The stairs leading down were twisting and lengthy. However, they were well maintained and appeared to be new. May stayed close to Peng, walking right behind him. Surprisingly, the place was well lit, either by candles or lanterns.

  “This place is bigger than it seems,” the boy commented briefly, and May nodded in agreement.

  “This is my first time here, but I can already tell that we have to be careful or we'll easily get lost.”

  Once they had descended, they found themselves facing dozens of doors and corridors. May preferred to avoid wasting hours looking for the way back. She basically wanted to leave unnoticed, so that no one from the estate would know she had been here in the first place.

  No one had officially forbidden her to enter, but she still preferred to avoid trouble.

  “This is where they keep the food.”

  They passed bags full of grains, but also jars of preserved vegetables. The cellar was deep underground and acted as a kind of natural refrigerator. The temperature was significantly lower than on the surface.

  “Huh, these cellars are bigger than my clan's entire estate,” Chen commented. “This food would last for one person for the rest of their life.”

  “Strange, no one lives here, so I don't know why they need so much food,” May replied, looking around. “In case of a crisis?”

  “Most likely. In the event of a drought or famine, everyone has to fend for themselves.” The boy looked through various jars of fruit. “Maybe no one lives in the clan's estate itself, but you know... The Yun clan is the largest in the entire sect. Hundreds of people from the family live in the sect's main Inner Court base.”

  May listened with interest, as she herself had no idea about this. The boy was quite knowledgeable after all. It was probably an advantage of growing up in a large clan.

  “Let's keep going. We're not going to find a sword in the storerooms.”

  “Maybe, but I'd rather not get lost here,” said May. “Let's always go through the door furthest to the right, that way we won't get lost.”

  “Good idea.”

  They had to move forward, unless they wanted to spend the rest of the day watching another collection of food.

  Finally, the smell of canned food disappeared, and the cellars changed their character. However, it looked like a regular junk storage room.

  Old horse saddles, tattered clothes, and muddy shoes... Nothing but trash.

  But they kept going. It was quite unusual, a room filled with wooden chairs up to the ceiling, a room with something that looked like scary dolls, probably toys of the previous inhabitants, and other junk. From time to time, they heard noises, most likely shuffling.

  “Just a storage room,” May said briefly. “Nothing worth paying attention to.”

  “I expected it to be, how should I put it, more exciting,” the boy said with a sigh.

  May rolled her eyes, expecting this. No one in their right mind would keep their family sword in the basement.

  May was about to tell Peng that they should go back when he found something unusual.

  “May! Look at this,” he shouted to her from behind another door.

  She approached him with interest. The boy was standing by a large steel door. It was quite abnormal.

  “They’re locked.”

  “I see. So what?”

  “What do you mean? You didn't think the sword would be out in the open, did you? And those doors... Big, heavy, and unbreakable. In short, the room must contain something valuable. Do you see where I'm going with this?” said Peng Chen.

  May rolled her eyes.

  “Yes. But as you said, it's unbreakable. How are you going to open it? We don't have a key. And if the sword is really there, there must be some security measures in place.”

  “Security measures? You mean some kind of formation?” The boy was surprised. In a world without cameras and surveillance, formations were used for defense, which were basically capable of everything that earthly technology could do. The only difference was the price. The production of even a single formation was absurd.

  “Yes, something like that. Such a valuable sword is definitely not just sitting behind that door.” She said, a little afraid of what Peng was going to do.

  “I think you're being a little hysterical. Who would be so foolish as to break into the Yun Clan's estate? It would be a death sentence,” he said, cocking his head toward her.

  “Aren't you going to break in there yourself?” she asked, narrowing her eyes.

  “That's different. We're not breaking in. You live here, and I'm a guest. Besides, we just want to see the sword, not steal it.”

  Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

  “Well, maybe so, but I think...”

  “You're thinking too much. Watch and learn, young lady.”

  Aren't we the same age...?

  The boy grabbed the door frame, and May heard the screech of metal. He ripped the door off its hinges and pushed it aside! May was shocked. She doubted she could do something like that with her own strength, and her strength stat was 17!

  “You... What stage of cultivation are you at?” she asked, slightly stunned.

  The boy looked at her as if nothing had happened, then replied indifferently.

  “Late Stage 6 of Qi Refinement,” he said briefly, then entered the room in front of him.

  Not only is he a whole stage ahead of me, but he's also already at Late stage... La Xia wasn't joking when he talked about the twins, I've never met anyone my age at a higher stage of cultivation.

  May felt strange. She had the system, access to unavailable pills, elixirs, and items, but she was still inferior to someone who had no cheats?

  Admittedly, my funds were limited and I didn't have the opportunity to use the system to its fullest, but still…

  “What about your sister?” May suddenly asked.

  “Her? She's at the same stage as me,” he replied. “Can we focus on what's ahead of us? Follow me.”

  The corridor stretched out before them. May, however, was still more preoccupied with the new information about the person in front of her than with the new room itself.

  At this age, being at stage 5 already means being a genius, but they are at stage 6? Both of them? At this rate, after joining Cloud Academy, they will be at stage 7 at the age of only 10? That's an absurd pace. After all, at Eastern Court Academy, some of the weaker teachers were at that stage...

  May began to wonder what this meant. Were they a rare talent that only comes along once in a hundred thousand? Or perhaps a one in a million talent? She didn't know herself, she had nothing to compare it to. She only knew her own talent, but she already knew that these twins were a level, maybe two levels above her in terms of talent.

  “May, are you okay?” the boy finally asked. “You've turned quiet.”

  “It's nothing. Peng, we should go back. We shouldn't be here.”

  What was she doing anyway? She was a grown woman, playing in basements like a little kid. It was frivolous, not to mention the potential consequences. She lost the desire to continue exploring and wanted to go back.

  “Are you scared? Come on.” He said, walking through another door. “I'm not leaving here until...” He didn't finish his sentence because he fell to the ground.

  May screeched softly and quickly ran to him. He was lying unconscious on the ground. She slightly panicked but quickly put him in a safe position and bent down, putting her ear to his chest to see if he was breathing. Fortunately, everything seemed to be fine except for the fact that he was currently unconscious.

  What happened to him? People at the 6th stage of Qi Refinement don't just faint like that.

  As soon as she raised her head, she saw a long black sword hanging in the middle of the wall in the distance. It was completely black with no hint of any other color. May swallowed hard and stood up.

  She sensed someone else's presence in the room. A shiver ran through her body. However, the feeling was familiar; she had experienced something similar some time ago.

  She already had her suspicions about who this person was. However, she was not particularly pleased about this encounter.

  “Sect Leader?” she said quietly, speaking to the empty room.

  However, no one answered her; it seemed as if no one else was there but her.

  Oh yes, I forgot. Without Izzy's spiritual abilities, I am unable to physically communicate with the former sect leader. I can only detect her presence, but talking to her is beyond my abilities.

  She still couldn't be a hundred percent sure that it was the former sect leader, now a spirit, but she believed it to be the most logical explanation. After all, the estate where she currently stayed belonged to the clan she descended from, so it wasn't strange for her to be here. The only problem was that she currently had no way of contacting her.

  May moved closer to the sword, still sensing the presence of some kind of entity, but it didn't seem like she could do anything.

  The sword suddenly began to vibrate, barely noticeable, but it didn't escape her attention. May watched closely.

  Did it want her to touch it?

  May wasn't sure if it was appropriate, but the closer she got, the more it vibrated. Soon she was standing right in front of the sword. She reached out her hand toward it. She hesitated.

  But something pushed her, some kind of impulse. She touched the Black Wasp.

  “Touching the legendary sword of the sect, you really have some nerve, lass.” She heard a familiar voice behind her.

  As she thought, it was Lin Yun, the spirit. It had been a long time since they last met.

  “I can see you...” she said quietly. “How is that possible?”

  “This sword is the source. It connects me to this world,” she said, looking at the sword. “By touching it, you established a direct connection.”

  May nodded, though she didn't fully understand how it worked.

  “What happened to him?” she asked, looking at the unconscious boy. She suspected it was her doing, but she didn't know why she had done it.

  “I don't need strangers hanging around here. So I put him to sleep,” she said.

  She was intrigued. Last time, she didn't seem to have very strong abilities. Could it have something to do with this sword? Perhaps she had to be close to this so-called source in order to use her full power? It was impossible to say for sure.

  May looked at the ghost. She was still just as disturbing. She looked almost human, but not quite. There was something about her that gave May the creeps. Subconsciously, she felt a great sense of fear.

  “Why didn't you do that to me?” May asked.

  “I was going to. But I changed my mind,” she said, pacing around the room. “After all, it's my fault you're here in the first place.”

  “Yes, I have to thank you for that, leader,” she said sincerely.

  To tell the truth, it saved her a lot of trouble. The Inner Court was much better than her previous place of residence. Plus, she got to live in a huge mansion? She couldn't have asked for anything better.

  “I need you alive. Don't flatter yourself, I did it for my own benefit. Those parasites... This is just the beginning,” she said with slight irritation. “The very thought that you could have been killed by those stupid worms irritated me terribly.”

  “The beginning?”

  “Don't worry about it. It concerns things that those at the top should be concerned about.”

  But it's hard not to worry about it. It doesn't sound too good.

  “You'd better tell me what you're planning. Ze Yun made you an offer, didn't he?” she asked.

  “Yes... But he wants to take me as his disciple because you ordered him to, didn't you?” May was surprised by her question. After all, she was the one behind it all.

  “I can't order him to do anything. I can only ask him,” she replied. “So? What are you going to do?”