Morning arrived like a drunken uncle at a wedding—loud, inappropriate, and totally unwelcome. Jin groaned as the sunlight stabbed him through the window with divine judgment, dragging him back from dreams filled with soft thighs, jiggling peaks, and hot springs that didn't require pants. He buried his face in the pillow and considered pretending to be dead for another three hours.
"System," he grumbled, voice muffled in cotton. "Is there a skill that lets me cultivate through sleep?"
[Ding! New Skill Available: Sloth Cultivation Technique – Level 0. Effects: +50% nap quality, -90% respect from elders.]
"Honestly, worth considering."
Before he could commit to spiritual hibernation, someone assaulted his door with the urgency of a man who just drank a laxative. "Jin! Jin! You perverted bastard, wake up!" Bai Mo's voice rang through the wooden panels. "The Alchemy Tower's on fire!"
Jin blinked. "Again?"
"No, not like last time with the tea kettle and the Spirit Chicken! This is worse!"
He kicked the door open without waiting for a response, his skull mask hanging off one ear and smoke trailing from his robes. "There was an explosion, a fire, and possibly a moaning pill beast. Also, there's a girl with boobs out somewhere in there—I mean chaos, there's chaos!"
Jin sat up, instantly alert. "You had me at 'boobs' and 'explosion.'"
"The Sect Master is drafting all top-ranked outer sect disciples to help. You're ranked sixth after that cheek-slapping nonsense yesterday, so congratulations! You're now an emergency alchemist!"
"I don't know the difference between a pill and a dumpling."
"You're perfect. Come on!"
Jin threw on his robes and followed Bai Mo, who was already sprinting away like the building behind him owed him money. As they approached the Alchemy Tower, Jin realized Bai Mo wasn't exaggerating for once.
The tower looked like a spiritual disaster. Smoke poured from every level. Apprentices were running around screaming, some of them missing pants, one of them carrying a cauldron full of glowing green goo. A roasted herb the size of a mattress smoldered in a tree. Another cauldron came flying out a window and embedded itself in a wall with a satisfying BOOMPH.
"This place smells like burnt ambition and crushed dreams," Jin muttered.
He barely ducked as a vial exploded overhead, releasing a puff of pink mist and a smell suspiciously like aphrodisiac bathwater. Before he could process that, she landed.
A woman with a sword strapped to her back, long black hair tied in a warrior's ponytail, and the kind of face that made you feel judged before you even had a dirty thought. Her robes were barely singed, which only made her more terrifying. She strode through the chaos with the serenity of someone too good for the situation—and the sword aura of someone who'd kill anyone who made a bad pun.
Jin turned to the nearest disciple and whispered, "Who is the ice queen with the murder ponytail?"
The boy whispered back, "Lin Feixue. Inner sect elite. Third-ranked. Sword genius and alchemy prodigy. Once stabbed a cauldron because it didn't 'look symmetrical.'"
"Hot," Jin said automatically.
Feixue spotted him, and her eyes locked onto him like a predator spotting prey that owed it money. "You. System Cultivator."
"Unless this is about unpaid debts, in which case, I'm Bai Mo."
"Follow me. You're assisting me now. They said you're 'accidentally competent.'"
"I prefer the term 'spiritually lucky.'"
She turned without another word, and Jin had no choice but to follow her into the wreckage of the Alchemy Tower. Inside, it was worse. Shattered tables, scorched talismans, melting pill molds, and what appeared to be a burned-out pair of pants fluttering in the wind like a defeated flag. The air reeked of overcooked ginseng and bad decisions.
Feixue didn't flinch. She walked with surgical focus to a charred workbench and knelt to inspect the broken remains of a spiritual root crystal. "Someone swapped our Fire-Attuned Spirit Root with a Demon Libido Blossom."
"That's a real herb?"
"It's used in dual cultivation, aphrodisiac pills, and very illegal incense."
"Sounds like a Friday night at Bai Mo's house."
She ignored him. "The reaction caused the temperature to spike, melted the cauldrons, and triggered several nearby Yin Convergence herbs. That's why the north wing exploded."
Jin blinked. "Wait… if the heat spiked, and the Yin herbs combusted—"
A door burst open with a shriek and a naked apprentice flew past them, wrapped in a bedsheet and screaming, "I'VE TRANSCENDED MY SHAME!!"
Jin turned to Feixue. "I think he reached Nirvana."
She didn't even blink. "No. He reached Nudity Pillification."
"I'm going to pretend I didn't hear that."
Feixue growled under her breath. "This isn't just an accident. This was sabotage."
"Who would sabotage an alchemy tower? What kind of lunatic—?"
A soft, overly innocent voice cooed from the shadows. "Feixue~! You're not still mad about the dragon fire, are you~?"
A girl skipped into view wearing frilly robes, a heart-shaped apron, and a smile that screamed, 'I've laced the cookies with chaos.' She was petite, adorable, and radiating dangerous spiritual energy in bubblegum pink. Her apron read: "Kiss the Alchemist."
Jin stared. "Who… what… why is she cute and terrifying?"
Feixue groaned. "Lulu. The sect's worst disaster in pigtails."
"Feixue~ you wound me! I just came to help~!"
"You came to stir trouble," Feixue snapped, drawing her sword slightly.
Lulu skipped toward Jin and leaned close. "Ooooh~ are you the System guy? You're cuter than I expected! Want to be my new pill furnace partner?"
"What does that mean?"
"It means you and I spend long, sweaty hours mixing ingredients in a hot room until something explodes!"
Jin blinked. "That sounds like either alchemy or a really weird date."
"Why not both~?"
Feixue stepped between them, eyes like blades. "He's mine."
Jin choked. "W-what?!"
"I mean, mine for the antidote project. Don't get ideas, fool."
Lulu winked. "Too late! I've already imagined seventeen scenarios. Four of them are legal."
"Leave before I use my sword as a suppository."
Lulu pouted adorably. "Fine! But I'll be back—with snacks! And hexes!" And then she skipped out, humming something suspiciously like a funeral song.
Feixue sighed, then turned to Jin. "Let's go. We need to brew a neutralizing antidote before the entire tower becomes a public nudity shrine."
She led him into a chamber that hadn't completely exploded yet. A large cauldron sat in the center, blackened but functional. Feixue lit the fire beneath it with a snap of her fingers, the flame glowing icy blue.
"Sit. Touch nothing unless I tell you."
"Yes, ma'am."
They began working. Feixue moved with the deadly grace of a woman who once used a scalpel in combat. Jin tried to keep up, mostly by not knocking things over. He was measuring Dragon Root Essence when the tower shook again, violently.
The vial slipped.
He stumbled.
His hand flailed.
And landed squarely on Feixue's chest.
Time stopped.
A cold aura rose so fast the cauldron froze over. Feixue didn't look down. She didn't move. Her eyebrow rose a fraction of a millimeter.
"For the record," Jin said slowly, "I was aiming for your shoulder."
Her sword hissed from its sheath. "You have precisely three seconds to justify this as medical."
"Spiritual massage?"
"One."
"Reflexology for internal Qi flow?"
"Two."
"System, help."
[Ding! New Skill Activated: 'Fate's Fumble – You touched what you shouldn't. Prepare for divine punishment.]
"Oh fu—"
Feixue's slap cracked like lightning. Jin's body soared through three walls.
He landed in a puddle of cooling Yin sludge and broken pills.
A nearby disciple looked down at him and whispered, "Bro, I saw everything. Totally worth it."
Jin groaned. "Yes. Yes, it was."
Jin limped back into the lab chamber looking like he'd just been rejected by all nine of the demon realms and then mugged by a pill cauldron. His robes were torn, one shoe was missing, and his hair stuck up like he'd been electrocuted by a Thunder Spirit with a grudge.
Feixue didn't even glance at him. "I left you alive. That was generous."
"I accept your kindness and the damage to my spine with grace," Jin wheezed, clutching his ribs. "Also, I think I tasted colors just now."
"Good. Now focus. The antidote must be brewed exactly, or everyone exposed to the Demon Libido Blossom mist will begin spontaneous dual cultivation… in public."
He froze. "You mean…"
"Yes."
"Sect-wide orgy?"
"Yes."
"And you're trying to stop that?"
Her glare was so sharp, it could've bisected a dragon.
"Right, right. Public decency. Honorable sect. Very noble goals."
He tried to help again, pouring in a vial of Moon Lotus Dew while Feixue added powdered Guilt Mushroom. The cauldron hissed, bubbled, and then made a sound disturbingly like a moan. Jin stared.
"Did it just purr at me?"
"That means it's stabilizing," she replied without emotion. "Or flirting. Either way, don't stir it counterclockwise."
Jin stirred clockwise, but somehow, his hand slipped again. The spoon flew into the cauldron, followed by a sprinkle of something that definitely wasn't on the ingredient list.
Feixue's eyes narrowed. "What did you just add?"
"I… think… a crushed Soul Libido Lotus?"
"You idiot! That's a forbidden catalyst! It might—"
BOOOOOOOM!
A puff of multicolored steam exploded from the cauldron, followed by a high-pitched giggle from inside the pot. The fumes swirled out like gossip at a sect party, and suddenly the room was full of giggling disciples, spontaneous blushing, and one guy trying to marry a broom.
"DAMN IT!" Feixue roared, trying to dispel the mist with her sword aura. "The antidote turned into a catalyst!"
"I think I just made the first airborne aphrodisiac cloud," Jin mumbled, eyes watering as the mist tickled his nose with unnatural warmth.
"You made a spiritual sex fog, Jin."
He tried to flee, only to crash into a disciple now stripping his robes off while reciting love poetry to a furnace. He turned back to Feixue. "What do we do?!"
"We isolate the core component! We separate the Dual Harmony Pill from the base! Use your System, fool!"
"System!" Jin shouted. "Emergency skill request! I need anything that neutralizes a sex fog!"
[Ding! Emergency Skill Unlocked: Pure Palm of Chastity – Slap all affected targets with holy intent to reset libido! Warning: Use with precision or cause humiliation.]
"I have to… slap the horny out of people?"
Feixue nodded grimly. "Start with that guy dry-humping the scroll shelf."
Jin sighed. "This is my life now."
He moved like a pervert-smacking whirlwind, his glowing hand emitting divine Buddhist chants with every strike.
PAK! "Be cleansed!"
SMACK! "Repent, you lustful llama!"
WHAP! "No, you cannot marry the pill furnace!"
Feixue used her sword to channel icy Qi into the vents, slowly clearing the fog. Together, they battled the outbreak like spiritual hygiene warriors.
But then the door exploded open.
Lulu returned.
Only now she was in an outfit that defied physics—half-lingerie, half-alchemist robes, all chaotic energy. She posed dramatically as a puff of perfume erupted behind her.
"I sensed lewdness! Did you all start the party without me~?!"
Feixue nearly snapped her sword in half. "YOU! THIS IS YOUR FAULT!"
Lulu giggled. "What? I may have replaced the Fire Root with a Libido Blossom accidentally. Oops~!"
"You almost caused a sect-wide pants emergency!"
Jin threw up his hands. "I nearly died! Twice! And I slapped like twenty people today and not one of them said thank you!"
"You're welcome~" Lulu winked.
Feixue grabbed her sword and started stalking forward. "I'm going to erase you from the sect registry."
Lulu giggled and threw a handful of Confusion Dust in Feixue's face. Feixue staggered, eyes glazing. "Wait… why do I feel like I need to hug someone?"
Jin's system dinged again.
[Ding! Passive Skill Triggered: 'Main Character Aura – All nonsense now revolves around you.']
"Oh come on!"
Feixue stumbled forward and crashed into Jin, chest-first. He caught her with all the grace of a man dodging spiritual lawsuits.
Her arms wrapped around him. Her face buried into his shoulder.
"Warm…" she mumbled. "You smell like roasted qi noodles…"
Jin blinked. "This is happening. I am being voluntarily hugged. By the Sword Ice Queen."
Feixue blinked, realized what she was doing, and recoiled so fast she almost backflipped. "I-I was confused! That doesn't count!"
"Totally counts," Lulu grinned. "Want me to throw more dust?"
"YOU THROW THAT DUST AND I'LL RELOCATE YOUR HEAD TO YOUR PANTS."
Lulu vanished in a puff of pink mist.
Feixue took a deep breath and looked around at the now-cleared tower. Disciples were regaining their minds. The last of the fog dissipated. Somewhere, someone proposed to a mop, but it was rejected.
"You did well," she said reluctantly. "You didn't entirely screw up. Just mostly."
"I'll take that as affection," Jin said proudly.
Feixue rolled her eyes, but her cheeks were faintly pink. "Let's never speak of this again."
"I've already started writing the scroll version."
"You're going to die."
"Worth it."
Just then, Bai Mo ran in again. "Jin! Emergency summons from Elder Wu!"
Jin sighed. "What now? Did someone spike the tea with Lust Grass again?"
"No, worse. You've been selected for the Heaven-Class Disciples Tournament."
Jin blinked. "...I'm sorry, the what now?"
Feixue's eyes widened.
Lulu's voice echoed from afar. "Oooooh~ you're going to die~ again~!"
And with that ominous chant hanging over his head, Jin knew that Chapter 10 was going to involve way more pain than pants.