- Tie Clan - Beggar District -
"It's the eternal bane of every flourishing clan to have a location set up for the misfits of their clan."
The air was damp and moldy in Tie clan's Beggar District.
Most of the elders didn't like coming to this side of the clan. As for any clan, the only thing stronger than the image of strength is real strength.
Fake strength is incredibly useful. It increases unearned benefits, it makes protecting resource points a vacation, and it makes people look the other way whenever you do something less than agreeable.
However, that's where fake strength stopped; if others opened the curtains and revealed what was hidden inside, there was nothing to stop the wolves from taking the farmers sheep.
"It's a necessary but unwanted existence." Xie Ling's next words gained narrowed gazes from the elders.
One of the younger elders spoke up, "Might I ask what you mean by that?"
Turning his body to the side as he looked up with narrowed eyes, Xie Ling replied, "Every group strives to reach perfection, and as long as that's happening, there will inevitably be those that straggle behind. Let's say your clan was ten times stronger than you are now; there would still be people like this." He raised his hand to point at a beggar picking his teeth with one of his toenails, causing the elders to frown at the sight.
Stroking his beard, one of the elders on the older side asked, "But why does that make it necessary?"
A smile grew along Xie Ling's lips as heavy pressure began to exude from him. "The only way to make sure a youth grows into everything the clan wants him to be is by pushing him to his limits. The strong-willed youths will survive the pushing, while the weak-willed ones will give up on themselves. Naturally, all clans want to make full use of all their youths, but in order for that to work, they would have to push a majority of the youths less and less hard until the weakest youth can participate; however, by doing that, those that could have been pushed harder with the chance of becoming mighty dragons will now only ever get to the level of a tiger, because no one ever pushed them in fear of losing the birds from the hawks."
His hand then rose to point at one of the elders. "Tie Gui - the Unshakeable. Your title comes from when you faced off against a rank-4 Enchantment Path Gu Master when you, yourself, were only rank-3. Forgive me if I'm wrong, but your teacher was Mai Tai, an external elder whose main focus on training was the mind, where he would intentionally put his students through tempting situations."
Tie Gui lightly nodded his head in confirmation, "That is indeed correct."
"And you, Tie Lau - the Burdened Tiger. Your title came from when you revealed a mole inside Tie clan. Shuang Yu - The Long Tongued Serpent, known for his forked tongue that always sounded righteous, however, in reality, held hundreds of traps hidden in disguise."
Tie Lau slightly narrowed his eyes before nodding his head like Tie Gui. "Thank you for the compliment."
Before even coming here, Xie Ling knew the same tricks that he used on the Xiong clan wouldn't work with Tie clan; however, he wasn't worried; in his lifetime, he's been under the watch of hundreds of shrewd and discerning eyes, each more meticulous than the last:
Well-aged yakuza groups with even more aged methods in separating the wheat from the chaff; ancient tribes living in the Amazon Rain Forest, where one would swear that their very soul was bare naked before them; and hidden beasts living in the mountains with instincts as sharp as a needle.
So why did Xie Ling pick this clan out of the rest? Because they were actually well accommodating towards their external elders. Granted, compared to Shang Clan's open employment of Demonic Gu Masters, Tie clan seemed like old stooges stuck in tradition, as only those with a clean history could hope to become an elder of Tie clan. But it would be a mistake to assume that meant they were unaccommodating to external elders.
Most clans hated diluting their bloodline with external elders because their value over bloodline was like a drunk man's obsession over alcohol. Tie clan was different; while they did value bloodline, they were world-renowned for their bravery, unwavering determination, and iron-cold justice. As such, they were not only lenient towards external Gu Masters but also quite accepting. As long as the Gu Master's wool was without spots, they could join the herd. It was a real shame that there were so few lone Gu Masters with a clean past.
Looking around, Xie Ling noticed a beggar hunched over in a peculiar manner. He felt something about the beggar that was vaguely familiar, but he couldn't quite put his finger on it.
After a few seconds of trying to remember, he realized that the elders were patiently waiting for him. quickly he corrected his silence: "The very act of pushing oneself shows that we believe in something better, and by seeing others not push themselves, we realize just how easily we too could have fallen. Only when we notice that something is worse and choose the path of betterment can we truly call ourselves good. A person who does good without knowing how to live on the other side is just naive, no different than a domesticated wolf saying it will let a sheep go free. The reason the wolf doesn't eat the sheep is because he doesn't know a sheep is made of meat, not because he's being kind or nice."
All the elders nodded their heads in approval.
Most, if not all, the elders already knew deeply about the difference between naive kindness and a righteous heart, but there was just something about how Xie Ling's spoke that made his words feel like they held more meaning.
Tie clan focused heavily on raising their Gu Masters mentally. All the best detectives often found their target by trying to get into the mind of their target, understanding how a Demonic Gu Master thinks, in order to catch a Demonic Gu Master. That's why their nods were those of approval rather than understanding. Just as Xie Ling used this tour around Tie clan to show off the character of a wise man, so did the elders of Tie clan use this tour as an opportunity to understand and test Xie Ling's character.
Bending down, Xie Ling picked up a rock and placed it inside one of his claws.
- Half An Hour Later - Tie clan - Rock Gambling Den -
As Xie Ling looked at the sign above the building, he muttered the words, "Give strong drink to the one who is perishing and wine to those in bitter distress; let them drink and forget their poverty and remember their misery no more."
Taking his first step inside the establishment, he thought of the many weaknesses of man: old age, starvation, freezing temperatures; however, the most dangerous of them all would have to be 'one's own mental state'. What separates men from beasts is how they can plan for the future.
To a beast, their emotions are reality, but man can supersede such things and accept that there is a higher reality behind their narrow scope of reality. Nonetheless, man isn't immune to such things. "Just as a beast's reality is its emotions, so too will there be times when a human will reach their breaking point and revert to nothing more than a beast. One is either lorded over by their emotions or lord over their emotions."
However, the same couldn't be said about Shi Zhe - the Predator. That thing 'lived-to-live'. While he was more than capable of plotting, he would only do that if he had nothing else to do. "A miserable beast who's controlled by his own hedonistic desires."
Upon entering the tent, the owner of the establishment, a rank-4 Gu Master, instantly made his way to Xie Ling and the elders. As one of the bigger business owners in Tie clan, how could he not be aware of Tie clan's biggest guest?
Considering that Tie clan is one of, if not the most upright clan within the southern border, it may seem counterintuitive that a gambling den should be a major enterprise inside the clan.
That, however, would be due to the myth that gambling dens are a place where wealthy men become impoverished men and virtuous men become wicked men. On Earth, such things were commonplace, but in this world, the only person who could utilize a rock gambling den was a Gu Master, the type of person who knew that if they went to far in wasting their funds, they would be dead within a week. To most Gu Masters, gambling was nothing more than a small entertainment.
The moment Xie Ling stepped into Tie clan, he's been trying to give off a strong image that will increase his chances of getting a more than adequate position in Tie clan; the five heads and claws adorned across his body displayed high levels of competence; his poem and actions at the Market District exuded mystery; his playfulness and openness at the Whispering Forest made him appear more youthful; his words at the Beggar District displayed wisdom beyond his years; and now at Tie clan's Rock Gambling den, he was going to make people think his luck was reasonably above average.