Territorial Invasion Is a Matter of Principle

The only sound left in the entire clearing was the man's wailing as he rolled around on the ground.

Seeing this, the Yin-Yang Sect captives being dragged along by the Sword Peak disciples swallowed hard, tears streaming down their faces in sheer terror.

A few, completely consumed by fear, even began frantically slamming their heads against the ground, the thuds echoing loudly as they tried to knock themselves dead.

Seeing this, the Sword Peak disciples quickly knocked them unconscious with a few swift chops to the neck. “Don't do that. We're scared too!”

Bai Zhirou's hand holding the sword was still trembling. She took a deep breath, opening her beautiful eyes a crack, and with a final strike, she finally ended the man's life.

Before he drew his last breath, a look of “finally, sweet release” washed over his face.

After finishing the kill, the intense stench of blood rushed straight to her head. Bai Zhirou's face turned pale as her stomach churned violently, her body trembling uncontrollably once again.

However.

In just an instant, her violently trembling body suddenly went completely still.

Her gaze also turned calm.

Because Jiang Ye had logged on.

Hearing the dry heaving in his mind, Jiang Ye shook his head helplessly.

He didn't waste any time either, raising his hand and letting his sword fall.

He performed painless excision surgeries on the rest of the Yin-Yang Sect disciples.

When Jiang Ye finished off the last Yin-Yang Sect disciple, a green settlement window popped up on his game interface.

【Adventure Quest: The Yin-Yang Sect's Provocation】

【Current Progress: 100%】

【Calculating rewards...】

【Congratulations! You have received: Earth-grade Low-tier Cultivation Method: 《Purple Heaven Thunder Art》; Tier Two Blazing Tiger Essence Blood * 10; Tier Two Nine-Patterned Body Tempering Pill * 10】

“Oh, it actually dropped an Earth-grade cultivation method. Not bad.”

The grades of cultivation methods in the game were divided into Mortal, Yellow, Mystic, Earth, Heaven, and Saint, with each grade further divided into four sub-stages: low, mid, high, and peak.

The quality of the true qi refined by each grade of cultivation method differed; the higher the grade of the true qi, the greater the boost to one's combat power.

Jiang Ye casually clicked 【Learn】.

In an instant, the cultivation method began operating automatically. The refined true qi actually carried traces of lightning, showing its quality was indeed quite good. Before he could even savor the feeling, another pop-up appeared on the interface:

【Perfect Clear! Triggered bonus reward: Drawing Talent...】

Jiang Ye's eyes lit up instantly.

This mini-boss, whom he had only managed to fight by exploiting a bug, actually dropped a talent?! Quests are awesome, I definitely need to do them!

After all, in 《Tribulation of Ten Thousand Races》, talents were absolute top-tier treasures!

However, when he excitedly looked at the talent's details, he froze in sheer awkwardness.

【Green Talent: Femme Magnet. Effect: Passively increases the favorability of the same sex.】

【Talent Ranks: Green (Mediocre), Purple (Pretty Good), Gold (Excellent), Rainbow (Amazing)】

Jiang Ye: “?”

“What the hell is 'same-sex favorability'? Come out here, you trash devs! What do I need this for?! To build a harem for Little Bai?!”

Jiang Ye felt like spitting blood, completely speechless.

“Wait, no. Thinking about it... this actually seems fine. At least it's better than 'increasing opposite-sex favorability'.”

Jiang Ye stroked his chin.

He was sharing a body with Little Bai now, and she was incredibly beautiful. With the game's current sensory synchronization, if...

Jiang Ye shuddered and muttered to himself, “Border friction is always better than territorial invasion. After all, territorial invasion is a strict matter of principle!”

He yawned. “Logging off, logging off. Little Bai, you have fun...”

Bai Zhirou's body trembled slightly, her eyes instantly clearing.

She stood dazed in place, still unable to recover from the shock of killing someone with her own hands for the first time.

It wasn't until Chu Qianfeng's cautious, almost inquiring voice came from behind her:

“Um... Junior Sister Bai, if there's nothing else, how about we head back to the sect first?”

Startled back to her senses, Bai Zhirou's pretty face flushed red. She hurriedly bowed in embarrassment and said in a voice as soft as a mosquito's buzz:

“Oh, alright. Thank you, Senior Brother Chu. Sorry to trouble everyone for the rest of the way.”

Chu Qianfeng: “?”

The other disciples: “?”

...

Half a shichen later, a cyan spirit vessel rose into the sky.

Bai Zhirou stood quietly by herself at the bow of the spirit vessel, her beautiful eyes curiously watching the sea of clouds flying past.

This was, after all, her first time riding a flying vessel. Her youthful nature triumphed over her fear, leaving her feeling excited and curious.

The gentle breeze lightly brushed past her temples, revealing her pure, beautiful, and pristine face.

Yet, despite such a beautiful sight, the Sword Peak senior brothers on the flying vessel kept their distance. Their eyes were filled with awe and dread, and none of them dared to approach her.

Not far away, Ye Ningning was pretending to look at the scenery while stealing glances at Bai Zhirou out of the corner of her eye.

Recalling how heroic, cool, and even somewhat sinisterly confident Junior Sister Bai had looked when killing the enemies just now, Ye Ningning's face flushed slightly as she nervously fidgeted with the hem of her clothes.

Standing by the cabin and holding a newly minted entry token, Chu Qianfeng noticed this and couldn't help but ask out of concern:

“Junior Sister Ye, are your eyes bothering you? Why are you squinting?”

Ye Ningning glared at him fiercely and snapped, “Your eyes are the ones squinting!”

Then, her sharp eyes caught sight of the token in Chu Qianfeng's hand. She snatched it away. “This is the token for Junior Sister Bai, right? Give it to me, I'll take it to her!”

Before Chu Qianfeng could reply, Ye Ningning skipped away with the token.

...

Another shichen passed.

Accompanied by the long cry of a crane, the spirit vessel slowly came to a halt in front of several towering peaks that pierced the clouds.

Ahead was the location of the Azure Mystic Sect.

Several thousand-zhang-tall mountains pierced straight into the sky. Amidst the swirling mist, rows of ancient palaces could be seen sprawling neatly across the mountain ridges.

The spirit vessel passed through a transparent grand formation shimmering with faint ripples—the sect-protecting grand formation of the Azure Mystic Sect.

Once inside the grand formation, the view suddenly opened up.

Spiritual waterfalls cascaded down from the horizon like the Milky Way, and the spiritual energy here was several times denser than on the outside.

In the sky, cultivators with transcendent and ethereal bearings occasionally flew past on swords, turning into streaks of light, while others rode unknown exotic beasts, galloping freely among the mountains.

The moment Jiang Ye joined the Azure Mystic Sect, a golden window suddenly popped up on his game interface.

【Main Quest: The Crisis of the Azure Mystic Sect】

【Current Progress: 0%】

【Reward: Pending (Gold)】

【Hint: The first clash between humans, demons, and fiends. The Azure Mystic Sect is like an isolated island. To stay or to leave? What is good and what is evil? Human or demon? Everything is about to begin.】

In his mind, Jiang Ye looked at the golden quest that had just popped up. The reward column made him drool, but it also gave him a massive headache.

Because without the game guide now, he definitely couldn't just go on a mindless killing spree. After all, he could no longer reload his saves infinitely.

But as a pure “combat-is-fun” player, the total number of words he had read across all nine of his previous playthroughs combined didn't even exceed five hundred.

Unless it was a critical plot point where the game forced the player to watch and locked them in place, he would skip through them like crazy.

He didn't really know what the quest plot was about, but he remembered exactly who he had to kill at the very end.

After all, in order to study how to clear all the major bosses without taking damage, he had practically figured them out inside and out.

According to his experience from his previous playthroughs, if he wanted pure combat fun, his top choice would still be the demonic sects. He had started out by joining a demonic sect several times. He remembered that when he first stepped into a demonic sect, his screen was completely covered in red dots. He had almost thought he had accidentally wandered into some mob-infested dungeon.

He couldn't help but sigh in admiration: As expected of the demonic sects, they really are full of talent.

In contrast, the Azure Mystic Sect's screen was currently full of white dots. At least for a newcomer like him, they held no aggro.

Jiang Ye had also tested this game's red-name mechanic before. The underlying logic was that only killing red-named mobs would grant experience points.

However, white-named targets would also turn red on the spot if their accumulated aggro reached a certain threshold.

When Jiang Ye first started playing, he had also done quite a few scumbag things, like slaughtering entire cities.

Back then, with the entire map filled with red names, leveling up was indeed fast, but he was hunted down wherever he went. It was incredibly thrilling, but in the end, he had to reluctantly reload his save to escape the nightmare.