raising their cups.
After that, nobody brought up the sect again—instead, the conversation turned to seeking Martial Souls in the Martial Soul Hall.
After chatting for half an hour, it was nearly noon, so they decided to go to a restaurant for lunch together.
But just as the four of them stepped out of their private room, another group happened to emerge from a different one.
The young man leading the other group glanced at Ian’s party. When he recognized Ethan Sun and Drake Long, a mocking look flashed across his face. "Well, well, if it isn’t Pristine Way’s shrinking turtles. What brings you out of your shells today? Aren’t you afraid someone might chop your heads off?"