Amidst the towering mountains, a sea of clouds drifted, and the faint cry of cranes echoed through this fairyland.
An immortal boat sliced through the clouds, sailing between heaven and earth, while the distant sound of a bell rang out, tolling nine times in total.
“Wow!” On the immortal boat, a group of little kids stood by the railing, exclaiming in awe at the sight of this wonderland.
“The immortal’s boat is even grander than my imperial grandpa’s dragon boat!” A little girl dressed in the fanciest clothes jumped up and down, trying to get a better look at the scenery outside, but she was too short—even the railing was taller than her.
“Get down on the ground, I want to step on you!” The little girl, full of herself, pointed at a plainly dressed little boy.
“I don’t want to!” The snot-nosed boy was clearly unwilling.
“It’s your honor to let me step on you! You guys, hold him down for me!” The little princess, born of royalty, ordered the lackeys around her.
“When I get back, I’ll tell my imperial grandpa to reward your families well!”
The kids’ crying and shouting outside was especially grating, completely out of place with the rest of the scene.
In stark contrast, inside the boat, a small, thin figure lay on a bed in a cramped room.
The window was open, so the child lying on the bed could see the blue sky outside and the occasional immortal crane flying by—and, of course, hear the shrill cries of the children outside.
“What’s all this noise!” A disciple, barely twenty and dressed in the sect’s pure white robe, came out and scolded the noisy kids harshly.
“You’re all about to set foot on the path of cultivation! Cultivators must first cultivate their hearts.
If you’re all this impatient and restless, what can you possibly achieve?” The young disciple already didn’t like kids, and this group of brats was so noisy and whiny that he couldn’t focus on his own cultivation at all, so his tone was especially bad.
The kids, after being scolded, all started crying even louder, their shrill wails piercing and nerve-wracking.
“Any status or position you had in the mortal world disappears the moment you enter the immortal sect.
If you can’t let go of worldly riches and glory, you might as well go back now and spare our sect’s place of cultivation from being sullied.” The young disciple was blunt and rude.
The little princess, who’d been pampered all her life, had never been treated like this and immediately started bawling louder than anyone else.
The little girl in the room sighed quietly, then buried her face in her pillow, hoping to block out the noise.
But the kids’ cries were so sharp they pierced right through the pillow and into her ears.
Help… My head hurts, and my leg hurts too! Wen Jiayin, hiding under the covers, gently touched her left leg, and the pain almost brought tears to her eyes.
As for how her leg got broken, that went back to a few days ago, when she’d just arrived in this world and become a beggar.
Wen Jiayin wasn’t from this world.
She’d crossed over after dying unexpectedly, and her bad luck seemed to have followed her into this life—she started out as a little beggar who’d frozen to death in the snow.
The original owner of this body had died from the cold, and when Wen Jiayin arrived, she didn’t inherit even a bit of warmth.
She was about to die again when an old beggar saved her, bringing her to a ruined temple where other beggars gathered.
The old beggar used his entire day’s food—half a steamed bun—to trade with the beggar chief for a spot closer to the fire, and that’s how Wen Jiayin survived.
Later, Wen Jiayin received all the original owner’s memories in a dream.
The old beggar was the one who’d raised the original owner, though they weren’t related by blood.
He’d found her as a baby on a snowy day like this, and while no one wanted to take in an abandoned infant in such hard times, this poorest of beggars took on the burden.
The original owner’s parents probably hoped she’d survive, so they left her at the door of a pastry shop.
But that family already had five kids, and even if they pitied the baby, they couldn’t afford to raise her.
When the old beggar took her away, the pastry shop owner’s wife wrapped up two big pieces of rice cake for him, a small act of kindness for the abandoned child.
So the original owner got her first nickname—Rice Cake.
The old beggar’s surname was Wen, and by chance, a scholar gave the original owner a name in passing—Jiayin.
The old beggar was illiterate but thought the name sounded nice, so by coincidence, the original owner ended up with the same name as Wen Jiayin.
At the time, Wen Jiayin hadn’t thought much of this coincidence.
She was busy trying to adapt to her new identity.
Honestly, in her previous life, she’d at least been born into a middle-class family.
Even if her parents were a bit biased, she’d never gone hungry or cold.
Facing the life of a beggar in the dead of winter, even though Wen Jiayin wasn’t a spoiled person, it was hard to adjust.
While getting used to her new life, she was also planning for her and the old beggar’s future—they had to survive this winter with barely enough food and clothing…
The old beggar was also worried about her leg.
Her leg had been broken when the original owner was still around, and if it wasn’t treated in time, never mind whether she’d be lame—if it got infected, Wen Jiayin wouldn’t survive the winter.
The old beggar left early and came back late every day.
Wen Jiayin didn’t know what he was up to, but one day, he came back excited and told her that a kind person at Anyao Hall was willing to give them medicine, and he’d go get it the next day.
It should have been a good thing, but Wen Jiayin felt uneasy for some reason, and that feeling only grew stronger after the old beggar left the next day.
She forced herself to endure the pain in her leg, leaning on a wooden stick the old beggar had carefully sanded smooth, and hobbled slowly toward Anyao Hall.
The biting cold wind nearly blew Wen Jiayin’s thin body away.
She shivered several times, wishing there was a fire to warm herself by.
But she never expected that fire would come, just not in a way she ever wanted to see.
Boom! At that moment, a huge explosion rocked the whole town, catching everyone off guard.
The blast made Wen Jiayin’s ears ring, and before she could react, a powerful shockwave sent her flying, rolling her across the ground before she finally stopped.
Flames and thick smoke shot up into the sky.
Wen Jiayin looked in the direction of the fire, and her heart sank.
That was where Anyao Hall was.
Wen Jiayin thought, she’d been reborn in the original owner’s body, and the old beggar had saved her from the brink of death.
She owed him two lives, so no matter what, as long as there was a sliver of hope, she had to save him.
Maybe, if she was lucky, the old beggar had already left, or hadn’t arrived yet and avoided the disaster.
Gritting her teeth, Wen Jiayin got up and hurried forward.
The stench of blood and burnt flesh hit her as she neared Anyao Hall, and when she saw the carnage, she almost threw up her guts.
Broken bodies were everywhere.
Having lived in peaceful times, Wen Jiayin had never seen anything like this.
Even her only good leg went weak.
Her rational mind told her this was no ordinary fire—so many mangled corpses, it looked more like a massacre…
She couldn’t stay here long.
Forcing down her nausea, Wen Jiayin made herself search for the old beggar.
If she didn’t see him, maybe he’d already left or hadn’t arrived yet and escaped the disaster…
But fate was cruel.
Wen Jiayin’s gaze stopped on an arm lying on the ground, a little away from the flames, so it was relatively intact…
There was a red string tied around the wrist, with a small walnut hanging from it—exactly like the one on her own wrist.
It was the old beggar’s birthday gift to the original owner, one for each of them.
Wen Jiayin could almost feel the original owner’s joy at receiving it.
If it hadn’t been for her leg, maybe the old beggar wouldn’t have died in this disaster…
But Wen Jiayin didn’t even have time to mourn before something even more shocking happened.
“Big brother, we’ve been tricked! Damn Medicine Sect, they must’ve run off with the treasure!” Two men in black dropped from the sky, their blades still wet with fresh blood.
This kind of thing defied all logic, and Wen Jiayin, who hadn’t managed to leave yet, stared wide-eyed.
She instinctively covered her mouth and shrank into the shadows, hiding behind some charred wood.
Her gut told her that if these two found her, she’d end up like the corpses on the ground.
But since these two were so obviously not normal, how could her hiding escape their notice?
“Look, big brother, there’s a little kitten shivering here.”
Wen Jiayin looked up and saw the corner of a black robe.
Before she could struggle, the man grabbed her like a chick.
No matter how she fought, his grip didn’t budge.
“Cough… help…” Wen Jiayin, weak and struggling, was like a helpless kitten, barely able to make a sound, let alone scratch anyone.
“Second brother!” The other man in black disapproved.
“If you’re going to kill her, just do it.
Don’t play around.
We’re not far from the immortal sects’ territory.”
“We can’t kill her, big brother.
I have a feeling this little girl is a treasure.” The chubby man in black let go just as Wen Jiayin was about to pass out.
His eyes had turned into beast-like pupils, and there was gray fur on his face—he was a half-demon.
Of course, Wen Jiayin couldn’t see any of this.
All she saw were two blurry, unrecognizable faces.
“Oh?” The skinny one knew his brother had treasure-hunting mouse blood and an uncanny sense for valuables.
He squinted at the sickly, skinny little girl in front of him—she didn’t look like a treasure at all.
But he also knew that worldly fortunes, if not hidden under dust, would never fall into the hands of small fry like them.
Wen Jiayin shivered under their disgusting, greedy stares.
Cold, fear, and the pain in her leg all tormented her fragile body.
Her vision kept going black, but she didn’t dare let herself pass out.
If she lost consciousness, she’d really be at their mercy.
Not that staying awake was much better, but at least there was a sliver of hope.
She caught sight of a red crow emblem on the black-clad man’s clothes.
She burned the symbol into her mind—whatever organization this was, if she ever got the chance… she’d get her revenge!
“Take her with us, but don’t let her freeze to death.
Second brother… what’s that strong smell of alcohol?” He didn’t finish his sentence before his voice broke in shock.
“Run!”
But how could they possibly escape?
Wen Jiayin, struggling to keep her eyes open, found herself staring into the eyes of a severed head lying on the ground.
Warm liquid sprayed onto her face—she didn’t need to guess what it was.
Another muffled explosion sounded, and something solid splattered onto her face and body.
The overwhelming shock shattered Wen Jiayin’s mental defenses, and she fell straight into a dark nightmare.
In her dream, she was still in her previous life’s home, back when she hadn’t fallen out with her parents.
Although she had an older sister above and a younger brother below, as the middle child, she did the most chores and got scolded the most, but was also the most overlooked by her parents.
Still, her naturally optimistic personality meant she never resented them for it, and the family got along well enough.
Wen Jiayin struggled to open her eyes.
One moment, she’d been in her warm bed at home, and the next, the bare branches above her—stripped of leaves by the winter cold—dragged her back to reality.
A few crows cawed harshly, hopping between the branches, and a cold, ominous atmosphere settled over Wen Jiayin.
She forced herself to sit up and saw the dried blood on her body.
The memories of what had happened before came rushing back, and though there was nothing left in her stomach, she couldn’t help but retch.
“Gulp, gulp…” Two discordant sounds kept breaking the silence.
Wen Jiayin held back as long as she could, and finally, after she managed to control her nausea, she looked up at the woman leaning against a rock not far away, who hadn’t stopped drinking from her wine gourd the whole time.
The air around them seemed to be marinated in her boozy breath.
“…Did you save me?” Wen Jiayin scooted over bit by bit to the woman’s side.
The woman was so beautiful that Wen Jiayin was momentarily stunned, but she was also extremely unkempt.
Wine dribbled from the corner of her mouth down her collar, grass stuck to her clothes and she didn’t care at all.
It was a shame to see her moonlit, flawless skin stained with filth and blood.
Wen Jiayin couldn’t tell if the woman didn’t notice or just didn’t care.
With such a strong smell of alcohol and no response for a long time, Wen Jiayin started to wonder if the woman was already drunk.
“Excuse me… are you an immortal?” According to the original body’s memories, Wen Jiayin recalled a rumor: every ten years, immortals from the immortal mountain would come down to take disciples.
Those with immortal fate could follow them up the mountain and have a chance at immortality.
Wen Jiayin had always thought it was just a story the old beggar told to amuse the original owner, but after everything that had happened, she suddenly had a bold idea.
“Immortal?” Who knew which nerve that word touched in the woman.
She suddenly burst out laughing like a madwoman, “Immortal…” Wen Jiayin was so startled she scooted back a little.
After the woman had laughed enough, she finally spoke.
“Kid, do you want to be an immortal?” The smell of alcohol hit her in the face, and Wen Jiayin instinctively leaned back.
“I—I do.” Wen Jiayin seized the moment.
“Um, do you know who those two people just now were?”
“Looking for revenge?” The woman didn’t answer, just gave Wen Jiayin a once-over.
Wen Jiayin’s dirty little hand was suddenly grabbed and pressed onto a jade stone in the woman’s other hand.
Before she could react, the jade flared up with a fiery glow.
“Hmm… average.” The woman didn’t explain, just let go of Wen Jiayin’s hand, took a couple more swigs from her wine gourd, then finally put it away.
“You’re in luck.
Let’s go.”
“Wait! Immortal… my grandpa…”
“They’re all over there.” The woman pointed at a nearby mound, where an unmarked gravestone stood.
“Their bodies were tainted with demonic energy.
I had to burn them all.
I buried the ashes here.”
“If you have anything to do, do it quickly.
After this, you’ll have to cut off all mortal ties.
Everything in the mortal world is like smoke—just a blink in your long life.” The woman’s voice seemed to carry a faint, ethereal sadness.
What could Wen Jiayin do? The old beggar could probably reunite with his beloved granddaughter now, and as the outsider who’d taken over someone else’s place, all she could do was kneel and kowtow a few times at his grave out of guilt.
Then she begged the woman to lend her some money to buy paper offerings for the poor grandfather and granddaughter.
The woman said she had no money, but maybe she softened at Wen Jiayin’s pitiful look, and finally pulled out a stick of incense from her sleeve, saying it was better than paper money.
When the incense finished burning, the woman—who’d been lying there looking dead drunk—suddenly lifted her eyelids.
A blurry figure had appeared beside Wen Jiayin, who was kneeling at the grave.
He gently patted the girl’s head, then turned and bowed deeply to the woman.
The woman staggered to her feet.
“Time to go.”
Then, like picking up a chick, she grabbed Wen Jiayin and, without caring if she was scared, used a shrinking-the-ground technique and vanished on the spot.
After that, the woman tossed Wen Jiayin to the junior disciples, saying her talent was average and she’d only barely take her in.
The junior disciples actually believed this nonsense and didn’t pay much attention to Wen Jiayin.
On top of that, she was filthy and stank, so the disciples—used to spotless cleanliness in the sect—didn’t want to go near her.
Wen Jiayin could barely move and almost never left her room.
The disciples who’d given her a fasting pill that would last her several days basically forgot she existed.
She lowered her left leg off the bed, then used the wooden stick propped against the bed to stand up, inching her way toward the window.
Her left leg hung uselessly, so she could only hobble forward on her right.
Her broken left leg hadn’t been treated.
The careless disciples hadn’t noticed her condition, or maybe they just didn’t want to waste medicine on a nobody like her.
She closed the window and slid down the wall to sit on the floor.
Now, a broken leg was the least of her problems—there were bigger issues ahead, ahhh!!! Wen Jiayin clutched her head.
Since coming here, even though she hadn’t tried to eavesdrop, she’d still picked up bits of information from the people coming and going.
For example, the sect she was about to join was called Jing Dao Sect, and among the elders, there was a particularly powerful sword cultivator called Xinyun.
As for herself… her name was Wen Jiayin.
A strong sense of déjà vu hit her.
She remembered that in a cultivation novel she’d read, the number one female lead… had this exact name! That wretched character stabbed her own master for a man and was then killed by the female lead with a single sword strike… and had the same name as her!
When Wen Jiayin realized she hadn’t just transmigrated, but had actually entered a novel, she scrambled out the door and grabbed a junior disciple.
“My name is Wen Mi Gao, not Wen Jiayin.
Can you help me change it?”
The junior disciple was a girl, looked a bit older than Wen Jiayin but was shorter, and had quite a temper.
She yanked her sleeve back from Wen Jiayin’s grip and looked her up and down.
Her first words almost made the usually good-tempered Wen Jiayin lose it.
“Mi Gao? That’s so country bumpkin.
Don’t change it, or you’ll be rustic inside and out.” The girl’s expression suddenly changed, and she clamped her nose, backing away several steps.
“Why do you smell so bad!”
Wen Jiayin felt wronged too.
If she could go out and wash up, she wouldn’t be this filthy.
The girl must have reached her limit.
She threw a bunch of talismans at Wen Jiayin’s head, then turned and ran, clearly overwhelmed by the stench.
A flash of light passed over the talisman paper, and in an instant, Wen Jiayin was clean.
At the same time, the talismans turned to ash.
Thanks a lot, you brat.
Her attempt to change her name had failed, and Wen Jiayin calmed down.
Since she was here to replace the original, fate wasn’t something a name change could alter.
So she hobbled back to her room with her stick and tried to recall the plot she remembered.
The male lead, Xiaoyao Zhenjun, was just like his title—his Dao heart was all about being unrestrained and carefree.
That unrestrained attitude showed in many ways, including his attitude toward sex.
As long as he liked someone, he didn’t mind a casual fling.
He’d had plenty of women along the way, but never truly cared for any of them.
The only one he ever expressed love for was the number one female lead, Xinyun Zhenjun, though Wen Jiayin thought that “love” was pretty questionable.
Xinyun Zhenjun really had it rough.
She cultivated the emotionless Dao, but ran into the playboy male lead, who not only pestered her endlessly but also dragged her into trouble.
Even while pursuing her, he secretly flirted with her only disciple, luring “Wen Jiayin” into his trap and making her turn on her own master.
Xinyun Zhenjun let her guard down around her disciple and ended up nearly dying in an ancient battlefield.
“Wen Jiayin” tried to finish her off but was killed instead.
The male lead took the chance to chop “Wen Jiayin” into pieces and “rescued” the female lead, staying by her side to help her recover.
Just when all the readers thought the rest of the story would be the usual: the female lead slowly falls for the male lead, breaks through her emotionless Dao, the male lead finds some rare treasure to help her, and after all sorts of misunderstandings and jealousy, they finally get their happy ending.
But then the author suddenly stopped updating for two months, and when they came back, they rushed out a terrible ending.
The female lead broke her emotionless Dao and lost all her cultivation, then was harassed by the male lead’s other women until she coughed up blood.
She cut ties with the male lead and returned to the mortal world, never to cultivate again.
Meanwhile, the male lead, after moping for a few months, suddenly broke through his love tribulation and ascended to immortality! Seriously, what the hell?
Wen Jiayin’s expression at the end was like that old man on the subway looking at his phone.
No wonder her troll friend made this book a punishment game and required a 3,000-word reflection—it was just to torture people!
After handwriting a 3,000-word reflection, Wen Jiayin was so disgusted by the book that she remembered certain plot points very clearly.
For example, the one who saved her was most likely the female lead’s martial aunt, known as the Wine Immortal, a big shot whose strength was off the charts.
But in the end, she died together with an ancient demon revived by the demon cultivators.
She had a lot of unsolved mysteries, but the pigeon author never bothered to explain them, just killed her off in a rush.
And according to the original plot, the female lead who would become her master seemed to have a “lone star” curse after meeting the male lead.
Everyone around her either wanted to kill her or died because of her, as if she was the author’s stand-in for someone they hated.
Otherwise, how could she be so tragic? The male lead’s other harem members never had it that bad.
Wen Jiayin wasn’t stupid.
She didn’t want to make an enemy of the female lead, and she knew her own skinny arms and legs couldn’t handle the certain-death buff that came with being around the protagonist.
So, picking a different master was crucial!
In the future war between immortals and demons, her sect would be one of the top three righteous sects in the cultivation world, and would have to face the crisis head-on.
If she became a sword cultivator, a spell cultivator, a body cultivator, or anything like that, she’d definitely be on the front lines.
No way, that’s not good!
So she had two targets: the Dan Peak master, and the Qinglian Peak master.
The first was an alchemist, the second a healer.
The original owner had a fire-type heavenly spiritual root, and it was high quality—really outstanding.
She didn’t know if she’d still have it now that she was here.
In the story, the original owner was favored by many elders, but after hearing the junior disciples gush about Xinyun Zhenjun on the way here, she became dead set on taking the female lead as her master.
The female lead hadn’t planned on taking a disciple, but the sect leader—her senior brother—kept pushing her, and seeing how stubborn the kid was, she finally accepted this future traitor.
Wen Jiayin raised her hand.
On her pale, thin wrist, the bright red rope was so glaring.
In her memory, the original owner didn’t seem like the type to turn on people.
How did she end up doing something like this? Grandpa would be heartbroken if he found out.
Sigh… Thinking about the future, even if she avoided the disasters caused by the main couple, after the immortal-demon war, half the cultivation world would be a barren abyss, with mountains of dead cultivators’ bones—just cannon fodder.
In the end, whose fate was really worse? Hard to say.
Wen Jiayin sighed several more times as she thought about it.
“Boom…” The ground under Wen Jiayin’s feet shook.
“We’re here, everyone out.” A voice called from outside.
They’d arrived—at the sect, of course.
Wen Jiayin took a deep breath, her eyes growing determined.
No matter what, even if she was just cannon fodder, she was going to do her best to survive here!
