Chapter 4: Slacking Off, Day Four
With Wen Ying’s current cultivation level, entering and leaving the Xun Xian Sect’s back mountain was effortless.
Wen Ying easily found the spot where she had left her cushion.
Thankfully, it wasn’t damaged, only slightly dusty.
However, just as Wen Ying was about to pick it up, another hand snatched it first.
There was someone else on the mountain?
But Wen Ying had clearly investigated before entering; there shouldn’t have been anyone else…
Wen Ying looked up and saw that the one who had taken the cushion…
wasn’t exactly a person.
The figure was shrouded in a black conical hat, the wide hood completely obscuring its face. Judging by its shape, it was a male, but extremely short, about half Wen Ying’s height—a child, perhaps.
Although its form resembled a human, Wen Ying immediately recognized it as a shadow.
Cultivators of demonic arts possessed a secret technique allowing them to separate their shadow from their body and control it. Those who had mastered this technique could make their shadow leave no trace, making it extremely stealthy and suitable for tasks humans couldn’t accomplish.
While convenient, this technique had drawbacks. The shadow lacked the seven orifices, rendering the controller essentially blind, deaf, and mute while manipulating it.
Since she couldn’t see who it was, Wen Ying wasn’t going to be polite.
Wen Ying chuckled, snatched the cushion from the shadow’s grasp, and ran off.
She didn’t want to get involved with something so troublesome!
This wasn’t robbery or bullying the weak. The cushion was hers; if anything, the little shadow was the thief.
Wen Ying ran very fast. With her maxed-out physical abilities and cultivation, almost no one in the world could catch up to Wen Ying at full speed, let alone a blind and deaf little shadow. By the time Wen Ying looked back, the shadow had vanished.
Wen Ying ran all the way down the mountain. Having not run this freely in a long time, Wen Ying felt exhilarated.
Unfortunately, the mountain was too short, the path too brief. Wen Ying reached the foot of the mountain after two or three minutes.
Slightly unsatisfied, Wen Ying stopped, put the cushion back into her sleeve, and walked back to the Xun Xian Sect.
Her sleeves, of course, couldn’t hold something as large as a cushion. She had a spatial pouch in her sleeve.
The system’s inheritance function not only inherited skills and bugs but also the items carried at the end of the previous life.
For a time, Wen Ying had been obsessed with accumulating resources—like hoarding ten thousand high-grade spirit stones, a thousand spatial rings, ten thousand taels of gold… and so on.
Her hoard grew ever larger, constantly accumulating, never diminishing. Regardless of the achievements she obtained with these items in each cycle, upon mission failure and reincarnation, everything started anew. Watching those numbers endlessly increase, Wen Ying gradually lost interest, leaving them untouched in her cave for a long time.
As Wen Ying returned from the mountain foot with her cushion, the disciples were taking their midday rest. Wen Ying passed by, met with scornful stares, pointed fingers, and whispers. Though she heard them all, she was too lazy to listen to the repetitive chatter.
After all, as the brainless, wicked female second lead in fifty-two stories, having good relations within the Xun Xian Sect would be a miracle.
This original owner, “the bully,” “the one who constantly clung to the gifted disciples,” “the one with extremely poor cultivation,” and “the cruel-hearted one,” was a very typical, clichéd female second lead.
For now, thanks to her status as the only daughter of the Wen family and the sole direct disciple of Venerable Lin Yu, no one in the Xun Xian Sect dared to do anything to Wen Ying.
As for later…
That would be a matter for when the white moonlight, Rong Hua, and Wen Meng, the true Wen family daughter, returned.
Back in her room, Wen Ying took out the cushion.
She used her spiritual sense to investigate, but detected no aura whatsoever. The ability to conceal the shadow technique’s aura so thoroughly indicated that the cultivator was among the top ranks of demonic cultivators.
Wen Ying’s extensive knowledge of demonic cultivation wasn’t learned from the Xun Xian Sect.
In several cycles, aiming for a reversal of fortune, Wen Ying had chosen to betray the Xun Xian Sect and become a demonic cultivator. Due to the full inheritance of all skill points…
Wen Ying’s demonic cultivation skills were also maxed out.
In the eyes of the people of this world, she could be considered a cultivator of both immortal and demonic arts.
However, Wen Ying genuinely disliked demonic cultivation.
It wasn’t that demonic cultivators were unpleasant. The problem was the person who always dragged her into death, a person she had never even met—the Demon Lord of the Demon Realm!
Though it was always an indirect consequence, and the Demon Lord wasn’t intentionally targeting her, she had died fifty-one times because of demonic cultivators, so hating them wasn’t unreasonable, right?
Therefore, Wen Ying rarely used demonic energy.
If it weren’t for the little shadow today, she would have almost forgotten that her demonic cultivation skills were maxed out.
Why there was a demonic cultivator in the Xun Xian Sect wasn’t important. As long as this demonic cultivator wasn’t related to the one who killed her.
…
In the following days, Fu Shuangxue was recovering from her injuries, Lin Yu hadn’t returned, and other plotlines hadn’t begun, giving Wen Ying some peace and quiet.
When not occupied, Wen Ying rarely went out, spending her days in Lin Yu’s courtyard experimenting with various dishes. Lin Yu’s courtyard had a kitchen, prepared for the original owner before she achieved spiritual immortality. The original owner was self-sufficient; before Wen Ying’s arrival, her cooking skill was already level eighteen. The original owner was willful, and Lin Yu, knowing Wen Ying’s love for food, indulged her use of the kitchen.
The melon seeds from the trial were roasted by Wen Ying in this kitchen.
As for the ingredients… Wen Ying could buy them in town, but she couldn’t pick vegetables.
Wen Ying was the type who “patted every watermelon, choosing the best-looking one to put in the shopping basket.”
Unfortunately, the level system didn’t include a “vegetable picking” skill.
Perhaps to compensate, this shoddy system’s points exchange function had one redeeming quality—it allowed the exchange of various fruits and vegetables. All raw materials available in modern society could be exchanged using points, guaranteed to be of high quality.
Therefore, Wen Ying’s useless points could be used to buy ingredients. However, the system considered these ingredients extremely common compared to the treasures of the cultivation world, resulting in low exchange rates; often, one point could buy three kilograms of vegetables. This left Wen Ying with an enormous surplus of points.
More was more; a complete variety and plenty to choose from was all that mattered.
Ancient life was terribly boring. Coupled with the dense plot points of these forty-plus story missions and her inability to travel, food was the only solace.
Three days later, Lin Yu emerged from seclusion.
Although Wen Ying had experienced this over forty times and was intimately familiar with the plot, small variations always occurred, resulting in a half-hour or so difference in the timing of plot points.
Half an hour here, half an hour there—that’s an hour in total. Previously, waiting for Lin Yu’s return in the plot, Wen Ying would have to stare at herself in the mirror for an hour.
This time, she was determined to slack off and not wait for Lin Yu’s return.
He could return whenever he pleased; she wouldn’t disrupt her daily schedule for him.
Therefore, on the morning of Lin Yu’s return, Wen Ying continued to prepare breakfast as usual.
Just as Wen Ying added the green peppers to the pan, Lin Yu returned.
“Little…” Lin Yu started to call Wen Ying’s name, but a mouthful of spicy fumes choked him, and he started coughing violently.
Hearing the commotion, Wen Ying poked her head out from behind the stove. “Master, you’re back—!”
Wen Ying shouted loudly; the frying sounds were loud, making it difficult for someone outside to hear otherwise.
“Wen Ying poked her head out, and saw Venerable Lin Yu standing in the courtyard, his white clothes fluttering without wind, his appearance refined and elegant, his brows like stars, his eyes radiating a faint, cold aura. Standing before the door, he was like a transcendent immortal, detached from the mundane world.”
—That’s how the original text should have described it.
But…
Looking at Lin Yu, who was now coughing and tearing up…
Whatever, cooking is more important.
Author’s Note:
I added some more~
Speaking of hoarding until losing interest, it’s really funny. I started with a goal of ten thousand in Onmyoji. I was so happy when I reached ten thousand Gou玉. Then twenty thousand, and now I have thirty-nine thousand, and I don’t feel anything anymore. It’s just mechanical hoarding.