Daily life of a cultivation judge

While Gong Jie was filled with relief at the potential turn of fate for the Empire, Duan Hu was filled with a different feeling. While outwardly he didn't show any change in emotion, inwardly, it was a different matter altogether.

The cooperation with the Golden Bamboo Pavilion could be considered his child. Everything from start to finish was planned by him. The return to the Xin clan faction was quickly gaining momentum to the point that even the neutral palace realm expert from the clan started entertaining such thoughts.

He didn't know why the neutral member was having a change of heart. Maybe it could have been because he could see how powerful the Five Clovers Kingdom was becoming and felt maybe the time to jump ship had arrived.

When the war started, the Five Clovers Kingdom only had a single palace realm expert, whom the Empire didn't know about up until the Kingdom came to their doorstep to declare war. Fast forward to the present, the Kingdom now had four palace realm experts while the empire had five. But while the empire had the greater number, it was just one extra palace realm, and if it had been in a different nation, one that was more unified, that extra palace realm expert would have been a significant asset.

But that was not the case with the Red Maple Empire. They all had their agendas, and having an extra palace realm expert meant nothing and if one looked at it critically, only two were genuinely committed to the war effort, and that was the Zheng clan patriarch and the neutral palace realm expert from the royal family. As for the remaining three, he was busy keeping the rival royal member at bay, and the Mo family patriarch was trying to seize the opportunity created by their feud.

It was no wonder the Five Clovers Kingdom was quickly gaining ground on them. They were united, and most of all, the Zou family gave them ample support. The reason they could produce four palace realm experts in such a short amount of time could only be because of their intervention.

But what about the Red Maple Empire?

Unlike the opposite faction, Duan Hu didn't believe they would have a good fate if they went to the Xin family.

Personally, even though he was in the faction that hoped to honor the wishes of their ancestor and help elevate the Red Maple Empire to stand at the same heights as the Xin clan, he did not believe it could ever be done. He even felt they might regress.

Other than the Mo Clan, the Zheng Clan, and the royal family, the other founding families had not produced another palace realm expert since their founders despite the resources at their disposal.

Tens of thousands of years have passed since all their founders passed, bar Deng Wei, and in that time, neither the Gui, Chen, or Gong clans, produced a single palace realm expert, and when it came to the rest the Mo and Zheng clan only had a single one each, and the royal family had three.

Duan Hu was cognizant of the fact that if they did not have the amount of resources they had at their disposal, they all six families would not have produced a single palace realm expert, and yet despite believing that, he was adamant at staying. Why?

It was because unlike the rest, blinded by greed and the prospect of joining a rank two clan, he strongly believed their fates would be far worse than whatever the Five Clovers Kingdom would do to them if they lost the war.

The Red Maple Empire was nothing in the face of a behemoth like the Xin clan. The Radiant Swan Kingdom wasn't the only rank three organization counted among their subordinate. There were sects and other organizations affiliated with them that were of similar rank.

Being a rank two clan didn't just mean having domain experts, it meant overreaching influence. It was just a single clan, but the territory it ruled over was a hundred times larger than the entire Red Maple Empire.

The Red Maple Empire could not compare to even a finger of the power they held. They would be no different than Duan Qui and her mother, infact, their circumstances could be considered worse. At least when it came to their ancestor and her mother, they had the backing of her father, who was a prominent member of the clan.

What did they have? Their ancestor, Duan Qui? The same person who was chased out of the clan? Everybody sharing prominent member of the clan.

What did they have? Their ancestor, Duan Qui? The same her bloodline would be a constant reminder of what happened back then. A stain that the Xin clan would not want known to others. Going back was no different than giving the Xin clan, a chance to erase that stain.

Even if Duan Qui's father was now a domain expert of the clan and had some say, would he take them back. His affection was to his daughter, not to her greedy descendants that are a few generations removed from her.

What about his wife, the princess of the Radiant Swan Sect? What if she was still alive and a domain expert too? Her reaching the domain realm wasn't a stretch, after all, she was rumored to have a heaven-defying talent, and for it to catch the eyes of the Xin clan, that talent had to be talent that was capable of reaching the domain realm.

If she truly was a domain expert, that meant they had a domain expert for an enemy. She had grounds to despise them even more than the Xin family. After all, they served as a constant reminder that her husband once loved another woman more than her and had a child with that woman.

He felt that whatever fate awaited them at the doors of the Xin clan was bound to be a horrible one. Well, he might not hold much hope for the Red Maple Empire, he did not want his clan to be wiped out, or suffer a far worse fate.