Chapter 666

Once the city below them began to work and move, Darius allowed everyone on the ship to look over the side. Once they saw that there were workers filling the houses and shops one by one every second and youths being sorted into the various cultivation mountain peaks, their faces changed.

They could sort of understand and feel Darius' determination and plan. However, what intrigued them the most was the fact that the Spirit Energy concentration of this place was spiking rapidly.

While the others were curious, Gunner could tell something more as he s face became solemn. Darius had not only covered just about every inch of the place with Spirit Gathering Arrays, but he also created a central spirit energy diffuser in the central palace.

It connected to the ever present Source Energy and then converted it into Spirit Energy then spat it out, causing the area to 'produce' its own Spirit Energy which was rapidly gathered by all the arrays and prevented from leaking around.

So outside the territory of their sect, the Spirit Energy was still barren. However, the moment you crossed the gate, the concentration rose by almost a hundred times and the farther in you went, it became denser and denser.

The outer city was great, but the inner sect was more than amazing. It was almost a thousand times denser than the outer city and the various mountain peaks began to become clouded as Spirit Energy mist began to form around them.

Gunner estimated that by the end of the day, those peaks would simply just no longer be visible. By the time the week ended, the entire inner sect would be a giant ball of mist where no one could take three steps without seeing where they are going.

While that was definitely a good thing, too much of a good thing was bad. Gunner didn't think that choking the area with Spirit Energy was the way to go at first, but then his face changed as he noticed that the most rapidly dispersed.

When he checked why, he understood. The disciples who were cultivating were like little whales, inhaling Spirit Energy and making rapid breakthroughs in their cultivation.

And this was only when they were all at the first major stage. When they reached Foundation Establishment, which required double the Spirit Energy or Golden Core which required exponentially more to form the core, how much would they suck away?

Seeing this, Gunner now finally understood the basic fundamental of the current Sect System of Pan and why it was so rubbish.

Resources, consumption!

The moment one discovered they had a spirit roots, regardless of quality, they were destined for a life of hardship and scavenging for any resource unless they had someone else to sponsor them.

And most people who criticized the sect system always forgot to ask this question, which was why should a cultivator or sect sponsor you in particular?

The answer was based on a set of logical criteria decided over a long period of time. Firstly, talent. Secondly, background. Finally, age.

The better your talent, the faster you cultivate and the less resources you use overall. The better your background, the more value the sect or cultivator sponsoring you can get apart from the disciples own value. The lower your age, the more malleable and brainwashable you are, allowing them to secure loyalty.

Also for things like Body Refinement, age was very important unless you had great talent.

And so came the fundamental sect system, the classification of disciples. Core Disciples, Inner Disciples, Outer Disciples and In-name Disciples.

Core Disciples were the backbone of the sect, often the first choice to become the leaders or Sect master. The lowest they can become are elders, but they usually rise above that. Their treatment is no different from a parent sponsoring a child, almost unconditional and natural. This tier was chosen solely by talent and background usually did not matter.

Inner Disciples were the second line disciples, often being the children of elders or important figures. They may or may not have the talent to match it and the sect gave them strong support. They did not have to slave for the sect, but certain key missions would be allocated them. The least they could become were Deacons of the sect, who were managers of various things under the control of the elders. Some of the exceptional ones may become elders in the end.

Outer Disciples were basically entry level disciples who were given next to no support at all apart form a place to live and an area to cultivate. They had to fight for their own resources and climb the ranks to inner disciple and possibly core disciple based on their talent and cunning. The sect often acted like it didn't care about them, but usually its best expectations were on the outer disciples because there was a difference between a flower raised in a greenhouse and one that was raised in the wild, among cruel weeds.

In-name Disciples were basically next to the level of servants and cannon fodder. Apart from some robes and allowing yourself to call yourself a disciple, you handled most of the day to day chores of the sect. You were not given a dime of resources and expected to use your own talent to cultivate, but since the reason you were even put there was because your talent was bottom-tier, you would stay there all your life, working and slaving for the sect. Occasionally, some miracles could happen and a shock would occur, but it was super rare.

This was the system all sects used. If it was based solely on merit and credit, it would be a perfect governmental system, but usually, it wasn't. Nepotism and corruption were heavy in most Immortal Sects, even moreso than any other form of government ever.

This was because unlike other governments which somewhat needed the populace and had representatives or leader who had to rely on others to maintain power, the Sect system had leaders who had incredible personal power.

They did not need you or your opinion. They also had enough lifespan to genocide you all and watch as a new batch was cultivated after mortals gave birth to a new cycle.

So this led to those of the upper echelon being absurdly narrow minded and corrupt, and their vile spawn were even worse in this regard since they were raised in such an environment.

It was entirely possible for a sect to acquire an Outer Disciple who had shown great cunning and talent, looking to be the one to take them higher up in the grand scheme of things.

However, because he defeated the son of an elder who is an inner disciple in a tournament which displayed his talent in the first place, and that fellow is filled with hatred. So he schemes against the fellow suing his father's superior and vast resources, eventually crippling him and ruining the talent.

This has cost the sect greatly and damaged their future, but will the lad be punished? Of course, but nothing near what he deserves. His father, who is an elder, is a loyalist of the sect and has worked hard, not to mention he knows core secrets.

He also spouts sophistry like 'a dead genius is no longer a genius' and everyone seems to nod in agreement. So the young fellow is given a slap on the wrist and a warning, and the matter goes nowhere.

Now, the sect is definitely wrong for its decision, but it is not illogical to decide so. The milk is already spilled and you couldn't collect it up from the floor and put it in your mouth.

The best thing to do was wipe it away and buy a new one. No need to bully your cat who spilled the milk and lash it for doing such.

However, the issue here is that your cat, and the other cats around, are watching and have seen this. They might not actively think it, but in the back of their heads, they know that spilling milk leads to no real punishment, so they could now do it if they pleased.

This is usually the first sign of a sect's incoming downfall and destruction because an oppressive atmosphere is created where each caste, instead of working together as a unit, fears and hates the higher one while they look down on and despise the lower one.

Eventually, as you might expect, they would make a mistake one day and be sloppy, 'offending' a talent and chosen of heaven who would destroy the sect after he trained a few years later, causing all the accumulated karma to be paid back.

Funny enough, this had happened so many times in Pan's history across the continent that it was a known phenomenon. They had also done everything to find solutions and workarounds, but they only worked for a short while.

After all, how could man be smarter than the heavens?

Eventually, the leaders and elders of sects were forced to come to am bitter conclusion. If they didn't want to be destroyed and last long, they had to stop being assholes.