“Make notes.” Said the catgirl. “I don’t want to repeat myself”

The wolfgirl nodded and took out a piece of paper, inkstone, and ink pencil. Satisfied that her lecture won’t be for nothing, Zhanzhan continued

“The servant wing at Shuangshan has three sub divisions…the junior servants is semi-section composed of children too young to work yet, usually native residents of Chenfei. They don’t live in the building on the hill, but in the village with their families or caretakers, learning menial labors and basic manners, that ensure they will properly represent sect once they get employed. That’s where we are now.”

“I am 9, and you are 9…that makes us too young to work?” asked Fengli, and scratched her head with the same hand she held the pen in, unwillingly getting ink all over her hair.

Zhanzhan sighed. “Just look at you now! Of course, we are too young, we’d only get in the way…well, nevermind, you’ll clean up later.

*nod nod*

“….The middle section is composed of servants aged 10-20, who live in the quarters of the sect, and do all kinds of labors from warehouse work, to sweeping the floor, to anything else that requires their attention but is beneath the esteemed cultivators…”

“I want to be a cultivator one day, too”

“You want to be a what?…nevermind, this isn’t time for jokes…”

“(I’m being serious though….)”

“*Ahem*. Finally, there are senior servants, aged 20+, who usually perform administrative duties or work at the medical wing, or leave the village and get employed somewhere else. At that age, they are essentially adults, after all, and thus are free to go whenever they want. We, northerners, don’t practice slavery!” said Zhanzhan, with an air of superiority in her voice.

She knew Fengli came from the south, so that should teach her how much better the mountaineers are from the lowlanders.

But…

“South doesn’t condone slavery, either…”

“Ah whatever! Let me see your notes….”

There was clearly something written there, but the handwriting was so terrible, and there were so many ink stains, Zhanzhan couldn’t read it at all, no matter how she strained her cat eyes.

“You…can understand your own handwriting?”

“Sure!” there was no doubt in the wolfgirl’s voice, so let’s leave it at that. After all, if she investigated it further, and it turned out that Fengli couldn’t understand what she herself wrote after, the lesson had to be repeated, and Zhanzhan was in no mood for that anymore.

She was in a mood for a nap. It was afternoon already, after all!

Fengli made a grumpy face and suggested they go and play instead. However, this ambition was cut short by a cold sentence:

“Play by yourself, if you want”

“Fine!” screamed the wolfgirl, and ran off, making a scene and attracting confused stares of fellow villagers.

Zhanzhan sighed, found herself a sizeable oak tree, and made herself a comfy nest on one of its wide branches. Like all catfolk, she was naturally agile and drawn to high places, and oftentimes once could see her or her relatives napping in such spots.

……..

Fengli arrived in Chenfei last winter, alongside several other orphans, handpicked by Lan Caolu, who promised them a better life in the village of Chenfei. Apparently, he was a well-known philanthropist, and often took care of the orphans, beggars, and the poor, so him bringing some new kids every now and again was no surprise for anyone.

However, Fengli was different. She knew she was. He told her, about her family, and promised to train her in the ways of cultivation…

If only she could tell all this to Zhanzhan, the catgirl’s jaw would drop and she’d be forced to admit that all her ambitions are valid! But now, she was instead considered foolish and delusional, and no one took her seriously…!

Overcome with frustration, she left the premises of the village, and traveled north, to her secret hiding spot beyond the waterfall. However, that was quite far away, so she gave up halfway through, and just sat on the riverbank, throwing little stones into the water, and cursing with every swear word known to her.

Just as she was overcome with all kinds of dark thoughts, a frog ran by.

Fengli hated frogs, so she chased after it, and grabbed its torso with her bare hand. The slimy mucus covering the creature’s skin felt disgusting against the smooth surface of her palm, but that didn’t matter, because the things she was going to do to it soon were….

Suddenly, her hand got numb, and the frog jumped out with a mocking croak.

“A friend of mine reported a lot of dead little critters on the river shore as of late, and that left her mortified, so I took it upon myself to ditch school and investigate….” a boy, clearly a few years older than herself, and wearing white sectarian robes, appeared out of nowhere and started lecturing her “but who would have thought that the culprit is a small girl such as yourself. Have you no morals? They are living creatures, too!”

Fengli didn’t take kindly to being called a little girl, and she didn’t think she did anything wrong, so she presented a counter-argument.

“They were weak, and they were disgusting so they deserved that!”

“Oh, so what say you if I leave you paralyzed here until tomorrow since, from my point of view, you’re both of these things?”

“Fine, do it. But after I become a cultivator, I will come back and take my revenge on you!” she screamed definitely, although the perspective of being left frozen there for a whole day and night was frankly speaking, quite unpleasant “And if I die, I’ll rise up as a ghost and haunt you!”

“Become a what? Come back as a what?” a genuine look of surprise painted on his face, he first tried to laugh, then he became serious when he realized that this wolfgirl isn’t joking. “You know that you’re a yaren, right? You can’t do these things.”

“Ha! I’ll have you know I already established a cultivation foundation!” That was a bit of an understatement. In fact, she could see the golden cosmos of stars within herself for as long as she could remember. All she had to do is close her eyes, focus, and then….

….she’d be transported to an inner realm within her mind. Just like she was doing now, just to flex on him!

However, this time there was another presence within her inner meditative world. Although faint, it looked just like…

Fengli quickly opened her eyes, breaking out of the trance. The guy too, opened his, a genuine confusion painted on his face.

“You! What did you do, just now!” she shouted and pointed her finger at the guy in an accusatory tone. By the way, it seemed she wasn’t paralyzed anymore, which was quite a pleasing discovery, but not enough to quench her wrath!

“It’s….a rare technique that allows one to visit the inside realm of another person, as long as they aren’t actively guarding against it…” the former haughtiness was all but gone, and instead, his voice, face, and body language were instead betraying uncertainty and disbelief “By the heavens, you didn’t lie! You really have a foundation! Now all that’s left is establishing the golden core, and you will be able to manipulate qi as humans do!”

This compliment felt quite nice, but she wasn’t the kind of person to let it go just yet.

“Ha! Told you! Told everyone, but they were like ‘nooo this girl has noo power she can never cultivate we know better we are sooo wise’ ahaha eat this you old farts, ahahahhaha.”

“But how can it be? Could it be…” a weird spark appeared in his eyes, and he clapped in excitement “Could it be you’re a natural-born genius, just like me!?”

——Say what?

“You must be! Tell you what…I’ll help you cultivate. If you manage to manifest the golden core before you hit puberty, I’m sure they will let you train along with us at the sect, I’m sure they will! And I will be credited for training you all the way up there! We will go down in history!”

“Uhh…” she didn’t know what to say to that, his sudden change of attitude knocked her off balance. But the deal wasn’t very bad, so she played along “That’s right, history! We will make…uhh..the history!”

She didn’t know what kind of character he was yet, so she held onto that one word he seemed to be fond of, not willing to let go of rare opportunity to receive the instruction she so much desired.

…….

However, her childishly manipulative strategies were unnecessary.

Wang Shunji turned out to be of similar spirit and values as herself, and despite 3 year age gap between them, they quickly formed a friendship of sorts.

In between playing the master and apprentice every now and again, that is.

Over the course of the following three summers, he taught her everything he could.

From sword techniques to meditative practices to all kinds of theoretical knowledge known to the cultivators, but obscure to common people- such as what are the meridians, what kind of sigils there are, what are the elements and what is resentful energy…

She wasn’t a very good student, and he wasn’t a very good teacher, but they enjoyed each other’s company, and neither thought these days were wasted.

However, the main objective of these meetings - making Fengli establish a golden core - was not fulfilled. Try hard as she might, there was simply no progress, and finally, came the rainy day when Wang Shunji finally gave up on teaching her further.