Return Of The Demon - 119 A tough talk

“I haven’t seen you in a while.” Xiao Mei-er said. “You have been quite busy lately. Why don’t you sit down and we can talk for a bit.”

Bai Yun smiled and sat down. Then the three of them sat down to talk. The talk was mostly on what Bai Yun had been up to in the past few weeks. After hearing about Bai Yun’s improvements in cultivation, his parents were quite pleased.

The chat also included Bai Mu’s investigation into the devil rituals. Bai Mu had found more instances of devil rituals and had caught quite a few devil cultivators by following the clues they had left behind. But the news that they found from them was disheartening. The only thing that the devil cultivators could tell the investigators was that they had gained the devil rituals from an eerie masked man. After they got their hands on devil rituals, they all decided to practice them.

The people who were captured were true scum. Most of them had committed great evils. Thus they no second thought about doing such evil acts.

But they could find no information about the person who supplied them with the devil ritual. The person behind it just seemed to spread the devil rituals without asking anything in return. Even Bai Yun could not understand the reasoning behind it.

After a while, the talk changed to more banal topics. Soon they started to talk about their friends and gossip about the happenings in the clan. Now that the important matters had been dealt with it was time for Bai Yun to talk about his matter.

“Is there anything you want to tell us?” Bai Mu asked after seeing the way Bai Yun was behaving.

Bai Yun then took a deep breath. It was time to tell them about his plan.

“I have been here for a few months. My cultivation has improved rapidly in the past few months.” Bai Yun said. “I have reached the four circle level in the soul path and the peak of both skin sewin and qi condensation.”

“But I have the feeling that my cultivation is stagnating a bit. And this is only my instinct, but I think that if I wish to reach the peak of cultivation, I need to experience more things in life. If I stay in the clan, then there is no danger to me. I can definitely increase my cultivation with the help of the clan, but I won’t be able to stimulate my potential under stress.”

“And it is not only a matter of stimulating my potential under danger. My status in the clan is quite high. And that restricts the way in which I can grow.”

“And I have a feeling that only by experiencing many things, love and friendship, pain and loss, can I grow as a person.”

When Bai Yun finally finished speaking, there was a silence. “What are you planning.” Bai Mu asked. “You wouldn’t have brought it all up if you hadn’t thought of doing something.”

“I want to go on a journey alone for two years.” Bai Yun finally said his plan.

“Excuse me, did you say something. I couldn’t hear anything.” Xiao Mei-er said with a smile.

Bai Yun turned to look at Xiao Mei-er. He felt goosebumps looking at her cold smile.

“I want to go on a journey alone for two years.” Bai Yun once again said softly.

“Sory. I still can’t hear you.” Xiao Me-er once again.

‘Bulls**t.’ Bai Yun thought. With your cultivation, you can hear a mosquito on the other side of the mansion.

Bai Yun slowly sunk down in his chair. He truly felt fear at his mother currently.

“Journey. Two years.” BAi Yun said again.

“Sorry. Can you say it once again?” Xiao Mei-er said again.

“Mei, just a moment.” Bai Mu suddenly said. “Let’s hear what he has to say.”

“What are you talking about Mu.” Xiao Mei-er snapped.

“I just want to know why he wants to go on a journey right now.” Bai Mu said. “Why now. And why a journey. If he wanted to go outside the protection of the clan, he could hide his identity. Or join a school.”

“It’s true that I could hide my identity.” Bai Yun said. “But it wouldn’t be very effective. And the things that I can experience inside the clan are very limited anyway.”

“And as for an academy, the academy I want to join is the number one academy in the city of scholars, the Shadow Stream academy. But the academy increases the difficulty of its test based on a person’s age. And I have wasted quite a few years in my muddlehead years. If I go now I may not be able to pass the entrance test. But I am confident that I can reach the required level in about two years. But I don’t want to waste the next two years in the clan.”

“So I came up with a plan. I will travel to the city of scholars. The journey I am thinking about should take two years to complete.”

“But I do not intend to take the main road. The main road has a lot of major forces and the cultivation of the people there are also very high. Thus though the path, there is more ordered, there is a higher chance of me running into danger.”

“The path I am trying to follow is a string of routes along the southern foothills of the evergreen hills. By studying the various maps I was able to come up with a path that I can take to help me get to one of the entrance points to the plains of enlightenment. From there I can take a teleportation formation to the City of Scholars. The entire journey should only take a little more than a year, giving me enough time to travel as well as stay for a little while in each place.”

There was once again a silence after Bai Yun’s talk. But a short while later, Xiao Mei-er’s voice broke the silence. “Impossible. There is no way I will agree to it.”

“Yun, give us a moment.” Bai Mu suddenly said. “I need to talk to Mei about it.”

Bai Yun stared at his father for a moment. It seems as if his father was agreeing with him. He did not know why. But after a moment Bai Yun quickly left and went back to his room.

“Mu, why are you going along with this farce of his.” Xiao Me-er said.

For a moment Bai Mu stayed silent. “I have been thinking about sending Yun away for a while.”

Xiao Mei-er was shocked. “What? Why?”

Bai Mu sighed. “Have you seen how Yun behaves in the clan?” Bai Mu said. “There are only three people who he have a decent relationship with. They are Bai Shi, Bai Ling-er, and Zhang Zi. And two of them are in a subordinate relationship with him. And he only showed his real identity to Zhang Zi under extreme circumstances. It is obvious that he is not ready to form meaningful relationships. But I believe that moving him from the clan’s enclosure and allowing him to interact with other people will allow him to grow him as a person.”

“What makes you think that moving him from the safety of home will help him to change?” Xiao Mei-er said.

“I know it will.” Bai Mu said with a smile. “I know because I was like that too once. It was by meeting you and our friends from the shadow stream academy that I changed. I believe that it would help him too.”

“So you are going to send him straight into danger?” Xiao Mei-er said.

“I wasn’t planning to do anything like that.” Bai u said. “I thought that sending him to a school in the city of scholars was enough. With our power and influence, we can get him into a good enough school. But Yun wants to get into the Shadow Stream academy. He is not at a level where he can do so right now. But he should be able to do so in two years. You have seen how fast he grows too. So the question is what he can do in those two years. I think that the plan Yun has come up with is quite good.”

“But Yun is such a weak child.” Xiao Me-er said. “How can you send him into danger.”

“Just think about this for a moment.” Bai Mu said. “If Yun was not born with a damaged soul, and was a normal child, would you be against this? Just forget the past few years and think about what is best for him.”

For a moment Xiao Mei-er was silent. She was against Bai Yun leaving. But once she calmed down, she could understand what the two men were talking about. Then the two of them continued to discuss for a while longer about how this would work.

“Yun.” Suddenly Xiao Mei-er shouted.

Bai Yun heard the sound, and almost immediately ran back to the garden. He was a little bit anxious about the talk, but seeing his mother’s fuming face, and his father’s smile, Bai Yun could guess the outcome.

Xiao Mei-er took a deep breath before she started talking. “FIne. I agree with you going on a journey for a few years.”

“But I have some conditions.” XIao Mei-er said

Bai Yun nodded in understanding.

“First of all, you must carry a tracking talisman. This tracking talisman will allow us to track you and find you soon enough.” Xiao Mei-er said.

“Secondly, you must send us messages at least once a month. If you miss even once, we will track you down and find you.”

“Third, you have to use a false identity when you travel. We have a lot of enemies, if they find out that you are traveling without our protection, things could get ugly. It shouldn’t be too difficult with your changing ability. If your true identity is ever leaked, you are to immediately contact us, and we will immediately come and take you home.”

“Fourth, you have to bring with you some simple weapons and clothes. You have to hide your storage rings and all other valuable items. If someone finds out about them, you must kill them. Or else we will immediately come and take you back. And we better not find out that any secret of yours was leaked and you didn’t inform us. If that happened, then I would lock you up, and you would never leave this house again.

“And finally you can only leave after two weeks. That would give your great grandfather enough time to make a couple of teleportation talismans. Once you use them up, that means that you can no longer continue your journey.”

“Only if you can agree with all of these conditions will I agree for you to leave.” Xiao Mei-er finished.

Bai Yun thought over the various conditions. Bai Yun found them all acceptable. He was more worried that they would ask old Hai to accompany him.

“Fine.” Bai Yun finally said. “But you have agree that I am leaving by myself. You cannot ask anyone to follow me in secret.”

For a moment Xiao Mei-er looked a little uncomfortable, but then a determined appearance appeared on her face. She finally nodded in acceptance.

“Okay then.” Bai Mu said. “Now that we have agreed on some basic things, I want you to tell me more about the path you will be taking. I want to make sure that everything fine along that path. I have access to fresher and greater information than you have available. I want to make sure that there is nothing dangerous along your journey route.”

Bai Yun then sat down to explain to his parents his route. As he quickly explained the various paths he had considered, a smile quickly flashed through his eyes.

He had succeeded in persuading his parents.

It was time to start phase two of his cultivation plan.