Rivers of the Night

The elders landed by the desecrated grave and fell into silence. Grand Elder Macie clenched her fists, but she could only stand to the side as they all waited for Elder Dezend to finish his analysis.

"… Odd…"

After several minutes, Elder Dezend of the Resonate Eye Sect finally spoke, the eye tattoo on his forehead slowly dimming as the light of Mana it was radiating chilled.

"What have you sensed, Elder Dezend?" Grand Elder Macie asked quickly.

"It's as the child from earlier said. There is a severe lack of Dark Mana in a long line leading downward. Her analysis was correct, and you raised a good disciple. But beyond this, I've noticed something else that's odd. The distribution of Water Mana is also peculiar."

"What do you mean?" Macie's heart clenched.

"On the surface, there's no issue. The distribution is about right. But, it's not natural. It's akin to the difference between allowing clothing to dry in a bundle rather than laying them out flat first. Not only that, but it was a rapid drying, at that. There isn't the same smooth distribution of evaporation. It looks like someone tried to mimic it to the best of their ability. It would have fooled any normal senses, but mine…"

There was a flash of sneering pride in Elder Dezend's eyes. Indeed, someone weaker wouldn't have noticed, but he did.

Elder Dezend was correct. In order to make it through the earth, Theron had first saturated the earth with Water Mana to ease his path of moving through it. That had expelled the Dark Mana by leaving no room for it, and then he pushed the muddy earth around him in relation to himself before pulling the Water Mana out to do it again.

However, every time he did this, he had left a little Water Mana behind on purpose. He knew that if he left no Water Mana at all, in the unlikely case that they did find out he had dug up Sadie's corpse, he would immediately be pegged as a Water Mancer, which he didn't want.

He didn't know the distribution of Mancers on this planet just yet, but it was safe to assume that it heavily skewed toward Dark Mancers. Back then, he hadn't thought to use the Mandate Core just yet, so he didn't want to too easily expose his Mancy Path.

But now, it seemed he had anyway.

As intelligent as Theron was, it was impossible for him to perfectly mimic nature. Earth needed years to settle down, reaching a perfect balance of permeability, erosion, and evaporation to decide its water content.

Those natural ebbs and flows would have taken too much time for Theron to perfectly replicate, so he settled for "close enough." Unfortunately, this had ended up exposing him nonetheless.

"If I'm correct, the one we are dealing with is a Water Mancer. Not only this, but judging by the limited scope of their abilities, they are at best a Gold Mancer.

"They were unable to try and mimic the Dark Mana, too. In which case, it's likely that they are using a Mancy Talisman, one capable of hiding the true aura of their path. Considering I didn't sense anything outside of the norm when I swept over the Sect just now, this is most definitely a high-class Mancy Talisman, almost certainly of the Divine Law tiers."

As Elder Dezend continued to speak, while his pride was very much still there, he was also growing more solemn. The others could feel it too because there was only one explanation for all of this.

"I'm afraid that… we are not dealing with a normal Demon Soldier, fellow daoists. If I'm correct, this is a Chosen Demon, one that directly suppressed the Heart Demon of the Demon Corps' Path and transcended immediately. They are weak, but they are far more dangerous for reasons I'm sure you know…"

A Chosen Demon was immune to the Heart Demon of the Demon Corps, or at least fiercely resistant to it.

Because of this, they were monsters on a whole other level. That was because they could gain the benefits of the Demon Corps at the lowest levels. This made their foundations far sturdier, and more important than any of that…

They almost always had the backing of a Demon Soldier of the highest levels. At that point, you couldn't call them Demon Soldiers any longer, you could only call them Noble Demons.

Grand Elder Macie's expression lost all trace of color.

The Sect couldn't afford to affect the seedling of a Noble Demon. If they did that, there would only be death awaiting them. Such existences wouldn't appear easily, but if their benefits were trampled on, they were known to lash out viciously.

Patriarch Nightingale likewise had a solemn expression. Looking at the grave somewhat sadly, he wondered if they should let this matter go for the sake of the Sect's survival.

However, after a moment, he had a thought.

"There is something that we are missing," he suddenly said.

Macie looked toward him with a trace of hope.

"The Demon Corps is ruthless. Their Chosen are so fearsome only because of the trials they are put through, but the challenge of our Sect isn't very high.

"I have heard of Chosen forced to face challenges on the order of Elder Titans and Voidwroughts. We do not even touch the level of Primal. If there is a Noble Demon involved, I would hazard a guess that it's one of the lowest-level Noble Demons, one that might only faintly touch the levels of Demon Lord."

The eyes of the various elders flashed.

Indeed. Every Chosen needed to pass a trial. You could measure their value and who backed them by how difficult this challenge was. The Patriarch's analysis was sound.

"If it is a Demon Lord… while our Sects cannot deal with such a powerhouse, the Hall of Ice and Heart can. In fact, we might be greatly rewarded for successfully luring such a Demon Lord into a trap.

"If we alert the Hall of Ice and Heart of our findings, and can manage to trap this young Demon Chosen, then we can kill three birds with a single stone."

Revenge for Sadie.

A decisive blow to the Demon Corps.

And rewards for their efforts.

At that moment, an amulet on Macie's chest suddenly lit up. Her disciple was contacting her.