Diary Upload Failed? Cao Ying: Give Me the Pen

"Qingzhou said he wanted to go to Jia Nan Academy," Ye Zhengqing said again, thinking, I knew it.

"Nonsense!" Ye Zhong slapped the table and sprang to his feet. "Jia Nan Academy is good, but it can't compare with the Pill Tower."

"With the Ye Clan putting all its efforts into nurturing him, he's sure to study in Sacred Pill City in a year and pass the assessment to become a core disciple of the Pill Tower two years later. Why waste time going to Jia Nan Academy?"

"What kind of clan head are you, if you can't even handle this little matter? Go and bring him here at once. I'll talk to him myself."

Ye Zhengqing lowered his head. "First Elder, it's already past the middle of the hour of the rat. Qingzhou has gone to bed."

"Then first thing tomorrow morning." Ye Zhong's beard and hair flew. "I'll go and talk to him myself. It'll be a good chance to check on his and Xin Lan's cultivation."

"Yes, First Elder," Ye Zhengqing replied. "If you go yourself, you'll surely be able to talk him out of it."

"Mm." Ye Zhong frowned slightly. "Zhengqing, here in my room, you're still calling me First Elder. Do you have a grievance with me as your father? Are you trying to get under my skin on purpose?"

Ye Zhengqing: "..."

Father, if you want to beat me, just say so. Why bother coming up with an excuse full of holes like that!?

Meanwhile, inside the reinforced training room in Lingxi Courtyard.

Ye Qingzhou was claiming the rewards corresponding to today's diary entries.

Cultivation experience for the Crimson Flame Bodhi Scripture surfaced, and he successfully reached the proficient level. At this rate, he would reach perfection in a month. Then he could enter a meditative state and begin cultivating with a hand seal, maximizing its effect on his cultivation.

His experience with the Fire Python Heavenly Dance Spear Technique increased, as did his experience with the several Dou Techniques he had just begun practicing.

His cultivation also improved noticeably, helping him break straight through a minor bottleneck to reach Two-Star Dou Ling.

His control over the Dark Wood Flame improved, and his alchemy made noticeable progress.

Perhaps before long, he could attempt to refine a Fifth-grade Pill.

Xiao Yan had refined a Fifth-grade Pill when he entered the Inner Academy as a Da Dou Shi. Ye Qingzhou was a Dou Ling, cultivated a High Xuan Tier Cultivation Technique, and had the Purifying Lotus Demon Flame to help him. He lacked none of the hardware.

"Nice. I'm in a good mood today, so I'll write a little more."

With a thought, Ye Qingzhou summoned his diary and began writing.

For the past seven days, he had unfailingly updated ten chapters a day, without writing any related book reviews.

So far, the story had reached the point where Xiao Yan left Wutan City for Qingshan Town.

["Nalan Yanran"... "the hidden force of Eight Extremes Collapse"... "Blood Lotus Essence"... "Xiao Yi Xian"...]

Ye Qingzhou wrote more than a dozen chapters in one sitting, stopping after Xiao Yan and Xiao Yi Xian teamed up to explore a cave and unexpectedly discovered something good. Then he chose to upload them.

After doing all that, he stretched and prepared to resume cultivating.

But in the next moment, a message came from the diary.

[Content from "Nalan Yanran" to "the hidden force of Eight Extremes Collapse" uploaded successfully. "Sister Xuelian" and the subsequent content are inaccurate; upload failed.]

"Failed!?"

Ye Qingzhou froze for a moment, but instead of being alarmed, he was delighted.

The successful upload meant Xiao Yan had not yet experienced those events.

In other words, he had managed to figure out the current point in the so-called plot.

Originally, he had estimated it using Ye Xinlan's age and other information he had learned indirectly, such as Cao Ying's age and the date of the next Five Great Clans assessment. He had guessed that Xiao Yan had yet to study at Jia Nan Academy and was still at the stage of growing stronger for the Three-Year Agreement, but he had been unable to determine the exact point in the timeline.

"A small portion uploaded successfully, while most of it failed."

"In other words, Xiao Yan has just left Wutan City and is on his way to Qingshan Town, but he hasn't arrived yet or stumbled upon the Blood Lotus Essence."

"That means there should be a year and a half left until the Three-Year Agreement. Xiao Yan is sixteen and a half now, about half a year older than me."

Ye Qingzhou fell into thought, untroubled by the failed upload.

After pondering for a while, Ye Qingzhou turned his attention back to the diary.

"As for my own affairs, as a proper improper person, if I can avoid writing about them, I will."

"But the diary requires everything recorded in it to be true."

"So, I need to test my idea."

Ye Qingzhou knew that sooner or later he would be unable to write about Xiao Yan, and he had already prepared several backup plans.

Now he was ready to try the first one.

Meanwhile.

Inside the Little Pill Tower in the Central Plains.

Cao Ying hummed an unfamiliar tune as she looked through the diary, passing judgment from time to time.

"Xiao Yan's former fiancée, Nalan Yanran."

"Nalan Yanran's father and grandfather have a pretty clear head on their shoulders."

"Huh? At first that sounds right, but it's actually completely irresponsible."

A trace of disdain appeared in Cao Ying's eyes.

The diary mentioned that Nalan Yanran's father, Nalan Su, had brought news of Xiao Yan and asked Nalan Yanran to go apologize and ease relations. Nalan Yanran had refused, saying, "It's my own business. What gives Grandfather and you the right to decide it? Why doesn't Grandfather go and marry him himself? What gives you the right to decide my marriage and my future?"

That sounded right. Cao Ying didn't want her elders making arbitrary decisions about her life either.

But there were serious problems with the way Nalan Yanran had handled the matter and with her attitude.

You were born into the Nalan Family. While others struggled to survive, you lived in brocade robes and ate the finest food.

For resources, ordinary people either became mercenaries and fought for their lives or worked as guards and attendants. You had never lacked pills since childhood, and someone taught you cultivation hand in hand.

Others had to save up resources for a long time just to obtain an ordinary Yellow Tier Cultivation Technique, but you could cultivate a Xuan Tier Cultivation Technique from the start.

You could even become the disciple of Yun Yun, a Dou Emperor of the Jia Ma Empire. Your considerable talent played a part, but it was also because of your family.

If you weren't a member of the Nalan Family, unless your talent was exceptionally dazzling, you wouldn't even have had a chance to demonstrate it before Yun Yun.

Having enjoyed so many benefits from your family, it was only natural that you should give something back, even make sacrifices, when the family needed you to.

A family was no charity hall. The law of the strong preying on the weak applied even within a family, and everyone was competing.

"The Nalan Family arranged a marriage alliance for you. Whatever their reasons, in the end, it was to befriend the Xiao Clan."

"Yet you marched right up to their door with great fanfare to break off the engagement, and went out of your way to show your disdain in their ancestral hall."

"An attempt to befriend them turned straight into enmity. If things go badly, it could become a blood feud."

"Once word gets out, I'm afraid the Nalan Family's name will stink in the streets."

"Where does that leave the Nalan Family and Nalan Jie?"

"That Yun Yun is an idiot too, actually letting Nalan Yanran do such a thing."

"If I were you, I'd at least give the Nalan Family resources first, as though buying this disciple from them."

"And any pressure should have been put on the Nalan Family, letting them approach the Xiao Clan and privately settle the broken engagement and compensation."

"If Xiao Yan remained a good-for-nothing, would the Xiao Clan really have let him marry Nalan Yanran and risk offending the Nalan Family and the Misty Cloud Sect?"

"Self-righteous, selfish, and stupid beyond saving."

"..."

When reading storybooks, Cao Ying liked to put herself in the protagonist's shoes, but thanks to her powerful soul force, she could always analyze things calmly and objectively.

She thought she was better suited to writing book reviews than the diary's owner, and would surely hit the nail on the head.

Cao Ying continued reading.

The very next moment, she was dumbfounded!

"The Light Boat Has Passed Ten Thousand Mountains, what are you doing!?"