Li Yanbi held a brush and leaned over his paper, painting.
On a small table were jars of pigments—red cinnabar, green turquoise, and white pearl. All of them had been personally ground by Chuxuan, who presented them one by one to his master for painting.
Chuxuan held the ink washbasin with both hands. "shidi has calmed down now. The boy's life is safe."
Li Yanbi swept his brush across the paper. "Elder Su raised a fine daughter. Back then, he begged me to agree to this marriage. How could that little Su girl be a match for Lanshou?"
Chuxuan mused, "My shidi is more beautiful than Su-shimei."
This was an incredibly arrogant statement, as Su Shiyan was considered the "number one beauty in the cultivation world" by Sevenstar Tower.
Li Yanbi didn't think there was anything wrong with it. He put down his brush and flicked his finger, instantly drying the ink on the painting. "If he had been plain, I would have been more at ease."
"Isn't it good that Shidi is handsome?"
Chuxuan picked up the brush after he had finished painting and carefully cleaned it in the ink washbasin, like a servant.
Li Yanbi turned to look at him. At three hundred years old, in the Nascent Soul stage, his appearance had not aged, and he was handsome and upright, with piercing eyes. "Chuxuan, what do you think of Lanshou's aptitude and character?"
Chuxuan looked up and smiled. "Shidi is kind-hearted, lively, and has great talent... At such a young age, he's already at the early stage of the Golden Core. He's incredibly intelligent!"
Li Yanbi stared at him impassively.
After being master and disciple for over a hundred years, how could Li Yanbi not know that he was spouting nonsense?
Kind-hearted and intelligent? Those words had nothing to do with Li Lanshou.
Chuxuan hesitated for a moment before saying, "Shidi is spoiled, unruly, and basically a street ruffian. He only reached the Golden Core stage thanks to the medicinal pills his master gave him. As for his spiritual root, if he weren't the master's son, he probably wouldn't have even been able to enter the inner sect."
"There's no need to be that blunt," Li Yanbi said, his expression ugly. Knowing that his son was a good-for-nothing was one thing, but having his disciple say it to his face was another.
After all, Lanshou was his own son. Even if he was useless, he was still a piece of his heart.
He took a deep breath. "If Lanshou was simply of mediocre aptitude, that would be one thing, but he is my son, yet he's lazy about his cultivation and completely infatuated with that girl from the Su family. It shows that he is..."
"Ambitionless!"
Chuxuan had noticed this long ago. Everyone in Conundrum Sect knew that Li Lanshou was a foolish boy without ambition.
As the only son of Li Yanbi, he could have mediocre aptitude or poor character, but he couldn't be without ambition.
Ordinary mortals without ambition could live a carefree life.
But the Dao was ruthless, and those who didn't progress would regress. Cultivators without the ambition to seek the Dao fearlessly would sooner or later become stepping stones for others.
Li Yanbi sat down and rested his forehead on his hand. "I can't protect him forever. If I die..."
"Master," Chuxuan interrupted, frowning. "You will definitely ascend to immortality."
Li Yanbi smiled wryly. "If he were plain-looking, he could still be a carefree cultivator in this world. But he's so handsome, and yet he has no ability to protect himself. Isn't he just asking to be bullied?"
"That's why I have him wear a mask, to prevent people with bad intentions from eyeing him," Li Yanbi said, closing his eyes in thought.
Chuxuan's expression changed, and his eyes darted around. He presented a jade slip he had received that day. "Elder Qi sent someone to deliver a letter about this year's sect trial. Lin Zhenchuan will lead ten disciples from each peak to the Azurerain realm."
Li Yanbi showed little interest. "You handle it."
A hundred years ago, in a bloody battle with the Demon Sect, all of Violetstage Peak's outstanding disciples had perished, leaving a gap in talent. Li Yanbi scorned trading with someone as petty as the elder of the Southern Court, and as a result, Violetstage Peak had declined generation after generation. By now, Chuxuan was the only disciple worth mentioning.
Therefore, it didn't matter who Violetstage Peak chose for the trial. Chuxuan alone couldn't carry the weight, and in the end, Violetstage Peak would come in last again.
It was just another loss of face, another round of ridicule from former peers who had once been beneath him. Li Yanbi had become numb to it.
Just as Chuxuan was about to leave, a young servant came in and respectfully said, "Peak Master, Xianzhang, Young Master Lanshou has arrived."
Li Yanbi's troubled expression brightened. "Get a fox fur for him. Don't let my son catch a cold."
Li Yanbi's cave was located deep within Violetstage Peak, near a thousand-year-old cold spring. Within a hundred zhang of the cave, the cold was biting and piercing.
Li Lanshou couldn't stand the cold. Besides coming to ask Li Yanbi to let him order Chuxuan around, he never came near.
Chuxuan sat down and waited to see Li Lanshou come in crying and begging his father.
Li Lanshou, with a fox fur draped over his shoulders, walked in and hesitated, unable to say the word "Father" right away.
Li Yanbi pulled him into an embrace. "Who bullied my son? Tell your father, and I'll settle it for you."
Li Lanshou snuggled into the warm embrace, his heart warming.
In the original plot, the Li family and its underlying power were like a "newbie package" for Chu Yue's leveling up.
According to the original host's story, early that morning, Chu Yue was still being whipped on Violetstage Peak when Xue Fengzhu, the master of Thousandchance Peak, arrived with a group of disciples, including Su Shiyan, whom the original host was infatuated with.
Su Shiyan accused the original host of bullying others, saying it was shameful for a cultivator to bully ordinary people.
Xue Fengzhu, seeing the injustice, stepped in to help and publicly rebuked Li Yanbi for being a poor teacher and condoning Li Lanshou's wrongdoing.
To protect the original host from punishment under the sect's rules, Li Yanbi could only bow to his mortal enemy, releasing Chu Yue. And then came the satisfyingly ironic plot.
Chu Yue left Conundrum Sect and reunited with Grand Tutor Zhou. Worried that Li Lanshou would harbor a grudge and seek revenge, Xue Fengzhu secretly followed to protect him.
Witnessing the assassins who ambushed Chu Yue, Xue Fengzhu stepped in at the last moment, saving Chu Yue once again. These two acts of kindness led to an immediate connection between Xue Fengzhu and Chu Yue, and he invited Chu Yue to join the outer sect.
The original host, having lost face in public, was filled with resentment. Hearing that Chu Yue had become an outer sect disciple, how could he swallow his pride?
He stormed into the outer sect and, in public, proposed a six-month challenge with Chu Yue, vowing to beat Chu Yue down to the dust in the sect competition six months later.
His cultivation was at the early stage of Golden Core, while Chu Yue was still a mortal. This was clearly bullying!
However, Chu Yue was a gifted prodigy with unparalleled talent in cultivation. In the sect competition six months later, the original host suffered repeated setbacks at Chu Yue's hands. Driven to desperation, he turned evil and resorted to underhanded tactics, only to be struck flying by Xue Fengzhu.
Xue Fengzhu, stepping in to uphold justice, stomped on the hand he was using to launch hidden weapons. "At such a young age, you're so malicious. Today, I'll do the heavens a favor and cripple one of your hands!"
Li Yanbi, unable to bear seeing his beloved son injured, once again humbly begged his mortal enemy, pleading to save the original host's hand.
But the misery wasn't over yet.
The surrounding disciples looked at the Li father and son with disgust and contempt, treating Li Lanshou like garbage.
Su Shiyan rushed over to embrace Chu Yue, crying pitifully and looking utterly helpless.
This scene played on repeat in the original host's mind day and night. After recuperating for a while, he became increasingly enraged and resorted to a desperate measure: drugging Su Shiyan with an aphrodisiac, intending to consummate the relationship.
Then Chu Yue descended from the heavens, rescuing the damsel in distress. Right there and then, he brutally severed the original host's tendons and ligaments, rendering him crippled.
Right before his eyes, he used his own body to counteract the aphrodisiac in Su Shiyan, making love to her passionately.
The original host suffered a mental and physical breakdown, becoming an invalid. Li Yanbi, who loved his son dearly, couldn't bear such humiliation. Ignoring everyone's advice, he went alone to kill Chu Yue.
At that time, Chu Yue was already a true disciple of the sect master, the beloved child and the hope of the entire sect. For Li Yanbi to kill Chu Yue was to betray the sect.
One tiger couldn't fight off a pack of wolves. Even though Li Yanbi's sword shone like the sun, he couldn't defeat the Conundrum Sect's protective formation and was eventually defeated, ending up in a miserable state.
Li Yanbi had made great contributions to the Conundrum Sect, so out of both sentiment and reason, they couldn't kill him. They could only imprison him in the dark and hopeless Subdual Tower.
There were other cultivators in the Li family besides Li Yanbi. The family's fortunes were intertwined.
To avenge the Li father and son, one after another, they came forward like the gourd brothers rescuing their grandfather, providing experience points for Chu Yue.
Because of Chu Yue, the entire Li family lineage, numbering over a hundred cultivators, was completely wiped out, forever vanishing from the continent.
Upon hearing the news, Li Yanbi, heartbroken, took his own life in Subdual Tower.
In Li Lanshou's memories, Li Yanbi was a warm and caring figure. His mother had passed away early, and Li Yanbi had raised him as both father and mother.
He taught him to read and write, braided his hair with his sword-wielding hands and told him stories of heroes from all over the world.
The original host, spoiled since childhood, was arrogant and domineering. He would pull Chuxuan's hair and force his shixiong to be his horse, tear up the relics that Chuxuan's mother had left him, and force Chuxuan to bark like a dog, slapping him if he did it poorly.
No matter how much trouble he caused, as long as he shed a tear, Li Yanbi, known as the "unyielding iron man" outside, would soften and forgive him without a second thought.
Li Lanshou had never experienced parental affection in his previous life. Now, nestled in Li Yanbi's arms, he felt the long-awaited warmth of family. "Father."
"What is it?" Li Yanbi asked with a smile. "Why do you sound so wronged? Are you still upset?"
"Chuxuan, go catch that kid..."
Li Lanshou shook his head. "I heard that Elder Qi sent the letter about this year's trial. Father, who are you going to choose to participate?"
Li Yanbi looked at Chuxuan. "I'm discussing it with Chuxuan. Who does Lanshou want to recommend?"
Chuxuan looked at Li Lanshou with a mocking expression. The Azurerain realm was full of danger. With the current cultivation levels of the disciples of Violetstage Peak, entering the Azurerain realm was equivalent to suicide.
He was curious about who had offended Li Lanshou enough for him to come up with such a vicious plan to kill someone.
"Myself."
Li Lanshou wanted to enter the Azurerain realm trial.
The Azurerain realm was the first major arc in the original story. Chu Yue leveled up madly in it, greatly increasing his strength, and incidentally had a fleeting romance with the holy maiden of the Jademaiden Sect.
He obtained countless precious treasures, won first place in the trial and became the most outstanding young disciple.
Coincidentally, when he returned from the trial, he happened to encounter the grand ceremony of becoming a disciple, where he was surrounded by thousands of people. Chu Yue joined Thousandchance Peak, and Master Xue was overjoyed.
From then on, Thousandchance Peak grew rapidly, taking advantage of a favorable wind to rise and become the number one peak in the sect.
The disciples of Violetstage Peak suffered heavy casualties, and in the subsequent sect competition, they ended up with no one available to compete, becoming the laughingstock of the sect.
Li Yanbi and Chuxuan were both startled. Li Lanshou wanted to recommend himself for the sect trial?
Li Lanshou, who usually did nothing but eat, drink, and play, was going to participate in the sect trial?!
This surprise was too sudden. Li Yanbi looked him up and down and warned, "Lanshou, the sect trial is not a place for you to play around."
"Yes, Shidi."
Chuxuan suppressed his smile, half-scaring him and half-coaxing him, saying, "The Azurerain realm is full of demons and monsters, with bones everywhere and poisonous miasma. If you touched it, it could corrode your face, and then you'd really be an ugly monster. That wouldn't be fun."
Li Lanshou gave him a cold look, thought to himself, 'Screw you,' and turned to Li Yanbi, saying, "I know the sect trial is a dangerous place, and I have no intention of playing around at all."
Li Yanbi felt a mixture of joy and worry. He was happy that his son was finally acting like a real man, seeking the Dao without fear of death, but he was also worried that his cultivation was mediocre and he wouldn't be able to protect himself in the Azurerain realm.
"Father, I am your son. If the father is a hero, the son must be a good man. You are as strong as iron, so I can't be just scrap metal."
Li Lanshou's tone changed from lazy and languid to clear and articulate, with a strong sense of rhythm. He was very skilled at persuading people.
Li Yanbi's heart swelled with emotion, and his eyes twinkled. "Well said! I agree!"
Li Lanshou paused and pressed on, "I have one more request."
"Please, Father, annul my marriage to Su Shiyan."
Li Yanbi had been waiting for this moment for a long time. Li Lanshou liked Su Shiyan too much, following her around like a dog begging for scraps. Li Yanbi had long been displeased, but he couldn't persuade him, and the more he tried, the more determined Li Lanshou became.
Unexpectedly, he had finally come to his senses.
Twin joys had come to his door!
***
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