Chapter 59 Senior Brothers and Sisters... "Do they deserve to suffer so much?..."

Chi Yang felt that she was probably the most miserable time traveler in history.

When others transmigrate, they either dominate the world or enjoy the company of beautiful women. What about her?

She was bound to a nasty system, and the tasks it assigned were so frustrating they made her scalp tingle.

She finally found a sense of belonging in the Myriad Manifestations Sect and met a junior sister who was genuinely kind to her, but then the junior sister turned around and went into seclusion for five years.

For the past five years, she has either been on the run or preparing to run away.

The one pursuing her was none other than Ao Hao, that monster from the Dan Sect.

For some reason, that thing had its eye on her. Every time it got close, it made her hair stand on end, and her system would buzz and rattle as if it were being strongly interfered with.

She could sense that the other person seemed to be able to detect her location through some kind of "synchronous" sensing.

Over the course of five years, she used every trick in the book.

In the end, they had no choice but to use their most treasured possession to transform into a little golden bee.

They relied on drinking dew and stealing nectar, living a guerrilla life in the poor and remote mountains and rivers, enduring a truly miserable existence.

That day, she had just finished drinking the last drop of clean dew from the leaf and was about to flap her wings and fly to her next hideout.

A cold, sticky sensation suddenly enveloped the area, like the forked tongue of a venomous snake, locking onto it tightly.

Chi Yang froze.

Through the covered eyes, a distorted figure slowly emerged from the black mist of the swamp.

“Found you…” Ao Hao grinned, his teeth starkly white in the dim light, his eyes gleaming with pure greed. “You really know how to hide.”

He stretched out his withered hand, black mist swirling around his fingertips, and aimed it at the bee on the leaf. Suddenly, a ruthless suction force erupted!

Chi Yang's heart skipped a beat, and she flapped her wings desperately.

But the suction force was very strange; it not only sucked into her body, but also made the system in her soul unstable, buzzing as if it wanted to break free.

She desperately wanted to give the system to him, but Ao Hao clearly wanted her dead!

Chi Yang felt as if all the power in his body was being suppressed, and he was almost in despair.

It's over... I'm going to be swallowed up...

Just as the black mist was about to touch the golden wingtips—

"call out!"

A streak of cyan sword light cleaved through the thick poisonous miasma, striking Ao Hao's wrist directly!

Almost simultaneously, a sinister aura swept across the left, while a dark, emerald-green light silently attacked Ao Hao's back from the right!

Shi Liuying and Rong Yan have arrived!

Ao Hao clearly hadn't expected the reinforcements to arrive so quickly and with such cunning coordination.

He let out a strange sound in his throat, withdrew his hand, and spun around, narrowly avoiding the three-way attack in a bizarre posture that resembled breaking bones. The suction force then dissipated.

In that brief moment of opening!

Shi Liuying moved like a wisp of smoke, flashing to the side of the withered tree and reaching out to scoop up the stunned little bee.

A fierce glint flashed in Ao Hao's eyes. Instead of fighting for it, he flipped his wrist, and the lingering suction force abruptly changed direction, lashing out to the other side like a vicious whip—

There, Shen Hanzhou, in his haste to catch up with the group, rushed forward slightly, thus exposing himself.

"Oh no!" Shi Liuying's heart tightened, but it was too late when she turned around.

A triumphant smirk flashed across Ao Hao's face. The black energy surged violently, transforming into a giant claw that instantly enveloped the stunned Shen Hanzhou!

"If I can't catch her..." His hoarse voice was mixed with a strange laugh, "using you to settle the score isn't a bad deal!"

The black claws tightened suddenly!

"Chen Hanzhou!" Shi Liuying shouted anxiously, her Buling Sword gleaming brightly as several sharp sword energies slashed towards the black mist.

Ao Hao, however, was prepared. A thick black mist burst forth from his body, enveloping the struggling Chen Hanzhou. Like a drop of ink falling into sewage, it sank into the swamp below without a trace.

Shi Liuying gripped the sword so tightly that her knuckles turned white.

She stared at the gradually flattening muddy water, then looked at Chi Yang, who had turned back into a human shape in her palm, pale and still in shock, and finally gazed into the dark depths of the swamp, her clear eyes seeming to ignite with two flames.

“Ao Hao…Yun Zhi Shui…”

As soon as Shi Liuying finished speaking, a green shadow flashed up like a streak of light and approached.

It is the reign of the emperor.

His face was paler than usual, and his breathing was slightly rapid. He had rushed over without stopping after receiving Rong Yan's message.

Jun Lintian's gaze immediately locked onto Shi Liuying, quickly scanning her from head to toe. Seeing that apart from a little mud on the hem of her clothes and her eyes shining brightly because of her anxiety, she was unharmed, and his tense shoulder line relaxed almost imperceptibly.

"Senior brother..." When Shi Liuying saw him arrive, the anxiety in her heart caused by Shen Hanzhou's capture was inexplicably mixed with a trace of frustration.

She lowered her head, her whole body flattened: "I didn't... I didn't protect Chen Hanzhou well."

A cool hand gently landed on the top of her head and ruffled it.

"It's not your fault." Jun Lintian's voice was slightly hoarse from the long drive, but it was very steady. "That thing is unpredictable and has been plotting for a long time. It's impossible to guard against it."

Rong Yan crowded around: "What exactly happened? What is Ao Hao's... or rather, what is the purpose of the thing that has taken over his body?"

Chi Yang was finally able to maintain her human form with peace of mind. Feeling the reassuring and familiar aura emanating from Shi Liuying, she took a deep breath and spoke quickly: "He wants to strip us of our systems. I can feel it!"

"Strip the system?" Rong Yan's eyebrows shot up. "This thing can be stripped away? If it could be stripped away, I would have ripped it out of my sea of ​​consciousness and smashed it to pieces eight hundred years ago!"

Standing in the dim light, Chong Cang replied in a low voice, "Perhaps it's not about peeling, but about uprooting."

His gaze swept over Chi Yang: "The system is deeply bound to the host's soul. As long as the host is alive, the system is like a bone-deep infection that is difficult to separate. Therefore, his purpose may be more direct—to kill all the people who possess the system, and the system will naturally perish along with the host."

"Isn't the cold boat in great danger!" Shi Liuying said anxiously, turning around to jump into the swamp, but Jun Lintian raised his hand to stop her.

“Not necessarily.” Jun Lintian shook his head, his gaze calm. “If he only wanted to eliminate the system’s host, he would have had plenty of opportunities to target Rong Yan, Chong Cang, or even Su Wan, whose cultivation was weaker, over the past five years. But he didn’t. He only pursued Chi Yang relentlessly when he showed his face, and just now, seeing that things were not going to work, he resorted to kidnapping Han Zhou as a second choice.”

He looked at Shi Liuying, his eyes filled with complex emotions: "Compared to eliminating all hosts, what he is more eager to do is probably... to kill you."

"Me?" Shi Liuying was taken aback, pointing to her own nose with a puzzled look on her face. "Why me? I don't have a system."

“It’s precisely because you don’t have it,” Jun Lintian said slowly.

“Before you went into seclusion, I noticed that Ao Hao paid special attention to you, and even seemed to be wary of you.”

"You've been out of touch for the past five years, and he's been almost in hiding, rarely making any moves."

"He only became active again after you returned from the pass, and even risked his life to appear and kidnap people."

"Firefly, there must be something about you that he has to get rid of, or... you yourself are the biggest variable."

Rong Yan gasped: "Could it be because fireflies can interfere with the system? Are transmigration systems divided into different levels? The highest level can directly rewrite the rules of the world?"

Shi Liuying, however, had little interest in rewriting the world.

She astutely caught another word in Rong Yan's words: "Transmigration System?" She looked up, her clear eyes reflecting the expressions of everyone. "Senior Sister, the system you all have... is it called a 'Transmigration System'?"

Rong Yan, Chong Cang, and Chi Yang all remained silent for a moment, then nodded.

This was no secret among them, but they had never formally told Shi Liuying.

The vague guess in Shi Liuying's mind became clearer and clearer.

In *Sword Heart Reflects the Path*, the balding old man with a graying beard is the director of the Transmigration Bureau. The senior brothers and sisters possess transmigration systems. And within Ao Hao lies the bizarre entity that can devour systems and even potentially alter the Heavenly Dao…

"Senior brothers and sisters, there's no point in us guessing what Ao Hao is planning. But there's a place where we might find the answer."

She gazed at the moon, its hazy light obscured by miasma, above the swamp, her eyes resolute.

"I need to go to Kenshin Illumination again."

-

Within the strange space filled with golden Dao essence and flowing sword principles, the Director of the Book Transmigration Bureau seemed to have been waiting for a long time.

The old man was still wearing that simple gray robe. He had his back to her, his hands behind his back, gazing at the golden figures in the space that were spontaneously generating sword moves. His sparse beard looked somewhat comical in the flowing halo of light.

"I knew you would come back." He didn't turn his head, his voice old but firm.

Shi Liuying had no time for pleasantries and went straight to the point: "What's going on with the system inside Ao Hao's body? Why can it devour other systems? And why is it so determined to kill me?"

The director was silent for a moment, then sighed softly.

This sigh seemed to carry an immense weight.

Shi Liuying felt the surrounding scenery suddenly blur and spin.

Once she regained her balance and looked around, she found herself in a completely unfamiliar place.

There is no sky, no earth, only boundless, soft, and bright light.

Countless books of varying sizes and thicknesses floated in the air, shimmering with a strange, flowing light, like quietly flowing galaxies.

Further away, one can see colorful and uniquely shaped clusters of light, like living dandelion seeds, being gently sent into tiny crevices by some invisible force.

Everything here was beyond Shi Liuying's comprehension; it was bizarre and fantastical, yet perfectly orderly.

"This is the Chuanshu Bureau."

The director's voice rang out beside me.

He was wearing a uniquely shaped wooden cane, and his beard seemed to have been carefully combed, but the few missing tufts were still noticeable.

"Director! Director!" A clear and lively voice came from afar.

A young girl dressed in a bright red dress that reached her chest and with her hair in two buns rushed over like a dove: "Quick, quick, take me to Daliang! You promised to take me there today! Chu Jichuan is still waiting for me to go to the Lantern Festival together!"

She threatened fiercely, "If you keep delaying, believe me, I'll pluck out all the little bit of beard you have left!"

The old man was so frightened that he quickly covered his chin and said repeatedly, "Gently, gently, don't rush! Let me finish dealing with this young friend's matter. Half a day, just half a day! I will definitely get you there!"

"Just half a day! Not a moment longer! Otherwise..." She made a pulling motion, her words full of threat.

"Alright, alright, half a day, it's a deal!" The old man made his promise, and only breathed a sigh of relief after the girl left. He shook his head helplessly, leaned on his cane and walked deeper into the area, gesturing to Shi Liuying, "Follow me."

Shi Liuying silently followed, unable to resist glancing again at the bureau chief's precarious beard.

Yes, all prestige has vanished.

The director led her to a relatively quiet area.

Here you can see a clearer view of the work area.

The human figures formed by light and shadow were enveloped by a gentle force and sent into those crevices.

Immediately afterwards, some bright or dim, complex-structured orbs of light were also projected in, following along as if by a pre-programmed sequence.

"The main responsibility of the Transmigration Bureau is to send suitable transmigrators to various book worlds that are on the verge of collapse or chaos for various reasons, to help stabilize the world line, repair loopholes, and maintain basic order and balance in different dimensions."

The director spoke slowly, his voice carrying a heavy sense of responsibility.

“Originally, this was an orderly process.” He changed the subject, his tone becoming serious. “But thousands of years ago, an unexpected change occurred when the ‘System 97’ was deployed to your world.”

Shi Liuying's heart tightened: "What happened?"

The director tapped his cane lightly, and the light screen in front of him shifted, revealing some blurry fragments of images.

"System No. 97, shortly after binding to its host, reversed course and devoured the host's soul and consciousness, gaining complete control over the body."

“That host…” Shi Liuying’s voice was dry.

"It is the current sect master of the Dan Sect in your world."

Shi Liuying's pupils constricted sharply: "But the Sect Master of the Dan Sect is still..."

"Alive?"

The director interrupted her, his eyes filled with deep weariness and solemnity: "That was just a puppet completely controlled by System 97, a shell used to bear its power and facilitate its actions. The real sect master of the Dan Sect perished thousands of years ago."

He continued, "This matter was only discovered by us two hundred years ago due to abnormal fluctuations in a certain world. By then, System 97, with its strange abilities and the passage of time, had begun to gradually erode the Heavenly Dao rules of the distorted world."

“We tried to force a recall, but it has become deeply entangled with that world and has even taken over, so conventional methods have failed.”

"So, you sent out a new transmigrator with a new system to try and destroy it?"

Shi Liuying's voice turned cold.

“Yes,” the director admitted. “We hope to use the power of new, controllable transmigrators, combined with the system assistance they carry, to resolve this out-of-control virus within that world.”

"However, System 97 is extremely sensitive to signals from the same system and has extremely strong interference and absorption characteristics."

"Without exception, all the transmigrators we sent out were affected by it."

"Their systems have been interfered with and altered to varying degrees, even by reverse infiltration, leading to changes in mission objectives and putting themselves in danger."

He looked at Shi Liuying with a complicated expression: "Your senior brothers and sisters... Rong Yan, Jun Lintian, Chong Cang, Chen Hanzhou, Chi Yang, Su Wan... are all transmigrators we have sent over the past two hundred years."

Some blurry images flashed across the screen, vaguely revealing Rong Yan's bewilderment upon first arriving in this other world, Jun Lintian's resilience when severely injured, Chong Cang's loneliness as he walked alone in the darkness, Chen Hanzhou's clumsy attempts to adapt to the rules, Chi Yang's disarray as a balance strategist, and Su Wan's struggle against the system...

Shi Liuying lowered her head, her hands clenched into fists, her nails digging deep into her palms.

It turns out that their two hundred years of life were burdened by involuntary shackles and ever-present crises due to the negligence and accidents mentioned by the old man.

An indescribable anger, mixed with heartache and bitterness, exploded in her heart.

She abruptly raised her head, her eyes flashing with astonishing anger, but her voice was very low:

"So, my fellow senior brothers and sisters, just because of your 'mistake' in transmigrating into the book store, just because you failed to manage that so-called System No. 97..."

She took a step forward, staring intently into the bureau chief's deep, yet weary eyes:

"Does he deserve to suffer for the next two hundred years?"

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Author's Note: Random red envelopes will be dropping! [pat on the head]