Integration

One sentence made Tao Ji think of Senior Martial Nephew, and he fell silent.

Xuan Miao accepted it the fastest. She nodded at Pan Yun. "Junior Sister."

Pan Yun smiled as she cupped her fist in salute. "Fourth senior sister."

Then she grinned and shook her clasped hands at Tao Ji. "Third senior brother."

Tao Ji held it in until his face turned red, but he still called out, "Fifth Junior Sister."

The commanders had all accepted it, so the remaining three juniors had even less say in the matter. They stepped forward again to greet Pan Yun.

Miao He was the most disappointed. "I thought I was going to become a Senior Sister."

She had been so happy last night.

Pan Yun, who was the same height as her, reached out and patted her head. "Don't be so down. With your Junior Martial Uncle looking after you from now on, isn't that happier than being a Senior Sister?"

Miao He asked, "Will Junior Martial Uncle attend lessons with us from now on?"

Pan Yun turned to look at Wang Fei Yin as well.

After giving an "Mm," Wang Fei Yin said, "You are still young. Learn more things and see what you like before choosing a field to specialize in later. Though you must specialize in one field, you cannot know nothing about the others either. Understand?"

Pan Yun answered together with the others.

"Alright, have breakfast. Afterward, go wait in the main hall. I will check your schoolwork shortly.

"Your Third Martial Uncle and the others only returned last night, so you are being given the day off today. Once I have checked your schoolwork, go amuse yourselves. Tomorrow, those who should attend lessons will attend lessons, and those who should go down the mountain will go down the mountain."

Everyone agreed.

Pan Yun served herself a bowl of porridge and took a steamed bun, then sat with Miao He and Miao Zhen. "Who is going down the mountain?"

"Me." Tao Yanbai popped up and sat beside Miao Zhen, sighing. "I truly hate going down the mountain."

While eating her porridge, Miao He said, "My master is going down too. Third senior brother, you hate going down the mountain, but I love it. Yet my master never lets me go."

Pan Yun pulled the conversation back. "What is third senior brother going down the mountain for?"

Miao He said, "To take third senior brother to practice medicine."

Tao Yanbai explained, "I have no talent for Daoist cultivation, and I also have parents and family. The Imperial Court decreed that if the children or servants of soldiers and commoners shave their heads to become monks or Daoists, their parents must serve the Imperial Court or farm the land for the people."

Pan Yun, a frog at the bottom of a well, knew nothing. "Then how are you here?"

"I stayed at the temple in the name of learning a craft," Tao Yanbai said energetically. "Even so, I still have to study hard. When I turn twenty, I will take the ordination certificate examination. If I can pass, then even if my talent is lacking, I can stay in the daoist temple with my senior brothers and sisters."

Pan Yun said, "Keep it up!"

"Keep the oil up? That does not sound right. Wouldn't it imply a blazing fire and a wick burning too quickly? Too much is as bad as too little."

Pan Yun readily changed her words. "That makes sense. Work hard!"

Tao Yanbai nodded fiercely.

Seeing this, Miao He wolfed down the steamed bun in her hand with two great chomps, got to her feet, and said, "I'm going to turn in my schoolwork right now."

With that, she charged toward the main hall.

The three of them watched her run away. Once she vanished from sight, Tao Yanbai asked Miao Zhen, "Has she finished her schoolwork?"

Miao Zhen said, "She finished it."

"How was it?"

After thinking for a moment, Miao Zhen said, "That depends on whether First Martial Uncle is in a good mood today."

If he was, perhaps he would raise his hand and let her off.

Tao Yanbai understood at once and relaxed. He stood up too. "I'm going to turn in my schoolwork as well."

With Miao He there for comparison, he should not end up too miserable, right?

Pan Yun silently lowered her head and ate. Senior Brother's mood today might be a little delicate. At the very least, he would not be very happy.

Wang Fei Yin was indeed not very happy. Thus, he punished Miao He, whose schoolwork had been sloppy, as well as Tao Yanbai, who had been earnest but had not done well enough. He praised only Miao Zhen.

After watching for a while, Pan Yun went to explore the daoist temple. She visited every corner of it, including the vegetable plots carved out along the mountainside behind the temple, and the large vats beside those plots...

She just did not see a well.

Pan Yun thought about it. When Wang Fei Yin had taken her to the mountaintop that morning, they had gone down a stretch of the path. There was a large pool of clear blue water there, and the water looked good. Did they have to fetch water from there?

Pan Yun returned to the main hall. Miao He and Tao Yanbai had already finished their punishments, and the two were cheerful again. They invited Pan Yun to divide up some things with them.

They were the things Tao Ji had brought back from the foot of the mountain.

There was food, clothing, and all sorts of medicinal herbs. Tao Ji had also bought two pretty hair ribbons for the two young girls, letting them choose and match them as they pleased.

Even Miao Zhen, who was normally composed, could not help smiling. She called Pan Yun over to happily share them.

Pan Yun was forcibly given two hair ribbons too.

They were all young, and their hair was both short and sparse, so they had no use for wooden hairpins. They tied their hair with ribbons instead.

Daoist cultivators had fewer restraints. Naturally, they followed their hearts, so Tao Ji had prepared hair ribbons in every color for them to choose as they pleased.

There was cloth as well. Only then did Pan Yun learn that they made their own Daoist robes. "Before, Martial Uncle, Master, and Martial Uncle helped make them, but now that we have grown up, we have to learn to make them ourselves. Junior Martial Uncle, do you know how?"

For the first eight years of Pan Yun's life, she had either been cultivating or taking medicine. If she had possessed the energy and leisure to walk as far as the front gate, her father would have wept with joy. Naturally, she had not learned a single thing about needlework.

She had always thought of herself as an introverted homebody, truly. She was suited to a life where clothes came when she stretched out her hand and food came when she opened her mouth, where she only focused on cultivation and turned a deaf ear to everything beyond the window.

In her previous life, she had been forced into being outgoing by life and school. Not only did she have to study and conduct research, she occasionally had to capture demons and ghosts. Compared to that, staying home to draw talismans for extra income had been a very happy thing;

And in this life, if her father had not suddenly been exiled, she could actually have relied on her father and brothers to live the life she had dreamed of in her previous life.

Her second brother had long made an agreement with her: if she could not get married, he would support her. If he could not pass the imperial examinations, he would take her back to their ancestral home in Changzhou Prefecture. At the time, she had decided that she simply would not marry when she grew up.

Though Pan Yun had not intended to live such a useless life, she had still made plans. Once she achieved a little success in cultivation, she could return to her old trade, drawing talismans to sell now and then. The money she earned would be enough to support herself. Then she could rely on father and brother while focusing on cultivation. Perhaps, by the time they grew old, she would have attained success in cultivation and found the road back to the other world?

Pan Yun hugged the cloth that had been stuffed into her arms, her eyes brimming with tears. Everything from the past had become a dream bubble and a phantom. Her life had to be planned anew.

Seeing that she was about to cry, Miao He hurriedly asked, "Pan Yun, what's wrong?"

Miao Zhen bumped her. "Call her Junior Martial Uncle."

Pan Yun shook her head to show that she did not mind. "I'm touched. In all my life, this is the first time someone has given me cloth."

The moment Miao He heard this, she said, "Junior Martial Uncle, you will receive gifts often from now on. Whenever my Master comes back from the foot of the mountain, he brings us gifts. And Senior Brother too—Senior Brother brings back the most things. I miss Senior Brother so much."

Miao Zhen nodded as well and said in a tiny voice, "I miss Senior Brother too."

Suppressing her longing for father and brother, Pan Yun wiped the tears from the corners of her eyes and asked curiously, "Where is Senior Martial Nephew now?"

Miao He sighed and shook her head. "I don't know. Senior Brother went into business and travels to different places every day. We do not know where he is now."

"When does Senior Martial Nephew usually return?"

Miao He said, "It is uncertain. Sometimes, when business is good, he comes back in September or October. Sometimes, when business is poor, he does not return until the New Year."

That sounded so pitiful.

But Miao He and Miao Zhen were very used to such separations. They had grown up in this environment and did not think there was anything wrong with parting.

They soon immersed themselves in the joy of dividing the gifts. Tao Yanbai washed a basin of apricots and brought it over, eating them as he divided the gifts with them.

Other than some precious medicinal herbs and cloth, the things Tao Ji had chosen to bring up were mostly candies and pastries.

The three of them hid them away in every corner. Following them, Pan Yun also figured out where food was stored in the temple.

Some went into the kitchen cupboards, some into the rice jars, and each person secretly hid a packet of their favorite snacks in their own room. The rest were unwrapped and offered before the stone statues and memorial tablets of the Three Pure Ones, Immortal Master Ge, and Minister Li.

They lit incense and invited them to partake. But by noon, several pastries had been eaten from the plates before the deities, distributed especially evenly—one pastry had been taken from before each deity.

Miao He took one, bowed to it, then bit into it. Seeing Pan Yun watching her, she took another, bowed to it, and handed it to Pan Yun, pulling her down to sit on a prayer cushion and eat.

"The patriarchs have eaten, so now it is our turn," she said. "Martial Uncle said that when the patriarchs see us eating happily, they will be happy too. As long as offerings are made sincerely, they can be eaten afterward."

Pan Yun held her pastry as well and sat side by side with her, eating. "The patriarchs are so kind."

Miao He nodded hard. "The patriarchs really are wonderful. I like the patriarchs the most."

The two of them, heads lowered as they nibbled their pastries, did not see the faint glimmer that seemed to pass through the eyes of the three Celestial Worthies.

Pan Yun successfully integrated into the big family of Sanqing Temple. It was not until the afternoon that she finally found time to take out the half-volume fragment and study the cultivation method.

Pan Little Black looked over it with her. As a Spirit Being that had read countless methods, it was better than Pan Yun at judging a cultivation method's quality.

After only one glance, it said, "Congratulations."

Pan Yun said, "Pity there is only half of it."

Pan Little Black said with certainty, "I definitely have a complete record of it."

Pan Yun's spirits rose. "Where is it? Find it!"

"That part has not had its seal removed yet. Wait until I unseal a little more."

Pan Yun: ...

Seeing that she did not believe it, Pan Little Black hurriedly said, "Really! I have recorded an ocean of cultivation methods. Just look at where I was passed down from and what I was originally created for. So long as you unseal me, let alone the latter half of one mere cultivation method, even deeper and more profound methods can be yours."

Pan Yun lowered her eyes in thought. After a moment, she said, "Fine, I will trust you for now. Tonight, we will try refining an array."

Pan Little Black happily obeyed its black cat instincts and did a somersault on the spot.

Pan Yun spread out the cultivation method and began to cultivate.

Human memories could quickly be corrected, but bodily memory was difficult to change.

The greatest difficulty in switching to Kun Yuan Gong was altering bodily memory.

The two cultivation methods were too similar—or rather, they had originated from the same method, with only differences in between. Now, she had to alter memories her body had long memorized.

It was like step exercise. For the past eight years, she had raised both hands when stepping up. Now, she had to change it to raising both hands when stepping down. Bodily memory was difficult to alter, but Pan Yun believed she could do it.

The lucky numbers for today and tomorrow are numbers ending in 3. A screenshot serves as proof. Add "Sword Going Against the Grain Great Ming" to find Mo Yan and exchange it for ten points of affection.