Chapter 1014: Suspicious People~

The inside of the Grand Meeting Hall was made up of a single large chamber with a little over a thousand seating spots that formed a half circle centered around a few seats located at the front of the half circle. Among these seats, it was obvious that the one at the center was reserved for Feng Chen, the current sect master of the Star Shattering Sect, while the few seats located beside him should be for the important elders of the sect.

So, that is where I will be sitting...

Not knowing how to feel about the attention he would inevitably end up drawing because of this, Xuan Hao unconsciously glanced in the direction of Elder Song, who in return gave him a victories grin. Fully aware of the fact that it would be impossible for him to sneak away in the middle of the meeting without being noticed.

"Well played, old man..." letting out a sigh as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao gave up on his plan of trying to escape in the middle of the meeting.

At least, it could not be considered a total waste of time, as he would get an opportunity to get a better understanding of the sect's current state and the state of the different powers inside of its now rather large territory.

Rustle~

Not wasting any time after coming to this decision, he quickly made his way towards the most comfortable looking seat before sitting down and closing his eyes. Given that none of the representatives had arrived yet, it would likely still be some time before the meeting began. Time that could be used to try and figure out how he was going to improve his different professions after the meeting came to an end, the most important of which was Blacksmithing, as there was no way he wanted to end up in a situation where he wouldn't be able to help Bai Ning due to his own incompetence on the subject.

Like this, time slowly passed as the different representatives of the sects and other powers across the Star Shattering Sect's territory slowly made their way into the Grand Meeting Hall...

"Looks like everyone is here. Ehm! Everyone, welcome to the first official meeting involving the future distribution of the Star Shattering Sect's territory." As everyone had made their way inside the Grand Meeting Hall, Feng Chen got up from his seat and began the meeting.

"Given that the size of the territory has already grown to a degree where it will be hard to manage without the help of smaller powers like yourselves overseeing some of the less important areas of the territory, we of course want to ensure that you also get your share of benefits and..." First and most importantly going over the main objectives of the meeting that could be boiled down to finding out who would manage what inside the now much larger territory of the Star Shattering Sect.

Of course, the most important resources would still be controlled directly by the Star Shattering Sect, with the main focus of the meeting instead being on the smaller mines and spiritual herb fields that would be distributed among these smaller powers.

How boring...

Watching how Feng Chen began explaining the meeting followed by a heated discussion between the smaller powers starting as they tried to argue for why they would be the best choice for managing a certain resource spot, Xuan Hao could not help rolling his eyes in boredom.

Although he had already expected something like this to happen when he had first reluctantly agreed to join the meeting, he was still a bit disappointed that nothing more than a few discussions on resource management was what came up at the meeting. Even if he knew that this was something important for the future growth of the Star Shattering Sect, it didn't make it any less boring.

The only interesting thing was the occasional verbal fights that took place when two of the smaller powers were eyeing the same mine and neither wanted to give up on getting their hands on it.

Unfortunately, when something like that happened, Elder Song would be quick to step in and calm both parties down before coming up with a solution that helped both parties involved.

For the first time in a long time, Xuan Hao found himself wishing that Elder Song wasn't so good at these kinds of things. At least the meeting would have been far more entering if that was the case.

Rustle~

"Hm?"

Feeling the familiar sensation of something moving around inside his robe, Xuan Hao could not help glancing at his sleeve as a small fluffy head poked out.

"I almost forgot about you. Finally coming out of hiding? Don't cause any trouble in here!"

Squeak~!

Letting out a lazy squeak in response to his question, the rabbit demon beast who had fallen asleep inside his sleeve curiously began to examine its surroundings with interest.

Compared to the mystic realm that was filled with all sorts of exotic vegetation, forests, mountains and demon beasts, the current noisy room filled with humans who were all too busy discussing with each other was far from anything that the rabbit demon beast had ever seen before.

If not for the fact that Xuan Hao had given it a warning just now, it would already have jumped out of his sleeve to examine the humans in front of it. After all, it had already seen through their strength and understood that there was no way for them to fight against it.

Squeak?

Observing the humans for a few minutes without doing anything, the rabbit demon beast could not help turning its head up towards Xuan Hao before letting out a sound to catch his attention.

"Is there something wrong?" Not knowing what the rabbit demon beast wanted, Xuan Hao asked curiously as he turned his attention away from the ongoing discussion centered around a spirit stone mine that more than 10 of the smaller powers present wanted to get their hands on.

Squeak! Squeak, squeeeaaaak!

Not able to properly communicate due to the language barrier between a human and a demon beast, the rabbit demon beast could only try its best to explain what it wanted to say by moving around its small head and paws, while also trying its best to use the connection that had been established between them after the blood contract to convey the meaning behind these gestures.

"You mean to say that something is off about one of the people here?" Although he didn't fully understand what the rabbit demon beast wanted to convey to him through the elaborate movements, the blood contract at least allowed him to understand that the rabbit demon beast was trying to tell him that there was something weird about one of the people present in the Grand Meeting Hall on the side of the smaller powers who had shown up.

Squeak!

Nodding its small fluffy head in response to hearing what Xuan Hao said, the rabbit demon beast discreetly pointed its small fluffy paw in the direction of a small group of people located at the back of the Grand Meeting Hall.

"Hm?" Following the small fluffy paw in the direction of this small group of people, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he understood what the rabbit demon beast had meant with weird about someone in this group of people. More specifically, one of the people inside the group, that looked ordinary on the surface, had a clear problem with his cultivation base.

Although his cultivation base was outwardly showing as someone in the Eighth Stage of the Core Formation realm, upon clearer inspection, it became clear that this wasn't the true cultivation base of this person. In reality, the true strength of this person was somewhere around the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!

However, the most surprising thing was not this, but the fact that he hadn't managed to notice this before it was pointed out by the rabbit demon beast, who clearly was far sharper than him when it came to spotting this person.

Or maybe it was just that the artifact that he was using to hide himself didn't take demon beasts into account. Making it easier for the rabbit demon beast to spot him compared to someone like himself...

No matter what, Xuan Hao understood that this person shouldn't have come with good intentions given that he was hiding his cultivation base and had snuck inside the Star Shattering Sect.

The only problem left was finding out just where this person had come from. For him to have access to an artifact that could even fool his senses... it was obvious that he belonged to some sort of powerful force, but where did this powerful force come from and what relationship did it have with the Star Shattering Sect?

Was it perhaps the mysterious force behind the appearance of the secret technique allowing the old Nascent Soul Realm Elders of the different major kingdoms to suddenly reach the Domain Lord Realm...?