Volume 2, Chapter 31 – A Visitor at the Door

Bai Xiang agreed with Bai Shengju, but not completely.

Lying low and biding her time wasn’t wrong. The reason she’d spent this past month doing completely normal things—at most running out into the wild to slaughter a few monstrous beasts—was precisely because she didn’t want to draw certain people’s attention.

What she disagreed with was that she didn’t feel that standing on equal footing with the Nine Dao Lords would be enough to pursue this matter.

Xiang Xian had reached that level, but when faced with certain things, she was still just as powerless.

Back in her side room, Bai Xiang, as usual, took a bath first.

After she came out, she wore only a nightgown, legs crossed as she sat upright at the edge of the bed, ‘Feixiang Heaven’ laid horizontally across her knees.

Time passed. ‘Feixiang Heaven’ gradually spread a blood-colored Qi miasma, coiling around Bai Xiang’s body and being absorbed by her bit by bit.

After the absorption, the Qi sea Bai Xiang had refined was stained a shade redder, its color deeper. Her fleshly body also received the faintest sliver of strengthening, and her Qi sea was pushed just a little wider.

Bai Xiang sat with her eyes tightly closed, unmoving as she ran her mental flow. She cultivated a few strands of brand-new Qi, used them to strengthen her body, and filled in the extra space in her expanded Qi sea until it was complete.

This round of strengthening was very limited.

Only when she was sure she really couldn’t cram in any more did she open her eyes, a bit dissatisfied with her progress.

Bio-modified humans were indeed fundamentally different from monstrous beasts and demonfolk. The clearest sign was that when ‘Feixiang Heaven’ beheaded that Lizardman, it could barely absorb any Demonic Power at all.

That thing could blast apart an aged Condensing the Aspect realm cultivator, yet this little bit of Demonic Power was truly too little. It showed that it relied far more on physical strength, with Demonic Power only as a supplement.

“The monstrous beasts on the jungle’s outskirts, there are still plenty left I could use for killing practice, but killing those beasts obviously isn’t getting me anywhere anymore. It’s only a hair better than killing Lizardmen.”

Bai Xiang wondered whether she should try going deeper into the jungle sometime soon.

She’d finally found her ‘Dao’ and urgently needed to improve her strength. She really didn’t want to keep wasting time on the outskirts of the jungle.

Killing things like ‘Tigerhide Blacksnakes’, ‘Man-Eating Spiders’, and ‘Serrated Tigerhead Wasps’ was far too inefficient. Especially those ‘Serrated Tigerhead Wasps’—even if she wiped out an entire nest of over a thousand, she could barely refine any Demonic Power from them. It was simply a waste of time.

The tigerhead wasps’ honey did taste pretty good, though.

If she had time later, she could bring some back for them to try.

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After thinking it over, Bai Xiang made up her mind. Tomorrow she would go to the Jobs Directorate to register as a job-seeker.

She’d already registered with the Jobs Directorate.

With her reputation opening the way, any “underage threshold” was a joke. Right now she counted as a “personally responsible party”, but her professional credits were still relatively low.

With low credits, she could only take those commissions on the outskirts.

These commissions weren’t posted by specific individuals—no one was that idle. They were issued by the Roads Directorate and some universities. The former regularly hired mercenaries to help with cleanups; the latter mostly needed them for research purposes.

If she wanted to go deeper into the jungle, she either had to keep grinding on small demons to grind up her professional credits, or simply join a properly licensed corporate team.

So she needed to put her name up as a job-seeker.

She wanted to join teams that needed to go deep into the wilderness, and offer those more vicious demon creatures as sacrifices to her sword.

“It seems there’s another channel.”

Thinking of the wild made her think of what had happened at the camp, and along that train of thought Bai Xiang remembered that the first time she and Huang Qian had gone into the mist, they’d even come across a corpse.

Gu Yong, Han Zhifeng, Li Yu.

The three of them were specialists from ‘Nanmu Consulting’ and ‘Senluo Consulting’.

The corpse belonged to Gu Yong. She’d never heard anything of the other two afterward; odds were they’d all kicked the bucket.

But the way they operated had given Bai Xiang some inspiration, because those security consulting firms often had to take commissions to deal with Demon Pools. And the Demon Pool illusions that were the most troublesome for ordinary people just happened to have no effect at all on Bai Xiang’s spirit.

“Wouldn’t ‘Feixiang Heaven’ like eating Demon Pools even more?”

Bai Xiang wasn’t sure, but it was very possible.

Because monstrous beasts were species born under the influence of Demon Pools. In terms of origin, the Demon Pool was the progenitor. Its power was definitely purer.

“Then when I put up my job-seeker profile, I’ll add a tag: security consulting firms preferred.”

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With that decided, Bai Xiang immediately felt lighter and finally had the leisure to think about other matters.

Bai Shengju had also given her a letter, saying Xiang Xian had left it for her.

Bai Xiang opened it and carefully read the letter.

It turned out Xiang Xian was going away and wouldn’t be at the Shenming Dojo for a while. She told Bai Xiang not to cause trouble outside and said she’d be keeping an eye on her regardless.

It was like she knew exactly what Bai Xiang had gone to do at dusk.

Could she have been watching from nearby back then?

Uncertain, Bai Xiang casually put the letter away, inwardly grumbling that her cheap master was pretty old-fashioned.

She clearly had a phone and could just send a text. It wasn’t like she didn’t know Bai Xiang’s number.

Xiang Xian had also told her where she was going, and that was a familiar name—Longhua Temple.

After all, she’d taken back the Jade Phoenix Sword.

That thing had originally been lent out by Yuming Sword Dao for Master Hua’an’s treatment. Now that Xiang Xian was going to Longhua Temple, there was no need to ask to know it was to treat Hua’an.

Master Hua’an…

For the Jade Phoenix Sword to be received into the body as bone and still get stolen—seemed that old monk had quite the refined taste; he even disdained using something others had used.

As she thought, Bai Xiang unconsciously thought of Bai Zhuqing.

She frowned slightly, weighing what sort of relationship the two of them really had.

Those steps of feeding her medicine hardly counted as “intimate”. Otherwise, artificial respiration would count too. She hadn’t had that sort of intention at all.

That didn’t necessarily say anything about how she felt about her. It was probably just that she was used to having such a little sister at her side; it was nothing more than concern between relatives.

And then there was that flutter in her heart she’d felt at the time.

That flutter from having her feet touched… That should’ve just been because all the acupoints there had been fully opened and her heart meridians had formed a new circulation. Being touched by someone other than herself there would naturally be more sensitive.

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Pressing her fingers to her temples, Bai Xiang thought about what road Bai Zhuqing should take from here.

Strictly speaking, she’d passed the Transforming Qi Method to her sister to save her life. But once Bai Zhuqing stepped into that stage, she could only follow Bai Xiang down the same path all the way to the end… That was also a fact.

After her own Transforming Qi, Bai Xiang could still keep advancing by relying on ‘Feixiang Heaven’—but what about Bai Zhuqing?

Bai Xiang had originally only planned to solve her own problem first. Since the Transforming Qi Method couldn’t be universally applied to others, she hadn’t cared.

But looking at it now, she’d have to research a more universal method. Otherwise, wouldn’t she be holding Bai Zhuqing back?

Back then, the one who’d kept nagging at her to be independent and strong had been Bai Xiang herself. She couldn’t now turn around, find some excuse, and say that if Bai Zhuqing couldn’t become strong, she’d just wash her hands of her, right?

She asked herself and knew she could never do something like that, and so Bai Xiang, very helplessly, realized that instead Bai Zhuqing now had every reason to cling to her.

Before, when she’d acted like a little tail following her everywhere, Bai Xiang could still complain.

How was she supposed to complain now?

She could only take things as they came for the time being.

As it grew late, Bai Xiang turned off the light and lay down hugging her sword.

Compared to sleeping curled up with Bai Zhuqing, she was still more used to resting like this.

The next morning, after getting up and washing, Bai Xiang suddenly realized she had nothing to wear.

She’d always washed her own clothes, but lately all her thoughts had been on slaying demons and nourishing her sword, and she’d forgotten to wash the clothes she liked.

It wasn’t that she had absolutely nothing to wear, but she didn’t like those modern skirts.

It had nothing to do with gender identity. It was just that she was always drawing her sword and getting into fights, and those clothes were far too likely to flash people.

After thinking it over, she decided to dig out the outfit she’d worn for that sword bout: first pulling on a pair of black pantyhose, then tightening the old-style dress over them.

For shoes she could only choose sandals for now, but those were only suitable for wearing in the city. Later she’d have to buy a pair of matching boots.

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When she went out, Bai Zhuqing saw her outfit and her eyes lit up. Like a little bunny, she bounced over. “Auntie wore this because you knew I like it, right?”

“No.” Bai Xiang looked at her coldly.

“You’re blocking the way.”

“I know how to braid several hairstyles!” Bai Zhuqing wasn’t discouraged. “If Auntie braided her hair a bit, she’d look even prettier. Want to give it a try?”

How was it that in front of outsiders—even in front of Le Ying—she always put on a very mature, big-sisterly, understanding act, but when it came to Bai Xiang, she regressed in age?

Bai Xiang couldn’t make sense of it, and walked around her little sister, heading forward.

“Senior Sister!”

Just then, Xu Shu came over from ahead. When he saw her, his eyes lit up as well.

“Senior Sister, there’s an old beggar at the gate, asking for you by name!”

An old beggar?

Bai Xiang immediately remembered the beggar who’d been watching her yesterday.

Could it be him?

“Take me there,” she ordered, leading Bai Zhuqing and Xu Shu to the entrance. Sure enough, she saw it was the same man from yesterday.

“You’ve been out looking for monsters to kill lately, haven’t you?”

The old fellow didn’t waste a single word, getting straight to the point.

“I’ve got a nice job here that can get you commissions most people never have a chance to take.”

“So give me a straight answer—are you in or not?”