The Thrill Was Maxed Out

The morning sun spilled over the two spirit fields halfway up the mountain.

A faint mist permeated the spirit fields, where a hint of green had already begun to sprout.

Li Muyang stood on the ridge, yawning as he held a watering dipper and cast the Cloud and Rain Art.

Having practiced until the small hours of the night before waking up early to work, Li Muyang looked somewhat exhausted.

Yet, his eyes were quite spirited.

He hadn't risen so early out of diligence, but rather because he was too excited to sleep after mastering a genuine demonic technique.

After half a night of arduous practice, he had finally mastered the Residual Cloud Movement Technique.

He had drifted off into a hazy sleep twice in the latter half of the night, but Li Muyang woke up again as soon as the sky turned bright.

Unable to fall back asleep, he simply got up early to water the spirit fields.

Li Muyang appeared unchanged, but once he activated the Residual Cloud Movement Technique, faint demonic patterns would vaguely emerge on his skin.

Bolstered by these eerie demonic patterns, Li Muyang's speed was terrifying.

If he ran at full tilt, he could even leave a trail of afterimages behind him.

With such speed, there were few in the Outer Sect who could catch him.

Hiding such a trump card, Li Muyang wouldn't say he could walk sideways through the Outer Sect, but at the very least, he would definitely be the first to slip away if anything happened.

Humming a cheerful tune while wielding the watering dipper to cast the Cloud and Rain Art, Li Muyang quickly finished his morning watering chores.

The next watering session would have to wait until the afternoon.

Looking at the faint spiritual mist swirling in the fields, Li Muyang tossed the dipper aside and sat on the ridge to rest.

The old tree growing on the ridge had become an old companion to Li Muyang.

He leaned his back against the trunk, sat in the shade, and closed his eyes as he felt the morning mountain breeze brush against his face.

Game with Fairies, initiate!

Inside the dimly lit stilt house, Li Muyang opened his eyes.

The little girl on the bamboo bed closed her eyes, having just fallen asleep.

In Li Muyang's field of vision, the choices for tonight appeared.

[I'm so sleepy... I'm going to sleep too, I'll ask about the monster tomorrow.]

[The monster that appeared in my dream... I seem to have heard of such things before. I can't sleep; it would be terrible if the monster appeared while I was asleep.]

As Li Muyang unlocked information about the assassin, the text for the choices before sleep had also changed.

Naturally, Li Muyang chose the second option.

Following this, the light in the room shifted rapidly, and the time within the game sped by as if a fast-forward button had been pressed.

The moonlight spilling through the window drifted away and vanished.

Finally, the first rays of the morning sun illuminated the mountains, and the sound of a rooster crowing echoed through the village.

In just over ten seconds, the entire village had fast-forwarded from the dead of night to daybreak.

"Cock-a-doodle-doo!!!"

As the rooster crowed, the village, which had been quiet all night, soon stirred with activity.

The little girl sleeping on the bamboo bed also rubbed her eyes and sat up.

"Big Brother, good morning."

The little girl greeted him obediently.

Two options appeared in Li Muyang's field of vision.

[(Ask her about the monster)]

[(Tell her to go wash up and prepare breakfast for her)]

Li Muyang naturally chose the second one.

Now that he had finally raised her favorability, he naturally had to keep maintaining it.

This little girl actually thought he was a decent person... so he couldn't let his persona collapse; he couldn't be too impatient.

Li Muyang stood up to let the little girl go wash, then opened the door of the stilt house, went out to the kitchen, and started a fire to boil porridge.

When Li Muyang returned to the stilt house with a bowl of steaming white porridge, the little girl asked timidly.

"Big Brother, didn't you sleep last night?"

The little girl looked curious, yet somewhat concerned: "There are so many bloodshot veins in your eyes."

Li Muyang looked at the favorability bar in the top right corner of his vision... it was still 25, no increase.

But this was indeed the first time Little Wild Grass had shown concern for him not sleeping after so many failures.

Li Muyang handed the hot porridge to the little girl and said, "Eat first. After you finish, let's talk about that monster of yours."

"I didn't dare sleep last night, fearing that the monster might come out to kill while we were asleep."

Li Muyang's words made the little girl shrink her neck.

"N-no way, right?" The little girl looked around guiltily and said, "There are so many powerful people in the stronghold; that monster wouldn't dare come in."

Li Muyang looked at the naive little girl and bared his teeth in a smile that didn't reach his eyes.

"Eat, let's eat. We'll talk after we're done."

Whether that monster dares to come in or not... as the unlucky guy who has been killed hundreds of times, don't I know that best!

Soon, the two of them finished the white porridge in their bowls one after the other.

After finishing her meal, the little girl wiped her mouth and took the initiative to speak.

"That monster appeared after I was caught by human traffickers and we passed by a potter's field in Yazhou County."

"It often appears in my dreams. It has two exceptionally thin, long legs, and when it stands up, it's taller than the walls by the roadside. It wears the kind of theatrical costumes only actors on stage wear, and its face is painted with something stark white."

"It has a total of seven arms and two mouths."

"It can't speak human language. As soon as it opens its mouth, it makes a screeching, grating sound that gives people a headache."

"The first time it appeared was at night. It suddenly jumped out of the woods by the road to grab me, but it was driven away by a human trafficker using a red rod."

"After that, it didn't dare appear in front of the traffickers anymore, but it often ran into my dreams to chase me."

"After I told the traffickers, they hired a shaman to look at me, but it was useless. The monster still appeared, though it rarely chased me anymore."

"Most of the time, it just stands far away in the woods watching me, and no matter how I run through the woods, I can't shake it off."

As the little girl spoke, she shrank her neck again, seemingly stirred by the terrifying memories.

She looked at Li Muyang cautiously and said, "The traffickers are gone now, but I didn't dream of it when I slept last night."

"It might have left, or it might still be waiting outside."

"So, big brother, we can't leave the stronghold for now. I'm afraid that monster is waiting for us outside..."

The little girl laid out all the information she knew.

Li Muyang, however, felt his scalp tingle.

This thing... he had originally thought it was a danger within the stronghold, but judging from the little girl's story, she had clearly provoked some kind of unclean entity on the road.

Just hearing about it was incredibly chilling.

The flavor of folk horror was dialed up to the max.

As someone who was afraid of ghosts, Li Muyang was currently thankful that this raising-sim game was an interactive galgame and didn't require him to fight in person.

Otherwise, fighting something this eerie and sinister... it would be a Sanity Loss!

Two options appeared in Li Muyang's field of vision.

[Let's go find Granny Gu in the stronghold; she specializes in dealing with these kinds of things.]

[Let's go find Steward Wu and ask him what to do.]

Great! This was a brand-new plotline that had never been triggered before!

It seemed there was finally a way to deal with this monster.

Li Muyang stood up immediately and chose the first option.

"Let's go find Granny Gu; she is an expert at exorcising evil."