The Grand Defile had fully dissolved into the most bizarre culinary festival in the history of the Eastern Training Sector.
Where an hour earlier five thousand armored warriors had brandished flying swords and roared battle oaths, there was now only the rhythmic, blissful sound of five thousand people enthusiastically slurping hot broth. The sweet smell of wild mountain mint, roasted ginger, and garlic-infused scallion oil hung over the meadow like a warm blanket, thoroughly expelling the lingering stench of burned turf.
“Elder Brother, you have to try dipping the flatbread directly into the turnip bowl,” a junior student from Heavenly Sword Manor urged his squad leader, his cheeks bulging with food. “The crust soaks up the broth like a sponge! It’s crispy on the outside, soft in the center. The garlic oil explodes when you bite down!”
The squad leader, whose hands had just been freed from the elastic silk by a smiling bear-artisan wielding a herbal solvent sponge, was already on his second clay pot basin.
“Quiet, Wang Ergou,” the squad leader mumbled between massive mouthfuls, his eyes half-closed in respectful ecstasy. “Don’t speak while eating the turnip. You’ll disrupt the breath flow of the broth-qi. Feel your third acupuncture point on the Yang-heel channel. Do you feel that tingling warmth?”
Wang Ergou blinked, focusing his spiritual senses inward.
His eyes widened in shock. “The dull knot in my chest... It’s fully gone! For two years, ever since I took that defective Qi-Condensation pill from the sect potion-maker, my chest always throbbed. Just then, the rain came! It’s fully clear!”
“It’s the spirit turnips,” the squad leader whispered. He wiped a stray drop of golden broth from his chin with the back of his hand. “They weren’t forced to grow with toxic chemical catalysts like the sect’s herb gardens. These roots grew in living soil fed by sky spring water. This single bowl of turnip soup has purged more pill toxins from my liver than six months of bitter quiet focus!”
A few yards away, a group of Crimson Flame fire fighters were huddled around a three-legged cooking pot, debating culinary philosophy with Uncle Xiong, the head bear-chef.
“Listen to me, Master Bear,” an elder Crimson Flame deacon said earnestly. He gestured with a pair of bamboo chopsticks. “Your turnip broth is divine, truly beyond reproach. But if you let our fire students channel a gentle, controlled wood-flame under the cast iron for the final quarter-hour, the sugars in the turnip would caramelize against the pot lining! It would give the broth a deep, smoky undertone that would pair magnificently with your roasted mutton!”
Uncle Xiong stroked his thick, furry chin, his amber eyes twinkling with skilled respect. “Hmm. A caramelizing flash-simmer at the end? We usually keep the earth-heat chimney pipe at an even simmer to preserve the delicate wood-qi. But a smoky finish on the winter batches could work wonders. What kind of fire-qi breath flow do you use?”
“The Seventh-Tier Ember Breath!” the deacon replied eagerly, leaning forward as if sharing an ancient old family secret. “It produces an even, gentle heat without spitting soot. If you have another bushel of turnips, I could show on that backup cooking pot over there!”
“Deal,” Uncle Xiong rumbled with a booming laugh, slapping the deacon’s armored shoulder with enough force to rattle his breastplate. “Hey, Little Seven! Fetch another sack of Grade-3 turnips from the cellar wagon! Our guest here is going to teach us the Ember Breath simmer!”
High on a grassy knoll overlooking the defile, four thousand warrior monks of the Pure Lotus Abbey stood in disciplined silence.
Abbot Hui Lun, draped in austere saffron robes and holding his golden Nine-Ring Buddhist Staff, had not ordered his students to advance. His weathered face was set in deep, solemn concentration as his golden Buddha-eye vision pierced the distance, scanning the meadow for demonic deceit.
He had arrived expecting to witness an unholy blood-cooking pot, cut limbs, and innocent souls screaming under demonic torture.
Instead, his spiritual senses revealed thousands of captive swordsmen sitting in neat circles. He passed bamboo baskets of warm buns, laughing with beastfolk maidens, and openly discussing soup recipes with giant bears. There was no demonic malice in the valley. There was no karmic foul fog, no blood curses, and no trace of dark soul manipulation. The spiritual aura streaming from the Grand Defile was astonishingly pure: an expansive, harmonious deep ring of contentment, peace, and mutual nourishment.
“Master,” a young novice monk whispered, his eyes wide as he sniffed the fragrant breeze. “Is... Is this the demon den?”
Abbot Hui Lun lowered his golden staff, its bronze rings giving a single, mournful chime against the stones.
“Demons don’t share warm bread with those who came to kill them, my child,” Hui Lun murmured. His voice was heavy with ancient sorrow. “Demons don’t purge the poison from an enemy’s spirit veins with sweet turnip broth. What we’re looking upon isn’t a demon den. It’s a living safe hall of boundless compassion.”
Hui Lun turned his austere gaze upward. He looked at the floating golden war-galleons of Heavenly Sword Manor that hovered in the sky like hungry vultures.
“We were deceived,” the Abbot whispered softly, his fingers tightening around his sandalwood prayer beads. “Grand Elder Xuan Ji has weaponized our vows of righteousness to serve his own insatiable greed.”
Down in the clover, Lin Xiao walked through the rows of fed crusaders, with Su Ling’er.
The nine-tailed fox maiden carried a wooden tray lined with small fine china cups of warm barley tea. She handed them out to students who had finished their soup. Her fluffy white tails brushed gently against the grass, their ruby tips catching the afternoon light.
“Drink some barley tea, young masters,” Su Ling’er said, her voice like the chime of silver bells. “It helps settle the stomach after rich broth. If your boots are still sticky from the honey-nets, just dip your feet into the brook over there. The current dissolves the residue in five minutes.”
“Thank you, Fairy Su,” a chorus of young swordsmen replied, blushing furiously and bowing their heads in deep respect.
A core student of Heavenly Sword Manor, holding his tea cup with both hands, looked up at Lin Xiao with tears shimmering in the corners of his eyes.
“Sect Master Lin,” the youth choked out, his voice trembling with shame. “When we marched through Cloud-Piercing Pass, Grand Elder Xuan Ji told us that beasts were soulless fiends who sacrificed human infants to feed the earth leylines. He told us that if we didn’t exterminate every creature in this valley, the mortal kingdoms would be drowned in blood.”
Lin Xiao took a sip from his own tea cup, his blue eyes filled with gentle amusement.
“Do I look like someone who eats babies, friend?” Lin Xiao asked with an easy smile. “Babies have no culinary value whatsoever. They’re loud, they drool, and they need round-the-clock diaper changes. Now, braised pork ribs with rock sugar and star anise? That’s something worth conquering a mountain for.”
The surrounding students burst into startled, relieved laughter.
“Grand Elder Xuan Ji lied to us!” another student shouted, his fist clenching around his empty soup bowl. “He only wanted the spirit springs! He wanted to steal the Jade-Dew Wine formula so the Manor could hike the prices across thirty cities!”
“Aye! My clan had to sell three old family farms just to buy two longevity pills for my grandfather from Heavenly Sword Manor!” an Azure Cloud fighter spat in anger. “And they tasted like bitter chalk! This turnip broth did more for my lungs in ten minutes than those pills did in ten years!”
A soft, sweet-sounding chime echoed through Lin Xiao’s mindscape:
Lin Xiao smiled as he read the numbers. Zero point four percent hostility. That’s practically a family picnic.
“Host,” the Omniscient Dao Spirit noted smoothly. “The leftover zero point four percent hostility is packed entirely among three senior deacons who are upset that the scallion pancakes ran out before they could secure thirds.”
“Tell Auntie Chen to fry two more batches,” Lin Xiao instructed internally with a chuckle. “Nobody should go home grumpy over scallions.”
High above, however, the sky was not peaceful.
Aboard the floating flagship Sky-Cleaver, Grand Elder Xuan Ji stared down through a scrying crystal, his entire body convulsing with uncontrollable, apoplectic rage.
His five-thousand-man vanguard had not been slaughtered. They hadn’t been taken hostage under heavy iron chains. They were sitting on the grass like vacationing merchants, burping contentedly, trading soup recipes with beast fiends, and cursing his name to the heavens!
“Mutiny...” Xuan Ji hissed, his fingernails digging so deeply into his palms that dark, poisoned blood dripped onto the polished deck. “Treason! Unforgivable, blasphemous treason!”
Behind Xuan Ji, the surviving elders of Azure Cloud Sect and Crimson Flame Pavilion exchanged uneasy, frightened glances. They could see the deep shift in the air. The righteous pretext of their crusade was evaporating like morning dew under a blazing sun. If word reached the high courts of the mortal empires that five traditional sects had marched thirty thousand soldiers across the mountains only to lose their vanguard to vegetable soup, their sects would become the laughingstock of the continent for ten thousand years.
Xuan Ji turned toward his flagship captains. His sunken eyes burned with a mad, world-ending glare that promised nothing less than total destruction.
“Signal the armada!” Xuan Ji snarled, his voice dropping into a deep-throated shriek that scared his own retainers. “Every captain, to your battle stations! If these fools want to feast with demons, they can die with them in the ash!”