Daily life of a cultivation judge

After Ye Xun and Xiang He had left, Yang Qing sat in complete silence as he reflected on the day's events, especially the things that happened towards the end of the day.

His eyes kept inadvertently falling on the wine gourd he was still embracing tightly.

Yang Qing stared at the cork intently before ultimately shaking his head as he decided against opening it and seeing its contents.

He decided if he was going to open it, it would be in the comfort of his abode and he also wanted to see the celestial nesting weaver's reaction when it saw the gourd.

Despite its nasty personality and incorrigible behavior of treating Yang Qing like its man slave and sucking him dry of any valuable resources any chance it got, it had a great eye for treasures.

Yang Qing even suspected that talent was an innate ability. He couldn't help but snicker to himself as he pictured its reaction when it saw the wine gourd that was made from empyrean world jade tree wood. It was sure to shed all its feathers. Yang Qing couldn't wait to torment it endlessly with the wine gourd before he hopefully had the gourd sent to the Dragons Meadow, but not before he had sampled the contents of the gourd.

A gluttonous glint flashed in his eyes as he looked at the wine gourd before ultimately putting it away.

Yang Qing then decided to meditate to wash away the weariness of the day. Reading the memories of the crystal spring tree and transmitting a cultivation art to it, along with his interaction with the middle-aged man and seeing his world-defying abilities up close along with helping the parasitic purple flower spore sycamore tree completely refine the green flame trees had sapped him of strength both mentally and physically.

He needed a rest. He was afraid if he slept it would go beyond just a day and therefore opted to meditate which would renew him faster than sleep could. 

He still had a lot of things to do like investigate the clues given to him by the parasitic purple flower spore sycamore tree on the locations where the daughter of the obsidian serpents regularly frequented with the fire adler bear when she was young.

There may be something left there that could help his investigation, and he thought when the obsidian serpent couple came back he could try and have a conversation with them in the hopes of finding out what the fire adler bear did for them back then.

"Speaking of the fire adler bear, I need to warn the Deer Mountain Kingdom about it and its relationship with the obsidian couple especially the daughter, and also its relationship with Meifeng.

If they were to do something untoward then the fear they have of the bear attacking them may really come to pass not to mention she also had the interaction with the middle-aged man forming a karmic bond.." muttered Yang Qing with a sigh.

"I have one too.." he added.

Even though they interacted briefly, he already considered Meifeng a friend considering how sincere she was.

Rather than hide it, Yang Qing decided he would be open with the Deer Mountain Kingdom about his friendship with her which should more or less ensure her protection against them. 

However, something was gnawing at him about the whole reveal.

If the Deer Mountain Kingdom had a traitor as he suspected, then revealing he was already friends with Meifeng would put a target on her back.

What if the traitor fed that information to the Blue Soul Flame Crow Syndicate? It wasn't a stretch to think that the syndicate may retaliate against her in their bid to get back at the Order, though Yang Qing suspected the chance of that happening was slim. 

With the chaos that they had created, they were sure to avoid the area.

Ultimately Yang Qing decided he would inform the king and the head of the Zhang family about his relationship with Meifeng and also its relationship with the fire adler bear and the mysterious Lady Gild.

He decided to inform the two because the Zhang family seemed to have an honorable reputation if they could even garner the admiration of a spirit beast, then it had to be good. The fact that they knew the Badger was also a factor in why Yang Qing chose to reveal the information to them.

They would understand how much of a precarious position the Deer Mountain Kingdom was in if they realized the Badger they had interacted with had a master who slapped it unconscious for four months.

And if by chance the information leaked, then his suspect list would be the king and the Zhang family.

After deciding on his next steps, Yang Qing took out a few spirit-calming incense sticks and started meditating. A few seconds in, he had a bold thought and decided to put out the incense sticks and take out the wine gourd.

Even if it was just a piece of wood and wasn't the real thing, Yang Qing figured the wine gourd had to still have some effects of the empyrean world jade tree. Maybe he would receive some unexpected benefits from cultivating with it in hand.

His guess proved to be true as his mind and thoughts instantly cleared up as he felt a cool and refreshing feeling envelop his entire body.

In just an instant he was already in deep meditation. He ended up coming out of the meditation eight hours later with his body and mind completely renewed.

He even felt like his mental sea of consciousness had expanded slightly and his control of his body seemed to have grown slightly. The leap in growth was negligible, but it was still something considering that was the effect of one night's meditation.

His eyes shone in excitement when it fell on the wine gourd before he ultimately put it away and made his way to the kitchen for his breakfast.

Su Jinjing and Lu Mei had already left for the branch's outpost which was the location where cultivators could bring in their complaints. If there were any cases to be heard, it would be from there.

The branch was covered in isolation and illusory arrays, so finding its location was difficult not unless the Order explicitly gave it to you, and in the Deer Mountain Range, only the Deer Mountain Kingdom was afforded that courtesy, the rest all had to visit the outpost.

Yang Qing had expected to meet Xiang He and Ye Xun after he woke up from his meditation, but when he didn't see them he figured they must still be handling the matter concerning the middle-aged man.

After he finished his meal, Yang Qing called the Imperial Secretary and had him arrange for the Zhang family head and the king to visit him at their convenience but he insisted on it being soon.

The imperial secretary wanted to come on their behalf because of the precarious position the kingdom was in but at Yang Qing's insistence on the matter being too sensitive he eventually relented and said he would inform them.

With that taken care of Yang Qing resumed his investigation of the battle.