Late at night, after all the teachers and students had left the school, a slender figure darted across the campus grounds, glancing around before quietly approaching Big Stone Lake.
"So this is Big Stone Lake." A barely perceptible smile curved Lian Yi's lips. Zhou You and Nuomi had presumed ordinary mortals couldn't see vengeful ghosts, talking openly about secret matters in a public setting. Little did they know, their carelessness had played right into her hands.
She unfurled her divine sense, extending it into the pitch-black waters to scour the depths inch by inch. The full layout of Big Stone Lake lay bare before her: haphazard piles of rocks, wildly overgrown reeds, wandering frogs, and garbage settled on the lakebed.
Retracting her divine sense, Lian Yi frowned slightly. "Where is the treasure?"
Not a single thing in the lake resembled a treasure.
"Could it be a treasure that can't be detected with divine sense?" Considering the profound heritage of the Carefree Sect, Lian Yi thought this was entirely plausible.
"Then I'll just go in and see for myself."
Pinching a hand seal for the Water-Repelling Technique, she plunged into the lake and paced along the bottom, keeping her head low as she searched.
"Still nothing?"
Lian Yi was bewildered. Had Nuomi hidden her treasure so thoroughly that even with the location in hand, not a trace could be found?
"Could I have overlooked some clue?"
Lian Yi was a clever woman. Otherwise, she never could have cultivated all the way to Foundation Establishment as a rogue cultivator. Beyond that, she knew how to scheme, toy with people, and revel in other people's negative emotions.
Before long, a suspicious thought struck her.
"Could it be this trash?"
"As the saying goes, divine treasures conceal their true form. Maybe a water bottle is actually a Jade Pure Flask or something similar?"
She picked up a plastic water bottle from the lakebed and studied it for quite a while, unable to discern anything out of the ordinary.
"Whatever. I'll take it all and study it slowly at home."
Casually opening her storage ring, she tossed the water bottle inside.
"And this book, this tree branch, this stone..."
As a Foundation Establishment cultivator, Lian Yi moved with astonishing swiftness, far beyond anything Zhou You could match.
Before long, every scrap of garbage on the lakebed had been swept into her storage ring, and Lian Yi departed in satisfaction.
Right beside Big Stone Lake stood the old dormitory building.
Up on the top floor of the old dormitory building, Zhenyue Ghost King knitted his brows, utterly baffled.
"What is she doing collecting so much garbage? Did crushing one of her avatars break her brain too?"
***
"Hurry, hurry, fall back to defend the high ground! I'll push top to backdoor the tower... We won!"
Duan Yuxian sprawled across a plush king-sized bed playing mobile games, surrounded by hamburgers, fried chicken, and an iced bottle of Pulpy Orange. The moment the victory icon flashed onto the screen, she tossed her phone aside in deep satisfaction and let out a heartfelt sigh.
"Now this is the life—"
She had spent the entire day indulging in games.
"That True Martial Great Hall really isn't fit for humans. No internet, no electricity. You even have to walk all the way to the outer sect just to charge your phone."
"Once I become the Hall Master, the first thing I'm doing is setting up two cell towers in the inner sect."
Bouncing up from the bed, she sat down at the computer desk and hooked her finger. The hamburgers and fried chicken on the bed floated over and landed neatly on the desk.
Duan Yuxian was staying at an esports hotel. The room was equipped with top-tier gaming rigs, blisteringly fast internet, and effortless food delivery. Naturally, the room rate wasn't cheap.
Money, however, was of no concern. Her master was loaded. Before she set off, he had handed her a full one hundred thousand yuan—her entire living expenses for the semester.
"Time to browse the local forum for a bit."
Since she was going to spend four years attending university in Chang'an, she would inevitably have to deal with the local immortal cultivators. Browsing the regional section of the Immortal Cultivation Forum was the quickest way to get a feel for the local cultivation scene.
"A bounty post asking about notable events that happened in Chang'an..."
Duan Yuxian clicked in and flipped through a few pages. Finding no useful comments, she assumed everyone had taken their replies to private messages.
"Someone opening a safari park asking how to bribe officials..."
Duan Yuxian rubbed her chin. She vaguely recalled that a tiger demon was good friends with her master. The beast had visited her master a while ago, and while pouring tea, she had listened in on their conversation.
During their chat, her master had advised the tiger demon not to stay cooped up in the mountains acting high and mighty; when it was time to grease some palms, grease them, and don't let pride get in the way.
"I'm being haunted by a Poverty Ghost..."
Duan Yuxian clicked in to take a look, then hit the "Author Only" filter in the upper-right corner. She saw the poster's reply stating that the Poverty Ghost had already been dealt with by people from the Carefree Sect and Mount Longhu.
"Mount Longhu?"
Duan Yuxian smiled knowingly. She should have guessed that any help request involving ghosts would trace back to Su Tingxue.
Su Tingxue was the only cultivator from Mount Longhu in all of Chang'an; anyone looking for ghost exorcisms had no choice but to seek her out.
"Still, what's with this Carefree Sect? From the looks of it, this Poverty Ghost was mainly handled by someone from the Carefree Sect?"
She took a screenshot of the forum post, sent it over QQ, and left a message for Su Tingxue: "Is the post talking about you?"
Duan Yuxian played another hour of games, but no QQ notification popped up.
After thinking for a moment, she sent another message: "I agreed to fight you and even let you publish the results, yet I didn't get a single benefit out of it. Can't you satisfy just a tiny bit of my curiosity?"
Another half hour passed before Su Tingxue replied: "I just got out of evening self-study."
Even without any emojis or tone of voice, Duan Yuxian could still feel a palpable sense of misery radiating from the words.
After all, she had endured the exact same grind last year.
"Typing takes too long. Let's do a voice call. Is that convenient?" Su Tingxue sighed and took the initiative to ask. After all, Duan Yuxian had a point; she was the one who had asked for the duel.
"Go ahead." Duan Yuxian put on her headset.
"Just as the post mentioned, it was a modern-era Poverty Ghost that countered me pretty severely, so I brought along a classmate from my grade..."
"...What's his name? None of your business."
"After dealing with the Poverty Ghost, while we were in the car heading back to school, he told me he had comprehended a very bizarre spell—"
Su Tingxue came to an abrupt halt, realizing she had let something slip. That was Zhou You's secret, a matter of personal privacy, and not something she could divulge to Duan Yuxian.
"Keep going! What kind of bizarre spell did he figure out?" Duan Yuxian was hooked and pressed eagerly. Su Tingxue hailed from a top sect just like herself and had seen the world; for her to describe something as bizarre meant the spell had to be truly remarkable.
No matter how Duan Yuxian pried, Su Tingxue refused to disclose another word.
Duan Yuxian hung up in a huff.
"Way to leave a person hanging!"
She spun twice in her gaming chair, and an idea came to her.
"A classmate in Su Tingxue's grade? If I remember correctly, Su Tingxue goes to Chang'an No. 2 High School, right?"
***
Ever since Zhou You discovered that his private messages were filled with spiteful comments, he had intended to stay away from his inbox for a while.
Yet the moment he logged into the forum, the little red notification dot in the upper-right corner glared at him. It made Zhou You itch all over. If he didn't click it to clear that red dot, an unbearable irritation nagged at him, souring his entire browsing experience.
His hand moved almost of its own accord and clicked the inbox.
Unsurprisingly, another flood of abusive comments poured in.
"Drop your address, let's 1v1."
"Trash, why're you scared to reply now?"
"What kind of nobody do you think you are to even know my Yuxian?"
"Lmao, typical brain-dead Tingxue fanboy logic. You're hopeless for life."
Veins throbbed on Zhou You's forehead with fury. He was the dignified sect master of the Carefree Sect, a formidable powerhouse of mid Qi Refinement! How could he tolerate a bunch of juniors barking at him like this? Today, he absolutely had to find one to vent his frustration on!
Zhou You quickly locked onto the most offensive target.
It was the guy demanding an address for a 1v1 duel. He was the most active sender in his inbox; while others sent a single insult and left, this guy sent messages three times a day, endlessly annoying.
His username was "Loves Yuxian Most."
"A duel's a duel. Who's scared of you?" Zhou You shot back.
"Loves Yuxian Most" responded almost instantly, arrogant as ever: "Brat, you actually dare to accept? Fine, bring it on!"
When immortal cultivators cursed people out online, they weren't just talking trash—they had zero fear of settling things offline.
"Loves Yuxian Most" immediately followed up: "Just you wait. Once I wrap up my business here over the next couple of days, I'm coming to find you for that duel!"
Chapter 58