A-Qing had been truly happy until recently.
Why? Because she had money.
If life ain't fun, you gotta check your bank account. Folks who say international travel is fun but domestic travel sucks? They're always the ones pinching pennies in their own damn country.
That bastard, the Ugly Demon of Inheritance, had a hell of a purse, and plunder has been the victor's right since ancient times. This was the first time in A-Qing's Murim life that she'd amassed more than a single gold ingot.
She even turned in the bad guy's head to the authorities. The bounty was as fat as his bad karma was high.
Exaggerating only slightly, her purse was so heavy she was practically leaning, finding it hard to walk straight.
So A-Qing indulged herself in the Murim's gourmet delights.
She bid farewell to her old lover, Moonlight Sword (No. 5), and welcomed a new, young, and beautiful Moonlight Sword (No. 6). She'd always just picked up other people's swords, but this was her first time acquiring a brand-new one. Her very own sword, untouched by anyone else's hands. A fresh surge of affection bubbled up. I'll take good care of you.
Her previous Moonlight Sword (No. 5) had completely rusted from the inside out due to poor maintenance. The blacksmith's shop wouldn't even give her scrap metal prices and told her to take it back, so she just discreetly tossed it by the roadside.
On top of that, she bought herself sturdy, cheap new clothes.
A-Qing had a great realization.
When you have a lot of money, even this damn Murim world can be enjoyable!
She could even tolerate looking at the status window. Her mood, elevated by her gourmet adventures, remained steadfast against the status window's kicks to her self-esteem.
This was A-Qing's spending habit. People who couldn't see a future often didn't save, a trend also seen among young people in her old world across various countries. Thanks to this, she was broke again in no time.
Ah, those were the good old days.
All that remained was Moonlight Sword (No. 6). The swordsman's lover, the sword. It was a luxury item she'd paid half a gold ingot for.
Moonlight Sword, let's be together forever, okay?
This was why people splurged. Because at least the things you splurged on remained by your side, even when you went broke.
"Order up."
Thud. The waiter unceremoniously set down the dishes.
Three dumplings. One bowl of soup. If you bought three or more buns, you got a bowl of soup for free. This was wisdom gained from two years of Murim life.
Unlike modern expectations, dumplings in the Murim were just plain steamed buns, the absolute bare minimum of food, with no filling. They were usually one coin, or two at fancy inns—the cheapest food in the Murim.
If they had meat, they were called "meat dumplings" and cost a whopping fifteen to twenty coin.
More wisdom from her second year in the Murim:
When dumplings are dry, it's good to dip them in the soup.
When your throat's parched, it's good to drink the soup.
A-Qing, with her suddenly meager meal, looked down at her swordsman's lover, her beloved sword, Moonlight Sword (No. 6).
Hmm, I wonder how much I'd get if I sold this. It's practically brand new, barely used.
But it was only the wisdom of a two-year Murim veteran. She couldn't possibly understand the secondhand prices and depreciation of swords, so she decided to hold onto it for now.
Anyway, she really needed to earn some money.
What to do?
A-Qing called up the martial arts window in her status screen. It was a rotten thing that always made her feel bad, but she needed to check her accumulated free training points. Free training points were a means to instantly learn martial arts, and they would serve as a crucial move in an emergency.
True Yue Maiden Sword Art, True Yue Maiden cultivation technique, True Yue Maiden steps, which was her Qinggong technique, had already reached the twelve stars.
The twelve stars was the highest achievement for that martial art. Achieving "Grand Completion" usually meant mastering a martial art to this level.
Of course, A-Qing's "Grand Completion" and the "Grand Completion" spoken of by Murim martial artists were entirely different concepts, just as different as learning martial arts via a status window. For A-Qing, Twelfth Stage Grand Completion meant all forms were engraved, and she gained additional stats and special abilities for each martial art.
Aside from those, the rest of the martial arts listed were just from casually touching manuals in bookstores. All of them were martial arts with a White Border.
'Murim Chronicles' ranking system went from lowest (white border) to blue, red, gold , and the highest, purple borders. The developers hadn't set specific names for the grades, so guides seemed to refer to them as "white martial arts," "blue martial arts," and so on.
By the way, Moon Maiden Sword Art (True Form) was a purple-bordered martial art. It was supposed to be one of the most broken martial arts, but since she hadn't learned any other purple ones yet, she couldn't tell. You needed a control group for comparison, after all.
And now, it was time to add another purple-bordered martial art.
She had endured a year of countless hardships to exceed 500 good karma points. It was a truly long and humiliating time.
Good karma was incredibly useful, thanks to the Good Karma Reward system. It was an in-game system that allowed you to choose and learn a desired martial art every time your good karma reached a certain threshold. The first exchange happened at 500 good karma.
Bad karma, by the way, was useless. You accumulated bad karma by doing evil deeds, but usually, you got plenty of training points in the process.
Good karma cultivation, which required you to only kill bad guys, was difficult for accumulating cultivation points, but in return, it allowed you to exchange karma for desired martial arts.
A-Qing didn't hesitate.
She had a goal from the very beginning.
The Heavenly Demon Divine Art had been tempting, but after a quick search during the game download revealed that "Heavenly Demon" was treated as a joke, she lost interest.
These days, Heavenly Demons ran restaurants, bakeries, became chaebols, and even played baseball, apparently.
Even in traditional wuxia, they were often just the protagonist's third concubine or something, so the Heavenly Demon Divine Art probably just had a fancy name and was nothing special.
A-Qing immediately claimed her Good Karma Reward.
Suddenly, words, the forms and true meanings of martial arts, and images of techniques invaded her brain, churning and flipping her insides. Involuntarily, she let out idiotic sounds.
"Ugh… eugh, ugh…"
It was a horrible, disgusting experience, impossible to describe, like unfamiliar knowledge piercing her brain, or someone reaching in and kneading her insides.
And a major aftereffect always followed.
Is this even possible? Who learns martial arts like this? Could this actually be a game world? Am I really me, and am I truly making my own decisions and movements? What if there's a transparent screen beyond the sky, and someone's just typing on a keyboard and swinging a mouse, controlling me? Then what am I...? No. Stop. Stop bad thoughts.
A-Qing forced herself to change the subject. In times like these, she needed to act goofy. She desperately rummaged through her memories of once being a modern human, the traces of a past that defined her as a living entity.
Who am I? I'm the owner of the Buddha's Palm.
Stephen Chow, watch out. K-Buddha's Palm is coming.
Try the Buddha's Palm wrapped in kimchi.
The K-Buddha's Palm that surprises Trump and makes Xi Jinping jealous. This martial art is mine now.
The Buddha's Palm is depicted in Subakdo... Got a problem? Chinese people?
Then go ask the Red Army's Cultural Revolution. Nothing happened, you say?
Perhaps thanks to her desperate clowning, she avoided feeling even worse.
However, she no longer had the courage to look at the status window. She didn't have the courage to look at people either. She couldn't look at the numbers above people's heads right now.
A-Qing squeezed her eyes shut and bowed her head. She chewed her steamed bun thoroughly. Even after chewing it so thoroughly, for some reason, her throat felt hot and it got stuck halfway down.
She forced herself to redirect her attention. With her eyes closed, the voices around her began to filter into her ears.
A-Qing's physical abilities, having mastered one internal cultivation technique to Grand Completion, were actually close to superhuman, so simply by focusing, she could hear all the conversations in the inn.
Among them, one voice caught her ear.
"Hey, I heard the escort leader is heading to Yongseong."
"Ah! May I know your honorable Young Hero's name?"
"It's Peng Daesan."
"The Jade Qilin! Good heavens, aren't you the eldest son of the Peng family? This is truly an honor! Yongseong, are you going as far as Mount Hua?"
"The escort leader doesn't need to know more than that."
"Ah ha! Yes, of course. It's a great honor to serve a Great Hero like yourself! Oh dear, please sit here. Hey, waiter, bring out a feast that'll break the table!"
An incredibly arrogant tone mingled with a suddenly fawning, sycophantic voice, creating the conversation.
A-Qing's gloomy mood vanished instantly.
So, if you're a master, they treat you like royalty just for joining an escort mission?! Holy shit, is this for real?!
It was a new world.
A-Qing was the type to wander around looking for bad guys to kill when she ran out of money.
All A-Qing knew about Murim was the miserable, penniless life she'd scraped together for a little over a year. And a few scenes from Stephen Chow movies.
So, A-Qing had no idea about the Hebei Peng Family.
The eldest son of one of the Five Great Families of the World was, after the incident where Senior Martial Emperor Wutian turned the Imperial Palace upside down, a person of higher standing than even princes of noble houses. The Kunpeng Escort Agency was not a small merchant group, handling distribution for two provinces, but it couldn't compare to the prestige of the Hebei Peng family.
A-Qing, unaware of these circumstances, simply thought that all masters received such treatment.
A-Qing, with her unnecessarily proactive nature, suddenly stood up from her seat.
"Excuse me. Escort Leader, you're going to Yongseong, you said?"
A-Qing addressed the escort leader. It was the confident demeanor of a master.
"Uh, hmm. Young Lady…"
The escort leader made a sour face.
What kind of situation was this? This was a moment to curry favor with a VIP who was a diamond-tier connection among golden connections. In Chinese, it was guanxi, a traditional endeavor to build friendships.
How could his expression be bright when some random person suddenly interrupted such an occasion?
"My name is A-Qing."
"A-Qing?"
The reply came from beside her. It was the low, melodious voice of that rude bastard, Peng Daesan, the legitimate heir of the Peng family. His voice alone was enough to melt any woman, but it had no effect on A-Qing.
Peng Daesan was sitting with his back to her, so A-Qing had to turn her head to see his face.
Wow! How can someone be this handsome?
The moniker "Jade Qilin" was one of the traditions passed down through generations. It was a special title given to the most handsome among promising young talents.
And this generation's Jade Qilin, Peng Daesan, was praised as having the greatest looks in the long history of the Central Plains. Was there any need to say more, given that Peng Daesan's unofficial title was "The Most Handsome Man Under Heaven"?
But A-Qing was fundamentally a man, merely with the body of a woman. So, a man's looks didn't sway her. She was just utterly shocked.
Whoa! What's with that face?! He's totally hot! I'm so jealous!
What the hell? Am I seeing something unreal right now?
Is this truly a real man's face?
If you lined up all men throughout the world's future and history by looks, he would clearly occupy the eternal number one spot at the very front.
Such was the level of A-Qing's shock, despite being a man mentally.
In fact, women who encountered the Jade Qilin's jade-like countenance without preparation usually fainted on the spot or truly collapsed unconscious.
As A-Qing gawked in admiration, her mouth hanging open, Peng Daesan casually dropped a question.
"A-Qing. Do you perhaps use the True Yue Maiden Sword Art?"
"Wow. You know the True Yue Maiden Sword Art! Do you perchance—"
"Ha. Tsk. This is… something new."
What the hell is wrong with this rude asshole?
Is he acting all high and mighty just because he's got a pretty face?
A-Qing made a sour face.
"A-Qing is your real name?"
"Uh, yeah. Why?"
"I've never heard of that surname. Then, what is the name of your family's progenitor?"
"Uh, hmm. Well…"
How the hell would I know that? But if I say I don't know, it'll seem too suspicious.
Actually, A-Qing mostly traveled alone. The only people she'd briefly associated with were other paupers in similar situations. They said birds of a feather flock together, after all.
So, she knew nothing about the greetings of the upper class, who dressed in silk. She just figured rich people asked about progenitors.
A-Qing racked her brain. Who among the people she knew had the surname "A"?
"Why can't you answer?"
"I was about to answer!"
"So, the progenitor?"
"Uh… Asura?"
Is this right?
It just slipped out, but Asura probably isn't it.
"A-Qing, 17th descendant of Asura." Sounds kind of cool, actually.
"Keuk, kekek, kehAHAHAHA….!"
Then, out of nowhere, Peng Daesan burst out laughing.
Guess it wasn't right after all.
"Good. Very refreshing. You get 27 points."
"For what?"
"Your face is average, so 0 points. Your figure is passable, but you're tall, so deduction. Your chest is big, which is vulgar, another deduction. So, 7 points. But you made me laugh, so a special 20 points, making it 27 points."
What the hell? How is he so blatant with this sexual harassment? One thing was clear: this kind of attitude was definitely not standard upper-class Murim culture.
Other women would have fled in humiliation and sorrow, but it didn't wound A-Qing at all. Instead, it made her furious.
"Hey. Your mouth is just flapping, spewing out whatever shit comes to mind, huh? Is that a mouth-hole or an asshole? You're literally shitting from your mouth. I'm 27 points? Oh, yeah? I'll give you a hundred points, wanna a big fat 'Good Job' stamp right on your face?"
"I don't really get it, but it sounds like you want to hit me."
Peng Daesan didn't hide his sneer.
"Fine. Go on. Just try it."
But there was one thing Peng Daesan didn't know.
Since entering the Murim, A-Qing rarely held back. She was A-Qing, someone with existential dread so deep she couldn't even tell if this was a game or reality. She didn't have the luxury of restraining her impulses. And if someone dared to provoke her to "just try it"?
So A-Qing clenched her fist. And then, BAM! she delivered a solid punch right to Peng Daesan's smooth cheek.
At that sight, the Escort Leader's face went white.