Daily life of a cultivation judge
Chapter 1215 - 1215: Two sides of the same twin (2)

Yang Qing was half tempted to ask how he'd earned his post, but ultimately decided to hold back.

However, Xia Cangfu easily saw through him and smiled."I improved the grade of a few arts here and there, and I'm not a bad sword teacher," he said leisurely, a smile on his face.

Yang Qing couldn't help but rub his nose at being caught.

Wait, so is he...A thought immediately struck him at the mention of not being a bad sword teacher. Xia Fang had said that one of the ultimate trump cards of their formation diagram was that it contained sword intent whose will allowed for spirit possession. Over the years, only two sword intents survived their ancestor's sword intent in that formation diagram.

One belonged to the sect master during both their golden and dark age. It was the sword intent that her grandfather had resonated with. The other belonged to a Xia clan descendant who had joined the Silver Crane Sect, though she hadn't said who it was, only that they were a disciple of the sect.

Yang Qing couldn't help but wonder if Xia Cangfu was that person. He certainly fit the criteria, given his achievements. Only those who possessed talent on par with their ancestor managed to keep their sword intents from being swallowed. What said I am talented more loudly than reaching the domain realm?

Not even geniuses were guaranteed to reach that realm. It took a special kind of talent to become a domain realm expert—and the fact that Xia Cangfu was one proved he was one of them.

Yang Qing hurriedly pushed those thoughts aside.If Xia Cangfu was truly the owner of one of the three sword intents, he'd find out soon enough, once the man explained why things had unfolded the way they did for the Xia clan, who had remained bystanders to it all.

Picking up where he left off, Xia Cangfu said,"So, after being brought back to the sect, our founder and his twin sister didn't immediately join Silver Breath Peak. They started off as outer sect disciples, but eventually joined the peak when they reached the foundation establishment realm."

"Remember when I told you there are two groups of cultivators who come here?" Xia Cangfu asked.

"Mmh," Yang Qing hummed with a nod.

"Our ancestor was in the first group. His twin sister was in the second."

"Even though her master was a Senior Scholar of this peak, and her brother was a devout student of it, for her, it wasn't the same.

She didn't share their fascination with this place. To her, it was just the gateway to her true path— the Silver Head Peak.

She thought she hid it well at first, but her master and brother saw through her. And the former gave her his blessing, if that was what she truly wanted.

He let her use the peak however she needed, until she felt ready to move to Silver Head Peak," said Xia Cangfu.

"When they began their cultivation journey, the results between our founder and his twin sister were almost identical. They both achieved the diamond body in the body refinement realm, and in the qi refinement realm, they each managed to reach the elusive 13th level. When they broke through to the foundation establishment realm, their first pillars were both gold grade," explained Xia Cangfu.

"It was in the foundation establishment realm that the differences between them began to emerge," he continued.

"Changes?"

"Mmh, changes," Xia Cangfu echoed before moving on to clarify."When they first started, their breakthrough pace was nearly the same, with our founder's twin sister usually leading by a few months each time.

But that changed once they reached the foundation establishment realm. She no longer led the race, and it was our founder who took the lead, and at a rapid pace at that.

The more time he spent here, the more he lost himself in it," said Xia Cangfu with a light sigh as he glanced around.

"The deeper he delved into the peak's mysteries, the faster his cultivation advanced, as if he had fallen into its rhythm. That was a good thing for him and for the peak, but not so much for his sister. Because the more he became absorbed in the peak's charm, the less restrained he became," said Xia Cangfu, his tone softening.

"Less restrained?" Yang Qing asked, his eyes flashing with a strange light. "He deliberately stalled his breakthroughs before?" he asked, voicing his suspicions.

"He never admitted to it, but the peak master knew it," said Xia Cangfu, a bitter smile forming on his face."Not only that, it wasn't just his speed he tampered with on account of his sister."

"What do you mean?"

Xia Cangfu sighed before continuing."The peak master was there when our founder formed his first foundation pillar. The fluctuations he gave off at the time weren't those of a gold grade one, but a purple grade one. He deliberately tampered with his circulation so that it would result in a gold grade pillar instead.

The peak master wanted to stop him, but when he realized why he was doing it, he chose to go along with it and pretended he never saw anything."

"He sabotaged himself?" Yang Qing asked in disbelief.

"He did," Xia Cangfu solemnly admitted.

Yang Qing's mouth opened and closed a few times before finally settling into a sigh of defeat, a wry smile creeping onto his face."Your ancestor is truly a unique individual," he said, sighing again, the disbelief still clear on his face.

Cultivators would give anything to form blue grade pillars, let alone purple grade ones—and yet here was someone who could have produced the highly coveted purple grade pillars, only to sabotage himself and settle for a gold grade one.

Even though gold grade pillars were still exceptional, if you asked a hundred people whether they wanted a purple grade pillar or a gold one, a hundred and one would choose the purple without hesitation.

What the Xia clan founder had done wasn't something any cultivator would even remotely consider.

Just as he was lost in those thoughts, Yang Qing's mind drifted back to what Xia Cangfu had said earlier about how the founder had gotten so absorbed in the rhythm and charm of the peak that he failed to restrain himself.

"He formed purple grade pillars, didn't he?" Yang Qing asked.

"He did," Xia Cangfu admitted. "Seven of them to be exact, before he finally came to."

"Seven," Yang Qing murmured. If he formed seven, then the grade of his core at the core formation realm should have been quasi-purple, not quasi-gold… Seems like the reason for trying to improve the grade of his core wasn't the only thing that got distorted in the Xia clan, he mused.

"What brought him back?" Yang Qing asked curiously.

"His sister," Xia Cangfu answered, a somber sigh escaping his lips.

"She was a competitive person. In an effort to keep up with him, she tried to form purple grade pillars too, but failed at every turn and ended up with gold grade ones. She only managed to form three, and then during her fifth pillar, she formed a blue one.

Whether in speed or quality, she could no longer keep up. It shook her… and drove her down a path of maddened obsession. Eventually, she got so consumed by it that she attacked him during one of his episodes of him being lost in the insights of some cultivation technique.

Luckily for him, despite being in an unguarded state, his sister had greatly overestimated her abilities… and underestimated his.

The gap in their foundation and abilities was so vast that even sitting there unguarded and distracted, her attack was unable to penetrate his defenses...

However.." Xia Cangfu paused, as his expression turned solemn.

"However..." Xia Cangfu paused, his expression turning solemn.

"Even though her attacks didn't hurt him physically, mentally was another story. His last living relative, whom he adored greatly, had just tried to kill him, and he didn't know why. And when he did learn the reason behind it, instead of being angry, he blamed himself for being neglectful," said Xia Cangfu.

"To redeem himself from the guilt, he stalled his cultivation for a while and devoted himself to researching techniques to improve the grade of one's foundation pillars.

That relentless research is what gave birth to the technique he later used—the very one that damaged his core," Xia Cangfu said, his expression turning downcast.

"Even if that technique had been perfected, it wouldn't have changed anything..." he softly added, his expression somber.

"What do you mean?" Yang Qing asked.

"His sister died during her breakthrough to the core formation realm. After she attacked him, she was detained. The peak master said he would help her find a breakthrough to her mental demons, but ultimately, even a domain expert's help proved insufficient.

She improved for a while, though she remained in seclusion, but in the end, her will couldn't be rebuilt. And when her tribulation finally came, she purposefully chose to be destroyed by it.

Maybe it was because she couldn't bear the gap in ability between her and our founder. Or maybe… she really had gotten better, escaped that obsession, but couldn't forgive herself for almost killing her brother. Perhaps dying under the tribulation was her way of atoning.

Whatever the guiding reason was, it still didn't change the fact that her life and death left a huge mark on our ancestor."