Luo Xue made it to Huangjing with time to spare before the Hundred-Year Grand Jade Auction started. She hadn't been able to attend the first time around with how heated things had gotten over the hidden realm. Seeing that she didn't care about it this time around, she left before anyone could ask her what she was doing.

She wanted to meet with another Chosen of Heaven earlier than she had before, Jin Xiaotong. Jin was one of the better powerhouses with his monstrous instinct and insane luck. He also supposedly befriended the legendary Fatty Wang during this auction. A friendship that went very far into the future. That being said, just like every other Son of Heaven she met, he had a huge flaw. Jin Xiaotong was something of a womanizer, constantly seducing new girls no matter which country he was in. Only to leave them behind when his next opportunity sprang up. Luo Xue could only pity them, and she doubts she can help them much in this timeline either. Maybe if she steers the Auction owner Cai Qingge away from him the woman will do her a favor?

As for the Auction itself, thankfully she was able to procure the spot as a Sect Representative for her Azure Mist Sect. They hadn't managed to get anything in the last timelines Auction as all their items were stolen on the way back by a Foundation Establishment Cultivator. This time, with her as the Representative, she's sure she can use the artifacts she painstakingly refined to either scare said Cultivator off, or even possibly kill them.

Then, as things often do for her these days…

Everything is wrong.

What do you mean the auction was delayed? What do you mean 10 Ancient-Grade spirit stones are suddenly in the auction!? What do you mean the Emperor of Huanglong changed his mind and decided to come to the Auction after he had declared it boring!?!? Still perplexed, she almost lost it completely when being escorted to the VIP section she saw something that nearly made her fly into a rage.

Why the hell is Long Jie singing and dancing with Fatty Wang while they drink Spiritual Wine!? Did he descend into her ex-fiancé's servant's body!? Then she notices her ex-fiancé's second and newly hired servant both passed out at the table beside the two merry men…

Not for the first time, Luo Xue concludes that this is all Xiang Rong's fault.

///___///

I drank a full bottle.

Goodbye, Spiritual Wine, Divine Wine is my new best friend. Seriously, I feel like I'm the crack addict outside a 7-11 at 3 AM, and Teacher is the dealer pulling up in a beat-up van going, 'Sup bitch, wanna hit?'. Why do I know this so well? I've seen it happen a lot growing up in what some would call a crackville. I'd honestly say crackhead is my second language.

Talk about a worse (in quality) drug than Divine wine aside, my body cultivation went up two ranks. Going from the 8th step of Muscle Altering to the first of Tendon Tempering. Directly jumping up to level three of body cultivation. Shanny's mind broke again today, not for the first time.

Yes, that's right. I'm gymmaxxing through drinking wine to the point I could probably punch a Core Formation Cultivator to death. I don't know what part about that is so hard to believe to be honest. Nah, I'm just fucking around; I know it's bullshit but man, are Shan's reactions funny. However, as opposed to the last time I broke through a major body stage, no black stinky sludge came out. So I asked Teacher what the heck was going on.

"Are my impurities not leaving? Or is one such as I entirely pure already?"

"They're being destroyed by the divine property of the wine."

I think she patted my head after that. I'm not sure, I was too busy drinking. Look, I'm getting groomed by a Divine being and that's okay. I'd make a killer house husband. I'd be a great dad too. I'll pump like five kids into Teacher, easy.

"Ihavetogonowbye!" Teacher immediately says, then disappears before I can react. Only a glimpse of her entirely red face has me realize my test paid off. Yep, mind reader, at least at surface thoughts. Otherwise, she'd have known it was a ploy. Or she read the fact even though it was a ploy to bait her out… I'd have still done it regardless. Teacher seems to lack experience in this stuff, but I'm sure she'd be a great wife.

"I've come to a conclusion." Shan breaks me from my thoughts.

"Thinking should be left to your betters."

"I've come to a conclusion." It's said with a bit more force this time. I just finish my last sip of wine before putting the bowl down and flopping onto the purple bed sheets like a dead fish. "You are working for the heavens, as their butcher."

Shan, give me a hit of whatever your smoking, because what the fuck?

"You can see the Mandate of Heaven, you aren't affected by the chosen's heavenly protection, and you are directly being taught by an Immortal. Everything with the recent resurgence of young heroes? You're the butcher sent to kill those who are unworthy of the role." The more she talks the more sure of herself she sounds. I just hum noncommittally, then use some Qi to light the incense burner across the room.

I just had a rather impulsive thought… Shan obviously doesn't trust me still, she's barely told me anything of her own life save for snippets here and there. Now, however, with her delusions and her own place as a Chosen of Heaven, one I already threatened to take away, she probably wouldn't dare try anything against me.

So I do something I hadn't tried before in fear of getting brain blasted. I use my divine sense on Shan's ring.

In the next moment, I'm no longer in China Land Kansas.

This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

///___///

A swirling canvas of colours greets me, shifting between twilight and dawn, with stars that twinkle like diamonds making grand patterns. I'm on my back and the ground is soft, the feeling of grass touching the skin of my hand informs me of what it is. I take a moment of 'What the fuck, where the fuck?' Before getting up and asking those questions to myself once again.

Rolling hills covered in vibrant, jade flowers, with crystalline streams flowing gently. Gigantic mountains rise in the distance, their peaks shrouded in mist. I'm in a valley of some kind, but definitely not a normal one. My eyes pan around me, settling on a crystal clear pond that I can't see the bottom of, and the open pavilion beside it. Then my eyes meet startled purple ones and my brain shuts down.

"You-you how are you here!?" A familiar voice, one I hear every day. She's sitting on a cushioned mat, legs crossed over each other, one lost in her thick orange and brown robe. Said robe is one she's not wearing fully, as she has worn-out bandages wrapped around her visible foot, arm, and extremely sizable chest. The last of her ensemble is the thick orange scarf wrapped around her neck. Look, I'm trying my absolute best not to think about-

"Hot blonde, nice." Fuck you, Rong mou- wait, that was my mouth! My old mouth! The one with a crippling blonde fetish (That I still have).

"W-what!? You! What did you just say!?" Shan points at me, wide-eyed, and aggressively asks. More surprised than angry by the looks of it.

I mean I'm surprised. What do I do in this situation? I was ready to meet some old granny and I stumbled on a blonde tomboy instead! Wait, that isn't important. I can finally speak like a normal person again! My not being normal in the first place notwithstanding.

"Do you know how fucking annoying it is not being able to say fuck?" Shan just blinks at me in extreme confusion. "Let me get it out of my system real quick. FUCK! Fuck! Fuckity fuck fuck!" I scream at the Heavens. They do not answer. This just in the Heavens are kinda bitchmade. I hear thunder rumble slightly. Okay, I take that one back, apologies.

"Who… who are you? You can't be Xiang Rong."

"Ah, forgot about you, Shanny."

"Shanny!? Have you been calling me Shanny in your head!?"

"It's a long story. How much do you know about curses?" Not like I can tell her the truth. Nor do I care to. What I'd care to do is bend her over a table because hot blon- Horny brain cease, impulsive thoughts bad.

Instead of answering she just gives me a blank look. Then sighs particularly loudly. "Sit down, brat. Let's get whatever this is over with. Let's see if you can beat me in a game while we talk." She waves a hand and another cushioned mat appears in front of her. Dice and a bowl appear next.

Let's see who wins, my rationality or my blonde lust.

///___///

"Let me go over this again. You are indeed Xiang Rong, but you've been cursed from a young age."

"Yep yep."

"This curse manifests itself by making you appear villainous in the eyes of others, as well as limiting your speech to fit said role."

"Exactly."

"Not helped by the fact you're a Demonic Cultivator." She frowns and clicks her tongue. "Nor the fact you're inner self is a childish womanizer."

"I don't remember telling you that second part."

"You didn't have to." Shan deadpans back to me.

Yeah, so it turns out the answer to whether my rationality or blonde lust would win was both. At first, Shan was flustered by the constant flirting as I explained my circumstances as vaguely and in universe terms as possible. Then she grew used to my flirting, even starting to throw some playful banter back my way. She obviously likes this version of me better, but then again, the other version of me was constantly threatening her and calling her stupid.

That's not the case at all.

Long Yu Shan is a genius. Which, I mean that much is obvious right? Yet, in this case, I mean in the more my world standards sense. She'd opened up finally during our talk so now I finally know the girl behind (and in) the ring. Shan is an 8th-tier Alchemist, a field that only has 9 tiers in it, yet that's not even her specialty. I had already known she specialized in mental arts, but now I know some of what she can do.

Celestial Dreamweaver Mirage Art is as grand as one would think. A powerful mental art that allows practitioners to manipulate dreams and illusions. I mean, you'd figure from a name like that. Shan then explained that's how she was able to take over the inside part of the ring seal.

I also somehow found a weakness in one of her techniques. The technique allows the user to set up a sort of emphatic link. So to make sure I wasn't bullshiting her (too much), I convinced her to set it up.

Then I promptly teased the fuck out of her. As I said before however, she's grown used to my flirting. Even if she's clearly still not used to the people being this direct in general. It's helped that I keep winning the dice game we're playing. Tien Gow is very much a luck-based game for mortals. For Cultivators, it'd be rather easy to cheat. Seeing that I'm connected to a one-way empathy bond right now, however, cheating is unthinkable for me. So instead it's carefully timed flirting then relying on bullshit luck powers.

"Shan."

"Silence. It will not work this time."

"You're beautiful, you know?" I hit her with it right as she goes to throw her dice, they instead tumble out of her hand aimlessly. Six and four, Red Head Ten in the Civil suit. Easy enough to beat. Shan proves her own words wrong as she slams her hand into the ground beside her, visibly flustered and frustrated. I should also clarify that it is indeed only the one hand. Her right arm was severed by a conceptual attack. Not even her soul can heal the damage done. Eh, not like I'm any less interested in her.

"So as I was saying. We should make this a regular thing. Have some dates, get to know each other, you know?"

"Throw your dice." She nearly growls. I then have a clever idea come to mind.

"If I lose this throw, you'll agree to make this a regular thing."

"Why do you wish to court me so badly!? I'm stuck in a ring! I don't even have a body. I'm not womanly, I'm horribly disfigured, and I have the manners of a cranky elder man." Shan all but growls out. I shrug in response.

"Hot blonde. And I really couldn't care less about the other stuff. Well, no, that's a lie."

"Ha! I knew it!"

"I think that stuff you said makes you more attractive to me." Her look of 'Gotcha!' Quickly morphs into a blank, listless stare as my words register as the truth in her mind art. "I'd just love a woman that can just kill me. Snap me in half like an incense stick. Honestly, I don't see the appeal of Jade Beauties. Give me a girl that looks like she'd punch me in the face for trying to pamper her but will let me do it anyway."

I then throw my dice as she's utterly stunlocked. And for the first time tonight, I lost.

"You lost," Shan says, still rather listlessly. She clearly knows what I said earlier and what this means.

"Yep, so for our next date I was thinking-"

"Get lost, you scoundrel!"

The next moment I'm back in my bed, smelling the familiar Auction House incense. I bring a hand up and carefully remove my necklace, holding Shan's ring in my hand.

I still feel the empathy bond.

"You don't have the right to refuse." You do. "This one's mercy is the only reason you still live." I've never thought of hurting you. "Now be good and heed my demands." It's nice talking to you, please?

"You're such a tyrant. Fine, bully me as you always do, brat. We can do 'that' again in a few days." She scoffs. Unlike before, there's no heat to it. Then, through the bond, I feel something for the first time from Shan's end.

She thinks I'm crazy.

Oh how right she is.

///___///

Xiang Rong… That name again.

Feilong sighs, sinking back into his deep-seated chair after reading the report. The name has become quite well known as of late, the Young Master of the Xiang branch family was making waves. Mostly negative ones. A trait he seems to share with another Xiang.

To think she would hide the boy from him…

He needs a drink. "Fetch me a bottle of wine."

"At once, your majesty." His loyal attendant says with a bow. Then immediately leaves. Yet Feilong is not truly alone, he never can afford to be. Thoughts of the people around him go back to his long war with the country Xueyu. A war that had ended abruptly, and very unexpectedly around twenty years ago.

That woman showing up on the battlefield meant the war was over. There's no possible way to fight a person, that'd be asking for a dog's death. What Feilong didn't account for was her taking an interest in himself. They weren't that close as lovers, it's impossible to be that close if her presence still causes him some distress to this day.

The blood of dragons feared the one who could control blood after all.

Yet, a memory of that time comes to him bidden by recent events.

"Fei, what would you name a new son?"

"I am long done having children. Especially after one of those children dragged me into this war in the first place." He had chuckled. The woman chuckled with him.

"Humor me."

"Very well. I'd name him Rong. I would hope he'd be the one that brings my family glory, makes us prosper, and carries my blood with the honor it deserves." He had answered, truthful as could be.

"....Rong. I like it."

He finishes his reminiscing as his attendant returns with the bottle, swiftly pouring a drink into his jade glass. Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me.

And as the Dragon Emperor of Huanglong, Feilong Is no Fool.