“Feng Yu, something’s been bothering me for a while now.”

I wonder if no one has realised that there’s something a little off about this city, and if it’s what I think it is, then oh boy.

“What do you mean, Long Di?”

We were walking down the street with no particular goal in mind since we got our medicine. Pretty easy, right?

I can tell that something is gonna go wrong, I’m just giving it time to fester before it erupts. Much like the dreaded pimple on a teenager’s face.

“The amount of people in this city is really… I wanna say scanty,” I noticed this before, and for a major city to have this small amount of people is weird no matter what way you look at it.

“Now that you mention it,” Feng Yu looked around as well, as did the other disciples who had been here before.

It did seem that there were a lot fewer people than the time they were here last.

“Alright guys, follow me, based on what I read, if you wanna know what’s going on in the world, you gotta ask the vendors.”

Saying this, I took everyone down the street to an old vendor. You see, tropes have many uses, such as allowing me to get and know what I want to know without having to wonder what to do next like a simp or a noob.

Eventually, we came up to this small little stand that had an assortment of trinkets and items that had no particular relationship with one another.

“Hey there, stand owner, I’ve got a question I would like to ask you,” I stared right into his eyes and was about to hit him with my self-proclaimed good manners so that he can be rewarded for his hard work.

Five minutes later…

“Exaggerated Sobbing!”

“Interesting, so there’s a relic for an expert that‘s been opened nearby, huh?”

As the stand owner broke down in tears because of my world-class etiquette, I got to thinking about what he said.

“L—Long Di? A—Are you sure we can go to that relic?”

Relics in this world were the uncovered and/or re-discovered remains of an expert who had passed away.

Shen Ling looked at me with an anxious and uneasy expression, I guess they don’t normally get the chance to go to these things.

“W—We don’t have the chance to go on those types of things since we’re just too weak.” Shen Ling said with her head down.

I could see all of them looking a bit disappointed when she said this, so it was most likely true.

So what I’ve got on my hands are kids who are too weak to do much of anything, while I, on the other hand, can only be described as someone who spammed the wild grass in pokemon and evolved his starter before hitting the first gym.

“Alright, I made up my mind, you guys are coming with me,” I told them.

“W—What!? You want us to go to that relic!? We don’t even know the nature of this relic, what if it’s not meant for us?” Tie Lang blurted out in a fluster.

“Based on what the stand owner said, the disciples of your generation… well, I guess they’re my generation too, well whatever. The cultivators of this generation are mostly all in the Cauldron Forging realm.

“I mean, that young master I so aptly bodied in the last couple chapters of my life was only at the 6th duan of the Cauldron forging realm and he had a whole clan’s resources poured into him. If we’re gonna use him as a yardstick, and I still think I’m lowballing here based on what I’ve seen brain-wise, we should be all fine if I go with you.”

When they heard my logic, they couldn’t refuse it. I mean, how could they?

Thinking of it, I’m in the same realm as their own elders, plus my own cultivation element, when used towards almost anybody else, can practically be called super effective! That there is a Pokemon term for all you non-gamers out there.

To be honest, I can’t see it happening any other way. At this point, me going with them can’t just be called holding their hands to help them cross the street, no this is more like me, throwing them into the back of a police car, driving said police car into the inside of a tank to perform the single greatest grand theft auto there ever was whilst using the aforementioned tank to cross said street.

Surprisingly enough, the one who spoke up first was Shen Ling. “O—Okay, we’ll come with you.”

Apart from the shocked expressions on their faces due to Shen Ling taking the initiative to speak up, they all still looked apprehensive.

Then again, to me, it makes no difference. If they didn’t agree, remember that police/tank metaphor from earlier? We would simply add kidnapping somewhere into that mess.

Adding to my grand theft auto charges, I wonder if a court would have tried me as an adult. Oh well, I guess we’ll never know.

“Hey!”

We were currently on our way outside the city when we heard a cry down the street. Looking down, we saw a young demon girl running towards us.

I was experiencing PTSD when I saw this. Stemming from when you see someone who is waving towards you and you wave back only to see that they were waving to the person behind you instead.

Is that PTSD-worthy? You’re darn tooting it is.

As a result, I led everyone to continue walking down the street and ignored her.

“Hey there, stop!” The shouting intensified.

“Uhm, Long Di, that person seems to be shouting at us,” Tie Lang said.

“No, she isn’t.” I refused to believe it.

“The group of kids walking out of the city, slow down!”

“I think it’s us,” the reticent Jia Yan spoke.

“Just a coincidence,” we still went on our way.

“The group of children comprising three boys and two girls. I’m talking to you!”

“That can be any group of children composed of three boys and two girls,” before any one of them said anything, I spoke, shutting up Feng Yu who was about to open her mouth.

“The kids being led by the boy whose eyes look like an expressionless, dead fish!”

“Okay, she’s talking to us. I believe that now.”

First of all, WOW, just WOW. I expected that from Feng Yu, but not you Shen Ling, not you. However, we all stopped and turned around, waiting for the inevitable shame of her running past us towards someone else.

She closed in on us at a frightening pace.

‘Wait for it.’ She was gonna run right past us, I thought.

She dodged everybody and everything en route to our group specifically.

‘Still not us.’ My mind remained unchanged.

As soon as she got to us, she immediately ran right to me before holding my hands and looking at me with an overjoyed expression, and because of that, one thought-based question came into my head.

‘Man, this girl sucks at running towards other people who are not me.’

“You’re him, right!?” She asked with a wide grin on her face revealing her fangs.

“Uhm… I wanna say no?” This seemed problematic.

“Nonsense, you’re him!” she asserted once again.

“What’s the point of asking me if you’re not gonna believe me when I answer?” I looked at her like she was crazy.

The disciples looked at the proceedings before them with baffled expressions as well.

“Uhm, this big sister, can I ask who you are?” Tie Lang took the initiative to interject and ask.

“Yes, you can!” She shouted in Tie Lang’s direction with that same smile.

“…”

No one said anything after that, and I think I knew what happened, so I looked at Tie Lang.

“Alright, Tie Lang, since she advised that it is possible to ask who she is, can you please do so?” I asked him.

“Oh! Sorry about that. W—Who are you?” He asked after realising where he went wrong.

“The name’s Yaomo Shou, my more recently conversationally abled friend!”

After one-sided introductions were over, she looked back at me with a… dare I say…? A worshipful expression.

I took a step back in apprehension since this was uncharted territory for me.

“You’re the young cultivator who beat up the young master of the Blood Crypt sect, right!?”

The other disciples looked at her with widened eyes when they heard this. The news for that spread!?

You’d think the Blood Crypt sect would try to keep that news under wraps.

“Don’t worry, I have my way of getting information. I can confirm that not a lot of people know about this,” she said after realising the strange looks we shot her way.

However, her next statement kinda left us at even more of a loss. “I want you all, or more accurately, you,” she said, pointing in my direction. “To take me to the newly discovered relic so we can use your nonsensical cultivation base to poop all over the face of everyone there.”