Tian Luo actually didn’t want to go to Senior Brother Su’s secret base together with the villain.
She tried to reason — with Lu Qizhi.
“I’m just going to catch up with my Senior Brother and strengthen our martial sibling bond, and also get to know the Zixu Sword Sect in advance. There’s really no need for you, esteemed senior, to come along! No need to trouble yourself! You’ve worked hard all day, your shoulders must be sore, right? Hurry and get some sleep early to recover!”
Tian Luo spoke earnestly and sincerely.
Lu Qizhi’s beautiful red lips parted slightly, his eyes staring straight at her. “Are you sure you don’t want me to go with you?”
Dear heavens!!! This villain is seriously clinging to me now, isn’t he?! Is this a naked threat?! What, you don’t want foot-soak water anymore?! At this rate are you going to follow me even when I bathe or use the toilet?!
Even though I don’t actually need to use the toilet right now!!!!
Tian Luo screamed internally.
But on the outside, she remained calm and sweet, tears shining in her eyes. “I think if you come with us, we’ll definitely be much safer. Thank you for your selfless dedication. I’m very sorry for taking up your precious sleeping time!”
Lu Qizhi nodded. “Mm.”
That’s it? Just ‘mm’?! You really can’t hear the hidden meaning in human speech, can you?!
Tian Luo smiled. “Okay then!”
At the side, Su Miantang had already cracked when he heard “thirty-li tunnel.”
He forced himself to stay calm, his big eyes filled with giant question marks. “Huh? Junior Sister, what are you talking about? What tunnel?”
His expression looked genuinely confused.
Tian Luo raised a hand and patted Su Miantang’s shoulder, her whole face screaming Senior Brother, confess and get leniency; resist and get punished. Drop the act, I already know everything.
She waved him along skillfully. “Senior Brother, let’s hurry! The earlier we go, the earlier we get back, and we can still get a good night’s sleep!”
Su Miantang’s face was full of resistance. “Junior Sister, I really don’t know what you’re talking about! What tunnel? Your Senior Brother truly doesn’t understand!”
“Last month, on the fifteenth during the Lantern Festival, the elder in charge of the Sword Sect cafeteria had something urgent and couldn’t find anyone else, so he gave you one thousand spirit stones to go down the mountain and buy ingredients. You bought five hundred jin of pork, five hundred jin of beef, and five hundred jin of vegetables. But when you came back, you staged a robbery, smashed your own head against a rock, and claimed you’d been robbed on the road and all the meat was gone, leaving only the vegetables.”
Recalling the plot from the novel, Tian Luo discovered for the first time that her memory was actually this good.
It had to be because Su Miantang was just too ridiculous!
With a pained expression, she continued, “Then you carried all the meat into the tunnel and sold it to the little cuties down there at outrageous interest rates, making ten thousand and three hundred spirit stones, while the entire Zixu Sword Sect ate vegetable soup for half a month. If this gets told to—”
Su Miantang immediately slapped a hand over Tian Luo’s mouth and looked back toward the bamboo house in terror.
Luckily, luckily—Master hadn’t come out.
Su Miantang gave up struggling. “Fine.”
With a heavy heart, he led Tian Luo and Lu Qizhi to his secret base, prepared to face Tian Luo’s interrogation.
But after Tian Luo arrived and watched him move aside the giant stone sealing the tunnel, she just waved goodbye to him.
Su Miantang: “????”
I was all ready to have the little ones call me King, and this really was just an early trip and an early return?
…
It really was just that—go early, come back early.
She only wanted to confirm the exact location so she wouldn’t panic when she needed it later.
Tian Luo returned to her master’s room on Tenth Peak, and Lu Qizhi followed in after her.
Her master was a lonely sword cultivator. Even his bed was a single bed, with no extra space for another person.
If two people squeezed into one bed, it would definitely become extremely ambiguous.
Tian Luo glanced at the villain. His expression was completely normal.
How could she forget? This was a villain who felt absolutely no shame even when naked.
Still, Tian Luo opened her mouth, using the gentlest voice of her life. “How are we sleeping tonight?”
Lu Qizhi glanced at her, then at the bed, frowning. “Sleep however you want.”
Fine. Change the topic.
Tian Luo took a deep breath. “So… today you drank eight jars of spirit brew. That means you owe me eight thousand spirit stones. Also, I’m out of stock now, so tonight I need to urgently brew more.”
Lu Qizhi sat cross-legged by the bed, his dark brows still furrowed. “Mm.”
Mm what?! I mean I’m about to soak myself and make foot-soak water!!!
Tian Luo screamed inside, but on the outside she put on a shy expression, cheeks flushing red.
“And also… I need to bathe. For us ginseng spirits, if someone sees our body, we have to marry them.”
Though she wasn’t wearing her bear-head hat now, her thick hair fell around her cheeks, making her look especially bashful under the candlelight.
“But there’s an age gap between us. This old one is already ten thousand years old. It’s not suitable. So could I trouble you to step outside for a little while?”
Even the Xuwang Ancestor wasn’t older than her. There was no way this villain was.
Lu Qizhi: “……”
He stared at Tian Luo, looking like he was about to lose his temper again.
Tian Luo raised her head and looked even more bashful. “Could it be that you… and I… ah, this…?”
Lu Qizhi wore an expression that clearly said What is there to look at? and floated outside.
Safe!
Operation begins!
Tian Luo rushed to the water vat in her master’s room, took out a wooden bucket from her mustard-seed pouch, washed her face as quickly as possible, and then started soaking her feet.
She was a ten-thousand-year ginseng spirit. Her blood energy was strong, and she wasn’t afraid of the cold. Cold water was no problem.
The main thing was producing the spirit brew!
Twenty minutes later, Tian Luo started filling ceramic jars with foot-soak water.
The whole process was smooth and efficient.
Not a single trace left behind!
By the time Lu Qizhi returned, Tian Luo was already lying on the bed, sleeping peacefully.
He stood by the bedside, looking down at her.
She slept soundly, even snoring softly.
The sound wasn’t loud, but in the quiet night, that faint humming lingered in the air like a lullaby.
Lu Qizhi watched Tian Luo for a while longer, then reached out to lift her clothes.
The Nine-Qilin Armor completely gave up resisting.
Please, mighty one, go ahead.
Lu Qizhi saw that the mottled blue bruises around Tian Luo’s chest still hadn’t fully faded. Thinking of the eight jars of spirit brew he had drunk tonight, he pressed his hand over her chest again, continuing what he hadn’t finished last time.
In her sleep, Tian Luo only felt warm all over.
She turned over and hugged Lu Qizhi’s arm, rubbing against it.
Lu Qizhi’s brows immediately knitted together. He raised his hand to pull her off.
But sleeping Tian Luo was stubborn and refused to let go.
His face was full of irritation, but after sitting by the bed for a while, he eventually lay down too.
His golden eyes stared at the ceiling.
The feeling of lying down was unfamiliar.
The last time…
The last time had been many years ago.
That memory surfaced instantly, and dark, violent energy almost burned through his brows.
His whole body tensed, spiritual power raging wildly inside him.
But beside him, a warm body pressed close.
His first instinct was to kill her.
Yet when he turned his head and saw Tian Luo sleeping peacefully, the fury in his heart slowly faded.
It had been a long time since another person had been by his side.
Lu Qizhi stared at the ceiling expressionlessly again.
After a while, exhaustion accumulated over countless years crashed over him like a tidal wave.
He resisted for a while, then slowly closed his eyes.
Ever since that incident, he had never truly slept again.
Because he didn’t want to dream.
Didn’t want to dream of that day, that moment—
of the fire swallowing his home…
If Tian Luo had known sleeping would lead to something this outrageous, she absolutely would not have slept last night.
Right now, both her hands and both her legs were tightly wrapped around the villain’s arm and leg.
To put it simply—
if her knee moved up even a little more, it would hit the villain’s Jinjiang.
That was terrifying.
Tian Luo carefully, very carefully, pulled one hand out from under Lu Qizhi’s arm.
A little bit at a time.
Every inch she moved, she checked his face.
Only after both hands were safely free did she start moving her legs away, carefully crawling over his body to the floor.
Then she turned around.
As expected, she met the villain’s cold golden eyes, wide open.
When people are nervous and guilty, they need to find a topic.
Tian Luo lowered her eyes and just happened to see his bare feet.
She saw the rings around his beautiful ankles and said after a pause, “So… I was looking at these ankle rings of yours.”
Lu Qizhi seemed to be in a good mood today. The violence in his brows had faded a lot.
So he actually responded. “And?”
Tian Luo stiffened, not expecting him to answer, and her mouth automatically started sweet-talking again.
“…I just think these things are really unpleasant to look at. How can they be removed? Maybe I can help you.”
That day in the cave, the moment she touched them, her palm had burned in pain.
Lu Qizhi looked at her and suddenly smiled, asking in a low voice, “You want to help me remove them?”
His mood really did seem good.
His golden eyes looked brighter than usual.
Whenever the villain showed this expression, it meant he was in a good mood.
Tian Luo didn’t know why, but she nodded anyway.
And right after nodding, she regretted it.
Is this really work for a little ginseng spirit like me?
She felt like a foolish king bewitched by a calamity-causing demon consort.
Lu Qizhi said, “These are called Soul-Locking Rings.”
Tian Luo’s heart tightened.
They were actually Soul-Locking Rings?!
Soul-Locking Rings came from North Demon City in the demon realm—an ancient demonic artifact.
They could corrode both flesh and soul.
Even a cultivator born with immortal bones, once bound by Soul-Locking Rings, would suffer daily torment of body and spirit.
Until both body and soul degraded into low-level, mindless demons.
No wonder even she, nurtured by heaven-and-earth spiritual energy, couldn’t touch them.
The book clearly said the Soul-Locking Rings had been missing for tens of thousands of years.
They were ancient relics that had only been mentioned.
And yet now, they were truly on the villain’s ankles.
“North Demon City. The Myriad Ghost Prison. There’s one person there who can remove them. But he won’t help me.”
At this, Lu Qizhi looked at Tian Luo with a half-smile and leaned closer.
Tian Luo said, “How would you know he won’t help if you haven’t even tried?”
Any normal person would know that was just encouragement.
But the villain thought for two seconds, and his smile widened.
“Good. Then we leave for North Demon City today.”
“Wait! Can’t you let me learn some swordsmanship first before I accompany you?!”
Tian Luo hugged his waist as he stood up, her little face crumpling.
She had worked so hard to sneak into Zixu Sword Sect!
She just wanted to learn some survival skills!
The villain had a bad temper.
His mouth flattened.
Tian Luo’s heart tightened.
But instead of getting angry, he said in confusion, “What can they teach you? I can teach you.”
She actually wanted to spend some leisurely days in Zixu Sword Sect.
Watch the male and female leads’ romantic drama.
Occasionally use her plot knowledge to give them a little push.
And gossip with her Senior Brother and Senior Sister.
She had absolutely no desire to live a tightrope-walking life with the villain.
Help!
Lu Qizhi stared at Tian Luo’s miserable expression.
His good mood vanished instantly.
With a gloomy face, he pushed her away and strode out.
This time, Tian Luo seemed to sense the disappointment hidden beneath his gloom and irritability.
What was going on?
Why did she suddenly feel so guilty?
…
The great plaza of Zixu Sword Sect was already packed with sword cultivators.
Nan Rong and Tian Yue were at the front practicing sword forms.
As the best disciples of their generation, they set a strong example.
Even from afar, they were pleasing to watch.
She just didn’t know how far their relationship had progressed.
Sadly, in the original book she’d only been a side character, so she hadn’t had many chances to help their romance.
Tian Luo stood at the very back, holding her sword.
Zixu Sword Sect practiced killing sword arts.
Every move was decisive and lethal.
Completely different from the shallow basics taught in the outer sect.
Just watching the sword forms, the difference in difficulty was obvious.
During one turning move, she saw the villain leaning against a tree not far away, his back facing her.
His white robes made his figure look especially thin.
He stood about ten meters away—not too close, not too far—but hadn’t left.
Even though, with his ability, he could have flown away anytime.
Tian Luo couldn’t help glancing at his feet.
Now that she knew what those black iron rings were, they looked more glaring than ever.
Her guilt deepened.
Just as she was wondering how to appease a villain she’d offended, Su Miantang—who was at the very back because of his localized rainstorm—suddenly leaned over nervously.
“Junior Sister, I can’t cover it up anymore!”
Tian Luo looked confused.
Then Su Miantang handed her a post while muttering worriedly, “Junior Sister, to be honest, that tunnel leads directly to East Demon Forest. That ten-thousand-year ginseng spirit definitely smuggled itself over through that tunnel.”
The title read—
[A ten-thousand-year ginseng spirit from East Demon Forest has gained sentience and is now imprisoned by Zixu Sword Sect, who intends to monopolize it.]
Ten-thousand-year ginseng spirit Tian Luo: “That’s complete nonsense!”
It had to be rumors spread by that bastard Guo Lin!
But why?
In the original book, hadn’t he always wanted to keep her all for himself?
What now?
Zixu Sword Sect was about to become public enemy number one in the cultivation world!
Tian Luo was already considering wandering the world with the villain.
She didn’t want anything to happen to Zixu Sword Sect.
Su Miantang said, “That’s not even the big one. Look at this.”
Tian Luo leaned over—
[The scourge of the cultivation world, Tan Gu Demon Ancestor, has escaped the Myriad Immortals Suppression Formation. A bloody storm is about to sweep the cultivation world again. How much food should I stockpile so I can hide at home and survive this?]
Su Miantang’s face was full of gossip. “I heard several female elders of Tianyan Sect were all his lovers. They loved him to death back then, only for him to cruelly abandon them. In the demon realm, nine out of ten demonesses have had some tragic love-hate entanglement with him. He really conquered immortals, demons, and monsters alike!”
The book hadn’t gone into detail about gossip like this.
Tian Luo couldn’t help being curious.
Su Miantang immediately stuffed two storybooks into her hands and whispered, “Written by those female elders he toyed with back then. Out of print now. One hundred spirit stones each. A sword cultivator never cheats another sword cultivator.”
Tian Luo: “……”
With too much money and nowhere to spend it, she bought them.
But the moment she turned around—
she met the villain, who had silently appeared behind her at some unknown point, his face dark as a storm cloud.
Tian Luo said immediately, “I’ve decided. We’ll set out for North Demon City at once. I’ve already thought it through—you can teach me on the road, and if it gets boring, we can read storybooks together. Perfect, one for you and one for me.”
Lu Qizhi frowned and took the book she handed him.
On the cover were several large words—
The One Hundred Nights of Entanglement Between Tan Gu Demon Ancestor and Me
Tian Luo was moved by her own thoughtfulness.
“My copy is A Few Little-Known Quirks of the Tan Gu Demon Ancestor. A must-read for cultivation world gossip. After we finish, we can discuss it together.”