Xiyao's body, forged from light, was soft and faintly cool.
Like the finest warm jade, she carried a sunny warmth.
She was like an affectionate little cat, curled almost entirely in Lin Ciyan's arms.
The girl pressed her cheek against his neck, greedily breathing in the utterly pure Holy Radiance Qilin aura around him. Every now and then, she would lift her head.
With her cool, haloed lips, she would leave little, trusting kisses on his chin or cheek.
Lin Ciyan wrapped one arm around her slender waist. With the other, he stroked her smooth back, where light flowed like moonlight, savoring this peaceful, intimate moment.
Mm, this was probably the ultimate pleasure of "slacking off" in cultivation, wasn't it?
Yet his thoughts couldn't help drifting away.
With the day he was due to go to the Outer Court drawing near, a few events from the "original story's" timeline inevitably surfaced in his mind.
"By my reckoning... at this point, that kid Huo Yuhao should still be struggling to survive in the White Tiger Duke Mansion, right?"
"Ma Xiaotao has probably already started suffering from her Evil Fire. As for a certain important 'plot trigger'..."
Not long ago, in Heaven Dou City, at the Tang Sect.
It was a dark and windy night, perfect for "murder and arson."
This ancient sect, once immensely glorious and with a legacy spanning ten thousand years, had met a calamity worthy of the name.
After ten thousand years of stagnation, they still treated the mutilated Mysterious Heaven Treasure Record as a peerless secret manual. As a result, this once "greatest sect on the continent" had fallen so far that it couldn't even field a single decent expert.
The current sect master was merely a Blue Silver Grass Soul Master at the Soul King level.
The four single-attribute clans had long since split off and gone their own ways. With nothing but a Blue Silver Grass Soul King to their name...
How could they possibly protect an estate in the prime district of Heaven Dou City, sprawling across a vast area and still built to the grand standards of a top sect from ten thousand years ago?
It was like occupying a sprawling royal residence in the city center, where every inch of land was worth a fortune, without even having a decent security guard. Who else would you expect to rob you?
So the Iron Blood Sect made its move.
The outcome was never in doubt: a one-sided massacre and purge.
In theory, with a clash of this scale happening inside Heaven Dou City, the city defense forces should have intervened long ago.
Strangely, though, that night, there wasn't a sound from the city lord's residence. It was as if everyone had gone deaf and blind at once.
The reason was simple. Months earlier, the Iron Blood Sect had already reached a "friendly" agreement with the city lord.
The reason the city lord had agreed came down to two words: taxes!
Ten thousand years ago, Emperor Xue Beng had given the Tang Sect a series of absurdly generous concessions to thank Tang San. One of them was a permanent exemption from all taxes in Heaven Dou City!
Not just land taxes—every commercial activity, every source of income, all of it was tax-free!
This wasn't an ordinary tax break. It was practically carving out a "lawless zone" right inside Heaven Dou City!
Even more outrageous, over the past ten thousand years, as the Tang Sect steadily declined, it had not only enjoyed its tax-free privileges, but also exploited loopholes in the regulations to keep taking advantage of Heaven Dou City and leeching off the empire.
The Tang Sect's logic: Without our ancestor Tang San, Heaven Dou would have perished long ago! So what if we take a little now? It's the tribute you owe us!
What city lord could put up with a deadbeat that had been sponging off them for ten thousand years?
Now that the Iron Blood Sect, a "concerned citizen," was willing to step in and clean house, the city lord was practically beside himself with joy. He might as well have personally opened the gates and shown them the way.
He could get rid of the Tang Sect, that bloodsucking parasite, and start collecting taxes from the Iron Blood Sect afterward.
A win on both fronts. A massive victory!
In this long-planned purge, nearly every member of the Tang Sect was slaughtered.
Only one blue-haired girl, barely in her teens, managed to escape by sheer luck and because she knew the terrain.
She watched helplessly as her parents and family fell in pools of blood. The dying cries of her clansmen rang in her ears:
"Xiaoya, run!"
"Xiaoya, you have to live!"
"Rebuild the Tang Sect... it's all up to you, Xiaoya!"
Her name was Tang Ya.
Carrying a heart full of hatred and the crushing burden of rebuilding her sect, she came alone, battered but determined, stumbling toward Shrek Academy, the sacred ground of Soul Masters across the continent.
Interestingly, compared with certain "predetermined" paths of fate, the Tang Sect's destruction seemed to have come... early.
On Sea God Island, Lin Ciyan was napping beside the Golden Tree.
Half awake, he happened to see Bei Bei approaching from not far away.
A timid-looking blue-haired girl walked close at his side, step for step.
She was young, but Soul Masters matured early, and her figure had already begun to take on a girl's slender curves.
Though her clothes were a little ragged, they couldn't hide her pretty, delicate features. Her large eyes, in particular, held a fragile, pitiable look.
Hey, buddy, it's the classic skin.
Limited edition: Down-and-Out Tang Ya, Rebuild the Tang Sect Edition, now available.
Lin Ciyan whistled inwardly. Seeing the unmistakable concern and protectiveness in Bei Bei's gaze, he couldn't help shaking his head to himself.
Sigh, Bei Bei, Bei Bei. You...
You'd already started slacking off in front of me (though you were secretly grinding like mad; after Lin Ciyan tried to talk you out of it a few times and failed, he gave up).
Even Sister Lexuan, your unattainable white moonlight, hadn't managed to distract you completely. So how'd you still get caught by this "plot gravity"?
Was this the legendary "fated tribulation"?
As he grumbled to himself, he wondered whether to give his childhood friend a hand or stick to the "better them than me" principle and watch the drama unfold.
Suddenly, his brows furrowed ever so slightly.
Something was wrong!
His Holy Radiance Qilin Martial Soul was unusually sensitive to darkness and evil energies.
Just now, he'd sensed something extremely faint and elusive from Tang Ya... Soul Power with a dark attribute?
Holy crap! There was something nasty in there!
Mystery solved!
He finally understood why Bei Bei had been so devoted to Tang Ya in the original story, to the point that even his childhood friend Zhang Lexuan... So this was the root of it!
Someone: The Tang Sect was, after all, founded by me. How could I bear to watch it simply disappear...
Lin Ciyan's mind automatically conjured up the figure of someone spying on the Douluo Continent from the Divine Realm.
And that smug face of his, pretending that "everything was for the good of the Tang Sect."
What good of the Tang Sect? It was all for himself.
Fine, fine. So that was how you wanted to play it?
You'd even resort to something like a binding curse, a favorability aura, just to find free labor for your lousy sect? Have you no shame?
He'd only had a few peaceful days, and now he'd stumbled into a showdown between immortals.
Lin Ciyan felt a headache coming on.
He made up his mind at once: cherish life, stay away from Tang Ya!
The best way to avoid getting dragged into this inexplicable mess and being manipulated by some petty God King was to make sure Bei Bei stayed away from this "source of trouble," too!
He felt a little bad for his childhood friend, but that was still better than everyone getting taken for a ride later.
Sigh, why was it so hard to slack off in peace?
I have to watch out for schemes from the Divine Realm. I've really worn myself out worrying about this family!
The outside world was too complicated.
My Xiyao was the best: pure and harmless, and cuddling with her even boosted my cultivation.