Chapter 23 : You’re Way Too Effeminate!
Chapter 23: You’re Way Too Effeminate!
On True Person Mingzhu’s side, the four female cultivators were even more curious.
What exactly had junior brother seen that made him deflate so completely when he had been so aggressive just moments ago?
“Third Senior Sister,” Zhu Huaisu gently nudged Chen Qianyun beside her with her elbow, “do you think Little Yuchen is really that effeminate?”
Having stayed on Moon-Washing Peak for so long—a place where yin outweighed yang—they had grown rather vague about what actually counted as “masculinity.”
“I don’t think so?” Chen Qianyun tilted her head and thought for a moment, her tone uncertain.
“Junior Brother just seems like a pretty normal boy, right?”
Although Chen Qianyun said so, she did not sound very confident either.
Eldest Senior Sister Su Muzhi, on the other hand, wore an entirely indifferent expression.
Setting aside the fact that she did not believe junior brother was effeminate at all—even if he truly did have a bit of that tendency, in her eyes it was far preferable to becoming a rude, reckless wild brat with no manners whatsoever.
At that moment, that annoying voice with the surname Long came over again.
“See now? You’ve already been changed without even realizing it.”
“Senior Brother Long! But I really feel that… there’s nothing wrong with me in daily life!” Nan Yuchen’s voice carried the last traces of struggle and grievance.
“Of course I know there’s nothing wrong with you. If you weren’t manly enough, how could you have saved me back at Windless Cliff? If it weren’t for you, the moment I pulled out that Nine-Leaf Ganoderma, I would have been eaten by that Wolf King.”
“Ah!”
Inside the quiet chamber, the three female disciples almost cried out at the same time, suddenly enlightened.
So that was it! No wonder when junior brother brought back that precious Nine-Leaf Ganoderma, he had only vaguely said he found it at Windless Cliff.
That brat! He had actually fought that Wolf King and kept it hidden from them!
Still, all of them felt rather reassured.
Being righteous enough to save a fellow disciple was, after all, a good thing.
Yet while reassured, the youngest, Zhu Huaisu, was also thinking about something else.
That Nine-Leaf Ganoderma had been used directly by their master and junior brother to help her break through a bottleneck.
If it had been found by this outer sect disciple surnamed Long, then counting that plus the earlier chance encounter at the marketplace when buying the statue, she and he had already crossed paths three times in just a few short days!
According to certain theories of fate, this was practically… a sign of entangled karmic ties! But she, Zhu Huaisu, was a personally transmitted disciple of True Person Mingzhu, with limitless prospects and a future that aimed at forming a core.
She had no desire whatsoever to have any “fate” with an outer sect waste who was nearly twenty years old and still stuck at the Qi-Refining Fifth Layer.
Thinking this, she made up her mind to stay far away from that Long fellow in the future.
At this moment, voices came once more from the listening insect.
“This actually isn’t your fault. You should know that you’ve been living on Moon-Washing Peak all along. Men are rarer here than heavenly treasures. You’ve stayed here for two years, soaking it in day after day. Through constant exposure and subtle influence, those little gestures and habits in your daily life have already… I won’t say ‘effeminate,’ since that sounds harsh, but you really have taken on some girlish traces.”
“Can it really turn out like that?” Nan Yuchen’s voice was filled with self-doubt, the confidence he had earlier completely gone.
“I… I thought I’d always been pretty careful…”
“But the attitudes of the male disciples don’t lie, do they? Junior Brother Nan, you also come from the lower strata of the mortal world. You should know that among boys, an effeminate one gets isolated, right?”
“Yes…” Nan Yuchen’s voice fell, carrying a trace of resigned dejection.
“This is actually an instinct most men have. Take Senior Brother Chu Yuanbai, for example. A gentleman like him would never dislike you out of jealousy or rumors. It’s just that your daily feminine aura and movements make him, as a normal man, subconsciously want to keep some distance from you.”
This explanation was, of course, complete nonsense fabricated by Long Tao.
Although Chu Yuanbai seemed decent to him, the two of them had no real interactions in daily life.
Who knew what kind of person he truly was? But now… as long as it could strike at Nan Yuchen’s mindset, any reason would do.
“And there’s another rather strange point you haven’t noticed, is there?”
“Huh? There’s more? Don’t scare me anymore.”
“I’m not scaring you. Look at yourself… You’ve clearly already succeeded in Foundation Establishment. By all logic, once the hundred days of Foundation Establishment were completed, desire-fire would temper the body, essence would nourish the sinews and bones, and your physique should have undergone an explosive growth spurt. No matter what, you should be half a head taller than me by now. But your height…” He paused at just the right moment.
“This…” Nan Yuchen was clearly struck at a sore spot.
“I asked Eldest Senior Sister back then too. She said it was because my cultivation progressed too fast and my foundation was unstable, which affected my growth…”
“Sigh… I suspect she was just comforting you. It’s not like there haven’t been geniuses in the sect who reached Foundation Establishment in two or three years. Not to mention long ago—just five years back, wasn’t there Senior Brother Qin Hongyuan? When he broke through, he grew several inches almost immediately.”
“Then… Senior Brother Long, what do you think?”
“Your problem probably lies in the word ‘harmonization.’” Long Tao threw out a conclusion he had just made up on the spot.
“Although you live on Moon-Washing Peak, the main techniques you cultivate lean toward the yang, fierce martial path, right?”
“Yes. I’ve been interested in martial skills since I was young, so I chose to enter the Dao through martial cultivation.”
“That’s likely where the crux lies!” When Long Tao said this, even he felt a little unsure inside.
“Your techniques are yang-oriented. But you’ve spent the past two years living on Moon-Washing Peak, which is a yin-dominant place. You’re immersed daily in the yin softness of your senior sisters. Your spirit and your physical qi and blood are completely out of sync, causing your Foundation Establishment to fall short of full success and leaving behind defects in development.”
The moment these words fell, Eldest Senior Sister Su Muzhi, who had been eavesdropping on the other side, could not help standing up, ready to charge out.
“Senior Sister! What’s wrong?” Zhu Huaisu and Chen Qianyun were startled.
“That bastard is talking complete nonsense! Utter rubbish! Little Yuchen’s slow development after Foundation Establishment was… was because I was worried his progress was too fast and his foundation unstable, so I deliberately used the Moon-Rong Pill to help him comb his qi meridians and suppress excessive growth momentum! It has nothing whatsoever to do with effeminacy or yin softness!”
Of course, there was another reason she did not say.
Junior brother had only arrived two years ago.
She did not want such an adorable little fellow to grow up all at once; she hoped he could accompany her in that childlike, lovable form for a few more years.
But that was something she would rather die than say out loud.
At this moment, True Person Mingzhu’s voice also sounded at just the right time.
“Although what this disciple surnamed Long said is somewhat biased, it cannot be considered entirely wrong.” She paused, as if weighing her words.
“Given Yuchen’s current condition, if it is still not improved by the middle to late stages of Foundation Establishment, that yang energy within him—disrupted by yin energy and unable to fully unfold—may indeed affect his main cultivation technique and Dao path. At that time, it would take no small amount of effort to harmonize it, and it might even influence the quality of his future core.”
This made the three disciples look toward the curtain in surprise.
They had never heard their master mention such a thing before.
“Of course you wouldn’t have this problem. All of you cultivate my Moon-Candle Heart Sutra, which is inherently a yin technique. But Yuchen is the first male disciple I’ve taken. I hadn’t paid attention to this detail before. I didn’t expect an outer sect disciple to point it out.”
Since even their master had spoken, Su Muzhi could only fall into unwilling silence.
But in her heart, she had completely made up her mind: in the future, she absolutely could not let junior brother have dealings with this person—at the very least, she could not let him enter Moon-Washing Peak.
“Then… Senior Brother Long, do you have any solution?” Nan Yuchen asked.
Even he felt that he was grasping at straws.
How could someone at the Qi-Refining Fifth Layer have a solution to a Foundation Establishment problem?
“Mm… I really do have one. It’s just that this method is a bit unorthodox and not very presentable.”
“Say it first. We’ll talk about whether it works afterward.”
“Simply put… do bad things.”
“Senior Brother Long, this really isn’t the time for jokes.”
Seeing Nan Yuchen’s expression, Long Tao’s heart plunged into extreme conflict and tension.
To that foolish kid, this sounded like a joke—but to him, every word from here on would determine his life or death.
Whether the System task could be completed had reached its most critical step! Life or death, success or failure, would all hinge on this single shudder.
“Sit down and listen to me finish first.” Long Tao’s tone carried a trace of severity.
On the surface, it was to steady Nan Yuchen, but in truth, it was to bolster his own courage.
“The bad things I’m talking about aren’t murder or arson. I mean the kinds of things you feel you shouldn’t do, things elders would scold you for, things that even make you feel a bit ashamed!”
“W-why… why would that help?”
“It’s very simple. At the root, your problem lies in your temperament. Staying with women for a long time has caused feminization from the inside out… that is, becoming more feminine. This isn’t strange. Even in the mortal world, there are plenty of only sons who grow up living with many sisters and end up like this.”
At this point, Long Tao was nervous to death, while frantically thinking about how to continue guiding the topic forward.
As a result, he began unconsciously blurting out some nonsense mixed with terms from his previous life.
Still, he could only grit his teeth and keep fabricating.
“What you need to do now is awaken that dormant male essence buried deep in your bones! Use the most primitive and direct method to shatter moral shackles! Go do something outrageous—something that makes your blood surge, that lets you rediscover the feeling of being a man! In other words, awaken the ‘male’ within your heart!”