Guess whether our comrade Zhu Lan will join the male lead’s side to beat up another bit player, or join the bit players to beat up the male lead?
You guessed right.
Zhu Lan chose to bolt.
She’d barely taken two steps when a storage ring suddenly flew right to her feet.
A windfall!
If Zhu Lan remembered correctly, the male lead wore a storage ring on every finger of his left hand—five in total.
Even the cheapest one cost at least a hundred silver taels.
He was outrageously wealthy.
This one on the ground looked like the ring from the male lead’s ring finger.
She took it.
Thanks, cannon fodder!
Since they’d created an opening for her to escape, she would definitely burn some incense for them next year in return.
While the idea of a level three Qi Condensation practitioner taking on a level nine was beyond belief…
But since the person in question was the male lead, was there really any reason to be surprised?
Based on her decades of experience as a reader of power-trip novels, the general process went like this: The male lead starts to frown—the male lead falls into a slump—the male lead is backed into a corner—the male lead has a power-up—the villainous cannon fodder has a power-up—the male lead has another power-up.
Finally, the male lead takes down the cannon fodder.
Sure enough, before she had run very far, Zhu Lan felt a sudden surge of terrifying aura from behind.
A streak of ancient, massive, and overbearing golden light shot into the sky.
A fierce wind swept away the clouds, and the previously overcast sky instantly cleared for miles.
The Linyuan Sword had unleashed its power.
Almost instantly, the five Nascent Soul cultivators who had been maintaining the void rift in the sky appeared at Ye Feng’s location.
The distance was too great for Zhu Lan to see Ye Feng’s current state.
However, she didn’t need to worry about him at all.
At most, he’d be heavily injured, escape, and then find some fortuitous encounter to turn his misfortune into a blessing.
Without the Nascent Soul cultivators to maintain it, the void rift above the sky was shrinking at an extremely rapid pace.
Zhu Lan’s heart turned cold.
She didn’t know any movement techniques and was relying entirely on her legs; she couldn’t possibly make it at this speed.
Just as the gap shrank until it was almost invisible, a piece of yellowed parchment flew out from the rift and floated in the sky.
It rapidly grew larger and wider, its phantom image shrouding the cultivators below.
A massive amount of spiritual energy was suddenly released.
Shimmering rays of light appeared at the edge of the empty sky, accompanied by auspicious clouds.
The glowing light wrapped around the clouds and covered the void rift.
Miraculously, the gap stopped shrinking.
Seeing her chance, Zhu Lan put her bamboo hat back on and blended into the crowd to exit the secret realm.
“Breaking news! A great expert’s inheritance has appeared in the secret realm! The ancient divine weapon, the Linyuan Sword, has resurfaced!”
“The entrance to the secret realm collapsed during a freak occurrence. The four great families of Liangzhou City called upon five Nascent Soul cultivators to reopen the entrance and save the trapped young talents.”
“Ye Feng, the former young master of Dragon-Slaying Villa, obtained the inheritance! He vanished amidst the attacks of the Nascent Soul cultivators while carrying the Linyuan Sword. His status is unknown!”
“The current young master of the Ye family used the ancestral treasure, ‘Rivers and Mountains Like a Painting,’ to stabilize the void rift channel, saving many of the trapped youths.”
In just a few days, the events at the secret realm had the entire city of Liangzhou in an uproar.
Everyone was heatedly discussing the treasures found within.
At the center of the gossip was Ye Feng, the former young master of Dragon-Slaying Villa.
As the curtain fell on the secret realm’s inheritance, his name became known to more and more people.
And more and more people began to covet the ancient divine weapon he carried.
Zhu Lan stayed far away from the eye of the storm, embarking on a long journey.
A large number of cultivators from the martial world were currently flooding into Liangzhou City.
Not only were there rogue cultivators, but also disciples from various sects.
A bloody storm where everyone would be in danger was brewing.
In the original novel, sects were as common as trees in a forest, but only one could be called the “leader of the world”—the Tianyan Sect, the greatest sect in the cultivation world.
Aside from them, there were three other equally powerful factions: the Western Extreme Buddhist Sect, the Yaochi Holy Land, and the Wanjian Sect.
Small Liangzhou City was still mostly populated by mortals.
For the cultivation world, it was at most a third-rate vacation spot, or even just categorized as part of the mortal realm.
The five Nascent Soul cultivators from before all belonged to specific sects.
Wealthy families provided conveniences for cultivators, while the cultivators served as protectors or guest elders.
It was a win-win arrangement.
In the original story, the most famous sects all had their own issues.
The only thing the Western Extreme Buddhist Sect had in common with the word “Buddha” was that their disciples believed in Buddhism and someone chanted sutras in the main hall all day.
They advocated “delivering people through slaughter,” believing that only blood could clear the karmic debts one left in the world.
As a result, the disciples were all more or less mentally unstable.
The Wanjian Sect was slightly better; it was composed entirely of sword cultivators.
The downside was that they didn’t allow female disciples.
After being repressed for too long, things started happening—gay culture became prevalent.
The Yaochi Holy Land was the polar opposite of the Wanjian Sect.
They only accepted female disciples and forbade any private relations with men or leaving the sect.
Anyone caught would be turned into a human jar, a truly cruel punishment.
Over time, “grinding mirrors” became common.
A female disciple might simultaneously be involved with her master, her martial aunt, her senior sister, and even the peak masters of other mountains.
The Tianyan Sect was somewhat better, though they had a habit of being overly protective of their own.
If you were the beneficiary of that protection, it felt wonderful.
But if you weren’t, you had to deal with a whole sect of unreasonable people who would frequently step on your toes.
Because of their power, no one dared to speak up.
This had caused resentment to build up between the Tianyan Sect and other sects for a long time, eventually leading to them being ganged up on and wiped out.
Zhu Lan had originally planned to go to the Yaochi Holy Land.
Even though she might have been collected into some female player’s fish pond as a catch of the day, at least pain and pleasure would coexist.
The problem was that the Holy Maiden of the Yaochi Holy Land was the female lead.
In the story, she hooked up with the male lead and violated the sect rules, nearly getting crippled as punishment.
Once the male lead found out, he naturally had to vent her frustrations.
Just as the female lead was about to be permanently maimed, he charged in to save the day and wiped out the entire Yaochi Holy Land by himself.
Zhu Lan knew her place as an insignificant bit player.
If she was stubborn enough to insist on going to the Yaochi Holy Land and failed to stop the female lead from eloping, or failed to convince the elders not to punish her, she would also be wiped out by the hero-saves-the-beauty male lead.
After thinking it over, the only place she could go was the Tianyan Sect.
Although it would eventually be destroyed, at least they weren’t that perverted.
In the original text, the male lead joined the Wanjian Sect.
Swords were the standard equipment for a male lead, and he did look handsome using sword techniques.
The male lead was actually the one who contributed most to the destruction of the Tianyan Sect; he had charged at the front with the Linyuan Sword, powering up like crazy and using his protagonist aura to plow through the entire sect.
Now that she had sorted out her thoughts, Zhu Lan’s goal was clear.
While she was on the road, the thought that she would be violated if she didn’t work hard at her cultivation kept her awake at night.
Finally feeling a bit of sleepiness, she had just closed her eyes when the carriage suddenly stopped.
“What’s happening?”
Zhu Lan asked, feeling a bit strange.
She lifted the curtain and realized they were in an exceptionally remote area.
“Little beauty, you’ll understand in a moment when you’re in my arms being loved hard by me!”
The driver, who had previously seemed honest and law-abiding, now revealed a lecherous face.
He tore off his clothes and lunged toward Zhu Lan.