“Could it be that you are unwilling to accept your Penalty?”
Hua Qirong glared fiercely at Ling Wan’er. “From the moment you became a Novice, I told your master that with your aptitude, you might one day stand alongside your Senior Sister Jiang Ningyi and become a Saintess of the Danran Sect. But look at you! You couldn’t wait to leave a stain on your cultivation path, could you?”
At its core, Ling Wan’er’s offense was not terribly severe.
However, if the matter were blown out of proportion, she would certainly lose any chance of becoming a Saintess.
A Saintess of an orthodox Sect, nearly causing a fellow disciple to be stripped naked and strung up on a mountain peak?
What kind of scandal would that be if word got out?
Hearing the bitter disappointment in Hua Qirong’s voice, Ling Wan’er lowered her head even further…
Seeing this, Jiang Ningyi’s usually cold and peerlessly beautiful face betrayed a look of anxiety. “Elder Hua…”
“Previously, Senior Brother Fang had a terrible reputation. It was rumored that he often bullied his fellow Junior Brothers and Junior Sisters. In particular, Wan’er’s good friend, Xiao Qing, repeatedly suffered from Senior Brother Fang’s exclusion and suppression.”
“Because of this, Wan’er wanted to retaliate. But she did not resort to lethal means, nor did she have any intention of truly harming Senior Brother Fang!”
Although Jiang Ningyi had felt some dissatisfaction when she saw Ling Wan’er frame Fang Chen, she knew her Junior Sister had acted without malice.
Ignorance was not a sin!
After all, before she learned the truth, Jiang Ningyi herself had considered splitting Fang Chen in half with a single sword strike.
Therefore, she felt she had to plead for leniency on Ling Wan’er’s behalf.
“Fang Chen actually did these things?”
Hearing this, Hua Qirong asked evenly, “Ningyi, do not fabricate stories just to speak up for Wan’er.”
Having just interacted with Fang Chen, Hua Qirong had formed a rather good first impression of him. She did not think he was such a heinous person.
“I guarantee with my life, I am not making this up!”
Jiang Ningyi said solemnly, then added, “It is just that the actual situation is somewhat more complicated.”
Seeing her swear such an oath, Hua Qirong’s delicate brows furrowed slightly, her stern expression relaxing. “Then tell me everything you know about Fang Chen’s situation.”
“Yes! Elder Hua, the situation is like this…”
Jiang Ningyi concisely explained Fang Chen’s previous notoriety and his current, starkly contrasting behavior.
“Is that so?”
After hearing the tale, Hua Qirong was stunned.
Clearly, she had not expected Fang Chen to have done all of this in silence.
Given her age and experience, she was not quite as deeply moved as Jiang Ningyi and Xiao Qing, but Hua Qirong still felt a measure of admiration for Fang Chen’s true demeanor as a Senior Brother.
Back when she was Fang Chen’s age, her own talent in the Dao of Alchemy had made her arrogant and disdainful. Why would she ever have spared a thought to help her juniors?
Now, this Fang Chen-who could play the guzheng so masterfully while silently enduring hardships for his Junior Brother-saw his standing in Hua Qirong’s eyes skyrocket!
“Wait!”
Her admiration abruptly gave way to a sudden realization, and her face stiffened…
Wait. Didn’t that mean the ‘disciple with the absolute worst aptitude in the Danran Sect’ that she had just loudly mocked to Fang Chen’s face… was Fang Chen himself?
She had basically insulted him twice over?!
Hua Qirong’s toes involuntarily curled into the floor.
After serving as an Elder for so many years, this was her very first time experiencing true, mortifying embarrassment!
“Elder Hua?”
At this moment, Jiang Ningyi-seeing Hua Qirong’s beautiful face shift between green and pale white in prolonged silence-cautiously called out.
“Ah?”
Hua Qirong snapped out of her daze. She lightly patted her own cheeks to disperse the awkwardness and said, “Alright, I understand everything now!”
She looked at Ling Wan’er. “Stand up.”
“Yes, Elder!”
Ling Wan’er rose to her feet.
“Let me make this clear. I am handing down this Penalty to teach you a lesson, so you never resort to such underhanded methods again.”
Hua Qirong glared at her. “Especially trying to frame someone inside my Formation. Did you really think that just because the Sound Forest wasn’t fully activated, I wouldn’t sense anything?”
With the Sound Forest running, she was acutely aware of everything!
Ling Wan’er looked slightly sheepish.
Hua Qirong continued, “Taking a step back, regardless of whether Fang Chen is a good or bad person, even if he were a wicked scoundrel who deserved to die, you shouldn’t have treated him this way.”
“If you really wanted to avenge Xiao Qing, couldn’t you have been patient? Why not wait until Fang Chen entered the inner Sect, and then openly and honorably challenge him to a duel?”
Sect rules strictly prohibited duels between inner and outer Sect disciples to prevent the strong from bullying the weak.
“But… but I thought he hadn’t reached Foundation Establishment even after ten years. If I didn’t seize the opportunity for revenge now, I was afraid that by the time I reached the Golden Core realm, he’d still be stuck in Qi Condensation. Wouldn’t I be even less able to exact revenge then?”
Ling Wan’er could not help but argue back.
Hua Qirong: “…”
She was rendered completely speechless.
Although she felt the girl was just talking back, upon closer thought, even if Fang Chen was hiding his cultivation, his true realm was only at the ninth layer of Qi Condensation.
And that was after consuming an Ancient Tree Spirit Fruit Pill, Spirit Machine Medicinal Liquid, a Void-Planting Pill, and heaven knows what else!
Looking at it from that angle, what Ling Wan’er said… actually made a lot of sense!
“What nonsense!”
Hua Qirong suddenly realized she was being led astray by Ling Wan’er’s twisted logic. She glared at her fiercely. “Regardless, I am ordering this entire peak to keep their mouths shut about today’s incident. As for you, from now on, you will go find out exactly what Fang Chen needs and do your utmost to make amends!” Follow the newest chapters on g.com.
“According to Sect rules, your behavior warrants a Penalty of compensating Spirit Stones and undertaking hard labor. You will repay all of this directly to Fang Chen!”
“Do you understand?”
Ling Wan’er answered obediently, “Understood!”
Seeing this, Jiang Ningyi breathed a sigh of relief, her tense, delicate face finally relaxing.
“You may leave.”
Hua Qirong waved her hand dismissively, as if swatting away a mosquito.
“Yes!”
The two girls withdrew.
…
“So refreshing! It even comes with a private hot spring, this is awesome!”
At this moment, Fang Chen was stepping out of the hot spring, steam wafting from his body.
Yingguang Lake Mountain featured public hot springs, but the residences situated halfway up the mountain boasted their own private ones.
Furthermore, this hot spring served as a natural medicinal bath. It was infused with the nourishing aura of the spirit herbs the Danran Sect cultivated across Yingguang Lake Mountain, making it highly beneficial to the physical body.
Over the years, soaking in it would provide tremendous assistance to one’s cultivation!
This could practically be considered a ‘newbie benefit’ the Danran Sect handed out to outer Sect disciples.
Ironically, once a disciple reached Foundation Establishment and entered the inner Sect, if they were assigned to a mountain peak with a poorer environment, they might not even get to enjoy such a luxury…
After changing his clothes, Fang Chen cast a Qi Concealment Technique to hide his cultivation base.
While soaking in the hot spring earlier, he had idly checked to see exactly what techniques he knew, only to discover that he actually knew a Qi Concealment Technique.
This was a skill the original owner had painstakingly trained in!
He had to admit, the original owner’s mastery over this Qi Concealment Technique was absolutely heaven-defying, and the quality of the technique itself was even better than Xiao Qing’s.
Anyone who wasn’t at least a full major realm higher than Fang Chen could completely forget about seeing through it!
The reason the original owner’s Qi Concealment Technique was so ridiculously effective was because back in the day, shortly after he became a Novice, he would be mocked for his pathetic cultivation every time the Sect held a major gathering or he returned to the Fang family for the holidays.
Left with no other choice, he could only grit his teeth and practice the Qi Concealment Technique to a level that ordinary people couldn’t see through, all just to escape the humiliation.
It had worked at first. But unfortunately, as his peers and fellow disciples reached Foundation Establishment one by one, his Qi Concealment Technique completely lost its utility.
Later on, it didn’t matter how incredible his Qi Concealment Technique was; it was totally useless.
Because everyone already knew that the outer Sect’s ‘Old Dog Fang’ would forever be stuck at the third layer of Qi Condensation!