As dusk approached, Hu Jiaping, who had been sound asleep under the tree all day, finally woke up. This irresponsible teacher had slept the entire day without moving an inch, waking up with grass and leaves tangled in his hair. The children all looked at him with disdain, their previous sense of respect completely gone.
"How's your practice going?" He stood up slowly, yawning and stretching as if still half-asleep, then trudged over listlessly. "Those who can fly, show me."
In an instant, over a dozen long swords soared into the air. Aside from a few exceptionally talented students who could fly across all the islands of the Academy, most of the children could now slowly but safely fly from this island to the northern one. Only Li Fei remained motionless on the ground.
Hu Jiaping squinted at her for a moment before asking, "Can you not read? Or do you just not want to fly?"
Li Fei remained silent. She truly didn't know how to respond—today had been utterly miserable.
Hu Jiaping bent down to examine the name tag on her waist, reading each character aloud: "Jiang—Li—Fei. That's a nice name. You've got such a refined name, yet you can't read?"
Li Fei murmured, "I can read..."
"Then you just can't learn it?"
She fell silent again.
Hu Jiaping sighed and said flatly, "Twenty taels per meal. Listen up, none of you are allowed to bring her food, or I'll throw you all off the island. If you still can't do it tomorrow, it'll be forty taels per meal. If you still can't by the day after, I'll have to take you to Zuoqiu Xiansheng. Was this year's Second Selection too easy, letting in a disciple like this?"
With that, he yawned and walked to the edge of the island. Suddenly, he leaped into the air, transforming into a whirlwind of scattered leaves before vanishing completely.
Li Fei's feet felt nailed to the ground. She stared fixedly at a spot in front of her shoes, saying nothing.
Ji Tongzhou deliberately walked past her, laughing loudly. Even from a distance, his voice carried: "I've never seen such a useless idiot who can't even learn Sword Flying! Hahaha! A moron like her will be kicked out of the Academy soon!"
"Li Fei..." Baili Gelin moved closer to comfort her, but Ye Ye pulled her back and shook his head. "Let her be alone for now."
The clearing gradually emptied as the pale sunset faded into nightfall. Still, Li Fei didn't move.
Humiliation, disgrace, pity—none of these frightened her. She could endure any reprimand. But Hu Jiaping's words had struck right at her deepest insecurity.
She hadn't earned her place in the Academy through her own abilities.
The Nine-tailed Fox had helped her pass the Second Selection, then disappeared without a trace. Whether he had helped or harmed her no longer mattered—the harsh reality was clear: she couldn't find any way to learn Sword Flying.
Her nose stung slightly. Li Fei sniffed hard and looked around blankly. The surroundings were pitch black, the wind whistling coldly. She was the only one left standing in the empty clearing.
Suddenly, a wave of helplessness welled up from deep within her. This unbearable emotion made her long to confide in someone—but who? There was no one here. Should she find Ge Lin? Chang Yue and Ye Ye were probably with her, and she didn't want too many people comforting her.Dragging her sore legs, Li Fei slowly made her way back to the Disciple Room. The courtyard doors were tightly shut, with faint lamplight seeping through the windows. Lei Xiuyuan's door was also closed—what was that crybaby up to? He was always calling her "Big Sis" this and "Big Sis" that. Was he thinking of her now?
Li Fei stared blankly at the flickering light in his room. A faint hope stirred in her heart—did she long for someone to care about her? For someone to understand her helplessness and offer a few words of encouragement? Or perhaps to notice her and comfort her gently? She wasn’t sure what she hoped for, but when she was sad, she still wished for a friend to stand by her side.
As if their hearts were connected, the door to the Quiet Mystery Chamber suddenly opened. Lei Xiuyuan spotted Li Fei standing dazed in the courtyard and immediately looked surprised.
"Big Sis," he called softly. "You... you're back..."
Li Fei forced a smile. "Why are you out so late?"
He walked over to her, rummaged in his sleeve for a moment, then pulled out a handful of candies and placed them in her palm. "The Master said we shouldn’t bring you food, but a few candies should be fine," he murmured. "Big Sis, you must be hungry."
Li Fei smiled again, surprised and touched. "...Did you come out looking for me?"
He nodded. "Eat quickly. It’s late—I should go back. Big Sis, you should rest early too."
The door to the Quiet Mystery Chamber closed again, and the courtyard fell silent. Li Fei looked down at the candies in her hand—round, neatly wrapped in white paper. Those few sweets eased her helplessness just a little.
Having friends felt so good.
Li Fei slowly pushed open her door and stepped inside. The room was empty, and her heart felt just as hollow, adrift. Every movement felt dreamlike, unreal.
Straightening the bronze mirror, she began undoing her braids. The mirror reflected a dejected face—thick, ink-like eyebrows, large but plain eyes, an average nose, an average mouth, an average face. It was an utterly ordinary face, bearing a six or seven out of ten resemblance to her Master.
Master... Li Fei let out a long sigh.
To stop her useless tears from falling, she quickly sniffled and unwrapped one of the candies Lei Xiuyuan had given her, popping it into her mouth—sour! The candy was so sour her teeth nearly fell out. What kind of candy had Xiu Yuan given her? She spat it out at once.
"Tsk tsk, after days apart, you’re crying already?" Without warning, that long-missed hoarse voice suddenly rang in her ear.
Li Fei jumped up with a start, knocking over the bronze mirror.
"Old Sir!" She didn’t know whether she was more shocked or thrilled. He was still here?! He had spoken!
"What’s with the shouting?" he grumbled. "Making a fuss over nothing."
Li Fei’s emotions couldn’t even be described as a mix of shock and joy—it was more like a drowning person suddenly grabbing onto a lifeline. She didn’t bother wiping her tears, blurting out urgently, "Where have you been these past months? I kept calling, but no one answered! I thought you’d left!"
He chuckled darkly. "I finally digested that measly bit of Demon Qi these days. The moment I wake up, I see you looking like a fool. As expected, without guidance, you can’t do anything right."Though she didn’t want to admit it, he was right. Without him, she probably wouldn’t have even passed the initial selection for Young Phoenix Academy, let alone become a disciple there now.
“You’ve already entered this academy? This room is quite spacious. Not bad.” The candle flame flickered slightly as a gentle breeze swirled through the room. The half-open window suddenly blew wide, and a hoarse voice drifted in from the windowsill: “Are you alone here? Excellent, excellent.”
Li Fei asked in surprise, “Where are you? I can’t see you.”
“Here.”
The voice lingered right in front of her. Li Fei looked around, but the room remained empty—not a single shadow in sight. Bewildered, she said, “Where?”
“Here, you fool!”
The voice seemed to come from behind the oil lamp. Li Fei moved the lamp aside in disbelief and saw a tiny white fox, no larger than a thumb, crouched on the table. Its beady eyes gleamed an eerie green, yet brimmed with intelligence. Despite its minuscule size, the fox held its head high, its posture exuding arrogance.
Li Fei was stunned. What… what was this tiny fox?
“…So you really are that Fox Demon!” she exclaimed.
Before, she had only suspected it. But now, seeing his form, she was certain—he was indeed that Fox Demon. But why? He had possessed her, yet not a single Celestial had noticed? No, no—the problem was even more complicated now. His voice was so hoarse she had imagined him as a stern, cold-faced elder, yet… this dainty, adorable little thing—what was this?!
The tiny white fox looked at her with disdainful pride. “Ignorant fool! I am the legendary Nine-tailed Fox! Not some common Fox Demon!”
Li Fei stared blankly at his small, fluffy body. The terrifying yet beautiful Nine-tailed Fox had shrunk to the size of a thumb, inexplicably radiating cuteness. Even his nine tails looked like little cotton balls. And yet, he still held his head high, as if looking down on all living beings.
“Pfft—” She couldn’t help it—a soft laugh escaped her, and she quickly covered her mouth.
“Insolent creature!” He flared up, his round eyes widening.
“S-sorry…” Li Fei struggled to suppress her laughter. “You’re… so small.”
She remembered how enormous he had been that day at Green Mound.
His intelligent eyes narrowed slightly, his voice tinged with frustration and anger. “With less than a thousandth of my Demon Qi, it’s a miracle your host body can even see me! Others can’t perceive me at all!”
“Host body?” The term carried an unsettling implication.
He replied indifferently, “All this time, I’ve been disguised as one of your hairs.”
A hair?! Li Fei instinctively touched her head. The thought that one of her strands was actually a Fox Demon made her expression twist strangely.
“No need to be so shocked.” His impatience returned. “You agreed to save me—otherwise, I couldn’t have possessed you.”
“When did I agree?” She had just been frozen in terror back then!
“How should I know? All I know is that I could possess you. In your heart, you wanted to save me.”Li Fei fell silent. Perhaps he was right—the moment he had looked at her with pleading eyes, she had already wanted to save him. Every monstrous creature she had seen before had dull, murky eyes, devoid of intelligence or spirit. He was the first one she had encountered who could speak, whose eyes brimmed with vitality. And at the time, he had been grievously wounded.
"Why were those Celestials hunting you? Did you do something terrible?" she asked, instinctively assuming demons were the villains.
The fox narrowed his eyes haughtily and replied coldly, "Humans have their ways, Celestials have theirs, and demons have ours. How can everything in this world be simply divided into good and bad? All living beings are merely driven by desire and self-interest! I am a thousand-year-old Nine-tailed Fox. From a single strand of fur to my millennia of demonic power, every part of me is a treasure coveted by Celestials. It's human nature to chase profit! If not for the Year of Calamity, which sealed away all my demonic power, those fools wouldn’t have stood a chance against me! I needed a safe place to recover my sealed power, and by sheer luck, I encountered you in Green Mound... With the Sea Fall descending, perhaps this was fate."
Li Fei found his words profound and difficult to grasp, leaving her momentarily dazed.
The fox sat quietly on the table when suddenly his pointed nose twitched as if catching a scent. "What’s that in your hand?" he asked.
Li Fei opened her palm. "Oh, just some candy my friend gave me. Since I can’t master sword flying, Zuoqiu Xiansheng punished me by forbidding meals. My friend was worried I’d go hungry, so he brought me some sweets."
The fox snorted disdainfully. "Eating those will only make you hungrier! What kind of friend does that? And why can’t you sword fly? Earlier, I saw you crying—did something trouble you? Speak quickly!"
Demons were indeed straightforward—no beating around the bush.
Li Fei took a deep breath. Her luck wasn’t half bad—just when she had reached despair, a new path had opened before her.
She explained how she couldn’t draw in spiritual energy or circulate her inner breath, making it impossible for her to learn sword flying. As she spoke, the fox burst into laughter, eventually roaring with mirth. "Those fools! Their crude cultivation methods would never work for you! You’re different—you don’t need such convoluted steps!"
A spark of realization flickered in Li Fei’s heart. Softly, she asked, "How... am I different from them?"
Zuo Qiu’s earlier question had suddenly made her aware of her uniqueness. She had never paid attention to these details before, but now, upon reflection, the anomalies were obvious: she couldn’t eat meat, mosquitoes never bit her, miasma and demon Qi didn’t affect her, and her breathing techniques were the complete opposite of others... The differences were too vast.
What... was she?
He scoffed arrogantly. "That’s none of your concern! A fledgling like you only needs to know their methods are useless to you! Now, my time is limited—I can stay conscious for barely a quarter-hour every ten days. Enough chatter. Listen carefully—I’m going to teach you the proper way to cultivate!"
Li Fei still had countless questions, but his dismissive tone forced her to set them aside. She focused intently on his instructions.
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