Cultivation begins in Qingfeng Market.

Dealing with the Yan family's affairs is facing considerable resistance; interpersonal relationships are the most troublesome aspect.

The Yan family has been operating within the sect for nearly nine hundred years, and their relationships are deeply intertwined.

The moment the results of the expeditionary force's handling of the matter were reported back to the sect, messages of pleas for leniency poured in from all sides.

Some of these relationships stem from a sense of shared fate, others from vested interests, and still others are simply kinship ties.

Even two Nascent Soul cultivators sent messages pleading for mercy, and these messages were sent one after another to Lin Zhao's cave.

Lin Zhao handed all this information over to Zhao Kun.

This is simply part of the Enforcement Hall's duties.

The Enforcement Hall has experience in handling these kinds of matters.

Zhao Kun led a hundred Foundation Establishment disciples and several Core Formation masters transferred from the sect.

They forcefully suppressed all the turmoil caused by pleading, pressure, and underhanded sabotage.

The Yan family boasts more than ten Core Formation cultivators, but only a portion of them truly belong to the core bloodline of the Yan family.

Including those who died during the expedition, the Yan family still has seven Core Formation cultivators left.

Five Core Formation cultivators were captured, two were spared, and one was the one who had secretly cooperated with Lin Zhao.

Another Core Formation cultivator was somewhat unexpected; decades ago, he had secretly passed on information about the Yan family to the Enforcement Hall.

The sect already knew that the Yan family patriarch was one of the original members of the Tribulation Cultivator Alliance.

This expedition is the sect's last chance to atone for the Yan family's sins.

These two Core Formation cultivators preserved the last spiritual peak of the Yan family.

The other four, with Blazing Flame Peak as the leader, were all taken back by the sect.

More than a thousand Foundation Establishment disciples within the sect and those connected to the Yan family were implicated, and over two hundred Foundation Establishment cultivators were captured in the expeditionary force.

The soldiers on the expedition were filled with anxiety.

Some people privately called Lin Zhao "the living Yama," saying that although the expeditionary force suffered before he arrived, at least they all died gloriously in battle, and no one was taken away by the Enforcement Hall.

But this is only the beginning.

The Enforcement Hall began investigating the illegal activities of the Expeditionary Force over the past two decades.

The enforcement personnel brought by Zhao Kun did not arrive recently; they had been preparing long before Lin Zhao arrived at the Crimson Nether Mountains.

For the past six months, I've been secretly collecting various pieces of evidence.

This is the moment they've been waiting for—to finish off the Robber Alliance.

The results of the investigation gradually came to light.

Misappropriation of supplies is a minor offense.

Intercepting spoils of war and embezzling spirit stones for the relief efforts are still considered minor offenses.

They framed and slandered others, using expeditionary missions as a pretext to eliminate dissidents.

They ambushed and killed their colleagues, and some even used secret techniques to control the expeditionary force's cultivators, turning them into puppets.

Some of these things were instigated by the Yan family, while others were done by various forces within the expeditionary force taking advantage of the chaos.

The previous victory masked a lot of information.

After twenty years of expeditions, far from the sect, the expeditionary force was already rotten to the core.

One by one, all sorts of dark things were unearthed, along with various pieces of evidence.

Although Lin Zhao had anticipated this, she was still shocked when she saw the jade slip evidence.

The Yan family bears a great deal of responsibility for the expeditionary force's poor state.

They were the ones who launched this expedition, dragging these 200,000 cultivators into a quagmire.

In the end, five Core Formation cultivators from the sect were taken away, while four affiliated Core Formation cultivators from the sect resisted and were killed on the spot.

The Foundation Establishment cultivators took three hundred with them.

There are 30,000 fewer Qi Refining cultivators.

The sect does not have disciples who practice Qi Refining; those are all affiliated forces and independent cultivators.

The Enforcement Hall shows some leniency towards sect disciples, but shows absolutely no leniency towards affiliated rogue cultivators. Those who should be crippled are crippled, and those who should be killed are killed without any mercy.

People come to see Lin Zhao every day at the entrance of his cave.

They wanted Lin Zhao to intervene and stop the Enforcement Hall's investigation, as Lin Zhao was the only one in the entire expeditionary force with that authority.

He is the highest-ranking officer of the expeditionary force appointed by the sect, and the Enforcement Hall must also report to him here.

He only needs to say one word to save many lives.

Lin Zhao didn't see a single one.

He has already given these people a chance.

He deliberately waited three months before setting off from the sect.

By leaking the information in advance, the expeditionary force was given time to deal with its own messes.

After arriving at the Expeditionary Force's Enforcement Hall, they waited another six months before taking action, making it nearly a year in total—quite a long time.

These people weren't unaware that the Enforcement Hall was conducting a secret investigation; they knew. They just felt that the law wouldn't punish everyone, and that the Expeditionary Force had fought for twenty years and, even if they hadn't achieved great merit, had at least endured hardship.

They didn't believe the Enforcement Hall would actually take action, or they believed they could get away with it.

As more and more people were taken away, Lin Zhao's reputation deteriorated rapidly.

Lin Zhao went from being worshipped after leading the cultivators to victory, to being turned into a living Yama after dealing with the Yan family, and now he has become a "jinx".

Some people say that as soon as he arrived, the Yan family was gone, and the Expeditionary Force was targeted by the Law Enforcement Hall.

It's better to die at the hands of a cultivator than to fall into the hands of the Enforcement Hall. The Enforcement Hall can't make things difficult for a dead person, can it?

Some people even began to miss the era of the Yan family, saying that although the Yan family patriarch was domineering, at least he protected his own, unlike Lin Zhao, who didn't even protect his own people.

They completely forgot that the Yan family had brought 200,000 Qi Refining cultivators and 3,000 Foundation Establishment cultivators with them on their expedition.

When Lin Zhao arrived, only half of the cultivators remained.

The other half of the cultivators died indirectly at the hands of the Yan family.

They also forgot that Lin Zhao led them to victory against the Tribulation Cultivator Alliance, reaping more spoils than in the previous twenty years combined.

Human nature is like this.

They elevate people to godlike status when needed, and trample them into the ground when not.

Lin Zhao put down the jade slip and looked at the chaotic rock forest below the cave.

"Don't test human nature."

He said something to himself, very softly.

Human nature is not worth testing; only self-interest can last.

Desire is endless—this was true of the cultivators in the expeditionary force, and it was no different for Lin Zhao.

Just then, Zhao Kun came to visit Lin Zhao.

Lin Zhao invited him in, and the two sat down to drink tea.

Zhao Kun sat down, took a sip of tea, and then handed over the jade slip containing the final decision on how the Enforcement Hall would handle the matter.

Lin Zhao was the highest-ranking officer in the expeditionary force, and according to procedure, all decisions had to be approved by him before they could be passed.

Lin Zhao placed the jade slip back on the table and said only one sentence: "I believe the outcome of the Enforcement Hall's decision."

Zhao Kun put the jade slip back into his storage bag, mentioning it as if it were nothing out of the ordinary.

Just as Lin Zhao had predicted, the Earth Flame Pool had re-condensed a True Earth Flame, but its grade was only third rank.

However, at the current rate of recovery, it would take hundreds of years for it to regain its status as a fourth-tier spiritual creature.

Then his tone changed again.

"Unfortunately, there is still a very crucial magical artifact that we haven't found at the fire pool."

Zhao Kun raised his eyes and looked at Lin Zhao: "How did the Fire Spirit Shield, the ancestral treasure of the Yan family, which was expected to be upgraded to a fourth-tier magic treasure, disappear?"

His tone remained calm. "This is the most important 'evidence' of the Yan family patriarch's unauthorized misappropriation of a fourth-tier spiritual item. How could it have simply disappeared?"

Lin Zhao held his teacup, seemingly admiring the tea leaves, and only spoke slowly after Zhao Kun finished speaking.

"It is common knowledge that the Yan family used a fourth-tier spiritual artifact. After all, the Fire Spirit Yuan Shield did not actually become a fourth-tier magic weapon, so it is not considered important evidence."

"If the Enforcement Hall really wants to find it, they should dig a little deeper under the fire pit; they might just find it there."

Lin Zhao took a sip of tea.

"Or perhaps, that shield was destroyed when the fourth-tier spirit creature self-destructed."

Lin Zhao looked up at Zhao Kun and said in a low voice, "What do you think, Senior Brother Zhao?"