The skies were faintly blue, the clouds adorned with specks of orange from the distant sun.

It was about to be night soon.

Mei and Da Xing sat silently before the Jade Mirror lake, as if contemplating. The wind blew faintly, the pleasant breeze swaying their hair.

Her friends had already headed off, saying their goodbyes. Xiuying in particular seemed to enjoy it a lot and said she would be back.

"Hey..." Da Xing said.

"Hm?"

"Well... while I can't say it turned out exactly as I wanted," he sighed. "Especially that herb crazy boy, and the metal kid. And Monkey's long rant... What a mess today was! Haha!"

Mei: ...

"I still enjoyed it. It's actually the first time a human looked for me after the tournament. Hah... I guess I just appreciate it. Thank you."

"Oh... er, it's nothing much!" Mei started to feel sheepish.

Really... she just couldn't think of where to bring her friends.

"And... to think... I'm touched that you entrusted this trip to me! Someone you don't even know... Sorry that it turned out like this..."

"Er... it's fine! It's fine!"

Mei sweated to herself. She wondered what he would think if he knew she just didn't think it through.

The two of them talked for a little more before Mei said goodbye and headed home.

22 days later...

Qiao Shun looked through a stack of papers, yawning. So tiring... he regretted volunteering to be the lecturer for the new batch of outer disciples. Having to teach so many inner disciples on top of his own students... he barely had enough time to sleep!

Enough of that. He put down the papers.

His mind wandered to a particular disciple... who was a little troubling, so to speak.

About a month ago, after noticing she was down with a particularly huge inner demon, he decided to arrange for her to be sent to a farm in the guise of community service, hoping she could sort it out.

He also received reports from his spirits that Hong Ling had taught Mei's nascent soul how to possess her body, which was a huge headache, but at least her nascent spirit didn't make trouble, so he left it be.

After all, they were technically the same person, memory wise! What was he going to do? Confront Xiao Mei and tell her she didn't have rights to her "own body"? That was just too much of a conundrum...

For the past weeks, occasionally, Mei and her friends would visit one of the spirit beast reserves and seemed to have become pretty close. Qiao Shun was personally glad to see that at least some disciples were getting close to spirit beasts, but at the same time, Xiuying had been making posters about spirit beast inequality and pasting them all over the sect... which was also another headache.

...

Urgh.

He slapped the pile of test papers away, sending them flying into the air. All around, little spirits scrambled, frantically snatching them from the air.

That was enough. As he should with his responsibilities as a teacher, he decided he would check in on Mei, then call a huge trip for all the disciples so he could finally take a break.

Qiao Shun thought it would be a simple trip to see she was fine, then he could head back home to take his long deserved rest.

After all, his spirits said Mei didn't seem to be having issues with her inner demon and seemed to be pretty normal. In his lectures, she didn't seem to be in any way abnormal either.

But now... as she sat on the fields with a grumpy face, planting seeds along with a chicken... why was he sensing traces of her inner demon?

And, strangest of all, it didn't seem to have become weaker or stronger... if the disciple was struggling to come to terms with their conflicts, it would naturally get worse, and if they were overcoming it, the reverse. How had it remained stagnant all this time, even after forcing her to farm?

He took a sip from his cup of tea, floating amidst the clouds...

Suddenly, the inner demon manifested-

Mei curtly swatted it away, going back to planting seeds. Just like that, it was gone. The chicken looked at her curiously but didn't say anything.

PFFFFFTTTTT

Qiao Shun spat out a mouthful of tea, coughing. WHAT?!

An inner demon was a manifestation of a cultivators inner turmoils! Since when was it something that could be just swatted away? In the past, he even heard of cultivators that went crazy throwing their most powerful techniques at an incorporeal inner demon... until they passed out from exhaustion days later...

This made absolutely no sense!

Urgh. After some quick mental calculations, Qian Shun decided trying to figure out what was going on would create the highest grade of headaches. He was just going to head back home and take a nap.

He would wait until after the trip was over, then worry about what to do with her.

The next day...

Hundreds of disciples sat in the hall, before Qiao Shun. Mei shifted around, waiting anxiously for the test results.

"Disciples, I am happy to report that you've all passed!"

A few cheers echoed around the hall.

"It's been nearly 4 months since you disciples have joined the sect. With all of you past the Foundational stage and understanding the basics, I believe it's a good time to head outside of the sect to gain some experience and get inspiration."

"I will pass all of you spirit tokens and send a few senior disciples to serve as protection. Tomorrow morning, head to the teleportation array with your friends and form groups and head outside the sect. Then, after a month, report back!"

Across the hall, murmurs filled the air as disciples discussed.

"I trust some of you will have unfinished business, so you are all dismissed!"

With those words, Qiao Shun hurriedly left.

"...he should have told us a week in advance," Xiuying complained.

"Two weeks." Wang Wei said.

"I was going to visit a friend tomorrow..." Xiuying sighed.

Going outside of the hall... Mei thought about it for a bit. While she didn't mind lazing around in the sect, the thought of that...

Right! Back when she first joined the sect, wasn't she imagining being a part of adventures and all that? This could finally be it!