"Ah, didn't drop dead last night."
"Today is definitely a good day to start a new book!"
Gu Xiaobai was a web novel author. One year, one week, and three hundred and sixty-five days had passed since his last book concluded. If he didn't rack his brains to start a new book, even if he didn't die suddenly from staying up late, he would starve to death at his keyboard this year.
He yawned and glanced at the time on his computer. A little past seven in the morning. Having burned the midnight oil all night, it was time to head to the Shaxian eatery for a bowl of wolfberry and pork liver soup. Pork liver nourished the body, and by the way, it strengthened... brightened the eyes. Typing put a huge strain on the eyes, after all.
He turned right out of his door, walked less than a hundred paces, and reached the Shaxian eatery. As soon as he sat down, he habitually picked up his phone to browse some videos, only to be astonished to find that his account had been inexplicably deregistered. The uploaders he followed previously, along with his collection of stamina-building video compilations, had all gone down the drain.
Don't cry, don't cry. Just register a new one.
"Eh heh, this uploader's commentary is quite interesting. Hmm, not bad, gotta follow."
"Huh? How come there's only one work? Must be a newbie uploader."
What Gu Xiaobai didn't know was that the video he had subscribed to and bookmarked was being thoroughly scanned by a system at that very moment, and then projected onto the corresponding parallel world.
...
The Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils Plane, Apricot Forest.
The Beggar Sect branch here was undergoing a major upheaval. Qiao Feng, who served as the current chief of the Beggar Sect, was inexplicably labeled a Khitan because of a letter brought all the way from Jiangnan by Xu Chongxiao, a senior elder long since retired.
Qiao Feng flew into a rage. He was not someone clinging to power; if they wanted to strip him of his position as chief, they only had to say so. Was there any need to be so vicious? Calling him a Khitan, and a Khitan carrying a blood feud for his parents at that!
The Beggar Sect was momentarily split into two factions. One faction, led by Quan Guanqing, opposed Qiao Feng continuing as the chief of the Beggar Sect since he was a Khitan. The other faction believed in Qiao Feng's upright character and, having just seen him shield the four rebellious elders from harm, refused to believe these so-called human witnesses and material evidence.
Who would have thought that at this moment, Madam Ma, the late Ma Dayuan's widow, would leap out from the crowd? Every word she uttered pointed to Qiao Feng as the murderer of Ma Dayuan.
"My late husband had no personal enmity with anyone in ordinary times. This humble concubine truly cannot fathom who could have murdered him."
"Could it be that my late husband held some important item in his hands, and someone wanted to obtain it while fearing he would leak the secret and ruin a major plan, and therefore wanted to silence him?"
Dressed entirely in mourning white and putting on a delicate, timid demeanor, Kang Min's words made more than a few sympathetic souls among those present think of something, their eyes involuntarily drifting toward Qiao Feng.
Among everyone present, only one woman spoke up to champion Qiao Feng: Azhu from the Gusu Murong faction. She retorted a few times, which only served to stir up Kang Min's burning jealousy.
"This young lady's suspicion is spot on. At first, I had the exact same thought..."
"But on the night I received the grim news of my late husband, someone suddenly sneaked into my house to steal..."
Kang Min's maneuver was akin to pouring oil on fire. She claimed that Qiao Feng had gone to her house to steal things, and smoothly produced a folding fan as material evidence. Spouting utter nonsense with a deadpan face in front of the entire upper and lower ranks of the Beggar Sect, she directly pinned the crime of murdering Ma Dayuan firmly onto Qiao Feng.
The harshness of her words transformed Qiao Feng from a hero of a generation into a low-class scoundrel of the martial arts world.
"Full of brotherly duty, disgusting! Qiao Feng, you deserve to die!"
"Qiao Feng, you Khitan dog, get out of our Beggar Sect!"
"This... how could Chief Qiao possibly murder his own brother? Could there be a misunderstanding in all this..."
"Bah! Madam Ma saw it with her own eyes, how could that be false? Wake up, brother!"
"Anyway, compared to this Khitan, I believe Madam Ma much more."
"The ironclad evidence is like a mountain. What else do you have to say, Qiao Feng, you Khitan dog!"
"What's the point of wasting more breath? Let's all go together, kill this Khitan dog, and avenge Madam Ma's murdered husband!"
"Kill the Khitan dog, avenge the murdered husband! Kill, kill, kill!"
The situation flipped instantly. Watching the crowd rally around her, hurling accusations back and forth—every punch landing solidly, every word piercing the heart—leaving Qiao Feng unable to refute and eager for his destruction, Kang Min felt a sense of exhilaration beyond description.
What was murder? Striking at the heart was truly satisfying.
Qiao Feng laughed out loud on the spot. It really was true that when a wall is about to collapse, everyone gives it a push; today he had finally witnessed it.
First the four elders betrayed him, then they identified him as a Khitan, and now they came to frame him for murdering Deputy Chief Ma Dayuan. You were going to dump every stinking pile of shit onto his head, weren't you?
He, Northern Qiao and Southern Murong, would have to be quite the martial artist to commit a murder and still manage to leave his own folding fan at the crime scene. Who on earth did they think they were looking down on?
And furthermore, this howling mob down below—did none of you have brains? Ma Dayuan died from the Throat-Sealing Claw, while I practice the Dragon-Capturing Hands, Eldest Brother!
Besides, Wang Jiantong's last will and testament was sealed. Didn't you lot break it open and read the contents before calling people together to rebel?
Suffering from selective amnesia, were you? Practicing victim-blaming, were you?
Qiao Feng knew in his heart that even if he were innocent, the mere identity of being a Khitan meant that no amount of explanation on his part would hold any meaning. Just as he grew disheartened and prepared to relinquish his position as chief, the sky suddenly underwent a strange transformation.
Streaks of light screens materialized out of thin air. Anyone who raised their head could witness this change.
A miracle! A true miracle!
For a time, high-ranking officials and nobles, peddlers and commoners, men and women, young and old, all dropped the tasks in their hands, strode outside, and raised their heads to gaze at this magnificent miracle in the sky.
...
"Good heavens, is this commotion a sign that the heavens are breaking?"
"It must be the heavens taking pity on us mortals, specially descending a miracle to save us common folk."
"Dad, Mom, hurry and come outside! Come and watch the immortals descend to the mortal realm!"
Many people assumed it was divine beings descending to earth and could not contain their excitement. Some even lit incense and offered sacrifices, supremely pious, prostrating themselves in worship.
Of course, there were also some who regarded it as a demonic apparition, running everywhere to invite Buddhist monks and Taoist priests to perform rituals to expel the evil spirits.
In the Great Song imperial palace, guards hurriedly reported an abnormal celestial phenomenon. The emperor and civil and military officials successively came outside the hall. Confronting the celestial screen hanging high in the firmament, each of them wore a worried expression, beginning to ponder whether this was a Khitan conspiracy. If such god-like methods truly were the work of the Khitan, wouldn't they have to immediately set about taking measures to guard against it?
...
Xixia, Dali, Khitan—the celestial screen spread across the entire land of China. This anomaly even startled the old monsters of the Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils world.
In the Xixia imperial palace, Li Qiushui, wearing a veil, made a light leap and reached the top of the palace. Xixia's Princess Li Qingluo, accompanied by her maids, also came outside to watch the celestial screen suspended high in the sky.
At Vulture Palace, the Childish Grandmother of Tianshan did not continue her closed-door cultivation either; she eluded everyone's eyes and came outside to watch.
At Leigugu Mountain, when Wuyazi heard his eldest disciple Su Xinghe recount the strange phenomenon happening in the sky outside, his heart was filled with puzzlement and incomprehension as well.
At the Shaolin Temple, compared to the other busy monks who were looking up in wonder, the sweeping monk's low-key sweeping appeared utterly out of place.
...
[This woman knows no martial arts, yet she stirred up storms of blood and gore in the martial arts world.]
[For her own selfish desires, she dragged the hero of a generation, Qiao Feng, onto a thoroughly tragic path.]
[To achieve her goals, she did not hesitate to sell her body, serving others with her beauty.]
[Yet despite sleeping with so many men, she still failed to live out a good life.]
Accompanied by an ethereal female voice narrating in a smooth, leisurely tone, the celestial screen shifted and displayed an image: a woman with charming looks and a captivating smile—none other than Madam Ma, Kang Min, wearing only a bodice.
[If I can't have it, I'll utterly destroy it. Interpreting Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils from the perspective of Kang Min (Madam Ma).]