Chapter 27: The Destined-to-be-Abandoned Good-for-Nothing (7) p1
“People can’t be pets.”
Su Mingxiu glanced at the vendor, then casually shifted her gaze back, not caring about how strange their combination appeared to others. She simply explained to Gui Mian.
The little disciple responded with a dazed “Oh” and dropped the subject. Instead, she held the turtle in front of her and naturally asked the next question, “Then how can it become my pet?”
With a wave of Su Mingxiu’s sleeve, their figures vanished from the bustling market, leaving the vendor holding the money and a group of children staring blankly in the direction they disappeared. After a long while, they seemed to come back to their senses and bowed towards that direction.
By the boundless lake outside the town.
The shimmering water reflected the sunlight, and a faint mist rose from the surface. Gui Mian squinted at the bright reflection, then suddenly saw the many fish fry that her master had bought at the market swimming out of Su Mingxiu’s long sleeve. With a series of “plop, plop” sounds, the fish returned to the vast expanse of the lake.
The little girl squatted by the lake, her hair tied up in a round bun with a red string. She never knew how to comb her hair. In the past, when Senior Sister Qiongying saw her messy hair, she would help her straighten it out. Now, always by Su Mingxiu’s side, her hairstyles changed every day.
But the child didn’t understand beauty or ugliness and never noticed the difference. She was still holding the little turtle in her hand. Seeing the vast lake, Su Mingxiu thought she would foolishly release the turtle as well. But to her surprise, the little girl was whispering farewells to the fish.
—She seemed to have instinctively developed a possessive desire for “captivity.”
Su Mingxiu raised an eyebrow, recalling Gui Mian’s previous question. She suddenly said, “Give it a name first.”
“A name?”
Gui Mian frowned. “Isn’t it called a turtle?”
“Turtle is just its species, not its name,” Su Mingxiu said, reaching out to stroke her head. “With a name, it will be different from other turtles here with you.”
But Gui Mian couldn’t think of a name for the turtle.
Su Mingxiu chuckled, a hint of amusement in her voice that the child couldn’t understand. “How about… Black Tortoise?”
Gui Mian nodded in agreement.
Su Mingxiu held her wrist and checked the circulation of spiritual energy in her body, finding it the same as before, with no trace of demonic energy. She decided not to take her back to the inn and headed straight towards the Sword Sect, planning to observe her condition on the way. If there were no problems, they could just return to the sect.
Her little disciple was exactly sixteen years old this year and had already reached Foundation Establishment. Su Mingxiu remembered that the Sword Sect and other sects would open a secret realm every few years for disciples of appropriate age and at the Foundation Establishment stage to enter. This was both to train the disciples’ abilities and to promote exchanges between sects.
Thinking about the system’s strict deadline for Gui Mian’s Foundation Establishment, Su Mingxiu could roughly guess that the opening of the secret realm was a plot point that Gui Mian, as the protagonist, had to go through. So, like a mature adult, she even took the initiative to ask the system about its next mission.
System: “…”
It couldn’t understand Su Mingxiu’s actions. It replied speechlessly, “The secret realm plot is an opportunity for the protagonist to grow and doesn’t require the host’s participation.”
Compared to its cooperative attitude in the last world, the system was now extremely guarded against her, afraid that she would learn anything about Gui Mian’s true identity.
But the Jade Elder didn’t care. She looked at her little disciple walking beside her and said suddenly, “Gui Mian, you’ve reached Foundation Establishment. When we return, you can participate in the secret realm expedition for Foundation Establishment disciples from the four major sects. I’ll give you an item. If anything happens, you can use it to contact me.”
System: [? ]
It wanted to stop her, but then it thought, since Gui Mian had successfully reached Foundation Establishment in her own way and was not far from Golden Core, even if Su Mingxiu learned about her true identity, she would still have to follow the final plot.
For this kind of curiosity within the allowed range of her character setting, it decided to turn a blind eye.
After Su Mingxiu finished speaking, the little girl didn’t respond immediately. Her lips moved slightly as if she was lost in her own world. After a while, she suddenly looked up: “Huh? Did Master just call me?”
“What were you thinking about?”
The red string hanging from the little girl’s hair bun swayed gently. It was the same material they had used to make string figures all night in that red-light district when they were catching the succubus.
As she looked up, the end of the red string brushed against her neck. Su Mingxiu suddenly noticed that her skin had become much fairer and smoother.
She didn’t know if it was because she had been eating well recently or because reaching Foundation Establishment had cleansed her body.
Gui Mian uttered a few difficult words, names of rare medicinal herbs and beasts recorded in ancient books, answering Su Mingxiu’s question: “I read a book in the sect’s library. It listed the types of food that Black Tortoises like to eat.”
“Uh…” A look of helplessness appeared in Su Mingxiu’s eyes. She stared at the turtle in Gui Mian’s hand, wanting to say that this Black Tortoise wasn’t the legendary Black Tortoise.
But thinking that since this little turtle was now with Gui Mian, it was destined to be different from other ordinary turtles. The Sword Sect’s mountain range was rich in spiritual energy, and even the grass and trees by the roadside were nourished by it.
Even if it was fed with ordinary pills, it might awaken some of its ancestral bloodline in the future—
Thinking this way, it wouldn’t hurt to raise this turtle as the legendary Black Tortoise.
So she patiently repeated what she had said before.
This time, Gui Mian carefully memorized every word, her little head nodding from time to time.
***
T/N: 玄武(Xuanwu): “Black Tortoise,” representing the north and winter in Chinese cosmology. It’s one of the Four Symbols of the Chinese constellations, alongside the Azure Dragon, White Tiger, and Vermillion Bird, each associated with a cardinal direction and season.
***
The journey back to the Sword Sect was far from peaceful.
Su Mingxiu looked at the fifth demon that appeared before them and, instead of killing it with a single sword strike, she left it with a sliver of life. Stepping on its head, she divided her Floating Duckweed sword into sixteen replicas that floated in mid-air. Her robes billowed as she lowered her eyes and asked indifferently: “Tell me, how did you find us?”
The demon only laughed, its fearful gaze fixed on Gui Mian standing beside Su Mingxiu. It said in a hoarse and unpleasant voice: “Kill… kill it… Must kill it… Monster…”
Su Mingxiu frowned slightly.
This demon was too low-level, unable to speak properly, its pronunciation strange. But its fear and malice towards Gui Mian were unmistakable.
She didn’t hesitate any longer and killed the demon with a single sword strike. But recalling the demon’s hoarse voice, she thought of something. She summoned her disciple, who was eager to charge forward and slay the demon, touched her neck with her fingertip, and asked: “There’s something I’ve never asked you.”
“Have you ever been injured here before?”
Gui Mian thought for a moment and shook her head.
The red string swayed before Su Mingxiu’s eyes again.
She sighed inwardly and decided not to ask anymore. Finding that Gui Mian’s condition was normal throughout the journey, she decided to take her back to the Sword Sect on her sword to avoid further trouble.
Just then, a strange laughter came from a secluded spot. Su Mingxiu’s expression changed. She pulled Gui Mian behind her, killing intent flashing in her dark eyes. Her divine sense instantly locked onto the source of the laughter and saw a black shadow writhing under a nearby rock.
“A word of advice for you righteous cultivators—”
“It’s best to kill your disciple now, lest you make a grave mistake and raise a tiger to trouble you.”
The person in the ink-stained robe remained silent, but the Floating Duckweed sword had already locked onto the newcomer’s location. It shot towards the black shadow silently, almost pinning it down. The shadow’s voice carried a hint of surprise: “This is… the Soul-Stabilizing Floating Duckweed Sword? Are you that Su from the Sword Sect?”
The demon had planned to ambush them from the shadows, but it sensed that the newcomer’s strength was not to be underestimated. So it tried to shake Su Mingxiu’s resolve with words before finding an opportunity to strike. Who knew it would provoke such a formidable opponent? Back when the Jade Elder of the Sword Sect roamed the world with her Floating Duckweed sword, countless demons and monsters had fallen under her blade. Later, after reaching the Great Ascension stage, she had few rivals in the nine continents.
Even though her cultivation had declined, it wasn’t something this demon could easily defeat.
It seemed like it had picked a fight it couldn’t win.
Su Mingxiu missed her attack, but her expression remained unchanged. She even seemed relaxed, and in a rare display of conversational interest, she casually replied: “Oh? It seems you have some insight into my little disciple’s identity.”
But the demon, who had just tried to provoke her, only let out a sinister chuckle. Both the cultivator and the demon knew that since they had met today, one of them was destined to stay here.
***
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