After a moment of gloom, Du Chengying returned to his usual expression. After all, Lin Qi was sitting alive and well right in front of him, which was much better than the worst possible outcome.

Du Chengying gathered his spirits and said, "Shall I take you for a walk around the mountain, Junior Brother?"

Lin Qi declined. "Senior Brother, your injuries haven't healed yet. It's better to rest first. There's no rush for this right now."

Du Chengying insisted, "It's just a minor injury, it won't get in the way."

Lin Qi was equally insistent. "Senior Brother, you should rest." He patted the soft couch beside him and said, "This bed is extremely soft. Do you want to try it, Senior Brother?"

Du Chengying, of course, knew this bed was extremely soft. The Merfolk from the Coast of the Cloud Sea cast their nets to catch clouds at the turn of day and night, weaving day and night without rest for three years just to craft the bolt of 'Luoxia' beneath Lin Qi. It was the only one of its kind in the world.

"There's no need," Du Chengying decided to take a step back for now. "My cave dwelling isn't far from yours, Junior Brother. You must be tired from coming up the mountain to acknowledge your master, so I won't disturb you any longer."

Lin Qi politely said his goodbyes to Du Chengying. Du Chengying gently declined Lin Qi's offer to help him up; his face looked ashen as he left. Lin Qi watched his retreating back, his face full of complete obliviousness.

System: "I must tell you, Du Chengying's Blackening Value is still at one hundred percent."

Lin Qi ignored the System. Either way, the System was just spouting the same old rhetoric.

The System said leisurely, "Before this, I had a villain Moderator who maxed out both the male lead's favorability and Blackening Value at one hundred percent in a small world. After that, he stabbed the male lead. Guess what happened next."

Lin Qi's ears twitched, and he probed, "The male lead stabbed back?"

System: "That's right, he stabbed back, and he stabbed very deep. He stabbed seven or eight times every night, stabbing until that Moderator didn't have a single drop left."

Lin Qi had long heard that the tasks in the villain department were inhuman, and he immediately felt a deep respect for that Moderator. However, after mulling it over, he felt something wasn't quite right. "Seven or eight times a night, and he didn't die?"

"He died," the System said calmly. "He died of pleasure."

Lin Qi: "..." He suspected the System was being dirty and wanted to report it.

The System said bluntly: "I am a professional System. Moderators like you all style yourselves as calm bystanders, thinking the direction of the small worlds is entirely within your grasp. Even the male leads are just NPCs in your eyes. Arrogant and ignorant, you are never willing to invest your true feelings. This is the root cause of your failure!"

The System's righteous and stern words were deafening. Lin Qi was almost dizzy from the impact, and he said cautiously, "What you're saying makes some sense, but could you please not use an echo?"

With the deep bass voice plus the echo effect, Lin Qi felt like he was hearing a voice from heaven, making him feel like he was about to ascend.

The System returned to its normal voice, coughed, and said, "The materials I gave you have been doubly verified through both experiment and practice. You'd better treat them seriously."

Lin Qi fell silent for a moment before saying, "Then I'll... take a quick look?"

System: 'Hahaha, finally tricked him into it. The earlier he figures it out and completes the task, the earlier my vacation can come.'

Lin Qi reluctantly opened Ascending to Heaven with the Same Sex. Because the material had the word 'heaven' in its title, it at least seemed to be somewhat related to the righteous path.

After reading it for two minutes, Lin Qi silently closed it.

System: "What are your thoughts?"

Lin Qi: "...Doesn't it hurt?"

System: "I don't know, why don't you try?"

Lin Qi: "..."

Lin Qi felt that he still had to selectively absorb the System's words. The System wasn't wrong; he wasn't invested enough and was too rigid in doing his tasks. These were all his shortcomings.

The task panel remained entirely gray, seemingly echoing what the System said. There were no more rigid task nodes. There was only one ultimate goal left—to make Du Chengying return to the righteous path and become a god.

The System asked him one last question. "Do you really understand Du Chengying?"

Lying on the cloud-like soft couch, Lin Qi recalled fragments of his interactions with Du Chengying. The ones he had any impression of were almost entirely task nodes. His task was merely to block damage for Du Chengying and deliver equipment to him. It didn't include being friends. Aside from his tasks, he wouldn't do anything extra.

However, he really hadn't expected Du Chengying's favorability toward him to max out. Lin Qi felt a little embarrassed, as if he had deceived Du Chengying's feelings.

Lin Qi had never thought about investing true feelings in the small worlds. During his pre-job training, his instructors had repeatedly warned him never to take the small worlds seriously.

He didn't just treat Du Chengying as an NPC, nor was he as arrogant as the System claimed. He merely always kept in mind: no matter how flesh-and-blood the people in the small worlds appeared, they were ultimately beings from a different dimension than him.

Maintaining absolute lucidity—this was the core principle by which Moderators survived.

It sounded very realistic, but also very cruel.

If Du Chengying knew he was an outsider here on a mission, someone who didn't belong to the same world, would he still treat him as a good friend?

Perhaps, just like natural humans, he wouldn't even say a single extra word to him.

Natural humans.

Synthetic Human.

Characters of the small worlds.

Layers upon layers of complex relationships gave Lin Qi a headache. He closed his eyes and raised a hand to cover his face.

The System very considerately gave Lin Qi quiet space to think.

Lying on the couch and smelling the soothing fragrance of the Three-Core Lotus, Lin Qi suddenly sat up. "I'll go check on him."

System: "To do your task?"

Lin Qi: "To understand him."

Since doing things according to his previous understanding was a mistake, he might as well try another path.

Lin Qi walked out of his cave dwelling. Outside, warm sunlight filtered down through the dense forest. Sanyue Zhenren's mountain peak was forever this tranquil and harmonious, akin to an otherworldly paradise in the cultivation world that remained aloof from worldly strife. Even every leaf fell leisurely, gently landing back into the embrace of the earth.

The giant canopy of the cedar tree stood elegantly like an umbrella, its silver needles gleaming sharply. He stood alone, his long robes fluttering in the wind. It was as if he were the only person left between heaven and earth, his tall, slender back revealing a sense of loneliness.

Lin Qi stopped from afar, for the first time feeling a little afraid to approach Du Chengying.

Du Chengying seemed to sense the gaze behind him. He silently turned his head, his cold eyes melting instantly the moment they touched upon Lin Qi's face. "Junior Brother."

"Senior Brother Du, why aren't you lying down?" Lin Qi stepped forward, walking out from the dense forest. This cedar tree was the oldest tree on Sanyue Zhenren's peak, occupying a cliff that jutted out from the entire mountain. Lin Qi had often drank wine and discussed the Dao with Du Chengying beneath it. He lightly brushed his hand against the cedar tree, his gaze shifting to Du Chengying's abdomen. The sash around his waist fluttered, and a faint smell of blood wafted in the air. "You're still injured."

Du Chengying didn't know if it was his misconception, but why did he feel as if Lin Qi was a bit 'closer' to him now? That otherworldly, detached sense of distance seemed to have faded slightly. He spoke in a gentle voice, "I was worried that Baoshu Zhenren wouldn't be willing to let things go and would come looking to make trouble for you."

Lin Qi furrowed his brows slightly. "Actually... Senior Brother really doesn't need to trouble yourself so much for my sake."

Du Chengying's face stiffened for a moment. "I was the one who brought you up the mountain. Naturally, I will take responsibility to the end."

Lin Qi remained silent. The sunlight stretched out their figures, casting overlapping shadows that seemed to lean intimately against each other. The two stood in silence, with only the sound of the wind and Du Chengying's shallow breathing lingering around him.

Lin Qi's palm slowly curled against the rough trunk of the cedar tree. The information he and Du Chengying received was completely asymmetric, which was why the other had a one hundred percent favorability toward him. What if Du Chengying knew that the injuries he blocked for him, and the equipment he gifted him, were all just to complete a task?

He didn't understand Du Chengying, but did Du Chengying really understand him either?

Maybe once Du Chengying truly understood him, his favorability would drop, and he probably wouldn't blacken because of his death, right?

Lin Qi hesitated for a moment before deciding to toss out the first truth. He raised his head, meeting Du Chengying's eyes, and said sincerely, "Actually, long before I came up the mountain, my father already communicated with Senior Brother Xiao Mo. My aptitude is insufficient, so I could only rely on these backdoor methods to enter Mount Yuelu. Therefore, Senior Brother, you don't have to be responsible for me."

Du Chengying had a tragic background and relied entirely on himself to forge his path. He should despise backdoor-relying nepotism babies like him the most.

"I know," Du Chengying replied, his eyes and expression gentle. "Junior Brother, you needn't feel discouraged. In the future, I will cultivate together with you. I won't let you be inferior to anyone else." There was even a faint trace of pity in his tone.

Unwilling to give up, Lin Qi added, "In truth, my aptitude is average, and I never thought about climbing far on the Great Dao. It's just to have the reputation of Mount Yuelu to bring glory to my clan, that's all."

Hearing Lin Qi's words, Du Chengying's expression grew even more sorrowful. Lin Qi had no interest whatsoever in the Great Dao of immortality; he had been forced by his clan and was reluctantly swept into this dog-eat-dog cultivation world. "Junior Brother, you have suffered."

Lin Qi: "..." Ah, Du Chengying was truly just as hard to communicate with as the System. Just what did he have to say to make Du Chengying understand that he wasn't some particularly good person?

Seeing Lin Qi's distressed expression, Du Chengying said softly, "Is Junior Brother worried about the sect entry assessment?"

Right, the sect entry assessment!

Because of the massive plot twist, and with the task nodes all turning gray, Lin Qi had almost forgotten about such a major event.

Mount Yuelu opened its gates to accept disciples once every fifty years. One month after entering the mountain, the newly accepted disciples had to be pulled out for the sect entry assessment. The assessment was a secret realm trial. Those who failed to pass would still be eliminated, and worse, some might even lose their lives in the perilous assessment.

For Du Chengying, the male lead, this was equivalent to a minor instance dungeon. Because Du Chengying had no spiritual power during his first month on the mountain, he was constantly bullied and ridiculed by everyone, who all believed that he would die in the trial.

Being the male lead, Du Chengying naturally slapped everyone's faces ruthlessly in the trial. Not only did he awaken his spiritual power, but he also gained his first Spirit Beast in the secret realm. When he rode out of the secret realm on his Spirit Beast, bathed in blood, his handsome face—now free of scars—was arrogant and cold, thoroughly stealing the spotlight in front of everyone.

Lin Qi's role inside was to team up with Du Chengying and then, by a lucky coincidence, lead him to fall into a cave beneath a deep pool. This allowed Du Chengying to form a bond with the Spirit Beast and erupt with his Spirit Seed. Finally, when Du Chengying emerged from the secret realm, Lin Qi was hanging onto the tail of the Spirit Beast behind him like a pendant.

But now... Du Chengying had come up the mountain a step ahead, which meant he wouldn't enter the trial together with Lin Qi.

Recalling the gloomy and cold look in Baoshu Zhenren's eyes when he left, as well as his parting remark to 'wait and see,' Lin Qi, who lacked the male lead's plot armor, reasonably suspected that he would die a very ugly death in the secret realm.

Lin Qi suddenly felt a little dizzy, his face turning slightly pale, looking even worse than Du Chengying, who was injured.

"Don't worry," Du Chengying hurriedly said. Seeing that Lin Qi looked as if he were about to collapse, he tentatively reached out and put his arm around Lin Qi's shoulder, whispering, "I will help you, Junior Brother."

"Help me?" Lin Qi said in a daze.

Du Chengying gave a quiet 'mm,' the corners of his lips curling up slightly. "We'll just use some backdoor methods."

Lin Qi: "..." He was now starting to believe what the System had said about the male lead blackening.