An Anonymous Immortal Grants You a Top-Tier Dao Companion - Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Little Martial Uncle was completely flustered by me. He wanted to wipe away my tears, but he also didn’t want to touch me too abruptly, so he took a white handkerchief out of his robe instead-everyone knew he had a habit of carrying one with him.

I used the handkerchief to wipe my tears, and I couldn’t help remembering just how many iconic scenes I’d written involving handkerchiefs.

Come to think of it, I really could write. I’d once written a scene where three of Little Martial Uncle’s bed partners discovered they all had handkerchiefs as tokens of love, so they banded together to confront him and demand that he pick who his real number one was.

In the end, though, Little Martial Uncle didn’t panic in the slightest. He gave them a wickedly charming smile, lured all three onto the bed, and went at it with them together.

…At a time like this, why am I still thinking about my porn? Heaven really is rewarding me with a steamy scene.

All kinds of messy thoughts ran through my head a few times before I finally started to calm down.

So I let go of his thigh, stood up, straightened my back, and let my expression shift from agitated to composed.

“Little Martial Uncle, don’t overthink it. The reason I haven’t gone to see you isn’t because I don’t admire you anymore,” I said. “You’ll always be my idol. But I have a crippled spirit root. No matter how hard I try, I’ll never reach the top. Every time I go see you, all I can feel is how huge the gap between us is. If this keeps up, my mentality is bound to twist out of shape. For the sake of my mental health, I decided it’d be better to stay farther away from you.”

Little Martial Uncle clearly hadn’t expected me to say that.

But just like in the legends, when he spoke, he only ever seized on the main point. Right then and there, he pointed out a bright path for me.

He said, “Don’t worry. If I help you cultivate, you’ll definitely make a breakthrough. No one in the sect will dare bully you again.”

When he said that, my feelings got complicated. On one hand, I was a little touched, because he really was a good person. On the other hand, I wanted him to shut up, because right now all I wanted was to run.

“Little Martial Uncle, I know my own constitution better than anyone. Ascension is impossible for me, so I won’t waste your time. And my admiration for you has never faded. To be able to personally hug your thigh today… even if I die, it was worth it. I’ll never forget today. Never, ever.”

After saying that, I gave him an extremely respectful salute. When I straightened up again, just the right amount of tears had welled at the corners of my reddened eyes.

Then I turned and left.

“…Su Jiuyuan,” Little Martial Uncle called from behind me. “Come back.”

I flew off on my sword without hesitation.

Chapter 5

The Sect Tournament was still going on. I took advantage of the chaos to sneak back to my room, pulled out the smut I’d written halfway out of boredom before, glanced at it once, shuddered all over, and immediately tore it to pieces.

I’m sorry, Little Martial Uncle. I’ll never dare write porn about you again. Your body can finally rest in eternal peace.

As I repented in my heart, I cleaned my room and thoroughly got rid of every last piece of incriminating evidence.

After thinking it over, I decided I should build up a little more virtue. I grabbed a few pieces of fruit, picked some magnolia blossoms, and ran to the back mountain to find Little Martial Uncle’s statue.

At worst, I’ll just come clock in for you whenever I have time from now on, okay? It’s not like you need to care this much about me!

I hadn’t set foot here in a long time, and the place felt like a lifetime away. The moment I got a clear look at the statue, I froze.

It had fallen into terrible disrepair. Its entire right arm was gone, and birds had already built a nest in the broken-off place.

That handsome face had become blurred and unrecognizable, its features impossible to make out. A crack ran from the corner of one eye at a slant, trailing downward like a line of tears.

I set down the flowers and fruit, and suddenly heard footsteps behind me, accompanied by the sound of people talking.

“Senior Brother, does it hurt? Don’t worry, Master said your injuries aren’t serious. Go soak in Cold Spring for one night and you’ll be fine.” The Little Junior Sister supported Qi Yuan with a worried look. “That useless woman. How did she suddenly get so powerful?”

Qi Yuan said bitterly, “Who knows what crooked, underhanded trick she used. That damned woman, sooner or later I-”

I kicked a pebble over in front of them and raised my voice. “You what?”

Qi Yuan and the Little Junior Sister both looked startled.

I strolled up to them and suddenly drew my sword. Both of them flinched at the same time.

What a well-matched pair of little lovebirds.

“Don’t be afraid. I just want to ask you something.” I pointed at the statue. “What happened to this statue?”

The two of them turned to look, and their expressions went blank in unison.

In the end, it was the Little Junior Sister who spoke first.

“Whose statue is this? Why would anyone put a statue here in the first place?”

Qi Yuan thought hard for quite a while before he finally remembered. “Oh, I think this is the statue of that Little Martial Uncle who ascended. I forgot who had it erected. Last year, Senior Brother and I were sparring here and accidentally broke it.”

I frowned. “You broke the statue and didn’t think to repair it?”

Qi Yuan said sharply, “It’s not like it’s anything important.”

I felt blocked up inside, unable to get the breath in or out.

Qi Yuan saying that Little Martial Uncle wasn’t important to the sect was, strictly speaking, true.

Little Martial Uncle was not an ordinary man, but the sect had talent everywhere and experts by the score. There were more ascenders than carp crossing a river, and legendary figures were as common as could be.

If I hadn’t written so many filthy little stories based on him every day, then after the initial freshness and brilliance faded, he probably would have slowly disappeared from my memory too.

What had first dazzled me about him?

I spent a long time trying to remember, and only then did it come back to me: it was just a single short sentence from Master.

“Your Little Martial Uncle Bai Hailiu was a genius sword cultivator. It’s a pity heaven was jealous of talent. He died when he was nineteen.”

Because of that one sentence, I became curious about Little Martial Uncle and went everywhere asking about his past.

An orphan, a sword cultivator who stood out within two years of entering the sect, solitary, low-key, and quiet. His favorite pastime was sitting by Cold Spring and watching the magnolia blossoms.

At eighteen, he had charged alone into Guixu and killed the thousand-year-old demon flood dragon that had been causing havoc.

The following year, the situation in the world changed. The Hungry Ghost Realm opened, and Ghost Mother brought countless ghosts to harm the mortal world. By himself, he drove Ghost Mother back and sealed the passage between the mortal world and the Hungry Ghost Realm.

He was the sect’s first person to ascend as a spirit body, because his corpse remained forever in the Hungry Ghost Realm. He did not even have a grave.

The statue had been erected for him by Grandmaster. Grandmaster pitied him for coming into this world alone and leaving it alone, so he set up a statue beside the magnolia tree he liked.

In the second year after the statue was built, the only Grandmaster who had ever loved and cherished him also passed into immortality.

Such a dazzling person was actually dimmed by this noisy world, to the point that he was quickly forgotten, and even the only remaining trace of him in the world was worn into a blurred, pitted ruin.

So was that why he kept thinking of me, because I went to see him every day?

I looked at the dilapidated statue, and the more I stared, the more the crack at its eye seemed like a surging line of tears.