Tales of Demons and Gods : The Legend of Xiao Ning'Er

The next morning, the Patriarchs for each of the families invited all arrived to the Winged Dragon Family's main hall, accompanied by her group of friends. She found out later that they had been intending to meet soon anyway, after realising that they were all being targeted by the Sacred Family, in order to try to find a counter measure. The Lu Family was a weaker aristocrat family, who like the Chu Family, focused on raising alchemists, although at a far lower success rate due to their lack of funds. The Heavenly Marks Family were even weaker, although their ancestor was one of the ten great lords during the Snow Wind Empire's era, they were now reduced to farming and collecting mountain herbs. The Chu Family had been putting heavy pressure on the apprentice alchemists of the Lu Family until some of them started quitting under the stress, and the Sacred Family had been undercutting the prices of the Heavenly Marks Family's herbs in the marketplace, eroding their income margins significantly.

The Du and Zhu Clans were commoner families focusing on blacksmithing, and primarily found their work in low to mid tier blacksmiths in the city and countryside. Their main business had come from the Hong Yue Family who owned many high tier blacksmiths, which worked in synergy with their marketplaces and auctions. Although the Hong Yue Family were not malicious, they had always prioritised business and money, and valued their relationships with the Sacred Family, which caused them to reduce their dealings with the commoner families. The last two commoner families, the Zhang and Wei Families were both mining clans. Because they did not own any of the mines they worked in, the aristocrat families in charge the mines began making up excuses to progressively fire a significant number of them over time.

Every one of these families had felt the overwhelming suppression by businesses and families linked to the Sacred Family, or from the Sacred Family themselves.

"Xiao Yunfeng, thank you for calling this meeting. We have been having our backs against the wall and it's clear that soon, we will be unable to maintain the costs of our maintaining our families."

"Yes, we appreciate that you even remembered us commoner families. Although our foundations are not deep, we will do everything we can to support our plans.

Ning'Er had briefed her father last night of what was happening and he had come to trust her judgement and give consideration to her ideas.

He responded, "We are all in the same boat, aristocrat family or commoner family. At the end of the day, if the demon beast horde attacks, we will all bleed the same blood and die the same death."

The Patriarchs around him nodded in agreement as he continued, "The Sacred Family's actions are weakening our great city and trying to sow division and dissension between us. I believe we need to begin paving the way to demonstrating how unity and teamwork can be a better path."

He paused as he looked at each of them slowly one at a time. "Instead of each family fighting against each other for survival, I propose that we create...a sect!"

There were audible gasps of surprise from the others in the room. The concept of sects in Glory City had died out in the last era to be replaced by the current clan structure. At most, there were alliances between families but a sect would blur the lines between families, and potentially have a far greater reach and influence. Would this even be allowed by the City Lord? It may disrupt the whole power balance between the families that was already tense as it was.

The four Patriarchs of the commoner families were intrigued by the idea because it felt like they would benefit the most, when taking their backgrounds into account. "How...would something like that work?"

"We share our resources among each other for family members who have gained our trust and shown the ability to grow. Our best martial techniques and cultivation methods, insights and knowledge, will be passed down to anyone who is worthy. We will have a system for our resources to be traded for merit points that sect members can gain through deeds that benefit the sect. We will protect each other and form business relationships that have each other's best interests at heart!" It appeared that Xiao Yunfeng would be quite convincing if he wanted to be.

"That sounds great...who will hold authority for decisions?" the Du Patriarch asked.

"The six of us will form the core of the elders with equal voting power for any of our major decisions and things to implement. Then, we will trust in the next generation to have a clear leader rise up who has the strength, wisdom and trust of his or her peers. In time, that will be our sect head!" Xiao Yunfeng concluded with a twinkle in his eyes.

The others in the room shot a subtle glance at Ning'Er who stood quietly behind her father, knowing to a certain extent, that she held the trust and admiration of the others of her generation. They were trying to decide whether they should put their hopes in this fourteen year old girl of another family. It was time for her to speak up and she silently, but confidently, stepped forward.

She smiled as she spoke, "Over the last few months, the Winged Dragon Family has spent considerable time and resources investigating certain leads that we have now verified. As a gesture of our goodwill, my father has written these letters containing vital information which can benefit you...and the sect, should you choose to build it together with us."

She turned to the first two Patriarchs. "For the Du and Zhu families, after extensive research in tomes from various ruins, we have compiled drawings and details of deadly weapons, which are currently not found in Glory City. The drawings for the Du Family contains ten destructive weapons of extremely long range, which can be used to protect the city walls against demon beasts...or even a clan's stronghold. The drawings for the Zhu Family contains ten intricate hidden weapons such as sleeve darts, miniature crossbows, and hidden knives. I believe that once you produce them, there will be considerable interest and demand from the inhabitants of this city, increasing your stature as blacksmiths."

She continued, "For the Zhang and Wei families, we have produced identical maps. Eighty miles to the East, there is a mountain range we call the Hell Mountains because of its jagged, steep slopes and the constant lightning and storms that occur there. Most adventurers have deemed that area impassable. There is a route marked out in this map that can bring you to a cave somewhere in that mountain range, where there are large deposits of Nephrine Jadeite, high quality Iron Ore, and Lightning Essence Stones. The Winged Dragon Family will provide the fighters and demon spiritualist experts to set up a mining operation and delivery route to Glory City. Your families will be responsible for providing the knowledge and labour for the mining itself."

She deliberately left the aristocrat families last so that the commoner families would not feel undermined in the discussion. "For the Heavenly Marks Family, we have also marked out a map just twenty miles to the South East. There is a steep drop off at a cliff covered by perpetual mist. Adventurers have named it the Devil's Drop because of those who have inadvertently fallen to their deaths. There is one section where if you use ropes to scale down twenty feet, it leads into a massive cavern filled with a natural spirit herb sanctuary filled with some of the most precious herbs which many have thought extinct in the St. Ancestral Mountain Range. And finally, for the Lu Family, we are currently in the midst of investigating a place which we believe holds recipes for long lost elixirs. We will share these recipes with you once we obtain them if you could give us our trust that they will come soon."

Everyone in the room were stunned. If the Winged Dragon Family had access to this priceless information and it checked out, they did not need to share their finds with anyone, or they could broker highly lucrative deals for themselves. Why partner with such weak families? Even her father had been shocked when she had shared her plans with him the night before. In the end, he had to choose to assure himself that his daughter's plans were far bigger than he had ever thought, and that idealistic as she was, she had the best interests of Glory City in her heart.

Nie Hai, the Patriarch for the Heavenly Marks Family finally spoke, "We're...speechless at the Winged Dragon Family's generosity. But we do need to get the endorsement from the City Lord first. What if he blocks these plans?"

Ning'Er simply replied, "Ziyun is currently speaking to her dad as we speak. She will update us of the good news soon." She knew that the City Lord was worried about the Sacred Family's collusion with the Dark Guild, and she knew that Uncle Ye Shuo would vouch for her and her friends' intentions. It was likely that Ye Zong would see the benefit of such an idea, especially in countering the Dark Guild and Sacred Family's maneuvers.

She could see the Patriarchs eyeing the scrolls in front of them with desire. The benefits that she had spoken about were just too incredible and mind-blowing. It would shift the power balance in Glory City forever. They did not know how a young girl could speak to them with such composure, clarity and depth, but they sensed that if they accepted their 'gifts', they were already halfway down the path of acknowledging her as the new sect leader.

They looked at each other, then gave barely perceptible nods as they realised that even without the benefits, they would have likely gone ahead with the idea since they were already in such oppressed positions with barely enough room to breathe. Nie Hai sighed as it became clear that there was unanimous agreement, asking one final question, "Considering the City Lord accepts the proposal, what would this...sect of ours be called?"

Ning'Er had an immediate answer.