[Little System, continue.]
Fei Qingsu called out to the system in his mind.
[Underlying, Years Advance Flowing Flowers, located at xxxxxx.]
[Plot Deviation Value is twenty-five percent.]
[Female protagonist halo effect weakened to sixty percent.]
Fei Qingsu's action speed was astonishingly fast.
Coupled with the Yellow Treasure Mouse he had successfully contracted just moments ago, Fei Qingsu swept through this secret realm like a wild goose leaving no feather behind, snatching up—no, taking away—all the good things that originally belonged to the female protagonist.
How could a scholar's actions ever be considered snatching?
[Host, the female protagonist is showing signs of waking up.] Reliable System searched for the location of the treasures while monitoring the situation on the female protagonist's end.
Oh, as expected of the female protagonist.
Logically speaking, under Fei Qingsu's routine operations, ordinary Foundation Establishment cultivators would remain sound asleep for a full ten hours.
Yet the female protagonist had woken up in just four hours, especially considering she was merely a Qi Refining cultivator.
Over on Gu Tiantian's side.
Her eyelashes fluttered slightly, her breathing became somewhat chaotic, and just as her body was about to twitch—
"Thud!"
A punch landed squarely on the back of her neck.
Gu Tiantian plunged back into an infant-like, peaceful sleep, and her tightly furrowed brows smoothed out.
There, that's better.
Fei Qingsu smiled faintly, produced an exquisite, clean white handkerchief, and meticulously wiped the spot that had made contact with Gu Tiantian.
Fei Qingsu's gaze swept over the simp entourage beside the female protagonist, raising an eyebrow.
Another punch per person.
A family should always be complete and tidy together.
A guess formed in Fei Qingsu's mind: if he continually prevented the female protagonist from waking up, wouldn't the plot of the male and female protagonists meeting be completely disrupted?
Yet the very next second, he remembered the existence of Heavenly Dao, that absolute troublemaker.
Could Fei Qingsu be someone who surrendered so easily?
Under the meticulous "care" of considerate team leader Fei Qingsu, the female protagonist and her simps enjoyed a wonderfully deep slumber unlike anything they had ever experienced in the sect.
Until the second day of the trial, when the status quo was shattered.
Because the secret realm trial lasted only two days in total, and now there were only seven hours remaining until the end of the trial.
Thunder rumbled ceaselessly across the sky, dark clouds began to gather, and amidst the howling gale, the outline of a giant eye belonging to an unknown creature emerged.
Its gaze scanned left and right, finally locking onto Fei Qingsu.
[Host, please rest assured. The Small World has rules, and Heavenly Dao's attempts to meddle are limited. Aside from guiding the male and female protagonists, it can only make three moves against supporting characters. Detected that this Heavenly Dao is in poor condition; it has been calculated that it can only strike at the Host twice.] The system remained thoroughly reliable.
"Vari... able."
This voice, whose gender was impossible to distinguish, entered Fei Qingsu's ears.
Then, that giant eye vanished instantly.
What was that? It dropped some fierce parting words and just left?
After Heavenly Dao made its appearance, the female protagonist's tendency to wake up became unstoppable.
Fei Qingsu hurriedly erased the punch marks from everyone's bodies.
After all, the Eldest Senior Brother was completely innocent and had never done anything detrimental to his junior brothers and sisters.
"Eldest Senior Brother, where are we?" Gu Tiantian woke up, rubbing her eyes and asking in a small voice.
"Junior Sister, because your contract failed just now, the senior brothers were all injured and are still unconscious." Fei Qingsu adopted Gu Tiantian's favored conversational tactics, shifting the blame entirely onto her.
Upon hearing the four words "contract failed," Gu Tiantian's heart sank. She didn't care that the senior brothers were injured because of her; she only cared why her contract could possibly have failed.
Her intuition told her that it was impossible for the contract to fail.
She was the daughter of Heaven's Will, after all. When she entered the sect, an elder had explicitly stated that she possessed profound blessed fortune and supreme luck.
"Eldest Senior Brother, I know I was wrong. I shouldn't have implicated the other senior brothers for my own selfish desires." Gu Tiantian apologized sincerely.
She remembered that Eldest Senior Brother had still tried to help her, which meant Eldest Senior Brother still loved her.
"As long as you know you were wrong, don't make the same mistake next time. You may have had the fortuitous opportunity to contract that giant beast, but you must always remember that every gift of fate requires sufficient strength to support it. If your strength is lacking, others will suffer disaster because of you."
Fei Qingsu offered earnest guidance, looking every bit like a gentle and caring teacher.
As for why he was wasting so much breath, it was because Fei Qingsu was stalling for time.
The group was currently riding on a wooden flying ship.
And they had just passed right by the male protagonist's hiding place.
In the original plot, it was precisely there that the female protagonist rescued the male protagonist.
"Eldest Senior Brother, where are we going? How much time is left until the trial ends?" Gu Tiantian's eyelids kept twitching, and a bad premonition arose.
Surely not much time could have passed.
"There are only seven hours left in the trial. To ensure you all receive proper tempering during this trial, I am taking you to a training ground I carefully selected."
Hearing this, Gu Tiantian was exceptionally shocked in her heart.
Only seven hours left?! Why had time passed by so quickly?
Gu Tiantian couldn't help but feel some suspicion toward Fei Qingsu.
Could Eldest Senior Brother have meddled with something?
"The others should wake up as well." Fei Qingsu used his Dharmic powers to rouse the remaining simps.
"Mhm..."
"I slept so well... what happened?"
"Why does my body feel a bit sore?"
The simps woke up one after another, and Fei Qingsu patiently answered their questions once again.
Among them, Number One learned of what had transpired. Whether due to having a smaller role in the original plot or simply possessing a slightly more rational mind, the look in his eyes as he gazed at Gu Tiantian shifted ever so slightly.
Most notably, Number One was no longer quite as obsequious.
The other simps, however, redoubled their efforts and continued to swarm around Gu Tiantian.
"Junior Sister, are you alright? It was just a spiritual beast, failure to contract it is no big deal. My family has a spiritual beast garden; whatever spiritual beast you like, I will gift it to you."
"That's right, that's right, Junior Sister, you have all of us backing you up, don't be sad."
Yet the more Gu Tiantian listened, the more irritated she felt.
Why had everything been going wrong lately?
Her bad premonition kept blaring warnings in her mind.
As she looked at this group of senior brothers buzzing around her, she only felt that they were as lowly as dogs.
Unawares, Gu Tiantian's tone turned somewhat impatient.
"Eldest Senior Brother, is there any water? Don't you have the Mountain Spirit Elegant Water given by the Sect Master?" A simp ran over to ask Fei Qingsu.
Fei Qingsu's right hand flickered slightly: "I do."
Mountain Spirit Elegant Water was a top-grade spiritual water that could prolong the life of mortals and stabilize the state of mind for cultivators.
"Then give me some, Eldest Senior Brother. You can't possibly drink it all anyway."
Such shameless audacity; how could something so precious be handed over to you?
Fei Qingsu originally intended to refuse, but a thought crossed his mind, and he changed his mind.
[Host, Mountain Spirit Elegant Water combined with Returning Grass will cause the drinker to attract dangerous beasts within a radius of a hundred miles.]
Fei Qingsu: "Very well."
"Hehe, thanks, Eldest Senior Brother." The simp snatched it away immediately, fearing that Fei Qingsu would compete with him for the task of bringing water to the Junior Sister.
"Junior Sister, you've slept for so long, are you thirsty?" Holding the water he had obtained from Fei Qingsu, the simp hurried straight to Gu Tiantian's side.
Fei Qingsu watched the scene unfold, finding it somewhat amusing inwardly.
Young man, there is something wrong with that cup of water.
Gu Tiantian was already feeling vexed, and words of refusal were right on the tip of her tongue. But when she looked closely, the water brought over by this simp was billowing with wisps of cloud mist, and as she drew closer, her vexation seemed to vanish entirely.
It held an immense attraction for her.
"Thank you. Is this water Eldest Senior Brother's?" Gu Tiantian recognized that this was Mountain Spirit Elegant Water, because everyone in the entire sect knew that Eldest Senior Brother Jiang Wu was deeply valued by the Sect Master.
This Mountain Spirit Elegant Water was personally gifted to the Eldest Senior Brother by the Sect Master herself; it was an exclusive item unique to the entire sect.
Gu Tiantian had set her sights on the Eldest Senior Brother precisely starting from this very matter.
Eldest Senior Brother truly still loved her after all.
"It's not the Eldest Senior Brother's, it's mine. Junior Sister, drink up quickly." The simp cast a stealthy glance toward Fei Qingsu.