After Transmigrating Into A Novel, I Provoked The Obsessive Female Lead - Chapter 5

“By the way, do you all know what major event happened recently?”

While descending the stairs, the conversation of the guests dining on the first floor drifted into Yan Zhu’s ears.

This was a border town. Most travelers here were demonic cultivators, though people of other identities were certainly not lacking. In this world, mortals had long coexisted with cultivators, and many large clans even externally hired powerful cultivators for protection or sought ways to establish connections with immortal cultivation sects to secure sanctuary.

Although Yan Zhu could not discern who was a cultivator and who was a mortal, it did not prevent her from becoming interested in their conversation.

She heard one person say, “Let’s not mince words among ourselves. Why are we all gathered here today if not for that matter?”

He looked again at the people walking on the street outside, a trace of irritation crossing his scarred face, “Damn it, why does it feel like more and more people are coming… If this continues, we won’t have any advantage at all!”

“Don’t worry, those admission tickets are not easy to get.”

The person sitting next to this man patted his shoulder and incidentally glanced in Yan Zhu’s direction. He had long noticed that this woman was eavesdropping, but… although this person possessed no spiritual energy, her appearance did not belong to a mortal.

Hopefully, this was not some old monster’s peculiar sense of humor; that group of people loved masking their cultivation and deliberately posing like this most of all.

Unfathomable, truly unfathomable.

He exchanged glances with the companions around him, discovering that they shared the exact same thought, so he suppressed his intention to attack.

“His coming out of seclusion is certainly a major event,” the person who initially brought up the topic shook his head, “but do any of you know what happened over there?”

“Over there?”

Yan Zhu had yet to fully adapt to this new world and still retained the habits of modern society, completely unaware that she had just nearly walked through the gates of hell.

She was momentarily stunned when she heard the phrase “over there” appear, and then realized they might be speaking of “the righteous path cultivators’ side.”

Sure enough, the few individuals quickly brought up the Lingyun Dao Sect.

“Do you all know about the famously renowned head disciple of the sect leader, hailed as the number one of the new generation of cultivators, Song Wenqing?”

Yan Zhu’s heart was hoisted by this name, and she could not help holding her breath, waiting for these people’s next sentence.

“Gone.”

A cold and detached voice came from beside her, directly interrupting her train of thought and causing those people to pause their conversation and glance at the two of them.

Yan Zhu raised her head and discovered that Song Wenqing had already walked over to the doorway. Seeing that the person was about to walk out the door, she could only immediately lift her foot to follow.

“I really wanted to listen to what they were saying about Song Wenqing…”

Silently following behind the young lady, Yan Zhu thought with no small amount of regret.

“I wonder how old she is now, and what major feats she has accomplished to actually have word spread all the way here to the distant Western Continent…”

As she thought about this, her eyebrows and eyes could not help curving upward with elation.

Song Wenqing, however, was filled with inner depression. She had not expected the news to spread so quickly that even the cultivators of the Western Continent were aware of this matter.

She raised her head, her amber-colored pupils reflecting the bustling mortal world.

Ridiculous.

She was not a demonic cultivator, yet she was not tolerated by the righteous path either.

In this vast heaven and earth, there was unexpectedly not a single place that could offer her shelter.

Song Wenqing suddenly gave birth to a boundless, indescribable sense of loneliness.

It was a gust of wind blowing across the vast earth, originating no one knew where, and unable to cease for a long time. She had been exiled by this mainland and from then on had no return journey.

Awaiting her was only wandering, endlessly wandering…

“Would you like to hold my hand?”

Song Wenqing’s chaotic thoughts were interrupted by the suddenly inserted voice, and the boundless sense of desolate solitude ceased along with it.

The surroundings were noisy and clamorous, yet she heard this sentence distinctly.

People came and went on the street, and the moving figures were clearly much more numerous than yesterday.

Yan Zhu noticed that the figure ahead seemed to become somewhat strained while moving. Not only was her speed visibly slowed, but she also kept almost colliding with people.

Although that person would always stop her steps at the very final moment, accurately adjust her direction, and successfully avoid them.

She furrowed her brows and walked quickly to her side.

“Would you like to hold my hand?”

The voice was very soft, just loud enough for the two of them to hear.

The pair of eyes behind the silver mask locked onto her, her posture of looking up and speaking reflected in those pupils.

Song Wenqing was already able to see the shapes of objects; her eyes were recovering, which was one of the few pieces of good news in these past few days.

She lowered her head to look at the person who had suddenly come before her.

Aside from the time she was rescued from injury, this was the second time they had drawn this close, to the point where she could vaguely make out the contours of her facial features.

Song Wenqing silently outlined her appearance in her mind.

She was very curious about this person: her identity, her appearance, and her motive for rescuing her.

Yan Zhu did not know what she was thinking and simply waited patiently for her answer. During this time, she could not help lowering her gaze many times to eye the young woman’s hands naturally hanging at her sides.

“No need.”

The rejecting voice sounded very stiff.

“I can walk by myself.”

Yan Zhu abruptly halted the action of reaching out to hold her hand, biting her lip somewhat helplessly, “Then you, ”

Her words were cut off right here.

Yan Zhu lowered her head in puzzlement, looking at the hand this person had suddenly grabbed onto her wrist. She opened her mouth, and before she had time to ask a question, she was yanked by a force into the other party’s embrace.

A slightly bitter, cold fragrance drilled into her nasal cavity.

“What is the meaning of Your Excellency?”

The familiar voice rang out beside her ear, sounding like it contained ice shards; the tone was cold, aloof, and it was not hard to discern the distinct hostility carried within it.

Yan Zhu could not spare the energy to care about her aching, bumped forehead, hurriedly turning her head and lifting her eyes to look over.

She saw that the place where she had previously stood was already swirling with dust, and a gigantic monster with ram horns, a lion face, a body resembling an ox, and hooves like a horse was crouching there. Sitting on its back was a delicate, doll-like little girl of about seven or eight years old.

As if sensing her gaze, the girl’s large and round, black grape-like eyes paused on Yan Zhu.

She tilted her head, a brilliant and innocent smile suddenly blooming on her previously expressionless face. She raised her hand, her fingertips pointing directly at Yan Zhu’s location, her childish voice sounding like she was acting spoiled with someone, yet the content of her words made one’s whole body chill.

She said, “Elder brother, I want her.”

A handsome man wearing black brocade cloud robes and a jade crown walked out slowly from behind her. He possessed slightly upturned eyes, with a faint smile lingering at the corners of his lips, looking inexplicably somewhat wicked.

“Children don’t know any better; I hope the two young ladies will be magnanimous and overlook this.”

He did not pay heed to his own younger sister’s request, instead staring fixedly at the two people as he spoke these words.

Yan Zhu saw the little girl’s mouth corners instantly pull down, her expression not resembling the angry look of ordinary children, but rather filled with a heart-palpitating hostility. “I want her, elder brother.”

She said it again, and intense displeasure could be perceived in her tone.

That man, however, turned a deaf ear to his younger sister’s request. He slightly bowed, reached out to pick up the iron chain tied around the monster’s neck, and pulled it to clear a path available for people to pass through.

“There has been much offense, please forgive us.”

Her heart began to beat wildly and abruptly. The acute intuition for danger caused Yan Zhu to halt her footsteps, hesitating whether she should step onto that path that seemingly led to safety.

Song Wenqing, however, acted as if completely oblivious to this, raising her foot and walking straight toward that path.

Seeing this, Yan Zhu had no choice but to slightly let go of her misgivings and follow along.

It seemed she truly had been overthinking. The two of them walked for several hours, traveling quite a long distance without a single incident occurring.

Yan Zhu looked back at the border town behind her that had shrunk into a tiny dot, the heart she had suspended for so long finally relaxing a little bit.

She looked at the young woman beside her, unable to help asking her where they were headed.

“Master… someone once told me that at the most dangerous place in the Western Continent, there is a Heavenly Pool which can repair a person’s meridians.”

Yan Zhu remembered. She had indeed written about such a thing in her text, used as a prop for the second male lead and the female lead’s romantic progression.

The female lead Song Wenqing suffered severe injuries while fighting against powerful demonic cultivators to protect the sect’s disciples, and she was the one taken by the second male lead to a Heavenly Pool in the Western Continent to repair her body within it. The two of them also developed mutual romantic feelings due to this period of getting along.

However, although the number of Heavenly Pools in the Western Continent was not small, the majority had already been occupied by various factions, leaving only a few that remained unclaimed due to being located in extremely dangerous places.

The Heavenly Pools were transformed from the primordial blood dripped onto the ground by immortals during the Immortal-Demon War, and their surroundings frequently harbored extremely strong baleful Qi, even potentially breeding a large number of ferocious beasts. Moreover, their tiers were generally above the third tier, with a third-tier fierce beast corresponding to a cultivator’s Golden Core stage.

Ever since entering the Dharma-ending Age, let alone righteous cultivators, even demonic cultivators, who were renowned for the speed of their cultivation, did not have many whose cultivation reached the Golden Core stage.

Remembering that the young woman beside her had relied entirely on foot travel along the way, Yan Zhu guessed that she most likely had not reached the Golden Core stage either, so she began to ponder how to stop her.

After all, the identity she had initially set for herself was a mortal, and speaking out too many detailed information points would make her highly suspicious. Yet if she did not speak, under what pretext should she intervene?

The Western Continent… what other fortuitous encounters were there in the Western Continent.

Yan Zhu wracked her brains to think. She had not spent much ink on the Western Continent, only occasionally adding descriptions at the very end of the text.

In the outline she had arranged, the Western Continent appeared as the final battlefield, though that was a matter for the latter half of the book, which she had not yet written before transmigrating over.

The Western Continent was the site of the Immortal-Demon War and had many immortal tombs. However, it was too dangerous and too concealed; even she, the author, did not know their exact locations.

It seemed there was also a secret realm in the Western Continent that opened at regular intervals, used by major demonic cultivator sects to train their disciples. In the text, she had only mentioned the opportunity for its opening once, and the time anchor was when that old monster came out of seclusion.

So the question arose again: what time was it now, and had that old monster come out of seclusion or not?

As Yan Zhu thought and thought, sorrow could not help welling up from within, look at this, not researching your writing and liking to cut corners resulted in this exact outcome.

Even though she was clearly the author, she was still completely in the dark.

Yan Zhu’s thoughts ran amok, and she suddenly recalled a detail she had paid no attention to while eavesdropping on that group of people’s conversation.

It seemed they had indeed mentioned someone coming out of seclusion or something…

No way.

Could it really be that old monster…

Merely thinking of this possibility, Yan Zhu felt a surge of turbulent emotion.

If that really was that old monster coming out of seclusion, presumably the secret realm would be able to open shortly afterward. The location for opening the secret realm was neither concealed nor particularly dangerous, and that place did not belong to any faction; it was simply the best pillow one could obtain when feeling drowsy.

However, as soon as the thought popped up, she subconsciously negated it.

It was too coincidental; how could there be such good things in the world for them to bump into, and the two of them were not the protagonists of this book.

Yan Zhu cast this piece of good fortune, which could be called hopelessly slim, aside and continued to ponder for a bit longer, finally allowing her to think of a destination.

She raised her head and discovered that Song Wenqing had already walked to a position about ten meters ahead, so she jogged all the way to the other person’s side.

The young lady took steps both large and fast, and as she followed along, she kept falling behind, often only being able to run a stretch of road after a certain interval to catch up.

The other party seemed to have already grown accustomed to this behavior of hers, her pace not pausing in the slightest as she listened to the footsteps.

Yan Zhu caught her breath evenly, brewed her words, and spoke as if casually: “I’ve always wanted to ask, how did you know this place is the Western Continent? Could it be that you’ve been here before?”

During these past few days, she had gradually realized that although the other party was cold in expression and few in words, and maintained quite a heavy defense in her heart, she was by no means an extremely wicked person; generally, whatever question she asked would ultimately receive an answer.

Sure enough, Song Wenqing quickly gave a reply.

“With such abundant baleful Qi, aside from the Western Continent, there won’t be any other place that has it.”

Yan Zhu’s heart gladdened; her original conjecture was verified. Slightly calming her emotional state, she asked knowingly: “You can sense baleful Qi?!”

Her tone was extremely astonished.

Perhaps it was too exaggerated, as the other party ignored her for a long time.

Yan Zhu could not hold back her temperament, trotted over, and continued performing her solo act.

“Then can you sense the place where the baleful Qi is heaviest?”

Song Wenqing suddenly halted her steps, her thin lips parting slightly.

“There are many places where baleful Qi is heavy, and they cannot be compared to find a single ‘heaviest’ one.”

“If you insist on saying so, it is inevitably right on Your Excellency’s person.”

Yan Zhu was stunned, and instantly realized something, her body abruptly stiffening. Enormous terror gnawed at her heart like worms, and cold sweat slid down from her temple in a split second.

The previously empty wilderness behind them currently stood with two large and one small figures. The little girl held the man beside her with one hand and grasped the iron chain tied around the monster’s neck with the other, revealing a delighted smile upon seeing her look toward them.

“Oh my, I didn’t expect to be discovered this quickly.”

The man in black said with a smiling expression, no trace of panic from being discovered visible on his face. He lowered his head to look pamperingly at the little girl, reaching out to stroke her little head.

“Little Lingshi is truly sensible, picking such a pretty older sister as a gift for Father Lord. I imagine the appearance of the other masked young lady surely won’t be unappealing either, so she’ll belong to Big Brother me!”

“No,” the child called Little Lingshi wrinkled her nose, disgustedly waving her hand to slap away the man’s palm before he had time to withdraw it. “Don’t give her to Father; she’s mine.”

As if broken, the spot where the man’s hand was struck bent into a bizarre shape. He smiled without the slightest concern, gathering a ball of black Qi to apply over it, and before long that area was nurtured back to as good as new.

“Then the other one can belong to Big Brother, is that alright?”

The two of them, as if no one else was around, reached a basic consensus on this matter.

Song Wenqing clasped her hand onto the sword hilt, her gaze icy cold and her body tensed, having already entered the preparatory mode for battle.

Yet Yan Zhu, the other protagonist of the story, acted as if foolishly dazed, only staring blankly at the enemies. At this moment, no second person in this world could guess her state of mind.

When the appellation “Little Lingshi” escaped their lips, Yan Zhu’s inner self, which had just calmed down, was once again churned upside down.

It turns out that it is you two fellows.