She stopped thinking about it and waited for a long time.
Upon realizing that Gu Qinghan had no intention of knocking on the door to interrogate her, Qian Yu, who had been enduring for a while, finally stopped pretending.
She laid her cards on the table.
Who said she was a stupid fox who hadn’t gained sapience?
Couldn’t they see that even Gu Qinghan, the one hailed as the Child of Destiny, was being toyed with in the palm of her hand?
Among the heroes of the world, who else possessed such world-shaking wisdom?
Qian Yu stood up from the bed and flicked her small sleeves, placing her hands behind her back.
Her tender little face showed three parts sarcasm, three parts coldness, and three parts the loneliness of a hero with no match under the heavens.
The little fox was invincible under the heavens!
“Qian Yu, what are you doing?”
Just as she was marveling at her own world-shaking talent, the door to the room was suddenly knocked open.
The black-haired girl named Gu Qinghan walked in and looked at the “vicissitudes and maturity” on the face of the little Half-Yao, her brow furrowing tightly.
“What’s with that expression? It’s as if you just schemed against someone.”
Qian Yu’s expression froze.
It was over.
She had been caught red-handed while losing herself in the joy of victory.
“Cough, Senior Sister, I was actually imitating Shizun’s favorite expression when she was alive to express how much I miss her.”
Qian Yu kept a serious face, worried about causing more trouble.
However, Gu Qinghan only glanced at her “cold” little face that was constantly shifting before losing interest.
She had already discovered that Qian Yu’s brain didn’t seem to work very well in this life.
Looking at her now, perhaps this was the price of Bloodline Awakening.
It was quite pitiful. “Forget it, don’t bother explaining. Come out and eat.”
“Oh…”
With her head drooping and her Supreme King’s Aura interrupted, Qian Yu obediently followed Gu Qinghan out the door.
Possessing a somewhat childlike temperament, her previous worries were soon replaced by a new wonder—Gu Qinghan was actually going to eat?
Hadn’t this cultivation machine been in Inedia for a long time?
She wanted to taste just what kind of food would make this Inedia Pill collection fanatic voluntarily call her to eat.
Maybe it was some kind of delicious delicacy or a supreme spiritual meal!
A moment later…
“Pfft—”
At the dining table forged from ice and snow, where not even a hint of the Black Ice’s coldness could be felt, Qian Yu’s little face wrinkled into a bitter melon.
She wanted to spit out the food in her mouth but didn’t dare, so she could only swallow it with a face full of deep resentment.
“Senior Sister, was this meal really made by you? How could it… how could it be so… unconventional?”
She looked at Gu Qinghan.
Even if she didn’t dare to speak plainly, the “hatred and dissatisfaction” toward the person who made this food still flashed like a little scheme in her large eyes.
Qian Yu had never eaten such “assassin” food before.
It looked vibrant and smelled quite good, so why did it taste so terrible once it entered the mouth?
It was just like the “Wine-Marinated Garlic Sour-Fragrant Sweet-Heart Bitter Melon Pie” that Shizun loved to make most when she was alive.
It was so unpalatable that she would rather go bury herself in the snow the next second.
Fortunately, she still had some restraint in front of Gu Qinghan.
Otherwise, if she had taken a large mouthful, she might have gone to see her Shizun in the afterlife ahead of schedule.
“…”
Gu Qinghan gave the Qian Yu, who was wearing a mask of pain, a faint look and silently picked up some food to eat, not saying a word.
Unfortunately, this meal was indeed made by her personally.
She had followed the recipe strictly, creating it with the same meticulousness she used for practicing sword techniques.
In order not to waste time and to take care of her own cultivation while eating, she had also used alchemy techniques to mix many types of precious spiritual medicines into it.
It preserved the purest medicinal properties without affecting the appearance of the food.
How could it be unpalatable?
“Eating on the path of cultivation is meant to sustain vitality and provide benefits. How can you judge it based on taste? Since you find it unpalatable, just eat more. You should know that the beginning of fitting a square peg into a round hole must involve friction. It is the same principle as an infant learning to walk, which wreaks havoc on the muscles and bones.”
Perhaps it was because she felt guilty toward Qian Yu and wanted to provide some benefits for her; or perhaps it was simply because she was dissatisfied with Qian Yu’s dislike for the food she had meticulously prepared.
After reciting such a string of grand principles, Gu Qinghan, appearing like a goddess under the moon, coldly and quickly piled the food in Qian Yu’s bowl into a small mountain.
Eat!
Qian Yu was struck with terror, suspecting that Gu Qinghan was trying to poison her.
She hurriedly said:
“I once heard an ancient saying: ‘Nothing increases or decreases; it is only created by the mind. Nothing is honorable or shameful; it only exists in the mind.’ It says that the path of cultivation emphasizes the principle of following one’s heart above all. Right now, my heart has already decided that I shouldn’t eat this meal. If I don’t choose to follow my heart, then I will be far from safety. In the future, Senior Sister, please leave the preparation of the meals to me!”
Perhaps because she possessed half Demon Race blood, Qian Yu’s level of education was extremely worrying in both her previous and current lives.
So much so that every time Gu Qinghan wanted to discuss the scriptures or the Dao with her and truly be a fellow cultivator, she would be deterred by the other’s ignorance.
But now, looking at Qian Yu, who was so frightened by her meal that she started quoting classics, the cold girl whose heart was entirely on cultivation was quite surprised.
Perhaps the other party really did have some potential to be tapped and wasn’t entirely a stupid Half-Yao with worrying sapience.
In that case, she might be able to understand this thing.
“This is for you. In your spare time, you can look at it yourself.”
A light flashed in Gu Qinghan’s hand, and a scroll glowing with faint golden auspicious clouds appeared in front of Qian Yu.
Written on it were the large characters—the Nine Tribulations Returning to Origin Holy Canon.
She had always been clear-cut in her actions.
This manual was what she intended to give Qian Yu as compensation after finishing the Soul Inquiry.
Later, she gave up on the Soul Inquiry, so this compensation was naturally canceled.
More importantly, this kind of high-level manual relied heavily on comprehension.
If it were compensation, she would set aside time every day to teach Qian Yu the basics step by step.
But if it were a simple gift, she had no reason to take time out of her day.
Even if she gave it away on the principle of not wasting what had already been exchanged, with Qian Yu’s lack of sapience, forcibly studying such a manual that could lay the foundation for becoming a Venerable on her own might result in her not understanding it, or worse, succumbing to qi deviation.
But just now, after hearing those two lines of nonsense about the Dao from Qian Yu, Gu Qinghan changed her mind and felt the other might have some intelligence.
Although those arguments were shallow, they pointed directly to the essence of cultivating the heart before cultivating the Dao.
Then, if the other party only sought to use this manual for cultivation without trying to innovate, it might be feasible.
“This is…”
On the other side, Qian Yu didn’t know the reason she was suddenly gifted a manual was because of her nonsense about not wanting to eat.
She only stared at the scroll Gu Qinghan pushed in front of her, her gaze slightly dazed.
She had seen this manual with Nalan Yunyan last night, but it seemed a bit different.
“Hmm? Have you seen this manual before?”
Qian Yu’s reaction made Gu Qinghan frown.
When seeing such a core inheritance of the Luoxia Immortal Sect, being dazed was expected, but she felt that the other’s daze wasn’t based on the high level of the manual.
Moreover, she hadn’t felt it before, but looking at it now, why did Qian Yu’s aura seem somewhat similar to this manual?
Could she have practiced this manual before?
“Shizun told me about this manual many times when she was alive, telling me that I must find a way to get my hands on it in the future.”
Why was this Gu Qinghan so suspicious?
Ever since realizing that the cold girl in front of her was not simple, Qian Yu could also capture the subtleties deep in her eyes.
Her eyelids jumped.
Without thinking further, she quickly pushed all the responsibility onto her Shizun.
She wasn’t lying; she only said Shizun told her she should learn this manual in the future, not that the manual she currently had came from her.
If Gu Qinghan thought the manual she possessed came from her Shizun, that would be entirely her own imagination.
Qian Yu was still a pure and honest child.
“I see.”
Hearing Qian Yu’s answer, Gu Qinghan nodded slightly and stopped doubting.
Unlike other high-level manuals that could cultivate unique spiritual energy, the uniqueness of the Nine Tribulations Returning to Origin Holy Canon lay entirely in helping a Half-Yao refine their bloodline.
Unless one investigated carefully, it was difficult to discover that a practitioner was using this manual.
This was even more true in her case, where she completely didn’t care who the other person was.
So, the reason the other’s cultivation progress was so slow was because her Shizun died too early, resulting in the manual only being half-taught with no follow-up?
Another thought suddenly flashed through her mind, and Gu Qinghan felt realization once again.
The last shred of doubt regarding Qian Yu vanished.
It was true that Qian Yu’s talent was poor, but for it to be poor to this extent—still at the Initial Stage of the First Realm at sixteen or seventeen—was a bit too ridiculous, making it hard not to be suspicious.
But now, thinking that the slow progress of her cultivation was due to a missing manual, this shred of doubt was finally dispelled.
So there was no manual.
She had thought this was the late-bloomer type of Child of Destiny like the ones in the cultivation novels Shizun had shown her.
Gu Qinghan looked at Qian Yu’s face, and for the first time, her feelings shifted from defensiveness, vigilance, and killing intent to a sense of guilt for never having treated the other as a true friend.
She pushed the manual completely in front of Qian Yu.
“This scroll includes the first three layers of the Nine Tribulations Returning to Origin Holy Canon. It is enough for your current use. If there is anything you don’t understand later, you can come and ask me.”
But don’t come and ask me every day.
Holding the golden scroll in her hands, Qian Yu felt a surge of joy, and her little cowlick instantly shook.
How did this woman know that Nalan Yunyan had only given her the introductory outline and not the specific manual?