After Crossdressing and Provoking Long AoTian

“Me?” Yu Qingtang stared at him in shock. “I only just reached peak Out-of-Body. Senior, you’re not seriously expecting me to break through to Soul Transformation right now, are you?”

Leveling up as easily as drinking water was Long Aotian’s specialty, not something a little idle cultivator like him was good at!

“Who else would I mean? Wen Tianxia?” Tianji Zi shook his head sagely. “I don’t think he’s got it in him. He’s reached the end of the road in this lifetime. You’re the one with potential.”

Wen Tianxia shot him a sidelong glance and snorted, but surprisingly didn’t bother arguing.

“You’re only a hair’s breadth away from Soul Transformation,” Wen Tianxia said, lowering his eyes toward Yu Qingtang. “You can try breaking through.”

Yu Qingtang stared blankly at Ye Chenyan, who was still up above weathering his lightning tribulation.

When Yu himself had broken through to Out-of-Body, Academy Head Wen had also insisted that he break through together with Ye Chenyan...

Could there actually be some connection?

Tianji Zi saw the question on his face and chuckled.

“I keep telling everyone you’re smart. See? Even this didn’t get past you.”

It was rare for anyone to praise Yu Qingtang for being smart. He immediately waved his hands in alarm and modestly denied it.

“No, no, not smart at all. Definitely not.”

Tianji Zi lowered his voice and crooked a finger, signaling for him to lean closer.

“You’re a soul from beyond this realm. When your cultivation is low, it doesn’t matter much. But the stronger you become, the more the Heavenly Dao will feel that you’re taking up this realm’s fortune.”

“There are only so many great figures and mighty experts heaven and earth can support. If you occupy one place, then this realm loses one.”

Yu Qingtang froze.

He looked up at him uneasily.

“Then... whose place did I take?”

“Relax. I’ve been keeping an eye on that for you.” Tianji Zi’s eyes curved with a smile, a sharp gleam flashing within them. “Heaven and earth are a chessboard. Someone wants to be the one moving the pieces. Black and white know each other’s positions and restrain one another.”

“You’re the variable that fell onto the board.”

He lightly patted Yu Qingtang on the shoulder.

“While his lightning tribulation is taking the brunt of it, hurry up and break through.”

Yu Qingtang stared blankly.

He had the ominous feeling that somehow, without realizing it, he had been swept into a plotline he was never supposed to be part of.

He looked uneasily at Ye Chenyan, then at Tianji Zi.

“What... what if I don’t break through?”

“If heaven and earth only have so many places, then I just won’t take one. I’ll leave it to someone else...”

“Hmm—” Tianji Zi considered this seriously, then nodded. “That works too.”

Yu Qingtang’s eyes widened.

“It does?!”

“Sure.” Tianji Zi smiled. “When the sky falls, there’ll always be tall people around to hold it up. If you don’t want to be one of the tall ones...”

He pointed at Ye Chenyan, then himself, then casually at Wen Tianxia, and finally at Girl in the Bamboo, who was standing guard beneath the barrier.

“You’ve still got all these tall people.”

Yu Qingtang: “...Senior, I think you’re morally blackmailing me.”

Tianji Zi smiled like a fox.

“Am I? Surely not.”

“It’s just that you’ve already stepped onto the board. Can you really still protect yourself, turn away, and ignore whether they live or die?”

Yu Qingtang opened his mouth.

Then he stole a glance at Tianji Zi and lowered his voice.

“Senior, I think I finally understand why Ye Chenyan says you’re so annoying.”

“See?” Tianji Zi looked proud rather than ashamed. “If you want to divine fate well, understanding the human heart is indispensable.”

Yu Qingtang: “...”

“Don’t listen to him.” Wen Tianxia stood with his hands behind his back. “Decide for yourself.”

“Hiding you beneath Ye Chenyan’s lightning tribulation was already a gamble. There was never any guarantee that it would fool the Heavenly Dao.”

“If you take one step back now and stop here—remain merely an Out-of-Body cultivator—perhaps everything can still be delayed...”

“Huh?” Yu Qingtang looked confused.

“You really haven’t noticed?” Wen Tianxia lowered his gaze to him. “The Esoteric Sect has decided you’re the Born Supreme, the savior of all beneath heaven. They’ve been arranging their plans step by step according to the progress of your cultivation.”

Yu Qingtang’s eyes flew wide open.

“What?!”

Wasn’t the plot supposed to advance according to Ye Chenyan’s cultivation?

Why was it following his?!

“When you broke through to Out-of-Body, the Esoteric Sect immediately sent Heavenly Realm envoys down the mountain to visit the various sects,” Wen Tianxia said calmly. “Naturally, they avoided certain sects that were never going to stand with them in the first place. Guiyi Sect and Four Books Academy are both absent from their list.”

“They still haven’t given up?” Yu Qingtang scratched his head and looked pleadingly toward Tianji Zi. “This is because I knocked his fate off course before, right?”

“Not just that.” Tianji Zi casually folded one leg beneath himself and sat down, smiling as he pointed at Yu. “You knocking his fate off course was the result. What you don’t know is the cause.”

“You think you arrived here by coincidence.”

“But perhaps someone calculated every move and guided you here one step at a time.”

Yu Qingtang’s mouth slowly fell open.

“...Just for me? That seems unnecessary.”

“Hahaha!” Tianji Zi threw back his head and laughed. “Don’t underestimate yourself.”

“Think about your journey so far. Whenever you actually wanted to break through, when have you ever encountered the slightest obstacle? Wouldn’t you say things have gone exactly as you wished?”

He patted Yu Qingtang’s shoulder with unusual gravity.

“Be careful.”

Yu Qingtang instinctively shrank his neck.

Suddenly, danger seemed to be lurking everywhere.

A silver-violet bolt of lightning came crashing toward them.

Tianji Zi casually raised one hand.

The terrifying bolt vanished without a sound, as though it had never existed.

He looked up at Ye Chenyan and called out a reminder.

“Watch where you’re sending those. Your Qingtang is down here.”

“That one was aimed at you.” Ye Chenyan looked displeased. “Old man, what are you saying to him? Stop scaring him!”

Yu Qingtang looked up uneasily and met his gaze.

Somehow, he immediately felt a little calmer.

Ye Chenyan was hardly having an easy time himself. Lightning was slamming down around him, while behind him Ziyun shrieked nonstop, her fur electrocuted until she looked like a sea urchin.

But the moment Yu Qingtang met his eyes and saw that familiar face, a tiny bit of courage rose within him anyway.

Perhaps it wasn’t only because Ye Chenyan was Long Aotian.

“How am I scaring him?” Tianji Zi clicked his tongue and shook his head. “You ungrateful brat who betrays his master and ancestors. I’m appealing to his feelings and reasoning with him...”

Yu Qingtang spoke softly.

“His lightning tribulation... wasn’t supposed to be this vicious either, was it? The Heavenly Dao noticed me, and that’s why...”

“Of course not—” Tianji Zi immediately turned around and patted him on the shoulder. “This is entirely his own fault.”

“Just look at him. He’s got the kind of face that begs to be struck by lightning.”

“He doesn’t,” Yu Qingtang muttered.

For once, he was unusually sharp.

Logically speaking, Long Aotian was the Heavenly Dao’s own son. How could the Heavenly Dao genuinely be trying to strike him dead?

And if Ye Chenyan’s body alone could withstand this lightning tribulation, then with Tianji Zi’s personality, there was absolutely no way he would have gone all the way to Nanzhou to bring Ziyun here as backup.

No matter how Yu thought about it, the problem really did seem to be this “variable”—him.

“Hiss—” Tianji Zi scratched his head awkwardly. “Why’d you have to get smart at exactly this moment?”

Yu Qingtang asked in a low voice, “If I break through... he won’t get struck even harder, will he?”

Tianji Zi shook his head gently.

“Don’t worry.”

“That’s good.” Yu Qingtang breathed a sigh of relief. “I don’t want him suffering any more than he already has.”

He looked earnestly at Tianji Zi.

“You can trick me all you want, but you can’t trick your own disciple too.”

Tianji Zi: “...”

Yu Qingtang slowly exhaled, flew forward until he was directly beneath the thunderclouds, and raised his head toward Ye Chenyan.

Ye Chenyan hadn’t heard what they had been discussing, but something about Yu Qingtang’s expression bothered him.

He wanted to descend to Yu’s side, but feared bringing the lightning tribulation with him, so he could only call from a distance.

“What’s wrong? What did he tell you?”

“He loves talking nonsense. Whatever he said, don’t take it seriously.”

“Mm.” Yu Qingtang nodded solemnly. “I know.”

Then he put on his usual silly grin.

“It’s nothing. I’m just joining the fun and breaking through with you.”

He deliberately joked, “Senior Tianji Zi said that if I break through now and I happen to get a lightning tribulation too, it’ll all strike you instead. Then I get to escape mine!”

Ye Chenyan didn’t laugh.

He stared directly into Yu Qingtang’s eyes and nodded seriously.

“Mm. Let it all strike me.”

“I told you before. If the sky falls, I’ll hold it up for you.”

The silly grin slowly faded from Yu Qingtang’s face.

He blinked at him.

Then a sea-urchin-shaped Ziyun bared her teeth and forced her way over.

“And me! I promised I’d help both of you! I can still eat more lightning!”

Yu Qingtang chuckled softly and nodded.

“Got it. Then I’m breaking through. I’m counting on you two!”

“Okay!” Ziyun shook the lightning from her fur with all her strength and braced herself, staring fixedly at the bolts falling from above.

Ye Chenyan gave Yu Qingtang a long look.

“Don’t be afraid.”

Just then, Scholar Xiao poked his upper body out of the Sea of Books Formation and looked outside.

He immediately turned around and shouted,

“Brother Chi! Another lightning tribulation really did show up! Is your furnace ready this time?”

“Coming!”

Chi Yantian came charging out of the Sea of Books Formation carrying an enormous furnace.

He called to everyone outside,

“Don’t worry! This furnace definitely won’t explode! This time I’m making it withstand the lightning tribulation!”

Ziyun cried out in alarm.

“Why are there so many people?!”

“Huh? You’re here too!” Chi Yantian pointed at her and burst out laughing. “Look at you! You got struck into that state!”

Above the Nine Provinces, beneath the Heavenly Dao, not even a lightning tribulation could suppress the commotion.

Yu Qingtang smiled.

And that was precisely why he could never stand aside.

He closed his eyes, drew in a deep breath, and began his breakthrough.

The winds and clouds changed.

Silver-violet lightning crashed down again and again.

Tianji Zi looked up at the storm pouring from the heavens and slowly closed his eyes.

Wen Tianxia stared at his face with open curiosity.

“Tsk.” Tianji Zi turned toward him. “Why are you staring at me? Annoying.”

“It’s rare to see guilt on your face. I thought I’d look a little longer.” Wen Tianxia was entirely unbothered. “The way they’ve walked this path step by step shouldn’t have surprised you.”

“Who said it didn’t?” Tianji Zi raised an eyebrow. “They surprise me every single time.”

“Other people may believe I can calculate everything without error. Surely even you, Academy Head Wen, don’t actually believe that?”

He chuckled.

“I’m merely an ordinary mortal. Even if I calculate every move, how could everything possibly go exactly as I wish?”

“Besides...”

“I’ve never believed in fate.”

Wen Tianxia laughed softly.

“The man beneath heaven who divines fate most accurately is the man who believes in fate the least.”

“Interesting.”

“Aah—” Tianji Zi gave a long sigh. “You know, it’d be so much easier if all these youngsters were like that rotten brat—impossible to control. Bad-tempered, stubborn, arrogant. Then you don’t feel sorry for them. You just want the lightning to strike them harder.”

“But look at this child. Usually he clings to life and fears death more than anyone, yet when it matters, he turns all loyal and righteous.”

“Now I can’t even bear to watch.”

Wen Tianxia looked even more astonished.

“You actually have a conscience?”

“If I truly had no conscience, would you still be standing here talking to me?” Tianji Zi rolled his eyes. “Enough.”

He looked toward the sky.

“See? The might of Heaven is dazzling. Yet the greater the display...”

“The harder it is to hide the Heavenly Dao’s fear.”

For once, the usual flippancy vanished from his face.

He stared coldly into the sky, as though looking through the thick thunderclouds and meeting the gaze of something beyond them.

“Hiss—”

Suddenly, he clapped a hand over his eyes and trembled faintly.

Wen Tianxia frowned and raised a hand to shield his vision.

Tianji Zi lifted his other hand to stop him and chuckled.

“No need.”

Wen Tianxia lowered his hand again and shook his head.

“You know perfectly well what happens. Why keep looking at things you shouldn’t?”

“Ah, the mood was right.” Tianji Zi collapsed inelegantly onto his little white cloud and rubbed his eyes. “Made me want to imitate the youngsters for once and try turning Heaven over.”

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