The Creepy Tang Sect

At this, Bei Bei looked helpless as well. He pointed at Chen Ping, at a loss for words.

"You brat, once you get into the academy, you're definitely going to be a troublemaker. I can see that now. Fine, my name is Bei Bei, and this is Tang Ya. You can call her Senior Sister Xiao Ya."

As he spoke, Bei Bei shifted over and held out his hand to Chen Ping.

Chen Ping hurriedly reached out as well, shaking Bei Bei's hand as he introduced himself. "Senior Bei Bei, Senior Sister Xiao Ya, then we can consider ourselves acquainted from today onward."

"My name is Chen Ping. I'm here to take our academy's Entrance Examination in a little over two months."

At that, Xiao Ya's eyes immediately began darting around.

From the fact that Chen Ping had risked entering Centipede Cave alone, Xiao Ya could tell that there was probably not even a single Soul Master in his family. His family circumstances might not have been particularly good, either.

Otherwise, no matter what, Chen Ping's family would never have let him figure out how to hunt Soul Beasts on his own. Even if they had to sell everything they owned, they should have spent some Gold Soul Coins to hire one or two Soul Master mercenaries to help him obtain a Soul Ring.

He might even have been an orphan!

Thinking of this, Xiao Ya immediately grew excited and shot Bei Bei a meaningful look.

Bei Bei nodded at her and asked, "Brother Chen, who else is in your family?"

Chen Ping gave a helpless smile. "They're all gone. I'm the only one left."

Tang Ya was overjoyed and blurted out, "That's wonderful."

Chen Ping's cheek twitched. He knew it. With Tang Ya's emotional intelligence, there was no way she could avoid saying something like that.

Although he had only just transmigrated here, and both the original owner of this body and his family had already died, Tang Ya's idiot-level emotional intelligence still made it hard for anyone to choose to follow her.

Joining the Tang Sect was something Chen Ping absolutely would not do.

It was not merely because Tang Ya lacked emotional intelligence, nor was it because, according to the Original Work's trajectory, Xiao Ya would most likely make disciples joining the Tang Sect kowtow to her instead of accepting them on behalf of her master.

Those things were somewhat hard for Chen Ping to accept, but he still understood that making money was hard and life was full of unpleasant compromises.

If kowtowing a few times could let him get five or six Self-Created Soul Skills for free, Chen Ping would not care about losing a little face.

There were only eight words people could never see through in their lives: life and death, success and failure, right and wrong, honor and disgrace.

Having already walked the line between life and death once, Chen Ping no longer cared so much about honor and disgrace.

But the problem was that there was something wrong with the Tang Sect.

This was not to say that the Tang Sect's current meager remnants—Bei Bei and Tang Ya, the only two cats left—were the problem.

It was that the entire sect gave off an eerie feeling.

Where was the Tang Sect's old site?

Heaven Dou City!

Where did Huo Yuhao begin?

Star Luo City!

Huo Yuhao, in Star Luo City, had supposedly grown up listening to legends about the Tang Sect, a sect from Heaven Dou City ten thousand years ago. Was that supposed to be a joke?

Shrek had not fallen in ten thousand years, so growing up hearing Shrek's legends made perfect sense. But what state was the Tang Sect even in?

From the job Chen Ping had taken two days ago, the Tang Sect had already declined to the point where even the surname of a child born into the Tang Sect through marriage, with a Blue Silver Grass Martial Soul, could not be decided.

The dispute between the names Tang Xiaolong and Wang Xiaolong already showed just how weak the Tang Sect had become.

And under those circumstances, Huo Yuhao had somehow grown up listening to Tang Sect stories.

If Chen Ping were still stubborn enough to walk into the Tang Sect's demon den, who knew when a Thought Seal might get welded onto his forehead.

That was still the better outcome. The worse outcome was Tang San discovering that this little bug might affect how he molded Huo Yuhao, then simply poking Chen Ping to death with one finger.

Thus, Chen Ping merely shrugged and put on a troubled expression. "Th-this... is that really right?"

Bei Bei was also left red-faced by Chen Ping's jab. He shot Tang Ya a fierce glare, then raised a hand and rapped her on the head. "Watch what you say."

Only then did Bei Bei cup his hands toward Chen Ping. "My Girlfriend tends not to think before she speaks. Sorry about that, Brother Chen."

Normally, if Tang Ya heard Bei Bei directly call her his Girlfriend, she would definitely leap up with claws bared and demand that he call her Teacher Xiao Ya.

But now, she had realized just how thoughtless her words had been. She hugged her knees and buried her head in them, too embarrassed to face anyone, so naturally she could not come out to refute Bei Bei.

Bei Bei also knew that if he continued trying to recruit Chen Ping into the Tang Sect at a time like this, it would truly be rubbing salt in the wound and trampling on his dignity. So he hurriedly changed the subject.

"Brother Chen, since you and Xiao Ya have both obtained the Soul Rings you wanted, hurry and absorb them. I'll stand guard for the two of you."

"But to be safe, it would be best if you absorb them one after another. What do you think?"

"I also have some medicine here. It can treat the injury on your face."

"Scarring can't be avoided, but our academy's Healing System teachers are very experienced in removing scars. You can have it removed once we get there."

At this, the cold expression on Chen Ping's face immediately melted away, and he smiled faintly. "I'd feel bad imposing."

Chen Ping had known all along that Tang Ya's offensive remark would come out, so he did not particularly care about it.

But if you did not care about something, others might push their luck.

So Chen Ping had still kept a faintly cold look on his face.

Only after Bei Bei changed the subject, offered to stand guard, provide medicine free of charge, and showed his goodwill did Chen Ping go along with the change, restoring the warm atmosphere from when the three of them had just killed the Big Touch Dragon King.

That was all there was to social etiquette, when it came down to it.

If you only ever gave others face, it meant you did not value your own dignity. If you did not value something, neither would others.

In the Original Work, Huo Yuhao had shown no reaction upon hearing Tang Ya's words and instead continued giving Tang Ya and Bei Bei plenty of face.

So Tang Ya and Bei Bei truly felt there was nothing wrong with what she had said. They naturally went on to invite Huo Yuhao into the Tang Sect and had him kowtow.

That did not mean Tang Ya and Bei Bei were bad people. They genuinely thought it was not an important matter. One could not expect two thirteen- or fourteen-year-old children to consider everything.

If Huo Yuhao's expression had changed even slightly after hearing that sentence, the two of them would have hurriedly picked up the social awareness they had tossed aside.

Tang Ya also pulled her head back out from between her knees. "Hehe, Little Brother Chen, don't be angry with me, okay? Go absorb your Soul Ring first. Once you finish absorbing it and become a One Ring Soul Master, I'll have two Soul Masters standing guard for me. It'll be safer."

For a half-grown girl like Tang Ya, this already counted as an apology. Chen Ping nodded slightly as well. "How could I be angry, Senior Sister Xiao Ya? Then I'll absorb the Soul Ring first."

"I'll try to finish quickly. While I'm absorbing the Soul Ring, I'll have to trouble Senior and Senior Sister to stand guard."

Chen Ping did not call them Big Brother Bei Bei or Sister Xiao Ya in the end. Instead, he called them Senior and Senior Sister, and it was hard to say that there was not a little calculation behind that.

Not to mention anything else, with Bei Bei's status as Mu En's great-grandson, once Chen Ping addressed him as Senior, unless they encountered a life-or-death crisis, Bei Bei would definitely guard him according to the highest standards.