I Topped the Aloof Omega in a Scummy Alpha Novel - Chapter 36
A Devil Triumphs
Good heavens, were they expected to beg for alms every day as part of their village-guarding duty?
Having been rejected countless times, Xuan Yuchi forced a smile. She would rather fish in the river or pick fruit from trees than be scolded for begging.
She seriously suspected this was an impromptu task arranged by the production team for the sake of program effect.
Bian Yunchen knew what Xuan Yuchi was thinking without even looking. She tossed out a line: “I’ll go this time.”
She walked forward with a confident stride, leaving Xuan Yuchi with a bright and clear view of her back. Today, the sun shone brilliantly, casting a golden fringe on her hair.
Her superb body proportions, with her wrists extending past her hips, and a simple outfit, made her look like she was shooting a magazine cover on camera.
Fans in the comment section screamed with delight, transforming into “walking fans” of Yunchen.
Xuan Yuchi stood frozen in place.
It had been a long time since she had seen Yunchen look this vibrant and youthful.
No, wait, never.
Xuan Yuchi: [Is her illness cured?]
System: [I don’t know.]
System: [Host, since you’re free now, let’s formally proceed with our work handover.]
“Sister Bian, wait for me!” Xuan Yuchi quickly chased after her.
The moment they drew close, Xuan Yuchi took her hand and smiled at her: “I’m worried you’ll be bullied alone.”
Bian Yunchen neither confirmed nor denied, slightly closing her fingers and pressing on the back of Xuan Yuchi’s hand.
One person’s hand was a bit warm, the other’s was cold.
The result was as expected. After half an hour of asking, they hadn’t been invited into a single villager’s home.
The village residents’ eyes were always filled with vigilance and hostility towards them.
Xuan Yuchi’s stomach was rumbling, and her low blood sugar was kicking in, making her feel panicked. Fortunately, she could drink water; she drank half a bottle, which eased her a little.
She tried to be cheeky with Afan, asking if they could work for Granny Mai in exchange for breakfast.
Given the situation of the guests, a moderate bending of the rules was theoretically permissible.
Afan let out an “Sigh.”
Considering the need to maintain distance between her and Xuan Yuchi…
She said sternly: “No.”
After speaking, she even glanced at Yunchen, as if desperately trying to show, “See, the two of us are truly innocent.”
Unfortunately, her performance, in the eyes of a professional, was still too forced.
Bian Yunchen supported Xuan Yuchi, quickened her pace slightly, and arrived at the village head’s doorstep.
“Hello,” Bian Yunchen smiled.
The village head was a woman who looked about thirty years old, sitting on a small stool by her door, basking in the sun.
The village head scrutinized Bian Yunchen, showing a defensive expression: “Can I help you?”
Bian Yunchen chatted with her as if nothing was wrong: “You are Village Head Wang, the guardian of the village, right?”
The village head fanned herself with a cattail leaf fan, nodded, and eyed them sideways.
After Bian Yunchen stated their purpose for coming to the village, the village head nodded again.
For programs being filmed in the village, the production team would usually contact the village head beforehand, if not to gain support, then at least to give notice.
“Village Head, does your house need a deep cleaning? I can do it for you, and you can just give us one meal of breakfast,” Xuan Yuchi said with a look of sincerity.
The village head smiled.
Xuan Yuchi thought she had a chance: “Besides cleaning, anything else works too.”
The village head waved her fan, making a shooing motion: “No need, alright.”
The waving fan immediately felt like a slap in Xuan Yuchi’s face, making her cheeks flush slightly.
Through the screen, the audience in the live stream felt embarrassed for Xuan Yuchi, and many felt sorry for her.
Even the most straightforward person is at an age where they care about their dignity.
“Village Head!”
Xuan Yuchi shouted, squatting in front of her, and pitifully grabbing the handle of her fan.
“I’m so hungry!”
The starving ghost made her tragic declaration. What was dignity compared to a full stomach?
Xuan Yuchi snatched the village head’s fan and began fanning her.
This time, the fan seemed to be flapping in the audience’s faces.
Comment section: [Is she really throwing all caution to the wind?]
[Who was feeling sorry for her just now? My stomach hurts from laughing.]
[With that kind of thick skin, she’ll succeed at anything.]
The village head, a big, hearty woman, furrowed her thick eyebrows.
Weren’t they told that the people coming were city folk, highly educated, very capable, and delicate?
Were they trying to fool a country woman?
The one whose face looked worse was Bian Yunchen. She quickly composed herself and stepped forward gracefully to separate Xuan Yuchi and the village head.
She didn’t forget to save Xuan Yuchi some face: “She just loves to joke around.”
“Village Head Wang, uh…”
“I remember Village Head Wang was over fifty, wasn’t she? You maintain yourself so well?”
The village head slightly rolled her eyes: “That’s my mother.”
Bian Yunchen then said: “How come I heard it was your maternal grandmother?”
“My maternal grandmother also…” The village head paused.
Her small eyes possessed a wonderful camera presence, making direct eye contact with the audience.
However, the village head was unaware that this was a live broadcast.
“Is this thing being recorded?” The village head stared straight at Bian Yunchen.
Afan typed two large characters on her phone for the village head to see.
“Live broadcast.”
The village head realized she had been set up. A village head position being passed down through three generations in her family was clearly against the rules.
Because the village was remote and far from the emperor’s reach, the Wang family found an opportunity.
The village head stood up, turned her back to everyone, and intended to close the door and refuse visitors.
Then, she heard the woman who looked aloof but was actually deeply calculating say: “I heard from Granny Mai that the village head’s family has served the village for three generations, diligently and conscientiously. Each term was an exception voted in by the villagers.”
Xuan Yuchi bit her tongue. Why had Yunchen’s speech suddenly become so official?
Granny Mai did say something similar. When it came to paying attention, Yunchen was the one.
The village head could no longer refuse them, as it would make her look guilty.
“Not at all, not at all,” the village head said, adopting the tone of city people in a false show of modesty.
“Ah, you traveled all the way from the city to guard the village, you must be tired.”
“You haven’t had breakfast yet. Ah, that’s just how life is in the countryside.”
“I have some leftovers at home. If you don’t mind, ah.”
The village head spoke three sentences in one breath, looking exhausted.
She had encountered two troublesome, difficult people!
“No, we can’t accept something for nothing,” Xuan Yuchi once again snatched her fan and fanned her.
“However, can we eat first and then work?”
Xuan Yuchi looked at Afan again, blinking rapidly.
Please go easy on us, miss!
“No…” Afan’s head was about to swing from left to right.
“I think that’s fine,” Bian Yunchen interjected first.
Afan, behind the camera, stretched her neck: “I suppose it’s not impossible.”
She smiled at Yunchen.
The meaning of that smile was: See? I respect your opinion more than Xuan Yuchi’s. Don’t suspect that I like her anymore.
Xuan Yuchi looked at her suspiciously.
That’s strange. Afan doesn’t look like a snob.
Why does she only concede to Yunchen?
Does she have a problem with me?
The group entered the village head’s luxurious, self-built country house and sat down at an overly decorated European-style round table that could seat twelve people.
The village head’s wife, Auntie Mi, brought out a basin of steaming, fragrant steamed buns, which made Xuan Yuchi drool.
“Eat up,” Auntie Mi seemed kind-hearted.
She also brought two plates of pickles to eat with the buns. Xuan Yuchi ate four buns in total; she was truly starved.
Yunchen originally had little appetite, as she was used to being hungry and usually only had half an ear of corn for breakfast, but because Xuan Yuchi ate so heartily, she also ate two buns.
Auntie Mi offered for the two of them to take the remaining buns with them. Xuan Yuchi said, “How can we impose like this? But Auntie, the buns you make are truly delicious. If you opened a shop in the city, you’d be the Steamed Bun Proprietor.”
Auntie Mi didn’t understand what “Proprietor” meant, but she figured it was similar to “Boss,” and she smiled broadly: “Sweet girl, you can take them all if you like. We have plenty of buns.”
“Is that allowed?” Xuan Yuchi went to seek Afan’s approval again.
“Of course…”
Avoiding suspicion had become a mental imprint for Afan. She subconsciously started to say the negative word but saw that Yunchen had already accepted the buns Auntie Mi put in a bag and was giving thanks.
Xuan Yuchi saw the “No” in Afan’s expression and then saw it change because of Yunchen’s action.
She developed a new, unpleasant suspicion.
The village head was upstairs taking a nap. Auntie Mi relayed the village head’s request.
Auntie Mi not only made excellent steamed buns but was also skilled at drawing maps. She quickly drew a hand-drawn map, with her house as the starting point and the destination being a cave near the village.
She said that when the village head was young, a valuable hulusi (gourd flute) was stolen by a monkey in the mountains, and the village head always suspected the monkey hid the hulusi in the cave.
If they were brave enough, they could help take a look, but she would understand if they didn’t dare.
Xuan Yuchi reluctantly agreed.
They returned to Granny Mai’s house, gave the steamed buns to Granny Mai, and borrowed two cleavers from her.
Granny Mai, upon hearing they were going to that cave, advised: “So many years have passed, the monkeys should be gone, but it’s still somewhat dangerous.”
Granny Mai glanced at the camera.
Afan instructed the camera operators to temporarily turn off their equipment.
Granny Mai whispered: “The previous outsider was found in that cave.”
Xuan Yuchi gasped in shock. Two cleavers couldn’t even boost her courage now.
Yunchen, however, was calm: “If the living are nothing to fear, why worry about the dead?”
Xuan Yuchi looked around at the staff: “Are you all coming with us?”
They nodded, which reassured Xuan Yuchi somewhat.
The path to the cave was difficult, wet, and slippery. Xuan Yuchi also carried two cleavers, making it inconvenient to hold onto the slope while going uphill, so she simply put one cleaver into her backpack.
After crossing a small hill and entering the flat ground of the forest, the group was panting heavily. Yunchen still had the leisure to wipe the mud off Xuan Yuchi’s hands with tissue paper.
“Sister Bian, I’ve noticed your inner core is very stable,” Xuan Yuchi spread her hand out, allowing Yunchen to wipe it.
Yunchen finished one hand and was about to wipe the other, first putting the used paper into her backpack: “Hasn’t it always been like this?”
Her enemies in the business world and her collaborators in the entertainment industry, the polite ones praised her emotional stability, and the impolite ones said she had no heart.
She was too lazy to care about those comments, but some people loved to come to her to complain, and she always brushed them off.
There weren’t many people who could make her care, who could make her have a heart.
While Bian Yunchen was thinking, a streak of mud suddenly appeared on her cheek.
She straightened her lips, saw the culprit looking mischievous, and, somewhat unable to tolerate it, pulled out a tissue to wipe off the stain on her face.
“Xuan Yuchi.”
“Ah…” Xuan Yuchi felt guilty. She just suddenly wanted to tease her.
“There was a bug on your face,” Xuan Yuchi lied.
“Hey, there are lots of mosquitoes and insects in the forest. Let’s hurry up.”
Bian Yunchen: “Mhm.”
Xuan Yuchi walked in front, hearing that “Mhm,” she was secretly delighted that the matter was closed. As expected of the inwardly stable Sister Bian.
She skipped and hopped as she walked. Teasing Yunchen was so fun. Why had she been so obedient before, only following Yunchen around? Actually, the old Yunchen must have been even more fun to tease.
Yunchen used to be more serious when she was little.
“Xuan Yuchi.”
She heard Yunchen calling her again, and she turned around: “Yes?”
The next second, Xuan Yuchi’s foot slipped, and since it was a downhill slope ahead, accompanied by a scream, she fell flat on her face.
Xuan Yuchi was speechless.
She remembered now. There was a reason why she hadn’t teased Yunchen before.
She just couldn’t outplay her…
Bian Yunchen slowly walked over and helped her up: “Why are you so careless?”
Although Xuan Yuchi’s butt hurt from the fall, the comments section was shipping them.
Xuan Yuchi was well-behaved for the rest of the way. There were no more insects on the path. Bian Yunchen walked behind her. Although she couldn’t block the sight, Xuan Yuchi occasionally rubbing her backside was truly unseemly.
“Watch your image,” she reminded quietly, forcefully holding Xuan Yuchi’s wrist.
With one hand held by Yunchen and the other needing to hold the cleaver, Xuan Yuchi reluctantly gave up.
“How much longer until we get there?” Xuan Yuchi asked.
The sun was directly overhead, and the group stopped to rest.
The map was with Yunchen. She unfolded it: “We’ll be there after we cross this patch of forest.”
Xuan Yuchi sat on the ground and tugged on Yunchen’s hand: “Sit down.”
She spread tissues on the ground, making a spot for Yunchen’s butt, laying several layers to ensure the moisture from the ground wouldn’t soak into Yunchen.
“Sister Bian, please humor me.” Xuan Yuchi genuinely wanted to persuade her to sit. Last night, when washing their feet, she saw that Yunchen’s heel was chafed.
Yunchen remained motionless, as if frozen.
“Xuan Yuchi, look, what is that over there…”
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