Chapter Eight: This Immortal Sounds a Bit Amateurish

“Ah, this feels so good!”

Basking in the warmth of the winter sun, Feng Xue adjusted the position and angle of his solar-powered charger, feeling completely refreshed as he continued on his way. He had to admit, dealing with female ghosts was a lot of work. Coupled with memory suppression, the entire night had thoroughly released the pressure and pent-up frustrations he had accumulated since crossing over.

Watching Feng Xue’s relaxed demeanor, the little white snake finally couldn’t hold back and asked, “How exactly did you do it?”

“Do what?” Feng Xue replied, glad to have someone to talk to after the little white snake had been so withdrawn since turning into a ring yesterday. As he casually searched for any traces of a road near the dilapidated temple, he responded offhandedly.

“Those two malevolent spirits! They clearly succeeded in possessing you, yet you didn’t lose a bit of your yang energy, not even a trace of primordial yang. Your vitality is normal, and you didn’t set up any kind of magic altar. Are you some ancient great demon? That can’t be—it wouldn’t make sense for the mouth-sealing spell to work on a demon… Wait, that’s why you can turn into a ring! This isn’t a mouth seal, it’s sorcery!”

“Whoa!” Feng Xue’s eyes lit up as the little white snake’s excited rambling made sense. The reason he risked offending demons to attempt such an absurd mouth seal was to obtain a portable cultivation guide.

It seemed that this little white snake actually knew quite a bit.

“Vitality, magic altars… is this the system of human cultivators in this world? I wonder if the little snake has a detailed cultivation method.”

A surge of joy arose in Feng Xue’s heart, but he quickly suppressed it. Although the recent mouth-seal experiment had successfully tested both his cheat and the mouth-seal system, and served as a stern warning, it had also created enemies. Even if the snake knew cultivation techniques, it probably wouldn’t share them now, and even if it did, he wouldn’t dare to practice them.

After all, cultivation manuals were delicate: a few incorrect characters or even slight misunderstandings could lead to catastrophic consequences.

Thankfully, the half-month of counting down days after crossing over had greatly tempered his temperament. Moments later, he calmed his restless desire and said, “I’m not some demon, just an ordinary person.”

“Lies!” The little white snake didn’t believe a word of Feng Xue’s sincere words. “How could an ordinary person endure two malevolent spirits tormenting them all night?”

“That’s because they were too greedy. If they only intended to take a sip, maybe they could have succeeded. But as soon as they set out to kill, well, that was a different story.”

The little white snake was completely unconvinced but said nothing further. Seeing her silence, Feng Xue countered, “Alright, I’ve answered your question. Isn’t it your turn to answer mine?”

“My life’s in your hands, so cut the nonsense. Just ask whatever you want.” The snake’s straightforward tone unknowingly echoed the same resolve she had shown when she grabbed Feng Xue by the collar yesterday.

Feng Xue didn’t dwell on it. While confirming the ground before the ruined temple, he leisurely asked, “About the malevolent spirits, magic altars, vitality—who did you hear all this from? Elders at home? Ancient scrolls left by predecessors? It can’t be inherited memories, can it?”

“I’m not from the demon clan. I heard it from other demons,” the little white snake answered without hesitation, revealing another key term for Feng Xue’s analysis: “Demon clan.”

“Sure enough, this world has a complete cultivation system. The demon clan must be those born as demons, while the little white snake is probably a demon awakened later through cultivation.”

His mind quickly pieced things together, but he refrained from probing the source of demon cultivation methods. Regardless of whether he obtained them, such fundamental secrets wouldn’t be willingly shared by the little snake.

Since they were still in the early stages of communication, it was best not to touch sensitive topics.

With that, he fell silent and continued picking at the weeds on the ground. From common sense, the area before the temple should have had a path before it fell into ruin.

Before his crossing over, many city-born youths might not understand what a country dirt road was—not a crumbling cement road, nor a gravelly stone path, but a road formed purely by continuous footsteps.

Such paths quickly become overgrown if unused. Yet, compacted soil remains less hospitable to weeds than loose earth. If the time isn’t too long, traces should still be visible.

This world seemed no different in that regard. Soon, Feng Xue found a barely distinguishable trail through the grass.

“Hey, do you know why this road fell into disuse?”

When he asked, Feng Xue expected the snake demon to retort with something like, “First of all, I’m not ‘hey,’” but she didn’t seem to mind at all and answered naturally:

“That was the road from a village in the north to the county town’s market. Then the village disappeared, fewer people used it, and later those two malevolent spirits appeared. More people died, so no one came anymore.”

“North… so the county town must be to the south?” Feng Xue took out his compass for comparison. He didn’t ask pointless questions about why the village disappeared but instead posed a more fundamental one:

“How do you know about humans?”

“That temple was originally called the Fox Immortal Temple. A fox immortal lived there and told stories about the human world to the nearby mountain demons… She also taught them how to deal with mouth seals and such.”

The little white snake’s tone grew somewhat nostalgic. Feng Xue’s eyebrows furrowed upon hearing the word “immortal,” especially since the temple was now occupied by malevolent spirits.

“Did those two malevolent spirits drive the fox immortal away?”

“No way!” The little white snake instantly bristled and shouted loudly, “Grandma Fox Immortal is a demon immortal who cultivated from a great demon. Those two who just became malevolent spirits could never match her! It’s just that a few years ago, Grandma Fox Immortal was invited away by humans to become a household protector immortal and enjoy a comfortable life. That’s when the two malevolent spirits took over.”

“Household protector immortal… a lower-tier immortal, huh,” Feng Xue thought to himself, but the phrase “great demon cultivates to immortal” caught his attention. He asked, “If the demons in your mountain benefited from her, why didn’t anyone drive away the malevolent spirits?”

Hearing this, the little white snake lowered her volume and answered calmly, “The demons who have completed cultivation have long gone to the human world to enjoy themselves. The ones left in the mountains haven’t even transformed yet. Malevolent spirits can’t hurt us, and we can’t hurt them. The temple itself isn’t particularly sacred. Who would bother?”

“Malevolent spirits and minor demons can’t harm each other? Those two ghosts seemed only capable of hypnosis and entering dreams, not affecting reality. So demons are immune to ghostly illusions? Come to think of it, the little white snake’s grammar when mentioning malevolent spirits was a bit off. Perhaps ‘ghost’ isn’t a general term here but a classification like Foundation Establishment or Golden Core stages?”