Stepping in for the Heroine to Crush the Protagonist Group [Transmigration] - Chapter 4

The night sky was endless, with no sign of stars or the moon.

A faint, yellowish-orange light shone from behind the young woman, illuminating the small area in front of them and melting the bone-chilling snow on the fingertips.

Gu Sheng’s appearance was gentle and non-threatening. Standing in a crowd, she was like a roadside daisy, easily overlooked.

But with just this single glance, Hu Li indelibly imprinted the woman’s image onto her heart, for no discernible reason.

“Little doggy, where is your owner?” Gu Sheng picked Hu Li up from the snow. She looked around, saw no one, and then gently stroked Hu Li’s head. “Are you a spirit beast from the mountain?” she asked softly.

A spirit beast from the mountain? Hu Li snapped out of her daze and let out a soft whine, rubbing against Gu Sheng’s hand ingratiatingly as an answer.

Gu Sheng felt Hu Li’s deliberate action and her hand imperceptibly paused. Then, her gaze dropped to Hu Li’s leg, which had been pecked by the rooster, and her delicate brows furrowed slightly.

“Are you hurt?” she asked Hu Li, carefully lifting the little dog’s hind leg.

Hu Li’s heart fluttered. She nudged Gu Sheng’s chin, whining softly and pitifully.

The original novel had stated that Gu Sheng was the kindest-hearted woman in the world. Therefore, as long as she played the victim a little, Gu Sheng would certainly take her in as a spirit pet.

If that happened, completing the mission would be a piece of cake.

Hu Li thought gleefully, dropping all her guard. She simply lay in Gu Sheng’s arms, refusing to move.

Gu Sheng lowered her eyes, slowly stroked Hu Li’s fur, and her thin lips moved. Then, she turned and carried Hu Li into the house, placing her on a thick-cloth-covered prayer cushion.

Inside the room, it was much, much warmer than the snowy ground outside. Hu Li comfortably closed her eyes, waiting for the system to announce the mission complete.

Yet, she waited and waited, but the system remained silent. Furthermore, she kept hearing a mysterious sound of running water.

Is Gu Sheng going to take a bath? Hu Li wondered, wiggling her ears and secretly cracking open one eye.

I’ll just take a peek, only one peek. Hu Li smiled, her eyes restlessly scanning the room. To her surprise, after looking around, she couldn’t even spot a shadow of Gu Sheng.

What’s going on? Where did Gu Sheng go?

Just as Hu Li was feeling confused, a pair of hands suddenly wrapped around her chest, lifting her up.

Hu Li shivered all over. She tried to escape the hands but was held tightly, forced to let the person pick her up and place her into a bathtub.

“Little doggy, this is a medicinal bath. It’ll be good for your injury,” Gu Sheng’s voice came from behind. Immediately afterward, a pair of hands began to scrub Hu Li up and down.

The heck! Is this area okay to touch?!

Hu Li felt a particular spot being touched and immediately leaped out of the water, splashing water all over Gu Sheng’s face.

Gu Sheng’s body froze, and she stopped her actions, staring at Hu Li face-to-face. The atmosphere instantly turned chilly.

No good. I can’t make the female lead angry.

Hu Li looked at Gu Sheng’s face, remembering her unfinished mission. She took a deep breath, then slowly flopped back into the tub, letting out a submissive whine.

Whatever. Gu Sheng doesn’t know who I am. If she wants to touch me a few times, so be it!

Hu Li closed her eyes, ready to face her fate, and stopped looking at Gu Sheng’s face.

However, Gu Sheng seemed to sense something, as she carefully avoided the area that had startled Hu Li before. She only meticulously smoothed the fur on her back and washed her four paws clean.

After the bath, Hu Li was already half-asleep.

She leaned against Gu Sheng’s embrace, letting the woman dry her, bandage her wound, and comb her fur.

“Ah, this is nice.” When her fur was being combed, Hu Li sighed contentedly. Subconsciously, she flipped over in Gu Sheng’s arms and snuggled tightly against her shoulder.

Gu Sheng was surprised by her action, and her breathing hitched for a moment. Then, after Hu Li let out a steady, snoring sound, she continued to gently comb her fur.

Hu Li slept soundly, even having a dream.

In the dream, she seemed to be back in her childhood. A bronze mirror was placed in front of her, and her two short legs swung constantly in the air.

“Mother, I want two braids today, braided like Sister Ningning’s,” she whined, looking at the woman whose shoulder was the only thing visible in the mirror.

“Alright. Mother will braid two little pigtails for Li Li.” The woman picked up a wooden comb, separated Hu Li’s hair into two sections, and began smoothing it.

Her movements were very light. Hu Li happily hummed a tuneless little song, making funny faces at the bronze mirror.

But gradually, the funny face looked less and less like her, becoming more and more distorted, as if it was getting out of control and starting to turn horrifying.

Hu Li’s pupils trembled, shrinking into tiny dots. She abruptly swung her hand and smashed the bronze mirror.

The ear-splitting sound of shattering glass pierced her eardrums. Hu Li jolted awake, greeted by strands of morning light streaming through the window lattice and onto the floor.

Was it a dream, or the original host’s memory?

Hu Li couldn’t figure it out. She sat in the small bed Gu Sheng had made for her, her eyes unfocused.

After a long while, she recovered her senses and remembered her mission. She quickly asked the system, “System, is my mission complete?”

The system, which had been up all night completing the book review issue report, stirred in Hu Li’s sea of consciousness. It pulled up the mission panel, tapped a few times, and then lay back down.

Immediately, a “Ding—” sound echoed through Hu Li’s sea of consciousness.

The sound lasted for a long time, and Hu Li’s ears kept ringing for a good while before it finally subsided.

Another mission completed. Now I can finally lay flat in peace. Hu Li leaned back against the headboard of the small bed, leisurely crossing her paws and unconsciously humming the tune from her dream.

But before long, a frantic knocking on the door interrupted her rare moment of leisure, startling her right off the bed.

At the same time, Gu Sheng, who was making a small dog coat for Hu Li, also stopped her work and stood up to open the door.

Outside the door were two disciples dressed in robes embroidered with auspicious clouds. They walked into Gu Sheng’s room one after another, finding a table and sitting down on the prayer cushions without being invited.

Of the two, one had handsome, sword-like eyebrows and stellar eyes, radiating a chivalrous air; the other’s gender was hard to distinguish, but his overall aura was definitely not of a common person.

Hu Li looked at the two with confusion, just about to ask the system who they were, when the tidal wave of book reviews provided the answer.

[Male Lead #2 online! Checking in.]

[The Shura field! My favorite Shura field! It’s actually online early.]

[I wonder what He Shiqing would think if he knew that the junior brother he brought back would later steal his fiancée? Would he have any regrets in the dead of night?]

[He’d think about washing his hair.]

[Qing Yang haters, shush, OK?]

[OK, I’m a loyal fan of Shampoo.]

…

The comments popped up skillfully and started their usual fight.

Hu Li raised an eyebrow, looked at the two sitting men, and scoffed, “Two scumbags! Neither of you deserves to appear in a *Shura field!”

(Shura field in novels means, (figuratively) a battlefield with dreadful and ferocious fighting.)

In the original novel, Gu Sheng’s senior brother, He Shiqing, was the second male lead. He and Gu Sheng had been betrothed early on and were the childhood sweethearts the author had paired her with.

However, childhood sweethearts are destined to lose to the ‘suddenly dropped from the sky’ male lead, so He Shiqing ultimately failed to marry Gu Sheng.

But Hu Li, having read the original novel, thought: He Shiqing? Does he even deserve to be the second male lead?! The author must really love men.

In the novel, half of Gu Sheng’s cultivation was crippled, and it was all thanks to He Shiqing.

He Shiqing was narrow-minded and incredibly petty. When he and Gu Sheng were cultivating together, he discovered that her talent far surpassed his. This made him jealous, so he secretly poisoned Gu Sheng’s food, causing half of her spiritual veins to break and most of her cultivation to scatter.

Afterward, he feigned concern and found a rare immortal medicine to resolve the poison, and from then on, he posed as the Young Sect Master’s savior.

But in reality, he was the source of all Gu Sheng’s misfortune.

“Bastard,” Hu Li cursed under her breath. Remembering that she was currently a dog, she decided to go all out. She seized the gap in He Shiqing’s conversation with Gu Sheng and darted over, opening her mouth, ready to bite him.

However, to her surprise, a hand grabbed her by the throat—her lifeline.

“This spirit beast of yours is quite unruly,” Xie Qingyang said, pressing Hu Li onto the floor and staring her down.

Hu Li raised a paw, ready to scratch him, but just then, Gu Sheng picked her up into her arms.

“Junior Brother, this spirit beast’s wild nature hasn’t faded yet. Be careful,” Gu Sheng said with a gentle smile, lightly stroking Hu Li’s head.

Xie Qingyang met Gu Sheng’s gaze, his breathing slightly ragged, the tips of his ears turning faintly red.

“Thank you for the reminder, Senior Sister,” he said, withdrawing his hand and sitting back down on the prayer cushion.

He Shiqing also turned his gaze over. He glanced at the lowered head of Xie Qingyang, then looked at Gu Sheng and said in a cold voice, “Junior Sister, you’ve never been in good health, and now you’re busy taking care of a spirit pet. You shouldn’t risk going to the Floating Life Pagoda.”

Floating Life Pagoda? Hu Li raised her head upon hearing the key phrase.

This was also a crucial plot point in the original novel, but apparently, the second female lead had no part in it. So, she glanced at Gu Sheng, then obediently settled back down, letting the woman continue stroking her fur.

Just then, the system, which had been playing dead in her sea of consciousness, suddenly flashed and issued a mission: 

“Third Mission: Host, please separate the Male and Female Leads immediately.”

Huh? Hu Li reluctantly opened her eyes and looked at Xie Qingyang, who was sitting across from Gu Sheng.

While this guy was admittedly a bit annoying, there was no need to tell him to scram the moment they met.

Besides, compared to Xie Qingyang, she found He Shiqing much more irritating.

Because, this scoundrel claimed he wanted Gu Sheng to meet the new junior brother, but everything he said was aimed at persuading Gu Sheng not to participate in the Floating Life Pagoda trial. He was clearly afraid that Gu Sheng would once again overshadow him and embarrass him, the chief disciple of the Tianyan Sect.

He’s truly an eyesore. Hu Li shook her head, wanting to drive him away but having no way to do it.

Therefore, she could only shift her gaze back to Xie Qingyang.

Earlier, when she gave Xie Qingyang the Tianyan Sect recommendation letter, she had followed the system’s instruction and placed a Mind-Muddling Gu on him. So now, all she had to do was chant the incantation to control Xie Qingyang and make him leave.

But listening to He Shiqing’s incessant chatter made it truly difficult for her to calm down and chant the spell.

Consequently, after failing the incantation for the seventeenth time, she turned toward He Shiqing and launched into a furious, non-stop barking fit.

To hell with it. The only thing that can shut this guy up is a mad dog.

“J-Junior Sister, this spirit pet of yours truly lacks discipline,” He Shiqing said after a moment of silence.

Gu Sheng smiled, about to reply.

But just then, Xie Qingyang suddenly jumped up from the prayer cushion, hoisted He Shiqing onto his shoulder, and ran straight out, muttering, “Senior Brother He, why were you barking just now?”

******

[What kind of sudden fit is Shampoo having?]

[Shampoo: I’m so scared. Senior Brother He is barking back at the dog.]

[He Shiqing: Woof woof. Actually, I’m a lonely lone wolf. Those interested in me, please click on my avatar and leave the key to your heart’s door.]

[Gross. I’m barfing right onto the dog head above me.]

[Ugh. You lone wolf, just wait for He Shiqing’s lawyer’s letter.]

[Fellow Daoists, what exactly happened to Xie Qingyang?]

[Nothing. The author just had a crazy moment at 2 AM. The text will be revised tomorrow morning.]

********

The book reviews floated past in a colorful blur. Hu Li rested her head and watched with a sense of schadenfreude, unaware that Gu Sheng was currently examining her with a look of deep curiosity.

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