Chapter 855: Sentence given (32)

Song Ba hurriedly cleared his thoughts of the potential undercurrents of the Red Maple Empire. To him, if he was asked, he could only say the Empire brought that fate on themselves by choosing to maintain an ambiguous relationship with the Golden Bamboo Pavilion. 

If they outright committed themselves as a true and proper subordinate, instead of an allied partner like they tried to portray then the Pavilion would likely treat them as it did them. Its subsidiaries had no shortage of shops owned by talented cultivators with the top leading ones having already reached at least the middle to the late stages of the palace realm.