Watcher, Right Now, You Really Are Despicable

Let us have the Ox of the Sky Carriage take a few steps back, returning to the moment Yaxiu and Amoduo crossed paths. Although they had dragged another sorcerer they happened across into their troubles, Yaxiu and the others felt not the slightest guilt. After all, they had seen him casting miracles in an attempt to attack them. Blessed with such an instantly harmonious encounter, they had clear consciences leaving the heavy responsibility of covering their rear to him. Come to think of it, they had encountered several sorcerers in succession along the way, almost all of whom raised their hands to attack on sight. While worrying over the average moral caliber of sorcerers, Yaxiu and his companions floored the gas pedal and sped off, deciding not to stoop to their level. "Why are they still chasing us?!" Hearing that the rumbling of the legion behind them showed no sign of stopping, the village girl scratched her head in frustration. "Isn't a wild beast supposed to stop chasing once it eats someone else?!" "A Heroic Spirit faction isn't a wild beast, but an institution of civilization. And the point of civilization is utter extermination, not quitting while you're ahead," Yaxiu said offhandedly. "Still, there's another question here—Heroic Spirit Legions don't go out of their way to hunt down sorcerers unless a sorcerer jumps right into their faces. We're running so fast, so why won't he give up? It's not like we even cursed at him yet." The Witch, Diya, guessed, "Could it be because Sword Princess and I are too pretty, so he wants to kidnap us? Like an evil dragon kidnapping princesses..." "The kidnapping part is true, but not of us," Sonia analyzed calmly. "His target is probably the Watcher." "Me?" "Didn't you say earlier that an impressive Heroic Spirit commander threw himself into you, only to be absorbed by you? It's just like a little white rabbit running from a fox and leaping straight onto me while I'm picking mushrooms..." "Are you saying you're great at cooking rabbit meat, Sword Princess?" "In short, the fox behind us actually wants to hunt the rabbit, not us. But he doesn't know the rabbit has already been swallowed in one bite by the Watcher, so..." Sonia's eyes flickered, and she said seriously, "The only solution right now is to hand the Watcher over." "Indeed." Diya nodded as well. Her hair was currently split into black and white, though the harmonizing duet of her voice was not grating. "The fox won't listen to our explanations at all; he just wants to bite the rabbit to death. As for who the rabbit is, the fox couldn't care less." "We have no choice now..." "Yeah, absolutely..." Listening to his two operators discuss how to package and sell him off, Yaxiu remained remarkably calm, even proactively offering suggestions: "Let me check if there's a Flowing Gold River nearby. If there is, I'll dive in to draw their attention, and you two can take the chance to drive away. "Though a Flowing Gold River is pretty hard to find, there's a high probability of a mine resource point around here. Hiding in a mine could buy some time too. If worse comes to worst and we're about to get caught, you two should jump out immediately, disconnect from the Void Realm, and return to reality. I'll drive back and ram into them—that ought to buy you at least twenty seconds. "Then again, I'm actually a bit scared of being mauled to death by Void Realm creatures. Maybe if you two kill me directly, that would make the fox behind us give up too. Sword Princess, you said before that the injuries sustained when a sorcerer dies affect reality, right? Then you'd better focus your attacks on my abdomen. I've been eating a bit too much lately, and I was just looking to lose some weight..." Listening to Yaxiu mutter on and on about how to orchestrate his own demise, Sonia and Diya exchanged a look, seeing defeat in each other's eyes. "All right, all right," Sonia said, feeling deflated. "You know full well we'd never abandon you, so stop flaunting your noble spirit of self-sacrifice." "I'm not flaunting anything. I genuinely think selling me out is a solid choice here," Yaxiu said. "If this keeps up, we'll be wiped out sooner or later. Better one dies than all three. You're my operators—the value of your survival is far greater than mine, and I really am the core of the problem right now. "If it's to protect you two, dying once isn't a price I'm unwilling to pay." Originally, Sonia had merely wanted to seize the opportunity to emphasize that this crisis was entirely the Watcher's fault, highlighting just how dazzling her noble virtue of standing by him through thick and thin was, so the Watcher would be moved to tears, choke up with gratitude, and spend the rest of his life repaying Lady Sword Princess's immense kindness. Who would have thought the Watcher would see right through her scheme and even turn it against her! It was infuriating. Not only had she failed to touch the Watcher's heart, but her own favorability toward him had significantly risen instead! "Dying in the Void Realm isn't real death anyway!" The village girl gave the cult leader's neck a fierce chop. "Why make it sound so dire? You want us to be overwhelmed with gratitude and pledge our lives to you? You want us to feel so guilty every night that we come to the Void Realm just to serve you? Then you can rest your head on my lap while I massage your temples, put your feet in the Witch's lap while she massages your calves, and make every night's Void Realm exploration feel like a vacation?!" "It's one thing to fantasize, but why do you have to be so specific about it—" Diya sighed. "Watcher, right now, you really are despicable." Yaxiu rolled his eyes. He hadn't been trying to flatter his two masters at all; he genuinely believed sacrificing himself was the most cost-effective option. After all, he was too lazy to visit the Void Realm in the first place. Now he could legitimately apply for sick leave, lie around at home playing video games, and his operators wouldn't even be able to reproach him. Why wouldn't he take that? Besides, dying wasn't really much of a loss for him; a portion of the Witch's and Sword Princess's Void Realm gains would be shared with him anyway. Conversely, if the Witch or Sword Princess died, Yaxiu would crash like a baijiu fund—he wouldn't be able to enter the Void Realm alone, there would be no surplus spoils for him to exploit from the others, and his cultivation would grind to a complete halt. "Is it possible to escape?" the village girl asked. Yaxiu opened the Void Realm map and shook his head. "The fox is deliberately herding us into a dead end." When the pursuit first began, Yaxiu's first reaction had been to drive toward the Star Hall territory. Bledo was a Star Hall commander, after all, and his enemy was clearly from an opposing faction. Though Yaxiu didn't know whether the Time Continent had a "Homeland Security Act," entering Star Hall territory would surely make their pursuer hesitate. Yet whenever he tried to turn north toward Star Hall, ranged attacks rained down from above to impede his progress. Far from heading north, the distance between them and the pursuing forces had closed considerably instead. The enemy had clearly anticipated his moves in advance and dispatched interceptor units. Compared to these tactically intelligent Heroic Spirit Legions, knowledge creatures like Fishcleaver Dragons were as naively adorable as Lalafells. "Since you've rejected my passionate self-sacrifice, there are three options left," Yaxiu said. "First, both of you accompany me into the Domain of Stillness to wait for death, or commit suicide directly. Although it's still a total party wipe, it'll at least minimize soul damage. I'll find a way to get some soul-healing potions, and we'll only lose ten days at most before returning to the Void Realm. "Second, destroy the 'Soul Summoning' sorcery spirit. Although we don't know which piece of the rabbit the fox wants to eat, tossing the whole rabbit away is guaranteed to work." At this, both Sword Princess and the Witch shook their heads. If it had been the old "Soul Summoning" sorcery spirit, throwing it away would have been fine, but after Yaxiu explained the newly unlocked troop types for the spirit earlier, there was no way they were letting it go. Star Prayerers! Star Flinger Warriors! These two things were far beyond the limits of a Two-Winged Sorcerer. While they didn't know how they measured up to a three-winged sorcerer, on the Time Continent, equipping these two troop types would practically let them walk around unchecked, slaughtering Fishcleaver Dragons like chickens. Moreover, obtaining these advanced Star Hall troop types was ridiculously difficult. After all, it had taken everything the three sorcerers had just to kill a low-ranking Heroic Spirit commander like Demilo. A high-ranking commander like Bledo traveled with a massive retinue and could even equip himself as a "Star Flinger Warrior"... Forget two or three sorcerers; even a "whole horde" of sorcerers would never have managed to slay Bledo. Had it not been for a fluke of fate, Yaxiu would never have unlocked these high-level troop types. Promoting to a Three-Winged Sanctuary Sorcerer would have been far easier than killing a Heroic Spirit commander. What was more, though they had no concrete proof, they believed that a "Soul Summoning" sorcery spirit that was so exceedingly hard to obtain had to involve far greater stakes. More importantly, they knew they would probably never get another chance to snatch a new "Soul Summoning" sorcery spirit in the future. Compared to losing this potential opportunity, they would rather have the Watcher commit suicide. "Maybe it isn't the Soul Summoning sorcery spirit at all," Sonia pointed out. "It could be the Commander's Manual you just absorbed... By the way, what skill did you pick earlier?" "Probably not that, because I chose Finance." "Why?!" The village girl was shocked. "Was Offense not good enough, which increases experience across all schools?! We don't even have that much soul power to equip troops right now! What damn finances are you going to manage without any money?!" By the end, she was so furious that she blurted out countryside slang. "But it's Finance! Financial management is an investment in the future!" Yaxiu argued. "Who could resist the temptation of investing in the future?"