An Elder Sister Was Like a Mother

Disciples came and went through the Spirit Insect Cave in great numbers, several times more than at the Scripture Repository.

There were also many Dao Foundation Stage inner disciples serving as stewards of the Spirit Insect Cave.

Some came to buy spirit insects, others to sell them. It bustled like a vegetable market.

"I nurtured this Mountain Toad for thirty-six months, and it has become a Gu King. Junior brother, what price would you offer?"

"Junior sister, I promised to give you that Mid-Grade Spirit Green Poison Giant Leech for your fiftieth birthday. How could I go back on my word?"

"Not a stone less! Senior brother, you know the rules of our Spirit Insect Cave. This isn't the Yi-Wa Market!"

"It's settled, senior sister! I'm reserving the next Five-Step Purple Lizard you raise!"

The cavern was spacious. Stepping through its entrance felt like entering a public square, with cages and people everywhere and voices boiling into a din.

The original owner of his body had visited the Spirit Insect Cave only once, when he first joined the sect, before the staggering prices in spirit stones sent him fleeing.

"Fixed price. Three thousand six hundred spirit stones, and it's yours!"

"Twenty mid-grade spirit stones. That's the sect's minimum price, set by Elder Wang."

"This is good stuff, with a very pure poison vein. It should fetch thirteen mid-grade spirit stones."

Listening to the people around him quote prices for spirit insects that started in the thousands, Lin Ke silently clicked his tongue.

Spells, Spirit Artifacts, cultivation pills, and the like had never been the mainstream in the Cloud Frontier.

What cultivators of the Cloud Frontier were most passionate about was still spirit insects.

"Lin Ke?"

Just then, a puzzled voice sounded beside him.

Lin Ke stiffened.

He turned and immediately recognized the person who had called his name amid the crowd.

His senior sister!

The senior sister who had met him in the mountain forests, discovered his decent aptitude, and brought him into the Golden Wing Sect!

His senior sister had always been dignified and gracious, gentle and kind. With her fair, delicate skin and tall, slender yet shapely figure, the original owner had always felt ashamed of his own inadequacy around her.

The original owner had always felt he was unworthy of her, yet believed she had taken him in because she liked him.

But Lin Ke, with his experience and an outsider's perspective, knew that she actually treated the original owner more like her own younger brother.

The original owner had simply been too naive to understand and had mistaken that tenderness.

You silly boy. She saw you as her little brother, and you thought she was in love with you. How full of yourself... Lin Ke sighed inwardly, stepped forward, and cupped his hands. "Senior sister."

"You seem reluctant to see me?" His senior sister carried herself with gentle refinement. Her beautiful eyes fixed on Lin Ke, then flicked toward his cupped hands, and her brows drew together slightly.

"Do you really need to salute me? Why are you being so distant?"

"Senior sister, I don't know what to say..." Lin Ke lowered his hands helplessly.

He could say nothing right now. The more he said, the more mistakes he would make.

Fortunately, the original owner's cultivation had fallen to the first layer of Qi Refining, and he had been assigned to the remote Green Mulberry Garden. A change in temperament would be perfectly reasonable.

"Your temperament really has changed quite a bit." His senior sister sighed, her gaze softening. "You needn't worry too much about the Blackgold Silkworm silk. I took a post here at the Spirit Insect Cave to see whether I could find a solution to your sect assignment."

"Once I've earned some merit and received a reward from my master, I can buy a Mid-Grade Spirit spirit insect. After you refine it into your life-bound spirit insect, you'll have a chance to gain a foothold in the Sect Grand Tournament."

"Senior sister, you really don't have to do this..." Lin Ke sighed inwardly.

His senior sister did not know that Li Le was actually pulling strings behind the sect assignment, or that Li Le would send people to target him during the Sect Grand Tournament.

The heart of the matter was therefore neither the sect assignment nor the Sect Grand Tournament, but Li Le.

If Lin Ke thought he only needed to get through this month's sect assignment and the Sect Grand Tournament immediately afterward, he would merely be treating the symptoms rather than curing the disease.

There were sect assignments every month and a Sect Grand Tournament every year!

Leaving Li Le unresolved was like leaving a fly buzzing beside his ear. Sooner or later, the irritation would drive him to death.

What was more, Li Le was no fly, but a cultivator who had entered the Dao Foundation Stage several months ago, with elder parents backing him.

Of course, Lin Ke would not tell his senior sister any of this.

Telling her certain things would only add to her worries. She did not have the ability to resolve these matters.

Just as he had never told his mother about his troubles in his previous life, because it served no purpose other than making her worry.

"Did you know that Li Le has come to pressure me again..." His senior sister's crimson lips parted. "He said that if I married him, he would have a reason to ask his father, Elder Li, to transfer you out of the Green Mulberry Garden."

"Senior sister, don't agree to it," Lin Ke said with ironclad resolve. "Trust me."

As he spoke, he released a little of his aura.

His senior sister immediately cried out, "Dao Foundation?!"

Her voice was quite loud, drawing glances from those nearby. Once they saw that it was merely two Dao Foundation cultivators chatting, however, they paid no further attention.

Dao Foundation cultivators were everywhere here, while Qi Refining cultivators were rare. There was nothing to be surprised about.

After all, ordinary Qi Refining cultivators did not have that many spirit stones yet.

Even a Dao Foundation cultivator serving as a steward might not save enough in a year to buy a single spirit insect, let alone someone at the Qi Refining Stage.

His senior sister realized she had lost her composure. She glanced around, then told Lin Ke, "Come with me first."

Lin Ke had no time to refuse, so he simply followed her around the cavern's central square and toward one side.

There were many pavilions here, their carved beams and painted pillars lending them a rich, classical beauty.

There were far fewer people here, but those passing through had obscure, unfathomable auras. They were probably Dao Foundation cultivators who had reached relatively advanced realms.

His senior sister led him into one of the pavilions and entered a private room. Even after shutting the door, she did not stop until she had used her Spirit Power to activate the room's formation, isolating it from the outside.

Only then did she point to the tea table in the middle of the room. "Sit."

Hearing the complicated emotions in her voice, Lin Ke vaguely understood something.

He sat down in silence, then stared blankly at the tabletop.

"Senior, my junior brother suffered his entire life. Why did you have to possess him..."

Possess him?

Lin Ke raised his head and looked in disbelief at his senior sister, whose face was already streaming with tears. "Senior sister..."

"My junior brother's cultivation had been declining day by day. I had already wondered whether a Nascent Soul powerhouse was residing in his body and draining his Spirit Power. Now, in just a few days, you've gone from the first layer of Qi Refining straight to Foundation Establishment..."

Her eyes dimmed, and she did not even bother wiping away the tears that slid down to her chin. "Senior, since you've possessed my junior brother, you might as well kill me too. I, Zong Ya, regarded him as my own younger brother. An elder sister is like a mother. Revenge is a vain dream, so I might as well go with him..."

His senior sister, Zong Ya, had a meek disposition. Otherwise, Li Le would not have been able to press her so relentlessly over the past few years.

And so Lin Ke sighed. "Senior sister, I am Lin Ke. I swear it by the Heavenly Dao."

At those words, Zong Ya raised her head in astonishment, her gaze wavering between suspicion and uncertainty.

Lin Ke shook his head and gave the explanation he had prepared earlier. "I obtained a treasure some time ago and thought it was a high-grade Spirit Artifact, perhaps even an Origin Artifact. But when I opened it a few days ago, I discovered the soul of an Outworld Demon inside..."

It was a simple story. A young man named Lin Ke had opened a treasure, and the soul inside came from Earth.

The two souls had merged. Lin Ke had gained the Earth soul's memories, and the Spirit Power he had previously poured into the treasure had also been returned to him.

Of course, in essence, what Lin Ke said was not much different from what had actually happened.

The crucial point was that the personality of the Golden Wing Sect's Lin Ke had dissipated, while the personality now ruling the soul belonged to Earth's Lin Ke.

"To think such a wondrous realm exists in this world!"

"Junior brother, I'm so glad you're alive..."