"Master, do you really think it makes sense for me and Special Envoy Leng to have a marriage engagement?"
The moment the words left his mouth, Ye Ling felt something was wrong. But by the time he wanted to take it back, it was already too late.
"Of course it does."
Bai Yiyi blinked her big eyes and answered without the slightest psychological burden.
[System judgment: The "breaking off the engagement" setting is beneficial for stimulating the host's diligent cultivation. Therefore, the host has obtained the "breaking off the engagement" setting.]
That single line of system text struck Ye Ling like a bolt from the blue, leaving him completely stunned.
Huh?
Just one sentence, and now I've got a fiancée I've already broken up with?
Ye Ling suddenly felt like he shouldn't say another word.
This was wrong. Very wrong.
He slowly turned his head and saw that Leng Qingqiu was still crying, though her sobs had quieted considerably.
Thankfully, there were no signs of sudden enlightenment. What he feared most right now was Leng Qingqiu awakening some kind of protagonist template, instantly ascending to the Great Ascension realm, and hanging him up for a beating.
He knew all too well how terrifying the "breaking off the engagement" trope could be.
"Sect Master Bai, you're overthinking it!"
Although Leng Qingqiu hadn't heard Bai Yiyi's voice transmission to Ye Ling, she knew very clearly that she had no engagement at all, let alone one that had been broken off. After all, she was… she was…
For a moment, her thoughts grew hazy. After thinking for a while, she continued, "Before I was born, my family did arrange a marriage for me. But later, due to certain reasons, that engagement was canceled."
In the end, it was all because she had been born a girl. If she had been born a boy, she wouldn't have had to endure so much humiliation here.
"Huh?"
Bai Yiyi cutely leaned to the side, poking her head out from behind Ye Ling. With an expression full of regret, she confirmed with Leng Qingqiu, "So it's not true?"
"It's not."
Faced with Bai Yiyi like this, Leng Qingqiu instinctively couldn't muster any anger. Instead, she felt an inexplicable urge to take this child home and bully her to her heart's content.
But when she noticed Bai Yiyi's bust, which more than rivaled her own, she immediately remembered that the adorable girl in front of her was actually an unparalleled powerhouse who could suppress a full-force Tribulation Transcendence Stage attack with nothing but her presence.
Great Ascension Stage.
It had to be Great Ascension Stage. Only a Great Ascension Stage expert undergoing worldly tempering would do something so utterly unreasonable.
"That really is a shame."
Bai Yiyi had no idea she had already been labeled a peerless powerhouse in Leng Qingqiu's mind. Right now, all she could think about was how to sell her good disciple.
Leng Qingqiu might look weak, but she carried plenty of good items. The techniques she used were also fairly high-grade in Bai Yiyi's eyes, though their core parts had clearly been removed, leaving her without a grasp of their true profundities.
Still, if Leng Qingqiu were willing to become her disciple's wife, Bai Yiyi could even reverse-engineer those techniques for her. If there was one thing she excelled at, it was cultivation methods. She might be useless at everything else, but when it came to this, she was wide awake.
So she pushed Ye Ling forward a little more and enthusiastically promoted him to Leng Qingqiu.
"But Envoy Leng, just look at my disciple. He's dignified, handsome, and obviously a stock with huge potential. Are you sure you don't want to think it over?"
"Oh, and by the way, my disciple has only been cultivating for one or two…"
Bai Yiyi started counting on her fingers. When she reached the fifth finger, her eyes lit up with delight.
"Five days! My disciple only took five days to reach the Foundation Establishment realm. You definitely wouldn't be losing out by becoming his Dao companion!"
Pah!
Little liar!
If Ye Ling was a big liar, then in Leng Qingqiu's eyes, Bai Yiyi was a little liar.
Foundation Establishment in five days?
I took three days just to reach Qi Refinement!
There's a book in the mortal world called Three Days to Qi Refinement, Five Days to Foundation Establishment that's fooled countless mortals who dream of cultivating immortality.
You think I don't know that?
And why does it just keep getting more outrageous?
If your disciple really reached Foundation Establishment in five days, I'll swallow the Void Sword Casket on the spot!
Ridiculous.
Still, thoughts were thoughts. Leng Qingqiu didn't say any of that out loud. She forced a smile at Bai Yiyi, then looked at Ye Ling's infuriatingly handsome face, full of hesitation, and said through gritted teeth, "Sect Master Bai, you flatter me. Your disciple has a boundless future. I'm dull and untalented, unworthy of him."
"It's fine, it's fine. We don't mind."
Bai Yiyi waved her hand, wearing the expression of a kindly elder.
Pfft! That was modest refusal. Modest refusal! Can't you understand that?
Leng Qingqiu nearly suffered internal injury from anger at Bai Yiyi's attitude.
To be fair, Ye Ling had beaten her for quite a while, but that was only superficial pain. With a bit of circulating her energy, she could disperse the bruises on her face.
But Bai Yiyi had only spoken a few sentences to her, and she was already furious beyond measure.
What infuriated her the most was that she really couldn't beat Bai Yiyi.
No wonder she was a Great Ascension Stage cultivator. Terrifying didn't even begin to cover it.
Before Leng Qingqiu could force down the suffocating anger in her chest and speak, Ye Ling spoke up first.
"Master, right now my priority is cultivation. I don't have even the slightest trace of romantic feelings."
"Is that so?"
After hearing Ye Ling's words, Bai Yiyi seemed to fall into thought. Looking a little dejected, she retreated behind Ye Ling.
For some reason, even though Ye Ling had just helped her out of an awkward situation, the knot in Leng Qingqiu's chest only tightened.
And—
Why did those words sound so familiar?
Wait, isn't that exactly what I used to say when I rejected all those admirers before I started dressing as a man?
Because she was born a woman, Leng Qingqiu had been excluded and even resented by her family. Yet thanks to her transcendent beauty, she had still attracted no shortage of admirers.
"Besides, I've already beaten Envoy Leng up like this. Being friends is fine, but as Dao companions? I'm afraid she'd pull a knife on me in the middle of the night."
You've got a decent amount of self-awareness, kid.
"Then I'll just seal her cultivation. That way there won't be any problem."
Huh? Listen to that. Is that even something a person should say?
"Wouldn't that make us the bad guys?"
Aren't you already the bad guys?
"Good point."
Phew…
Listening to this exchange between master and disciple, Leng Qingqiu felt as though she were riding some kind of immortal roller coaster, tense and overstimulating. Her heart thumped wildly, like a little deer hopping across a busy highway, the kind that nearly gets run over.
"Master, stop messing around. Let's hurry and send her down the mountain. It'll be dark soon."
Ye Ling couldn't really make sense of Bai Yiyi's way of doing things, but right now he just wanted to send Leng Qingqiu, this walking disaster, away as soon as possible.
Something felt very wrong.
Judging by the system's previous displays of authority, Leng Qingqiu shouldn't be in this state at all.
Even if she hadn't suddenly gained some epiphany or awakened a divine technique, the way she looked at him should have been filled with humiliation and fury. Instead, she was only grinding her teeth, with not even a hint of killing intent in her gaze.
And from what she'd said earlier, she hadn't actually been dumped by anyone. It couldn't possibly be that engagement from before she was even born, could it?
Everything about the current situation felt deeply abnormal.