Chapter 483: Lodging a Complaint
Su Ming listened to his master's outburst, and while feeling helpless, he could only remain silent.
However, just as Lin Yu was laughing his hardest, even preparing to roll around on the void cloud—
His gaze inadvertently swept over the patch of mud that had been ravaged beyond recognition.
The wild laughter on Lin Yu's face suddenly died out, as if an invisible giant hand had clamped down on his throat and choked him silent.
The void inside the Xuantian ring fell into a deathly stillness.
Two breaths later.
“Aaaaaaah—!!!”
Lin Yu's soul body, which had been as solid and smooth as jade, now had its edges violently rippling from extreme heartache.
“Heart-Clearing Orchids! Those were my Silver-Spotted Heart-Clearing Orchids!!!”
Lin Yu's projection inside the ring was racing around frantically, jumping up and down like an ant on a hot pan. His fingers trembled as he pointed at the two white cranes outside, cursing wildly: “Damn feathered beasts! Stealing someone else's spiritual herbs is bad enough, but they dared to touch the medicinal ingredients I use to make my Soul-Nourishing Incense?!”
Staring at the mess of mud, broken roots, and torn leaves on the ground, Lin Yu's heart was bleeding. He could already see the bleak, smoke-less months ahead of him.
“Su Ming! What are you still standing there for?!” Lin Yu's voice had become sharp from sheer fury. “Go up there and beat them! Pluck every last feather off their bodies! Throw everything you've got at them—your Water Arrow Technique, your Water Prison Technique! Hurry up and grab the remaining few for me!”
Su Ming replied helplessly, “Master, you saw it yourself. Those are the Sect Leader's cranes. Even if I actually made a move, I'm only at mid Foundation Establishment. How could I snatch anything from a great demon beast that's at least at the peak of the third rank? If I went, I'd just get slapped flying like Shadow.”
“So what if they're the Sect Leader's cranes?! Does being the Sect Leader's cranes mean they can just eat my incense for free?!” Lin Yu was still boiling with rage, but hearing Su Ming's logical analysis finally dragged a shred of his nearly manic emotions back.
He paced back and forth in the void with extreme agitation, grinding his teeth and muttering: “Can't fight head-on... can't beat them... and they've got backing...”
Suddenly, Lin Yu's footsteps stopped.
On his twisted, enraged face, the expression shifted rapidly, eventually settling into a cold sneer full of scheming and cunning.
“Can't win by fighting? Then don't fight.” Lin Yu's voice instantly regained its usual dark calm as his eyeballs spun in their sockets a couple of times.
“When you run into something with both backing and strength, fighting head-on is the stupidest move. We need to solve this like civilized people.” Lin Yu spoke to Su Ming inside the Consciousness Sea. “If you can't beat them, go and lodge a complaint!”
“Lodge a complaint?” Su Ming was taken aback.
“No kidding! The Sect Leader's cranes stealing from an outer sect disciple's spiritual field—no matter how you spin it, you're in the right!” Lin Yu quickly sorted out his train of thought. “What kind of situation is this? This is a leader's family member encroaching on a junior employee's lawful private property! Go straight to the Sect Leader's Peak and find the Sect Leader to argue your case!”
Hearing this suggestion, Su Ming instinctively felt hesitant.
“Master, isn't this... not quite appropriate?” Su Ming weighed the pros and cons in his mind. “Just for a few measly Heart-Clearing Orchids, I go and bother the Sect Leader? Wouldn't that make me look way too petty, like I have no magnanimity? What if the Sect Leader thinks I'm making a mountain out of a molehill and ends up annoyed with me?”
“What do you mean 'a few measly Heart-Clearing Orchids'?! Those are my lifeblood!” Lin Yu immediately bristled at that, letting out a cold snort as he retorted, “You think this is about magnanimity? Wrong! This is about where you draw the line!”
Lin Yu's tone turned extremely serious: “The Way of Survival doesn't mean you just play turtle all the time! When someone steps on your head and you don't even dare to squeak, that's called cowardice! If you don't go and complain, those two feathered beasts will think you're easy to bully. They came today to eat your Heart-Clearing Orchids; tomorrow they'll dare to eat your Star Dust Powder; the day after that, they'll take a dump right in your cave dwelling! Your Gazing Star Cliff will become their free cafeteria, and then what kind of seclusion will you even be able to do? What cultivation will you accomplish?”
These words hit Su Ming like a bucket of ice water, plunging him into deep thought.
“Besides, what's your status now? You're a True Disciple of Formation Peak! The personally accepted disciple of Xuanheng Zhenren!” Lin Yu reasoned persuasively. “You don't just represent yourself—you represent the face of Formation Peak! The spiritual field of a Formation Peak True Disciple gets destroyed, and your master, Xuanheng Zhenren, would lose face too! If you go and lodge a complaint now, you're not doing it for yourself—you're upholding the dignity of the sect! You need to frame this as a matter of the sect's honor!”
Su Ming thought it over carefully... and it did seem to make sense.
Su Ming took a deep breath and finally nodded. “Master is right. Then... should I give it a try?”
Just as master and disciple were finalizing their plan in the Consciousness Sea, the “looting” outside finally came to an end.
That Sect Leader's white crane swallowed the last relatively fresh chunk of Heart-Clearing Orchid root, belched contentedly, and turned its head. It glanced at Shadow, who was covered in mud, a flicker of boredom passing through its eyes.
It flapped its enormous wings, stirring up a fierce gale, and along with that white crane from Spirit Beast Peak, it shot arrogantly into the sky. Soon, they disappeared into the depths of the sea of clouds.
Su Ming quickly walked over to the ancient tree.
In the pit, Shadow was struggling to move, its body squirming with extreme difficulty. Its originally sleek and glossy black feathers were now not only caked in stinking mud but also snapped off in several places. The sharpness and ferocity that once shone in its golden eyes had vanished, replaced by an intense sense of grievance and frustration.
When it saw Su Ming approaching, its short beak let out a series of extremely low “cheeps,” like a child who had lost a fight outside and was crying to its parent for comfort when it got home.
Su Ming crouched down and, without the slightest hint of disgust, reached out both hands to scoop up the dirty, fluffy ball.
“Alright, stop making noise.” Su Ming's fingers gently smoothed down its disheveled feathers as he used liquid spiritual energy to peel away the sludge clinging to its body, bit by bit.
Feeling the warmth of Su Ming's palm and the soothing touch of his spiritual energy, Shadow finally stopped struggling. It weakly tucked its tiny head tightly into Su Ming's hand.
This was the first time since its birth that it had experienced the despair of being utterly powerless to resist.
“In the world of immortal cultivation, if you can't beat someone, you just can't beat them. Anger and stubbornness won't change the gap in size and cultivation.” Su Ming's voice was very soft. “When you grow up, when you have the cultivation to peck through a great demon beast, that's when you can get back what you lost today.”
Shadow shrank into the crook of Su Ming's neck and let out a faint “chirp.”
Su Ming stood up and looked at the spiritual field, which was now completely ruined.
He patiently searched through the mud. It took him a full incense stick's worth of time, but finally, behind a large rock, in a crevice hidden by mud, he managed to dig out three or four Silver-Spotted Heart-Clearing Orchids that had survived because of their concealed location.
Staring at those pitiful few herbs in his hand, Su Ming let out an utterly helpless sigh before carefully storing them away in his storage pouch.
“Let's go.”
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