Turn enemies into friends
Faced with the filth being poured over her head, Yun Wei remained unmoved, neither dodging nor avoiding it, nor even looking up.
She placed her right hand on the black scabbard at her waist, and with a clear "clang," the Duanchen Sword was drawn and slashed through the air.
The wooden barrel that was about to fall was neatly cleaved in two by this sword.
The slippery tung oil coating the barrel wall was evaporated by the sword energy the moment the sword touched it, turning into a wisp of unpleasant blue smoke that vanished without a trace.
The filthy water splashed out with a "whoosh" and spilled onto both sides of the door frame and the ground, splashing water everywhere, filth flowing, and a foul stench spreading.
Yun Wei, dressed in a flowing white gown, stood steadily inside the room, her Duan Chen sword pointing diagonally at the ground, its cold light sharp and untouched by a drop of water.
"A mere trick." Yun Wei scoffed inwardly, flicking her wrist slightly. The Broken Dust Sword emitted a deep, melodious hum as it gracefully sheathed itself.
Such despicable tactics, only daring to act in the shadows, are nothing short of cowardly.
Her gaze swept across the room. Every table, chair, and couch was made of jade bamboo that gleamed with a cold light and felt icy to the touch.
A plain white screen stands in the corner of the room, with only a few sparse bamboos outlined in ink on it. The brushstrokes are vigorous and convey a sense of refined and aloof artistic conception.
The most striking feature is the ubiquitous white gauze curtains throughout the room. Two curtains hang near the window, swaying gently in the night breeze that blows through the bamboo outside, like smoke or mist.
The bed was also draped in the same gauze curtains, layer upon layer, shadowy and indistinct, concealing it in a hazy mist. Even the partition between the inner and outer rooms was a floor-length plain white gauze curtain.
The room's furnishings were cold and aloof, much like the style favored by some elders in her memory.
Yunwei's gaze fell on the shattered barrel and the filthy mess on the ground.
Although his cultivation foundation was damaged and his spiritual power was far less than before, his instinct to sense residual auras remained.
Without moving, she closed her eyes and focused all her attention on one point. Her spiritual sense spread out like an invisible spider web, penetrating the screen and gauze curtains to capture the faint but real fluctuations in the air.
The source of the aura, accompanied by a rapid heartbeat and a sense of panic, was... behind the screen.
Yunwei suddenly opened her eyes, glancing at the plain white screen painted with ink bamboo, her left hand slightly outstretched, making a grasping motion in the air.
"Come out," she snapped.
Behind the screen, a petite figure staggered out and crashed heavily to the ground in front of Yun Wei with a thud. The dagger she was holding also fell to the ground with a clang.
She was a girl of about thirteen or fourteen years old, wearing a faded, patched light green cloth dress, with her hair styled in simple double buns. At this moment, her face was as pale as paper, without a trace of blood, and her whole body was trembling uncontrollably.
Her eyes were large and were now brimming with tears, her gaze filled with panic and helplessness.
"Fairy...Fairy, spare me..." The girl pleaded incoherently with a heavy sob in her voice, her voice trembling uncontrollably. "I did this...because there were too many people signing up for the sect competition...the elders will only select 128 strong people to participate in the first round...but I am too weak."
She sobbed, her words broken and fragmented: "My parents spent all their savings to send me here... They... they said if I don't win the championship... they won't recognize me as their daughter anymore..."
“I was thinking… if the people who signed up withdrew on their own… then my chances of staying would be… greater… I… I didn’t mean to hurt you… I just wanted to scare you, to make you feel unsafe living here… so you would quit on your own…”
Yun Wei lowered her eyes to look at the trembling girl on the ground, her gaze calm and indifferent.
Cowardly, selfish, and foolish. For his own selfish desires, he committed this despicable scheme, yet he was as timid as a mouse and utterly irresponsible.
With such a mindset, even with some talent, it's difficult to achieve great things.
"Rules are made for those who abide by them." Her voice was cold and devoid of emotion. "Those who seek opportunism and harm others for their own benefit, even if they manage to enter a sect by chance, will not go far. Today it is me, and you are still able to survive. If it were someone else, you would already be a corpse."
The girl looked up with teary eyes, her lips trembling as she couldn't speak.
Yun Wei's gaze shifted and landed on the dagger on the ground.
With a slight lift of her right hand and a subtle movement of her knuckles, she held the dagger in mid-air, hovering it in front of the girl.
"No!" The girl was terrified, thinking that Yun Wei was going to kill her. She quickly closed her eyes and hugged her head tightly with both hands.
The expected excruciating pain did not come.
With a crisp "clang," the dagger was driven deep into the wall behind her, its hilt still trembling and humming.
The girl opened her eyes in shock, staring blankly and fearfully at the trembling dagger on the wall, then at Yun Wei, not understanding what it meant.
"Meet me at the cliff at dawn tomorrow," Yun Wei said coldly.
"Fairy...Fairy...you...you mean...?" She stammered, tears welling up again, "You...you won't kill me? And...you're still willing to teach me?"
Yun Wei said calmly, "Instead of wasting time scheming to harm others, it's better to use these three days to hone your skills. You only get one chance."
"Yes! Yes! Thank you, fairy! Thank you for sparing my life! Thank you for giving me this opportunity!" The girl was so excited that she kowtowed repeatedly.
Finally, she raised her eyes and her gaze fell on Yun Wei's clear and cold eyes. She suddenly paused and murmured, "Fairy... your eyes... are so familiar... like the immortal sister who saved me when I was a child... she looks just like that too, cold-looking, like the moon in the sky, but her heart is warm... Fairy, you are just like her, both are good people!"
Yunwei's eyes flickered slightly.
This person is cowardly and selfish, but not a truly wicked villain. Her parents have absurd expectations and regard the leader as something easily obtained. She herself is like a rootless duckweed, easily driven or exploited by others.
Leaving her here could become a hidden danger, or she could be used as a pawn by others to deal with us.
Rather than letting it go unchecked, it's better to keep it in sight. Offer some guidance; if it proves promising, we can recruit it for our own use—it's a useful tool. If it's hopelessly rotten, we can deal with it later.
"What's your name?" Yunwei asked.
"I...I'm called Anian," the girl hurriedly answered, her gaze sweeping over Yun Wei's right palm.
There was a strip of plain-colored cloth wrapped around it, with a hint of darkness showing through.
As if remembering something, the girl hurriedly took out a small white jade bottle and a roll of fine gauze from the small cloth bag at her waist, and carefully presented them to Yun Wei, with a hint of appeasement and atonement:
"Fairy... Fairy, this... this is our family's ancestral 'Jade Marrow Muscle Regeneration Powder,' it's very effective for external injuries! My mother brewed it herself using herbs from the mountains! And... and some clean gauze! Please accept it! Consider it... consider it my apology!"
Yun Wei's gaze swept over the simple jade bottle and clean gauze. Without refusing, she calmly accepted them and put them into her sleeve. "Thank you."
"Then...then I'll be going now! I'll definitely be there on time tomorrow at 5 a.m.!" Ah Nian felt like she had been granted a pardon. She quickly got up and pulled out a relatively clean cloth from somewhere. She quickly wiped the dirty water off the floor, picked up the broken pieces of the wooden bucket, and slipped out of the room.
Looking at the ground that had instantly returned to its clean state, a very faint ripple flashed across Yun Wei's eyes.
Being able to immediately take action to clean up the mess shows that they acknowledge their mistake and still have some sense of responsibility.
She walked to the table and sat down, her brows slightly furrowed.
The soul-protecting rope given by Xie Lanchen did indeed have the effect of stabilizing the remnant soul and concentrating spiritual consciousness. Like an invisible rope, it barely maintained the body formed by her remnant soul from collapsing and kept her on the surface of life.
But it was too slow. The Soul-Protecting Rope could only maintain the connection, like a bandage barely stopping the bleeding; it couldn't help her quickly regain her strength, let alone repair the severely damaged essence of her soul.
With this remnant soul, let alone seeking revenge against Xie Qingfeng, he would be powerless even to face the strong opponents in the sect competition.
As far as she knew, the fastest and safest way was to find the top floor of the Guiyun Sect's library, where the scroll "The Secret Record of Nourishing the Soul and Returning to Origin," which was listed as a forbidden technique and could only be read by the sect leader and elders, was located.
It's best not to let Xie Lanchen know about this, Yun Wei thought.
Although he helped several times, and even went so far as to ask the elders for the Soul Protection Rope, the "Return to Origin Soul Nourishing Secret Record" is a secret method for repairing damaged souls, and its purpose is too clearly defined.
If the boy were to ask the elder for it, it would immediately arouse suspicion, which would be tantamount to exposing his own weakness and putting both of them in danger.
*
As night deepened, all was quiet.
The library stands majestically beside the main peak, with powerful protective barriers inside and several disciples on duty at the entrance.
Fortunately, Yunwei knew the terrain of this place very well. She went around to the back of the pavilion and found a formation node that she had accidentally discovered when she was practicing her sword. The spiritual energy flow was slightly sluggish and weaker than in other places.
This place is located at the junction of the mountain wall and the pavilion, and is usually hidden by vines.
She gathered a wisp of spiritual energy at her fingertips and silently slit open a gap, just enough for one person to turn sideways.
The interior of the pavilion was pitch black.
Yunwei gathered her breath and moved lightly, her footsteps landing silently. In just a few leaps, she had reached the top floor.
The place was small, with cold jade boxes embedded in the walls on all four sides. The boxes contained the most treasured books and secret techniques of the Guiyun Sect, and a chilling aura seeped out from them.
In the corner stood a black iron cabinet, used to store rare and fragmentary scrolls whose spiritual power was too domineering and could not be contained by ordinary jade boxes, or secret records that required extreme cold to lock their aura.
With a clear goal in mind, she headed straight for the deepest part, where a separate bookcase was crafted from ten-thousand-year-old black ice jade.
This jade box is the coldest and has the strongest restrictions; it is the place where the "Secret Record of Nourishing the Soul and Returning to Origin" is stored.
At this moment, the Xuanbing Jade Book Cube was completely empty.
Yun Wei's gaze suddenly sharpened, and her heart sank slightly.
Not here?
She quickly scanned her surroundings. The other jade boxes had intact seals, with no signs of being forcibly broken. Only the Xuanbing Jade Box containing the secret records had dim seals, as if it had been opened not long ago.
Could it be that her father took it and hid it beforehand? But... we can't rule out another possibility.
This secret record is priceless, and there are bound to be those who covet it.
To keep an eye on her, her father added registration checkpoints, but perhaps he also overlooked the possibility of an inside traitor?
Just as she was deep in thought, she caught a faint breath, almost completely masked by the spiritual energy of the library itself.
The other party was clearly trying their best to conceal their presence; if Yun Wei hadn't been completely focused at the moment, it would have been almost impossible to detect them.
Her mind raced: the aura was concealed so well, able to infiltrate this place silently, and the target was this "Secret Record of Nourishing the Soul and Returning to Origin"... friend or foe?
Her gaze lingered on the room for a moment, and her spiritual sense, guided by the faint aura, finally landed on the inconspicuous iron cabinet in the southeast corner.
It is made of black iron mixed with star-patterned wood, and the cabinet body flows with a faint silver luster. Upon closer inspection, it seems that tiny star-like specks are moving between the wood grain.
A piece of black jade was inlaid on the cabinet door, with clouds and mist swirling within it. At first glance, it looked like an ordinary storage magic tool, nothing special.
Yun Wei's gaze sharpened slightly as she tiptoed to the counter.
She gathered a wisp of spiritual energy at her fingertips, probed into the black jade lock core, and gently flicked it along the array patterns.
With a soft creak, the cabinet door opened, the sound just barely drowned out by the night wind sweeping past the window.
A boy was hiding in the cabinet.
His brows seemed to be covered with an unyielding frost, and his eyes, a very light cobalt blue, were now coldly piercing towards him, carrying the murderous intent of someone who had been caught in a compromising situation.
But when he saw that it was her, the fierce look in his eyes vanished instantly, replaced by astonishment and panic.
Xie Lanchen.
It was him.
Their eyes met, and the air seemed to freeze.
What's the boy doing here? He sneaked into the library in the dead of night to steal the "Secret Record of Nourishing the Soul and Returning to Origin"... Was it for her?
Yes, he was the one who gave him the soul-protecting rope. The boy was sarcastic, but his actions showed otherwise...
Yun Wei slowly raised her hand and gently removed the black mask covering her face, revealing a cool and beautiful face that was also tired.
She looked at him, her gaze deep, a faint yet meaningful smile playing on her lips, and softly uttered three words:
"coward."
Upon hearing this, the boy was both ashamed and anxious: "Nonsense! Who's a coward!"
He added, "The sect leader suspects someone covets the secret manual and ordered me to investigate secretly. But you, coming here alone, what are you up to?"
Yunwei looked at his attempt to cover up his misunderstanding, and the faint smile on her lips quietly disappeared.
The father's methods were expected, but Xie Lanchen's actions were rather interesting. His father ordered him to investigate, but he secretly stole the secret records and hid them in the cabinet.
Yun Wei took a step closer, her gaze fixed on the boy's cobalt blue eyes, and asked in a low voice, "You are here, holding the 'Secret Record of Nourishing the Soul and Returning to Origin,' is it for yourself, or... for me?" Her question was direct and sharp, leaving no room for negotiation.
The boy's eyes flickered slightly, and he finally turned his head away. His tone was somewhat stiff and cold, as if he was unwilling, yet also trying to put on a brave face: "Don't worry about it. What do I care about your life or death? I'm just afraid that if you lose too easily in this competition, it will make my victory seem unfair."
Yunwei watched his stubbornness and insincere arguments quietly, without exposing him.
Just then—
"Who's up there!" A sharp shout suddenly rang out.
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