The Romantic Cultivator

Ji Yuan was now looking at the jagged horizons of the gigantic ruined city and he was clenching his fists tightly, “I hope that she is alive and will live to survive this trial.”

Although the time spent with the Lovely Empress was short, they had both helped each other in their hours of need.

He could still remember how the Lovely Empress had used her spirit animus to sweep Lin Antian away to save him and that she had also furiously attacked Gu Sangu, simply to buy him time.

If he still could not see it how earnest she was in trying to go to his aid while sacrificing a huge part of the reserve of her inner spiritual sea to summon her spirit animus then he must really be blinded to her devotion.

In that moment, the Lovely Empress already had a place in his heart even though Ji Yuan did not want to tell her that as he sort of enjoy bickering with her. And that was the reason why he ahd swallowed her profound pill without even doubting about her ‘poisonous’ intentions.

Ji Yuan said quietly but it was firm, “We need to find her in this trial.”𝑶𝑽𝗅xt.𝒸𝒐𝐌

The Smiling Divine Maiden merely hummed as she turned around and Ji Yuan could not see the expressions that were on her.

But deep down, Ji Yuan knew that they were actually very close to each other and were even closer than real sisters.

He was now thinking that the Smiling Divine Maiden Chu Lixue was a very mysterious maiden. She seemed to have many secrets that she was not willing to share and she seemed to be wearing a mask to disguise her true facade.

But he knew that behind her haughty icy mask, she was actually not a cold person. It was because she had risked herself to buy him time to escape up the walls. This one was real and that she had also helped him to analyze the mistakes in his fighting style with Gu Sangu as well.

The Smiling Divine Maiden seemed to know what was on Ji Yuan’s mind and said to him with shrugged shoulders, “Don’t be mistaken. Just now I had a sudden compassion to help you. However I have soon regretted my actions as reckless. I should remain as still as water.”

Ji Yuan laughed weakly, “Lucky for me.”

Then he softened his voice to ask quietly, “Actually why are we taking the most dangerous route? We can just avoid that monster and to take our chances with the less powerful desolate monsters, right? It seems that we are too far ahead and there are no other cultivators around here.”

The Smiling Divine Maiden smiled casually before asking him with a wry smile, “What is the objective of this trial and how many cultivators do you think will be able to survive this trial?”

Ji Yuan answered, “All of us have to score +9 Points and I am estimating that around 40 cultivators will be able to survive this trial.”

The Smiling Divine Maiden giggled softly before she smiled mysteriously, “Less than 10 cultivators will be able to survive to survive this trial.”

Ji Yuan was startled, “Seriously?”

The Smiling Divine Maiden looked up to the windy dark heavens with a knowing smile, “They will be contesting over the celestial-step robe and will be slaughtering each other for the highest points.”

Ji Yuan rolled his eyes as he sighed softly, “So this is actually your plans? You offer such a godly reward for this trial because you want to recycle all of them and take their profound treasures?”

The Smiling Divine Maiden nodded slowly, “And should you fall as well then we would have gotten two saint-step divine swords. Isn’t this more rewarding than anything else?”

Ji Yuan: …

“Then why did you save me?”

The Smiling Divine Maiden laughed aloofly for a while before she smiled, “That is why I had regretted saving you.”

But secretly, she was saying to herself: I don’t want my sister the Lovely Empress to be hurt when Ji Yuan is dying or dead…

She said slowly, “The route that we have taken is the shortest route. The rest of the route are just longer or deathtraps and they will only delay us from reaching the yellow portals.”

As Ji Yuan looked at the Smiling Divine Maiden, he began to ponder for a while before he said, “This is but one answer to one of the two questions, right? We still need to get +9 Points. Without getting the +9 Points, we can’t complete this trial.”

He was actually thinking of flashing his two saintly divine swords and to force his weaker opponents to surrender, hence they would be forced to donate 1 Points to him. All he needed to do was to find 9 cultivators that got at least 1 Points and he could complete the trial when he had entered through the yellow portal.

In this way, he could complete the trial without killing anyone and still got his 5 million high grade spirit stones. Altogether, he could get 10 million high grade spirit stones for completing all three finals.

When he had thought of his plan, Ji Yuan thought this was such an awesome plan. He had never felt so rich before. Although he had once traded 40 million high grade spirit stones for Yu Jingjing’s heaven-step divine zither, it was mostly in slaughter points and he had to spend it or it would be wasted.

How much was 10 million high grade spirit stones in standard spirit stones again?

Ji Yuan made a quick calculation and it was 1000 million standard spirit stones.

He was now feeling filthy rich enough to buy all the surrounding celestial clans around the Emperor Hall Sect!

Even if he had kept half of the high grade spirit stones to use for realm breakthroughs and replenishing for his sect, he was still a filthy rich cultivator.

But when he had thought that he still owed 990 million high grade spirt stones to the Mo Clan, he felt extremely poor again.

The Smiling Divine Maiden was suddenly looking at him with a weird expression and she was wryly smiling, “Huh? When did I say we are going to complete the trial? Although the trial rules state that we have to get +9 Points to complete this trial when we enter the yellow portal, it never says we can’t fail the trial if we got 0 Points when we enter the yellow portal.”

Ji Yuan blinked his eyes, “What do you mean that you want to fail the trial on purpose? You mean you are aiming for 0 Points?!”

Smiling Divine Maiden Chu Lixue lovingly looked at Ji Yuan’s golden eyes as she hummed with a wry smile, “My aim is just to reach the safe area and to let everyone kills each other. This trial is just my trap to kill everyone in the lesser and greater areas.”

Ji Yuan nearly fainted when he had heard her.

The Smiling Divine Maiden began to walk away, “Be thankful that you are still alive…”

All of a sudden Ji Yuan had thought of something and had interrupted her, “You can track down the Lovely Empress, am I right? Or else how did you manage to find us? I run like hell in the previous trial so it is quite impossible for you to find me and Lin Antian.”

The Smiling Divine Maiden was suddenly gasping as she put her fingers to her face, “You… you’re right…”

Immediately she had turned to another direction now.

Ji Yuan asked her, “You are heading back now to the exterior walls now?”

The Smiling Divine Maiden paused for a while before she said melacholy, “Unless I find her, the darkness in my heart will never go away. Why are you so surprised? We are not here to win anyway.”

Ji Yuan was grinning now, “I don’t care about this trial either.”

———————–

Author Note: Here goes another plot twist. The fun part about ‘The Romantic Cultivator’ is the multiple twists, don’t you think so as well? This arc is a major arc and it isn’t so simple to end at the Extreme Bliss Colosseum and that is why the hardest trial is shown first instead of the usual sequence.