Chapter 571: A Soggy Reception
Manor my ass, this place is three times bigger than our entire estate back home.”
“Zhen Hai, language!,” Zhen Yue admonished her cousin while smacking his head. “We have to try and make ourselves look presentable for grandfather’s sake. It’s not everyday we get to do something like this.”
Zhen Hai did have a point though that the Blessed Willow Manor was fucking huge.
The moment they had crossed the front gate, they had entered into a massive corridor that had these fierce warrior statues lining the walls in pair. One of each pairing flanked the would-be walkers of these halls, giving the illusion that they were judging the people who entered their domains.
And that was just the entrance corridor.
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While Zhen Liu and his family walked into the Blessed Willow Manor, their so-called ancestral home, the kaijin were busying themselves with their second favorite activity, aside from fighting, gambling on what was going to happen to their lord next.
=Just because I prefer to work with logic and reason over impulse doesn’t mean I’m mechanical…I just like looking like it. Anyways, I don’t think anything is going to happen. Our lord’s grandfather will make amends and the conflict will end there. It’s the most logical solution.=
=Are you even allowed to make that sort of joke?=
[Personally, I think you’re both wrong,] Hurricroak interjected, [but only because y’all went too far.]
=Oh?=
[If anything, he’ll probably end up making at least one enemy, but because of something incredibly stupid. Well, stupid to us at least.]
=How so?=
[Remember what happened last night with those rich prick kids? Wasn’t one of them named Zhen something or other?]
<=Oh yeah...=>
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It should be noted that not all of these disciples were direct descendants of the Zhen Clan, so several of them stuck out for being clearly adoptive members or distant relatives. Granted, this distinctiveness did not stop the people in the courtyard from staring at the branch clan members passing by them. It was if they could sense for foreign they were.
While a majority of these disciples focused on their training, a decently sized chunk of them stopped whatever they were doing and began to gossip about the people passing by them. Apparently, some of them were a bit more informed than the others.
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Amongst these gossiping youths though, one group in particular looked positively shocked and appalled at the appearance of these branch clan people. More specifically, they were absolutely stunned at the appearance of these scions.
Since they had the displeasure of exchanging blows with them.
Lei Zhong, Ao Tang, Fan Ying, Gou Huang and Zhen Ren Fa were in the middle of practicing when they heard their fellow disciples gossiping about some passer-bys. Once they saw who it was, they ended up getting caught up in the talk as well, albeit, for less than polite reasons.
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She had made a promise to herself that she would find these bastards and make them pay for humiliating her, but now that sentiment was even stronger.
It was bad enough to get beaten by some brackborns, but brackborns descended from one of the clan’s oldest black marks?
This would not stand, this would not stand at all.
‘I have a pretty good idea on how they’ll be made to make amends with the clan…and I’ll make sure that it’ll be impossible!’
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[Pfft! You make fun of Logos and Pathos for going extreme, I’m calling you out for going too small and personal,] Razorstella added, [y’all gotta think of the environment as well as the actors when taking into account an activity. Dancing on a stage and dancing on the streets are entirely different beasts that require entirely different moves.]
[Ooh, alright smarty legs, what do you think is gonna happen to the maestro?]
[Why it’s simple, my dear electro toad,] Razorstella began to answer.
[We showed up in the middle of a big ole festival, right? One that the Zhen Clan here was a wonderfully convoluted link to, yeah?]
<=Yes...=>
[Well then, wouldn’t this be the perfect time for them to throw a big competition in an attempt to rope in all types of new talents? In other words, a grand stage in which the director shows everyone in this xenophobic fuckfest of a town just how strong he actually is?]
[Oooh…I could see that happening.]
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“Holy shit that’s a big ass arena and-wait, aren’t those the aether beasts we brought in as tribute?,” Zhen Tai pointed out to his cousins as they left the training area and came upon a giant arena instead.
The arena was built in a traditional circular fashion, with coverings added to prevent the sun from beating down on the people watching.
In the center was a giant square fighting area made of some kind of white stone that radiated pure toughness.
Off to the sides of this fighting stage, the branch clan members could see some of the more wild aether beasts they had brought being set up near it, excluding a certain murderous otter-dragon thing.
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“Huh…good to know.”
“Y’all think we’d get a chance to participate?”
“That depends.”
“On?”
“Whether or not they want us dead, and whether or not the prizes are worth us participating and possibly getting humiliated and beaten.”
“Fair…”
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[A blood enemy? A competition? Bah, and you guys say I think too much in simple terms,] Nepherage disputed, [y’all are forgetting one super simple and intrinsic fact about our lord when it comes to these encounters.]
[Simple?]
[Intrinsic?]
=Oh hush you. Nepherage, you were saying?=
[I’ll address that slight later, but y’all are forgetting that our lord is the equivalent of a walking trouble magnet. It is incredibly likely that while we’re planning to just make amends and get out of here, we probably showed up at the exact same time as someone else’s evil scheme to get revenge or something like that. Therefore, I’m betting our lord is gonna prove himself to be way more heroic than what these main branch guys anticipated.]
[Oh please, you really think someone is dumb enough to attack in the middle of a festival, where the Zhen Clan’s most powerful warriors have all gathered?]
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Meanwhile…
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Zhen Ba Yin let out a sigh and began rubbing his hands together out of stress at the report.
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Then again, the attackers were the same clans that the Zhen Clan wiped out during the revolt all those centuries ago.
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*Bam!*
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