Rong Xuanhe had a hazy, indistinct dream.
In the dream, it seemed to be some sort of lantern festival. He was dressed in ancient attire, walking through a bustling crowd while white birds flew past his ears, guiding him all the way forward.
He walked and walked. The swaying lanterns gradually disappeared, and a towering ancient tree appeared before him.
The canopy almost blotted out the sky, blocking the daylight completely, with shade so thick it felt nearly exaggerated.
He had never seen a tree this large, so big it felt terrifying. It grew just like that amidst a narrow, deep valley, its branches and leaves luxuriant as though connecting heaven and earth.
Lying under the tree was a person dressed in red. Their face could not be seen, and they showed no reaction to his arrival.
Rong Xuanhe stepped forward and gently patted them. The temperature beneath his fingers was ice-cold and biting, like a corpse.
He was startled by this thought. The next instant, the person suddenly sat up, tilted their head, and flashed a grin at him while bleeding from all seven facial orifices.
A pair of icy hands grabbed Rong Xuanhe in a death grip. Terrified, he tried desperately to shake them off, but no matter what he did, he could not break free.
The young man retreated step after step, and upon raising his head in panic, he discovered that four large characters had somehow appeared on the tree trunk.
A leaf before the eyes blocks the view of Mount Tai.
The dead person’s hands gripped tighter and tighter. Finally, Rong Xuanhe screamed in terror: “Let go! Let go already! I don’t want to be a scapegoat, ahhhhh!”
Amidst his panicked screams, a new voice rang out in his mind.
Transfer group evaluation passed. Connecting to the “Pre-marriage, Post-love” system.
The “Pre-marriage, Post-love” system is at full capacity. Transfer failed, switching groups.
Beep-boop! Hello, dear host. The Substitute System is very glad to serve you!
“Let go!”
Rong Xuanhe was far too terrified to hear what the system had said, only caring about wailing loudly and flailing his hands.
As a result, as he thrashed about, he actually tore the dead person’s hand right off.
He froze for a second, then screamed even louder.
“Wuwuwu, I’m begging you, please let go, okay? I’m really so scared wuwuwu. I’ll help you find the murderer, alright? I didn’t mean to actually pull your hand off.”
So frightened that snot and tears streamed down his face, the young man shivered for a long while before belatedly realizing that the corpse was no longer moving.
Enduring his fear, he cautiously pried open the hand wrapped around his wrist.
One finger, two fingers. Just as the very last finger was peeled off, the hand violently flipped over and grabbed him again!
“Ah!”
Rong Xuanhe let out a heaven-shaking shriek, scaring himself into hugging whatever was closest.
“What are you screaming about?”
A deep male voice sounded right beside his ear.
Rong Xuanhe snapped his eyes open, only to find himself clinging to Su Wenchuan like a koala, hugging the man for dear life.
He had yet to recover from the nightmare, tears still hanging on his eyelashes. After staring blankly at Su Wenchuan for a few seconds, he hurriedly scrambled back in a fluster, sitting up: “Sorry, I had a nightmare, I wasn’t intentional.”
Damn it, hugging anything else would have been fine, but he just had to grab onto this murderous god.
Watching his flustered movements as he retreated, Su Wenchuan’s brow indeed furrowed slightly. After a moment, he pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed: “Crying even in a nightmare?”
Rong Xuanhe felt a mix of embarrassment and grievance: “I dreamed of a ghost.”
He touched his wrist, unsure whether it was just psychological, but the sensation of being grabbed still lingered there as though someone had genuinely caught him. Upon closer inspection, there was even a faint red mark.
The young man could not help muttering: “Could the ghosts here actually have physical bodies?”
Come to think of it, in a place where birds, beasts, insects, and fish could all cultivate into spirits, it was hardly strange for ghosts to have physical forms.
He immediately raised his head to look around. Through the window gauze, the outside sky was a pale, soft blue, and in roughly another hour, daybreak would arrive.
Su Wenchuan closed his eyes and said flatly: “There are no ghosts. Stop looking.”
Half-doubting, Rong Xuanhe lay back down. Noticing the distance between them, he quietly inched toward the inner side of the bed.
Under no circumstances must he roll into Su Wenchuan’s embrace again.
Yet his body seemed to have a mind of its own, as no posture felt quite right.
He tossed and turned, and after a short while, rolled back.
His back felt chilly, as though a ghost were crouching right behind him. With his eyes wide open, Rong Xuanhe’s thoughts drifted back to the terrifying image of the bleeding-faced corpse in his dream, and he could not help swallowing hard.
Stealthily, he inched a tiny bit back toward Su Wenchuan’s side, feeling a bit safer once he sensed the source of warmth.
Seeming to notice something, Su Wenchuan turned his head slightly and whispered, “Can’t sleep?”
“No.” Rong Xuanhe buried his face into the blanket, his voice muffled: “It’s just a bit cold.”
The room fell quiet for a moment. Just when Rong Xuanhe thought the man was going to ignore him again, a hand suddenly reached over, wrapping around his chilly fingertips.
Rong Xuanhe stiffened all over, his heart beating wildly: “Senior?”
Su Wenchuan’s voice came through the blanket, a little unclear: “So scared of ghosts?”
“Mn.”
The young man poked his head out, curling his body into a tight little ball wrapped snugly in the quilt: “I’m just really scared. I don’t even watch horror movies. I mean horror scripts, I never dare look at them.”
Back in school, when the whole class watched a horror film together during a holiday, he went home and was so terrified he ran a fever for a full day, and he still hadn’t dared revisit it since.
For some reason, he thought he saw the corners of Su Wenchuan’s lips curve up slightly, but when he blinked, it was gone, as if that fleeting moment had just been an illusion.
“Ghosts aren’t anything pleasant, true.” Su Wenchuan instructed with a calm expression: “If you encounter them in the future, remember to stay far away.”
Hearing this, Rong Xuanhe froze, then looked a bit troubled: “Will I definitely encounter them? Can’t I just avoid them?”
Su Wenchuan glanced at him, withdrew his hand, and pulled it back: “If you encounter one, just come find me. Now, go to sleep.”
“Oh.”
The young man obediently closed his eyes.
And opened them two seconds later.
He suddenly remembered: back when he was being terrorized by that ghost in his dream, hadn’t a new system said something?
The Substitute System is reporting the time. It is currently five in the morning.
A mechanical voice tinged with a hint of grievance drifted over. Rong Xuanhe went “Ah” in his mind: “We’ve already progressed to the substitute plotline?”
Having just learned that Su Wenchuan had a Dao companion, the system had automatically transferred him to the substitute group right after. The network speed was practically lightning fast.
Still, now that he was finally entering a familiar domain, Rong Xuanhe could not help puffing out his chest a little.
He used to play villainous supporting roles, cannon fodder passersby, and brain-dead antagonists all the time; a mere substitute role should be a piece of cake to act out.
Expectantly, he asked: “Are you more useful than your first two colleagues? Can the system store stock some practical items? For instance, pain reduction, fake-death-and-respawn cards, get-rich-quick guides, or classified gossip?”
Completing tasks will grant a chance at a lucky draw. The prize pool is very rich.
Rong Xuanhe felt reassured: “Good, good. A reliable one has finally arrived.”
At least it was more reliable than that stupid affection points metric.
Impatiently, he asked: “So how many draw chances do I have right now?”
“Zero.”
“Zero?” The young man opened his eyes wide in disbelief: “The tasks your colleague issued don’t count? The affection points I worked so hard to accumulate don’t count either?”
Rewards settled under different groups cannot be mixed. The reward records for the Saving-the-Courtesan System and the Sweet Pet System have been sealed and cannot be converted.
Rong Xuanhe took a deep breath, his blood pressure soaring: “Bandits! I want to unbind!”
The system fell silent.
“Did you hear me! I want to unbind!”
The system silently pushed the prize pool interface in front of him and began playing dead.
“I want to un…”
A translucent panel floated before his eyes, dazzling with all kinds of glittering rewards. Not only were there the pain-reduction and fake-death cards he had wished for, but also a universal key claiming to open any lock, disguise pills, invisibility talismans, substitute puppets. There were so many good things he couldn’t finish looking at them all in a single glance.
Rong Xuanhe’s anger vanished instantly: “Never mind, staying bound is fine too.”
He was simply that passionate about his work.
However, the system did not issue any tasks right away, and the next few days continued to be spent on the road.
Passing by a slightly more prosperous city, Su Wenchuan brought back two cooks, which meant two extra spiritual horses were added to pull the cooks following behind at the rear.
Rong Xuanhe always felt something was off. Other people airlifted ingredients, but Su Wenchuan airlifted chefs.
He hadn’t been idle these past few days either. Even though the Substitute System hadn’t issued a single task, it had at least handed over a compensation gift package.
Quick Assimilation Guide to Cultivation World Basics.zip.
Rong Xuanhe initially thought it would be one of those miraculous knowledge transfers where memories would automatically appear in his head after a nap. But upon opening it, he found densely packed pages numbering in the three hundreds, enough to make anyone pass out just by looking at them.
He struggled back and forth between word fatigue and forced reading, finally managing to half-swallow and half-digest a rough understanding of this world’s common knowledge.
To put it simply, it was completely different from the short dramas he used to film.
The absolute clash between righteousness and evil in dramas didn’t exist here at all. Multiple factions coexisted, with aristocratic clans standing tall, and no single force could dominate the rest. There was no absolute leader in the righteous path, nor a unified Demon Lord among the cultivators of the demonic path; everyone carved out their own territories and kept each other in check.
The mortal realm was governed by a Human Emperor, the demon race was ruled by a Demon Emperor, and the netherworld was managed by a Nether Sovereign. The three realms each stayed in their proper places, minding their own business, and occasional minor frictions never stirred up any massive waves. As for the internal cultivation world, most resources were monopolized by aristocratic clans, while small and medium sects either attached themselves to them or formed alliances, making independent forces like Cangyi Mountain quite rare.
However, these weren’t what Rong Xuanhe cared about most.
One evening, before they managed to find a town, the carriage stopped to rest in the wilderness. Su Wenchuan had gone off somewhere, while the boy was on guard outside the carriage, dozing off.
Seizing the opportunity, Rong Xuanhe quietly crawled out and tugged on the boy’s clothes.
“Um.” The young man lowered his voice, trying his best to make his tone sound casual: “I wanted to ask you something.”
The boy opened one eye, yawned, and sat up straight: “Please speak, Young Master.”
Rong Xuanhe asked: “What happened to your Venerable Lord’s Dao companion? You hadn’t finished telling me that day.”
The boy froze. He looked around as if checking whether Su Wenchuan had suddenly appeared, then leaned in closer and asked in a low voice: “Why is Young Master suddenly bringing this up?”
“Just curious.” Rong Xuanhe brushed it off: “Anyway, since we have nothing else to do, tell me about it. I won’t tell anyone.”
The boy hesitated for a bit, seemingly weighing things. But since he had been getting along well with Rong Xuanhe over the past few days, and figuring that Rong Xuanhe was already brought along by Su Wenchuan and would likely find out sooner or later anyway, he sighed and said: “The Venerable Lord’s Dao companion is already dead.”
Rong Xuanhe’s heart skipped a beat.
“And,” the boy paused, his gaze growing complex, “they died for someone else.”
This sentence carried a rather heavy amount of information. The young man took several seconds to digest it before pursuing: “For someone else? Who?”
The boy shook his head: “That I don’t know. Some people say it was Fu. Anyway, this matter is a taboo on Cangyi Mountain, and no one dares to mention it. Externally, the Venerable Lord only claims that his Dao companion ran away and has never acknowledged that person’s death, though the older folks on the mountain are all clear on it. You must absolutely not bring this up in front of the Venerable Lord.”