Fine.

In the end, it’s still on me, like rain that only falls on my roof.

Nana Toki sighed like a deflated bellows; the side-character life is a rock in the shoe.

I should just wash up and sleep, drifting like a leaf down a dark stream.

Year’s end still sat a ridge away, the sect tournament glinting like winter sun.

So Nana carved out chunks of time to cultivate, then slipped away like a shadowed fish.

She nosed around the Cloudpeak Sect, asking disciples from other peaks for any echo of the seal.

This was a fire at her doorstep, crackling toward kindling.

If she waited for the once-in-a-century Demon Purge to break the seal, she’d be a moth to a bonfire.

Too many visitors from other sects would be a flood of variables, turning clear water murky.

And inside the sect, a Grand Elder sat like a deep lake whose depth no one could measure.

Rumor had it the Grand Elder had shut herself in seclusion, a stone door closed against the world.

The inner council was now guarded in shifts by disciples from other peaks, like lanterns changing watch.

That smelled like an opening, a door in the fog.

Nana ran the sect inside out, like wind weaving through bamboo.

At last, a few outer-sect disciples let slip something that rang like metal on stone.

There was a forbidden ground inside the Cloudpeak Sect, right beside the main summit, Moonview Peak.

They said that forbidden ground had stood for several centuries, a boulder on the path of time.

No one knew what lay imprisoned within; the sect decree was iron and cold.

Disciples and elders alike were forbidden to enter; violators would have their cultivation abolished and be cast out like leaves in a storm.

She had no proof, only a compass-needle tug.

But that forbidden ground had to be the seal tied to her hidden quest, as clear as moon on water.

Besides, Cloudpeak had nowhere else deep enough to cage a person, not a single cave mouth left.

With the seal pinned beside Moonview Peak, her next days sharpened like an arrowhead.

She ignored all else and sank into cultivation on Stream Peak, like a stone lowering through calm water.

Shrine Water was baffled by this sudden iceberg of diligence.

For days, she watched Nana in secret, like a heron eyeing a reedbed, fearing her disciple had knocked her head.

Without being called, Nana actually started cultivating on her own, a sunrise that came early.

Three months flickered by like sparrows.

Nana’s cultivation rose from Foundation Establishment first layer to third, a hill swelling into a peak.

Her strength grew, a flame feeding on seasoned wood.

Maybe because she’d never properly studied cultivation theory, Nana’s grasp of her realm was a map with coffee stains.

For three whole months, she only felt her Spirit Energy grow thicker, like broth well-boiled.

Her fire ran hotter, like coals under a bellows, and that was that.

As for “state of mind,” the lofty sky her master kept pointing at?

Mm. She had no idea what that cloud even looked like.

She stretched wide in the cave, like a cat uncurling in a sunbeam.

By her count, the sect tournament would roll in a few days, beating drums toward the arena.

By the plot, she was supposed to face the heroine, the moon at the zenith.

I really want to thump Her Highness a little, like tapping a stubborn gourd.

But I’ve got a seal to break, a thread to cut.

I’ll find a reason to forfeit, like smoke slipping past a wall.

The Cloudpeak arena sat at the Third Elder’s peak, a stage of stone above a sea of faces.

On the day of matches, even the Sect Master would go there, a flock of cranes to a single shore.

Moonview Peak would be empty as a winter courtyard, and the forbidden ground would open like an unlocked gate.

She couldn’t pummel the heroine, and that left a pebble in her shoe.

“Eh? Senior Sister, you’re out of seclusion~”

Leaving the rear mountain of Stream Peak, Nana spotted her little junior and their master at the lakeside pavilion.

Shuiqin Lin waved like a willow branch in wind when she saw Nana coming out from the back mountain.

“Why’d you come out?”

Nana glanced at the dishes on the pavilion table, then at her junior’s ninth level of Qi Refining.

Her brow knit like ripples in a pond.

Where’d all that promised effort go, girl?

When did you toss it like seeds to sparrows?

“Uh… well…”

Shuiqin Lin’s cheeks blushed pink, like dawn on snow, under Nana’s stare.

“I… got caught by Master again… fainted from hunger in the cave, so I…”

Her head drooped like a wilted lotus, and her voice faded to a thread.

Nana: “...”

In a way, it wasn’t that her junior didn’t try; she just tried like a moth head-butting a lantern.

“Sigh~ you’ve had it rough.”

Nana exhaled like wind through pine and patted her junior’s head, a gentle snowfall.

Her gaze went distant; even the lake seemed to still.

Her little junior was this endearingly dense; after Nana broke the seal, would the girl even protect herself in the wind?

With Shrine Water around, maybe the sky wouldn’t fall.

Shrine Water watched her two disciples getting along and smiled, soft as moonlight on eaves.

“Luo’er, you broke through again this time, didn’t you?”

“Reporting, Master. Currently Foundation Establishment, third layer.”

Nana didn’t stand on ceremony. She sat at the pavilion table, picked up bowl and chopsticks, and ate with her junior.

At her realm, she could go half a year without food, a crane surviving on mist.

But she kept a post-seclusion meal as a ritual, like lighting a lantern to keep night human.

She didn’t want her taste buds to go numb, a lute string left unplucked.

It was a flimsy reason, but no one stopped her.

As for Shrine Water?

Nana had never seen her eat, snow that never melts.

She must have fully cut off grains.

“Senior Sister, will you take first place in this sect tournament?”

Shuiqin Lin poured tea by habit, steam curling like white snakes.

“Senior Sister’s amazing—first place will be a breeze, right?”

Nana: “...”

Uh… I’m actually planning to forfeit, like a kite cutting its own string.

Seeing Shuiqin Lin more excited than her, Nana slid her gaze away, guilty as a fox.

“Mhm… first place… yeah, something like that…”

If we count from the bottom.

“I knew you had it in the bag! I have total faith in you.”

“...”

I wish you’d have less faith, like clouds thinning at dusk.

The day of the sect tournament arrived.

Thump! Thump! Thump!

Three drums rolled across the Third Elder’s arena like thunder under stone.

The matches began, a tide breaking its banks.

Nana was late, a drifting leaf on a rushing stream.

From afar, she saw the arena sea-dark with heads, a forest of spears and whispers.

They stood in neat lines, five square blocks, each two to three hundred strong.

Voices surged and dipped, like birds over a lake.

Cheering rose in waves, then broke into foam.

The bouts had already started, blades singing under the sun.

Disciples clustered below the stage, debating who’d laugh last, like gamblers under a lantern.

Nana stood at the back, listening with a face like a straight blade.

Laugh last? Please.

This was just the heroine’s big stage for acting cool, a moon preening in a clear sky.

What’s there to discuss but the weather?

Where were the elders, anyway?

Nana squinted and scanned, eyes skimming like swallows.

Behind the arena, on a high platform, sat four men and one woman, figures like pine on a cliff.

From left to right: Sect Master Yun Lan, Shrine Water, the Third Elder, the Fourth Elder, and the Fifth Elder.

Yiling Shen stood behind the Sect Master, a sword shadow behind a moon.

It wasn’t Nana bragging.

Out of all those people, her eyes found Yiling Shen first, like iron drawn to a lodestone.

Not the heroine’s halo—well, not only.

She was standing so high that even a blind sparrow would notice, especially flanking the Sect Master and four elders.

And Yiling Shen’s face was cold as a frosted blade.

From below, she looked like a queen ruling a province, crown glinting in winter light.

Proud as a crane on a lone pine.

Nana: “...”

She cared, a little, why the supposed contestant was on the judges’ platform, a chess piece in the wrong square.

But.

To avoid notice, Nana took one more look around, then slipped away like mist down the mountain path.

She’d confirmed the Sect Master and four elders were penned at the arena.

Time to head for Moonview Peak and break the seal, a knife to a knotted rope.

From the Third Elder’s peak to Moonview Peak wasn’t a single breath, but it wasn’t a sea-crossing either.

Even if they sensed her in the forbidden ground, they’d be a step too late, chasing shadows.

She sighed, long as smoke from a chimney.

Thinking of breaking the seal and wearing the hat of sect traitor, she felt a spear through the heart.

Damn it. These days, even villains need tricks, or the wind will strip them bare.

What would her master and junior do when they found out?

Probably be furious, thunder under a summer sky.

The main quest still wanted her to be filial, a filial piety embroidered on a black flag.

Tsk, it shouldn’t count as disrespect, right?

Master never told her not to unseal the forbidden ground, so the main quest shouldn’t fail, like a bridge still holding under rain.

System: “...” “Host, you’re very good at exploiting loopholes.”

Low profile. Low profile.

Chatting with the System, Nana walked for half an hour, footsteps like pebbles tapping a path.

She reached the foot of Moonview Peak, the mountain towering like a blade.

She took in the surroundings and clicked her tongue.

Compared to Stream Peak, Moonview Peak was palatial, a jade hall above clouds.

The scenery didn’t beat her home peak’s, but the Spirit Energy here was thick as morning fog.

Tsk. Rotten, decadent capitalism, piling pearls on one plate.

Sour at the rich, Nana circled Moonview Peak, a fox stalking a wall.

She searched and searched, then finally found a deep cave behind the rear ridge, a mouth yawning like a sleeping dragon.

This had to be it.

She stood outside the cave and touched the air, fingers brushing emptiness like reeds on wind.

“...”

No barrier?

Her eyelids twitched like startled moths, a ripple chasing another.

Cloudpeak was a major sect; a forbidden ground without a barrier was a joke told to thunder.

No one would buy it, not even a drunk fisherman.

Besides.

This forbidden ground had been set by the Grand Elder, a hand like a seal on wet clay.

Forgetting the barrier was impossible, as absurd as winter without cold.

Could someone be fanning the flames behind the curtain, a hidden hand in the reeds?

Impossible, she told herself, the words cold as creek stones.

To avoid suspicion, she hadn’t even crafted a cover to explore here; no one in the sect should know she’d come today.

Nana frowned, knotting her thoughts like tangled fishing line.

Who else could be stirring this pot, besides her?

“...”

“Tsk…”

After a long think, she slipped a few Amber Talismans from her sleeve, like fall leaves from a cuff, and pasted them on herself.

A little extra guard never hurt, armor thin as paper but sharp as prayer.

The System stared at the Talismans on Nana’s back, its display stuttering like a lantern in wind.

Then it snapped to, realization cracking like ice.

Weren’t those the same Amber Talismans the host plastered on Luo Shanshan in the last world?