Pale green robes. Amber eyes. A smile that disarms both beasts and men.

A cold sweat broke out on the back of Ji’an’s neck.

’Wait a minute. That’s not a background character, is he? Isn’t that guy the Love Interest Number 6! Who made millions of girls faint from his first appearance?!’

Mo Wuchen. The Shadow Assassin.

In the original novel, Mo Wuchen was raised by a shadowy, underground syndicate as the ultimate weapon.

He was trained to mimic human emotion so perfectly that no one could detect his intent to kill.

His gentle smile wasn’t a sign of kindness; it was a psychological weapon designed to lower his target’s guard before he slit their throat.

He was a complete, unhinged psycho who viewed life as a fleeting, meaningless game, until he met Gu Zhiwei, who became his twisted obsession.

Ji’an watched from the bushes, her breath catching in her throat.

To a normal person, Mo Wuchen looked like an angel petting a duck. But knowing his lore, Ji’an realized the horrifying truth: He wasn’t petting the duck. He was tracing its jugular vein.

He was casually calculating the exact amount of pressure required to snap its neck without making a sound.

’Nope,’ Ji’an thought, her self-preservation instincts screaming at maximum volume. ’Absolutely not. I am not dealing with this psycho killer. I already have my plate full with crazy bastards like that Yandere Prince and a Tsundere Sword Lord on my plate. My dance card is full! If I take on one more burden, I’m gonna crash and short circuit!’

She didn’t care how handsome he was, nor did she care that his smile could shatter a million hearts.

A heartthrob who literally stops your heart with a poisoned dagger was not on her itinerary today.

Moving with agonizing slowness, Ji’an began to moonwalk backward into the ferns. She didn’t snap a single twig.

She didn’t disturb a single leaf. She let the Void Locket do its job, erasing her existence from the clearing.

"Quack?" The duck on Mo Wuchen’s knee tilted its head, looking toward the bushes.

Mo Wuchen paused. His amber eyes flicked toward the ferns where Ji’an had been hiding seconds ago.

His gentle smile didn’t waver, but the temperature in the clearing dropped by a fraction of a degree.

"Is someone there, little friend?" Mo Wuchen whispered to the duck, his voice like liquid velvet.

He waited. But silence answered him.

He chuckled again, a soft, chilling sound, and went back to stroking the duck’s neck.

Fifty yards away, Ji’an turned and sprinted in the opposite direction, putting as much distance between herself and the smiling assassin as humanly possible.

***

Once she was certain she had put at least two miles of dense forest between herself and Mo Wuchen, Ji’an finally slowed to a halt, leaning against a tree trunk to catch her breath.

"Okay. Priority one: Avoid the handsome psychos," Ji’an muttered to herself, adjusting her robes. "Priority two: Find Tang Bo and Liu Liu before they get eaten by a carnivorous flower. Priority three... figure out what the hell I’m actually supposed to be doing here."

She reached into her sleeve and pulled out the green jade Lifeline Token the Head Elder had given her.

As soon as her thumb brushed the smooth surface of the jade, the token vibrated.

A soft hum filled the air, and a semi-translucent, pale blue holographic screen projected upward from the face of the plaque.

Ji’an’s eyes widened. "Whoa. It’s like a smartphone. The cultivation world really doesn’t mess around with its magical tech."

The holographic interface was sleek and surprisingly intuitive.

In the top left corner was a mini-map, though the vast majority of it was covered in a dark "fog of war," revealing only the immediate area she had explored.

In the top right corner were her vitals, a glowing green bar representing her Qi reserves and physical stamina.

But it was the bottom right corner that made Ji’an grimace.

There, pulsing with a steady, crimson light, was a small, eye-shaped rune.

"A recording rune," Ji’an deduced, tracing the symbol in the air.

The Elder had mentioned that the token acted as a lifeline, but he hadn’t explicitly stated the secondary function. The token was essentially a body cam.

Everything she did, everything she saw, and everything she said was being recorded and transmitted live to a massive scrying array back in the Assembly Plaza.

Thousands of Outer Disciples who had failed the initial screening, the Deacons, the Elders, and the Inner Sect Elites on their jade terrace were currently watching the participants like it was a reality TV show.

Ji’an swallowed hard. 𝐟𝕣𝕖𝐞𝐰𝕖𝚋𝐧𝗼𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝗰𝐨𝐦

She pictured the massive viewing screens floating in the sky above the plaza. She pictured Gu Zhiwei cheering for her.

She pictured Wen Shiru analyzing her every move with that calculating fan of his.

And then, she pictured a certain someone.

She could vividly imagine him standing at the edge of the terrace, his dark eyes locked onto whatever screen was displaying her feed.

He was probably gripping the railing so hard it was crumbling to dust. He was likely analyzing every shadow, every rustling leaf, ready to shatter the illusion realm itself if she so much as got a paper cut.

’The little guy would probably be worried right now...’ Ji’an felt a sudden, inexplicable rush of warmth in her chest.

The memory of his intense, worried stare from the morning flashed in her mind, mingling with the phantom feeling of his lips on the back of her hand.

She looked down at the Frost-Soul Barrier bracelet on her wrist. The blue crystals glinted in the sunlight.

She couldn’t help it. A small, fond smile tugged at the corners of her mouth.

She lifted her wrist, bringing the bracelet into the direct view of the token’s recording rune. She didn’t wave, nor did she speak; that would be too obvious.

Instead, she just tapped the blue crystals twice with her index finger, a silent, private reassurance transmitted across dimensions.