78 Chapter 77.

(POV Chu Yue)

"One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four."

Her rhythmic clapping sounded out as she repeatedly counted out. Miss Gyoko acted as my instructor, and had me move about according to the choreography she showed me when we first began my idol training. It's been nothing but this routine practice over the past week and I'm definitely reaching my limit.

How am I supposed to survive this hellish idol training? It's a hundred times worse than cultivating. All I needed to do to cultivate was sit down and circulate the spiritual energy throughout my body and accumulate it within my dantian. Everyday I'm at the verge of collapse thanks to this ridiculous strenuous dance.

But the thing that shocked me the most was that I'd broken through several times over the last week after I performed the choreographed dance as part of my routine. I've actually become a 6th realm semi transcendent. Thanks to this, my suspicions towards Miss Gyoko only deepened by the day.

The only reason I could think of for my rapid increase in strength had to be related to her. I was under the impression she was master's wife and for reasons unknown to me she decided to aid me in my cultivation. Maybe it was secretly master who request for it. She might actually be a really good person with a big heart when I think about it.

She's clearly aware of my declaration of love towards her husband, but she's not the slightest bit perturbed and has assisted me to such a degree. It was only now I started to feel a bit guilty, she's such a good wife, yet I'm such a petty person. When I thought of how I treated little Han I wanted to cry. I really was a terrible person.

I need to take her as an example and have a bigger heart.

(POV Megumi)

This brat still dares to have idle thoughts towards my husband even when I'm giving her spartan idol training like this? The occasional blush on your cheeks and wandering eyes makes it pretty obvious who you're thinking about all the time. Out of spite I had her cultivate the most difficult dance I came across from an ancient pocket realm. I even discovered it while venturing about in the upper god realms and she's actually not dead yet? Instead she's smoothly broken through?

What the hell? Is this thanks to the fortune she's mooched off of husband? Tch. All these little lucky monsters get to break through like running water. Do you have any idea how tough it was for me as a goddess of calamity to break through at the speed I did? It was hell. I wasn't blessed like these little monstrous brats, cultivating was nothing but an uphill struggle for me back then.

You'd think my life would be smooth sailing with such a powerful father, right? But, even with such a mighty father, thanks to my constitution, uncountable unforeseen tribulations would pop up all the time.

For example, I'd be in deep cultivation and while I cultivated, a rift in space would randomly open up beneath me. Of course being the weak little girl I was back then, I'd fall in and face a backlash in my cultivation. My father was always at his wits end constantly keeping an eye on me after the first time it happened.

Then, the first time I attempted to break through to become a lower realm god, just as I was about to breakthrough, someone talked badly about me behind my back somewhere which caused me to sneeze. Yeah, it was definitely because someone talked poorly about me behind my back that I sneezed. I'm not a careless woman who sneezes for no reason at important moments.

Ehem. Anyways, thanks to that stupid sneeze, the middle god realm I was in at the time collapsed. It was an accident. Of course the laws of the realm tried to smite me out of existence after I brought harm to the weaklings from that realm, but somehow I managed to just barely escape while on the verge of death. I had dropped back down to a 1 star true god after that first failed attempt at breaking through. All those years lost really broke my heart back then.

Thanks to that event, my name became even more renowned among the middle god realms as a jinx. Because of that event, no man would touch me, not even with a twenty foot pole. Sorry I was mistaken, that would be mortal terms, in god terms it would be a pole twenty realms in distance apart. I was really treated like the plague after that. I eventually gave up on the middle god realms and started venturing about the mortal realms where there were no rumors about me floating around. I made sure to take extra caution. I only stayed at most for a month in each mortal realm. That was the limit to how long a mortal realm could withstand my presence.

When I look at this little girl who has it so easy thanks to the person who belongs to me that I worked so hard to find, I'm naturally infuriated deep down. However, because she's husband's first disciple, I can't do whatever I want to her. I can only bully her a bit every now and then and make her wish she never had to cultivate again. My objective was to make her hate cultivation to the point she gives up on her thoughts towards my husband.

At least that was what I thought initially. After spending the last week together with her I've come to find her rather cute in her mindless pursuit of strength. I had to admit, her desire to become strong enough to snatch my husband away was slightly entertaining. Her body would be sprawled on the floor everyday after sweating buckets. After practice she would always look up to me with her back to the ground with a somewhat affectionate and grateful look in her eyes.

What am I thinking? Don't be deceived by the puppy dog eyes of a deceptive little mortal child! She's definitely plotting something. Mortals are crafty, this child in particular is vicious after all.

"Practice is over."

Looking down from above the girl collapsed on the ground trying to catch her breath I decided to show a bit of kindness.

"Isn't it time for your shift at the construction site?"

Aren't I kind in reminding her of her shift at the construction site? I'm a bit moved by how thoughtful I am. It's not like I enjoy that look of agony whenever she here's the word construction site after her practice or anything. I'm a woman with a big heart after all. Huhuhu.

"Can I just skip that today?"

"You were given a chance at a stable job thanks to my recommendation, are you trying to smear my good name by ditching work?"

"Haaah. Fine. I get it, I get it. I just need to go, right?"

Once she resigned herself to her fate, she got up and walked out the door.

(POV Chu Yue)

This really is hell after all. After practicing to death, I'm forced to do manual labor to help build up my stamina. Although I'm a cultivator and have attained a certain level of strength, I've basically lived as a shut in all my life. One might have strength, but not necessarily have stamina. I'm the perfect example of such a case.

According to Miss Gyoko, idols are monsters that don't know exhaustion. They apparently have boundless stamina and carry the weight of countless dreams on their back. Thus, after practicing the choreography every day for ten hours straight, I head to the construction site for a six hour shift as a part timer Monday through Friday. After that, all I've got time for is sleep.

The only good thing about everything is, I can tell my strength has been visibly increasing by the day. The combination of dance along with heavy labour has surprisingly worked rather well in tandem.

The dance allows my moves to appear more graceful and dignified while the heavy labour has allowed me to improve my balance and stamina.

Luckily for me, tomorrow is finally a rest day. I actually have the full day off to myself. I can't wait to slack off and do nothing.

…

"Rise and shine little idol in training."

"Mmm mmm."

"Don't try shaking your head and pretending to still be asleep."

"It's my day off, why are you here?"

After a long day of work at the construction site I finally dragged my lifeless body back to the apartment I was staying in. I fell asleep as soon as I hit the bed. Did I sleep for two days or something? With squinted eyes I examined the alarm clock and... it was still my day off. It was 5 freaking AM the same day I fell asleep. I got back at 1 AM today. Are you kidding me?! Can you not let the once a NEET idol sleep in peace?

"Tch. It's still my day off, why did you wake me up?"

"What are you talking about? Today you may not have any dance practice, but you do have vocals practice starting today."

No way!

Of course I was suspicious of her and asked,"are you actually the devil?"

Miss Gyoko just flashed a beautiful smile towards me like she were casually sentencing me to my death. She neither acknowledged or denied anything, but still sent shivers down my back.

"Oh, today I'll be having you practice vocals completely opposite to what you sang during your audition."

"Opposite? How so?"

Miss Gyoko pulled out her smartphone and played a song recording. It started off with a techno soundtrack with a heavy scream shortly after before an electronic voice sounded out.

I was a bit surprised at first by the unexpected scream out of nowhere, but it was still sounded alright. "It's actually pretty catchy, what's it called?"

"I'm glad you like it, it's called 'C*ase the Light! by F*ar, and Loathing in Las Vegas'"

Of course, I may have voiced my opinion too soon. I thought the first scream at the beginning was a one off, but after a while it came back many… many times. Then the words that followed from Miss Gyoko felt like the grim reaper had sentenced me to death.

"You'll be practicing the death metal screams in the song in preparation for your upcoming gig."

"What? No way! No way! There is no way a frail little girl like me can sing like that!"

"What are you talking about? If you're going to make it in this business, you need to be an all rounder. You need to make an impact. People like different and new things."

"They may like different and new things, but isn't this going too far? There should be limits, right?"

"Showbiz is a dog eat dog world little Chu Yue. In fact, your scheduled debut performance is at a venue where death metal is the main genre. You're going to hit them with two different extremes. The first will be with your graceful dance combined with domineering death metal."

"..."

Her wordless smile at my fearful silence really made me think she had some sort of grudge against me. Well, she probably does have reason to have a grudge, right?

"You're kidding, right? My debut performance is really going to be that?"

"Yes, so start practicing."

"Can I quit?"

"No."

"Waaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhh."

"What the hell was that high pitched girly waile? That's not even close! Is this a joke to you? You need to get your voice to sound scratchy. The complete opposite of your crystal clear voice. If you need a visual, try imagining you're a pregnant woman giving birth."

"Is that how pregnant women sound when giving birth?"

"Yeah… probably?"

Can you please try to at least hide the laughter in your eyes and say that with a straight face?

I started visualizing myself in a lot of pain and trying to vent that pain through a scream. Imagine it, you are a pregnant woman. A pregnant woman. Yes, I am pregnant.

"WaAaAaAahHhHhHhHh!"

Ah, I did it.

"Good, now try that while performing the choreography you've been practicing. Also make sure to flash your best smile while doing it."

This is so embarrassing. Will I really be able to win master's heart like this?

I reluctantly dragged myself off of the bed and and performed a graceful dance while letting out death metal screams all while in the comfort of my apartment. There were occasional knocking sounds from the walls, but I chose to ignore it. If I have to suffer this humiliation, let my neighbors suffer along with me in agony.

"Pfft."

"Don't laugh! You're actually enjoying this, aren't you?"

Although I was complaining, strangely enough I noticed my cultivation base was rotating on its own more than what was normal for performing this dance. Was this the result of the added death metal screams? Could it be there was actually some sort of deep reason to choosing death metal screams? I looked towards Miss Gyoko, but she had eyes that were even more surprised than mine.

What? So you were just messing with me and this was an accidental result? Or are you trying to make me think it was accidental?

"Tch."

Eh? Did she just click her tongue?

My natural response to her was, "WaAaAaAahHhHhHhHh!" since I didn't want to stop and lose out on a good thing. I really wanted to cry, this was so far off from the image of the prim and proper figure of a lady I wished to be.

However, when I realized it was beneficial to my cultivation, I continued to scream along to the death metal screams throughout the song. By the end of the song I had actually broken through to become a 7th realm semi transcendent.

Even if it were something she hadn't planned for initially, Miss Gyoko definitely was amazing. Even her random ideas lead to amazing results.

"Miss Gyoko, thank you. I will keep practicing on my own."

"Right. Oh, by the way, your first performance is in four days. Make sure you practice hard."

"Four days?! Isn't that way too soon?! Will I even be ready in time?"

"It's not too soon at all. In fact, I wish it were sooner. Don't worry about it, you just need to dance and scream out to your heart's content. Everything else will be handled by the band playing in the background and autotune. You'll be the center of all attention with your screams though, so try not to choke. Pfft."

Pfft?! Pfft?! She definitely just wants to get a kick out of watching a little girl like me screaming her lungs out on stage.

I'll definitely show her. I swear I will.

"Anyways, good luck with practicing. You don't really need me supervising you for something easy like this. I'll be looking forward to your performance in four days."

With those parting words, she walked out the door to my room and I was left alone again.

Seeing as I was alone again I naturally continued to practice hard. Don't be deceived by my face planted firmly against a pillow or the blanket covering my body that was curled up into a ball hugging a hug pillow. I was practicing very hard right now on methods to fall back asleep and enjoy my day of rest. It's an idols job to make sure she is well rested. I read that online somewhere. I'm just following those instructions, this is all part of practice.

Don't worry there is some very intense mental training occuring in my head right now. That's also another form of training.

After ten minutes of my diligent practice I fell back to sleep peacefully. It was like the earlier death metal screaming was just an illusion.

That was of course until ten minutes spent in dreamland I was awoken by an earthquake.

(POV Megumi)

You've got to be kidding me. Why did death metal screams improve the cultivation technique and let her breakthrough again? This is a load of bull. Is this little girl actually more ridiculous than my husband and little Han put together?

Why did I never stumble upon any dog shit luck like them in my cultivation? Ah! I'm so pissed I want to scream.

"WaAaAaAahHhHhHhHh!"

Ah, I actually feel a bit better. I suddenly wondered, could this really be incorporated into cultivation techniques? When I pictured a group of female cultivators lined up in rows blurting out death metal screams, a terrifying chill ran down my back. Wouldn't that be a bit too scary?

Imagine while they are sparring, instead of announcing the names of their moves and letting out a battle shout, they let out a death metal scream instead. Just thinking about a death metal scream of "Falling sky decimating eaAaAaAaAaArRrRrtTtThHhHh!" somehow felt... actually it somehow felt right, didn't it?

It wasn't until now I noticed the aftermath of my casual death metal scream. I was already fairly far away from Chu Yue's apartment, but there was a large crater extending outwards like a fan in front of me with a collapsed building at the edge of the crater. Without realizing it, I accidentally caused a small earthquake and left this building in ruins as evidence of my crime.

I started to break out into an uncontrollable sweat and I quickly scanned the building. Thankfully it was abandoned and no one was inside. I really should be more careful. That was close, I'd rather not face backlash from the laws governing over the realms again.

Seriously, being a goddess of calamity is the worst. Every time I make a mess in a lower or middle realm I need to flee for my life to another realm. The number of times I've almost died is really uncountable.

If I just stuck around in the upper realms, it wouldn't be an issue if I killed someone, but in lower realms like this mortal realm, there wasn't much I could do about the stupid laws that prevented harm towards the weak.

Oh well, it was just a small earthquake, it's not like I accidentally destroyed the realm or anything this time.