Don't Pick Up Boyfriends From the Trash Bin Chapter 162 - System vs. System (12): Mountain ghosts, idle days, the scientific cultivation of immortality

Chapter 162 - System vs. System (12): Mountain ghosts, idle days, the scientific cultivation of immortality

Translator: kiribold

editor: sarah

At that time, a group of grave robbers accidentally touched the seal in the Mountain of Time and Rain, causing a thousand-year-old mountain ghost to be born. There was no return for anyone who entered the mountain without exception.

The Black Dragon wanted to catch the mountain ghost and plunder its essence for elixir, while the White Merman wished to save his fellow disciples. So one pretended to be a scholar, and the other pretended to be a swordsman. They pretended to be captured while pa.s.sing by the mountain, and the two were thrown into the same sinkhole. After spending three days and three nights together, a strange cellmate friends.h.i.+p was formed.

Seeing this, Yan Jinhua recalled his unpleasant experience of chasing the novel.

When the two of them were imprisoned, the Black Dragon took the name Ming Ye, and was often up to mischief, deliberately teasing the serious and gentle Duan Shujue. The author spent many words describing the scholar named “Ming Ye” as having a first-cla.s.s appearance and a garish beauty. The readers below cheered up one after another, scolding the woman that pretending to be a man was a corny old cliche while they chased the text fascinatedly, waiting for the author to tear off the vest of the “Ming Ye” girl and let her become the male protagonist’s first harem member.

A few chapters later, the author successfully stripped “Ming Ye” and personally proved that he was a genuine man with two ding dings, at least one more than the readers had.

As soon as the update came out, the comment section was in a frenzy.

The author could only bite the bullet and change the text due to the threat of readers abandoning the text.

The Black Dragon’s ding ding had already grown. Even if you helped him purify his body, readers couldn’t erase the memory of this person as a male from their minds. Everyone said that they didn’t want the plot to continue developing and watch the protagonist turn gay, so the author had to cut the plotline of Mountain of Time and Rain.

In the comment section, the author weakly said that the mountain ghost was actually a good story. Didn’t anyone want to read it?

Except for some indifferent people, most people had already expressed that they didn’t want to read it, scram. Laozi spent money to see Duan Shujue conquer land and the heavens, don’t give Laozi waterworks instead.

As a result, the Mountain of Time and Rain plotline was cut in half and written off briefly. In the first battle between the Black Dragon and the White Merman, because he didn’t take this young and “pedantic” Daoist seriously, the Black Dragon was defeated. The White Merman rescued everyone from his cultivation sect. And from then on, his prestige spread throughout the world.

But readers were still unhappy.

Yan Jinhua asked in the comment section: Author, what about the mountain ghost’s thousand-year-old elixir essence? Doesn’t he want it? If not, it is also OJBK to capture the mountain ghost into the harem.

The author replied: This isn’t what Duan Shujue would want.

Yan Jinhua almost fainted in anger from the white lotus scent drifting ten miles upwind. He was so outraged that he couldn’t calm down even after typing several negative comments, saying that the protagonist was a useless virtuous loser. Why doesn’t he just become a monk? Or chop off those two useless ornaments and go into the palace as a eunuch.

Since then, the author hadn’t replied in the comment section.

However, when the Mountain of Time and Rain plotline was cut, it led to the chaos of pacing in the next plotline of The Mermaid Immortal. But that was another story to be put aside for the time being.

On the other side.

During the break between Chi Xiaochi’s sword practice, 061 also took Chi Xiaochi to review this part of the story.

It seemed that Yan Jinhua’s resentment for this storyline wasn’t slight, so in the previous life, he not only took the sword in the stone but also bravely rushed into the Mountain of Time and Rain. He rescued all the imprisoned disciples and while upholding righteousness, killed the mountain ghost. The body was brought back, the alchemy furnace raged with never-ending flames, and after forty-nine days of refining, it produced a red heart stone.

At that time, Duan Shujue’s spiritual power was being absorbed by the sword in the stone, but he didn’t realize it. He devoted himself to practicing swordsmans.h.i.+p in Yuguang Pool and was ignorant of the outside world, not even knowing he had such a fate.

Chi Xiaochi commented on Yan Jinhua, “He is really a hero who achieves great things and doesn’t stick to the small details.”

061 shook his head. “From a certain perspective, he counts as a strong man.” After all, not just anyone could pull on an indifferent face to steal someone’s life without any burden.

061 added, “If he put his energy on the right path, with his status as the second senior brother, even if he didn’t freeload off Duan Shujue, he would still gain luck, right?”

“Come on. Don’t put a high hat on him,” Chi Xiaochi said. “People like this, you expect them to learn? His r.e.c.t.u.m leads straight to his brain, how much he learns is how much he s.h.i.+ts.”

061 couldn’t help laughing at Chi Xiaochi’s mouth and asked, “What are you going to do now?”

Chi Xiaochi said, “Sword practice.”

Doing what Duan Shujue wanted to do was one of the main guiding ideologies of his service project this time.

And Duan Shujue’s interests weren’t much, nothing more than practicing swordsmans.h.i.+p and making friends.

…and now there might be one more, raising a snake.

For a protagonist, it was probably too dull.

But this is the life that Duan Shujue loves, so Chi Xiaochi had the responsibility to help him lay a good foundation.

Chi Xiaochi picked up the sword in the stone.

Under the bright blue sky, the young man danced with his sword facing the water, surrounded by fog. Little by little, gracefully and unrestrained, like a painting made by a sage hand willfully scattering ink spills.

“…wrong.”

But soon, the sound of advice came not far from his side.

Wen Yujing was lying high with incense burning, holding a book in one hand, his blue silk hair tie scattered on the wooden chair, carrying the demeanor of a carefree immortal outside the world.

He stared at a book page and said, “Between the eighth and ninth stance, there should be a change of breath.”

Chi Xiaochi retracted his sword stance, held the sword on his back, and bowed slightly in salute. “s.h.i.+fu. The sword manual handed down by my ancestor is very detailed, but it doesn’t mention that there should be a change of breath here.”

Wen Yujing turned over a page of the book and said, “Then the sword manual is wrong. If you don’t believe me, compare it a few times.”

061 had gone through a world of cultivating immortality before. He discovered that the so-called cultivation of immortality was nothing more than cultivating the body and cultivation of “qi.” Qi nourishes the spirit, and the spirit nourishes the body, a trinity. With balanced circulation, qi becomes power. Once the power is strong enough, it can evolve into spiritual power. With spiritual power, you could fly to the sky and become omnipotent.

To put it bluntly, what golden core, nascent soul, divine transformation, and ascension stages? All were manifestations of refining qi to a certain extent.

The so-called “qi” was infinitely mysterious for ordinary people, and it took decades or even a hundred years of meditation to obtain it.

For a system that was good at calculation, once the operation and arrangement rules of “qi” were mastered, this was a bunch of 0s and 1s calculation sets.

To put it bluntly, science could advance the cause of cultivating immortality by a large margin.

Just now, he used a scientific algorithm to calculate the most suitable cultivation method for Chi Xiaochi.

Chi Xiaochi looked at him for a while without saying a word.

He thought of a summer vacation from a long time ago. He took a big math problem downstairs to ask Lou Ying.

Lou Ying was timing his watch to do a set of physics papers. When he was halfway through with the final question, Chi Xiaochi came to his door.

He simply pointed out the calculation method, and Chi Xiaochi calculated it and came up with an answer.

However, the summer homework’s given standard answer was completely different from the one he calculated.

He said, “Huh, it’s wrong.”

Lou Ying didn’t look at the answer. He pulled his scratch paper and read it for a few seconds, then pushed it back. “There’s nothing wrong with your answer. The book is wrong.”

Chi Xiaochi said, “… Ah?”

Lou Ying had always treated everyone with humility and courteousness, but only when he faced his area of expertise was there a unique and gentle sense of strength. “It’s a misprint or a miscalculation. Either way, it’s not your fault.”

Chi Xiaochi flipped through the pages, and sure enough, the answers on this entire page were misprinted.

When he looked at Lou Ying, his eyes were full of stars. “Lou-ge, you’re too amazing.”

Lou Ying smiled and gladly accepted the compliment. He proofread the calculation process on the scratch paper under his pen, filled in the answers on the paper, and turned off the timer with more than 40 seconds left. He turned around and asked Chi Xiaochi, “Want to play video games?”

At present time, Chi Xiaochi turned his back. All he saw before his eyes was Wen Yujing’s appearance reading just now.

He tried his best to erase that image from the image of the man in his mind, took off his shoes, and leaped into the water.

The merman was good at harnessing and treading on water. He didn’t even wet his socks. As for the merman’s swordsmans.h.i.+p, only practicing beside the spiritual spring could produce twice the result with half the effort.

He pulled the sword into a beautiful sword pattern and placed it flat in the palm of his hand, precisely the starting position of the eighth style.

Meanwhile, Wen Yujing held his book on the sh.o.r.e. When Chi Xiaochi turned his back to him, he got up and walked a few steps slowly, putting away the shoes Chi Xiaochi had taken off by the lake.

Since following Wen Yujing, Chi Xiaochi’s daily routine was practicing swordsmans.h.i.+p and raising a cat.

After getting along for a long time, he gradually figured out Wen Yujing’s habits.

Like modern ragdoll cats, he was elegant, easy-going, and gentle. He never let Chi Xiaochi out of his sight. He liked to observe secretly, was lazy and sleepy, and loved his bamboo lounge chair the most, wis.h.i.+ng to carry it on his back with his sword.

After turning back into his cat body, he loved to be extra clingy and held, and he especially liked to be touched on his back. When he felt comfortable, he would even show his belly without any pretense of being a s.h.i.+zun.

Chi Xiaochi suspected that he ran to the Sword Meeting to find an itch scratcher that was pleasing to the eye.

As a result, he gained Duan Shujue, finding a good s.h.i.+t shoveling officer for himself and inhaling fish along the way, killing two birds with one stone.

Before Chi Xiaochi started petting the cat for the first time, he said, “s.h.i.+fu, this is too much an encroachment.”

Wen Yujing ambled over him, comfortably sweeping his tail around, not afraid of being offended.

Chi Xiaochi obeyed s.h.i.+fu’s order and started rubbing the cat.

The soft little ball had a first-cla.s.s feel when you pet it, and the after-sales service was guaranteed, so you didn’t have to worry about being bitten.

But as a fish, Chi Xiaochi couldn’t fully enjoy the happiness of petting cats and always felt that he would be accidentally eaten if he wasn’t careful.

Apparently, his s.h.i.+zun was very satisfied with his new disciple and pulled him to sleep with him every day.

Chi Xiaochi felt that this was not a normal and healthy teacher-disciple relations.h.i.+p. After coaxing his s.h.i.+fu to sleep one day, he returned to the lake, transformed into his fishtail, and laid on the rock, wanting to be a quiet mermaid.

Consequently, when he woke up in the night, he found that his s.h.i.+zun was sleeping soundly on his fishtail, holding a large fish scale in his four claws, making it a quilt.

Chi Xiaochi was instantly awake.

The sleepless Chi Xiaochi chatted with 061, discussing whether Wen Yujing regarded him as a disciple, a pillow, or a food reserve.

061 said, “He just really likes you.”

Chi Xiaochi replied, “I know. I also like hairy crabs, especially the ones with a lot of yellow fat.”

061 couldn’t help laughing. “Should be all of them.”

Chi Xiaochi asked, “What does ‘all of them’ mean?”

061 said, “It means to treat you like all of them.”

Chi Xiaochi: “…”

He braced his hands on the rock and looked at the kitten hiding under his scales, sleeping peacefully. He thought about his constant jokes about braising it as dog food.

061 said, “There’s still a little time before dawn, sleep a little longer.”

Chi Xiaochi replied, “Can’t sleep.”

061 suggested, “How about watching a movie?”

Chi Xiaochi said, “Watch.”

So, 061 chose a large jade stone on the other side of the lake as a projection screen. An open-air movie was played under the moonlight. The film was a foreign doc.u.mentary on the ocean, and there were no subt.i.tles. The person on the screen read a sentence, and 061 translated it simultaneously. After a while, Chi Xiaochi fell asleep on the rock.

061 turned off the movie and softly said good night.

The kitten in his arms opened his eyes and looked at his beloved tenderly for a few moments before going back to sleep.

The breeze blew through the lake, brus.h.i.+ng the green-dyed sycamore leaves with a rustling sound.

Apart from the occasional troubles, the teacher and disciple got along quite happily.

It wasn’t until three months later that Chi Yunzi came to the door and detailed the strange happenings on the Mountain of Time and Rain.

He had to guard Jingxu Peak, so he needed a strong disciple to go there and check on the situation. Among the younger generation, Chi Yunzi counted and found that only the remaining Duan Shujue was suitable.

Chi Xiaochi agreed on behalf of Duan Shujue and reread The Mermaid Immortal in private.

In The Mermaid Immortal, because of very real and human reasons, the story of the mountain ghost wasn’t detailed, so neither Yan Jinhua nor Chi Xiaochi could open the perspective of G.o.d.

The only information they knew was that the mountain ghost was a woman and had lived for at least a thousand years. Besides that, her personality and biography were all unknown.

During the serialization, many readers speculated that Duan Shujue left her alive because he wanted to collect a stamp and accept her into his harem.

Later, the author had the mountain ghost appear in the update to give Duan Shujue her newly brewed wine. She deliberately wrote that she was plain-looking except for a pair of lake-like eyes that slightly pulled up the overall score. She could barely be considered as beautiful.

This time, readers thought that the author was deliberately slapping them in the face and made a scene in the comment section again.

Soon after, the author became a eunuch in despair and threw down the text. There were no longer any updates.

Chi Xiaochi was curious to know what this mountain ghost in the author’s imagination looked like.

But Yan Jinhua was looking forward to it even more than Chi Xiaochi.

He couldn’t be like the book and fall directly into the Mountain of Time and Rain when he was on a mission with the other disciples. That was too pathetic, so he lied about not feeling well to avoid the mission and waited for the second batch of people from Jingxu Peak to be folded into the Mountain of Time and Rain. As soon as he heard that Chi Yunzi had gone back to Huishou Peak, he immediately slammed on the door to go.

The plan had changed so should his strategy.

The mountain ghost was indeed a piece of fat meat, and Duan Shujue was a gentleman and a saint. He couldn’t bear to kill it, and Yan Jinhua could always go up and rub against his luck.

Even if his strength wasn’t good enough to kill the mountain ghost, there should be some treasures around her as a thousand-year-old monster.

When Chi Yunzi heard such a request from the always lazy second disciple, he couldn’t help but be surprised. “What’s the use of you going?”

Yan Jinhua knew how to be a decent person and didn’t say anything about saving his fellow disciples or the righteousness of the world or other nonsense. He said, “Responding to s.h.i.+fu, after all, I have lived with Duan-s.h.i.+di for a period of time. I haven’t seen Duan-s.h.i.+di for a long time, and I really miss him. Now is a good time to travel together. I have refined some medicinal pills here, not precious, but they are a token from the heart. I hope that s.h.i.+fu will fulfill my wish.”

These words were sincere and reasonable. It was rare for this naughty second disciple to self-initiate a task. Chi Yunzi thought for a moment and agreed. He gave three orders and five applications. He mustn’t try to be brave and strong. He must listen to Wen Yujing for everything.

Hearing this name, Yan Jinhua almost vomited blood. “…Wen…Little s.h.i.+shu is going too?”

Chi Yunzi said, “He favors his new disciple. He was afraid of an accident, so he said he would go with him.”

The fact that Wen Yujing took away Duan Shujue and picked up his precious pearl caused Yan Jinhua to have no good feelings towards this person.

In private, the system said in Yan Jinhua’s ear, “Host, Duan Shujue is now his disciple and has been nailed down, but the Dinghai Pearl must be returned.”

Yan Jinhua already had this intention without the system reminding him.

Even if Wen Yujing hid the precious pearl, he could still try to get it back. If worst came to worst, he could lie about having a circ.u.mstantial witness for evidence so that he wouldn’t deny it.

But even with Yan Jinhua’s thick skin, which was invulnerable to swords and spears, he never thought that Wen Yujing would directly embed the Dinghai Pearl gilded with silver into the hilt of Duan Shujue’s sword in the stone.

Yan Jinhua:…I’m f.u.c.ked.

This feeling of returning things to their rightful owner was quite bad and disgusting for Yan Jinhua. As if all his efforts of jumping up and down turned out to be useless, everything he quietly obtained from Duan Shujue would be returned to Duan Shujue in some other form.

He forced himself to calm down and smiled as he gave away the valuable medicinal pills he had stored for a long time.

These pills were all refined in his own s.p.a.ce, full of spiritual energy. He kept some of them for himself, and the rest was intended to be an excuse to see Duan Shujue again, but he didn’t intend to actually give them away.

Duan Shujue was just like his gentleman character setting, taking the initiative to refuse. “How could I trouble Yan da-ge?”

Yan Jinhua smiled, but his eyes glanced at the sword in the stone at his waist. “Why are you so polite with Yan da-ge? It’s not a rare thing, since it’s given to you, just keep it.”

Who would have thought, without waiting for Duan Shujue to refuse a second time, Wen Yujing would take the medicinal pill and examine it carefully. In a gentle and calm tone, he said, “He’s right, it’s really not a treasure, but it’s good-intentioned anyway, so you should accept it.”

Yan Jinhua: “…”

With s.h.i.+fu’s approval, Duan Shujue thanked him and naturally put the medicinal pills into the pouch at his waist.

Yan Jinhua could see clearly that when he opened the pouch, it was full of golden medicinal pills. The pills were overflowing with spiritual energy. One was more potent than his six.

He even heard his system gasp.

…Yan Jinhua experienced the feeling of w.a.n.g Kai being slapped in the face by s.h.i.+ Chong dangling from a coral tree no more than three feet high.

061, on the other hand, expressed that it was a routine operation.

He didn’t know alchemy, but he had seen top-quality elixirs at Chi Yunzi’s place. After a.n.a.lysis, it proved that alchemy wasn’t too tricky. It was about combining some metal elements and inorganic ones such as oxides, sulfides, and chlorides. Sieve the excess mercury, use the stone powder produced by the unique three-machine stones in Jingxu Peak as the primary raw material, add “qi” with a purity of more than 98%, and add a simple equiprobable summation formula. The calculated Σ is used as the volume of “qi,” which was refined, concentrated, and injected into the elixir pills. The pills were clear gold, glowing, and of the highest quality.

The essence of the so-called scientific immortal cultivation lies in this. After learning mathematics, physics, and chemistry, one would not be afraid to travel all over the world.

The three of them disguised themselves and prepared to go on the road.

Duan Shujue was a young swordsman, and Wen Yujing ended up as Duan Shujue’s sword-holder. The two of them together were extraordinary, which gave Duan Shujue a n.o.ble air. He was like a royal prince sneaking out of the palace, secretly dreaming of being a chivalrous hero. His family was worried, so they sent a train to accompany him with a sword in his arms.

In contrast, Yan Jinhua was extraordinarily redundant.

Yan Jinhua didn’t care about this, his eyes were fixed on the precious pearl, and he was gritting his teeth all the way. He waited until they reached the boundary of the Mountain of Time and Rain and landed in the mountains. Only then did Yan Jinhua pretend to be surprised and notice the accessory on the sword in the stone. “Shujue, the accessory on your sword looks familiar.”

The precious pearl had always been properly stored by Yan Jinhua and had never been seen by Duan Shujue.

Duan Shujue lowered his head, caressed the pearl lightly, and was slightly puzzled. “s.h.i.+fu gave me this.”

Yan Jinhua said with a smile, “Coincidentally, it’s very similar to the bead I lost in the Jingxu Sword Meeting.”

With such intensity of frantic hints, Wen Yujing finally responded,

“Ten years ago, I found this object in a sea area. I wonder where you got your bead?”

Yan Jinhua: “…”

How did he know that he got this thing in the sea?

Could it be that there were two pearls? Or…was he hinting at something? Did he know something?

Yan Jinhua, who originally wanted to claim the pearl, suddenly broke into a cold sweat.

Wen Yujing smiled and said again, “For the road to heaven, everyone has their own opportunities, and things can be similar. This is common sense.”

Yan Jinhua carefully scrutinized these words, and a sentence from Mrs. Gan Lin almost came out.

Wasn’t he being a hooligan who refuses to recognize his accounts even when beaten to death? What picking up the pearl early? Clearly, it was nonsense to not pay it back!

The bulls.h.i.+t was on the road. You pick it up, and so it’s yours? Completely shameless!

Under Yan Jinhua’s righteous indignation, he even cursed himself.

But he couldn’t do anything about Wen Yujing, no one had seen him use the pearl, and even Duan Shujue didn’t know the existence of this bead. What could he use to prove the pearl once belonged to him?

Being attacked by a move he was familiar with, Yan Jinhua was disgusted and helpless.

The three of them turned along the mountain, looking around, but there was no sign of the mountain ghost.

Behind the three of them, a small black snake with colorful and spotted scales under the sunlight quietly followed along the trees, its golden eyes fixed on Wen Yujing’s back, spitting out a bright red forked tongue.

That was the one people spoke of, little fish’s new s.h.i.+zun?

He didn’t look like much.

Sarah: Two ding dings!!! As expected of a dragon ahahaha good on you author XD

Kiribold: Having two doesn’t stop Ye Jiming from being a whiny bottom