Chapter 4: The Sect Is Built

It was a very mysterious feeling.

Chen Yi felt like he was playing some kind of construction game.

When he confirmed the establishment of the mountain gate, a virtual model appeared outside the water mirror, right before his eyes.

The style of this mountain gate was like the gates of Daoist temples and Buddhist monasteries at tourist sites. Not only was it in the form of a grand, imposing archway, there were also stairs extending downward from the gate.

When Chen Yi saw the size of the archway and the direction in which the stairs stretched, he had a bad feeling.

How could something this huge possibly be hidden?

But now that the arrow was on the bowstring, it had to be released.

In the end, Chen Yi gritted his teeth, faced the mountain gate toward the east, and pressed it down.

Then, like some enormous object falling from the sky, it landed with a booming rumble, stirring up a wild gust of wind and fallen leaves, blowing all the hair on Chen Yi’s forehead upward.

Just like that, the archway truly appeared from nothing, descended from the heavens, and stood upon the soil with perfect harmony.

Chen Yi stood directly beneath the archway, facing a winding flight of green-jade stone stairs that threaded through the dense orange grove, connecting the upper and lower slopes.

The hair blown up from his forehead slowly fell back down. Standing high above, Chen Yi saw everything clearly. Without the water mirror blocking his view anymore, terraced fields overlapped before him, and in the distance, the mountains stretched on, towering and majestic.

There was also a damp, earthy scent that refreshed the heart and lungs, making his mind clearer than it had ever been.

The first step.

He had finally taken it.

Chen Yi steadied his wildly pounding heart and made himself calm down first.

He had no time to admire this miraculous masterpiece of divine craftsmanship. There were more important things he had to do right now.

Fortunately, both the original body and himself were top students who had been able to test into a 985 university. They had been born poor, with only their IQs still somewhat reliable. Especially when facing tests, they had enough calm self-control.

After distinguishing what mattered most, Chen Yi withdrew his gaze and turned to look behind him.

The establishment of a mountain gate carried the deeper meaning of staking out territory. Taking into account that this book also had the concept of folded space, when Chen Yi turned and saw a large open area behind him, while not a single orange tree had disappeared, his expression remained calm.

He just did not know whether this folded space could only be entered and seen by him, or whether it had already been released in advance.

Chen Yi leaned more toward the former.

The appearance of folded space only began to show signs after the protagonist solved three to five supernatural incidents.

Then, in the early-middle part, through the protagonist’s conversations and explanations, Blue Star’s greatest secret was revealed: the seal!

It turned out that for tens of millions of years before this, Blue Star had been sealed, leaving only less than one percent of its area for living species to reproduce.

Until the time limit of the seal arrived, it would not be fully undone.

The loosening of the seal and the process of spiritual energy leaking out little by little also gave the species of the outside world a chance to adapt. Otherwise, if everything opened fully right away, all that currently existed on Blue Star’s surface would be destroyed by ancient viruses and lifeforms.

Whether his guess was right or not, Chen Yi had no other choice.

He called out to the system inwardly.

The water mirror reappeared before his eyes.

The reward from the previous task was in the most eye-catching place.

[The Lurker Sect]

[Establish a Sect] Character reward: Sect Grand Hall, Scripture Pavilion

There was also a new task below.

[Main Quest: Sect Master Appointment]

[Reward: One peach tree, low-grade spirit stones x5]

One: Appoint the sect master. (0/1 incomplete)

Two: Cultivate a technique to the first level of Qi Refining. (0/1 incomplete)

Three: Widely recruit disciples (II). (2/5 incomplete)

Chen Yi glanced at the main quest, paused his idea of immediately starting construction, and first focused his attention on the sect master appointment in the main quest. Without the slightest hesitation, he set himself as the sect master.

With the sect system in his possession, what else could he be if not the sect master? Was he supposed to appoint someone else as sect master? Would that not make him a complete and utter tool?

This task had to be a freebie. The difficulty lay in the third item. Two little kids were easy to coax, but adults…

Forget it.

Chen Yi stopped thinking about it. Better to continue construction.

The ground had already been leveled, and he did not need to build the houses himself. This time, Chen Yi had experience. Full of confidence, he wanted to create the Scripture Pavilion he cared about most first.

Unfortunately, the system gave no response. After thinking it over, he could only choose to build the Sect Grand Hall first.

This time, it worked.

A massive, towering grand hall transformed from nothingness into reality. Like a pavilion descending from heaven, it blocked the sunlight, enveloped Chen Yi in shadow, and fell from the sky.

Again, the earth trembled. In the blink of an eye, beyond the flying dust, an ancient grand hall that should have existed only in imagination, xianxia films, and paintings appeared shockingly before his eyes.

Sandalwood formed the beams, crystal served as lamps, and golden glazed tiles formed the roof. Amid the swirling immortal mist, a black plaque hung above the dark-colored main doors. On it, three large characters were written in vigorous, flamboyant strokes: The Lurker Sect.

Chen Yi’s mouth opened slightly.

After taking a moment to recover, he went into the grand hall for a look.

Tch! An empty shell. There was nothing inside!

Chen Yi came back out and immediately built the Scripture Pavilion.

With a boom, another building descended from the sky and rooted itself firmly into the earth.

Compared to the grand hall, this Scripture Pavilion could be considered small and delicate. It was like a small mountain temple, with black tiles and gray walls. Only when one came closer could one see its ancient simplicity and exquisite elegance, its concentrated aura and refined beauty.

Chen Yi pushed the door open, and the wooden door swung open in response.

The space inside was probably around a hundred square meters. It was bright and quiet, shaped like an octagon. Bookshelves filled the walls, and the shelves were packed with books.

In the open space at the center were five tables and five meditation cushions. Above them, in a place resembling a lectern, there was an even larger low table, as well as a lotus meditation cushion that looked several degrees more high-end.

Chen Yi also noticed that on one side, there was a section of stairs leading upward straight to the ceiling, but the way ahead was sealed shut.

He looked at this section of stairs a couple more times. Then, connecting it with the architectural style of the Scripture Pavilion, Chen Yi already had a few guesses.

Now was not the time to verify them. He had to obtain what he wanted and go back as quickly as possible.

Thinking this, Chen Yi walked to the bookshelf closest to the door.

Probably because some condition had not been met, the books on the shelves were all sealed. Only the one in front of him could be picked up.

So Chen Yi picked it up.

The hard cover was made of some unknown material, decorated with dark-blue hot-stamped floral patterns. In the most eye-catching position on the front were five large, striking words: Spirit Nurturing Art.

He flipped the book open. What entered his eyes were rows of densely packed tiny characters, accompanied by some crude illustrations.

Just as Chen Yi was getting a headache, knowing he did not have enough time to understand it, the book suddenly turned into a ball of blue light and rushed into his head.

Chen Yi was so frightened that his soul nearly flew out of his body.

It was not as if he had never considered that this system might be a trap, that some body-snatching supernatural creature might be hidden inside it, and that all this prosperity was nothing but an illusion.

He clenched his teeth, unwilling, and waited for death. After a while, he opened his eyes in confusion.

He was still alive.

He touched his forehead.

Then he silently sensed himself.

There was knowledge in his mind that he had never learned before, called Spirit Nurturing Art.

This miraculous method was like receiving an enlightenment in a martial arts novel. All the cultivation methods and techniques related to Spirit Nurturing Art became clear to him in an instant, even more deeply engraved than the memory of doing a hundred problems of the same type in his senior year of high school.

Chen Yi was overjoyed. He knew he had made the right bet.

Following the system was his path out of desperate straits!

As its name suggested, Spirit Nurturing Art was related to spiritual energy. In this book about spiritual energy revival, whoever mastered the method of using spiritual energy first would be one step ahead!

What did the ghost stories born from human imagination even count as? They were nothing more than undispersed energy wandering in the present world, born from human incense offerings, awakened to harm people only after being touched by a trace of spiritual energy.

Compared to a technique that could sense spiritual energy, use spiritual energy, and strengthen the body with spiritual energy, the difference was as vast as clouds and mud!

Of course, the prerequisite was that one had truly cultivated the technique and could use it. Only then would it cause harm to supernatural entities.

Chen Yi immediately sat down and cultivated according to the technique.

He did not know whether the entry level of this technique was simply easy, or whether his talent was decent, but very soon, he sensed the thin spiritual energy permeating the atmosphere and drew it into his body by using the technique.

Once spiritual energy entered the body and completed one circulation, that counted as entering Qi Refining.

After completing one circulation, Chen Yi opened his eyes. Feeling the spiritual energy flowing through his meridians, he only felt that his ears were sharp, his eyes were clear, and even his body seemed several degrees lighter.

Then he looked at the time.

Less than an hour had passed.

In the book, after the protagonist encountered a supernatural entity and awakened, the cultivation method he obtained through the Night Watchers was to slay supernatural entities, come into contact with pollution sources, and absorb pollution energy to gradually become stronger.

But there was also the possibility that one might be unable to withstand the pollution, collapse, and turn into a living ghost. Once someone became a living ghost, they could no longer be considered human. They lost their rationality, became violent and ferocious, and, irreversibly, could only be destroyed.

In fact, in the early-middle part of the book, it was mentioned that awakened ones and supernatural entities both revived because of spiritual energy. They were like “bottles” that absorbed spiritual energy, but they did so unconsciously and passively.

Without the inheritance of ancient methods, ghosts eating people and people killing ghosts were the only ways for them to obtain spiritual energy and increase their strength.

At the same time, spiritual energy that had not been absorbed systematically existed in the body in a scattered form. Especially spiritual energy absorbed by killing ghosts, which carried yin attributes unfavorable to humans, caused countless early Night Watcher pioneers to die.

If the official debut of folded space had not spread some common cultivation techniques, who knew how many more of humanity’s Night Watchers would have died because of this?

But now, Chen Yi had obtained the correct cultivation technique fifteen years in advance.

Chen Yi knew all too clearly what this represented.

No one would have to die for this again. Humanity would also gain the ability to fight supernatural entities. More importantly, when the ancient lifeforms appeared in the future, the humans of Blue Star would have the ability to converse with them, even resist them.

Instead of spilling endless blood, piling up corpses, and letting rites and music collapse, only for the protagonist, whose success was built upon ten thousand bones, to finally sit upon the throne of the eight desolations of the universe in tragic grandeur.

Chen Yi sensed his body for a moment, went out and ran a lap, then pulled up an orange tree. After confirming that his current physical fitness was roughly three times stronger than before, he decisively stopped.

He did want to cultivate a while longer, to become as strong as possible before that supernatural entity came looking for him.

But there were still two children at home who were drinking milk, and he truly could not feel at ease.

This folded space was clearly cut off from the outside signal. If he could not be contacted for a long time, forget the children crying; his parents would probably worry too.

Although Chen Yi was a transmigrator, he felt very close to the original body’s family. Since he had replaced this body, he had to take responsibility for its loved ones.

After taking one last look at his sect, Chen Yi walked out of the mountain gate and descended along the green-jade stairs.

That faint sense of crossing over was like leaving an immortal mountain cave dwelling far from the mortal world and arriving in the human realm, where there was the sound of wind, the croaking of frogs, and the slowly rotting smell of oranges and leaves fallen to the ground.

When he came back to himself again, he was standing outside the orange grove. Not far ahead were the terraced fields.

May had just passed, and the rice seedlings had only just been planted. The young rice shoots stood quietly in the mirror-like water, forming a connected stretch of emerald green.

He took a deep breath.

It was the scent of green mountains.

Chen Yi looked back at the orange grove. What an overbearing sect system. Had it circled every mountain under his name into its own land range?

He stepped backward, as though he were about to bump into an orange tree.

But there was no feeling of impact. The bluestone stairs appeared before his eyes once again.

Chen Yi stepped back out, and that orange tree appeared again.

Was it folded space?

Or an illusion?

It did not matter.

As long as it did not frighten the villagers.

Worried about home, Chen Yi did not linger any longer and turned to leave.

Entering Qi Refining had tripled his physical fitness. On the way back, he walked with long, powerful strides, swift as the wind. He could easily cover two meters in one step. Fortunately, no one saw him. Otherwise, he would definitely have frightened the simple villagers in the mountains.

He returned home.

The original body’s parents’ home was a two-story self-built house on a residential plot. Although it was not the best house in the village, it was not bad either. In the yard, they kept a flock of chickens and a Da Huang dog.

The Da Huang dog was the old family dog and recognized Chen Yi. It wagged its tail and came up to him.

But the big white goose the family had raised for four years was not familiar with Chen Yi. Spreading its wings, stretching out its neck, and strutting over with an arrogant pigeon-toed gait, it charged at him.

Peck!

With one hand, Chen Yi stroked the Da Huang dog’s head. With the other, he moved as fast as lightning, grabbed the big white goose by the neck, used a clever twist of force, swung it in a circle, and threw it into the chicken pen.

The big white goose’s miserable honking brought some liveliness to the silent courtyard. His mother, Xiang Lan, pushed the door open and came out. The moment she appeared, her brows were raised and her eyes were cold. “I called you so many times and you didn’t answer. The children nearly cried themselves unconscious, and you still know how to come back?”

“They’re still crying?” Chen Yi felt a little guilty.

Xiang Lan said, “They cried themselves tired. I finally managed to coax them to sleep, and the moment you come back, you start teasing cats and dogs, waking the children…”

“Daddy.”

Before she could finish, a soft, sticky voice sounded.

The older brother, Chen Yiqian, hugged the doorframe, his eyes red as he looked at Chen Yi with grievance.

Chen Yi hurried forward and picked his son up. Xiang Lan also shut her mouth. Both of them lightened their movements at the same time, coaxing the older brother who had been woken up, and carried him into the bedroom.

The older brother was a child who loved sleep. Once he fell asleep, not even thunder could wake him.

For him to be startled awake by this bit of commotion showed just how uneasy and afraid he had been inside.

When they entered the room and looked, his younger sister was awake too. With a head of messy hair and a flushed little face, she sat frog-legged on the bed. When she saw Chen Yi return, her mouth drooped, and her tears burst out like a breached dam.

“Daddy, hold me.”

Her little hands were already open.

Chen Yi carried one in each arm, pressing his cheek to the one on the left and kissing the one on the right. He apologized softly and coaxed the two little cubs who clung tightly to him, slowly walking around the room.

Xiang Lan watched this scene from the side with a smile. After a while, she began to feel sorry for her son again and wanted to take one of the children from him, but Chen Yi refused.

He was strong now. Holding two three-year-old children was no heavier than holding two feathers. Even carrying them like this for an entire day would not tire him.

A father was like a mountain. A strong father would give his children a greater sense of security.

Chen Yi carried them for a full half hour and coaxed them for a long time before finally lulling them back to sleep.

It was already five o’clock.

Chen Yi placed the children on the bed as carefully as if he were laying down land mines, then went out and glanced at the westering sun. With a serious expression, he said, “Mom, I’m going out for a bit. I’ll be back soon.”

Xiang Lan seemed about to say something, but when she saw her son’s grave expression, she nodded and lowered her voice. “Come back early.”

This time, Chen Yi truly left early and returned quickly.

He would not fight an uncertain battle.

This time when he went out again, he visited two places.

One was the village supermarket, where he bought two mirrors and red string. Then he went to an old peach tree he remembered and broke off a branch before returning home.

Following the legends, he hung the mirrors and red string on the main door and windows. Then, using the family’s firewood knife, he chopped the peach branch into something that looked like both a knife and a sword, something strange and odd, but in any case, something like a weapon.

He did not know whether these preparations would be useful. They were all rustic methods from legends or film and television dramas, but it was better to be prepared than not.

Chen Yi’s greatest trump card was still Spirit Nurturing Art, with which he had entered Qi Refining, as well as the confidence that came from knowing what supernatural entities truly were.

When Chen Yi was doing these things, his mother was cooking in the kitchen. Occasionally, she came out and stared at Chen Yi for a while. In the end, she could not help asking, “What’s going on? Did you attract something? Why are you preparing all this for no reason?”

Chen Yi had not planned to hide it from his mother. After all, his parents would definitely be the next “clients,” so it was good for them to understand in advance.

So as he whittled the peachwood sword, Chen Yi said, “There’s a hotel in the county. I heard it had a fire a few years back, and quite a few people died. Do you know about that?”

Xiang Lan nodded.

Chen Yi said, “Last night, I didn’t know the situation and booked a room there. Although I later refunded it and changed hotels, the feeling wasn’t very good. Better safe than sorry.”

Xiang Lan froze for two seconds, then said solemnly, “You have to believe in science.”

Chen Yi: “…”

At six-thirty, Chen Jiankang came home and also saw the things hanging around the house. After hearing Xiang Lan’s explanation, his brows rose and his eyes widened on the spot, and he was about to take the things down.

As the village chief, how could he take the lead in promoting feudal superstition?

Fortunately, at the critical moment, his eldest grandson and eldest granddaughter both woke up. Chen Jiankang resentfully adjusted his expression. Just before his face broke into a beaming smile for his precious grandchildren, he glared coldly at his son. “Take them down early, got it? What the heck are these things? Aren’t you afraid people will laugh?”

Chen Yi nodded in agreement and did not argue with his father.

It was fine. Once tonight passed, if that supernatural entity came, he would definitely deal with it. If it did not come, that was fine too. He would prepare even more thoroughly and make sure that if that supernatural entity dared to come, it would never return.

After dinner, there was not much to play with in the village. He let the children tease the Da Huang dog and the big white goose in the yard. Then, when it was completely dark at eight-thirty, Chen Yi brought the children into the room, bathed them, rubbed them with lotion, gave them milk, and told them a bedtime story.

In the blink of an eye, it was already nine-thirty.

With their father’s company, the children felt very reassured. They obediently drank their milk and fell asleep.

Chen Yi placed the peachwood sword within reach and lay down as well.

He had barely slept last night, and he had been busy all day today. Even after entering Qi Refining, his energy was not good. Before midnight arrived, he had to seize every second to get some sleep.

He closed his eyes.

Fell asleep in seconds.

When he opened his eyes again,

all was silent, and a certain supernatural aura was approaching…

Chen Yi opened his eyes, his gaze sharp and clear.

He took the peachwood sword in hand, gently and quietly lifted the quilt, put on his shoes, and sat silently by the bed, waiting.

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