Skinwalker Belle – Chapter 580 – Side Story: Establishing the Beginner’s Village

The street was deathly silent.

Wind blew through, kicking up a few withered leaves that spun and settled on the clean bluestone pavement.

Those several hundred fierce warriors of Cloud Mountain Sect, along with their third-rank martial artist leader, had vanished into thin air, as if they had never existed at all. Only the several hundred unclaimed Scale-horses remained, pawing the ground restlessly and whinnying softly, proving that what had just happened was no illusion.

The disaster survivors hiding in the ruins poked their heads out, staring at the empty street with dazed, bewildered expressions.

That’s… it?

Lin Li paid no attention to the reactions around her. She found it somewhat dull.

By the usual pattern, after beating the small fry, the big shots would soon come calling. The monk may run away, but the temple stays put—she couldn’t be bothered to actively seek out trouble with this Cloud Mountain Sect anyway.

Besides, an endless life stretched out before her, long and vast. She’d need to find ways to pass the time.

She looked around this ruined little city, and a thought surfaced in her mind.

Why not play a management simulation game?

The moment the idea appeared, it spread like wild grass, instantly consuming her thoughts.

Alright, let’s do that.

Step one: find a suitable city lord. An obedient, capable tool person who could help her manage this “starter village.”

Lin Li closed her eyes, and her Omniscient Domain instantly enveloped the entire city.

The thoughts of countless people flooded into her mind like a cacophony of electric currents.

Greed, fear, desire, numbness…

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Within these murky emotions hid twisted faces. Someone was thinking, if I could please this goddess, could I become someone above others? Someone was wondering if the goddess could conjure gold. And others were coveting those unattended Scale-horses.

Lin Li’s consciousness raced through these filthy thoughts, her brow furrowing tighter and tighter.

Until she sensed a faint but extraordinarily resilient point of light.

It was an old man hiding in a shabby shack in the southern corner of the city.

His body had decayed to its limit—breath as thin as silk, the flame of his life on the verge of extinguishing at any moment.

But his mind was like a steel blade honed countless times, filled with rage, unwillingness, and a fierce determination to tear down this filthy world and rebuild it from scratch.

He’s the one.

Lin Li opened her eyes. With a flicker of movement, she appeared before the dilapidated shack.

Seeing the goddess move, the thousands of disaster survivors gathered their courage and followed, forming a loose circle at a distance, whispering among themselves.

Lin Li lifted the tattered cloth door curtain and stepped inside.

In the shack, a gaunt old man covered in age spots leaned against the corner, coughing violently. Every breath seemed to take all the strength he had.

“Cough, cough… who?” The old man’s cloudy eyes struggled to open a slit.

“Me.” Lin Li walked up to him, her voice calm. “From today onward, you are the lord of this city.”

The moment these words left her mouth, not only did the old man in the shack freeze, but the thousands of disaster survivors outside erupted in an uproar.

“What? Making Old Man Liu the city lord?”

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“Did the goddess make a mistake? Old Man Liu is practically in the coffin—he can barely string words together. How can he be city lord?”

“Yeah, he can’t even stand up anymore…”

Li Siniang was frantic too. She mustered her courage and called out from outside: “Goddess! Please reconsider! Uncle Liu… he’s on his last legs!”

The old man laughed at his own words, which sent him into another fit of coughing. “Ahem… young lady, don’t make fun of a dying man like me… I don’t have many days left…”

“I said you can do it, so you can.”

Lin Li paid no attention to the murmurs of the crowd.

She extended a slender, fair index finger, and at its tip, a drop of liquid more radiant than the purest emerald slowly condensed.

The droplet exuded an overwhelming aura of life, as if it contained the vitality of an entire world.

She flicked it gently toward the old man.

The emerald “Holy Water” transformed into a streak of light and flew with pinpoint accuracy into the old man’s mouth.

The next second, a miracle occurred.

Under the stunned gaze of thousands, the old man in the shack was visibly changing at a rate the eye could follow!

His withered, shriveled skin seemed to be smoothed by an invisible hand, rapidly becoming plump and lustrous. The deep furrows and age spots on his face vanished without a trace within a few breaths.

His graying hair turned jet black from the roots at an astonishing speed, and his thinning scalp grew thick and full once more.

His back, hunched from years of hunger and toil, straightened inch by inch with audible cracks. His cloudy, aged eyes cleared and sharpened, gleaming with keen light.

In just over a dozen seconds.

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The dying old man who had one foot in the grave had become a young man of about thirty—with sharp brows, bright eyes, a tall and upright bearing, and a resolute demeanor!

Outside the shack, silence fell instantly.

Everyone’s mouths hung open, their eyes bulging like copper bells, as if witnessing the most inconceivable thing in the world.

Restoring youth!

This was a true miracle!

The man lowered his head, staring at his own hands that had regained their strength, feeling the surging Qi-Blood within him. He was completely dumbfounded.

He jerked his head up to look at Lin Li, his eyes filled with fervent worship and awe.

Thud!

He dropped to his knees and kowtowed three times heavily before Lin Li.

“Your sinner, Liu Cheng, kowtows in gratitude to the Divine Maiden for granting me a new lease on life!” His voice was resonant and powerful, with not a trace of his former frailty. “From this day forward, this life of Liu Cheng’s belongs to you, Divine Maiden! Through fire and water, I will follow you even unto death!”

Lin Li nodded with satisfaction.

“Very well.” She looked at Liu Cheng, who was kneeling on the ground, and gave her first order.

“I’ll give you three days to get this city’s framework in place. I want order here, rules, and a place where people can survive.”

Liu Cheng was taken aback, then a troubled look crossed his face. “Divine Maiden, three days… that’s too tight. And there’s not a single grain of surplus in the city. Even if we organize everyone, they’ll still starve…”

Lin Li smiled.

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She turned and walked out of the shack, looking at the thousands of refugees outside who had already prostrated themselves on the ground.

She waved her hand gracefully.

“I say, let there be grain!”

Rustle—

As if a golden rain had fallen from the sky.

Under the horrified, incredulous gazes of everyone present, a mountain of plump wheat grains materialized out of thin air in the vast open space before the city lord’s mansion.

Under the sunlight, that “grain mountain” gleamed with a dazzling, mesmerizing radiance.

“Food—there’s more than enough.”

Lin Li’s voice was soft, yet it carried clearly across the entire city, imbued with an authority that brooked no dissent.

“Now, any more questions?”

Liu Cheng stared at the mountain of rice that towered even higher than the city walls, swallowing hard. The fervor in his eyes nearly burned with intensity.

He kowtowed heavily once more and roared with all his might: “No problem! Within three days, Liu Cheng will present the Goddess with a brand-new ‘City of Hope’!”

Lin Li no longer looked at him. Instead, she raised her head and gazed toward the direction of Cloud Mountain Sect, a hint of amusement curling at the corner of her lips.

The novice village was complete.

Now, all that remained was to wait for the first wave of monsters to come knocking, delivering their experience points.