After introductions, the conversation drifted all over without a specific topic. The Sacred Daughters spoke about their likes and dislikes. They gossiped about their preferences in men as well as talented and famous acolytes. They also chatted about specific cultivation paths of the order that interested them the most.
Long Yifei became well acquainted with all of the ladies at her table. She wasn’t one to burn bridges unless absolutely necessary. She even accepted Wei Shuangshuang’s offer of friendship despite the woman’s personality. And aside from the outspoken heiress, she was the most prominent one at their table due to her effortless beauty.
The banquet eventually ended and everyone went off to bed. All the Sacred Daughters had their own dormitory room which was scattered around the main building. Acolytes weren’t allowed in the dorms except for the Sacred Daughters they were associated with. Even then, they were not allowed to visit for the first two weeks so that the newcomers could focus on their studies. This was still a school and the order wanted the students to have good start to the school year without distractions.
The next day, Long Yifei started her classes, following the schedule that had been placed in her room. It was held in a large lecture hall inside one of the white monolithic buildings that lined the main boulevard. The seats were in a concave formation that faced a central stage and increased in height after every row so that everyone would be able to see.
Long Yifei arrived early and picked out the best seat in the center, on the fourth row. Newcomers steadily flowed in. Her tablemates from the banquet found her and sat around her. By the time the bell rang, most of the seats were taken and over a hundred pretty faces stared eagerly at the empty stage.
An immortal aura swept into the room, followed by a tall lithe woman who glided across the floor like a dancer. Her wavy brown hair fluttered behind even though there was no wind. There seemed to be a musical hum in the air even though nobody was making a sound.
The prioress walked up to the center of the small raised stage and began to speak, “New Sacred Daughters of the Virtuous Order, welcome to your first class, Introduction to the Four Classics. I will be your instructor, Prioress of the Order, Immortal Winter Hymn Xuan Xina. Let’s get started.”
She took out a small scroll of notes and opened it up, “The four classics. They are the four foundations of womanly virtues. They exemplify everything about what it means to be a woman; to be feminine, elegant, refined, beautiful. Experts and peerless female cultivators throughout the history of mankind have delved into all kinds of immortal Daos and emerged with these four classics. These four are the most powerful, most effective ways a woman can cultivate.”
“The first is song and dance. Singing, utilizing our voices bestowed by the heavens to turn words into melody, cultivates our mind and our spirit. Songs can have all kinds of wondrous effects. It can heal a person's mind who has suffered hardship or it can strike down an enemy without even the need to get close to them. It can instill hope, draw out deeply hidden emotions, it can even help others cultivate and achieve breakthroughs.”
“Dance is the other part of the first classic. It is utilizing our natural bodies, training them, honing our movements to the utmost. Dance can have similar effects to song, letting those who see our dances receive similar benefits. But different from singing, dancing is also a powerful martial art. It creates some of the strongest fighters of the Order who can go blow for blow with the best cultivators of the continent, including men.”Xuan Xina went on the explain the other three classics in great detail. Some of the students took notes while others committed everything to memory. Long Yifei had already studied the four classes under the tutorship of two Prioresses but she still paid attention to every word.
The second classic was music. It dealt with music that was produced by all kinds of musical instruments including the zither, erhu, pipa, guqin, flute, and bells. Singing wasn’t considered a part of this second classic because it was a natural product of the human body.
Music was far more versatile because of this fact. Instruments could be made from all kinds of materials to imbue various fantastical properties to the music that one produced. It could heal, it could support, it could defend, and it could also attack. A member of the order wielding a trumpet made from the thigh bone of a flame demon had just as fearsome flame abilities as any other cultivator that followed the Dao of flames. Another who played a guqin made from the heartwood of a tree of life could produce tremendous healing spiritual energy unparalleled in the world.
Music was versatile but it was also expensive. It was highly dependent on one’s instrument how far one could progress. It was thus a popular classic among the legacy students and those whose acolytes had deep pockets.
The third classic was literature. This was the intellectual pursuit that was the polar opposite of music. Those that specialized in literature studied ancient tomes and classical poetry. They tried to seek truths and understanding of the world from the greats of the past. They also sought to create new works by writing their own poems and novels.
The benefits this classic provided were a bit more ambiguous but they were no doubt powerful. These members of the order were the smartest of them all. They could provide wise counsel to their acolytes, help them solve difficult problems where brute force was useless. They could use their comprehension ability to help understand the intricacies and mysteries behind a particularly difficult bottleneck. They could also pass on their amazing comprehension and intelligence to their offspring, allowing them a massive advantage.
Long Yifei couldn’t help but think of Zhou Ziyun. Her master’s second disciple was a prickly woman, highly susceptible to jealousy, and their relationship was almost nonexistent. But Long Yifei had to admit that Zhou Ziyun’s mind was something of a revelation. If she was still a virgin, she would definitely have been able to join the Order simply based on her potential in the third classic.
The lecture finished with the fourth classic which was art. Art included everything outside of the written word or music that could be created by human imagination. It had a variety of forms including paintings, sculptures, flower arrangements, textiles, and even ceramics. It was anything that could be created by hand, infused with the creator’s intent, their energy, and their dreams. It was also on par with music in its versatility and its benefits were far too numerous to be described in detail.
These four classics, song and dance, music, literature, and art, were the four pillars of the Virtuous Order of Chunzhen. They were what built the Order from the ground up many thousands of years ago. Each one represented the epitome of womanly virtue. By training in these classics, the Sacred Daughters would learn what it meant to be a woman; their beliefs, their values, how they should conduct themselves in the world, and how they should treat their men, their acolytes.
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