“Interesting.”
Santai finally spoke, her voice no longer lazy. “That isn’t yours, is it?”
She might not be able to see through the true nature of this power, but she could easily tell that it had come from somewhere else. It was not something Chen Guan inherently possessed.
Chen Guan did not answer. He simply maintained his raised hand in silence.
In An Changqing and Long Ao’s eyes, this was a silent standoff.
But to Santai, that silence itself was a tacit admission.
“Tsk.”
Santai suddenly laughed. She casually brushed away the last of the scroll’s ashes from her sleeve, then clapped her hands.
In that instant, the vague pressure surrounding her abruptly solidified.
If her aura before had been like an unfathomably deep sea, then now there was a shark lurking within it, ready to hunt.
“Then let Big Sis see for herself.” Santai licked her slightly dry lips, the light in her eyes growing ever more dangerous. “How long can you keep this up?”
Chen Guan’s heart sank.
He knew that he had absolutely no chance in a head-on fight.
They were both geniuses, but her stats were still higher than his. Even if she simply stood there and let him attack, given his current condition, he might not be able to truly injure her.
What should he do?
Countless thoughts flashed through his mind.
At that moment, the flame in his palm suddenly leapt higher of its own accord before quickly falling back, flickering unsteadily.
The stabbing pain traveling up his arm made his face turn even paler.
This tiny change escaped no one’s notice.
“Chen Guan!”
A trace of urgency entered An Changqing’s voice. He could tell that Chen Guan was barely holding on. Such tremendous power had to come with an equally tremendous price.
Could it be that he was going to end up like last time…
Long Ao was even more direct. Ignoring the disparity in their strength, he let out a roar as his muscles bulged once more. “I’ll hold her off! You guys get out of here!”
With that, he actually started charging toward Santai.
“Don’t move.”
Chen Guan’s hoarse voice rang out, stopping Long Ao’s reckless impulse.
He slowly lowered his flaming left hand, but kept his palm spread and aimed at Santai, as if warning her not to make any rash moves.
“Cough… cough, cough…”
A violent fit of coughing seized him. He bent over, and a trace of blood seeped from the corner of his mouth.
This time, he wasn’t faking it. Forcing Baal’s power through his body had caused genuine damage.
Repairing himself while simultaneously damaging himself was truly a miserable experience.
The air in the tunnel warped from the intense heat. Once Chen Guan’s coughing stopped, he slowly straightened up. His arm, wrapped in crimson flames, remained firmly aimed at the darkness ahead.
A drop of blood slid from the corner of his mouth and landed on the dusty ground with a faint sizzle, instantly vaporized by the heat.
His chest heaved violently. Every breath felt as though it were dragging against a battered bellows, bringing a searing pain with it.
Without giving him any more time to recover, Santai moved without warning.
Her figure faded where she stood, like a drop of ink dissolving into clear water. The next instant, a bone-chilling gust of force swept in from Chen Guan’s left.
Chen Guan’s mind could not keep up, but his mental power caught the deadly trajectory.
His body abruptly leaned backward, while the enormous pitch-black scythe in his hands swung upward entirely on instinct.
Clang!
The sharp explosion of metal nearly burst their eardrums.
Santai’s figure materialized in midair, her hand-blade striking the body of the scythe with pinpoint accuracy.
The force transmitted through the weapon hit Chen Guan like a battering ram. His right arm instantly went numb.
A split-second later, agonizing pain tore through his palm as the skin between his thumb and forefinger split open. Blood stained the handle, yet his fingers clamped down on the scythe without loosening in the slightest.
Using that force, he let his body slide backward several meters, opening up the distance once more.
“Not bad reflexes.”
Santai landed lightly and shook her slightly numb hand. When she looked at Chen Guan again, there was a hint of approval in her eyes.
Although she was a member of the Knowledge faction, she knew a little about hand-to-hand combat. Even an opponent at the same rank might not have been able to receive that strike as cleanly as he had.
Before she had even finished speaking, her figure vanished again.
This time, she was faster.
Within the tunnel, all they could see were blurred black shadows. They circled Chen Guan and attacked from every direction, each blow landing precisely in the gaps of his defense.
An Changqing and Long Ao could no longer follow Santai’s movements at all.
To them, Chen Guan seemed trapped in a storm made of black shadows. He could only swing his enormous scythe, barely holding on amid the tempest, his situation growing more perilous by the second.
Long Ao could not stand watching any longer. “We’re going over there and helping him shoulder the pressure.”
“It won’t help.” An Changqing stared fixedly at the battlefield. “We can’t even see her movements. If we go over, we’ll only get in his way.”
A profound sense of helplessness welled up inside him.
This was what a true top-tier expert was like. They, the so-called prodigies of the academy, did not even have the qualifications to interfere in a battle before her.
At the center of the battlefield, cold sweat covered Chen Guan’s forehead.
Every time he swung the scythe to block an attack, it felt as if he were colliding head-on with a runaway heavy truck.
The muscles in his arms screamed, and even his bones seemed to be developing hairline fractures.
Worse still, the foreign power in his left arm was draining away faster and faster under the strain of the battle. The dam holding back his reason was steadily being eroded by the raging tide.
He had to change the situation.
After blocking another hand-blade strike from above, Chen Guan did not retreat as he had before. Instead, he planted his foot and surged forward.
The crimson flames that had merely clung to the edge of his scythe suddenly exploded outward.
Whoosh.
The flames seemed to come alive. They followed the blade and coiled toward Santai’s arm.
Santai’s eyes twitched.
The flames sent an alarm of pain through the muscles beneath her skin.
Without a moment’s hesitation, she withdrew her hand and retreated. Her figure floated backward like a ghost, carrying her more than ten meters away. For the first time, she voluntarily opened up the distance between them.
Santai lowered her head and glanced at the sleeve of her windbreaker. A patch of it had already been scorched black, with tiny sparks dancing across the fabric and refusing to die out.
“What kind of fire is that…?” she murmured.
Honestly, she still hadn’t managed to figure out all of Chen Guan’s techniques. That alone was absurd.
For Santai, if she couldn’t control an opponent’s skills, she couldn’t reproduce another version of that opponent. It was giving her quite a headache. She had even been hoping to collect her coworker’s account.
Chen Guan no longer had the strength to pursue her.
That last burst had nearly drained every remaining ounce of power from his body.
He leaned on his scythe with one hand and gasped for breath. The scene before his eyes began to sway and split into overlapping images.
Santai watched him, uncertain whether she should continue the attack.
After all, he was her coworker. Playing around was fine, but if she hit him too hard, things could get awkward.
The problem was, she couldn’t determine the upper limit of the boy’s strength. She didn’t dare stop recklessly, afraid that he might suddenly land a blow on her. That would be humiliating beyond words.
“That’s enough, little classmate.”
Santai’s voice suddenly rang out. She had thought of a good solution.
“Close combat is indeed a little troublesome, but…”
Santai extended her right hand, palm facing upward.
A completely black calligraphy brush appeared in her hand from thin air. Intricate constellations were carved into its shaft.
“I’m not a close-combat fighter.”
Santai gripped the pen and made a casual sweep through the air with his wrist.
nd fell into a coma while saving his younger sister from an out-of-control car. He became a vegetable. No one knew that his consciousness had crossed into a world of cultivation. Over the course of sixty years, he began as the lowest kind of mine slave, struggling to survive amid mountains of corpses and seas of blood. By sheer chance, he eventually obtained the complete memories of a fallen Immortal King. Alchemy, medicine, formations, feng shui, physiognomy, artifact forging… Every great inheritance of the cultivation world was now his. But when he opened his eyes again, he discovered that ten full years had passed in the modern world. To pay for his treatment, his father had sold the family’s shop and house, leaving himself covered in lasting injuries and illness. His mother had cared for him day and night, and more than half of her hair had already turned white. His younger sister, who had been only fifteen back then, was now twenty-five. To help repay the family’s debts, she had been forced to lower her head and put on a smiling face in places of glittering lights and endless revelry. Only then did Chen Xuan understand that what he had lost was not merely ten years. He had lost the life his entire family was meant to have. The good news was that he had brought back the memories of an Immortal King’s entire lifetime. The bad news was that his soul had returned alone—his cultivation had not come with him. Spiritual energy was scarce, resources were depleted, and the modern world still had firearms, surveillance, capital, and laws. If he wanted to protect his family, break free from everyone’s control, and become truly invincible beneath the heavens, he would have to start all over again.
【Prologue: The Beginning of It All – Use holy water to heal the saintess tainted by demonic energy, then converse with her.】 Shen Nian stared at his older sister sipping yogurt, lost in thought. So you’re telling me my sister is the saintess, and yogurt is the holy water? 【Main Quest 1: Brave Youth, Become an Adventurer! Reward: Rookie Adventurer Title.】 【Side Quest 1: Find the Adorable Kitty! Reward: 1000 Gold Coins.】 Shen Nian: "Wait, I’m a high school senior here—did some guy who got isekai’d accidentally bind his system to me?" Hold on, completing quests gives gold rewards? Titles even boost stats? Is this for real? (A lighthearted, absurd campus comedy—not a revenge power fantasy.)
s + Rent Collection Wealth】 At the start, he inherited a rundown house in the urban village from his grandfather. The house had no tenants, but the moment he was diagnosed with a terminal illness, a self-proclaimed empress from the Tianxuan Continent arrived as his first tenant. Ye Chuan soon discovered that with every new tenant moving in, not only did he receive massive daily payments, but he also obtained unique items related to their backgrounds. 【Acquired Bai Qianshuang’s related item: Tiger Strength Pill—dramatically enhances physical power!】 【Acquired Bai Qianshuang’s related item: Deer Blood Pill—significantly boosts vitality!】 …… From that day on, all sorts of bizarre tenants began appearing in the house: the empress from Tianxuan Continent, an apocalyptic sorceress from the Magic Realm, a mysterious scientific girl who fell through a spacetime rift… Every single day, he received strange, powerful items and endless money. Then one day, he suddenly realized—he had become invincible. Enough, enough! Stop giving me more!
] [Lone Wolf, No Male Gaze] [Protagonist is pursued early on; extreme protagonist-stans, stay away!] The "Carnival Paradise" descends and slowly devours the real world in the form of a game. By chance, Zhu Yan awakens the talent [Roleplay], becoming one of the first beta players. He thought he could develop safely, but after clearing the first instance, he is branded by humanity as the chief culprit behind the game's spread—a traitorous villain. A villain? Who would ever... become one! He'll be the villain! From then on, Zhu Yan is not only a player but also a lackey for the Carnival Paradise. Between the straight path and the crooked path, he chooses the con. With his left hand, he dons the villain's mantle, staging scenes within instances, infuriating players who decry him as a despicable traitor, all while the game happily promotes him. With his right hand, he joins the non-human organization "Fangcun Mountain," which opposes the Carnival Paradise, transforming into a mysterious player who slaughters game bosses, earning cheers of "Long live the expert!" from fellow players. Gradually, Zhu Yan rises to become an S-rank human player in Fangcun Mountain's archives, while also being the Carnival Paradise's certified top game Boss. But when the final war erupts and both major factions place their hopes in him— Players tag his various aliases: "Experts, this offensive depends on you." The Carnival Paradise's supreme Boss throws an arm around his neck: "Bro, you're the iron, I'm the steel; you can't let me down again!"
