Rain had been falling continuously over the west of Canglan City for three days.
The bluestone pavement was washed glossy and slick. Rainwater dripped from the eaves in continuous streams, striking several people’s shoulders and splashing into fine spray.
A pitter-patter of drizzle slapped against his face.
He opened his eyes. Before him lay a narrow alley flanked by tall, moss-covered walls, muddy water lapping over the brims of his boots.
The rain was fine and dense, chilling his skin, and the fabric at his collar was already soaked through.
Where was this place?
Before he could make sense of it, a muffled thud sounded beside him.
Something had fallen onto the bluestone pavers.
He looked down.
It was a young girl.
She lay on her side in the muddy water, loose black hair obscuring most of her face. Her coarse clothes were caked in mud, and though she braced her elbows against the ground in an attempt to stand, her arms trembled uncontrollably.
Across the bluestone pavers by her feet rolled a few stones shimmering with faint light.
Spirit stones.
Gu Yanqing’s gaze swept past the spirit stones and settled on his own hands.
He was holding a dusty gray pouch. Its drawstring was loose, and several spirit stones pressed firmly against his palm.
At that exact moment, a flood of memories that did not belong to him rushed into his mind, flashing before his eyes like a spinning lantern.
Canglan City, the Gu clan, Mid Foundation Establishment.
Behind him stood the lackeys he usually kept around, flanking him on either side and blocking both ends of the alley.
And the girl collapsed on the ground before him...
Lin Zhixue.
Those three words felt like a bucket of freezing water dumped over him from head to toe.
Gu Yanqing’s pupils shrank abruptly.
Lin Zhixue.
The female lead of 《Treading on Snow》.
The peerless sword cultivator who suffered every humiliation in the early and middle parts of the story, only to trample over countless corpses and reach the pinnacle as the number one in the Dao of the Sword.
And right now, he was actually cornering her in an alley.
Before he could ponder any further, another flash of images surfaced in his mind.
In the original plot, Lin Zhixue’s cultivation surged wildly after obtaining her fateful encounter—Golden Core, Nascent Soul, Soul Formation—until she personally uprooted the Gu clan.
And he was the very first person she purged after breaking through to the Golden Core Realm.
Slain with a single sword strike.
Not even a last word left behind.
The rain kept falling.
He gripped the money pouch, his palms drenched in sweat.
He was finished.
That was his very first thought.
Completely and utterly doomed.
Transmigrating into a book was one thing; transmigrating as a cannon-fodder villain was another. But of all the terrible luck, he had transmigrated into this exact moment.
He had just finished robbing the female lead of the spirit stones she had saved for three months. His lackeys were flanking him, the female lead was lying in the mud, and everything was progressing smoothly according to the original script.
And the end of that script was his head separated from his shoulders.
He stood frozen in place, his mind racing as he scrambled to find a way out of this dead end.
“Ding—system activation in progress.”
A system?
To be precise, an emotionless, mechanical voice had suddenly sounded in his mind.
Gu Yanqing froze for a few seconds.
His heart pounded violently. A surge of wild, post-disaster relief welled up from deep within him, nearly bursting from his lips.
There was a system! There was still hope!
“Host world detected as 《Treading on Snow》. Matching binding target...”
“Ding—system successfully bound.”
“Binding target: Lin Zhixue.”
Gu Yanqing’s smile froze on his face.
Wait a second.
Bound to whom?
He looked down at the girl who had not yet managed to get up, then felt the cold system interface inside his mind.
...What the hell was this system? It bound her?
“Function introduction: Real-time tracking of the bound target’s location.”
“To check the bound target’s location, please silently chant ‘Query Location’.”
Gu Yanqing silently repeated the command in his mind.
An outrageously crude map unfolded in his mind, displaying only a single blinking red dot less than three paces away from him.
Next to the red dot were a few words: Lin Zhixue.
“And what else?” Gu Yanqing asked in his mind.
The system fell silent for a moment.
“Nothing else.”
“...”
He waited for a full ten breaths, but the voice never sounded again.
So, transmigrating had not granted him a golden finger system.
The system was bound to the female lead, and its only function was to track her.
Tracking the very person who would slaughter him with her own hands in the original story.
Useful. Utterly fantastic.
At least now, when she came to take his life, he would know which direction to run.
He took a deep breath, forcing down the urge to curse.
No. He could not panic.
Even without a system, he had to survive.
Since he had taken the original host’s place, everything he did from this moment on had to serve a single goal: changing his ending.
“Young Master?”
Seeing no movement from him for so long, the lackey behind him stepped forward.
“This wench still dares to glare at us. How about we...”
“Shut up.”
Gu Yanqing did not turn his head, his voice kept low and heavy.
Intimidated by the snap, the lackey took half a step back in embarrassment.
The sound of rain reclaimed the alley.
Gripping the pouch, Gu Yanqing looked down at Lin Zhixue on the ground.
She was still kneeling in the mud, gritting her teeth without shedding a tear, though her eyes were already rimmed in red.
Her fingertips dug into the gravel on the ground, her frail frame trembling slightly beneath her soaked clothes.
Rainwater dripped from the ends of her hair, trickling down her chin mixed with the grime on her face.
She raised her head and looked at him.
In those eyes, there was no begging, nor any tearful grievance.
All he saw was the stubborn defiance of someone driven to the brink yet refusing to bow her head.
Yet those eyes were also red.
Gu Yanqing suddenly remembered that the spirit stones the original host had robbed were her entire savings from three months of scrimping.
Three months. Qi Refining Fourth Layer.
As an ignored collateral disciple of a minor clan, her cultivation resources were pitifully scarce to begin with—no one gave her anything, no one cared for her, and no one had her back.
God knew what she had to endure each day just to scrape together these few spirit stones, hoarding them one by one in hopes of saving enough to trade for a breakthrough elixir or a handy magical artifact, just to take even half a step forward on the path of cultivation.
Three whole months.
And now, they were entirely in his grasp.
In the original plot, he had stolen these spirit stones and humiliated her mercilessly on top of that.
Gu Yanqing looked away from her face and glanced at the pouch in his hand.
He knew what he did next could not be too out of character.
A domineering, arrogant dandy could not turn into a benevolent saint overnight.
He had to return these spirit stones to her in a way that would not arouse her suspicion.
He weighed the pouch in his hand.
It felt so light that he could easily act disgusted.
“Just this pathetic handful of spirit stones?”
He furrowed his brows, his tone dripping with blatant disdain.
That condescending attitude looked no different from any other dandy in the back alleys.
With a casual flick, he tossed it.
The money pouch arced through the veil of rain and slapped into the muddy water before Lin Zhixue with a smack, splashing up a few droplets.
“Not even enough to cover this young master’s wine bill.”
Having said that, he turned and walked away.
Without looking back once.
The two lackeys stared in bewilderment before hurriedly following behind him.
“Young Master, this...?”
“Shut your trap.”
Rain fell upon his shoulders, casting an aloof, distant air over his retreating figure.
The lackeys dared not ask another question, hurrying after him out of the alley.
Only the sound of rain remained in the alley.
Kneeling in the mud, Lin Zhixue could not even process what had just happened.
The spirit stones lay rolled beside her hand, the pouch gaping open, not a single one missing.
She hastily stuffed the spirit stones into her bosom, not even bothering to tie the pouch shut.
Clasping the dusty gray pouch with both hands, she scrambled up from the ground and stumbled in the opposite direction toward the other end of the alley.
Only after running several paces did she look back.
The entrance to the alley was already deserted.
The young man’s figure had vanished into the endless sheets of rain.
Wiping the water from her face with a firm sweep of her hand, she clutched the spirit stones tightly against her chest and fled without looking back.
Rate on N.U.
