I Failed to Reform the Protagonist [Transmigration] - Chapter 9

— That was a pretty accurate guess.

Pei Jing had no desire to sleep down in the well. Just the thought of that snake being in the same well as him made his skin crawl. Disposing of it would only take a second, but Pei Jing didn’t want to look at it, much less touch it. Leaning against the well wall and staring up at the sky, he thought: Encountering this on my first day pretending to be a new disciple. Is this an omen for the hardships of my life to come?

He was so bored that he eventually closed his eyes and began to circulate his breath to regulate his energy.

Finally, dawn broke.

Yinghui Peak was named such because it was the first peak in all of Yunxiao to welcome the morning sun—a single line of red light, and the world became bright. The brilliant, rosy sunrise was seen from the narrow angle of the well; it looked like a gorgeous painting of spread rouge.

Having been bored all night, Pei Jing could finally wake Chu Junyu up with a clear conscience.

He turned over and grabbed Chu Junyu’s sleeve, yanking it several times. “Wake up, wake up! It’s dawn, stop sleeping.”

Chu Junyu slowly opened his eyes and gave Pei Jing a calm look. His eyes were clear, without a hint of daze, as if he hadn’t slept at all.

Pei Jing was taken aback. “Have you been awake this whole time?”

Chu Junyu sat up. “You woke me up with your noise.”

Pei Jing: “Nonsense, I wasn’t making any noise at all.”

Chu Junyu pursed his lips and didn’t respond.

Now that it was light out, the scene inside the well was clearly visible.

Pei Jing tilted his head, his gaze pausing. He discovered, to his utter astonishment, that the coiled poisonous snake in the corner had died at some unknown point. Its body was twisted inch by inch; it looked as if it had experienced immense agony when it died, having struggled on the ground. The snake’s head was flipped up, its vertical pupils a bloody red.

But since he was afraid of snakes, the corpse of a dead snake was an even stronger trigger. His scalp felt numb; after just one glance, Pei Jing felt like vomiting. He instinctively grabbed Chu Junyu’s sleeve and hid behind him.

Chu Junyu looked down at the hand on his sleeve, then shifted his gaze to the miserably dead snake.

Pei Jing was genuinely having a breakdown. “Why do they have to look so disgusting even when they die?”

Chu Junyu countered, “Why are you even afraid of a dead snake?”

Pei Jing choked for a second and then babbled, “I’m not afraid, I’m just disgusted.”

Chu Junyu asked with a half-smile, “Is that so?”

“Yes!”

Yinghui Peak had strict rules; new disciples had to stay here for a full year before they could join other peaks. Attendance was taken during morning lessons. If the supervisor found them missing, they would surely send someone to look for them. For a Golden Core cultivator, finding two Qi Refining disciples within a single peak was child’s play.

They just had to wait for someone to come.

Pei Jing sat cross-legged and began counting on his fingers with great familiarity. “Look at us! You saved me once, I saved you once, plus we spent a night together in this godforsaken place. Even if we aren’t like brothers, we’re at least life-and-death comrades, right?”

“Last time I gave you my whole life story, and you just brushed me off with a name. Don’t you think it’s time to be a little more honest?”

“Where are you from? You shouldn’t be from Canghua, right?”

When the youth in brown clothes smiled, his eyes seemed to capture a thousand miles of sunrise.

Chu Junyu paused. After locking eyes with him for a second, he turned away and said, “A place you’ve never been.”

Pei Jing thought to himself: Is there any place in this world I haven’t been? He pressed on: “Tell me, maybe I happen to know it.”

Chu Junyu ignored him again.

— Was he getting the cold shoulder?

Pei Jing said, “Wow, do you even know how to hold a conversation? I bet with that personality of yours, you won’t make a single soulmate in this entire sect besides me.”

Chu Junyu’s expression was cold. “I don’t need any.”

Pei Jing was very confident: “Whatever, it’s fine. Having me is enough for you.”

“Heh.”

Not long after, the Yellow Charm Daoist arrived with a group of people and rescued them from the well.

The disciples who had tricked Chu Junyu into the well and stolen the rope yesterday were also dragged out. They were trembling, huddling to one side, not daring to utter a word.

The Yellow Charm Daoist asked Pei Jing with a dark face, “Yinghui Peak has rules; no one is allowed out after nightfall. Chu Junyu was framed, but what about you? Were you out for a stroll?”

Pei Jing spoke truthfully: “…I just lost my way and couldn’t find my way back. I didn’t mean anything else by it.”

The Yellow Charm Daoist flew into a rage: “Can’t you at least be a little more serious when you try to fool me?”

Pei Jing: “…I really wasn’t fooling you.”

The Daoist was so angry his teeth ground together. His impression of Pei Jing deepened once again. “To still be able to get lost at your age… Since you’re this stupid, I won’t assign you any other tasks. You can just go water the plants in the spiritual garden.”

Having said that, he glared at Pei Jing with a look of “hopeless disappointment,” waved his sleeve, and barked, “Dismissed!”

The cultivators who had come to watch immediately dispersed with giggles and chatter. Faintly, the gloating voice of a male cultivator could be heard: “If you ask me, what kind of ‘Chosen One’ is he? He’s just a total loser. We get to go hunt demon beasts, and he goes to farm. Hahaha!”

Every month, the disciples of Yinghui Peak were assigned tasks. These didn’t require going to the administrative hall to collect; they were considered assignments and an opportunity for practice. Currently, in the Outer Peaks, he was essentially an outcast among outcasts—living in the worst dormitory and doing the most exhausting, useless work.

After everyone had left, Pei Jing muttered, “This Yellow Charm Daoist holds a grudge way too much. Just because I tore a piece of his paper yesterday, did he really need to target me like this?”

Chu Junyu was the last to leave. Even though he had also been rescued from the well, he didn’t look the least bit disheveled. He walked in the morning light without a word, carrying an aura that naturally warned people not to approach.

Pei Jing didn’t even have time to lament his fate of becoming a farmer before he quickly jogged to catch up with Chu Junyu. “Hey, wait for me!”

Chu Junyu acted as if he didn’t hear.

Pei Jing sped up slightly and caught up. As he walked, he said, “What did he mean by ‘framed into going out at midnight’? If you ask me, the Peak Master just saw that you have good aptitude and didn’t want to punish you. He thinks I’m a lost cause, so he sent me to farm.”

The more he thought about it, the more it seemed to be the case.

“Unfair. Truly unfair.”

Chu Junyu said nonchalantly, “Then go kill him.”

Pei Jing: “Huh?”

Chu Junyu’s profile was as white as cold jade, and his gaze was as thin and cool as early snow. He said, “To give you back your ‘fairness’.”

Pei Jing was shocked: This kid is something else; his moral compass is completely broken.

Pei Jing tried to educate him: “…This kind of ‘murdering your teacher’ stuff is something we shouldn’t do. Don’t even think about it. In Yunxiao, that’s a capital crime.”

Chu Junyu laughed. “A capital crime?”

Pei Jing nodded. “The very first rule of the Yunxiao Sect is that you must not harm your fellow disciples, let alone your teachers and elders.” He added, “Actually, when we encounter problems, we don’t have to solve them in such a bloody way. Believe it or not, I’ll make that Yellow Charm Daoist see me in a new light very soon.”

Chu Junyu’s smile was unreadable. “Through your superb farming skills?”

Pei Jing ignored the mockery and said, “Not at all. Just you watch.”

Currently, the morning lessons at Yinghui Peak were covering knowledge about spiritual roots: Gold, Wood, Water, Fire, and Earth—the five elements of heaven and earth, the source of all things. The books also recorded that a mutated Water root becomes Ice, mutated Wood becomes Wind, and mutated Fire becomes Lightning.

Among the five-element roots, a Single Spiritual Root was considered the best, as it allowed for the maximum absorption of spiritual energy for cultivation. Among the mixed roots, the Five-Element Root was the worst.

To be admitted into Yunxiao, one had to at least have a Three-Element Root, so as everyone listened, they began to check their own spiritual roots.

The persona Pei Jing had set for himself was a Three-Element Root. As for which three, he hadn’t decided yet.