Chapter Eighty-Four: It’s So Easy to Earn Money from Otaku
“Master, it’s time for your medicine.”
Another day.
When Young Master Sang pushed open the prison door, Master Yu Xia was, as usual, slumped on the ground looking like a lost soul.
The moment she saw Young Master Sang, terror flashed across Master Yu Xia’s face, and she instinctively stepped back.
“You—you’re going to feed me that medicine again…”
“No, I won’t eat it! I won’t eat it!”
“My cultivation is almost depleted; I can’t take any more!”
“But you still have some Heart-Nurturing stage cultivation left,” Young Master Sang said with a smile. “Don’t worry, you can still last for a while!”
With that, he forcibly pried open Master Yu Xia’s mouth and stuffed the pill inside.
“Mmm… mmm!”
Master Yu Xia struggled desperately but was unable to escape her fate of swallowing the pill.
Whether it was Young Master Sang’s illusion or not, he thought he saw a tear slip from the corner of Master Yu Xia’s eye.
As the pill quickly dissolved and transformed back into a rain of spiritual energy, Master Yu Xia seemed to become numb, her body slumping weakly against the wall.
Her gaze was increasingly vacant, her lips dry, and her vitality significantly diminished.
“Why…”
Just as Young Master Sang was about to finish for the day, Master Yu Xia’s weak voice suddenly came from behind him.
“Why… are you so cruel to me?”
“Do you enjoy torturing me a little bit?”
“Why don’t you just destroy my dantian and ruin my cultivation outright?” She stared blankly at Young Master Sang.
After thinking for a moment, Young Master Sang replied, “If I really did that, Master Yu Xia would probably seek death without a second thought.”
“But a corpse is useless to the Demon Cult.”
“We in the Demon Cult are still too short on manpower. Even someone as wicked as Master Yu Xia is still worth considering for recruitment.”
“And I know,” Young Master Sang said, “as long as I don’t destroy your dantian and leave you with a shred of hope…”
“…you won’t want to die.”
Master Yu Xia shuddered.
He was right.
During her time captured by the Demon Cult, she had thought about dying countless times in her heart.
Whether it was at the hands of the Demon Cultivators during questioning or finding a moment to end it all herself.
She had thought she had lost everything, that it would be easy to end her own life.
Yet whenever she found a real opportunity to end it, she suddenly realized she just couldn’t do it.
She was unwilling.
She couldn’t accept that all her life’s hard work would lead to such a tragic, powerless ending.
She couldn’t bear the thought of her painstakingly cultivated abilities fading away with her corpse.
She refused to accept that, after climbing to the peak and seeing the view from the top, she would be reduced to a mere skeleton in a prison.
Master Yu Xia couldn’t bring herself to do it.
Even more terrifying was that she realized this kind of thought was perfectly grasped by the man in front of her.
He seemed completely certain that she wouldn’t want to die.
He seemed to understand her better than she understood herself.
This feeling filled Master Yu Xia with a bone-deep terror.
“What… what do you want?”
She said dully, “You know I can never ally with the Demon Cult.”
“I fought tooth and nail to become the Sect Leader of Water Moon Sect, one of the most renowned cultivators in the righteous path. My pride won’t allow me to do something like that.”
“Still thinking about your pride?”
Young Master Sang sighed and scratched his head. “You’ve already been reduced to a prisoner, so why still care about pride? Looks like your training isn’t thorough enough.”
“Your cultivation is still too high. I need to increase the dosage.”
“You keep saying a corpse is useless to you,” Master Yu Xia suddenly laughed bitterly, “but what use would an ordinary person without cultivation be to you?”
Young Master Sang thought for a moment and said, “Whether it’s useful or not, you’ll find out soon enough.”
“I’ll be coming back tomorrow.”
With that, he slowly left the prison.
Only Master Yu Xia remained, slumped there, staring blankly at the ceiling.
She was thinking about Young Master Sang’s words.
Thinking about why she didn’t dare to die.
Thinking about what she had been living for all these years.
But after a long time, Master Yu Xia still couldn’t answer herself.
Perhaps.
She herself didn’t know the answer.
——
——
Young Master Sang was in a pretty good mood lately.
Work was easy and smooth, and every day was basically just feeding Master Yu Xia her medicine and then clocking out, leaving him free time to play around as he pleased.
At most, it meant going to Hua Jianglian’s room to pick up some trash.
Not exhausting at all.
Today, he was humming a little tune, leisurely walking to Hua Jianglian’s room.
But just before he reached the attic, he suddenly heard a wailing cry from a distance.
“Sang! Fold!!!”
Before Young Master Sang could respond, a figure dashed toward him and took cover behind him, desperately trying to shield herself.
It was Hua Jianglian.
She was wearing a cute pale pink sleep dress, looking terribly wronged as she hid behind him, her face full of grievance.
Right behind her was a familiar face.
Tang Yubbing.
“Leader, you can’t escape this. You absolutely cannot touch that money.”
“I, I just want to borrow it for a bit! I’ll pay the company back once the income arrives in a few days!”
“This, Leader? Sister Yubbing?” Young Master Sang, watching the two glare at each other, couldn’t help but ask, “What’s going on here?”
Tang Yubbing glanced at Hua Jianglian hiding behind Young Master Sang with a look of exasperation and sighed.
“The leader wants to buy the limited merchandise from Fusa Pavilion’s new comic. She wants to use company funds.”
“But right now, that company fund is meant for repairing the protective array that was damaged by Water Moon Sect.”
“The leader’s acting like a spoiled child. No matter how I advise, she won’t listen.”
“Sister can’t convince her, so Brother, think of something.”
Young Master Sang turned his head to glance at Hua Jianglian.
She seemed to realize she was in the wrong, her gaze quickly shifting to the side.
“What’s so special about the merchandise that makes the sect leader desperate to buy it?” he asked curiously.
“It’s figurines of the male and female leads from my favorite comic,” she exclaimed, her eyes lighting up with excitement. “They look super good! The male lead and female lead are hugging and kissing under a laurel tree—it’s so sweet!”
“I must buy it and put it in my room!”
Figurines, huh.
How expensive could that be to cause a big fight between the leader and deputy leader of the Demon Cult?
“Actually, it’s not that expensive… just around two thousand high-grade spirit stones,” her voice trailed off, getting quieter.
“…How much?”
Young Master Sang thought he must have misheard.
Hua Jianglian blushed and stammered as she repeated it.
After confirming that he hadn’t misheard the number of digits or units of measurement, Young Master Sang fell into a long silence.
“What’s… wrong?”
“Nothing.” Young Master Sang suddenly sighed.
“I just realized that it’s so easy to earn money from otaku.”
