Outer Sect I Choose to Be the Puppet Master

Inside the cave dwelling.

The light of the luminous pearl was soft yet cold.

Liu Tianxing slumped on the ground, gasping heavily for air.

He looked at the black-clad young man sitting behind the stone table. That bone-deep sense of terror was still wandering through his meridians.

He did not dare to hide anything.

"The Blood Fiend Sect."

Liu Tianxing's voice was hoarse as he began to recount the assets he had managed for forty years.

"We currently have fifty inner sect disciples, two hundred and sixty outer sect disciples, and over a hundred handymen."

"The sect controls two low-grade spirit stone veins on the edge of the Black Rock Wasteland, producing about one hundred thousand low-grade spirit stones annually. The auction house in Ash Town and the shops across three streets are our main sources of spirit stones, with an annual net profit of around fifty thousand."

"In the Treasure Pavilion, there are over three hundred low-grade magical artifacts and twenty mid-grade magical artifacts, along with various low-grade pills and talismans."

"Among the surrounding factions, there are three third-rate sects of similar scale to ours. We usually have some friction, but it is all within a controllable range."

Liu Tianxing took half an hour.

He completely exposed everything about the Blood Fiend Sect, down to its bare bones.

Shen Fei leaned back in his chair, listening quietly.

He quickly built a three-dimensional resource model of the Blood Fiend Sect in his mind.

One hundred thousand low-grade spirit stones.

Over three hundred pieces of cannon fodder.

To the super factions of the upper realm, this little bit of wealth was not even enough to fill the gaps between their teeth.

But for an undocumented ascender who had just ascended and whose cultivation was suppressed to the great circle of the Qi Condensation stage...

This was a perfect initial stepping stone.

It was enough.

It could serve as his first resource extraction machine.

Shen Fei's fingers stopped tapping the table.

He looked at Liu Tianxing.

"Three things."

Shen Fei's voice was flat, carrying an unquestionable tone of command.

"First. From today onwards, all resource allocations, personnel changes, and external decisions of the Blood Fiend Sect must be secretly reported to me. Any unauthorized action will trigger the Life and Death Talisman."

Liu Tianxing shuddered all over and closed his eyes in pain.

He knew that his forty years of hard work had completely changed owners at this very moment.

"Second," Shen Fei continued.

"Arrange an identity for me as an outer sect handyman. The more low-key, the better. Give me the dirtiest and most tiring work. I do not want anyone in the sect to notice my existence."

Liu Tianxing suddenly opened his eyes, his face full of astonishment.

A terrifying figure who could easily subdue a late-stage Foundation Establishment expert like him.

He didn't want the position of Supreme Elder.

He didn't want the treatment of a core disciple.

He actually took the initiative to ask to be a bottom-tier handyman?!

He could not understand this kind of thinking.

But under Shen Fei's cold gaze, he could only swallow all his questions back into his stomach.

"Yes... I will arrange it tomorrow."

"Third."

Shen Fei stood up.

"Compile a list of all disciples in the sect whose cultivation progress is abnormal or whose origins are unknown, and give it to me."

Children of Destiny were often hidden among these anomalies.

Shen Fei needed this list to screen his next prey.

Liu Tianxing nodded repeatedly.

"I have noted it all down."

Shen Fei walked to the entrance of the cave dwelling.

With his back to Liu Tianxing.

"I know what you are thinking right now."

Liu Tianxing's body stiffened.

"You are thinking that once I leave this cave dwelling, or when I fall asleep, you will find a chance to kill me and remove the restriction on your body."

Shen Fei's voice echoed in the spacious cave dwelling.

"You can try."

Shen Fei did not look back.

"The trigger delay of the Life and Death Talisman is zero. From the moment you have a murderous thought to the moment all your meridians snap and your soul shatters, there is no window of operation in between."

"You can take a gamble. See if your sword is faster, or my talisman."

After saying that.

Shen Fei pushed open the heavy stone door of the cave dwelling.

His figure flashed, blending into the night outside.

Inside the cave dwelling, only Liu Tianxing was left.

He looked at the empty doorway, cold sweat soaking his back.

He had indeed harbored murderous intentions.

But after Shen Fei said those words, he completely despaired. That man seemed to be able to see through every thought deep within his soul.

He slumped on the ground like a puddle of mud.

The skies over the Blood Fiend Sect had changed.

...

Three days later.

An ordinary name was added to the roster at the outer sect handyman department of the Blood Fiend Sect.

Chen Mo.

Responsible for weeding and fertilizing the number three spirit field in the back mountain.

This was a bitter chore that even outer sect disciples were unwilling to do. Every day, one had to face slightly toxic spirit herbs and endure the wind and sun.

Early morning.

Shen Fei wore a set of dusty, coarse handyman clothes.

Holding a rusty iron hoe in his hand, he stood in the spirit field.

He lowered his head, his movements mechanical and regular as he cleared the weeds.

There were no spiritual energy fluctuations whatsoever.

He looked completely like a mortal coolie without any cultivation talent.

Not far away, several outer sect disciples wearing cyan martial outfits passed by.

"Look at that new idiot, working quite hard."

An outer sect disciple sneered.

He casually picked up a mud-covered stone from the ground.

"Hey! New guy!"

He shouted, throwing the stone viciously at Shen Fei's back.

Smack.

The stone hit Shen Fei's handyman clothes, leaving a dirty mud print.

The several outer sect disciples burst into laughter, waiting to see the joke of this new handyman panicking or angrily resisting.

But.

Shen Fei did not look back.

He did not even disrupt his hoeing rhythm.

It was as if the stone had hit a piece of wood.

He continued to keep his head down, digging the soil stroke by stroke.

Ignored.

Utterly ignored.

The outer sect disciples found it boring and walked away cursing.

"What a spineless piece of trash."

They had no idea at all.

In the eyes of this piece of trash, they did not even count as ants.

Would a giant dragon care about the provocation of a bug beneath its feet?

No.

Shen Fei did not need to show off and slap faces in front of these pieces of cannon fodder.

What he wanted was to hide behind the deepest scenes and control the overall situation.

Night fell.

The main peak of the Blood Fiend Sect, the sect master's secret chamber.

Liu Tianxing tremblingly compiled the sect's daily affairs into a booklet.

Including the mining progress of the spirit stone veins, the detailed revenue of Ash Town for the day, and the cultivation progress of several inner sect disciples.

He respectfully placed this thick document into a hidden compartment in the corner of the secret chamber.

Then, he backed out.

Two o'clock in the morning.

Shen Fei appeared in the secret chamber like a ghost.

He picked up the document from the hidden compartment and quickly flipped through it.

The resources of the Blood Fiend Sect were continuously flowing into several anonymous storage bags he had designated, in a covert manner.

His current identity was the lowliest handyman.

But in reality, he was the true master of this mountain.

Shen Fei flipped to the last page of the document.

That was a list of abnormal disciples that Liu Tianxing had compiled according to his request.

There were seven people on the list.

Shen Fei's gaze paused on one of the names for three seconds.

Meng Chuan. Inner Sect Disciple. Mid-stage Foundation Establishment.

Anomaly Description: Three months ago, this person's cultivation was only at the eighth level of Qi Condensation. After returning heavily injured from an external sect mission, his cultivation advanced by leaps and bounds, breaking through two minor realms in three months. Moreover, his combat style shows obvious differences from our sect's cultivation methods.

Shen Fei's finger tapped lightly on the name Meng Chuan.

Three months, breaking through two realms in a row.

Returning heavily injured, with a drastic change in cultivation methods.

This vibe was far too familiar.

Either the guy had been possessed by an old monster, or he had stumbled upon some heaven-defying fortuitous encounter.

"Interesting."

Shen Fei put the list away.

He didn't go looking for this Meng Chuan right away.

The prey had already appeared in his sights. As a villain, he had more than enough patience to wait until his prey was fattened up before going for the kill.

Shen Fei left the secret chamber.

He didn't return to that dilapidated thatched hut in the handyman quarters.

Instead, he made his way to the Blood Fiend Sect's library pavilion.

This place housed the cultivation manuals, ancient texts, and records of the Upper Realm that the sect had collected over generations.

For a newly ascended, unregistered nobody, information was far more valuable than spirit stones.

Using the Sect Master's token, Shen Fei easily bypassed the restrictions on the library's highest floor.

He spent the entire night there.

He flipped through hundreds of ancient texts detailing the law system of the Upper Realm.

Finally, within a tattered book titled the Taixu Manuscript, he found a crucial passage.

The laws of the Upper Realm are as vast as the sea. Ascenders are suppressed by them, truly trapped by a 'Providence Barrier.'

To break this barrier, brute force is useless. One must devour providence of the same origin, using this providence to wash over the laws, in order to tear open a gap and regain one's true self.

Shen Fei closed the manuscript.

A flash of enlightenment crossed his pitch-black eyes.

Providence Barrier.

Devour providence of the same origin.

This not only explained why his cultivation had been suppressed at the Great Perfection of the Qi Condensation realm.

It also pointed out the most critical direction for the next evolutionary stage of his Heaven Devouring Demonic Art.

Murdering for treasure and absorbing cultivation could only temporarily loosen the barrier.

If he wanted to completely shatter the suppression and return to the Golden Core realm...

He had to hunt down those Children of Destiny who were blessed with massive amounts of providence!

He would swallow their providence right along with their lives!

Early morning.

The first ray of sunlight pierced through the windows of the library pavilion.

Shen Fei returned the manuscript to its original place.

He walked out of the library, changed back into his dirt-stained handyman uniform, picked up an iron hoe, and headed toward the spirit fields in the back mountain.

A new day at the Blood Fiend Sect had begun.