“You’re crying.”
Xie Hansheng’s consciousness had been hazy at the time, but he’d vaguely heard Shu Wanzhao’s sobbing.
She sounded like someone who had lost someone important, her cries raw and bloodied, scream after scream.
Xie Hansheng had always believed his junior sister had a vicious personality and never took anyone to heart.
She even constantly used her parents’ deaths to remind their master—and the entire sect—of what they owed her.
Reminding them at every turn that the master owed her parents a life.
She squandered her parents’ goodwill without restraint, practically hanging their deaths on her lips at every opportunity.
He’d thought she was a heartless person without a heart.
But after he collapsed, he realized that his junior sister wasn’t as bad as he’d imagined.
At the very least, she hadn’t pushed him away at the critical moment.
Instead, she’d blocked the Demonic Qi for him.
She was just a child starved for love.
Just like now—like a little hedgehog, raising all her spines in a show of aggression, when in truth, beneath those spines lay a soft belly. She wasn’t invulnerable. She could be hurt too.
Xie Hansheng said to her, “Junior sister, before me, you don’t need to pretend.”
The girl, much shorter than him, arched her brows and glared at him fiercely. “You’re talking nonsense. That’s only because if you died, the master and senior brother would come after me. Otherwise, I couldn’t be bothered with you.”
“You didn’t die, and senior brother still hit me.” As she spoke, she worked herself into a state of grievance, snorting coldly at him. “It’s all because of you.”
Xie Hansheng’s tone turned heavy. “How did he punish you? I’ll go reason with him.”
With that, he stepped forward, about to go find Shen Changan.
Shu Wanzhao immediately blocked his path. “Don’t.”
No way—she wasn’t about to tell him about something as embarrassing as getting her palms smacked. Besides, she still had a whipping scene owed in the plot. If he went to Shen Changan to explain things for her, wouldn’t she end up cleared of all wrongdoing?
“Anyway, stay out of it. If you feel bad about it, just give me all the demon-expelling pills senior brother gives you from now on.”
Xie Hansheng stopped in his tracks, silently watching her anxious face.
She’d rather endure punishment than let the truth of what happened that day come to light.
Did she really want to draw the line with him that badly?
Shu Wanzhao didn’t care what he thought. Seeing his pitch-black eyes, dark and cold, somewhat frightening, she felt a shiver of fear herself. But in the plot, before Xie Hansheng’s demonization, as long as he wanted to stay in the sect, he wouldn’t lay a hand on her.
Just as Shu Wanzhao’s brain was spinning wildly, the man—perhaps having conceded—replied flatly, “Fine.”
She let out a breath of relief and sneaked a peek at his expression.
He’d returned to his usual expressionless deadpan, revealing nothing of his thoughts. But the atmosphere in the room was suffocating, and she didn’t want to stay. She snapped a couple more “fierce” remarks at him before scurrying away.
Leaving the man standing silently in place, sunlight casting shadows through the window lattice onto him, stretching his solitary figure long.
No one noticed the faint black aura stirring within the shadow behind him…
And in his eyes, a flash of crimson came and went so quickly it might have been an illusion.
After bullying Xie Hansheng, Shu Wanzhao returned to her own courtyard. The senior brother was still busy and wouldn’t be coming to nag her anytime soon.
This was a rare moment of respite since she’d transmigrated here.
Disciples passing by saw her and immediately detoured far around. She didn’t know what kind of sins the original owner had committed to be so universally avoided—people sighed at the sight of her, dogs barked at the smell of her.
Still, some were willing to interact with her. Like the cliques in modern schools, some disciples didn’t like the original owner but maintained ties with her out of respect for her status.
Though the master raised her hands-off, he was extremely generous. The storage pouch was filled with all sorts of fine Dharma Artifacts. The Glazed Fire that had attracted Demonic Qi last time was a flame used to temper Spiritual Power, and it could also be used for alchemy.
Because it was a heavenly flame, it always drew covetous eyes.
But the original owner, that wasteful thing, had used the Glazed Fire as a lamp—an absolute travesty.
Shu Wanzhao dug out a pile of treasures from her storage pouch: defensive artifacts, offensive ones, one-time talismans for concealing one’s aura, and bottles and jars of alchemy pills.
She didn’t understand them, so she had the System help her identify them.
The System said they were all immortal grade, but…
“If I’m not mistaken, Wolongzong should be a small-to-medium sect, utterly unremarkable in the cultivation world. Why would the original owner’s master—ahem, my master—have so many treasures?”
The System checked.
But its page kept showing “loading,” the panel spinning endlessly before finally displaying: Main System Busy, Please Try Again Later.
[It should be hidden plot. After all, this is a female-oriented novel—everything recorded is from the female lead’s perspective. The plot I gave you before was also information obtained from others after the female lead appeared.]
[Many details haven’t been unlocked yet. But no problem—for now, the host just needs to maintain the persona and cause trouble for Xie Hansheng. You need to keep humiliating him, pressuring him, opposing him, until he develops an Inner Demon. Then you move on to the big plot of exposing him.]
[Then you go mess with your senior brother.]
Mess with him?
Shu Wanzhao jolted, her palms starting to ache phantomly again. She felt nothing but melancholy.
Xie Hansheng was easy to bully, but Shen Changan… was unfathomable.
Shu Wanzhao stopped thinking about it and pulled a gaudy little cauldron out of her storage pouch to fiddle with.
Can this thing even do alchemy?
After a moment’s thought, she took out her Glazed Fire and drew out a wisp of it.
The moment she put it in, a flurry of footsteps suddenly sounded from the courtyard, and someone arrived with their voice before their person.
“Senior Sister Shu, I heard you’re back?”
The newcomer was quite rude—no knocking, no waiting for Shu Wanzhao to respond, just pushing the door open and walking straight in.
“Oh, you’re here.”
A whole crowd of people squeezed their way in.
The leading female disciple had thin, narrow eyes with upturned corners, giving her the look of someone shrewd and calculating.
The System promptly reminded her: 【A sycophantic fence-sitter, swaying with the wind, a vain little extra—key prop, Mu Xiaoting.】
【You can use this person as a key prop. When necessary, have her help you stir up some trouble for the male leads.】
Like the other Sect disciples, Mu Xiaoting and her group didn’t like the original owner, but the original owner had many treasures that Outer Sect disciples could only dream of.
Just like right now—her greedy gaze was fixed unashamedly on the trembling alchemy cauldron in Shu Wanzhao’s hands.
In her mind, as long as she buttered up the gullible little senior sister, even scraps from her hands would be something others yearned for.
“Senior Sister Shu Wanzhao, I heard you ran into Demonic Qi on your way down the mountain this time? Second Senior Brother really is something—knowing it was your first time going down, he still left you on your own. Thank goodness nothing happened. Oh, we were all so worried about you.”
In the past, when she’d flattered and fawned over the little senior sister, she’d casually toss her treasures as rewards.
But today, for some reason, the little senior sister was clutching that alchemy cauldron tightly and hadn’t offered it to her at all.
A flicker of displeasure passed through Mu Xiaoting’s eyes, but on the surface she said casually, “Senior Sister, I’ve been learning alchemy lately, and it just so happens you have an alchemy cauldron here…”
She hinted relentlessly.
Little did she know, Shu Wanzhao wasn’t listening to a word she was babbling—she was frantically trying to suppress the cauldron.
The cauldron was buzzing loudly.
It looked like it was about to explode!