Chapter 26: Fifth Senior Brother
After not seeing him for several days, Jin Lulu had grown even clingier with Yu Qingtang. She hugged his arm and refused to let go, then pouted and answered, “But I haven’t joined Heavenly Fire Cult either. Don’t you still let me call you Senior Sister?”
“That’s different.” Tu Jiaojiao looked certain of victory. “You were born with metal-fire spiritual roots. You’re a good seedling for our Heavenly Fire Cult. Besides, your mother was also an outer disciple of our Heavenly Fire Cult. With a destiny passed down through the same lineage like this, what’s wrong with calling me Senior Sister a few times in advance?”
Jin Lulu stuck out her lower lip. “But my fire spiritual root is only a tiny bit—”
“Nonsense.” Tu Jiaojiao sat down next to her. “Your metal-fire spiritual roots make you exceptionally talented. How is that only a tiny bit?”
The two of them squeezed over together. Three people insisted on sitting on the same long bench, and Yu Qingtang carefully shifted to the very edge.
Ye Chenyan raised a brow, pulled him over to sit on his side, and even blocked Jin Lulu. He asked her, “You have metal-fire spiritual roots? Then you really are very suited to Heavenly Fire Cult.”
“Besides their secret fire-attribute cultivation methods, Heavenly Fire Cult is also skilled in artifact refining. If you go there, you can learn a trade.”
Tu Jiaojiao’s expression gained a hint of a smile, and even Ye Chenyan looked much more pleasing to her eye. “Exactly! Guiyi Sect’s Ye Chenyan, right? I see your name contains fire, and you’re not bad as a person. You seem like someone who understands the situation.”
She nodded in satisfaction, then reached out and pinched Jin Lulu’s cheek. “See? Even he says so.”
Jin Lulu flopped onto the table, wanting to cry but having no tears, and looked pitifully at Yu Qingtang. “But I don’t want to learn blacksmithing...”
Yu Qingtang choked slightly. “Artifact refining and blacksmithing aren’t really the same thing, right?”
He gave Tu Jiaojiao a look, signaling for her to help explain and give Jin Lulu a beautiful vision of the future.
Who would have thought Tu Jiaojiao’s gaze would dodge, her smile would stiffen, and she would clear her throat before explaining, “If you only pursue pretty moves, then how will it work if you can’t beat anyone afterward?”
“Even if artifact refining requires some strength, has requirements for body arts, and also requires learning hammer techniques, think about it. In the future, whatever magical artifact you want, you won’t have to beg anyone. Instead, plenty of people will come begging you. Isn’t that wonderful?”
“I have a single fire spiritual root, so I have no way to learn it. Otherwise, I’d want to...”
Before she finished speaking, Jin Lulu held her head and wailed, “I knew it! I don’t want to learn body arts! I don’t want to learn blacksmithing—”
Yu Qingtang: “...”
The rest of Tu Jiaojiao’s persuasion stuck in her throat. She glared furiously at Yu Qingtang. “You did that on purpose!”
Yu Qingtang waved his hands in shock. “I didn’t, I really didn’t!”
I didn’t know your Heavenly Fire Cult’s artifact refining really involved blacksmithing either!
Yu Qingtang hid a little behind Ye Chenyan and poked his head out, refuting in a small voice, “Besides, not everyone wants to become some important figure. If she truly doesn’t want to learn it, you can’t force her, can you?”
Seeing Tu Jiaojiao’s brows rise and eyes sharpen, Yu Qingtang immediately changed direction. “However! She’s still young right now, and it’s also hard for her to take responsibility for her own future. Why not let her try everything?”
“Actually, practicing the qin is very hard too! Maybe after playing for two days, she won’t want to learn that either!”
Tu Jiaojiao narrowed her eyes in thought, feeling there was some reason to it. “You really are smooth from every side, aren’t you? Not a drop leaks through.”
Yu Qingtang gave two foolish laughs and tried to muddle through.
Tu Jiaojiao raised her hand and pulled Jin Lulu to her feet. “Fine. You want to learn the qin? Then I’ll first take you to buy one and let you try.”
Jin Lulu looked at Yu Qingtang eagerly. “Then Senior Sister Qingtang has to teach—hey!”
Tu Jiaojiao hoisted her up around the waist and snorted. “Our Heavenly Fire Cult also has people who know how to play the qin! We don’t need him to teach you!”
She walked outside in a huff, still trying to convince Jin Lulu. “Why are you always thinking about him? Look, our names sound like senior and junior sisters. He’s not called Yu Qingqing or Yu Tangtang!”
Before leaving, she did not forget to toss out a pouch of spirit stones. “Open a room for me. I’ll stay here when I return.”
The attendant hurriedly agreed.
Yu Qingtang: “...”
Only after seeing the two of them leave Ascension Tower did Yu Qingtang let out a breath and wipe the cold sweat from his forehead. “That scared me to death.”
Now that he was safe, he picked up another bun again and could not help praising, “But this Miss Tu truly deserves to be the holy maiden of Heavenly Fire Cult. She really is beautiful beyond compare.”
Ye Chenyan propped his chin in his hand and looked at him.
Yu Qingtang blinked. “What?”
“Jin Lulu. Tu Jiaojiao.” Ye Chenyan raised a brow thoughtfully. “Miss Yu’s journey has truly been... full of wild bees and restless butterflies.”
“What!” Yu Qingtang’s eyes widened in shock.
The corner of Ye Chenyan’s mouth lifted in a smile. “Earlier, you said Miss Lulu was innocent and lively, and the booklet she wrote for you was gentle, considerate, and quite interesting.”
“Now you’re praising Miss Tu as beautiful...”
“Stop!” The more Yu Qingtang listened, the more wrong it sounded. “Why are you making me sound like some scum who falls for every person he meets...”
Ye Chenyan raised his brows and nodded.
Yu Qingtang expressed shock.
You’re a harem-opening Long Aotian, and you’re questioning me, a Pure Love War God! Is there any justice left?
With a complicated expression, Yu Qingtang reminded him again, “I’m a woman right now.”
Ye Chenyan raised a brow. “Right now?”
“Ahem.” Yu Qingtang swiftly changed his words. “Right now, in the past, in the future, all... all...”
A smile flashed through Ye Chenyan’s eyes, and he took the initiative to skip over the topic. “Even if you’re both women, you still shouldn’t abandon one friend for another when making friends.”
Yu Qingtang’s expression grew complicated. “Can ‘making friends’ and ‘abandoning one for another’ be used together?”
At that moment, the Nanzhou female cultivator stood and passed behind Ye Chenyan. Yu Qingtang instinctively looked over, and Ye Chenyan immediately blocked his view, pointing at him as if the evidence was irrefutable. “See!”
Yu Qingtang choked and could not defend himself no matter how many mouths he had.
“Hmph.” Ye Chenyan stood. “I’m full. Let’s go. We’ll stay at another inn.”
“Huh?” Yu Qingtang was shocked. “Why?”
Tu Jiaojiao was coming back to stay later. The red rose versus white rose rivalry was concentrated in these few days.
“To avoid trouble,” Ye Chenyan said with perfect confidence. “Didn’t you hear that ‘beautiful beyond compare’ holy maiden of Heavenly Fire Cult is coming back to stay here?”
Yu Qingtang choked slightly and tried to reason with him. “But we don’t really have much of a feud. Maybe by then we can turn enemies into friends...”
Ye Chenyan turned back with a bright smile. “You want to be friends with her?”
Yu Qingtang obediently nodded.
Ye Chenyan’s smile deepened. “I don’t.”
He lifted his chin toward the entrance. “Let’s go.”
Yu Qingtang: “...”
He looked wordlessly at Ye Chenyan, then turned around. “Fine. Don’t regret it. This is your own choice.”
You’re the one who doesn’t want your wife. You can’t blame me for this.
Ye Chenyan laughed. “Don’t worry. Even if we don’t stay here, we can still come eat buns in the morning.”
Yu Qingtang clicked his tongue. “Was I talking about buns?”
“That’s true.” Ye Chenyan laid it out with perfect logic. “Ascension Tower’s buns are exceptional, but for noodle soup, one has to go to Fortune Inn in the west of the city. For proper meals, there are also Auspicious Pavilion, Hundred Flavors Residence...”
Yu Qingtang was unconsciously led along by the nose and felt that it was not impossible to try them all before the Golden Core Competition.
He suddenly suggested, “Oh, right. That place where the innkeeper is handsome but the food is terrible...”
Ye Chenyan was decisive. “We’re not going.”
...
The two changed to another inn. Although it was not as luxurious as Ascension Tower, it had everything it needed, and its stir-fries in particular were truly exceptional.
It was just that the innkeeper said they used demonic beast meat, so an ordinary Golden Core cultivator could only eat two bowls. Any more would be impossible to digest. Yu Qingtang considered himself an utterly ordinary Golden Core cultivator, so he could only eat two large bowls with tears in his eyes and did not dare ask for a third.
However, Ye Chenyan was presumably no ordinary Golden Core. Being Long Aotian was somewhat physical labor, after all. Yu Qingtang thoughtfully served him two extra bowls—though for some reason, the innkeeper looked at the two of them strangely.
Maybe he had never seen Golden Core cultivators who could eat this much.
After the meal, Yu Qingtang lay on the bed and rubbed his stomach to help digest.
After not following the red rose versus white rose route, the next few days before the Golden Core Competition had opened up for him, and there was nothing urgent he needed to do.
He thought for a moment, dug a transmission stone out of his storage ring, painfully stuffed a spirit stone into it, and spoke into it. “Master? Senior Sister? Senior Brother?”
“Tang—” Eldest Senior Sister’s voice came from the other side. “You finally sent a message. Senior Sister was afraid you’d already been eaten by someone!”
“What are you talking about? He’s not a vegetable.” Third Senior Brother laughed and asked him, “There’s no one around you, right?”
“Mm-hm.” Yu Qingtang rolled over. “There were people around the whole way before. Sometimes we were with an escort team, and sometimes we were in someone else’s sect. I was afraid of too many eyes and ears, so I didn’t dare send any messages.”
Besides, he had also agreed with Eldest Senior Sister that in the future, he would be the one to initiate contact, in case the timing was inconvenient.
“It’s good to be cautious,” Master praised. “But your Fifth Senior Brother went to look for you. He should have arrived in Qingzhou several days ago. Have you seen him?”
“Fifth Senior Brother?” Yu Qingtang froze. “Isn’t Fifth Senior Brother already full Nascent Soul? He can’t enter the Golden Core Competition.”
And he was too old.
“Tsk, silly boy. He went to back you up,” Third Senior Brother said, furious at iron for not becoming steel. “If you’re participating in the Golden Core Competition, you need at least one fellow disciple there, don’t you?”
“Your Master said he talked too much back in the day and had too many friends and too many enemies. If he went to that kind of place, he might stir up old grudges, so it wasn’t convenient for him to leave the mountain. It just so happened that your Fifth Senior Brother was traveling outside and was close to Qingzhou, so we let him take care of you.”
Eldest Senior Sister chimed in, “We were also worried that after the Golden Core Competition, if that brat refuses to let you go, your Fifth Senior Brother can at least serve as a deterrent.”
Yu Qingtang was deeply moved. “Senior Sister, Senior Brother, Master—”
“Stop howling for now,” Sixteenth Senior Sister said coolly. “Lodging in Qingzhou is practically robbery. Your Fifth Senior Brother may already have been detained somewhere by now, so poor he doesn’t even have spirit stones to transmit a message. Go find him quickly.”
Yu Qingtang rolled out of bed. “Huh? Then where should I look?”
Sixteenth Senior Sister was decisive. “Go to the cheapest inn.”
“I’m going right now!” Yu Qingtang hurriedly stuffed the transmission stone, which was still shouting “Be careful!” and “Come back alive!” into his storage ring, then rushed out in a panic.
He had only just charged downstairs when he hurriedly ran back up and knocked on Ye Chenyan’s door.
—The cultivators at this Golden Core Competition were all like wild Pokémon trainers. The moment your eyes met, you had to battle. If he did not bring Long Aotian along, it truly was not safe enough.
“This is urgent!” Yu Qingtang pressed his palms together. “Please, come with me to save someone!”
...
A moment later, the two appeared in front of the cheapest inn within a ten-mile radius.
After hearing Yu Qingtang’s description, the attendant lazily yawned. “Never seen him. Ah, maybe I have, but I don’t remember. So many people come and go.”
“In any case, none of our guests are someone like that.”
Ye Chenyan frowned. “Think again.”
As the attendant was giving a perfunctory reply, Yu Qingtang stuck his head out and looked at the price board—a lower-grade room, two hundred spirit stones a night, meals not included.
“Hiss—” Yu Qingtang sucked in a breath. “At this price, my Fifth Senior Brother probably can’t afford to stay here either.”
The attendant looked amazed. “He can’t even afford this? Then he can only go to a bridge arch.”
Displeasure appeared on Ye Chenyan’s face. “You—”
Yu Qingtang tugged him back and asked sincerely, “Then do you know which bridge arches are friendlier to newcomers?”
Ye Chenyan: “...You’re serious?”
Yu Qingtang nodded. “I’m serious.”
Then they really did find Fifth Senior Brother beneath a newcomer-friendly bridge arch nearby, his pant legs rolled up, wearing coarse cloth clothes stained with quite a bit of mud.
He was holding a big white steamed bun in his mouth and looked extremely pleasantly surprised. “Little Junior... Sister!”
“Fifth Senior Brother!” Yu Qingtang let out a breath of relief and asked him, “How did you end up like this? You look like you just finished planting rice.”
“Oh, I asked the brothers under this bridge where I could find work.” Fifth Senior Brother had an honest appearance, and when he smiled, he looked even more simple and sincere. “They said mortals are busy with the farming season right now. They provide meals, and I can earn a few spirit stones too.”
Yu Qingtang: “...”
So you really did just come back from planting rice!
Ye Chenyan was greatly shaken. He opened his mouth. “...Is Biehe Sect truly poor to this extent?”
Yu Qingtang patted his shoulder. “Let me put it this way. My Master has one ceremonial robe he wears to keep up appearances on important occasions.”
“Whenever he wears it, he absolutely won’t stand up after sitting down in meditation, because there’s a hole torn in the backside.”
Ye Chenyan: “...”
Author’s Note:
Ye Chenyan: ...I thought he was pretending to be pitiful. It turns out he really is pitiful.
Yu Qingtang: ?