I could barely sense what was happening around me, even after Wang Ren fed me the healing pill. All I felt was the constant shaking of the earth and the titanic presences of Foundation Building masters clashing above my head.

  I regretted not having the chance to witness such a battle. It would surely allow my comprehension to advance in leaps and bounds. Perhaps healing them after would let me skip ahead a few small realms in my cultivation.

  However, I was unable to even raise my arms. Such dreams were pointless. Suddenly I heard Wang Ren shouting, fear and anger in his trembling voice. I only heard one word.

  Traitor.

  One of the presences winked out a breath later. Then, the wind brushed against my cheek and I felt the weight of the world pressing down on my neck.

  Raising my head despite the pain, I forced my eyes open and found myself staring at Elder Jin. His eyes sparkled with glee as he raised his sword.

  “Killing you will give me great pleasure, trash. You dared cripple my disciple, now die!” he said, cackling like a madman as he swung his sword at my neck.

  I had escaped death one too many times already. There was no way that I would be able to escape the heavens net once more. No one was that lucky.

  I closed my eyes, hoping that Xiao Cui would at least have escaped this tragedy. I hadn’t accomplished everything I wanted to with this second life, but I had done plenty of amazing things.

  The slice of death never came. I tentatively cracked one eye open, finding a woman standing between me and Elder Jin. She wore robes of pure white silk, with white hair tied in a ponytail that hung down to her waist. Her ears curved into sharp points.

  She held Elder Jin’s sword between two fingers, the man’s eyes wide with shock and fury at his strike being resisted with such ease. The mysterious female cultivator turned to me and I felt that her sparkling blue eyes were familiar.

  She grinned, revealing two thin, needle-point canines like a cat’s. It took a moment for my brain to work, given that it was currently fighting off the soul parasite, but it finally clicked.

  “You! The cat!?” I exclaimed.

  “What cat? Are you blind, brat?” she retorted, the mischievous grin never leaving her face.

  Elder Jin struggled to free his sword, pulling while his qi flared. However, despite the woman dressed in white robes barely focusing on him, he was unable to free his blade.

  With a sudden twist of her hips she released his sword. Elder Jin flew backwards, stumbling once before recovering his balance.

  “You dare!?” he roared.

  Even the proud elders of the Cloudy Falls Sect were not free from the shackles of cliche, it seemed. I was still in shock.

  It was only a guess but all I could think when I saw the woman with her sharp canines and white clothes was that she resembled that scary cat I saw at Grandpa Guan’s place. Elder Jin yelled something and threw out three paper talismans.

  They crumbled to dust as three streams of flame erupted from the ground. They swirled around him like dragons as his sword danced elegantly.

  He lunged at the woman, the streams of flame following the lead of his sword as he stabbed towards her. They condensed into the tip of his blade as he reached her torso.

  The female cultivator, whose cultivation was utterly unfathomable to me, barely reacted. She hissed—exactly like a cat—and withdrew a fan of white feathers from an unseen storage item. With a snap the fan unfurled and she waved it once.

  That seemingly effortless wave caused a tornado to explode outwards. It snuffed out the rivers of flame around Elder Jin’s sword and smashed into his chest.

  He spat blood as he was blown away, his sword never even reaching the woman. To his credit, Elder Jin was as sturdy as an elm tree and remained on his feet as the winds cut at his skin.

  “Damn woman! Where did you come from?” he snarled. “This is the territory of the Cloudy Falls Sect, not the wilds where you can act with impunity.”

  The female cultivator exhaled, making a soft noise that sounded exactly like the purring of a cat. At this point I was convinced my theory was correct, but I didn’t dare give voice to my suspicion.

  “Cloudy Falls Sect…” she murmured to herself, looking up to the sky as if deep in thought. “Oh! I remember,” she suddenly exclaimed while slapping her fist against her palm.

  “Insolent!” Elder Jin exclaimed, fury burning in his eyes.

  The woman ignored him while continuing to talk to herself. “Master’s lessons on the lower sects were always so boring. The Cloudy Falls Sect is the third-rate hegemon of this little corner of the world, yes?” she asked, cocking her head as she questioned Elder Jin.

  “Third-rate!? Woman, give me some face. My Cloudy Falls Sect is the ruler of these lands for a thousand li in every direction. Just who is third rate?” he roared. “If I don’t kill you now then this Jin Bai will write his name backwards for eternity!”

  “Why are you so angry?” the woman asked with genuine curiosity, elegantly dancing around Elder Jin’s torrent of sword slashes.

  From my perspective it looked like a child trying to strike their master. He was moving at a speed that was almost impossible for me to follow and yet the woman barely moved her body. It was as though she knew where he was going to strike and had positioned herself to avoid the sword before it even moved.

  Once more she clamped his sword between two fingers. “I do not mean to offend,” she said sternly. “I speak only the truth as my master taught me. The Cloudy Falls sect leader is in the Early Core Forging Realm, yes? That makes your sect third-rate. It is no insult.”

  Elder Jin’s eyes widened in realisation as he appraised the woman with fresh eyes. His jaw suddenly dropped open and he leapt backwards, abandoning his sword.

  “You-! How is that possible!?” he cried, pointing a finger. “Shit, I must inform the others.”

  The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  Even though he had tried to kill me, I’d thought Elder Jin had a certain air of dignity—the confidence of a Foundation Building master. However, all trace of that dignity had vanished and was replaced with fear and anxiety.

  He took out another talisman, this one brimming with qi. I could feel its power from here. The elder tore it in half and vanished in a brief flash of light.

  “Oh. I didn’t expect him to run. That’s annoying,” the woman muttered, snapping her fan shut.

  It disappeared into her hidden storage item and she turned to face me. Her cerulean eyes resembled two calm ponds and I noticed they had vertically slit pupils.

  There was no doubting it anymore. This was the cat from Grandpa Guan’s place. Yet she was now a woman in human form. And not an ordinary woman.

  She was a cultivator who was powerful enough to make a Foundation Building Elder of the Cloudy Falls Sect flee in terror. Just how strong was she?

  No wonder I’d felt a primal terror when she snuck up on me back then. Even when she was a snow white cat the presence of a superior cultivator was enough to subdue me.

  She tutted while slowly advancing towards me. “I don’t know why my master told me to look after you, brat,” she said with a sigh. “There’s nothing special about you. Maybe your cultivation speed is a little faster than usual but there are geniuses above geniuses the world over.”

  She stopped right in front of me, drinking me in with her eyes. Her piercing gaze felt as though it reached into my very soul—which was still being crushed by Gao Shan’s parasite.

  Wang Ren’s brief healing had given me some respite but I was close to succumbing. I wasn’t sure what to think of the woman. Was she a cat or a human?

  My mind blanked out for a second. I opened my eyes to find her grasping my skull in her hands. There was a hissing sound as razor sharp claws extended from each of her fingers, pressing against my skin.

  I winced, expecting the worst when suddenly I felt a burst of cold flash through my body. The pressure on my mind and soul immediately vanished as the parasite was obliterated by her qi.

  The remnants of its energy were immediately devoured by the various parts of my body. I inhaled and my lungs drew it in. The void in my dantian took its share and the rest was sucked into my heart, refined into pure spiritual energy to fuel the cycle.

  Slowly but surely my body was being transformed from a vessel to contain my cultivation and soul into a medicinal forge. I offered a silent apology to the heavens for ever doubting their gift.

  “You couldn’t even deal with a mere Sentient Soul Poison,” she sighed, looking at me as if I was a piece of shit on her shoe. “Worthless. However, one of my master’s final wishes before he ascended was to make sure you didn’t die. So I will honour it.”

  Her master? Grandpa Guan, I assumed. What did she mean by ascended? Wasn’t that when cultivators broke through the limits of the world to reach the heavens because their cultivation was so absurdly profound?

  Was Grandpa Guan such a powerful figure? I thought he was just a slightly insane old man with a lot of odd properties in his portfolio. That’ll teach me to mouth off to everyone I meet…

  I shivered, realising that he could’ve squashed me like a bug for the disrespect I showed him. Well, apparently he’d not cared. More than that, he even told his cat to save my life after he left this world.

  My body was slowly recovering. What I’d been calling a soul parasite was actually a Sentient Soul Poison, according to her. Now that it was destroyed the flowing medicinal energy and qi in my body was repairing it.

  I’d almost died—again—yet I’d escaped narrowly, infuriating the heavens once more. I’d gained much: insights into my dao, battle experience to consolidate, and even had revenge against the Gao Clan bastards.

  I bowed low, touching my head to the ground. “Thank you for saving my worthless life,” I said sincerely, before raising it to look into her piercing eyes once more.

  “Hmph. At least you have manners,” she snorted.

  Her body blurred and she disappeared. When she reappeared in front of me once more, she had an unconscious Wang Ren held by the scruff of his neck in one hand and the handle of a large, flat sword in the other.

  Sitting on the sword with terror and shock painted across their faces were Xiao Cui, Yu Chun, and the young city lord Teng Sheng. I was glad they were safe—that battle between the elders and the Gao patriarch had been devastating.

  All around us, the city lay in ruins. Houses flattened, streets torn up, and endless corpses of unfortunate mortals littered the earth.

  “Do you have the deed for master’s building?” she asked me as she tossed Wang Ren to the ground unceremoniously.

  “Yes, but unfortunately it seems to have been destroyed in the battle,” I replied, taking out the deed and sighing.

  “Don’t worry about that. Master Guan has insurance on all his properties,” she said dismissively with a wave of her sleeve.

  The deed flew into her hands and then vanished. I frowned as I realised the jade slip to unlock the security arrays had also disappeared. It had been inside my storage bag! Cultivators were scary.

  “Get off,” she ordered the three on the large flying sword.

  They obliged, rushing over to hide behind me from the terrifying woman. I wasn’t sure what they expected that to do—if she wanted to hurt them I’d be nothing more than a fly to swat on her way.

  “Master Zhao! I’m so happy to see you unharmed,” little Cui cried, eyes glistening with tears as she threw her arms around my neck.

  I tousled her hair affectionately and for once she didn’t pout or complain. “Nice to see you too, little Cui. Thanks for saving my life. It seems I owe the three of you now,” I replied, turning to Yu Chun and Teng Sheng and nodding my head to each of them in turn.

  “Of course, Zhao Dan. You are my saviour, it was only right,” Teng Sheng replied with a smile.

  He had a starry look in his eyes while gazing around at the destroyed city. The confidence of youth was truly an envious thing.

  “As the young master says. I owe you my life, so returning the favour was the only choice,” Yu Chun said with a soft smile.

  I felt my heart warming. These three had gone to such lengths for me, despite being mortals—or barely a cultivator in Teng Sheng’s case.

  “This is all very touching, but we need to hurry,” the female cultivator interrupted, stepping to appear beside us.

  Yu Chun jumped in fright and Xiao Cui glared at her. Teng Sheng’s jaw dropped open and he looked down at his own body with some disappointment.

  “Why do we need to hurry?” I asked, unsure what she meant. “The Gao Clan is defeated and Three River City has been freed from their vile clutches. Once I’ve healed Wang Ren and we check on the city lord and the captain, things should be able to return to normal.”

  A moment of silence hung in the air for a breath’s time. The cat woman tilted her head back and chuckled. Even her laughter made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.

  “Oh dear. I see why Master Guan wanted me to help you, brat. You are clueless.”

  I frowned. I still had no idea what she was talking about. I stood up and walked over to Wang Ren’s limp body, sighing in relief when I sensed a faint qi signature. He was alive.

  When Elder Jin had sent him flying I feared the worst, but my Senior Brother was a sturdy bastard. Even a mountain might not squash him.

  “What am I so clueless about?” I asked, frustration evident in my voice. “You’re being confusing.

  What remained of my qi was enough to heal Wang Ren back to consciousness and start him on the slow path to recovery. I pressed two fingers against his neck and let my qi flow into his body.

  I had gained many insights into qi and the body of a cultivator today, but I was exhausted and couldn’t consider improving the technique at the moment. Healing Wang Ren would be enough.

  “That Elder will go back to the Cloudy Falls Sect and tell them that a terrifying threat has appeared in Three River City. He will tell them you are allied with this threat and have betrayed the sect and the city. There is no longer a place for you here. If you stay, you will die. Or worse,” she explained as though talking to a child.

  My face paled as I realised she was right. Elder Jin had held a grudge against me to begin with after I crippled his disciple. If he had an opportunity to turn the winds and rain against me he would leap at it.

  “Wait a minute. What terrifying threat?” I suddenly asked.

  “Me, of course,” the female cultivator replied, flashing her sharp canines in a devious grin.