Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Three days later, the Sect Leader emerged from seclusion.

Pei Yi went to the Sect Leader to seek justice.

To his surprise, I went as well.

Seeing me arrive, Pei Yi looked startled before coolly averting his gaze.

“Since you know you were wrong, go and apologize to Qianqian.”

“Your disciple, Liufeng, requests to dissolve the engagement with Pei Yi.”

Two voices rang out simultaneously.

Hearing this, Pei Yi was stunned for a moment before speaking with utter disbelief. “Xie Liufeng, you have repeatedly made things difficult for Qianqian. It’s bad enough that you don’t recognize your faults, but now you’re even using our engagement as a threat?”

I ignored him, looking only at the Sect Leader and Master with a calm expression. I bowed again. “Ascending to immortality requires one’s own opportunities. My path does not lie in marriage. I intend to become an immortal; I have no time to be entangled with him.”

The words “become an immortal” rang out with power. After a long silence, I looked up to see the Sect Leader’s shocked expression. His cultivation realm had been stagnant for a long time, but now his face was filled with joy-he must have gained some sudden insight.

“Very well. Since it is a karmic debt, letting go is not necessarily a bad thing.”

He agreed to dissolve the engagement between Pei Yi and me.

Pei Yi, however, looked as if he had been struck by a heavy blow. The gaze he directed at me was full of shock and fury.

“Xie Liufeng, how dare you!” He laughed out of extreme anger, a paranoid redness seeping into the depths of his eyes. “Once this bond is severed today, no matter how you beg me in the future, I will never look back.”

Hearing this, I simply brushed off my robes and stood up, my long sword slung behind my back. I turned my head slightly and said to him, “As you wish, Senior Brother.”

“Fine, fine. Don’t you regret this.” He laughed in his rage and turned to leave as well.

I watched the thick black energy on his body grow heavier, corroding the Nascent Soul in his abdomen inch by inch.

I knew that the one who would regret this would not be me.

Pei Yi and Qianqian stayed together.

Humans and demons walk different paths; even the Sect Leader found the matter absurd.

But no matter how they punished Pei Yi, he refused to back down. He insisted that although Qianqian was a demon, she possessed the purest nature in the world and was the person most worthy of his love.

To this end, the Sect Leader soaked him in the Cold Pond, placed him in solitary confinement, and even struck him three hundred times with the spirit whip. Pei Yi was severely injured and on the verge of death, yet he still did not change his mind.

He was set on Qianqian, even publicly declaring that a mundane creature like me-who only had eyes for my own opportunities and lacked great love-couldn’t compare to a single strand of Qianqian’s hair.

Once these words were out, they naturally incited the indignation of the Junior Disciples.

During the days when Pei Yi was falling into depravity and absurdity for Qianqian’s sake, I was the one guiding all the younger generation of the Sect.

They owed me a debt of gratitude for their cultivation, and even more so, they followed my guidance in character: one should be grateful and repay kindness; an ungrateful white-eyed wolf is the most despicable creature in this world.

The Junior Disciples wanted to drive Qianqian away to vent their anger on my behalf, but I restrained them.

“In the Cultivation World, strength is respected. If you were to entangle yourself with everyone who slanders you, you would find it difficult to achieve the Great Dao even after thousands or tens of thousands of years.”

The Junior Disciples listened to me and became even more diligent in their cultivation. Each of them swore to surpass Pei Yi, their former Senior Brother, and become someone who could follow closely behind me.

They were all good children.

Thus, under their forbearance, Pei Yi had yet to see clearly his true situation within the Sect.

His behavior became increasingly erratic and rebellious, repeatedly touching the Sect Leader’s bottom line.

Ultimately, he was a disciple the Sect Leader had raised himself; he couldn’t actually take his life.

The Sect Leader and Master ran out of options and eventually chose to let him be.

Pei Yi began to openly take Qianqian to various places in the Sect.

Sometimes it was the Training Ground, sometimes the Library Pavilion.

He walked with fingers intertwined with Qianqian’s, looking at all of us with a cold, sinister air between his brows.

I knew that in his eyes, we-the group of people who had targeted Qianqian and refused to repent-were all beneath his contempt.

By flaunting his affection for Qianqian in front of us now, he was trying to establish his authority, making us understand that we should respect Qianqian just as we respected him as the Senior Brother.

But as he indulged in his illicit love with a Mermaid, he didn’t seem to notice how long it had been since anyone in this Sect had called him “Senior Brother.”

The only person they acknowledged now was the Senior Sister who had already stepped into the Divine Transformation realm, and the sword in that Senior Sister’s hand.

Pei Yi didn’t know-he didn’t even realize-that his cultivation realm was no longer just stagnant. He had neglected his cultivation for too long and had now regressed to the Golden Core stage.

Before long, it was the day of another year’s Grand Competition.

Pei Yi stood before the Sect Leader, taking it for granted that he would lead the team.

But when he heard the Sect Leader announce that the team leader was Senior Sister Xie Liufeng, his entire demeanor changed.

“On what grounds?” he protested coldly.

The only response he received was my long sword pressed against his neck.

In the past, he and I were equal in strength. If we fought, we couldn’t settle it within a hundred moves. But now, I crushed him by two whole realms. When I moved, he couldn’t even see how I struck before the sword was already at his throat.

“On the grounds that in my eyes, you are now nothing more than trash, an ant.”

Having said that, I sheathed my sword and walked right past him. The crowd of disciples immediately followed me and left as well.

In the vast Training Hall, he was left all alone.

“Ah Yi, I’ve come to get you~” the Mermaid’s sweet voice rang out. For the first time, as Pei Yi looked at Qianqian’s bright and beautiful face, he wore an expression of terror and helplessness.