gossip
Since her conversation with Xiao Ze, Wen Zheng has collected a lot of things on the mountain to draw talismans. Most of them are pebbles and leaves, as well as a piece of bamboo that she carried back.
After her attempts, she found that the spiritual power of most things would dissipate after being marked with talismans, but the only thing that succeeded was the talisman she drew on a bamboo strip.
Wen Zheng practically worshipped her only successful offspring.
By experimenting with different sizes and weights of bamboo strips, Wen Zheng's success rate in drawing talismans increased. However, the only drawback of bamboo strips is that the cinnabar is easily rubbed off.
Wen Zheng tried various methods over two days, but couldn't solve the problem. She was so anxious that she got a sore throat and blisters appeared on her lips.
That night, she had just finished recording all the runes and was about to go out for some fresh air when she looked up and saw someone sitting on the roof. She looked closer and saw that it was Mu Qing sitting on the roof enjoying the breeze, holding a bottle of wine in her hand.
Thinking of Mu Qing's strange behavior of frequently monitoring her lately, Wen Zheng lowered her head and ran quickly. Just as she was about to run out of Mu Qing's sight, he called out to her.
Where to?
A cold voice came from behind, but Wen Zheng pretended not to hear it and kept walking.
Mu Qing saw through Wen Zheng's thoughts at a glance and dropped a bombshell, "Why haven't you and your system been communicating lately?"
Wen Zheng was walking very fast. Before she could stop, she slipped and fell to the ground. She felt a sharp pain in her tailbone and lay there for a long time, unable to get up.
Mu Qing, holding the wine, leaped down and slowly knelt beside her. "Don't be so surprised. I just happened to overhear your conversation with it."
"[Really?]" The system's weak voice echoed in Wen Zheng's mind.
Mu Qing nodded. "I also know you want Wen Zheng to win me over. I'm curious about what it is about me that makes you so interested in me."
Wen Zheng lay on the ground with her eyes closed. The sound of the system in her mind gasping for air was particularly loud, sounding like it was sniffing.
[Oh no, Wen Zheng, stop pretending to be dead!]
The system's explosive sound forced Wen Zheng to open her eyes. Her pupils dilated, and she reached out to touch her eyes before slowly getting up. "I'm sleepwalking, I'm sleepwalking."
She turned and walked towards her room.
Mu Qing called out to her from behind, "Stop pretending, let's talk."
Wen Zheng: "..."
Upon seeing the familiar chessboard once again, Wen Zheng recalled how she and the system had teamed up to trick Mu Qing, and fell silent for a moment.
Mu Qing had the same thought and said, "Why don't you let your system come out and have a chat?"
Wen Zheng opened her mouth: "It can't get out."
Mu Qing: "So it resides in your soul?"
"More or less."
Mu Qing took a sip of wine, exhaling white mist. "What's your relationship with the system? Why is it asking you to win me over?"
These doubts had been ignored by Mu Qing, but when they were brought up again, she felt that Wen Zheng's appearance was at an inopportune time.
It's too much of a coincidence; it's as if her appearance was meant to hint that there was another reason for her master's death.
Wen Zheng's fingertips gripped the wooden bracelet, leaving fingernail marks on the smooth wood. "I don't know. When I woke up, the system was with me. I don't remember anything else."
Mu Qing stared at her with cold eyes, not believing her words.
He knew Wen Zheng's character; she would never admit anything until the truth was laid bare in her face.
The two faced off, neither willing to give in.
Seeing the increasingly tense atmosphere between the two, the system couldn't help but interrupt them, "[Um, if you have something to say, just ask me. She doesn't know.]"
It spoke on its own initiative, flying out from between Wen Zheng's eyebrows and transforming into a ball of light that landed on the chessboard.
Both of their gazes fell on the system, which had transformed into the shape of a bird and hopped around on the chessboard twice.
[If you have any questions, just ask me.] The system looked at him, its tiny, bean-sized eyes blinking twice.
Mu Qing: "Why did you try to win me over with Wen Zheng's charm?"
The system shook its foot, [This cannot be said.]
"So what is your purpose?"
[I can't say that either.]
Mu Qing: "..."
Wen Zheng raised her hand to interrupt their conversation, "Ask something you can answer." She felt like she was listening to a conversation between a human and a machine.
"Okay." Mu Qing glanced at her, and Wen Zheng sensed something was wrong. She heard Mu Qing ask the system, "Can her memories be restored?"
The system nodded this time, [Okay, but not now.]
"when?"
The system fell silent once again, and its silence made Wen Zheng lower her eyes and think about the original owner of the body.
When she transmigrated, the original owner of this body had already lost her memory and was lying in a mass grave. Even under these circumstances, someone was still trying to kill her.
Who exactly did the original owner of this body offend?
Mu Qing quietly finished her drink, already having made up her mind.
Since Wen Zheng can recover, he doesn't mind letting her recover faster. He's heard there's a kind of fragrance that can put people into a dream state; perhaps it will provide some clues.
Mu Qing got up to write a letter to his friend asking for incense. As soon as he moved, Wen Zheng and the system watched him warily. They breathed a sigh of relief after watching him walk away.
After the system saw Mu Qing off, it also planned to return to Wen Zheng's mind to rest, but she grabbed it and whispered threateningly in its ear, "System, do you know about me?"
The "I" she refers to is the original body.
Speaking of which, the system appeared suddenly, without giving her any clues, and only told her to win over Mu Qing. What does it want to do?
The system's small, fluffy body, held in Wen Zheng's hands, swallowed hard in a human-like manner. [Host, calm down.]
"I'll calm down once you tell me." Wen Zheng's hand tightened, her eyes flashing with malice.
[You do not have sufficient permissions to view this at this time.] The system's mechanical voice sounded.
Wen Zheng was amused and exasperated by its automated response. "What permissions? How do I achieve that?"
[You can view this once you reach the Nascent Soul stage.] The system seems to have gone offline; its reply was very formal.
When Wen Zheng heard the word "Fusion Stage," she thought she was hallucinating. The Fusion Stage was a cultivation level that many cultivators would spend their entire lives trying to reach. Even Mu Qing was only at the Nascent Soul stage. How long would it take for her to cultivate to the Fusion Stage?
By the time Wen Zheng tried to continue asking the system questions, it had already logged off and crashed. The bird's body left in her hand kept changing, eventually turning into a crow.
Wen Zheng snorted coldly, threw the crow far away, thought for a moment, then picked it up and put it in her sleeve pocket.
We'll settle accounts with it once the system wakes up.
After all that had happened, Wen Zheng lost the will to go out for a stroll and continued to stay behind closed doors to create new talismans.
They were completely unaware of the rumors that were slowly spreading within the Immortal Pursuit Sect.
In the past few days, a rumor has begun to circulate in the Immortal Pursuit Sect. It is said that a menial disciple who went to the Ghost Clan obtained a secret technique of the Ghost Clan and seized the cultivation of his fellow Golden Core stage senior brother, thus also becoming a Golden Core stage cultivator.
The rumors spread far and wide, with some even saying that the handyman disciple had improved his cultivation by eating the heart and liver of his senior brother who was at the Golden Core stage, and that the handyman disciple was a demon.
Such outrageous rumors spread very quickly. Although the elders in the sect intervened, their efforts to stop them were far slower than the speed at which the rumors spread.
After hearing the rumors, Qi Sheng and the others rushed to Aoxue Peak to find Wen Zheng.
Wen Zheng, who was deep in thought during her seclusion, heard a loud knocking at the door. Thinking that Mu Qing had come to cause her trouble, she hurriedly went out to check and found that the people who came were her senior brothers and sisters from the Ghost Clan, and Qu Hong and Mo Xin were also there.
"How come you all arrived at the same time?" Wen Zheng invited them into the house.
A charcoal fire was burning inside, and unlike the freezing cold outside, the blankets scattered nearby still retained warmth.
After the group entered, they sat down on the floor. Qu Hong hurriedly asked Wen Zheng, "Have you heard?"
"What did I hear?" She raised her eyes and swept them over the crowd. "Is the sect going to be finished?"
She couldn't think of any other reason why everyone had come.
"The sect isn't finished yet, but you're about to be finished," Lu Yun said.
Wen Zheng: "?"
Her puzzled expression told everyone that she was completely unaware of the rumors.
Everyone chimed in with their own stories, recounting the most widespread rumors circulating in the sect, including the story of Wen Zheng using her fellow disciples' hearts and livers to enhance her cultivation, and the story of her secretly harming her fellow disciples.
After listening to their accounts, Wen Zheng's eyes darkened, and she immediately identified the suspect.
"Let's go find that fat guy."
She has a low profile in the sect, and the only person she has a grudge against recently is the fat talisman cultivator whose business she stole.
Seeing that she had a suspect, everyone quickly got up and followed her. The group hurried down Aoxue Peak and found the fat man who had come to accept the mission at the entrance of the mission pavilion.
The fat man came to accept the mission alone. When he saw Wen Zheng leading a group of people from afar, he was so frightened that he quickly ran into the mission hall.
He was huge, and he bumped into a lot of people as he ran, and they pointed and whispered about him.
Keep an eye on it.
"That's right, that's right."
The fat man bowed his head and apologized, then found the manager of the mission hall. "Someone's causing trouble," he said, pointing to Wen Zheng and her group.
The manager was a young man. After glancing at the menacing crowd, he looked at the fat man and said, "If you want to fight, go outside and fight."
Disciples often caused trouble in the mission hall because of competing for missions, which he was used to.
"No, I..." The fat man was halfway through his sentence when Wen Zheng appeared behind him, a smile on her face, but the smile didn't reach her eyes. "It seems you know why I came to find you. Come with me."
The fat man jumped in fright and asked tremblingly, "Where to?"
"Let's find a secluded spot and talk about the rumors you spread about me." Wen Zheng gestured towards the outside.
The men's unfriendly gazes all fell on him, as if they wanted to find a secluded place to beat him up.
The fat man stood firmly on his feet, his mind racing, and then shouted, "Because I exposed your secret practice of evil arts, you brought so many people to cause me trouble. Let me tell you, even if you beat me to death, it won't change the fact that you practice evil arts."
His passionate speech drew the attention of those around him, and after hearing what he had to say, they looked at Wen Zheng with subtle expressions.
Is this the person who recently stole his senior brother's cultivation in the sect's rumors?
Some people in the crowd looked on with disdain, while others had hope in their eyes, wanting to find out about the evil technique Wen Zheng was practicing. However, they all retreated and kept their distance from Wen Zheng.
If she goes berserk and absorbs my cultivation, that would be terrible.
The bustling and noisy scene at the Mission Pavilion was frozen in time by a single sentence, and everyone was waiting for Wen Zheng's reaction.
Wen Zheng stood there stunned for a long time, then suddenly remembered something she had overlooked.
This fat guy doesn't seem very bright; how did he come up with the idea of spreading rumors so quickly within the sect?
Moreover, not many people knew about Xiang Hutian's death, nor did many know that Xiang Hutian had a grudge against her.
Can the fat guy really handle something this complicated?
Suppressing her doubts, Wen Zheng said to the fat man, "When I came to find you, I already sent a message to the sect leader explaining this matter. If you cannot provide evidence that I am practicing evil arts, I will issue you a death challenge."
The Death Challenge is a famous life-or-death battle in the cultivation world. Two people go on stage at the same time, but only one can survive.
Wen Zheng was busy upgrading her talismans and didn't have time to deal with the rumors slowly, so she decided to tackle the source of the rumors once and for all. If the fat man couldn't produce any evidence, she could make an example of him.
If she takes it out, she can see for herself who is hiding in the shadows and harming her.
"Why should I!" the fat man retorted instinctively upon hearing the death challenge. "Why should I fight you? I only heard it from someone else anyway."
He had fought Wen Zheng before and knew he couldn't win. If he accepted the death challenge, he would surely die.
"I heard it? Who told you that?" Wen Zheng pressed him. "It's just a baseless rumor. Because you and I have a grudge, you're spreading it all over the sect. What a despicable thing to do. I curse you to never reach the Nascent Soul stage in your entire life."
The fat man's face turned red with anger at the contemptuous words. He was breathing heavily through his nostrils and staring angrily at Wen Zheng: "You were only at the early stage of Foundation Establishment before you left the sect, but you came back as a Golden Core cultivator. Even if you didn't secretly practice evil arts, you still have some unspeakable secrets."
Wen Zheng didn't want to get entangled, so she directly made a vow to Heaven: "Wen Zheng hereby swears to Heaven that if I really practice evil arts and use the lives of my fellow disciples to improve my cultivation, then please send down divine punishment so that I may die a horrible death."
A beam of light flashed beneath his feet, and the oath of Heaven was established.
Everyone looked up at the outside. The sky was clear and cloudless, without a single thundercloud in sight.
The fat man knew he was doomed. He swallowed hard and prepared to run. Outside the door, a sword aura blocked his path.
The elder of the Discipline Hall came in with the elder of Sword Peak, along with Fatty's master, Elder He Qing.
They had all witnessed what had just happened and understood what had transpired. This was a serious matter, and now they needed to bring everyone to the sect leader for his judgment.
Elder He Qing's face was extremely ugly, and he glared at the fat man as he turned around.
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