The pearl shot into her body, transforming into a wisp of smoke and leaving nothing behind.

Zanxing reached up to touch her chest, feeling a small warm spot at her heart, like being warmed by a stove in winter, but it wasn’t uncomfortable.

This was probably the treasure recognizing its master.

In all cultivation power fantasy novels, when the protagonist’s drop of blood fell on a treasure, the treasure would immediately awaken its spiritual intelligence, recognize its master, and form an unbreakable bond. Then it would take the protagonist through heaven and earth like the most loyal lover, opening the door to a new world.

This pearl was the same.

However, right now, the most important thing was how to leave this place.

In the original plot, after the male protagonist obtained the Xiaoyuan Pearl, he cultivated underwater. Since it was an old novel she’d read several years ago, and Zanxing had read dozens of cultivation novels afterward, she had long forgotten most of the plot, let alone such detailed descriptions. In any case, the male protagonist performed a series of fierce operations, had “flashes of inspiration” and “sudden realizations,” leveled up three times in a row, and seemed to have found the exit. But now… Zanxing looked at her hands. Apart from the pearl that generated heat at her heart, nothing seemed different.

She tried pressing her hand against the cave wall, gathering qi in her dantian, shouting “Ha!” and striking the cave wall with her palm.

The cave wall dropped a few tiny grains of sand, and Zanxing cried out in pain, looking at her instantly reddened palm, realizing she had thought too simply.

Novels were all lies—this path wouldn’t work.

She stood up and remained quiet for a while, feeling what seemed like a slight cool breeze coming from somewhere ahead.

Wind?

The only source of light in this cave was overhead, with cave walls on all four sides. Where could the wind be coming from?

Zanxing paused for a moment. She didn’t know if it was because of the Xiaoyuan Pearl, but the wind blowing toward her gradually became more obvious, seeming to form a long line. As long as she followed the line, she could find its source.

She stood up and slowly moved in the direction from which the wind was blowing.

She didn’t know how long she had walked, but just when she thought this darkness would never end, a point of light suddenly appeared before her eyes. Unlike the weak, distant light from overhead, this point of light was accompanied by the sound of water.

A crack appeared in the cave wall not far away. The crack was just a flat line, barely wide enough for one person to pass through. Zanxing hesitated for a moment before walking forward. She didn’t rashly crawl out first, but just pressed against the crack and looked outside through the fissure.

An endless curtain of water, with the sound of waterfalls crashing into water and splashing overhead. Looking up, she could vaguely see the shadows of mountain peaks. Zanxing’s heart leaped with joy. Not caring about the unscientific setting of why water wouldn’t flow through the stone crack, she understood only one thing: outside was the water ravine. As long as she went out from here and swam up, she would reach the shore.

She had just tentatively extended one leg when a black shadow suddenly appeared in the previously calm water curtain. This shadow was neither particularly large nor small—about the size of a bull—but had no distinct shape, just a vague, flat mass. It looked somewhat like television static when there was no signal, or like an ant colony formed by countless black ants.

Anyone with trypophobia would die on the spot from looking at it.

Zanxing retracted her leg with lightning speed, suddenly remembering that in the original story at this point, the male protagonist still had one final step before reaching shore: killing that damned demon beast.

The “Yu” is hidden in this water ravine, beneath the calm stream.

Yu, also called short fox, could hold sand in its mouth to shoot at people. Those hit would experience muscle spasms, headaches, fever, and in severe cases, death. The idiom “innuendo” (literally “holding sand to shoot shadows”) originated from this very creature. This thing liked to hide in water, and no one had ever clearly seen its true appearance. Now Zanxing could see it clearly—it looked like it had been pixelated, nothing worth seeing.

So the question was: did she, a delicate woman, really have to fight hand-to-hand with this pixelated mass underwater? Moreover, this pixelated thing was a ranged mage! This wasn’t difficult mode—this was hell mode!

Zanxing plopped down on the ground, suddenly feeling the road ahead was vast and uncertain.

Staying here had no danger, but she would starve to death eventually—she couldn’t eat dirt. Going out, that pixelated mass was watching menacingly outside, ready with its innuendo attacks. This wasn’t a cultivation novel—this was a survival novel!

“Calm down, Yang Zanxing.” She took a deep breath, forcing herself to recall the plot. The male protagonist Mu Cengxiao, after obtaining the Xiaoyuan Pearl here, began cultivating. He had a special constitution—though he hadn’t broken through to Foundation Establishment before, his vital energy had been accumulating in his body. The Xiaoyuan Pearl broke through the shackles of his constitution, allowing all the vital energy accumulated over the years to flow into his meridians, instantly leveling up several times from early Refining Qi Stage straight to late Foundation Establishment, just one step away from Golden Core.

The upgraded male protagonist successfully killed the demon beast and returned to shore.

The prerequisite for killing the demon beast was having sufficient cultivation. Did she also need to cultivate here?

Zanxing still remembered that in the original story, this female cannon fodder with the same name as her had very low cultivation. Her existence seemed only to serve as a foil for Liu Yunxin’s kindness and tolerance, and to help establish stable hatred between cannon fodder Wang Shao and male protagonist Mu Cengxiao. Regarding “Miss Yang,” the original story described more of her beauty, arrogance, and vicious heart, while her cultivation level was glossed over in passing.

But thinking about it, it couldn’t have been particularly outstanding.

However, the current “Miss Yang” had become Yang Zanxing. Corporate slave Yang Zanxing from modern society didn’t even know how to cultivate, let alone try fitness. If she had to mention any related exercise, it would trace back to the tai chi exercises in middle school PE class.

How did people cultivate in novels… Zanxing racked her brains for a long time before finally sitting up straight, copying what she’d seen.

The first step should be entering seclusion for meditation… right?

Sitting cross-legged, relaxing her body, what was the second step… she didn’t know. Then, like yoga, close her eyes to focus, empty her mind, and regulate her breathing.

Deep breathing, inhale, exhale—

Perhaps because she hadn’t stopped moving since transmigrating, Zanxing felt extremely tired the moment she relaxed. As if she were about to fall into a deep sleep, her spirit gradually relaxed. She felt as if her entire being was floating in the air, her body becoming extraordinarily light. Though clearly in a dry sand cave, it felt as if water was slowly flowing through her body, perfectly warm. The water flow also seemed to breathe, like fish gills, swallowing and exhaling air in rhythmic contractions.

The closed-eyed Zanxing didn’t see that from her heart, a faint golden light was emanating. From the water curtain outside, countless light beams like flowing water gradually appeared, as if attracted by the Xiaoyuan Pearl, sweeping in through the stone cracks and silently drilling into the body of the meditating Zanxing.

If any cultivator had been present, they would have immediately recognized this as refining essence into qi, refining qi into spirit. This young woman, whose cultivation had originally been negligible, was breaking through Qi Transformation in this short time, then advancing to Spirit Transformation. It looked like she was about to enter the Foundation Establishment stage.