The ground below us rippled and sent chunks of dirt flying into the air. I was pressed up against a now shaking tree beside Yue, my hands pressing her down.

Leaves and twigs pelted toward the ground and smacked against the back of my head. The faint sound of shouts and roars could be heard in the background before the ground finally came to a still.

Yue peeked around the tree and quickly surveyed the surroundings before she jumped up, grabbing my arm.

“Get up! The hell are you lying down for?” She exclaimed before pulling me upward and sending me stumbling forward.

Peijin: Yue and I are here. Where’s everyone else? We’re in a forest but there’s a lot of rumbling so we’re going to leave it first.

I waited for a moment, but no response came. I sighed loudly and rolled my eyes in annoyance.

“Can they seriously not answer?”

“Maybe they’re dead,” Yue replied, shrugging. I promptly smacked the back of her head, and she let out a small yelp.

"Don't say stuff like that. You'll make my karma worse."

She moved to strike me with the blunt end of her spear, but another deafening cry sounded from beyond the trees, the ground shaking once more.

“We need to get out of here,” I declared.

Yue raised a brow at me. “Why wouldn’t we check it out?”

“You’re seriously stupid.”

Her nostrils flared. “Since when were you against doing stupid shit? Besides, we're strong enough at this point.”

I ignored her words and turned my back before surveying the area before me. It was obvious I was some kind of female cultivator by my long blue robes, elaborate belts, and expansive sleeves.

My hair was even longer and styled properly, with a bun and hairpins at the top. I couldn't see myself, but the weight of my hair was now substantially more noticeable than my typical shoulder-length hair.

Yue looked the same. No amount of spiritual energy could fix her, I guess.

I dug Zhige into the bark of a towering tree before I swung myself up, examining the area. Immediately, my eyes lit up with awe.

Observer Socrates: Woah.

Many observers are amazed at the sight before them.

We were on a cliff’s edge and surrounded by a wispy gray fog that seemed to move around the landscape with a mind of its own. The sun formed rainbows on the droplets of water and reflected beautifully off the colorful temples.

Red, teals, and dark blues were sprinkled all over a massive temple hanging by the cliff. It was enormous—a massive gold bell hung in the middle of it, and it shook unsteadily with each seismic wave that passed through the ground sporadically.

Observer Socrates: I’m sure you’re glad you put more effort into describing the scenery than fixing your plot holes.

And Socrates still read every single chapter and now stalked me. I must have done something right.

I felt Yue appear beside me before she let out a small gasp, the wind blowing her long black hair behind her. Her hand gripped onto the trunk of the tree, and she unsteadily wobbled on the branch, trying to dig her nails in.

“Is that a temple?”

I smirked and looked at her. “Still wanna figure out what those explosions were, or do you wanna head to the temple?”

“Shut up.”

I jumped down to the ground, my robes whipping behind me before landing softly. I couldn’t help but look down and admire the way my outfit looked. The blue robes must have been an adaptation of the blue hoodie that better fit the environment.

Thanks to my contract with Chang, the influx of messages in the channel had brought me thousands of stars—even though the last room lowered my earnings due to the lack of the system and messages, I still earned a lot for the angry messages and complaints Chang received.

“Yue, do you have enough stars to level up?” I leapt over to the side of the cliff before I jumped down and hung off the edge, peering at the temple across the massive ravine.

She snorted, puffing out her chest and running her hands through her long black here. “Of course I do.”

I looked down at my own blue screen before me.

203,495 stars.

“Whatever you say.”

54,000 stars used.

Agility level 25 → level 35

I gripped onto the ledge before I pushed my feet off, launching myself across the ravine before I landed on the opposite cliff. I skid down like a snowboarder before latching onto the tiled roof of the temple.

Yue was a barely visible speck at the other side of the cliff, and my hand gave a mocking wave as I cupped my hands in front of my face.

“Are you coming?” I shouted, enunciating every single world to make sure she would be able to hear it.

I could see her small figure freeze for a moment before she swiped through various screens, clearly contemplating the situation before her. Now that we were further into the arcs, both the gods and disciples had more access to spiritual energy—Yue could pull off the jump even if she didn’t have enough stars by borrowing some spiritual energy from her sponsor.

She seemed to argue with an invisible figure for a moment, her arms waving frantically around her.

Hindsight activated!

Above her body loomed the figure of a demonic bull who seemed just as frustrated and stubborn as Yue. His holy and invisible figure let out a puff of smoke before he seemed to relent, tapping her hand.

I let out a small chuckle, turning toward Zhige as I sat down on the roof of the temple, kicking my feet back and forth.

“Isn’t this amusing?”

Zhige’s eye glared at me before the blade shrunk, and I was quickly reminded of our earlier feud.

I glared back, and the blade shrunk even more. “Can you talk or will Karma zap the hell out of you again? You need to explain why you defended the Major Arcana.”

This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author's work.

The red eye rolled, clearly picking up on the pun in my words.

“Sorry, I forgot you were demonic. No wonder you’re insufferable, too. You and Yue would be good friends.”

I was very glad Zhige only had an eye and not a mouth.

“Oh, but Karma did say you really like me,” I joked, smiling at the eye. “Most people do, so I’m not surprised.”

I looked back up toward the cliff edge to see Yue had backed up and was bracing herself to sprint forward. With Hindsight on, there was a faint aura of spiritual energy around her, but it wouldn’t be enough to boost her all the way to the edge.

Clearly, the Bull Demon King was a bit cheap, even when it came to his star disciple. He was probably better than Sun Wukong, though.

Yue sprinted forward and made the leap, her arms flailing in the air, and she flew with surprising speed across the ravine—before all the spiritual energy was used up. She plummeted into the gray fog, her arms flailing.

“Zhige, go get her,” I ordered, and the sword flew into the fog before it lifted her up. The nature of this arc granted much more spiritual power, especially considering that Yue and I were now technically cultivators.

I left Hindsight on, apprehensive about whatever beast or ghost could appear. Suddenly, I noticed a thin white string attached to my finger.

I looked up, trying to use Hindsight to see what god was above me, but there was nothing but a dark blue vacancy. The string seemed to stretch infinitely into the dark pit. I bent my finger and watched as the string drew taut.

Was something connected to me?

Or… was something controlling me?

A hand clamped on my shoulder, and I jumped before realizing it was just Yue. Her hair was disheveled and she was panting.

“You suck.”

“I thought you had enough stars?”

“Fuck off.”

Zhige flew back in my hand; swinging the blade around, I moved to slice through the string. It had a surprising amount of resistance, requiring me to push with a significant amount of my strength to snap it.

Yue stared at me as if I were stupid, her jaw slightly opened. I matched her expression before I jumped onto the ground, trying to shake the feeling of unease that caused the hairs on my neck to stand.

I looked through the temple doors. It looked as if it was a rather well maintained temple, not even a layer of dust covering the outdoor pillars despite its inconvenient location. Yue followed suit behind me, spinning her spear around.

“Yue, remember those prayer candles I bought a while ago?"

She blinked in confusion before replying, "What?"

"We used them during the sponsorship to talk to the gods."

“Obviously I remember that."

“Could you buy some? They're a bit expensive.”

“...”

I looked at her expectantly with large eyes. “You didn’t spend any stars just now, but I spent a lot to get across the ravine.”

“No one asked you to.”

“Please?” I drew out the ending of the word, trying to guilt her into it. She let out a loud sigh, and I gave her a beaming smile.

The candles appeared in her hand, and she quickly handed me a dozen of them. I knocked on the large temple doors and wiped my feet on the ground before entering, admittedly a bit apprehensively.

Before me, a beautiful and massive room covered with red and golden ornaments greeted me. In the middle was a luxurious golden statue of a beautiful woman sitting. Her eyes were closed and formed gentle crescents, and her metal hair was tied up to form elaborate buns.

Stunning red robes were wrapped around her delicate figure, and as the natural light poured in, it reflected off of her sloping features.

“I feel like I lived here in a past life,” I whispered softly, walking around in amazement and twisting in circles, my feet almost tripping over each other.

“Yeah, maybe as a servant," Yue snarkily replied.

“...”

It looked as if this was a rather deserted shrine, but it was still well taken care of even if we were the only people in it. The faint sound of roaring and explosions was drowned out by the stillness of the temple.

“Peijin, I’m confused.”

“Of course you are.”

“Is this our Earth two thousand years ago?”

It was a valid question—it wasn’t like cultivation, beasts, and demons were a part of our history textbooks before the system took over.

“I’m assuming the heavenly, demonic, and ghost realms existed prior to when the system was activated for us,” I said, turning around and looking at Yue. “But Chang mentioned broadcasting for other planets before Earth.”

“So the heavenly realm is the same but this is a different mortal realm?”

I nodded.

She gave me a quizzical expression but didn’t press further. She looked up at the shrine, her fingers brushing against the golden statue, and she set up some of the candles as I read the plaque below it.

“Daji…” I muttered before freezing. “Oh.”

“What?”

I quickly kicked down all of the candles she had lined up as she let out a surprised shout.

She moved to line them back up, but I tightly grasped her wrist, shooting her a serious expression. “This is a shrine for the cult of Daji.”

“Can you not speak nerd?”

I let out an annoyed sigh, smacking my forehead. “Daji is a demonic incarnation of the nine-tailed fox," I whispered, looking up at the statue. “We need to get out of here. We can't stay."

Yue pulled her arm back and stared down at me. “So what? Just don't worship her then. We can still look around.”

I chewed on my lower lip before scoffing. “You don't understand! Daji is one of the most wicked Chinese demons!”

Raising a brow, Yue put a hand on her hip and gesturing toward herself. “Yeah, we already have a few demons involved in our party.”

“She’s persecuting Wei!" I exclaimed, finally revealing the truth, "In his past, Daji banishes Wei from the heavenly realm!”

Many observers are completely stunned.

Many observers are asking if that means Wei is a divinity.

“That’s right,” I firmly declared, “Wei is the martial god of protection and luck.”

Observer ‘Socrates’: Not for long.

Yue gawked and held onto the side of her head. “Wei is a divinity?!” Her voice was shrill and completely taken aback. “That’s why he always wore those stupid robes with that stupid hairdo?”

“Yup.”

“And that’s why you always favored him?”

I immediately brought up a finger and pointed it at her accusingly. “What the hell are you talking about? I don’t have any favorites!”

Suddenly, the entire temple shook as pebbles fell from the ceiling before the entire shrine erupted with a massive explosion, causing Yue and me to fly off the cliff.

“Gah!” I shouted, my back smacking into the harsh rocks before I suddenly started plummeting down the ravine.

My eyes widened as I finally pieced together the sight before me. A giant blue dragon swirled in circles above me, its tail flapping and creating massive booms as it snapped back and forth. Its familiar red eyes peered at me, and although it was in a slightly different form, I immediately recognized it as the sea serpent.

Atop its head, a small blond girl gripped onto it and led it forward, and her hair whipped around her face frantically. Flowers were tucked in her hair, and she wore simple pink robes.

Just beside her, a man in a golden mask and a streaming, light-brown ponytail wielded a staff before him, blocking a flurry of attacks shooting toward his opponents. His piercing gaze looked through the mask that melded perfectly to his sharp nose as he leapt up at the air and darted forward, engaging in a furious battle.

“Yang?!” I exclaimed in shock at his glorious appearance.

“Peijin!” Yue screamed, reaching down to catch me as I remembered that I was falling.

Suddenly, a figure grabbed onto me, bringing me into his arms with surprising strength and gentleness. I opened my eyes and met his familiar, puppy-like ones.

His long black hair flowed behind him, and his cheeks were flushed and plump. His muscular figure was felt through those annoying white robes, and he gave me a cheeky grin as his eyes glimmered.

“Are you alright?”