Glasses clinked and laughter rang out as the night passed.
The most beautiful things always seemed to vanish in an instant, lasting only a moment.
At least Qinghe still felt unsatisfied, secretly signaling Cui Hao to suggest another round tonight.
In last night's Monopoly game, Qinghe had basically lost more than won... actually, she hadn't won at all...
Fine, Qinghe didn't win a single game.
The punishments were entertaining, but Qinghe was the one who received most of them.
But Qinghe, if nothing else, had the spirit to accept defeat.
Though she would complain a little when rolling bad dice, she never held back when doing punishments, putting in full effort.
She was someone who could take a loss.
She was also a qualified atmosphere booster—Qinghe at least provided plenty of her own unique laughter.
Sandong also participated once.
Though she played somewhat dazedly, being the sect's mascot, people in the sect would more or less look out for this mascot.
The sect gathering came to a perfect close.
The next day, noon.
The sect's main hall.
Chu Xingchen looked sideways at Li Yingling: "I have a question I want to ask you."
"Cultivation requires a balance between work and rest."
"...Do you think that's what I wanted to ask?"
Li Yingling calmly shook her head, a cheerful smile appearing on her face:
"Naturally not. I just wanted to say that."
No wonder Master liked talking about balancing work and rest in cultivation—after reaching higher realms, saying those words really did have a certain effortless flair.
Like a top student saying—I just listen casually in class, play after school, and copy homework.
My casualness is a realm you can never climb in your lifetime.
But before Li Yingling could bask in this feeling for long, Chu Xingchen decisively raised his hand and flicked her little head.
A crisp sound—one could tell it was a fine skull.
Li Yingling quickly covered her forehead, looking at Chu Xingchen with some grievance: "Why hit me?"
Chu Xingchen replied calmly:
"Because you started speaking nonsense."
"So you speak human language, Master?" Li Yingling, lacking the dignity of a Nascent Soul cultivator, said with some grievance. "If you ask, must I not answer?"
"I also have to respect my head disciple's choices, don't I?"
"If I said I wouldn't answer, would you still ask?"
"No, I'd give you another flick to make you understand how heavy respect for one's teacher is."
Li Yingling fell silent.
If "respect for one's teacher" was described as "heavy"... it really was heavy.
She then became very sensible, her tone becoming earnest to the point of being affected:
"Please ask, Master. This disciple will surely hold nothing back."
Chu Xingchen ignored Li Yingling's slightly affected tone and pulled out a sheet of paper, writing:
[Strong Luck]
[Beautiful]
[Sharp-witted]
Li Yingling's gaze followed Chu Xingchen's brush strokes, watching her master finish writing these words, then looked up with some pride:
"Is this Master's summary of me? It's quite fitting."
Chu Xingchen didn't respond to Li Yingling's self-praise, instead asking: "If you could upgrade one of these three, which would you choose?"
Li Yingling didn't press further—perhaps fearing her master would make her feel the weight of respect again—and looked down at the three words, pondering.
First, for herself, upgrading "Beautiful" wouldn't make much difference—she was already devastatingly beautiful, and getting more beautiful was just that.
In Master's words, not cost-effective.
As for Sharp-witted...
Li Yingling asked herself, aside from Master, she hadn't yet met anyone smarter than her.
With so many fools in the sect, handling them with her current intelligence already felt like lecturing pigs.
If her sharp-wittedness improved another level, wouldn't dealing with those people feel like lecturing ants?
Never mind whether she could become smarter—she probably wouldn't be able to accept so many fools in the world.
Her gaze shifted, and Li Yingling settled on—[Strong Luck].
After all, no one would complain about having too much luck, right?
Although Li Yingling felt her luck was already quite good, but... a bit more would be even better, wouldn't it?
"If I had to choose, I think upgrading Strong Luck would be better."
Though she didn't know what use these vague things her master asked about were, Li Yingling gave her answer after serious consideration.
Chu Xingchen nodded lightly and asked again: "You're certain?"
"Is there even a need to think about it?" Li Yingling raised her head curiously. "Master, what's the point of asking this?"
"No point, just curious whether you're vain or think you're clever." Chu Xingchen shrugged. "Didn't expect you prefer dumb luck."
Li Yingling snorted: "Who doesn't like dumb luck? Many people can't even envy it—Master, you don't like it?"
Chu Xingchen stood up leisurely, preparing to walk toward the door:
"As long as you like it. Though you've reached Nascent Soul, as your master, I still need to remind you to practice diligently and scale new heights."
Li Yingling glanced at her master, feeling he was inexplicably strange today.
Could this be... Master's subtle way of keeping her in check, telling her not to get carried away?
Li Yingling looked at the paper her master had left on the table, lost in thought.
Chu Xingchen stepped outside, greeting the warm noon sunshine.
[Target: Li Yingling]
[Cultivation: Early Nascent Soul]
[Golden Tag: Cultivation Genius]
[Orange Tag: Heavenly Fortune]
[Blue Tag: Beautiful]
[Blue Tag: Sharp-witted]
[White Tag: Confident]
Though blessed with heavenly fortune, being careful in all things is never wrong. Nothing in the world is absolute—always leave room for possibility.
Chu Xingchen turned back, seeing only Li Yingling looking down at the paper on the table.
He chuckled lightly, then turned and walked away.
[Task Complete]
[Reward: Mountain and River Map placed in system space]
Chu Xingchen's casual steps paused as he silently opened the system space, looking at the so-called reward—the Mountain and River Map.
Hmm...
How to put it, this Mountain and River Map was clearly no ordinary item.
Chu Xingchen could roughly use it to track spiritual vein movements, occasionally seeing traces of subtle spiritual veins shifting.
This meant at minimum it was a reliable real-time spiritual vein map.
But this was probably just the most basic use of the Mountain and River Map—further applications would need more research.
However... this thing looked like a child had torn up a piece of paper when unhappy.
The Mountain and River Map had extremely obvious tears—many spiritual vein paths were clearly only half-drawn, cutting off at the tear points.
What was this?
A name as grand as "Mountain and River Map" when it's just a torn half-finished product?
But then—
[Main Quest Issued]
[Any disciple breaks through to Deity Transformation Realm]
[Quest Reward: Mountain and Sea Map]
Chu Xingchen instantly understood.
Mountain and Sea Map? Wrong! That was clearly—Mountain and River Map [Part Two]
Was the system really out of things to give, splitting one reward into two?
Could it be that after the Mountain and Sea Map, there'd be an Earth and Sea Map waiting for him too?
Tsk...
Li Yingling raised her head, just in time to see her master's slightly displeased and deep-looking retreating figure.
This...?
Could it be she was too smug? Or was her talent still somewhat lacking in Master's eyes?
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