They kissed for who knows how long.
Maybe one incense stick’s time, maybe two. Shangguan Yunying herself couldn’t say.
All she knew was that when she finally managed to snap out of her dizzy haze a little,
the sky seemed just a shade darker than before.
That realization also made her aware that she’d been gone far too long.
Reluctantly, she pulled back from Gu Chengyin’s embrace, her cheeks still flushed with lingering heat.
Her eyes were moist and bright, like apricots fresh-washed by rain.
As she refastened her robe—somehow unbuttoned at some point—she murmured,
“I’ve been out too long.”
Her voice carried a note of reluctance and faint helplessness. “I really need to get back.”
Gu Chengyin looked at her as she was, then reached out to straighten her slightly rumpled collar.
Casually, he asked, “How is His Highness doing?”
Shangguan Yunying blinked, knowing he was asking about Luo Zhao’s hypnotic state.
“Nothing unusual,” she answered softly.
“Except for that time you were attacked in Luodu—His Highness seemed to have a conflict with His Majesty.”
“But I don’t know what happened inside the warm chamber.”
Gu Chengyin nodded. The answer didn’t surprise him.
Luo Zhao forcing the Luo Emperor to abdicate was, after all, a family scandal—bound to stay hidden.
As for other times, Luo Zhao acted almost exactly like his usual self, so Shangguan Yunying only needed to interact normally.
That clearly proved Luo Zhao was still under hypnosis.
Otherwise, he wouldn’t carry out the system’s commands so thoroughly.
If it had been the real Luo Zhao forcing the abdication, the result certainly wouldn’t have been as smooth.
He definitely wouldn’t have made the Luo Emperor withdraw his decree so cleanly.
Gu Chengyin silently downgraded the threat Luo Zhao posed.
At the end of the day, comparing him to a dog would almost be an insult to dogs.
“Mm, I understand.”
“Once I finish handling things, I’ll come find you.”
Hearing that promise, Shangguan Yunying’s eyes lit up instantly.
That light came so fast, so bright, it nearly lit up her whole being.
She looked up at Gu Chengyin, her gaze brimming with anticipation and joy, and said in a sweet voice,
“Pinky promise!”
She even held out her pinky. Gu Chengyin, seeing her delighted expression, couldn’t help but smile too.
He extended his own pinky and hooked it with hers. Shangguan Yunying’s smile grew even wider.
Gu Chengyin reached up and ruffled her hair again, and then the two of them walked side by side toward the exit.
Once outside, they stood in the open space before the Ten Thousand Phenomena Tower.
The Golden Guard stood at attention, eyes straight ahead, as if they had seen nothing.
Shangguan Yunying turned back to look at Gu Chengyin, her eyes filled with reluctance and a struggle to hurry herself away.
She opened her mouth as if to say something, but in the end, no words came.
Finally, she waved her hand, turned, and quickened her steps toward the Crown Prince’s Palace.
After a few steps, she looked back again. Seeing Gu Chengyin still standing there watching her,
she broke into a wide grin and waved once more.
Then she turned and disappeared, her steps light and swift.
Gu Chengyin watched until her figure vanished before withdrawing his gaze and heading toward the Ten Thousand Phenomena Tower.
The tower stood ahead—dark bricks, gray tiles, soaring eaves, and upturned corners, radiating a profound stillness.
In front of the tower stood the Golden Guard, aligned in two rows, holding long halberds, solemn and unmoving.
Gu Chengyin approached and produced the Crown Prince’s Token from his sleeve, offering it forward.
A Golden Guard stepped up to take it and scrutinized it carefully.
That was protocol: aside from the Emperor and the Crown Prince, anyone entering the tower had to show their token.
While the guard inspected it, Gu Chengyin asked casually, “Is Gu Xiaoli inside?”
The guard’s inspection paused almost imperceptibly. He didn’t answer immediately.
Instead, he lowered his head and continued checking the token, as if pondering something.
After a moment, he lifted his head, returned the token with both hands, and asked,
“Is Your Excellency, the Junior Preceptor, looking for someone?”
Gu Chengyin took the token and hummed in affirmation.
It was only then that the inspecting guard said,
“Then I’m afraid Your Excellency’s trip will be in vain. There’s no one in the tower at present.”
Gu Chengyin raised an eyebrow slightly and gave the guard another glance.
Though he hadn’t directly answered whether Gu Xiaoli was there, the phrasing made it essentially a no.
This was a clever man.
Knowing a direct reply might breach protocol, he’d offered a generalized answer.
This way, he avoided violating rules while doing the Junior Preceptor a favor.
A smile tugged at Gu Chengyin’s lips. “Thank you,” he said.
The guard’s expression remained unchanged. He gave a slight bow and returned to his post before the tower,
resuming his duties as if nothing had been said.
Gu Chengyin stood there for a moment, staring at the tower’s gate, frowning.
Gu Xiaoli wasn’t in the main hall, nor in the tower—so where was she?
Previously, she only ever went between those two places, occasionally dropping by to bother him.
Now both were empty…
Gu Chengyin suddenly blinked.
Wait.
Was he being an idiot?
Where Gu Xiaoli was, couldn’t he just ask Shangguan Yunying directly?
He’d been kissing and cuddling with her, being all lovey-dovey for so long,
and in the end, he’d completely forgotten to ask about the important matter. Instead, he’d stupidly headed straight for the tower.
Gu Chengyin shook his head, silently laughing at his own foolishness.
Of course, that was mostly because Shangguan Yunying’s charm was truly overwhelming.
Yes.
Truly overwhelming.
Overwhelming enough to make him forget his business entirely.
He didn’t dwell on it. Turning around, he prepared to head back to the Crown Prince’s Palace to ask Shangguan Yunying about Gu Xiaoli’s whereabouts.
But after just a few steps, he stopped abruptly.
At the entrance to a nearby corridor, a figure stood quietly.
She wore a plain white silk gown, her ink-black hair cascading like a waterfall, her face cold and pure.
An aura of faint frost and snow seemed to envelop her, sending a chill through anyone who saw her.
Lin Qingyan.
Back from the Luo Emperor’s place so soon?
Gu Chengyin’s brow shot up. He walked over quickly, speaking in a familiar, casual tone:
“Auntie, you’re back already?”
Lin Qingyan hummed flatly, her face still bearing that aloof indifference toward everything,
as if the whole world had nothing to do with her.
Gu Chengyin didn’t mind. He was getting used to her demeanor by now.
He figured it was actually convenient—she required little attention.
As for Lin Qingyan being summoned by the Luo Emperor under the name of the Grand Harmony… well, that was meant to cut the ground from under them.
And the result?
A slight curve lifted the corner of Gu Chengyin’s mouth.
The result was that his influence had soared yet again.
In fact, this level of leverage was even greater than that from the tribunal of the Three Ministries.
Lin Qingyan listened to him, and not to the Grand Harmony.
That fact was simply too earth-shattering.
Not just the hidden forces in the shadows—even the Luo Emperor himself was probably shaken to the core.
The Jingzhe of the Heavenly Master’s Court, ignoring the Grand Harmony’s orders, yet following a man who hadn’t even achieved the Golden Core…
What did that mean?
ut it can buy an entire year of absolutely perfect training results! Su Yu stared at his empty wallet and decisively opened up various online loan platforms. “Borrow a thousand bucks! Recharge my vitality!” Boom! His vitality broke a hundred points, shattering the limits of the human body! “Borrow ten thousand bucks! Recharge my combat skills!” Boom! A basic punching technique so common it was everywhere instantly maxed out, revealing the ultimate assassination technique of Five Elements Unity—Inner Force! When a rich kid hired assassins for a midnight ambush, aiming to break both of his legs, they instead ran headfirst into a monster—a human-shaped tyrannosaur, brimming with dragon-like vitality. With just two fingers, Su Yu snapped a steel staff reinforced with alloy. Staring at the killer’s stash of stolen cash—a staggering quarter-million dollars—he showed a corporate-sincere smile: “Thanks for the pre-exam gift pack, Mr. Zhao! I’m gonna go re-invest this!” Three days later, at the National Martial Arts College Entrance Exam, while everyone else struggled just to reach the passing line, Su Yu threw a single punch—and more than a thousand vitality points literally detonated the entire arena!
ing gift was a patch of barren land, and disciples were all picked up along the way. He spent fifty years diligently building three "ramshackle little sects," thinking he could finally live a carefree life relying on his disciples. But right at the fifty-year mark, he was suddenly swept away by a spatial rift and exiled to the Chaos Desolation, the Disorderly Ruins. There was no spiritual energy there, only slaughter. Relying on the cultivation feedback from his disciples, Gu Changyuan hacked his way through a sea of blood for eleven hundred years. When the system finally fished him back out, he discovered the ramshackle little sects he'd built back then had developed a rather... unusual style. Hold on... I vanished for a thousand years, so how did my ramshackle little sects become holy lands?!
e, Immortal Body, Transmigration, System, Progression Fantasy, Academy Setting, Third-Person Perspective. Alternate Title: Transmigrating into a High Martial World and Reading Live Comments. Bad news: I transmigrated. This is a terrifying high-martial world, and my original, pathetically weak body fell into a coma and never woke up. Good news: I got a Popularity Points system upon arrival. I can see live comments and even create an unkillable alternate identity. Starting out, the alternate identity has all stats at 1. The system tells me that to grow stronger, I must participate in the plot, gain popularity points to allocate stats and grow stronger, and ultimately awaken my original body. And so, carrying my original body on my back, I officially entered Huaqing Academy, where the story's protagonist resides. From that moment on, Chen Guan kicked the original plot to pieces. Live Comments: [Doesn't anyone find this mysterious coffin guy creepy? He can summon indescribable grey misty hands.] [Is this guy a hero or a villain? What kind of onion became a spirit?] [By the way, does anyone know who's in the coffin? Shouldn't the debt for saving his life be repaid by now?] [According to unofficial histories, the person in the coffin was Chen Guan's first love. Their love was once passionate and earth-shattering, but they were separated by life and death due to worldly circumstances. What a star-crossed pair.] ... Years later, the world knew of a demon god born from a coffin, shrouded in grey mist, impossible to gaze upon directly. His foremost divine emissary often wielded a scythe, reaping lives like the god of death. As war approached, facing former friends and a boundless sea of enemies, Chen Guan merely raised his scythe. "Would you like to dance as well?"
shall grant"] ["Inscribing the glory of our race upon tombstones"] ["All that is threatened, I shall protect"] How his younger sister sees her brother: A brother who only makes eye contact once a day, mostly fading into the background as he tinkers with who-knows-what in his room all day. Their life paths should have remained largely separate. Until one day. Su Qi created an equipment card for his never-met "online girlfriend." His sister fell into silent contemplation upon receiving the "white stockings." [Card can be upgraded] [Upgrade by fulfilling any of the following conditions] [Condition ①: Consume one hundred higher-tier cards] [Condition ②: Complete one 'Heart-Pounding Adventure'] What constitutes a Heart-Pounding Adventure? [Heart-Pounding Adventure (Beginner Level): Equip the card and invite 'Su Qi' to admire it.] [Heart-Pounding Adventure (Easy Level): Equip the card, invite 'Su Qi' to touch it, and analyze the equipment's texture.] [Heart-Pounding Adventure (Entry Level): Equip the card and invite 'Su Qi' to...] [Heart-Pounding Adventure (Challenge Level): Freely combine the words 'Brother' 'Out' 'Brother' 'Me' 'Please' into a complete sentence...] "Please help me analyze both teams' mistakes in this match, brother..." His sister exhaled in relief—surely... surely there couldn't be anything more difficult? [Heart-Pounding Adventure (Suicide Mission Level): Sneak a peek at the names of the galgames in 'Su Qi's' hidden E-drive folder]
