Villains Aren't Stepping Stones!

Shen Xinye once again appeared outside, stepping back onto the ancient, wind-swept stone tiles of the high trial platform.

The blinding golden light of the pocket dimension faded away, leaving her standing under the dim, artificial twilight of the subterranean abyss.

This time, held securely in both of her hands, was a magnificent, glowing golden crown.

The crown was carved from a mysterious, iridescent divine metal that shimmered with subtle, rainbow-colored runes.

It radiated a thick, ancient aura that hummed with immense, unyielding power, casting a warm light over her blue robes.

She turned towards Shen Haoran and grinned, showing it off with an uncharacteristic, childlike pride. ”Young master, look! This is a fragment of an Imperial Artifact! It also stores some of the foundational knowledge and secret techniques of that perverted emperor!”

Shen Haoran looked at her beaming face, a soft, genuine smile gracing his lips as he nodded approvingly. ”Good job. You deserve it.”

Hearing his praise, she beamed even brighter, her eyes sparkling like polished jewels under the dim light.

She held her head high, practically radiating pure joy.

Haoran looked at her cheerful demeanor and subtly chuckled to himself—he firmly believed that if she had a tail, it would be wagging at a frantic, uncontrollable speed right now.

”Let’s go,” Haoran said smoothly, turning his posture back toward the descent.

”Mn!” She nodded eagerly, clutching the glowing golden crown against her chest.

The two turned around and decided to descend the floating path, but before they could take their first step onto the hanging wooden stairs, Haoran suddenly paused.

His golden eyes shifted slightly, turning towards the cold, motionless figure of Lin Che’s headless corpse lying near the edge of the platform.

He thought for a moment, his expression thoughtful.

This guy wasn’t his enemy, he just wanted to be left alone. Unfortunately, Haoran wasn’t having any of that. If you aren’t with him, then you are against him.

Still, this man didn’t do anything deserving of death aside from refusing to joing him.

The least he can do is not leave his corpse to rot here.

With that, he snapped his fingers with a casual, fluid motion, and a small, vibrant flicker of the Gold Incinerating Supreme Flame suddenly materialized above his fingertips.

The golden fire danced innocently, yet the ambient heat it produced caused the surrounding air to warp and distort violently.

He flicked his finger, sending the tiny spark drifting toward the corpse.

The moment the golden flame touched the fabric of Lin Che’s torn linen shirt, it instantly erupted into a blinding, silent column of white-hot fire.

In less than a single second, the body, the bloodstains, and even the tiny pile of plain dirt were utterly consumed, burned away to the atomic level.

Not a single trace of ashes remained—only a soft gust of wind that scattered the residual heat into the pitch-black abyss.

”Let’s go,” Haoran repeated, his tone as calm as if he had merely swept away a speck of dust.

With that, the two of them walked down the hanging stairs together, their boots making rhythmic, steady sounds against the floating wooden planks.

After a few moments, navigating the steep, suspended incline with ease, their feet finally stepped back onto the firm stone floor of the cliffside.

But at that exact moment, the space directly in front of the stone archway suddenly rippled like the surface of a disturbed pond, tearing open as Su Meilin and Ling Yinchi emerged from the spatial distortion.

The two maidens of the Immortal Clans froze in their tracks, their eyes widening slightly as their gazes immediately landed on the glowing golden crown held firmly in Shen Xinye’s hands.

”Shit,” Ling Yinchi clicked her tongue in mild irritation, her playful smirk instantly vanishing as she scratched the back of her head. ”So you already got the core inheritance. What an absolute waste of time and effort.”

Shen Xinye shook her head lightly, her posture relaxed and confident as she offered them a polite, calm response. ”There are still plenty of treasures left back there. Mountains of gold, ancient scrolls, and rare pills. You can go up and have a look for yourselves if you wish.”

Ling Yinchi stared at her with a suspicious, skeptical glint in her orange eyes. ”You actually left something behind? How surprisingly generous of you.”

”Idiot,” Su Meilin interjected flatly, casting a dry, exasperated glance at the orange-haired maiden beside her. ”Even if she wanted to take them all, she physically couldn’t. Have you forgotten? All of our external storage rings were confiscated before entering the trial zone. She can only carry what fits in her arms.”

Realizing the logical truth of her words, Su Meilin turned her head, offering a respectful, polite bow toward Haoran and Shen Xinye.

”Thank you for leaving the rest.”

With that brief acknowledgment, Su Meilin didn’t waste another second and tapped her boots against the stone and immediately began climbing the floating wooden stairs toward the apex platform.

Ling Yinchi let out a quiet sigh, adjusting her orange cheongsam before she offered a brief, half-hearted nod toward the pair and turning on her heel to follow after Su Meilin, her figure quickly vanishing up the staircase into the dark void.

Shen Haoran and Shen Xinye stood side by side on the cliff edge, silently staring at their retreating backs until both maidens completely disappeared from view.

The moment they were entirely alone once more, Shen Haoran didn’t bother using the slow, winding paths of the sandstone maze to exit.

He casually tapped his foot against the ancient stone floor.

*Rumble—!*

A soft, golden spatial array expanded beneath their boots, liquefying the stone floor into a swirling vortex of light.

Then, the ground opened up and smoothly swallowed them both, transporting them directly out of the deep subterranean ruins.

*

*

*

Meanwhile, on Another Academy Exam Space for Golden Core Students.

The sky in this pocket dimension was a strange, dull shade of violet, casting long, bruised shadows across a jagged, wind-swept wasteland of shattered grey rock.

The air was thick with the metallic stench of fresh blood, mixed with the acrid smell of burning demonic qi.

Xia Mengyao and Luo Mingye, who were partners for this trial, stood in the center of a wide clearing, completely surrounded by the colossal corpses of Golden Core Demonic Beasts.

There were towering obsidian-scaled wolves with severed heads, massive razor-clawed bears pinned to the earth by translucent strands of zither qi, and winged serpents sliced into neatly divided segments.

Xia Mengyao, her short red hair fluttering in the dry wind, slowly sheathed her slender longsword with a soft, metallic *click*.

Beside her, Luo Mingye stood with an ethereal, serene grace, holding a beautifully carved, ancient wooden zither cradled gently in her arms.

In front of them, a group of several dozen native servants were kneeling on the sharp gravel, bowing their heads repeatedly until their foreheads touched the dust, thanking them profusely.

”Thank you, noble immortal maidens!”

”You saved us from being devoured by these terrible monsters!”

”We will build shrines in your honor! We will pray for your ascension every day!”

”No problem, please hurry along and hide in the caves deeper in the valley,” said Xia Mengyao, her cheeks flushing a delicate shade of pink as she waved her hands frantically, feeling immensely embarrassed.

In truth, she felt a heavy, uncomfortable knot in her stomach.

It was the academy’s higher-ups who had deliberately rounded up these helpless native mortals, dropping them directly into this monster-infested trial ground just to serve as live targets and scoring metrics for the students.

She felt thoroughly awkward being thanked so tearfully when the academy she represented was the sole reason these poor people were put in life-threatening danger in the first place.

”Thank you! Thank you, kind immortals!”

A native servant, seemingly the leader, sobbed once more before hurriedly ushering his people away.

The crowd scrambled into the rocky hills as fast as their legs could carry them, desperately wanting to find a dark, hidden cave to hide from the roaming beasts.

Xia Mengyao let out a long, weary sigh, shaking her head as she watched their retreating figures.

She then turned her attention toward the unconscious and injured boy lying on the blood-stained gravel beside them.

He was also a student, and was even their classmate back in the outer branch.

His name was Qing Yan. In a classroom filled with prideful geniuses from noble families and powerful clans, he was universally known as the least talented, most timid, and utterly weakest disciple of their class.

He possessed a poor, flawed foundation compared to others, that is because unlike other students who were geniuses of their sects or clans, he was actually a native servant who got lucky and was invited to join the academy.

He was supposed to be Xu Xiansu’s randomly assigned partner for this trial, but seeing him lying here alone in a pool of his own blood, half-devoured by a demonic wolf before Xia Mengyao and Luo Mingye had stepped in to kill it, Xia Mengyao could already tell what had happened.

Xu Xiansu had decisively abandoned him to his fate the second they stepped through the portal, leaving him behind as dead weight so she could go hunt targets on her own.

Well, Xu Xiansu was always an aloof, cold-hearted loner who looked down on anyone that wasn’t part of their circle, so Xia Mengyao really shouldn’t be surprised by her actions.

Xia Mengyao turned towards her soft-spoken friend. ”Mingye, can you heal him? He took a heavy blow to the chest, and his internal meridians are completely scrambled.”

Luo Mingye nodded gently, her pale, delicate fingers hovering over the silk strings of her zither.

She sat down cross-legged on a flat boulder, rested the instrument on her lap, and began playing a relaxing, harmonious song.

With a gentle flick, soft, green waves of soothing, life-giving spiritual energy materialized in the air, drifting like glowing emerald butterflies toward the wounded youth.

The music resonated with his fractured dantian, causing Qing Yan’s visible wounds—the deep claw marks across his chest and the dark purple bruises on his arms—to stitch together and heal at a speed visible to the naked eye.

As the last soothing note echoed and faded into the quiet wasteland, his breathing stabilized, his eyelids trembled violently, and he slowly opened his eyes.

The bright violet sun hanging in the sky seemed to be painfully sharp for his eyes as he struggled to open them, squinting hard against the glare.

But then, as he fully opened his eyes and saw the strange, alien sky above, he suddenly bolted upright, clutching his head, and couldn’t help but curse loudly at the top of his lungs.

”Fuck! Did those bastards leave me to sleep outside on the pavement again?!” he roared in a sharp, surprisingly loud, and utterly coarse accent. ”I fucking knew I shouldn’t have gone drinking with those frat boys after finals! My head feels like a damn hangover from hell!”

Xia Mengyao and Luo Mingye blinked simultaneously, their expressions freezing as they stared at him, looking completely stunned and thoroughly bewildered.

In their memories, Qing Yan was a pitifully timid, stuttering boy who couldn’t even look an instructor in the eye, whose voice was usually as soft and quiet as a tiny mosquito, and who would tremble in terror whenever someone raised their tone at him.

Now, here he was, sitting in the dirt, flailing his arms, and shouting bizarre, profane curses with absolute, shameless volume!

’Did the demonic wolf’s attack hit him on the head too hard? Did he lose his sanity from trauma?’ Xia Mengyao wondered, her hand instinctively returning to the pommel of her sword.

Qing Yan sat up properly, rubbing his throbbing temples, and finally looked around his immediate surroundings.

His eyes immediately widened to the size of saucers at the terrifying sight of several colossal, mountain-sized demonic beast corpses lying in pools of black blood around him.

”Holy shit!” he screamed, his voice cracking violently as he scrambled backward in the dirt, kicking his legs like a panicked crab. ”What the actual hell is this?! Did I wander onto a budget xianxia movie filming set?! Where are the green screens?! Where are the safety wires?! Are they using such realistic things on movies now!?”

He swung his head wildly to the left, and his eyes landed directly on Xia Mengyao and Luo Mingye, who were standing nearby, staring at him like he had grown a second head.

Seeing two drop-dead gorgeous, ethereal maidens dressed in immaculate, ancient-style flowing robes, one holding a gleaming sword and the other holding a glowing jade zither, his jaw dropped completely, a line of drool almost escaping the corner of his mouth.

”Holy crap... am I in heaven?” he blurted out loud, his eyes wide with absolute, unrestrained shock. ”Did the alcohol poison my liver and kill me?! Is this my reward?!”

Just then, right in front of his line of vision, a glowing, translucent blue screen materialized out of nowhere, accompanied by a sharp, electronic chime that echoed directly inside his mind:

[Ding!]