The Sect Leader System-Chapter 300: A Question of Leadership

Benton looked over the small assemblage gathered before him—Jin LiJuan and Ganzou, Zi Delan and the five that had made up his former gang, and Pan Jiang and four other Poison Claw Sect members—and unfortunately didn’t see experienced, powerful cultivators.

They were all so, so young!

Of course, Pan Jiang was an important scion in his sect and seemed to mature and grow more responsible by the day. And though Zi Delan had yet to fully develop into his role as a council member, the boy had street smarts that couldn’t be taught. Best of all, Ganzou was a powerful beast with excellent senses. He’d be a right terror for any cultivator or beast of a comparable realm.

Jin LiJuan, on the other hand… Well, she was trying. Not only was she quite diligent in practicing her techniques, but she also had made great strides in furthering her bond with her beast. And her power was greater than any of the other humans simply by virtue of having ascended to Foundation Establishment.

Benton blew out a breath. He had a decision to make.

“Greetings all,” he said. “Welcome to the start of the Rising Tide Sect’s second great expedition to the Eternal Celestial Peak.”

He had to suppress a chuckle at the fact that he was sending a dozen kids hunting at a nearby mountain and referring to it as a great expedition, but a certain amount of pretentiousness was expected when dealing with cultivators.

Well, that was a convenient excuse, anyway. If truth be told, he simply found it amusing.

“To begin with, we have a minor problem of preeminence and precedent.” He smiled—speaking of pretentiousness, his speech so far was a bit over the top. “Jin LiJuan, a Foundation Establishment cultivator who is our sect’s fourth most powerful member not counting myself, and Zi Delan, an august member of this sect’s council of elders but who is still in the Qi Gathering realm, will both be embarking on this journey. So who leads?

“Our sect is newly formed and lacking in rules and traditions, so as we go forward, we naturally seek to govern future situations based on the examples we set now. It makes sense for a sect to have the strongest member present on a mission lead. It also makes sense that a member who is a Pavilion head or otherwise sits on the council should be the leader.

“Today, the precedent I set when the two spheres of influence conflict is that leadership will be decided on a case-by-case basis.”

Benton paused a moment to make sure no one objected. Not that anyone would speak up, obviously, but if anyone exhibited body language that indicated disagreement, he would have sought to get that person’s opinion, but everyone simply nodded along.

“Let me say that I would trust either of these individuals to lead the mission, so do not take my choice an aspersion in any way for the one not chosen.” Benton could hardly countenance the words coming out of his mouth. Both of the kids were kids. Back on Earth, he wouldn’t necessarily have trusted them to clean their rooms without constant supervision.

On the other hand, he didn’t feel like the trip would be all that hazardous, and Ganzou was the main protection against threats they couldn’t otherwise handle.

“Jin LiJuan,” he said, “you are the most powerful cultivator on the expedition. You are the only one going who was present for the first expedition. Thus, I will trust you with ensuring the mission’s success. Understand?”

Her eyes went wide. “Yes, Master.”

“Though you’re in charge and any final decision is yours alone, I expect you to weigh the counsel of Zi Delan heavily. Additionally, Pan Jiang is an experienced and knowledgeable member of a powerful allied sect. I expect you to listen to his wisdom as well.”

She cupped her hands.

“Any expedition should have goals,” he said. “Your first and foremost priority is safety. You have healing pills which can solve almost any problem. You have Ganzou, who is stronger than most threats you should meet and who can sense higher ranked beasts at a significant distance. Do not let anyone die. Do not get careless. That goes for everyone. Protect and support your fellow expedition goers.”

He paused to meet the eyes of each person going on the trip just to emphasize the point.

“To that end, I’ve prepared a life-saving device.” He held up a contingency ring and, after explaining the purpose and how it worked, distributed one to each of the people present who didn’t already have one.

“The second goal is simply to gain practical, real world experience. Fighting. Camping. Surviving. Learn lessons and consolidate gains,” he said. “For those of you from my sect who want to attend the tournament, this is your chance to gain much needed practice that you can’t get in the sparring rooms. Make good use of this valuable opportunity.”

“Yes, Master,” his seven sect members chorused.

“An important note to remember about the mountain. Our sect has an agreement with the Lord of the Eternal Celestial Peak. We provide him with the occasional gift and cull beasts before they erupt into a tide, and he allows us to collect a reasonable amount of valuable materials. If you sense a presence so great that you immediately collapse to your knees, that’s probably the Lord.” Benton had spent part of the previous evening creating one hundred Thunder aspected greater spirit coins. He pulled the satchel he’d stowed those in from his ring and handed it to Jin LiJuan. “Give him the bag. Otherwise, return it to me when you get back.”

“Gratitude, Master,” she said.

“We’ll be departing for Sixth Flawless Flowing City in about three months, so the internal tournaments will be conducted a few weeks before that,” he said. “Doing the math gives a deadline of about nine weeks before those start. I want you back in plenty of time to prepare, so under no circumstances should the expedition return later than six weeks from today.”

“Yes, Master.”

Though they’d all answered like they had no issues with the timeline, several of them bore confused looks.

“You’re probably thinking, ‘That darn mountain is a long way from here. How the heck can we even get there and back in six weeks, much less get in some good hunting.’” Benton sighed. “Well, good point. I guess you’re kind of screwed. Never mind about the expedition, I guess.”

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With the exception of Pan Jiang and Jin LiJuan, all of them looked at Benton like he’d lost his mind. He barely stopped himself from laughing.

“Or you could use this.” He pulled his newest invention, the Skycart, from his ring. “What do you think?”

Jin LiJuan honestly didn’t know what to think. Instead of one of the obvious choices such as Zi Delan or Pan Jiang, Master had named her as leader of the expedition.

As an orphan who had never led anything more important than perhaps a game of tag, she was forced to question Master’s decision making. How could it be that she was responsible for the lives of eleven other people?

Sure, her goal in life was to protect innocents so no one else had to grow up without parents like she did, but all the cultivators going were adults—or close enough, older than her, anyway. No kids younger than her were going.

She sighed. On the other hand, they all had loved ones who cared about them. Siblings. Parents. Friends. Someone.

They were just as worthy of protection as a mother or a father.

And if one of them died, it would be all her fault.

Jin LiJuan had come a long way toward achieving her goal of being a strong cultivator. She’d bonded a beast and reached Foundation Establishment. But she just didn’t feel like she was ready, yet. Not nearly. She didn’t know what to do.

At her feet, Ganzou whined, the sound he made when he wanted her to pick him up, a feat that had gotten much easier as she’d increased in both Spiritual and Body Cultivation realms. So that was what she did. Instead of snuggling next to her like he normally did, though, he brought his face near hers.

Not to lick her, though. He knew she hated that. Instead, he stared into her eyes.

While listening to Master talk about the goals for the trip and answering his questions when required, she tried to figure out what Ganzou was trying to do. The moment stretched as she engaged in a staring contest with him.

Suddenly a word popped into her mind—Protect. Which wasn’t all that weird since she’d just been thinking about the weight of her responsibility. What was strange was that the word, somehow, felt like it didn’t come from her.

Protect.

She stared at Ganzou. Could it be?

“Are you talking to me?” she said quietly. “You can speak?”

He nodded. Protect.

“You’ll protect me?”

Protect. Pack.

Ah. Wow. That actually … helped.

Though she was a Foundation Establishment cultivator, she knew exactly how weak she was. All three of her techniques were only at Small Success, and none anywhere close to reaching the next stage. Worse, one, Quiet Mind, didn’t really help her in combat. And her sword technique was only in the Qi Gathering realm, not giving her any ability to project her qi. Her only real cultivator combat technique, Ensnarl, had about the weakest possible effect she could imagine, allowing her to manipulate existing plants to momentarily distract an enemy.

And even if all three of those were better and she were farther advanced with them, she still had a hard time making the right moves in a fight at the right time, a skill that everyone kept telling her would come with experience.

Ganzou, though, was strong. Powerful. His attacks were fast and instinctual. He was a strong protector.

She pulled him into a tight hug. “Gratitude, Ganzou.”

He sent no further words into her mind, but she got the distinct impression that he was pleased. And a little smug.

Master was staring at her expectantly, though, apparently wanting her to look at the large metal rectangular box he had deposited on the ground. It kind of looked like a carriage that had the top chopped off, with six rows of padded bench seats that all had a door on each side.

Obviously, the purpose had to be to transport the rest of the expedition goers. Which made sense. She had a glider, but none of the others did.

The device had no wheels, though. Nor wings. She had no idea how it was supposed to move. Other than the doors and a bar sticking out from the front, it was simply a box with no other obvious features.

“Jin LiJuan,” Master said, “please bring out your glider.”

As ordered, she quickly removed it from her ring. “Yes, Master.”

He did something at the back of the glider, and when he moved his hands away, she saw that he’d fastened a metal ring to the craft, which he then attached to the bar at the front of the metal box.

“Behold the Skycart!” he said.

Everyone just kind of looked at each other, not knowing how to reply or exactly what was supposed to happen.

“Take it up and see how it performs,” Master said.

“Yes, Master,” she said.

She and Ganzou hopped onto the glider, and she slowly accelerated while easing off the ground. Honestly, she expected the big box that was many multiples the size of her device to hold her back, but she barely noticed any change in performance. Maybe she had to press a little harder to go faster, but she wasn’t sure that wasn’t just her imagination.

She circled high overhead, testing the performance, and discovered no issues.

“Push just a little qi into the circle I just installed,” Master said.

The voice sounded like it came from just beside her ear, but when she looked around, Master was still way down below her.

He truly was unfathomable.

All she could do was obey. Though it wasn’t easy. None of her techniques let her do such a thing, and it wasn’t nearly as simple as manipulating qi internally. Both Senior Brother and Pan Jiang had insisted on her spending time to train going through the process, though, claiming that it would help her when it came time to learn proper techniques.

After a bit of effort, she succeeded and immediately wished she hadn’t.

The circle opened, releasing Master’s Skycart!

She must have done something wrong. Since she had been towing the thing, it would surely drop to the ground and crash. Master’s hard work would be ruined. And it was all her fault.

Jin LiJuan quickly circled around to try to catch it somehow and … found it floating gently downward. She followed it, landing next to it.

Master brought the rest of the group over to the Skycart. “I know this device doesn’t look like much, definitely not as stylish as the gliders, but the formations are actually much, much more impressive.

“First of all, it’s highly stable no matter what the glider pilot does. You could have Yang Xiu pulling you and still not have to worry about her flipping you upside down and having all of you fall out. Of course, you can’t actually fall out, anyway. There’s a formation preventing that.

“And as you can see, it floats safely and gently down to the ground under its own power upon being released, even to the extent of avoiding obstacles and finding a clear spot to land. That’s actually the recommended landing procedure. Not to worry, though. If the pilot forgets to release you, you’ll still land as softly as if on a bed of feathers.

“You won’t exactly be traveling in style, but I’ve got safety and comfort handled!”

Those announcements got some wows from the crowd, which clearly pleased Master.

“Go ahead and load up,” he said. “It’s time for you to get going!”

As the other expedition goers climbed into the Skycart, Master pulled Jin LiJuan away from the others and did something with his qi. She looked at him questioningly. 𝙛𝒓𝒆𝙚𝒘𝒆𝓫𝙣𝓸𝙫𝓮𝒍.𝒄𝒐𝓶

“Silencing array. No need for others to hear what I’m about to give you.” He handed her two jade slips. “Upgrades for your techniques, both based on the ones you’re already using, so getting them up to Small Success should take a trivial amount of time. The sword technique teaches Wood based sword fundamentals exactly like your current one, but also allows you to add sharp thorns of Wood qi to the blade, and at Mastery, you can shoot those thorns as a ranged attack.”

That was so perfect. Exactly what she needed.

“The other is a direct upgrade of Ensnarl called Entangle,” he said. “It allows you to reinforce existing plants with qi to strengthen them and to create vines and branches solely out of qi.”

“Gratitude, Master,” she said.

And she was grateful. Very grateful. He was providing her with the tools she needed to actually perform like a cultivator. But she was quite confused about one thing.

Her face must have shown that confusion because he said, “You’re wondering why the techniques are Wood and Nature aspected when you can use any aspect.”

She cupped her hands. “I love these!”

“But you are still curious, and I bet you were hoping for something Void or Lightning aspected.”

She paused, not wanting to seem ungrateful. She couldn’t lie to him, though. “Yes, Master.”

“Let everyone think you’re aspect is along the lines of Wood or Nature. Then, when you pull out Void and Lightning and Time and Space and Gravity techniques, you’ll have surprise on your side.” He grinned.

She couldn’t help it. She grinned, too.