Severing Ties: The Sect Regrets My Departure

Chapter 254: The Esteemed Spirit Beast Peak Master Has Actually Turned Into A…

“Third Senior Sister, don’t just stand there! Do something!” Jiang Xun urged, his voice laced with panic.

Qin Meran’s condition was deteriorating rapidly. The Spirit-Severing Pill was tearing through her already battered Dantian. If they delayed any longer, her cultivation base would be irreparably crippled.

But Xu Wanqing was paralyzed. She was currently suffocating under the heart-shattering torment of her Void Stone Wax curse. Even if the agony subsided, she was utterly terrified of touching another bottle for fear of poisoning Qin Meran again.

Useless! Jiang Xun cursed inwardly, gritting his teeth.

He would have to intervene himself.

Though his cultivation realm was ostensibly low, he stepped forward and pressed two fingers against Qin Meran’s collarbone. A surge of unbelievably pure, transcendent Spiritual Qi flooded her meridians, hunting down the various toxins ravaging her body.

Normally, poisons like Qi-Dispersing Powder and Spirit-Severing Pills possessed properties that dissolved Spiritual Qi. Once they infiltrated a cultivator’s system, they acted like bone-clinging maggots, requiring weeks of grueling effort to slowly flush out.

However, against Jiang Xun’s intervention, the lethal poisons were like candle flames doused by a torrential downpour. They were extinguished instantly, utterly incapable of resisting.

He wasn’t merely ‘dispelling’ the poison. He was annihilating it! The spiritual power he wielded carried a unique, domineering property that forcefully ground the toxins into nothingness.

Under this miraculous treatment, it took less time than it takes to brew a pot of tea for Qin Meran’s suppressed cultivation to fully recover.

For a moment, Qin Meran sat frozen, incredulous. She patted her chest, checked her meridians, and felt the familiar, stable hum of her Dantian. Wild joy erupted across her face.

“I’ve recovered! I’ve actually recovered! I finally don’t have to suffer anymore!” she wailed, burying her face in her hands and sobbing hysterically. All the cosmic grievances and absurd torments of the past two days came pouring out.

“It’s alright now, Fifth Senior Sister. It’s all over,” Jiang Xun said soothingly, playing the perfect, comforting Junior Brother as he stepped closer.

Overwhelmed with gratitude, Qin Meran looked up, ready to shower him with thanks.

Instead, she watched Jiang Xun stop dead in his tracks. He sniffed the air, his face instantly turning a sickly shade of green. He stumbled backward several steps.

“Urp!” Jiang Xun pinched his nose, gagging violently. Realizing his reaction was incredibly insulting, he offered a strained, awkward smile. “I’m so sorry, Senior Sister. I didn’t mean to… it’s just… the smell on you…”

“Hrk!” He gagged again, turning away.

For Qin Meran, his reaction was a bucket of ice water dumped directly onto her warm, grateful heart. Looking down at her own shredded robes, caked in foul-smelling mud, sewage, and dried blood, her stomach violently rebelled. She nearly vomited on herself.

Just as the crushing humiliation settled in, a wet rustling sound broke the silence.

“Woof! Woof! Woof!” The stray dog that had been lying paralyzed near the door suddenly scrambled to its feet. Seemingly reinvigorated by the pungent stench radiating from Qin Meran, it trotted over excitedly and began enthusiastically licking the filth off her calf.

Qin Meran snapped.

She had just spent the last two hours being chased, humiliated, and literally eaten by stray dogs! Now, she smelled so putrid that a random mutt viewed her as an all-you-can-eat buffet?

A vulgar proverb flashed through her mind: A dog can never change its habit of eating shit. The thought pushed her over the edge. Blind rage ignited her recovered Spiritual Qi. Without a second thought, she drew her leg back, channeled her power, and delivered a devastating kick straight into the dog’s ribcage.

“Meran, don’t!” Xu Wanqing shrieked, her voice cracking in terror.

But her warning came too late.

The heavy, Qi-infused kick landed with a sickening crunch.

“Yipe!” the dog howled mournfully as it was launched backward like a cannonball. It slammed into the courtyard wall with enough force to shatter the stone, exploding through the rubble and disappearing into the adjacent alley.

The structural damage caused a massive roof beam to collapse directly toward Qin Meran’s head.

With her cultivation restored, it was a trivial threat. She merely raised a hand, catching the heavy timber effortlessly.

However, the collapse kicked up a massive cloud of dust, coating her already filthy body in a thick layer of gray grime. Standing amidst the ruins of the courtyard, choking on dust, the sheer absurdity of her endless misfortune brought tears of frustrated rage to her eyes.

“Woof! Woof! Woof!” An urgent, furious barking pierced the dust cloud.

Qin Meran looked up, stunned. Through the settling debris, the stray dog came trotting back. By all logic, a mortal dog struck by a cultivator’s kick should have been reduced to red mist. Yet, not only had it survived, it was charging right back at her, barking incessantly.

If she had bothered to listen closely, she might have realized the barks sounded desperate, almost human in their panic. But Qin Meran was far past reason. To her, this unkillable mutt was openly mocking her!

“Despicable beast! You dare provoke me?!” she snarled, stepping forward. With a flick of her wrist, she unleashed a handful of offensive Talismans.

Small explosions rocked the courtyard. The dog yelped hysterically as its fur caught fire and one of its legs snapped, causing it to limp violently. Yet, miraculously, it refused to die, its eyes rolling wildly as it continued to bark at her.

“Vile creature! Do you truly believe I can’t end you?!” Qin Meran roared, summoning a stack of high-tier divine Talismans, absolutely determined to vaporize the unkillable menace.

“Junior Sister, stop!” Xu Wanqing threw herself between Qin Meran and the dog, her face deathly pale and drenched in cold sweat. “You cannot kill her!”

Qin Meran lowered her hand, glaring at her senior sister in annoyance. “Why are you protecting a stray dog?”

“Just… wait a moment, Junior Sister—”

“Wait for what?! You have no idea what I’ve suffered because of these filthy beasts!”

“It’s not what you think—”

“Shut up, Xu Wanqing!” Qin Meran snapped, her rage blinding her to protocol. “Save your nauseating, bleeding-heart act for the gullible fools outside! Do you think I don’t know the rumors? Everyone knows your ‘benevolent Bodhisattva’ routine is a complete sham! Have you worn the mask so long you’ve actually brainwashed yourself?!”

Under normal circumstances, Qin Meran would never speak to a senior sect member so brazenly. But she was broken, filthy, and exhausted. The words spilled out like venom.

Her brutal honesty struck Xu Wanqing like a physical blow, draining the last remnants of color from her face.

Seeing the situation rapidly deteriorating, Jiang Xun hurriedly stepped in. “Fifth Senior Sister, please calm down! Don’t take it out on her. Third Senior Sister isn’t protecting the dog to annoy you. She’s doing it for Seventh Senior Sister’s sake.”

“Little Seven?” Qin Meran blinked, her rage faltering. She glanced around the ruined courtyard and finally noticed the pristine, empty puppet lying on the bed. “Wait… where is Qingyao?”

Jiang Xun sighed heavily. Assuming a mask of profound grief, he recounted the tragic tale of Lu Qingyao losing her physical body to the Demon Beast and her desperate escape as a Nascent Soul.

He expected Qin Meran to express shock, horror, or at least polite sympathy.

Instead, Qin Meran’s expression remained perfectly flat. “Qingyao has always been unbearably arrogant and dismissive of others. Suffering a severe setback like this will force her to learn some humility. Frankly, it’s a good thing.”

Jiang Xun stared at her, genuinely taken aback.

What is wrong with her? he thought. Qin Meran wasn’t exactly a saint, but she usually maintained the facade of a polite, empathetic scholar. Why wasn’t she even pretending to care?

He had no idea that beneath her neutral expression, Qin Meran was throwing a mental parade. Discovering that someone else—specifically the junior sister who had viciously mocked her right before she fled the sect—had suffered a fate far worse than her own was the greatest news she had heard all week. She was struggling not to smile.

“So,” Qin Meran asked smoothly, “how is Seventh Senior Sister doing now?”

The question instantly brought the tension back to Xu Wanqing. She began to sweat profusely.

“Well… you see… while I was conducting the transfer for Seventh Junior Sister… you arrived. And the stray dog arrived. And… well… there was a slight mishap…”

“A mishap?” Jiang Xun’s brow furrowed. He looked nervously at the empty puppet. “Did the possession fail? Did her Nascent Soul dissipate?!”

“No! No, her Nascent Soul is perfectly intact!”

“Then where is it?”

“It’s…” Xu Wanqing swallowed hard, unable to meet their eyes.

Jiang Xun followed her terrified gaze to the charred, limping stray dog cowering behind her robes. His eyes widened in absolute horror. “Third Senior Sister… please tell me she didn’t…”

“Yes,” Xu Wanqing whimpered, scooping the filthy, trembling dog into her arms with a look of pure devastation. “During the transfer, there was a disruption. Your Seventh Senior Sister’s Nascent Soul… entered this dog.”

Hiss! Both Jiang Xun and Qin Meran sucked in sharp breaths. Even Qin Meran, who had been secretly gloating moments before, stared at the dog in stunned, horrified silence.

“I didn’t mean for this to happen!” Xu Wanqing babbled frantically. “Everything was perfect! She was about to enter the puppet, but the dog barged in! The raw life essence of a living creature is naturally more appealing to a displaced soul than dead wood. She… she actively flew into it!”

Seeing their blank, traumatized faces, Xu Wanqing hurriedly tried to spin the disaster. “But don’t worry! It’s only temporary! A living vessel is actually much better for her soul’s stability than a puppet! I will gather the materials to reconstruct her original body immediately. She will be back to normal soon, I swear!”

Her desperate reassurances fell on deaf ears.

Jiang Xun and Qin Meran looked at the empty puppet. Then they looked at the scorched, three-legged mutt whining in Xu Wanqing’s arms.

Lu Qingyao, the esteemed Master of the Spirit Beast Peak, a genius of the Azure Mystic Sacred Land… was currently a stray dog.

If word of this ever leaked, the Sacred Land would become the laughingstock of the entire continent for a thousand years.

“Wait, that doesn’t make sense,” Jiang Xun said, his eyes narrowing sharply. “Third Senior Sister, with the White Jade Fan suppressing her soul, a mere distraction shouldn’t have allowed her Nascent Soul to break free and possess a dog. Where is the fan?”

The question hit Xu Wanqing like a physical blow.

Deadly! This is deadly! Her scalp went completely numb. But she couldn’t lie. She didn’t dare.

“The White Jade Fan…” she stammered, her voice barely a whisper. “For some reason… it vanished.”

“Vanished?” Jiang Xun let out a dry, disbelieving chuckle. “Third Senior Sister, this is no time for jokes. The fan is bound to you. You were actively holding it. How could it possibly vanish?”

But as he looked at Xu Wanqing’s ashen, terrified face, his smile slowly died. “You’re serious?”

“It truly vanished!” Xu Wanqing cried bitterly. “I was distracted for a single second! By the time I turned back, the fan that was supposed to be anchoring her soul was just… gone! It vanished into thin air!”

She looked at Jiang Xun’s face. He didn’t believe a word of it.

“I swear it’s the truth!” she pleaded, near tears. “I searched everywhere! It just disappeared! You have to believe me, Little Junior Brother!”

It was a cruel twist of fate. When she was a villain, Xu Wanqing had lied effortlessly, manipulating everyone in the Azure Mystic Sacred Land without breaking a sweat. Yet now, when she was telling the absolute, unvarnished truth, she was met with nothing but cold, hard suspicion from Jiang Xun, Qin Meran, and even the dog in her arms.

And as if the universe hadn’t punished her enough, the merciless voice of the Void Stone Wax echoed in her mind once more.

“As a virtuous soul, your past deceits have rendered you entirely untrustworthy to your closest peers. This is a profound moral failure!” “Deserves Penalty! Deserves Penalty!”