Page 18

"I only just got here-" As she spoke, she spotted Qiaoqiao standing beneath a flowering tree. The girl wore a delicate apricot shade, as bright as a splash of spring sunshine, lifting the spirits of anyone who saw her.

Mu Liuyun immediately understood why he wanted her gone. She winked at Qiaoqiao, then turned into a streak of crimson and vanished into the plum grove.

Plum blossoms drifted down in flurries.

Bai Fu stood beneath a plum tree, his broad sleeves hanging low and his loose black hair cascading like a waterfall, exuding an ethereal, immortal grace.

"Qiaoqiao."

"Master." Qiaoqiao walked up to him and said quietly, "I don't want to be expelled from the sect."

Her voice was light and soft, with a trace of grievance.

Bai Fu's expression shifted slightly. His little disciple was as adept at acting spoiled as ever. The pale-yellow ribbons tying her hair hung beside her shoulders, looking just as light and soft as she did.

Why did an emissary of justice have to take exams, too?

I couldn't bear to leave Ethereal Peak, my senior brothers and sisters, A Xue, or Elder Ning...

Bai Fu waited for a long while.

His little disciple's thoughts sounded as though she had forgotten someone.

The temperature around the Immortal Venerable gradually dropped.

I couldn't bear to leave Master, either!

If only there were a secret to passing every exam!

The flowering branches swayed gently, and the temperature rose again.

"A secret to passing every exam-"

Qiaoqiao: How did Master know what she was thinking!

She looked up. Master's gaze was gentle as he looked at her, seemingly holding a smile.

"What is it?" she asked eagerly, her heart clawing and scratching with the urge to know the answer.

Yet Master kept her guessing. "Go find your third senior sister. She'll tell you."

Could Master have given the secret to Third Senior Sister?

What exactly was the secret?

Listening to her endless muttering, Bai Fu could not help curling his lips into a smile. He stepped forward and, with something close to restraint, gently patted the girl on the crown of her head.

"Don't worry. On the day of the trial, I'll be there, too."

A delicate plum fragrance drifted into her nose. A little dazed, Qiaoqiao raised her head to gaze at her handsome master, only to see his departing back. The gentle touch on her head seemed to linger.

Two branches of white plum blossoms swayed beside the window. The wind had risen on the mountaintop.

After leaving the Fallen Plum Blossom Abode, Qiaoqiao immediately hurried toward her third senior sister's residence.

She had not gone far when she saw two female cultivators approaching. The one on the left was somewhat shorter, her hair covered in pearls and jade ornaments and her clothes lavish.

The woman beside her was tall and slender, with a jade complexion as lovely as a hibiscus and shimmering eyes like autumn waters-a great beauty with a gentle, gracious air.

"Third Senior Sister!"

Qiaoqiao's eyes lit up at the sight of her. I hadn't seen Third Senior Sister for a while, and she'd gotten even prettier!

Her third senior sister, Wen Zhi, curved her lips slightly. Qiaoqiao was still so adorable. Before she could speak, she heard her say again, Huh, the one beside her looked a little familiar... I remembered!

Wasn't she the black-hearted bestie who said my senior sister's pills were poorly made while secretly selling her spiritual pills for ten times the price?

Wen Zhi's smile instantly froze on her face.

The female cultivator whom Qiaoqiao called a black-hearted bestie was Fairy Peilan, the junior sister of Moonlight Peak's Peak Master. Moonlight Peak was the foremost peak of the Flowing Cloud Sect.

This fairy's cultivation was unremarkable, as was her standing on Moonlight Peak, yet she was Wen Zhi's only friend.

At those words, towering waves surged through Third Senior Sister's heart.

Peilan was her best friend. Though she belonged to a higher generation, she was willing to associate with Wen Zhi as an equal. They had known each other for a hundred years and shared a deep bond. How could she be the black-hearted bestie Qiaoqiao spoke of?

Immortal Venerable Wanghan had five disciples in total. Aside from his eldest disciple, Shen Ji, and Qiaoqiao, who had no presence whatsoever, the others were all "oddballs" in everyone's eyes, and none had much of a reputation.

Third Senior Sister Wen Zhi was outwardly a sword cultivator but was actually a pill cultivator. She spent all day absorbed in pill refining and liked researching all sorts of bizarre pills, such as the Yawning Pill, which made someone yawn a hundred times within the time it took an incense stick to burn, and the Fragrance and Stench Pill, which reversed pleasant and foul smells after being swallowed...

When Wen Zhi of Ethereal Peak came up, the disciples' impressions were always "a weirdo," "bad-tempered and a loner," and "always refining rubbish pills nobody wanted"...

In Qiaoqiao's heart, Third Senior Sister was clearly a gentle, approachable beauty and a pill-refining genius. In the past, she had not understood why disciples from other peaks saw her that way. In her dream, she had seen it-it was all because of this Fairy Peilan!

As she recalled the events in her dream, she could not help ranting.

Aaaah, this made me so mad!

How could someone be so awful!

Peilan pretended to be close to Third Senior Sister, but secretly envied her talent for pill refining. Every time Third Senior Sister refined a batch of pills, she would shower her with praise that concealed put-downs, saying that although Senior Sister's pill-refining techniques were brilliant, the pills had no practical use and no one thought anything of them. Only she appreciated these useless pills.

She coaxed Senior Sister into practically giving the pills away to her, then claimed they were the work of some master pill refiner and sold them for ten times the price.

She'd already made nearly a million Spirit Stones reselling Senior Sister's pills! Her pots and bowls were practically overflowing with profits, and she was living a ridiculously comfortable life!

As she listened to her little junior sister's thoughts, Wen Zhi's expression gradually changed.

Peilan had actually been secretly reselling her pills?

Hadn't she said she had helped look for buyers, but no one wanted those pills and they simply wouldn't sell?

She'd gotten filthy rich sucking Third Senior Sister's blood! Now, whenever she went to spend money at the Golden Tower, she even ordered two male courtesans!

Hmm?

Speaking of which, was the Golden Tower that legendary place where breathtakingly beautiful male cultivators gathered? Qiaoqiao suddenly paused. I really wanted to go have a look, too... I wanted to order ten!

Wen Zhi: ?

Little Junior Sister, that wasn't very appropriate, was it?

Qiaoqiao lowered her head to look at her Storage Bag. It was flat, and the corners of her mouth drooped along with it.

Wen Zhi could hardly suppress a smile. Perhaps her little junior sister was only imagining it?

I was just as poor as Third Senior Sister. Senior Sister scrimped and saved to gather all her pill-refining ingredients, and the enchanted robes she wore were styles from ten years ago. A single spiritual hairpin of Fairy Peilan's cost fifty thousand Spirit Stones!

Senior Sister was so pitiful!