Xiao Mian was pushed back a step by his own sword energy, and his back collided with Leng Mushi who was caught off guard. Leng Mushi's nose suddenly felt sore and rushed straight to her head, and tears instantly flowed down.
In a battle of spiritual consciousness, if one side is injured to a certain limit, it will be automatically judged as the loser. Xiao Mian was injured by his own sword energy and spat out blood, with his entire front lapel covered in blood red.
He knelt with his back to Leng Mushi, the Shuiyun Sword in his hand propped on the ground, buzzing with grief because he had accidentally injured its owner.
Leng Mushi realized what had happened and didn't know how to describe her feelings. Xiao Mian was... why did he do that
She raised her hand slowly, not knowing what she was going to do, but just as her hand was about to touch Xiao Mian's shoulder, the world suddenly spun around, and she was bounced off the opposite platform and returned to the trance formation.
The consciousness of both sides returned to their bodies and the battle was over. The disciples of the Punishment Hall had already been waiting outside the two trance formations in the chaos. Leng Mushi and Xiao Mian were taken away as soon as they went out.
Amid the loud discussions of the disciples, Leng Mushi and Xiao Mian were taken towards the Punishment Hall.
Xiao Mian's consciousness was injured, although his body was not seriously injured, but his face was pale. He was held down by the disciples of the Punishment Hall and followed behind Leng Mushi, with his eyes lowered, looking very fragile.
Leng Mushi looked back at him several times. For some reason, she always felt that he looked inexplicably familiar.
It seemed like she had seen it many times before. She even knew that Xiao Mian was biting his cheek at this moment...
Leng Mushi shook his head at this absurd feeling. All the disciples of the Punishment Hall were highly skilled and impartial. They carried low-level disciples like Leng Mushi like they were carrying a cloth bag. On the way from the square of the Jisheng Hall to the Punishment Hall, Leng Mushi's toes touched the ground only a few times.
Compared with other halls, the Punishment Hall seemed very solemn and exceptionally cold. Leng Mushi knelt in the hall, and the cool air coming from her knees penetrated directly into the gaps between her bones.
Kneeling beside her was Xiao Mian, who had his head down but his back straight. You Zishu had already taken the elixir and was sober. He was standing not far away from the two of them, with his usual deadpan expression. No intense emotions could be seen, but his hands were clenched tightly in his sleeves and the snow spirit at his waist was trembling slightly, confirming that his master was on the verge of an explosion and collapse.
There were three immortals sitting at the top of the hall. In the middle was the sect leader Zhengping, on the left was the fifth elder Tianxuzi, and on the right was the sixth elder Quyang Xianzun.
Leng Mushi observed Xiao Mian out of the corner of her eye. Now the matter had become a bit of a big deal, and her master Hua Yanyue had passed away again. There was no one to support her, so she could only rely on herself.
Most of the time after her mother's death, whether she made a mistake or just went out drinking with friends, Leng Mushi would kneel like this when facing her father's questioning. With a stubborn and hurt attitude, she lowered her head and listened to her father's scolding, feeling her heart grow colder.
So with the current situation, Leng Mushi is actually what Fan Chen described as a veteran.
Excessive sadness is not conducive to physical development. She is good at using many happy things to drive away the haze that follows her like a shadow. Today’s incident has made such a big fuss, but she is not afraid at all. Since Hua Yanyue is not here, even the head of the sect, Zhengping, has no right to expel her from the sect.
The only reason why Leng Mushi felt a little panicked now was that she had dragged Xiao Mian down.
It was certainly not her fault that the incident got so out of hand, but people like Xiao Mian and You Zishu, who were gifted with talent, had never encountered such an embarrassing situation of being personally judged by their elders, so they must have been extremely shocked.
Leng Mushi secretly decided that after this time, no matter what temptation the law gave her, she would never provoke Xiao Mian again.
But at this moment, she withdrew her attention from Xiao Mian and turned her head to look at You Zishu who was standing not far away. While the three people at the top were still pondering about releasing their pressure, she raised her hand and pointed at You Zishu and said, "He is the culprit, why don't you kneel!"
Leng Mushi raised her head to meet the stern gazes of the three immortals, and said as if she had suddenly realized something: "Oh, so disciples of the head of the Taichu Sect have special privileges."
As soon as she finished speaking, the hall became so quiet that one could hear a pin drop. You Zishu turned his head in shock and looked at Leng Mushi. He had never seen such a bold and shameless person like her in his life. She disrupted the disciples' preliminary examination and dared to talk nonsense here!
Sect Leader Zhengping glanced at Leng Mushi and said, "Zi Shu, you speak."
You Zishu bowed slightly and was about to speak when Leng Mushi continued, "This all happened because You Zishu wanted to snatch the jade pendant my master gave me. But why didn't he, the culprit, kneel down and even speak up to defend himself? Could it be that as the head disciple, he can arbitrarily distort right and wrong? It seems that there is no justice in this Punishment Hall."
"You are looking for death!" You Zishu could no longer bear it, and Xueling drew his sword with a clang, with the tip of the sword pointing directly at Leng Mushi.
The disciples standing in the Punishment Hall also glared angrily.
Any one of the three immortals at the top could kill Leng Mushi with a single blow. Such disrespect shown by a disciple to an immortal had never happened in the Taichu Sect before.
However, Leng Mushi was the disciple of the second elder Hua Yanyue, and after so many years, the second elder accepted her.
Each of the two disciples was like a rare treasure, and no one dared to touch them easily.
But it was naturally impossible to let her be so presumptuous, so the Fifth Elder Tianxuzi's pressure suddenly dissipated, and the disciples with lower cultivation in the hall all felt a sweetness in their throats. Leng Mushi, who had the lowest cultivation, fell directly to the ground without being able to lift up his head, and vomited blood.
When the pressure faded, they thought Leng Mushi would behave himself, but Leng Mushi looked at Tianxuzi and asked him, "I wonder why the Fifth Elder is showing off so much?"
A good-natured pressure was said to be a show of power. The fifth elder was an old man with a kind-looking face, an immortal look, snow-white hair and a beard.
Hearing this, his beard twitched, and he looked at Leng Mushi, and said in a low voice: "The Punishment Hall is not a place for you to talk nonsense! You are disrespectful to your elders, and you, such a lowly disciple, should be punished!"
Leng Mushi felt an itch in her throat, but for some reason, after vomiting out the blood, she felt relieved.
She looked at Tianxuzi, the living ancestor whom she had only met once since she entered the mountain. He once again raised his blood-stained red lips in an evil smile, his eyes shining brightly, and his appearance was exactly the same as Hua Yanyue's in the past.
The three immortals all trembled in their hearts when they saw this.
"I told the truth, but the elders said I was talking nonsense. I insisted on listening to the one-sided words of the culprit and was not allowed to make excuses. Otherwise, it would be disrespectful and I would be punished..."
Leng Mushi licked her lips and was grabbed by Xiao Mian's arm. Xiao Mian wanted her to stop talking, but Leng Mushi broke free and said, "I'm afraid that even the private prison of the mortal emperor is not necessarily so arbitrary... Ha, the Taichu Mountain Punishment Hall says that low-level disciples are not allowed to speak up to defend themselves after entering the door. I don't understand. The immortals can punish me unjustly. When my master comes back, I will ask her to expel a bastard disciple like me from the sect."
After Leng Mushi finished speaking, the hall fell silent again. You Zishu's Snow Spirit Sword was still pointed at Leng Mushi, but the three immortals at the top all made Leng Mushi angry.
The fifth elder spoke again: "You are one of my people. You spoke rudely in the Punishment Hall. You..."
"Fifth Elder," Leng Mushi interrupted him directly, "I have no master-disciple relationship with you, and I have never met you in private.
"It has been four months since I entered the mountain gate, and until I became Master's disciple, no one helped me. At the beginning, it was indeed the elders who sent people to take Leng Tianyin and me into the mountain gate, but Taichu Mountain is recruiting disciples from all over the world. Even if no one accepts, can't I come by myself?"
"Until now, Elder, you claim to be a member of my tribe, and you have put pressure on me, not allowing me to defend myself against my grievances... Do you think I should acknowledge you as my living ancestor or not?"
The Fifth Elder was so angry that his face turned red and his beard was shaking as if it was about to fly away. Leng Mushi knelt in the hall with his back straight, his neck stiff, looking at the three leading immortals, his chest stained with blood, but he refused to give in.
The head of the sect, Zhengping, finally spoke: "Since you keep saying that you are wronged, then tell me."
Leng Mushi pointed at You Zishu and said, "Before I say anything, he should kneel down. As the eldest disciple of the sect's respected elder, he should be a role model for the sect. Now, in the Punishment Hall, he is pointing his sword at my vital point. This is enough to show how arrogant and unrestrained he is in private, relying on his status."
You Zishu has always been a dull and upright person, never doing anything beyond the line, let alone being unbridled and unrestrained.
But people's words are as sharp as swords. Even if Leng Mushi is the only one who said them, it is enough to make Zhengping recall You Zishu's style of doing things.
Zhengping's gaze lightly swept over You Zishu, who immediately sheathed his sword and knelt on the ground with a plop.
His face was red, and he and the five elders at the top were like a pair of burning charcoal. Leng Mushi sighed slightly, and then said: "It was You Zishu who ignored the distinction between men and women and dragged me into the grove for no reason. He also said with certainty that he was instructed by you, the Immortal Master, to take away the jade pendant given to me by my master."
Leng Mushi put the headmaster Zhengping on the fire and roasted him: "You should know that I have worn this jade pendant for three months since I came here. My master gave it to me on the first day of my membership. It is the key that allows me to enter the Cangshengyuan barrier at will."
Leng Mushi said: "I asked You Zishu why, but he didn't explain and came to rob. Immortal, there are so many rare and precious elixirs in the Cangsheng Courtyard, and so many wild and untamed demons and beasts. What kind of situation will it cause if they are accidentally released? Why do I need to explain it to you?"
“When Master left last night, she told me to take good care of Cangshengyuan, and said that if there is anything, I can come to see the head immortal. Master said that she had already told the immortal last night…” Leng Mushi pinched herself as if she was familiar with it when she said this, and tears suddenly burst out.
The girl's sobbing sound was like ringing in people's ears in this silent hall. Leng Mushi sobbed deliberately: "Of course... I naturally don't believe that Master has just left and you, Immortal Master, will ask your disciple to take the key jade pendant of my Cangshengyuan. Of course I won't give it to him."
Leng Mushi said: "But I... Woohoo, I can't beat him, what can I do? Fortunately, my master left me a lot of elixirs, I took the opportunity to feed him, and he almost pierced my heart with the Snow Spirit Sword..."
Leng Mushi's eyes were red from crying. She looked up and asked the headmaster Zhengping innocently and cruelly, "Did you really ask me to snatch the jade pendant when my master just left? Then why didn't you want it when you met my master last night?"
There are many ways to say this. If the headmaster admits it, it will prove that he has bad intentions and condones his disciples to bully his fellow disciples. How shameless he is.
Furthermore, Leng Mushi had no idea what the elder's jade pendant was used for from what she said, so You Zishu was indeed rash in handling this matter.
Zheng Ping was in a dilemma, but Leng Mushi gave him a way out at the right time: "I know the Immortal Master will never do this. Maybe Senior Brother just misheard and was anxious. So when the drug took effect, I panicked and wanted to take him to a quiet place to feed him the antidote."
Leng Mushi started to act pitiful and called back Senior Brother You Zishu.
Leng Mushi paused and looked at Xiao Mian: "Senior Brother Xiao happened to follow me at this time. He followed me because he saw that the eldest brother pulled me against my will before, and he was worried. Senior Brother Xiao cares about me."
"But as luck would have it, Senior Brother Xiao saw me dragging Senior Brother along, and asked us what we were doing. I was so flustered that I couldn't explain clearly, and Senior Brother Xiao thought I was killing my fellow disciples, so he picked up his sword and chased me."
Finally, she added: "During the battle, I explained everything to Senior Brother Xiao. Senior Brother Xiao couldn't stop in time, so he blocked for me and got injured."
"Master," Leng Mushi said, "this matter was just a misunderstanding from the beginning to the end."
Leng Mushi described the whole incident in a way that mixed truth with falsehood, avoided the important issues, and distorted the facts.
You Zishu was speechless. There was no way he could say what Leng Mushi had said to him, and it was even more impossible for Xiao Mian to say what Leng Mushi had done to her. Sect Leader Zhengping also could not admit that it was he who nodded to You Zishu to ask for the jade pendant.
So under such a multi-faceted secret, no matter how absurd this description is, it has to be true.
Soul searching can reveal the truth, but is Zhengping shameless
How does he explain that he allowed his disciples to snatch the second elder’s jade pendant
Are the chosen ones like You Zishu and Xiao Mian shameless
Everyone wants it, so in the end, this matter can only be judged as a misunderstanding.
In the end, Leng Mushi and Xiao Mian were punished to clean the stone steps because they disrupted the initial examination of the new disciples.
As for You Zishu, he was punished to clean the entire forbidden area in the back mountain by himself, and was not allowed to take his disciples out for training within three months.
For You Zishu, this was the first time in his life and it was also an extremely severe punishment. He simply isolated himself and never came out after entering the forbidden area.
Leng Mushi and Xiao Mian would clean the stone steps every day during the students' get out of class time. It was a very embarrassing punishment in public.
But this level of embarrassment is nothing to Leng Mushi.
She just swept the house with a broom every day, thinking that three months would be enough. After all, the grass and trees on both sides of the stone steps in the mountains were lush and green all year round, there were not even any fallen leaves, and there was nothing to sweep.
But after just a few days, she was shocked to find that the originally lush green plants were rapidly withering and dying.
The stone steps were covered with dense dead leaves overnight. Now it is February on earth, a time when all things are preparing to revive, but the grass and trees on Taichu Mountain have just withered.
Leng Mushi and Zhu Rong found out that there was a cleaning formation on Taichu Mountain. Every year at this time the cleaning formation was activated, and there was not a single dead leaf on the long steps.
However, the punishment she and Xiao Mian received was specifically announced to the entire sect, so the clearing formation was not opened, just to make them suffer.
Leng Mushi had to get up early and go to bed late. She was busy all day and night. The law did what it promised. Therefore, Leng Mushi had to refine medicine every day, cleanse her spiritual roots at night, record the reactions of the drugs, be blown up by the alchemy furnace, and raise demons and beasts.
Every morning before dawn, the disciples would sweep the stone steps before class, and every night before get out of class was over, the disciples would sweep the stone steps again.
She and Xiao Mian divided the work and each of them covered the upper and lower parts. She started from Feihe Courtyard and Xiao Mian started from Feihe Courtyard. However, gradually, her scope began to move upwards, and Xiao Mian would help her with more work every day.
Sometimes it’s a few steps away, sometimes even just a few stone steps.
Leng Mushi was in a very complicated mood. During the more than twenty days when she had not seen the sun, food boxes appeared on the dividing stone steps several times.
Leng Mushi opened it once and found that the amount inside was just enough to fill her up. It was obvious who had done this.
Leng Mushi just looked at him and didn't move.
Because every time she placed a storage bag on the stone steps, it was filled with various rare elixirs, as well as the low-level pills for daily use that she made herself, and several bundles of magic spider silk for connecting the meridians. Xiao Mian never touched it.
They interacted in a strange way, where they didn't know each other but secretly gave each other warmth.
Like two clams living deep in the sea, they occasionally open their mouths to spit out a pearl at each other, and then immediately retract their mouths.
Leng Tianyin wanted to catch Leng Mushi's trace every day, but unfortunately Leng Mushi got up earlier than the chickens and went to bed later than the dogs, and was so busy that Leng Tianyin couldn't catch any trace of her. She could only hear about her sister's romantic affairs from the discussions of her fellow disciples, and she would always quarrel with them because she was not convinced.
After Leng Mushi's laws helped her to cleanse her spiritual roots, she had advanced from the lower star level to the middle star level.
For a new disciple, this was a breakthrough like a rocket in just a few months.
Even for someone as gifted as Xiao Mian, who had pure water spiritual roots, it took him eight years to advance from the initial stage to the upper level of Star-weight realm, and only in recent months has he entered the extreme level of Star-weight realm. Moreover, every time he advanced to a higher level over the years, the sect attached great importance to it, with continuous rewards and resources, and Tianxuzi also showed off his little disciple to everyone he met.
Leng Mushi advanced to the middle level of the Star Realm in such a silent way. Not only did her own master not know about it, she received no encouragement, no congratulations from fellow disciples, and she didn't even receive any rewards from the sect. It was like walking in the night in gorgeous clothes.
But these are not what she focuses on, she feels that they are not enough.
It really wasn't enough, the gap was too great. The spiritual flow she could output was still just a weak strand, not enough to support her in refining the next level of elixir.
Even with the help of the laws, she began to learn to suppress other spiritual roots when refining pills, which made the quality of the pills she refined higher and higher. However, it was completely unable to satisfy her urgent state of mind, and she was unable to refine pills of higher levels.
She has been working day and night in the past few days to refine dozens of introductory elixirs, enough to supply the entire sect for a year. Now, every time she opens the furnace, she will no longer be injured.
But Leng Mushi could not go any further, as the rules also stated that the spiritual roots should not be tempered too frequently, otherwise it would easily backfire.
Leng Mushi had to stop for the time being and give up the idea of skipping levels to refine the elixir. She was not in a hurry for success, but the more she got into the real world and touched the tip of the iceberg of the path of alchemy, the more Leng Mushi realized what it meant to have endless learning.
And why Hua Yanyue is so crazy when refining medicine.
Almost everything in this world can be used as a medicine, and a medicine often has many functions. When these functions are combined together, they can become a pill.
But this combination is never fixed, and each interaction will have different effects.
Add to that the temperature of the fire, the time to open the furnace, the time and amount of spiritual power injected after the furnace is opened, the size and amount of the pill itself, and even the storage of the pill after it is made, the cultivation and physical condition of the person taking the pill... countless, countless factors will affect the effect of the pill.
What was a mere recipe in a book? As long as he had enough spiritual power and time, Leng Mushi could even transform a few herbs in a low-level recipe into hundreds of different kinds of pills.
Not to mention that as she enters the next stage of the alchemy path, the refining raw materials she comes into contact with will become more complex, with more and wider benefits, so many that it is unbelievable, so many that they can evolve infinitely. It is like opening the door to another world. How can Hua Yanyue not go crazy
How could she not be crazy
Every day, Leng Mushi wished she could be torn into eight pieces. She even stayed up all night. The record booklets she carried with her had already filled two large boxes.
This meant that the time she spent sweeping the stone steps every day was simply torture for her. She couldn't help but spontaneously use her spiritual power to speed up the sweeping. She couldn't help but flip through the books on formations and tried it first in the Cangsheng Courtyard. Within two days, she had set up a small circulating cleaning formation in the area she was responsible for.
In this way, when the disciples returned to the disciple courtyard at night and no one noticed them, she could start her cleaning formation and she would have to come out less often to sweep the stone steps, thus finding time to refine the elixir.
Hua Yanyue had only been away for a month, but Leng Mushi was almost going crazy.
And the more she studied the recipe, the more she discovered the infinite mysteries of the Great Dao.
One night, she tried to use the legs of the magic spider on the beam as medicine, and then tried to use these elixirs to control the magic spider to spin silk. Finally, she reached her limit and vomited a mouthful of thick black blood out of exhaustion.
She fainted on the ground, but the vast ocean of advanced spiritual power around her hovered in this small house for a long time, slowly, like a pair of gentle hands, soothing her tense spirit and brushing away her extreme fatigue.
She was awakened the next morning by the sound of knocking on the barrier of Cangshengyuan.
She got up, and all the embarrassment and dark circles under her eyes from the past few days were swept away by the advancement she made last night.
Now her hair is just a little disheveled, but her eyes are as clear as the moon and her cheeks are as rosy as full and ripe fruits.
Fresh and beautiful, its skin and flesh will burst open when touched, and it will be full of delicious juice.
Leng Mushi climbed up, unaware that she had advanced again and entered the upper star level, a height that no new disciple in the sect could ever reach.
She simply stood up and patted her robes, then stood by the table, fiddling with the elixir she had made last night to control the demon spider before going out to see who was knocking on the barrier.
Whenever she moved those red pills with her fingers, the demon spiders on the beams would squeak and be pulled by some invisible silk threads towards the direction where Leng Mushi moved the pills.
Leng Mushi slowly raised her lips, but quickly suppressed them.
This matter cannot be told to anyone. If any cultivator in the world knew that alchemy practitioners have the ability to achieve such a technique that can even control demons, there would surely be chaos in the world.
Leng Mushi was only trying to exert her influence on the demon spider. The demon spider's spiritual power was very low. She was able to try to control it because her ability was enough to suppress it.
And if her cultivation becomes stronger in the future, there will be countless things she can try... As long as she fantasizes a little bit along the lines in her mind, Leng Mushi is so excited that she trembles all over.
This "Gate to Heaven" has only opened a little bit, but it is enough to drive people crazy.
She calmed herself down at the table for a while before walking to the edge of the barrier, opening it—and seeing Xiao Mian outside.
"What are you doing here?" Leng Mushi didn't want to see him very much. She just wanted to stay away from him.
Xiao Mian was holding a lunch box in his hand. He was not surprised at her cold attitude. She was always like this.
But he clenched the food box tightly, and finally endured the humiliation and whispered: "You haven't eaten for a month."
Leng Mushi: …
"I don't need to eat."
After she finished speaking, she looked at Xiao Mian's drooping brows, his knuckles clenched until they turned blue.
Leng Mushi thought of the food boxes that appeared on the stone steps where they separated every few days, and she couldn't help but soften her tone a little, adding: "You didn't ask for the things I gave you..."
Upon hearing this, Xiao Mian raised his head and looked at Leng Mushi from a distance.
After a moment, he looked away first, pursed his lips and said, "Those are too expensive."
Leng Mushi didn't say anything else. She felt that the food box should not be accepted. She had never expected that Xiao Mian liked her. She went from thinking it was ridiculous to now feeling it was too heavy to bear.
After being humiliated by her like that, and still frequently peeking at her things, Leng Mushi really didn't know what to do.
She had originally wanted to give him those pills and things to reconnect his meridians as compensation so that they would both be even. However, Xiao Mian refused to accept them and kept sending her food.
So she opened her mouth and refused: "I won't eat the food you send me, and I will never bother you again in the future, Xiao Mian, I won't..."
"I just came to celebrate for you!" Xiao Mian said hurriedly.
The young man Xiao Mian's hair and clothes were neatly arranged, but the look in his eyes was like a tangled mess: "You have advanced, I just came to celebrate for you..."
"Aren't you going to celebrate?" Xiao Mian looked at her and asked.
Under the gaze of his star-like eyes, Leng Mushi recalled her advancement some time ago as if it were a lifetime ago.
This was actually a very big thing. If it were any other disciple, they would have already told others and gone to collect the disciple advancement rewards issued by the sect with great fanfare.
She was so happy and excited after cleansing her meridians and advancing to the next level, but there was no one to share her happiness with, and she had no time to share it with others. She had no choice but to suppress this happiness and put all her energy into refining the elixir.
Unexpectedly... the first person who wanted to celebrate with her was Xiao Mian.
Seeing her hesitant expression, Xiao Mian opened the food box, which contained exquisite dishes and rice, and even a small pot of wine.
He tapped the wine pot with his slender fingers and said a little embarrassedly, "I brewed it myself, using wild fruits from the spiritual spring that I picked when I was cleaning the mountain path these days. It's slightly sour, but tastes good."
Xiao Mian slowly curled his lips towards Leng Mushi, smiled extremely restrainedly, and asked her softly, "Would you like a drink?"
Leng Mushi felt the wine was sour before she even tasted it.
She tried hard to bear it, but she couldn't hold it.
She let Xiao Mian in.
The author has something to say: Leng Mushi: I’m afraid the wine doesn’t make me drunk…
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Two chapters combined into one, please leave a message!