Daily life of a cultivation judge

Yang Qing went through everything about her founder, at least where it tied to her personal matters. The part about the founder's childhood, and how his twin sister once almost tried to murder him, he most definitely made sure to include. He felt it might shed some light on the founder's personality and what mattered to him, while also offering a little insight into how he might have reacted to what the Xia clan had done concerning the retainer clans.

Yang Qing believed that part of the reason Xia Huang and other Xia clansmen who were disciples of the Silver Crane Sect were able to follow through so easily on not interfering with clan affairs, even when they were on the brink of annihilation, had much to do with their understanding of the founder's personality. That was something they would have become aware of once they joined the Silver Crane Sect.

For someone like Xia Huang, however, he must have known the founder quite well even before joining the sect, since he was present when the founder was alive. Of all Xia clan members still living, there was probably no one who knew him better.

This was probably why, despite being a domain expert and a powerful one at that, and despite his important position in one of the most prominent peaks of the entire Silver Crane Sect, he did not intervene. Had he chosen to, with his ability and position he could very well have prevented the decline of the Xia Clan.

Had he decided to step in, no matter how aggrieved that rogue cultivator's son felt, he would have had to swallow his grievance and live with it unacted upon for the rest of his life, or at least until either he or the Cyan Crescent Kingdom that backed him grew to a point where they could effortlessly suppress the Silver Crane Sect, which, given what he had seen with the ancestral dragon vein, was likely never going to happen.

The Silver Crane Sect, in his humble opinion, was a slumbering dragon that had hidden its claws and its form well. Outwardly, the general information circulating was that they had no soul formation expert. But with that ancestral dragon vein and their historic foundation that traced back to an ancient powerhouse, Yang Qing might as well throw himself back into his mother's womb and live there for the rest of his life if he believed for even a second that the sect didn't have a soul formation expert. Given their foundation and history, even a blade of grass would have reached the soul formation realm with such accumulations, let alone a sect so filled with talented cultivators.

They most definitely had a soul formation expert within their ranks, and by his assumption, they had more than one. It wouldn't surprise him if it turned out they had a soul formation expert for each of their five main peaks. If that wasn't the case, he felt that at the very least—aside from the Silver Head Peak, where the sect's true power was concentrated and thus all but guaranteed to have a soul formation expert—the Silver Breath Peak, where he had been, also had high chances of harboring one. Its peak master, the Xia clan founder's master, was likely to be one.

That being the case, had Xia Huang—a member of his peak and a descendant of his disciple—decided to interfere in the Xia Clan's matter, could the Cyan Crescent Kingdom have stopped him? The fact that they sought his and the sect's permission before doing anything was proof of the weight Xia Huang and the sect held. And yet he didn't act. Why? The answer likely lay in the founder who had given them everything they had.

As such, Yang Qing did everything he could to unveil what he had learned about their founder to Xia Fang, framing it in a way that best expressed what the founder's stance might have been had he still been alive. He also wanted to show her that while what happened to her and her clan members was unfair, what happened to the Xia clan members of old was most definitely not. Those who took the celestial light hawthorn from that rogue cultivator's son were deserving of the misfortune that befell them. In the fight over a treasure, you had best be prepared to face the karmic weight that comes with it.

In a different life, maybe they get the celestial light hawthorn and the rogue cultivator's son dies, or some other tragedy befalls him that prevents him from stepping into the domain realm. With that, the massacre that befell them never happens. They get to keep the celestial light hawthorn trouble-free, their golden era doesn't get cut short, and who knows, maybe after some time, with accumulation and luck, the clan finally produces its very own domain expert that belongs to the clan, unlike Xia Huang, who belonged to the Silver Crane Sect.

With a domain expert at the helm, the clan could only go up from that point, their safety guaranteed for hundreds of thousands of years, provided they did not invite some unforeseen calamity. As for the retainer clans, their long-term scheme of vengeance would have had to be forfeited for good. They would have had to continue on as things were, with their heirloom artifacts and legacy locked away in the Xia clan's manor, as they burned incense daily to their founders in the hopes that having their heirlooms and legacy art taken was the worst thing they would have to endure.

Another scenario of how things could have played out for the Xia clan is if they had not taken the celestial light hawthorn, but instead, shown a rare emotion cultivators usually don't show when it comes to fighting over treasures—empathy. Empathy toward that domain expert's father. He knew it was only wishful thinking on his part. Given that the person was a rogue cultivator with a weaker cultivation base, it would have been easier to draw milk from a rock than to expect a clan of the Xia clan's stature to accommodate him.

But if they had, and let him leave with the flower, or reached a compromise—perhaps by splitting the celestial light hawthorn or offering him another way to treat the devouring lily phantom cauldron spider that had parasitized his wife—then the enmity sown that day would have been avoided. It might have even ended up with them establishing positive karma with a soon-to-be domain expert.

But alas, things didn't go that way. Whatever end they met, they had sown it themselves, and Yang Qing hoped his exposition of all he had uncovered would help Xia Fang understand that. Even if it would likely do little to comfort her or help her deal with the loss of her grandfather, or with Lai Hu's and the Lai clan's betrayal.

Though was it really betrayal, if they—like the others—had their heirloom taken by the Xia clan?