The woman sat up from within the coffin, her pitch-black, dense hair cascading down her shoulders and making her fair skin look as pristine as snow. She smiled, her eyes curving, a lingering trace of fatigue still resting between her brows.
“It has been… a long time…”
“In the mortal realm…”
Yan Zhu did not catch the exact meaning of her sigh. She merely stared fixedly at the woman’s face, her eyes widening slightly as her entire body froze in place.
The other person looked identical to the stone statue she had seen earlier that had blinked at her!
“Do not be so tense…”
The woman sat inside the coffin, stretched lazily, and smiled at her with curved lips.
The next instant, a warm breath brushed against the side of Yan Zhu’s neck, sending a shiver through her.
“I am not going to eat you.”
Startled, Yan Zhu looked at the woman who had somehow materialized right beside her and hurriedly retreated to put some distance between them.
“Who are you? What are you… trying to do?”
Her voice trembled uncontrollably.
“Jun Lin,” the woman said with a smile. “Jun Lin, as in ruling the entire world.”
“As for what I want to do… well… for now… I haven’t quite decided.”
“However, I certainly will not eat you, that much is certain.”
She twirled a lock of Yan Zhu’s hair and took a sniff, the look of delight on her face completely unmasked. “Little doll, you are truly pretty.”
“Tell me, would you be interested… in becoming my disciple?”
“Ah?”
Before she could catch herself, the exclamation slipped out again.
The moment she realized what she had done, Yan Zhu hurriedly covered her mouth, only to find that the woman was already laughing softly.
“You really are an interesting little doll.”
“I am not…!” Yan Zhu felt a surge of shy irritation.
“Not what?” The woman raised an eyebrow, her gaze lingering on Yan Zhu’s face.
Under that intense scrutiny, Yan Zhu’s cheeks grew slightly warm, and for some inexplicable reason, she lost her footing of confidence. Rather than sounding like a rebuttal, her next words came out as a murmur, “I am not a little doll…”
Hearing this, the woman who called herself “Jun Lin” smiled gently.
“To me, you are nothing more than a little doll,” she remarked.
“However, this is indeed quite fascinating,” Jun Lin reached out to grab Yan Zhu’s wrist, continuing with immense interest, “Your entire body is surrounded by the aura of the Great Dao, yet there is not a shred of spiritual power within you.”
Noticing the young girl’s bewildered expression, Jun Lin could tell that she was entirely unaware of her own condition.
“Furthermore…”
“Tsk,” sweeping the person before her with a surge of divine sense, even Jun Lin could not help her astonishment, “You are… a natural Dao physique?!”
To prevent any misjudgment—though the possibility of such an error was exceedingly slim—she carefully and meticulously scanned her from head to toe once more.
“Indeed… a natural Dao physique…”
“No wonder,” she muttered, “No wonder you clearly possess zero cultivation, yet find yourself surrounded by the laws of the Great Dao.”
Still feeling perplexed by the mention of the “aura of the Great Dao,” Yan Zhu was abruptly hit by this stranger proclaiming her to possess a “natural Dao physique,” leaving her already chaotic thoughts even more tangled and difficult to sort out.
She felt a wave of dizziness wash over her, feeling as though the world she had only just begun to familiarize herself with had turned entirely unfamiliar in a single instant.
The woman was entirely unaware of the mental journey the young girl had just experienced; she only felt that the girl’s condition was far more complex than any case she had ever witnessed before.
Frowning slightly, Jun Lin cautiously controlled a wisp of spiritual power to snake inward along the meridians of the girl’s wrist, tracing a path through all the acupoints of her body.
“Strange…” she let out a soft exclamation.
“Truly bizarre.”
She released the girl’s wrist, though the smooth, delicate texture made her fingertips linger and lightly rub together in mild reluctance.
Perhaps due to holding it for so long, her originally icy palms had also absorbed some of that warmth. Jun Lin did not find the sensation unpleasant; on the contrary, a faint wave of nostalgia welled up within her heart.
“What is so strange?”
Curiosity clawed at her heart like a kitten’s paws, and Yan Zhu could not hold back the question.
Pulling her thoughts back slightly, Jun Lin looked at the eager expression on the young girl’s face and couldn’t help but chuckle.
She realized the girl truly suited her taste; in just this brief period since they met, she didn’t know how many times she had laughed.
“What is strange is… cough…”
Jun Lin cleared her throat, deciding to tease her a little.
“There is good news and bad news. Which one would you like to hear first?”
“I am not choosing!”
Feeling that this person was utterly detestable, Yan Zhu stepped back a few paces and kept a vigilant eye on her.
I refuse to play chess on the board you have forged; I choose to flip the board over directly instead.
Taken aback, Jun Lin felt her interest deepen even further.
“Are the little dolls of today really this interesting?”
“Since you refuse to choose, I will tell you both then.”
It made no difference to her anyway; she had originally only intended to tease the girl, and while that initial goal hadn’t quite played out as expected, Yan Zhu’s reactions had left her thoroughly satisfied.
“The good news is… you are a rare, once-in-a-millennium natural Dao physique, and I intend to take you in as my disciple.”
“As for the bad news…”
At this point, Jun Lin paused deliberately out of mischief. Seeing Yan Zhu widen her eyes slightly with her cheeks flushed pink, she continued: “You lack spiritual roots.”
“That is why I say it is strange.”
The smile faded from her face, her gaze turning slightly heavy.
“A natural Dao physique, yet utterly devoid of spiritual roots.”
This situation was equivalent to someone being tested and proven to have genius-level intelligence, only to lack the basic qualifications to enroll in elementary school.
While it could technically be explained, it was simply too absurd, making the prospect of stepping onto the path of immortality even more difficult to achieve.
Yan Zhu arrived at the exact same realization.
“Then why do you still want to take me as your disciple?!” she couldn’t help asking.
This person was exceedingly bizarre—emerging from a coffin, possessing a face identical to the stone statue, walking right up to a stranger she had just met with supreme familiarity, and repeatedly teasing her with her words.
It was Yan Zhu’s first time encountering a woman whose speech and actions defied all logic and regularity. Yet, whether it was the reaction of the little cat beside her or her own intuition, everything was telling her one thing: this person was dangerous.
“Naturally… because I have a way to resolve your problem.”
“Having a disciple with a natural Dao physique would make even those arrogant fellows up in the heavens envious of me.”
Perhaps having spoken too much, she felt a wave of drowsiness wash over her and covered her mouth with a small yawn.
“This body is truly useless. I wonder how that unfilial brat handled things.”
She twitched the corners of her mouth, a trace of displeasure surfacing in her heart.
These words remained unspoken.
After all, it wouldn’t do to let the Heavenly Way catch wind of it, she thought.
For some reason, that fellow had been acting quite restless lately.
“No, thank you.”
Yan Zhu replied coldly. Although the temptation of immortality was immense and possessing power would allow her to better protect herself, she had no desire to blindly take a mysterious woman with an unknown background as her master. The risk was simply too high.
“Oh? You had better think carefully. In the current cultivation world, you will never find a master better than me.”
“Thank you for your concern, Senior,” Yan Zhu bent down to pick up the black cat resting at her feet and cradled it in her arms. “However, I have matters to attend to right now, so I must excuse myself.”
“Farewell.”
Exhaling a breath of heavy air, Yan Zhu strode toward the small side door that had opened up across the way at some point.
Just as she was about to brush past the woman, she heard a cold scoff, causing her heart to seize tightly.
“Are you planning to search for that… masked little doll?”
Before Yan Zhu could respond, she heard the woman say: “Then you had better hurry up and go. From the looks of it, she is about to die!”
“Song… What did you say happened to her?!”
“She is dying.” Jun Lin tilted her head, her gaze sweeping meticulously across Yan Zhu’s face as if trying to imprint the girl’s current expression into her mind to savor it slowly.
“However, if you beg me, I can send you over right this instant…”
“And perhaps I might even step in to save her.”