After Constantly Courting Death, I Became the White Moonlight - Chapter 32

Time flew by.

It had already been over half a month since that intense battle with Xuan Ye in the city of Jialan.

With the help of the elders, the floodwaters covering the city’s lakes had completely receded. The awakened beastfolk of Jialan were slowly regaining consciousness; given time, they would gradually reintegrate with the cultivation world of today.

Both Pei Ji and Senior Sister were severely injured in the battle. After a long period of recovery, they were finally able to move around freely again.

Ning Ning had spent all of yesterday practicing sword techniques. Early this morning, just as she stepped out of her courtyard, she heard a thunderous, aggressive voice not far off.

It was clearly a young woman’s voice—light and pleasant—but she was reciting her lines with the tragic determination of a warrior going to their death. Each syllable hit like a war drum. The nearby birds and monkeys went silent in terror.

“To hell with the Celestial Stems and Earthly Branches Spiritual Core Compendium!
Yin-Yang and the Five Elements cycle through my grasp, I swallow Sun Essence and Moon Dew into my dantian—
Oh, my f*cking heavens!
Seek the root of the heavens, give birth to true breath!
Merge Xuan and Huang, refresh the whole damn body!
Muscles, bones, skin, flesh—
Revive with your goddamn Heaven-and-Earth BOOM HAMMER!
AAAHHH—DIE!!!”

Every word was enunciated with perfect clarity.
It wasn’t so much recitation as it was… rap battle meets war cry.

Honestly, she was just one beat away from debuting as a cultivator idol under the stage name MC Thunder Rose.

Only then did Ning Ning remember—Senior Sister Zheng Weiqi had been stuck at her academy for years without graduating, and now the annual year-end exams were just around the corner.

If she didn’t pass this time, it would mean another full year of torment.

—But this style of reciting… cursing out the entire pantheon every line… wasn’t that going a bit too far!?
Senior Sister, please… stay calm!

Worried, Ning Ning followed the voice—and sure enough, found Zheng Weiqi perched at the edge of a cliff.

She was still in her usual male disguise. Hair tied high, handsome features glowing slightly under the morning sun.
From a distance, she looked like a dashing noble young lord.

Unfortunately, her expression was twisted with rage, and she was yelling loud enough to shake the trees—
Turning her “recitation” into something more like a pig being slaughtered.

Sensing someone approaching, Zheng Weiqi paused and looked up.
When she saw who it was, her face immediately broke into a sunny grin.

“Little Junior Sister!”

“Senior Sister…”

The echoes of that, uh, spirited morning reading still rang in Ning Ning’s ears.
She hesitated for a moment and asked, “Didn’t Master put a curse on you so you couldn’t swear anymore?”

“You don’t get it.”

Zheng Weiqi gave a mysterious smile and leapt down from the massive boulder at the cliff’s edge, the wind fluttering around her like a dramatic cape.
“Do you remember the curse’s specific terms?”

Of course Ning Ning remembered.

The verbal duel between Senior Sister and the Young City Lord during the Jialan incident was nothing short of legendary.
To this day, it still held a top-three spot in Ning Ning’s personal ranking of All-Time Cultivation World Iconic Moments.

The terms of the curse were clear.
Anytime she cursed or swore, the magic would force her to do the one thing she least wanted to do in that moment.

So now, when she recited her studies while swearing like a sailor—

Ohhhhhh.

Ning Ning’s eyes widened with sudden realization.
She looked at Zheng Weiqi with growing awe.

Senior Sister really was Senior Sister.
Right now, the one thing she hated most in the world must be studying—so by cursing, the magic was forcing her to recite!

A brilliant workaround.
A perpetual-motion study machine.

Curse, recite. Curse harder, recite better.
A self-sustaining cycle. Genius.

Even Master Tian Xianzi himself probably never imagined that his curse would be weaponized like this.

“I’ve been cramming nonstop these past few days—my mouth and ears are about to sprout calluses.
Those damn elders, always testing us nonstop. If it’s not you being tested, it’s me. What the hell are they even testing—damn their entire family lines!”

Zheng Weiqi scowled, but then her eyes curved into a playful grin.

“Little Junior Sister~ I’ve mastered everything down to a divine level, and I’m sick of it. Want to come earn some pocket money with me?”

Ning Ning blinked.
“Pocket money? You mean like… setting up a street stall?”

“Of course not! I’m cramming for exams—I don’t even have time to head down the mountain, let alone go shopping! Don’t you know? Even within our sect grounds, there are ways to earn money!”

Seeing the younger girl frown in confusion, Zheng Weiqi explained patiently, “The Pagoda of Ascension! The higher the floor you reach, the more likely you are to get rare high-grade treasures. If you’re lucky, you could earn enough in one run to cover a whole year’s worth of food! Don’t you remember that ghost pearl you got? It was worth a fortune.”

…Oh, right.
But she had already given it to Pei Ji.

“Even though the chances of triggering a hidden storyline are pretty low, the rewards from normal stages are still valuable. If we get one more person and tackle the illusion realm on extreme mode, we’re bound to rake in a good haul.”

Zheng Weiqi grinned. “You know what they say—three heads make a tiger! That’s my newest vocab word, cool huh?”

Ning Ning: “…”

Ning Ning clutched her chest in pain. “Senior Sister… that’s not how you use that idiom.”

—So this is your so-called ‘flawless mastery’? Are you sure you’ll pass this exam, Senior Sister???

…

Mist hung low over the land, a soft drizzle blurring the edges of the world.

As the illusion gradually took shape around them, the first thing Ning Ning felt was a chill that sank deep into her bones.

Zheng Weiqi had deliberately chosen one of the most notoriously difficult floors in the Pagoda. Alongside them stood He Zhizhou—known for being penniless—and Pei Ji—known for being ruthless.

Unlike last time when they were scattered upon entering, the four of them now stood together.

Their surroundings looked like a quaint southern water town during the rainy season. Smoke and mist wove together like a great net cast down from the heavens, draping over the soft green of wild grass and woven garments.

It seemed to be around twilight. The dusk hovered, neither fully arrived nor completely gone. No sun nor moon could be seen—only thick clouds piled high like cotton, veiling the remaining strands of daylight.

They stood on a long embankment. Not far away, a quiet river flowed, turned silvery-grey by the mist. Willow branches danced in the wind, brushing against the drizzle. A cool breeze swept by, rippling the water like jade glass.

A stone bridge stretched across the river, and behind them lay rows of low houses with white walls and dark tiles, soaked in the rain and fog until all detail was obscured.

It looked like black ink bleeding across a sheet of rice paper—distant, elusive, and unreachable.

Ning Ning took a slow breath. The air was crisp and sweet, carrying the scent of damp grass and wood. It reminded her of a refreshing little dessert on a summer day—enough to clear the mind and lift the soul.

This illusion realm had never been mentioned in the original novel, so she didn’t know the storyline. Zheng Weiqi had only told her that it had stumped plenty of disciples—even those in the Golden Core and Nascent Soul stages.

Ning Ning, who spent more time running street stalls than dungeon crawling, had never attempted this place before. She’d only heard that it was exceptionally hard.

Suddenly, a sob rang out—mournful and unexpected.
It sounded like someone had just lost a winning lottery ticket worth five million.

Ning Ning used spiritual energy to block out the rain, then followed the sound with her eyes.

There was hardly anyone along the riverbank. The nearest person was a young girl in a jade green dress.

The girl held a delicate oil-paper umbrella embroidered with lilacs. Her head was bowed, and soft sobs escaped her lips. Though her face was hidden behind her hand, the gentle swaying of her figure and her partially revealed profile hinted at delicate beauty.

She seemed to be holding back her tears with all her might. Each sob was thin and broken, like scraps of paper shredded by the wind—scattered and sharp against the ears of anyone nearby.

If sorrow had a shape, this was it.
She could’ve walked straight onto the set of Rain Alley as the perfect stand-in.

“She’s crying so sadly…”

He Zhizhou furrowed his brows in deep thought. “From what I know, in pretty much every storybook scenario, a girl crying alone in the rain usually means one thing—a tragic love story. Which also means—it’s time for a handsome and dashing young man like me to swoop in and offer a little comfort.”

Zheng Weiqi, ever the seasoned cynic, gave him a sideways glance and casually tightened her grip on the longsword at her waist. “From my experience, in just about every Pagoda illusion, that kind of girl is definitely some sort of monster in disguise. Don’t fall for the beauty trap and get booted out the moment we enter.”

“So what if she is a monster?” He Zhizhou, in his past life a proud connoisseur of dating sims featuring beautiful girls, chuckled and cracked his knuckles. “Let me tell you the tale of Bai Suzhen and Xu Xian. With my personal charisma, I could turn any monster into a timeless romance legend.”

“You?”

Ning Ning didn’t even spare him. “If we’re talking male leads for a love story, my little junior brother’s face is way more qualified than yours.”

Pei Ji pressed his lips together and said nothing.

Just as Ning Ning finished speaking, the sound of sobbing abruptly stopped—replaced by the splash of something hitting the wet ground.

Turns out the rain-slick ground had done its work. The green-robed girl had slipped mid-sob and fallen flat. Her oil-paper umbrella was swept away by the wind, leaving her alone under the pouring rain, struggling to get back on her feet.

Her wet robes clung to her like a blooming lotus floating on the water.

And in the mist and drizzle, her features slowly became clearer—eyebrows like distant mountains, eyes like autumn waters. She was the very picture of sorrowful elegance, so pitiful it tugged at the heartstrings.

“That’s my cue!” He Zhizhou whispered excitedly. “Pei Ji, pay close attention! You can use this technique for picking up girls later!”

He lowered his voice even more, confident as ever. “I’ve seen this plot before—step one is to help her up and ask if she’s okay. Then, boom! She starts spilling story clues. Just watch and learn.”

After a short pause, he added with a straight face, “By the way, don’t you guys think the way her dress spread out like that makes her look like a… like a giant scallion pancake? I’m suddenly really hungry… Can we eat in here?”

Ning Ning: “…”

With that kind of brain, how are you supposed to fall into a love story?! Go fry scallion pancakes at a food stall instead, thanks!

For some reason, a bad premonition welled up in her chest.
She couldn’t help but start to feel worried for that poor girl.

He Zhizhou, being the kind of person who said it and did it, wasted no time stepping forward. In fact, he even played into the scene by shouting dramatically, “Miss, are you alright?!”

He didn’t bring an umbrella. His feet splashed through puddles, sometimes slipping on moss by the riverside, causing him to wobble dangerously from side to side.

He didn’t look like a dashing gentleman—more like a duck waddling its way through the rain.

This was destined to be a love story between a duck and a scallion pancake.

The green-robed girl looked up through tear-filled eyes. Her right hand reached out shakily, her voice trembling and sweet: “Young Master…”

Ning Ning, meanwhile, could already see the ending of this tale, and sighed internally.

—He Zhizhou was running too fast.
Which meant he didn’t notice the giant, soaking-wet patch of moss near where the girl had slipped.

The next moment, he would personally demonstrate what it meant to “blossom twice in one spring.”

The moss whispered, “Your shoes kissed me with pain, but I shall sing in return.”

He Zhizhou’s fall was nothing short of an Olympic dive—arms stretched upward, legs perfectly straight, crashing backwards just like the green-robed girl before him.

A full-body, textbook wipeout.

And just when he thought things couldn’t possibly get worse…

Fate, like a merciless hammer, came crashing down on the fragile shoulders of this so-called “beautiful young man.”

—Because unfortunately for him, he had been running directly toward the girl.

Sir Isaac Newton’s coffin was still sealed tight—but based on the laws of physics, specifically inertia, even after falling to the ground, one’s body would continue sliding in the original direction.

Question:
If the green-robed girl remains stationary and He Zhizhou falls feet-first toward her… what happens next?

Answer:
…No comment. Some things are just too painful to witness.

His legs continued forward, and his foot perfectly landed on the girl’s shoulder—

—then promptly launched her into the air.

And not just a simple tumble, either—she spun as she slid, gracefully twirling farther and farther away like a human Beyblade.

That day in the misty drizzle, He Zhizhou bore witness to a scene he’d never forget.

A girl spinning away like a top, full of fragrance, full of sorrow—twirling through the rain with grief in her eyes, bewilderment in her heart.

She slid by like a dream—so fragile, so tragically beautiful. Like a figment from a fevered fantasy, a spinning top of a girl glided right past him.

She kept drifting silently, further and further away, until she reached the crumbling edge of the riverbank.

…Wait.

The riverbank.

He Zhizhou’s eyes flew wide open. Like a flailing mudfish, he desperately reached out with one hand and let out a blood-curdling scream,  “NO———!!”

He had thought, in this scene, he’d be the suave male lead dancing through fields of flowers and fluttering hearts.
He guessed the setup correctly—but oh, he had never expected this ending.

He wasn’t Xu Xian.
He was the string used to launch a spinning top.

And that poor green-robed girl—propelled by his foot—spun and spun until she skidded clean off the edge of the long embankment.

Just before she plunged into the river, He Zhizhou caught a glimpse of her expression.

It was like she had finally found the man who stole her winning lottery ticket—shock, terror, rage, confusion—all swirling together into an expression more abstract than abstract art.

In the distance, someone shrieked. A bystander’s scream pierced through the fog, echoing through the heavens with enough force to elbow aside the clouds:

“MURDER! HEEEEEELP! SOMEONE’S BEEN KILLED——!!”

Who could’ve predicted…

What was clearly meant to be a complex, storyline-rich dungeon experience…
was hijacked by a player who, within the opening act, committed full-blown NPC-homicide—with his feet.

Zheng Weiqi could only let out the longest, deepest sigh imaginable. She didn’t even have the strength to scold.

Ning Ning covered her face, too stunned to speak.

Pei Ji’s gaze held a hint of confusion, as if silently wondering—
Was this the “watch and learn” technique He Zhizhou just mentioned?

If the Pagoda illusion could speak, it would most certainly explode in fury and scream that timeless, iconic phrase—

“What the hell is this?! You are, without question, the WORST batch of students I’ve ever had!!”