Xiaoxiao realized belatedly: he knew that creature was poisonous, yet didn’t inform her—this was somewhat… not very honorable.

However, he had ultimately saved her, so she should thank him regardless.

Just then, the purple-eyed man said, “Miss, pardon my presumption…” After speaking, he lifted the still-immobile Cui Xiaoxiao and immersed her in the clear water to help dissipate the toxicity more quickly.

Fortunately, she had only been affected by the snake’s poisonous mist. If she had been bitten by the snake, with venom directly entering her bloodstream, it would have been much harder to treat.

Earlier, Cui Xiaoxiao’s body had been burning with stabbing pain, but now, soaking in the water, she felt much better.

When she could move again, she swam toward the deeper part of the pool where the stream waters gathered, using the water to wash off the remaining poisonous mist and egg fluid from her body.

However, this washing inevitably soaked her clothes, making them cling to her skin… She looked up to see the young man still watching her and couldn’t help but say, “…Hero, could you please turn around?”

The man raised his sword-like eyebrows, slowly turned around, and sat cross-legged on a large boulder to wipe his sword. He also took an outer garment from his bag and tossed it behind him to Cui Xiaoxiao.

During this time, he kept examining Cui Xiaoxiao’s Soul-controlling Talismans endlessly, his long fingers slowly tracing back and forth along the talisman’s pattern lines.

Those fingers were long and powerful, and their slow movements seemed to carry a bewitching quality that made Cui Xiaoxiao inexplicably feel parched.

Cui Xiaoxiao didn’t want to keep looking at him. She emerged from the stream, silently recited an incantation to shake off the water from her body, and seeing that her outer coat had been torn by the bushes and was unwearable, she put on the man’s outer garment.

Seeing that the man kept looking at her talisman, she said casually, “What? Are you also interested in talismans? By the way, seeing that you’re also a cultivator, I wonder what dao you practice?”

The man, estimating that Xiaoxiao had finished dressing, finally turned his head slightly, facing sideways, his thin lips curved in a self-mocking smile: “I practice a wild path, never having had a proper sect… Besides, in this vast world, there’s probably no one who would dare accept me.”

Xiaoxiao disliked hearing such self-deprecating words from him, so she asked casually, “What? Is it because you lack private virtue that no one is willing to accept you?”

The man finally raised his eyes to look at Xiaoxiao—this thin girl was now wearing his outer garment, and because it didn’t fit well, she kept rolling up the sleeves, looking exactly like a girl child who had stolen an adult’s clothes…

His lips curved into a faint, genuine smile, yet he stated in a flat tone, “My birth is not good, and my bloodline is not pure. Proper sects would not accept me…”

When Cui Xiaoxiao looked at his eyes that glimmered with purple light, she guessed that he probably had foreign blood. From this perspective, he too had a hard background, similar to her own experience of wandering the streets!

However, her fate had been relatively good—she had eventually met Master Tang Youshu, who guided her to abandon evil ways and enter the righteous path of cultivation.

Thinking of her master’s kindness in recognizing her worth, Cui Xiaoxiao felt quite emotional. Half consoling, half joking, she said, “What does a poor birth matter? Since ancient times, the path to immortality has never distinguished between noble and humble. When one person attains the dao, even chickens and dogs can ascend to heaven. Your skills are so good, and your natural talent also seems excellent. How can you be so self-deprecating? Others won’t accept you? At worst, you can just bow and enter under my Lingshan Talismonger Sect!”

After hearing this, the man’s eyes seemed to ripple with a slightly surprised light. After a moment of silence, he said self-mockingly, “If Miss’s master were to see this humble one, he probably wouldn’t dare accept me either…”

Cui Xiaoxiao rarely had such an opportunity to show off. As the sect leader, she had the convenience of accepting disciples at will!

“My master has long since passed away to immortality. Now I’m the one managing the Lingshan Talismonger Sect. If you bow to me as master, I’ll accept you into the sect and make you a third-generation senior disciple!”

Cui Xiaoxiao’s eyesight was excellent—she had long since noticed the golden glint in the cloth pouch at the man’s waist and couldn’t help but envy his wealth.

Her master’s Gold-Dissolving Curse hadn’t been lifted yet, and she had fallen into this wretched place, not knowing when she could find her senior martial brothers.

If she could recruit a disciple who didn’t lack money and wasn’t troubled by the Gold-Dissolving Curse, that would be truly blessed by the Immeasurable Heavenly Honored and Amitabha Buddha!

Since Xiaoxiao had promised her master to reform and follow the righteous path, she naturally wouldn’t steal at will. But if a disciple offered filial piety, then she could righteously accept it.

However, Xiaoxiao didn’t seriously fantasize about accepting this man as her disciple. She intuitively felt this man was not simple, and his skills were superior to hers. How could he possibly bow to her as master? After all, the Talismonger Sect was not very prestigious and couldn’t cultivate great masters.

Her talk of accepting him as a disciple was just casual teasing.

But this extraordinarily handsome man seemed to be genuinely persuaded by Xiaoxiao. His purple eyes were hidden beneath his flowing black hair, and no one knew what he was thinking. Finally, he looked up at Xiaoxiao with a smile and said, “Since the Lingshan Talismonger Sect is willing to take in a fallen person like me, how can I not know what’s good for me? If that’s the case, Master, please accept this disciple’s bow…”

After speaking, he knelt on one knee and bowed three times to Cui Xiaoxiao.

Although Cui Xiaoxiao had been verbally coaxing this man to accept her as his master, it was more to comfort him, not to worry about having no friends on the road ahead.

But who knew this man was so sincere that he bowed when he said he would?

She instinctively wanted to speak up and reverse the situation, but the man had already stood up and respectfully called her master.

…Well, accepting a disciple didn’t cost any money, and she couldn’t lose anything by it. After all, if the Talismonger Sect wanted to grow, it needed to branch out and spread its leaves.

This man had good skills. Once the three fellow disciples were promoted to martial uncles, the great enterprise of hunting rabbits and catching mountain chickens would have a successor!

With this thought, Cui Xiaoxiao laughed awkwardly a few times, said some polite, encouraging words, then asked casually, “By the way, I still don’t know my disciple’s name!”

The young man also smiled at his newly acknowledged little master and said word by word, “This disciple’s surname is Wei, given name Jie!”

Cui Xiaoxiao was just about to agree that her disciple’s name was strong, clearly a good name that could revitalize the Talismonger Sect, when the smile on her face gradually froze.

“Wei… Jie? Which Wei and which Jie are in your name?”

The Talismonger Sect’s new disciple casually picked up a tree branch and wrote his full name in the sand by the stream.

What beautiful calligraphy! The upright and graceful name was written with flowing dragon-like strokes, with extraordinary brushwork.

Thus, the large characters “Wei Jie” struck directly into Cui Xiaoxiao’s eyes.

Finally, Cui Xiaoxiao was silent for a long while before asking gravely, “You… how did you come to have this name?”

He had a cultivation foundation and was not an ordinary mortal! Any cultivator would have some taboo against the name of the former demon lord. How could it be such a coincidence that he also named himself Wei Jie!

After hearing Cui Xiaoxiao’s words, the man said indifferently, “A name given by one’s father cannot be discarded. ‘Jie’ means a calamity one wishes to avoid but cannot. I was originally forced to come into this world. For my father and mother, I am their calamity.”

Cui Xiaoxiao’s mind was buzzing, constantly working. Her thoughts jumped back and forth between this verdant Qilao Mountain, the suddenly appearing Po Hun Snake, and this man who was also called “Wei Jie,” becoming increasingly confused.

Everything here seemed to be filled with endless strangeness.

She hesitantly asked again, “May I ask who your esteemed father is?”

Wei Jie looked steadily at his little master’s large eyes and said slowly again, “He is the former head of the demon-subduing Wei family—Wei Jingling!”

Cui Xiaoxiao gasped and stepped back two paces.

She saw this handsome man finally reveal a completely evil smile and continue, “As for my mother… if Miss has seen the stone tablet on the mountain, she should know that she is a female demon… I am a half-demon born of a human and a demon! Being the offspring of ghosts and demons, I’m not worthy of the Wei surname, so I changed my surname myself, taking the ‘Wei’ with the ghost radical…”

He said this obviously to give this girl who dared to accept disciples so rashly a lesson, so his lips carried some mockery as he quietly waited for the girl’s terrified reaction.

After all, his mother was a female demon that everyone avoided like the plague, and his father was a guilty person sought for punishment by the righteous path.

Whoever accepted such a disciple would not be far from their sect’s collapse!

His agreement to bow as a disciple earlier was actually to wait for this teasing moment. He just wondered what excuse this girl would use to hurriedly distance herself from him.

However, he usually wasn’t so bored. He just didn’t know why today he always wanted to tease this little girl who had appeared from nowhere.

Originally, he thought this girl was sent by his enemies to deliberately lure him into the valley, so he pretended to fall for it to see what tricks she would play.

But later, he discovered that this girl truly didn’t know what was hidden in the valley, and her poisoned appearance was pitiful.

This was just a girl who didn’t know her limits. His teaching her a lesson this time would save her from overestimating herself in the future, setting up her mountain stronghold to play sect leader, and rashly accepting disciples everywhere.

But the girl in front of him stared at him for a long time, then opened her mouth to ask something completely unrelated—”May I ask what the current era name is?”

After Wei Jie answered, Cui Xiaoxiao silently counted on her fingers for a long time, then asked desperately, “You said… this is Qilao Mountain? Why are there so many trees here?”

Even if she had accepted the wrong disciple, the little girl’s reaction was too strange!

Wei Jie didn’t know why she would ask such questions. The smile on his face gradually faded as he thought, could this girl be unable to handle the shock and start talking nonsense?

He didn’t know that his new master’s heart was currently in turmoil.

She… she felt a sense of temporal confusion. This man didn’t seem to be lying or teasing, but what was going on?

Just as Cui Xiaoxiao was puzzled, she suddenly heard a voice by her ear saying, “My dear, you’re truly remarkable, actually able to activate the ancient statue of Zhu Jiuyin! But… how did you send yourself to this time? Don’t you know that with your destiny, returning to two hundred years ago, you’re bound to die at his hands? Oh my, how interesting, hahaha!”

Cui Xiaoxiao knew this was the Demon Pearl in her body talking to her. Although her blood restrained the Demon Pearl’s evil nature, preventing it from controlling her body to do evil, it had been nourished by the snake poison earlier and had become revitalized again. It had awakened and was leisurely chatting with her.

After saying these words, the Demon Pearl seemed to have exhausted its spiritual energy. It yawned lazily and fell back into deep sleep without speaking again.

But Cui Xiaoxiao was so shocked she couldn’t recover: What did it say? Had she returned over two hundred years ago because of that evil statue? And whose hands was she supposed to die by?

How clever was Cui Xiaoxiao? As she carefully pondered the Demon Pearl’s words while carefully recalling everything since meeting this man, she finally realized belatedly and gasped!

If this were Qilao Mountain from two hundred years ago, then the trees here hadn’t been burned by the phoenix’s heavenly fire yet.

Then this man who wielded a whip to shatter stone… wouldn’t he be the demon lord Wei Jie from back then!

That’s right! The Wei Jie of the past, who had not yet become a demon, had once come to Qilao Mountain and shattered the merit tablets of the four great sects…

The more Cui Xiaoxiao thought about it, the more her head hurt. She asked the man who had been watching her somewhat weakly, “Those people who went up the mountain earlier… who were they?”

Wei Jie said lazily, “They looked like followers of the four great sects.”

Cui Xiaoxiao ground her teeth and asked, “So… they weren’t coming to catch me at all, but were after you, weren’t they! Why didn’t you say so earlier?”

Wei Jie raised his sword-like eyebrows and said leisurely, “But Master, you are indeed beautiful, like a clear lotus in water. I didn’t know if there were any admirers of yours among so many people!”

Faced with this shameless rogue, Xiaoxiao rubbed her cheeks wearily and asked again, “What did you do to make them pursue you like this?”

The man smiled and said lazily, “I merely stole their temple-guarding Golden Cores to supplement my vital energy… Master, would you like to eat a few to calm your anger?”

After speaking, he untied his cloth pouch. Good heavens, what Cui Xiaoxiao had mistaken for glinting golden balls were all gleaming Golden Cores—he had emptied the foundations of all four great sects!

Good, now that he had explained this, Cui Xiaoxiao could match up the timeline again.

Her master’s secret texts had mentioned that before Wei Jie became famous, he was besieged by disciples of the four great sects at Qilao Mountain for stealing Golden Cores.

At that time, with his foundation still unstable, he was attacked by the crowd and knocked off the cliff, forced into the Po Hun Snake Cave. Severely injured, he fought to the death with that giant python. After being poisoned by the snake and hanging between life and death, he began his path to becoming a demon!

But now, what was this situation? Why was everything developing so differently from before?