Daily life of a cultivation judge

The hate-filled eyes were not hidden from sect master Pan Xue who remained unmoved even by the hostility displayed by one of the disciples of his sect.

"I am sorry judge Yang Qing, but I am a bit lost. You're saying you're about to pass a verdict on our sect but this is the first I am hearing of any sort of grievance filed against us, and if there were, shouldn't we have been present to defend ourselves?

I may have not gone to the courts much but I have had a few acquaintances familiar with its working. As far as I know, unless I am mistaken, both parties need to be present.." said the Sect Master in a tone that was neither overbearing nor servile.

"Ideally, yes, but there are exceptions of which this case happens to fulfill the criterion. The person filing the case is a low-ranking member of your sect, if he were to present his case with you present, I doubt he would be in the right headspace to do it or even be willing to do so considering the nature of his complaint.." Yang Qing calmly said.

"And what is the nature of his complaint?" 

"You should already have an idea, shouldn't you?" Yang Qing said with a small smile tugging on his lips as his gaze fell on the area where the outer sect disciples resided.

"But since you have asked, Ma Qi has filed a case against the Striding Falcon Sect for malfeasance on its duty to its disciples, the betrayal and misrepresentation of its duties to its disciples, and mistreatment of said disciples.

Since you have betrayed your duties as a sect to one of your own, it is his wish to be released from being a disciple of your sect.."

As Yang Qing made his announcement he transmitted his voice not only to the sect master before him but to the rest of the sect members.

Immediately after his declaration, a few more figures immediately shot from beneath the inverted mountain.

There were seven of them in total and in the lead was a stern-looking elderly man in black daoist robes that had gold cloud embroidery.

To his left were two men and a woman. They all wore similar-looking robes to the stern-looking elderly man. The two men looked to be in their late forties while the sole woman looked to be in her early forties.

She had long curly pink hair and an amorous charm to her. Though she tried to hide it, her gaze flickered with conceit and mild killing intent when it fell on Ma Qi which she quickly extinguished when she felt a threatening aura come off from Luo Meili who stood next to Ma Qi.

Ma Qi thanked her with his gaze as his expression slowly turned pale when he saw the parade of figures before him.

Even though he knew none of them, based on their robes, he knew they were the core elders of the sect. Now there were seven of those figures along with the sect master staring at him.

His heart started racing madly while his palms started getting sweaty and his tongue dried up. Right now every fibre of his being was screaming at him to undo everything and go back to being the lowly worm he was before.

"Don't worry it will be okay,"

Yang Qing's voice echoed in his mind as he felt something like a protective coat wash over him and bring freshness and calmness to his entire body. His tense state gradually relaxed.

"Trying to overwhelm a second-stage qi circulation disciple with the cultivation pressure of core formation experts, do they not feel any shame? Well again, if they did, this situation wouldn't have happened.." Yang Qing thought to himself as he decided to pay them back a dose of their own medicine.

For a microsecond, he brought his full cultivation pressure to bear before he quickly put it away.

Ma Qi was shocked to see each and every one of these figures who terrified him to no end suddenly keel over as they struggled to breath. One of them, the female even started vomiting.

He looked puzzlingly at the seven elders and the sect master wondering what happened before he saw a brief cheeky smile from Yang Qing. Seeing his goofy look, Ma Qi almost let out a laugh before he stifled it when he saw Yang Qing's goofy smile coupled with the sorry state of the sect master and the elders.

He had to admit, the scene felt rather refreshing. The bitterness he had held within all these years seemed to have healed a bit from the scene. He couldn't help but fantasize about being in Yang Qing's place replicating what he had just done to the smug inner sect disciple and the cold outer core elders from the missions hall.

However, he soon became dejected as he wondered if he could ever reach those heights. Every self-belief he had, was already shattered in those three years. Now all he had was doubt and self-pity.

"Judge is this how the Order does things, terrorizing those beneath you without care?" coldly asked the stern elderly man who seemed to be the leading figure of the seven elders. His cultivation base was at the peak of the 10th stage of the core formation realm. He didn't seem to be that far off from catching up to the sect master who was at the 11th stage of the core formation realm.

"He must be Wei Shen, the chief elder and the leading figure of the alliance faction.." muttered Yang Qing as his gaze fell on the rest of the elders. All of them except the pink-haired woman who was still vomiting were at the late stage of the core formation realm while she was at the seventh stage.

Seeing such a lineup, Yang Qing could see why the sect master's authority slowly waned away the longer the status of the retired supreme elder remained ambiguous.

"Sorry for my poor display, I just recently broke through to the palace realm so occasionally I do struggle to maintain control over my cultivation base, there are slipups.

You understand right, considering you had a similar slipup just moments ago.." Yang Qing said with a meaningful glance.

The face of the chief elder, the sect master, and the rest all contorted at Yang Qing's flimsy excuse, especially the sect master.

He couldn't believe that pressure was of someone who had just broken through considering it rivaled that of his granduncle before he went into death seclusion.

Besides, when Yang Qing released his cultivation pressure it wasn't the pressure that affected them but the illusion created by it. They all felt they had been crushed by a gigantic Yang Qing whose body was made of an entire ocean and whose height reached the heavens. 

In that microsecond, they felt what it was like to be crushed by the might of heaven and the earth.

Whether it was the sect master, the chief elder, or the rest of the elders, their bodies were still trembling from the effect.

Whatever casualness, or notion they had before because of Yang Qing's identity as an Order judge which meant he wouldn't act out of turn, was immediately crushed. All that remained was the reality that should have had, had it been anybody else.

At the end of the day they were standing before a palace realm expert, someone who could pulverize them in the blink of an eye. Yang Qing's brief display had exhibited that fact clearly to them.