Four hours quickly passed by before the time came for Yang Qing, Yi Jie, and Feng Xin to go back to work. Due to how fluid an inquisitor's job was they never kept exact hours for their jobs. There were cases that would leave them on duty for almost one week straight with no break and there were cases that only took half a day for them to get all the pertinent information they would need before the matter is submitted to the judge they're attached to.
While Yang Qing and Yi Jie were already in the courtroom starting on the pile of cases for the day, Feng Xin had a few hours to kill before he would be needed for another case. He used that time to liquidate some of his assets i.e. some of the spirit beasts he slaughtered from the green fog region such as the iron shot frog, ice-beaked egret, corroding heron, and such. Some of his spoils such as the corroding heron was sold to one of the alchemists for a pretty good sum which he used to finally pay off some of his outstanding debts from some of the restaurants around and got delisted.
His final stop was the Thousand flavors restaurant. Unlike other places, this was the only place he had good credit and it was also the only place he sold a few parts of the green flowered babirusa. At the end of the deal both he and the manager of the restaurant left with pleased looks on their faces.
…
Much to Yang Qing's delight the cases that he had during the day were much less cumbersome than the prior day's cases. One of the cases was a prince who tried to dine and dash in a rank 4 restaurant within his kingdom however things did not go as planned as his guards were swiftly defeated when they tried to force their way out. To avoid any further troubles the restaurant decided to bring the matter to the Order rather than settle it with the kingdom. In the restaurant owner's mind, he wondered if a prince acted this wantonly what about the king? Rather than risk it they would rather throw the hot potato the Order's way and ensure their safety.
The next case was a groom suing his wife for lying about her age. The groom was a seventh-stage core formation expert while the bride was a tenth-stage core formation expert. While the bride seemed to be the stronger of the two based solely on cultivation bases but in terms of potential the groom was miles ahead. He was just about 70 years old while his bride was close to 600 years. With core formation experts having a life expectancy of about 4,500 years, her age could be considered young considering she was at the late stages of the core formation realm.
When cultivators broke through to the core formation stage they could retain their youth form despite what age they are. Some cultivators choose to revert to their youth form when they were about 20 years or so while others choose to maintain a mature look of a person in the mid-40s to 50s while others don't mind their body showing their true age.
When it came to the groom and bride; the groom despite being 70 years had chosen to retain his youth as he resembled a young man in his early thirties while the bride decided to go the same route and retained her youth looks from when she was 30 years. She was a dashing beauty with a gentle and warm face. Age was about the only thing she changed as her looks were what she truly looked like when she was that age. However, she had lied to the man that she was 63 years old. It was only during the wedding when the groom was given an artifact that checks the true bone age of cultivators that he discovered his wife to be was almost ten times older than he was.
He was appalled when he discovered the situation. Of course, he aired his grievances, words were exchanged, and swords and talismans were drawn. At the end of it all, the groom suffered a beating from her brothers, father, grandfather, and great-grandfather of the bride. Not only him but even the guest who gave out the age bone-checking artifact was not forgotten for his part in all this. It was only due to the bride's plea that he survived with just a solid beating nothing else though it would still require a few months to heal.
The bride's family confiscated everything from the groom including the wedding gifts. The groom was originally a rogue cultivator while the bride was from a prominent rank 4 clan that had over forty core formation experts with her grandfather, great grandfather both being at the peak of the core formation stage.
It was also partly due to the bride's resources and his natural talents that he managed to reach his current realm.
Yang Qing had a bit of difficulty with the case because on one hand other than lying about her age the bride by the name of Li Mei did sincerely love the groom Hao Ren to the point she even used her own allotted resources to help support his cultivation.
The age lie came from fear and insecurities that Hao Ren would look down on her and leave for greater skies as for her she had spent most of her life cultivating as life passed her by till she decided she wanted to pursue something different and maybe start a family.
As for the groom Hao Ren, the age difference did shake him a bit as his wife-to-be was as old as his ancestor though the lie was what got to him and the beating he got from her family did little to help the situation. And also the family never treated him well. They always treated him with scorn and disdain due to his rogue status and lacking any backing whatsoever. It was only due to his talent that he had any leg up in the family. He only ever tolerated them because of Li Mei. But after the fiasco that happened on the wedding day he had sworn that he would never step into the Li family grounds. His association with them was over. Some part of him was even entertaining the idea of going back and giving the whole family a thorough beating when he reached the peak of the core formation stage. He had a quasi-blue core while most of the Li family had red and orange cores. In the same realm, he would be able to best them due to the advantage of the quality of his core.
In the end, Yang Qing ordered the family to pay his medical bills and give half the wedding presents to Hao Ren which the Li family head didn't like but had to go along with it. Though Li Mei's persuasion had a part to play in it.
Yang Qing also tried to convince Hao Ren to give Li Mei a chance as throughout the whole process it was evident how much she still loved him as she didn't even so much as contest a single thing.
Hao Ren after hesitating, in the end, agreed but only if Li Mei left her family and started over with him, to which she agreed.
With help from the Order they managed to resettle someplace far away from the Li clan territory.
As for the last case Yang Qing dealt with, it was even simpler as he only had to serve as a witness and officiator to a duel. Two rank 3 sects were fighting over ownership of a pseudo monarch rank treasure. None wanted to relent to the other and to prevent other sects from profiting from their all-out clash they decided to settle their dispute through an official life-and-death duel under the supervision of the Order.
To prevent wide-scale destruction brought about by cultivators fighting over treasures the Order created an official duel on their grounds to help reduce this risk.
Each sect would choose five cultivators and the rank or title of the cultivators didn't matter. The Order provided both the venue and standardized weapons to both sides to ensure the duel had a modicum of fairness.
The first to score three wins would be declared the winner. On normal occasions, it was usually straightforward since a winner would be produced within those five matches and sometimes it didn't even reach five but in this case, for some strange reason, the two sects had an almost indefinite tie as almost 15 cultivators from both sides ended up fighting.
Due to the severe losses both sects suffered as the majority of the 15 cultivators fielded by both parties were elders, the two sects decided that a merger between the two sects would be better. That way they could cover the losses they suffered by combining their numbers which would also help them guard against others who might have some ideas about the quasi-monarch stage artifact.
Since the Order also acts as witnesses and officiators in mergers when asked, the two sects decided to invoke the services of the Order at a fee of course. An agreement was made between the two sects and the Order to which Yang Qing was assigned as the arbiter to the merger. Though he would only be able to do the job only when he was officially a palace court judge as his current rank didn't allow him to supervise any mergers.
Luckily the two sects still needed time to sell the idea to the rest of the sect and put their affairs in order while Yang Qing's promotion ceremony and official induction were just a few days away.
….
The moment the last case ended Yang Qing bolted from the courtroom without even waiting for Yi Jie to chauffeur him home. He had a very important party to prepare for, the welcome party for Zhu Lao the dean of cultivation history and dissection also famously known for his creation of the gold-grade art, the shadow void steps.
All day Yang Qing had been counting down the hours till the end of his shift so he could rush to the party Meng Chao 'generously' invited him to.
