"Okay, I understand the reasoning."
"But why would this guy just drop dead on my doorstep for no reason?"
His mind raced, but he couldn’t figure it out no matter how hard he thought.
However, when he happened to glance down, he saw his little sister, Ji Wei, biting her lip. Her head was bowed in silence as she stared at the tips of her toes.
A thought suddenly struck him:
"Everyone, you may all leave now."
"As for this matter with the Qi Cultivation Grandmaster..."
"I’ll ask my Master and Magistrate Zhao to step in and handle it."
...
The moon climbed to its zenith. The crowd in the Ji Family courtyard quickly dispersed, leaving only the siblings, Ji Xiu and Ji Wei, along with an unconscious Lin Ruxue lying on a bed in the guest room.
After careful consideration, Ji Xiu had men from the Wind and Cloud Association deliver Wang Hongzu’s body to Gu Baichuan at the County Yamen.
Gu Baichuan was a Hundred Households in the Northern Garrison Command. As an Official, his authority was at its peak, second only to a Prefecture Official, making him even more imposing than the County Magistrate. His duty was Patrolling the Outer Dao.
The Central Yellow Sect worshipped foreign Divine Beings, spreading their faith to delude the hearts of the people. Among the factions designated as Outer Dao by the Great Xuan, they were unequivocally a target to be exterminated on sight.
The corpse of such a person—a Qi Cultivation Grandmaster, no less—was a genuine, tangible achievement.
In any case, if he kept the body, he couldn’t possibly travel all the way to Jiangyin Prefecture to claim a reward. Besides, the circumstances surrounding the death would be too difficult to explain clearly.
It was better to do Gu an easy favor, letting the man they called Lord Gu add an achievement to his record. He would then owe Ji Xiu one, and when the time came to go to Jiangyin Prefecture, Ji Xiu would have a personal connection there.
As for Cai Ling’Er.
Apparently driven by curiosity, she had shamelessly insisted on staying at his home in the role of a "maidservant." She wanted to have a long, heart-to-heart talk, hoping to dig up all his secrets and get to the bottom of things.
She completely disregarded the scandalous implications of an unmarried man and woman sharing a house alone.
Ordinarily, Ji Xiu wouldn’t have minded. But he had a gut feeling his little sister, Ji Wei, wanted to talk to him about something. With walls having ears, it wasn’t as if he could intimidate Cai Ling’Er into leaving by Breaking a Realm or becoming a Manifested Saint in front of her.
So, Ji Xiu showed no mercy and simply kicked Cai Ling’Er out.
After all, despite the so-called three-month term, her position as his maidservant was one she could take or leave at will.
In response, Cai Ling’Er pouted but didn’t insist on staying. She rode off in a huff, and from the looks of it, she was heading to the Inner Street to go fleece Instructor Liao of the Whale-Slaying Saber.
Ji Xiu felt a sliver of pity for the man. The sky hadn’t even begun to lighten yet; old Instructor Liao was probably still fast asleep.
The instructor was completely unaware that upon waking, he would be welcoming a "Living Ancestor" from the Prefecture City.
Thinking back, old Instructor Liao Yuanhua had never done anything to wrong him.
But ever since meeting Ji Xiu, he’d had a run of bad luck. First, he’d failed to take Ji Xiu as a disciple and stormed his home, only to be tied up and extorted by Ji Xiu’s own Master.
Then, when Ji Xiu had challenged the Divine Fist Sect, he had also challenged Liao’s school as a matter of convenience to cultivate his Sword Mountain and Fire Sea Stance, causing the instructor to lose a great deal of face.
Things had only just settled down for a few days.
And now, because of his bet with Cai Ling’Er, he figured Liao was about to be... well, the direct heiress of his ultimate boss—the Jadeite Shop Cai Family from the Prefecture City—was about to...
...exploit him for all he was worth. She would make him forge a weapon with a draw weight of at least Fifty Stones from superior Eighth-grade Materials, a process that would cost several hundred silver taels at minimum.
As for getting reimbursed by the Jadeite Shop Cai Family? Trying to get an expense report approved by a boss who was practically a world away? That was never going to be easy.
It was a classic case of getting caught in the crossfire when you’re just minding your own business.
Even without seeing it for himself, Ji Xiu could already predict how it would play out. Cai Ling’Er, that sly girl who was an expert at sizing up a situation, would use every trick in the book to get what she wanted for free.
And after she was done, she would probably make some grand, empty promises that would leave the entire Whale-Slaying Saber school thanking her profusely for the honor.
"Sigh."
The candlelight flickered. He glanced at Lin Ruxue, who lay unconscious in the guest room, a victim of a disaster she hadn’t deserved.
Ji Xiu sighed, returned to the room, and sure enough, he saw his little sister, Ji Wei, sitting there properly, nervously twisting the corner of her clothes.
His expression turned serious.
"Speak."
"This whole mess... how exactly did it happen?"
He tapped the table, his expression certain.
Possessing the Innate Wisdom of two lifetimes and having lived with his little sister under the same roof for more than a decade, Ji Xiu knew what she was thinking from a single gesture, a single look. He could tell in an instant if she had something to hide.
Hearing the serious tone in her brother’s voice,
Ji Wei bit her lip, her eyes welling up with tears.
In her dream, her "bargain" Master had warned her time and again before she left, telling her never to reveal her greatest secret to anyone.
Otherwise, she might be captured by those with ill intentions and fall into great peril.
But looking at her brother’s stern face,
Ji Wei didn’t hesitate for even a second before deciding to tell him everything.
Because in her worldview, her brother didn’t count as "anyone." In her narrow world, he was the only real, flesh-and-blood person, the only family member who had ever shown her warmth.
She just didn’t know how to begin describing an experience so bizarre and fantastical.
After all, for a Martial Artist confined to the small world of Anning County, the story would be utterly shocking—mind-blowing, even.
And when Ji Xiu suddenly spoke, Ji Wei started, and an idea came to her in a flash.
"Brother, do you believe in transmigration?"
"Transmigration is when..."
She proceeded to tell Ji Xiu absolutely everything that had happened in her dream—a dream that took place in a Celestial Universe called Chixiao Heaven, a world completely separate from the Great Xuan.
She explained how she had been accepted into a top-tier sect called the Ten Thousand Laws Sect and had even received its True Inheritance.
Her Master was known as the True Venerable of Ten Thousand Laws. He had said that the next time she entered the dream, her soul returning to Chixiao Heaven, he would grant her a Guiding Map and inscribe her Dao Seal. This would mark her formal Licensing, allowing her to step onto the path of Cultivation—to absorb the Spiritual Mechanism, receive her license, and fly to become an Immortal...