Chapter 2

Chapter 2: Wedding Dress

"Cauldron?" Lu Xun froze slightly at her words.

As a veteran player of "Heavenly Dust" and a webnovel enthusiast, how could he not know what a cauldron was?

There were things that people did not know to cherish—things they spent just a few minutes producing every day, wrapped in tissue, and tossed into the trash.

Yet to certain female cultivators of the Heretical Path, such things were rather precious. After all, a cauldron was better off with abundant vital fire.

The more vigorous a cauldron's vital fire, the faster they cultivated!

Thus, when Lu Xun heard the word "cauldron," his expression changed drastically. He looked at her and could not help thinking:

There's actually something this good!?

In "Heavenly Dust," quite a few players had chosen this path of cultivation as well.

As mentioned before, it was a game with an extremely high degree of freedom. So long as you were an adult, you had plenty of choices.

However, this path to leveling up was also known as one of the worst starting routes, with an exceedingly low ceiling!

How high could the ceiling possibly be when you relied on such unorthodox methods to level up and cultivate?

And interestingly enough, the person serving as the cauldron would die once for every three times this type of cultivation art was practiced, instantly turning into a dried corpse!

The especially dry kind—not a single drop left!

But players had resurrection chances, so naturally they could mess around however they liked. At worst, they could ruin their account and just make another one. But Lu Xun could not do that.

Every one of his resurrections was immensely precious. He could not waste them like this.

Using his life to indulge with her was far too ridiculous.

Maybe it would be worth it to trade his life for a perfect start, but he was genuinely a little disdainful of a cultivation path with such a low ceiling.

So after finding it somewhat interesting at first, Lu Xun began considering how to deal with the situation.

At that moment, Ji Li, standing before Lu Xun, was also lost in thought.

Her father's surname was Ji, and her mother loved pears, so she was named Ji Li.

Her family had originally been a Martial Arts Family, but who could ever clearly explain the grudges and entanglements of the martial world?

By chance, her parents had acquired an immortal Magic Sword and a cultivation manual. For some unknown reason, word got out, and covetous enemies slaughtered her family. She alone escaped alive, carrying the sword and manual with her.

Not everyone in this world cultivated immortality. In "Heavenly Dust," people before Level 10 were not particularly strong either, not much different from martial artists of the jianghu. Only after Level 10 did true cultivation truly begin.

As for this cultivation manual, it was a Demonic Art, despised by those of the righteous path.

And the foremost requirement for cultivating it was that she needed an opposite-sex cauldron.

Still an untouched young maiden herself, how could she possibly stomach that!

She still only vaguely understood such matters, let alone using them to cultivate... After all, she was only a sixteen-year-old girl.

But she had to avenge her family! It was a blood feud!

Moreover, her pursuers were still hunting her down. Raising her strength could not wait!

This Demonic Art had become her only support!

As for the Magic Sword named Wedding Dress... without cultivation, she could not unleash any of its power. At most, it was a somewhat sharper piece of Mortal Iron—and absurdly heavy besides!

Thus, a cauldron was what she needed most right now.

But how could she possibly... possibly...

Until she saw Lu Xun.

"There is actually a man in this world with such looks?" Ji Li felt her heart pounding wildly at first sight.

He was so handsome that it felt like not only was she not losing out, she might even be gaining a little?

Yes, Ji Li might not even have known it herself, but she was a genuine, bona fide Appearance Control.

Her mother had once taught her that no man was any good. Since that was the case, what was wrong with choosing the one she found best-looking?

That actually... made a bit of sense?

Thinking about it carefully, if her father had not been handsome, would her mother, with her exceptional martial arts, have married him based on his skills alone?

And her thoughts were simple. Even if she really had to find a cauldron, she should at least find someone pleasing to look at, right? What if she got so disgusted halfway through cultivating that she suffered qi deviation?

As for whether there could be anyone in this world better-looking than the man before her?

She did not believe it! Impossible! It did not exist!

He was just too ridiculously handsome...

And he seemed to be an ordinary person without even the strength to truss a chicken. She could not sense any qi from him at all.

Hoho, didn't that mean this young lady could do whatever she wanted?

Him, then! She would kidnap him first and talk later!

Ji Li drew the spirit sword Wedding Dress and pointed it at Lu Xun. She held it there for ages, yet had no idea what to say and couldn't think of the right words.

After all, she was only a sixteen-year-old girl.

After holding it in for a long while, she finally forced out, her face red, "Will you submit or not?"

Listening to her voice and tone, Lu Xun became even more certain that she was a rather immature girl. But he really couldn't beat her at the moment, so he couldn't help but smile bitterly. "Here? That wouldn't be appropriate..."

At his words, Ji Li's face turned even redder, right down to the tips of her ears.

Pah, pah, pah! How could we do it here!?

But... why did even his bitter smile look so good...

Lu Xun watched helplessly as strings of numbers popped up beside Ji Li, who was in the terminal stages of Appearance Control:

"Affection Points +1!"

"Affection Points +1!"

"Affection Points +1!"

"Huh, did the Affection Points feature come over too?" Lu Xun was surprised.

Back when he was a player, raising the Affection Points of game NPCs had been painfully difficult. He could run himself ragged doing quests and still might not gain even a single point. It had been enough to make him sick.

And many hidden quests required Affection Points to reach a certain value before they could be unlocked. He had also heard that once Affection Points reached a certain level, there was a chance that some very exciting things might happen.

There was no helping it. He had just had to grind honestly!

But what was going on now? Why were Affection Points coming so easily?

Was it because he used to have "Charm 1," but now had "Charm 10"?

Lu Xun was baffled and looked up at the sky.

Little did he know that this forty-five-degree upward gaze also fell into Ji Li's eyes.

Tsk, that jawline is pretty nice.

Tsk, that profile is handsome too.

"Affection Points +1... +1... +1..."

Lu Xun: "???"

Although he still hadn't fully figured out what was happening, an increase in Affection Points was a good thing regardless. At the very least, it proved that he could be relatively safer.

He even began to suspect that he had run into some kind of troubled girl.

Should he feed her some inspirational drivel and tell her to turn back from the wrong path?

Just as he frowned in thought, Ji Li suddenly glanced east.

Oh no, those people are chasing after us again! Ji Li inwardly cried out in alarm.

She moved with astonishing speed. Lu Xun saw only a blur before he felt himself being scooped up in one swift motion!

She carried Lu Xun sideways in one arm, like she was carrying a surfboard out to ride the waves...

Breathing in the faint scent of the girl, Lu Xun's heart was filled with mixed feelings.

"Damn it, I ran into a super-strong girl!"

With a tap of her toes, Ji Li dashed north. Even while carrying Lu Xun, she moved as though she bore no weight at all.

Lu Xun didn't know that his hundred-plus jin of weight was still lighter than the Wedding Dress Sword.

"Gurgle, gurgle—" The fierce wind poured straight into Lu Xun's mouth, and he immediately shut it.

Instead, now that he was so close to the Wedding Dress Sword, he got a clear look at it, and its basic information appeared before his eyes.

Sword Name: Wedding Dress (Yellow)

"It's actually a Yellow Weapon?" Lu Xun was slightly startled.

No wonder the sword looked so unusual!

It truly was no ordinary item, worthy of the name Yellow Weapon.

Then he looked up at Ji Li again.

From his angle, with certain things blocking his view, he could actually see only half of her face.