Lin Xinyi looked at the two people before her as if she were looking at a handy tool.
Originally, all Lin Xinyi needed was a corpse mutilated by the demon cult—something she could use to frame Bai Yuqian perfectly.
But now it seemed that living people who could twist the truth might be more convincing than corpses that couldn’t speak.
After all, Lin Xinyi loved twisting the truth most of all.
Though there would be some risk of exposing herself, Lin Xinyi had never worried about risks.
After all, when necessary, she just needed to be prepared—to have a way to keep herself hidden.
“Hey, you two. Go do something for me. If you satisfy me, I won’t pursue this matter…”
“Do something?”
The two exchanged glances, not understanding why a venerable elder would need insignificant nobodies like them to run errands.
Lin Xinyi had no intention of explaining.
She just smiled faintly and suddenly produced a sharp blade.
“Right now, I only need you to do one thing for me—but I don’t need your cooperation~”
“E-Elder?!!”
Seeing Lin Xinyi draw her blade, the two outer disciples were visibly panicked.
One of them was so frightened that she fell sitting on the ground, having no idea what the elder intended to do.
Lin Xinyi said nothing more.
Her blade flashed swiftly, like a crescent moon, slicing horizontally across the female disciple’s body.
Blood splattered from the disciple’s chest, utterly terrifying the other female disciple beside her.
“That was a bit heavy-handed. Spending all my time with those monsters made me forget—you’re the weak kind…”
Lin Xinyi glanced coldly at the female disciple who was clutching her chest and lying on the ground, barely breathing.
Confirming she was still alive, Lin Xinyi turned to the other disciple, who had already wet herself in fear.
“Ah, sorry. I forgot you outer disciples lack cultivation skill and don’t have reinforced bones and sinews. I used a bit too much force…”
Every time Lin Xinyi tried to ambush Qin Huaiyin with a blade, it was blocked by the other’s terrifying physique.
So when she thrust her longsword just now, she put in too much strength.
As a result, the wound she inflicted was deeper than usual.
But the outer disciple before her was already too terrified to stand, sitting on the ground with a steady stream of liquid flowing between her legs.
“No! Please don’t kill me! I—Senior Sister Li and I were just looking for some excitement here. There’s no need to annihilate us!!”
“Annihilate you? Ah, you’ve misunderstood. Now I think you’re more useful alive~”
Lin Xinyi didn’t waste words.
With one slash of her blade, a clean line of blood slowly appeared on the neck of the female disciple—just deep enough to bleed.
“As expected, even with less than a tenth of my spiritual power remaining, I’m still that Nascent Soul stage ‘Evergreen True Person’~”
Lin Xinyi watched the female disciple with blood flowing from her neck.
The woman’s legs had gone weak and she couldn’t stand, desperately covering her neck to stop the bleeding.
Lin Xinyi thrust her sword again, piercing straight through the chest but carefully avoiding any fatal areas.
The longsword ran through the other’s body without killing her.
At the same time, the intense pain caused this female disciple to faint on the ground just like the previous one.
All of this happened in less than a second.
“Don’t blame me. Blame your worthless lives.”
Lin Xinyi said coldly.
Yet even as she finished, she could see the woman still clutching the hem of her robe—clearly, even as she lost consciousness, she had tried to struggle.
Lin Xinyi cast a healing technique on the woman.
After all, she needed to ensure these two female disciples didn’t bleed out and die here. If that happened, everything she’d done would be more loss than gain.
“It stings a bit, but it’s a necessary sacrifice~”
Lin Xinyi reached into her storage space and casually pulled out two pale black talismans.
The blood-red patterns on them proved their value.
【Puppet Talisman】
【Spirit-grade Treasure】
【Can alter memories, distort cognition. Only usable on cultivators of a lower realm than the user. Single use only】
Lin Xinyi had gone through great effort to obtain these two little things back in the day.
After all, killing a cultivator not far below her own realm had required considerable scheming.
She had finally extracted the soul and refined it into five talismans—and now she had to use two of them at once.
“Bai Qianqian, this time I won’t just ruin your reputation—I’ll make the whole world despise you~”
With that, Lin Xinyi pressed the two talismans onto the unconscious female disciples lying on the ground.
Instantly, the talismans burned away completely, and a stream of black smoke rushed into their foreheads.
A slight smile curved Lin Xinyi’s lips.
She began to move her hands in a spell formula.
Only when a black imprint appeared on the two disciples’ foreheads did she slowly withdraw her spiritual power.
“From now on, forget everything that just happened. Go and spread the word that demon cult spies have infiltrated the sect—and that you were wounded by those spies~”
After altering the two’s memories, Lin Xinyi watched their blank-eyed expressions with satisfaction.
As she continued the spell, the two disciples, having received their commands, walked off in two different directions.
“This time, Bai Yuqian, even if you grow a hundred mouths, you won’t be able to explain yourself~”
Lin Xinyi covered her mouth with a soft laugh, then hurried toward the location of the sect’s grand selection.
But what Lin Xinyi didn’t notice was that beneath the tree where she had discarded her pill, a figure slowly emerged and bent down to pick up the fallen pill.
“Elder Lin’s hobbies have been quite interesting lately.”
Watching Lin Xinyi’s departing figure, the person slowly walked to where Lin Xinyi had just been standing.
Murong Xue’s blue-white hair fluttered behind her in the breeze.
As the sect leader, Murong Xue had also been heading to the grand selection when she spotted Lin Xinyi rushing out of Yun Yiyi’s cave dwelling.
Seeing her run so urgently, and out of concern for a fellow sect member, Murong Xue had followed.
Of course, it definitely wasn’t because of those beautiful, elegant hands.
Nor was it to create a chance encounter.
When she saw Lin Xinyi, Murong Xue didn’t come out.
She had planned to admire from the shadows—but ended up watching an entire show from start to finish.
“Such a precious pill, and the elder just throws it away so carelessly…”
Murong Xue said nothing.
She popped the retrieved pill into her mouth like a piece of candy, then licked the thumb that had held the pill.
Her eyes, gazing in the direction Lin Xinyi had gone, flashed with a peculiar light.
“It seems Elder Lin is up to something devious…”
With those words, Murong Xue leaped into the air, looking down over the entire sect.
The two female disciples whose memories had been altered had already run out of the forest to where more disciples gathered.
Murong Xue watched them like an indifferent spectator.
Seeing them emerge from the forest and begin shouting about demon cult spies, she didn’t intervene.
She simply turned and slowly flew toward the grand selection venue.
“I wonder what interesting thing Elder Lin will stir up this time.”
Lin Xinyi saw the layered steps of the Celestial Altar ahead and quickened her pace.
Below the steps, a crowd had already gathered.
Those who had passed the first round of tests were climbing the stairs with all their might.
Some rejoiced at reaching their ideal height.
Others sat kneeling on the steps, wailing after losing their composure.
Lin Xinyi swept her gaze coldly across them—and spotted that unmoving white figure in the middle.
“Why is that person standing there?”
Seeing Bai Yuqian’s figure, Lin Xinyi frowned slightly.
As the second test of the sect’s grand selection, Lin Xinyi knew the process intimately.
The Heart-Questioning Steps, which tested aptitude and mental state, was a classic event.
【Heart-Questioning Steps】
【Immortal-grade Treasure】
【One hundred steps forged from intent by the Hidden Immortal Sect’s founding patriarch before his ascension. Every ten steps tests one’s will and mental state. The firmer the mind, the higher the aptitude, the higher one can climb】
When Lin Xinyi first embarked on the path of cultivation, she too had walked these steps.
She had been young then, but exceptionally talented.
Though she hadn’t climbed the highest, she had reached sixty-nine steps.
That achievement had earned her direct acceptance as a personal disciple without further testing.
Lin Xinyi understood well what it felt like to stand on those steps.
Even the passing mark for inner disciples was only twenty steps.
“What is Bai Yuqian doing? Why did she stop there?”
Lin Xinyi bit her thumb anxiously.
Bai Qianqian was standing exactly on the fiftieth step.
Her relaxed expression clearly showed she still had energy left.
Lin Xinyi still remembered how, when that person returned for revenge, she had climbed all one hundred steps in one go.
Her astonishing aptitude had even caused this Immortal-grade treasure, the Heart-Questioning Steps, to recognize her as its master—becoming one of Bai Qianqian’s greatest weapons, even if using a staircase as a bludgeon wasn’t exactly elegant.
But now, not only had the other stopped at fifty steps, she had stopped exactly at the passing line for personal disciples.
Compared to the other disciples nearby—grimacing, crawling up the stairs on hands and knees—Bai Qianqian stood in stark contrast.
“No good. If Bai Yuqian keeps such a low profile, how will those demonic energy accessories on her attract any attention…”
Lin Xinyi could certainly point it out herself, but for a venerable elder to target an unremarkable disciple so blatantly would be too obvious.
She needed the other elders to discover it on their own.
Bai Qianqian looked left and right.
She noticed that none of the elders were paying her any attention.
Their eyes were all on the young girl currently in the lead—that girl was clenching her fists, kneeling on the steps, but had already reached the seventieth step.
“She’s reached seventy steps. Looks like this batch has some impressive ones~”
“I wouldn’t be so sure. Back in my day, I climbed ninety steps in one go—I only stopped to save face for the sect.”
“Haha! Old Wang, you’re only fooling yourself with that. I was there with you—you rolled down after forty steps.”
“You—!!”
Lin Xinyi found the elders’ noisy chatter irritating.
Her mind raced, trying to figure out how to make those elders focus their attention on Bai Yuqian.
The demonic energy was very weak—without close inspection, no one would detect it.
“Useless, all these elders. Not one of them sees that Bai Yuqian is pretending to be weak. How did these people become elders…”
Lin Xinyi slowly stood up and walked to the edge of the viewing platform, staring intently at Bai Yuqian standing motionless on the fiftieth step.
Just as she was feeling utterly frustrated, wondering what else she could do, a familiar voice sounded in her ear.
Before Lin Xinyi could react, a blue-white figure had already appeared beside her.
In an instant, the noisy chatter fell silent.
All the elders rose to their feet and bowed.
“Greetings, Sect Leader!”
Hearing the voice beside her, Lin Xinyi turned and was shocked to see Murong Xue already at her side, less than half a meter away.
“At ease.”
Murong Xue waved to the elders who had bowed.
They all returned to their seats.
Though they continued chatting about this and that, their voices were noticeably quieter.
Lin Xinyi saw Murong Xue approach and quickly moved to bow, but as soon as her hands came to chest level, Murong Xue grabbed her wrist.
“S-Sect Leader!!”
“Elder Lin, I just wanted to have a little chat.”
The moment her wrist was grabbed, Lin Xinyi felt a strange barrier form around her, separating the two from the other elders.
The outside noise faded completely.
Lin Xinyi realized Murong Xue had set up a Barrier (barrier/domain).
Lin Xinyi didn’t understand why the other would do this.
Though puzzled, she didn’t voice it.
She simply shrank back slightly, trying to maintain a safe distance, but with her wrist held tightly, she couldn’t retreat far and could only stand in place.
“Elder Lin has been with the sect for quite some time now. Yet I wonder—why do you only have one disciple?”
“Sect Leader, what are you saying? And you, Sect Leader—don’t you also have no disciples at all?”
“Is that so? As it happens, I’m thinking of taking one on today. Does Elder Lin have any thoughts?”
Murong Xue gently held Lin Xinyi’s slender wrist.
But to outside observers, the two still appeared to be standing side by side as before.
Because the barrier distorted sight, no one knew that Lin Xinyi’s right wrist was tightly grasped.
She could neither retreat nor move forward, standing less than half a step away from Murong Xue.
Lin Xinyi had no idea why the Sect Leader was discussing this with her.
“I’m not good at teaching disciples. Just training my one personal disciple already takes everything I have. How could I have the energy for anything else?”
“Is that so?”
At those words, Murong Xue loosened her fingers slightly.
Seeing the release, Lin Xinyi immediately pulled back her tightly held wrist, her eyes full of wariness.
Murong Xue seemed not to notice.
She continued leaning against the railing, quietly watching Lin Xinyi.
Stared at like that, Lin Xinyi felt a creeping unease, unsure if the other had seen through something.
“So Elder Lin is already at her limit just training one disciple. Then my request would indeed be too demanding…”
“I’m glad the Sect Leader understands.”
Seeing the other relent, Lin Xinyi wanted to end the conversation quickly and get away from this person.
After all, Murong Xue was a solid Deity Transformation cultivator, the head of an entire sect, with deeper schemes than Lin Xinyi could fathom.
She didn’t want to get too entangled with her right now.
“I came to watch the sect’s grand selection only on a whim. If the Sect Leader has no other matters, I should return to care for my foolish disciple…”
As she spoke, Lin Xinyi tried to leave the barrier.
She reached out to touch it lightly, only to have her finger bounce back.
Normally, Lin Xinyi could have torn it open with ease.
But now, with her spiritual power obstructed, breaking through would take some effort.
And if she showed any difficulty, she’d be bombarded with all sorts of questions. Her raised hand stopped in midair.
“Sect Leader, would you please open this barrier…”
“It seems Elder Lin really cares about that only disciple of hers.”
“Caring for one’s disciple is only proper for a teacher, isn’t it?”
“Is that so? I had thought it was merely a cultivation cauldron the elder was raising…”
“!!!”