Chapter 29: Backdoor?

Upon reaching the eating location, Fu Li realized Zhang Ke was also present. The two people had ordered many dishes for Fu Li; the entire table was covered in all sorts of dishes, from fried to steamed to stewed.

“Senior, please sit,” Zhang Ke stood up and poured a drink for Fu Li. “The combat test is in the afternoon, so I didn’t prepare any wine for you. This is freshly squeezed fruit juice. It’s quite tasty, give it a try.”

“Many thanks,” Fu Li took the cup and drank a mouth. The juice was sweet, tasty, and even contained a hint of spiritual qi.

“This is a restaurant specially for the cultivation world, it only receives customers from the cultivation world,” Zhang Ke knew that Fu Li didn’t have a very robust understanding of the cultivation world and thus informed Fu Li of the sects within the cultivation world. “The Fields Sect manages this restaurant. Their sect is very fond of planting things. Whether its flowers, grass, or vegetables, there isn’t anything they can’t grow, only something that we can’t think of. A while back, one of their sect’s juniors ran over to Africa for vacation and planted a huge heap of cucumbers out of boredom. In the end, this matter was discovered by a reporter and made it onto the news.”

“It’s possible to get on the news by planting cucumbers?” Fu Li didn’t quite understand. Didn’t the humans of this country rely mainly on agriculture?

“The people nowadays are all idle. Planting cucumbers in Africa can be considered a novel affair.” Zhang Ke didn’t know what Fu Li’s original form was, so out of fear of violating a taboo, he held up a bowl of beef soup. “Senior, do you eat beef?”

Fu Li nodded. “I don’t really have foods I abstain from.”

A spoon of the exceedingly tasty beef soup entered his stomach. There was no foul smell, only a fresh aroma. Seeing that Chu Yu wasn’t drinking, Fu Li asked, “Why aren’t you drinking?”

Chu Yu shook his head. “Benefactor may not have known, but I transformed after obtaining the Fate of the Dao, so I can’t consume beef.” The cow was of extremely lofty status in Daoism, so no Daoist cultivator would consume beef.

Fu Li was struck by sudden understanding. It turned out that he was a Daoist fish. It was no wonder his scent was so pure, and even had several strands of virtue mixed in.

After their meal, Fu Li rested for half an hour in the company of Zhang Ke and Chu Yu before returning to the bureau. Using his examination number on the bulletin board as a guide, he found the exam venue he should be going to.

Under the guise of a biotechnology company, the management bureau didn’t seem to occupy much space, but in actual fact, it contained a Qiankun within. The moment the examinees entered the formation, they found scores of combat stages lined up inside. The moment they stepped into their corresponding exam room, the formation in the exam room would automatically transport them to different combat stages.

Fu Li’s first opponent was a monkey spirit with a head of yellow hair. He had just made his move when the monkey collapsed on the ground. He glanced at his own palm, wondering if he would be suspected of bullying a child.

Afterwards, Fu Li defeated a peacock yao, tiger yao, bear yao, pigeon yao, chicken yao, an unknown yao belonging to the bird species, a donkey yao, and so on. The fact that every fight was won by him with ease made Fu Li doubt the overall level of this era’s yao cultivators.

He thought of a proverb spoken in the human realm – in the absence of a tiger in the mountain, the monkey would be named king. In his current situation, he was possibly the monkey.

It wasn’t him who was powerful, but the modern yao cultivators who were too disappointing.

During his tenth fight, Fu Li’s opponent was a crested ibis. He had seen on news broadcasts that this type of bird was a national endangered animal. Hence, regardless of the fact that this crested ibis was covered from head to toe in sturdy muscle, Fu Li only defended and didn’t go on the offense in fear of harming this endangered animal.

The crested ibis’ attacks didn’t hit its target, putting it in such anger that it violently struck the ground with the meteor hammer in its hand. The crested ibis placed a hand on its hips and swore at Fu Li, “You who’s obstructing this Laozi, what exactly is the meaning of this? You’re messing around with Laozi?”

Fu Li thought, it seemed this crested ibis had once stayed in Sichuan. But the news broadcasts had never once mentioned that Sichuan was a suitable place for a crested ibis to live in.

“F*ck your ancestors’ coffins, Laozi isn’t going to continue playing around with you,” The crested ibis spat at Fu Li. “Fool, if Laozi ever meets you outside, I’ll definitely put you in a whole world of pain.”

Fu Li, “…”

Did all endangered animals have such explosive tempers?

The crested ibis angrily conceded defeat and Fu Li continued his fight with the next opponent. According to the competition regulations, one would be able to enter the next round as long as they won twenty rounds within the stipulated time.

“Captain Ning Xuan,” A bureau worker walked in with an A4 paper in his hands and a somewhat complicated expression on his face. “A crested ibis yao reported his opponent for intentionally humiliating him during their battle.”

The crested ibis could be considered a known creature in the cultivation world. It was said that his race had nearly been exterminated in the earlier years. After that, who knew what kind of dog sh*t luck they had, but they were upheld as a k2018;national treasure’ by the humans. As a result, they became a rarity to be treasured in the next instant. As the only crested ibis yao in the cultivation world, this extremely irascible yao directly gave himself the name of Crested Ibis. A few years ago, Crested Ibis deliberately hid inside the house of a yaoguai who had offended him and then reported the yaoguai to the human police for illegal capturing of crested ibis.

In the end, this yaoguai had no choice but to be powerlessly led off by the police and then sentenced to several years of jail. At this moment, the yaoguai was still squatting in the human prison.

“There’s someone who actually dares to provoke him,” At the side, curiosity could be seen on Chao Yun’s face. “I respect him for being a man with a sense of justice. Who is the person who’s so fearless?”

“Examinee number 1356.” The worker said in a low voice, “I heard Captain Chu Yu say that this examinee number 1356 saved his life.”

“Then ignore him. These few years, the crested ibis has been using the label of ‘national treasure’ as a symbol of authority to do many yao-infuriating things. Let the examinees play among themselves, we won’t care about them,” Chao Yun drank a mouthful of water. “With that petty character of his, he’ll suffer losses sooner or later.”

Narrow-minded, overly-jealous, and vengeful – this crested ibis was practically the cultivation world’s most outrageous creature.

The crested ibis saw that the panda, who was similarly a national treasure, received more favor from the humans than him. Thus, he learnt how to speak in a Sichuan accent just like the panda, as if doing so would make him that much more noble. Hadn’t he thought to consider if the panda’s ability to speak in the Sichuan accent was the reason why it was favored by humans?

It was clearly because the humans liked how fat the panda was! The fatter the panda, the more the humans loved them to an unfathomable degree. The humans even tamped down their conscience and called pandas who were peeing and pooping cute. Who knew what was wrong with these humans?

Fu Li won twenty rounds consecutively. When he left the combat venue, he noticed many cultivators crowding outside the exam venue. He stood on tiptoe and glanced over. Wasn’t that noisy and verbally abusive yaoguai in the crowd the bad-tempered crested ibis? Did someone provoke him again?

“Brother!” The extremely noisy green-haired yao from the afternoon squeezed out of the crowd. He patted Fu Li on the shoulder enthusiastically. “You also lost too many rounds and decided to just withdraw?”

Fu Li blinked. He looked at the top of the green-haired yao’s head; he seemed to be missing a tuft of hair.

“Hey!” The green-haired yao noticed Fu Li’s gaze and smiled with some embarrassment. “I encountered a hen spirit just now who grabbed my feathers the moment the fight started. Too savage.”

Fu Li shot a sympathetic glance at him. That really was quite pitiful.

“You’re also watching the excitement surrounding the crested ibis?” The green-feathered parrot yao saw that Fu Li was interested in the drama the crested ibis was kicking up and started to summarize the outrageous acts the crested ibis had committed the past few years. “Guess what he’s kicking a fuss about this time?”

“What?” Fu Li was stupefied by the green-haired yao’s summary. It was his first time realizing that yaoguai could actually survive in such shameless ways. If this were the past, he would probably have been killed by some great yao in one slap?

The times were good; all these yaoguai had been spoiled.

“He lost to someone else in a fight yet insists that the person was humiliating him. He’s been making a fuss here for almost half an hour,” The green-feathered yao spoke in a slightly sour tone of voice. “We all belong to the bird species, and the colors of my feathers are so much brighter than his. Who knows where he gets the confidence that he’s a higher-class bird? Just because he’s called a national treasure by the humans, he really thinks he’s a national treasure? The real national treasure, the panda, doesn’t even act the way he does.”

Fu Li was silent. The examinee that the crested ibis made a commotion about wanting to report couldn’t be him, right?

“You!” The crested ibis suddenly rushed out of the crowd and grabbed the lapel of Fu Li’s clothes. “It’s you. Follow me to see the bureau’s staff member, I want to report you.”

The crested ibis was so annoyed that he stopped speaking with a Sichuan accent. Smooth standard Mandarin let slip from his mouth.

Fu Li looked down at the tightly gripped lapel. In the yao world, this sort of behavior was called ‘provocation’. As he listened to the crested ibis’ unending jabbering, Fu Li turned his head, wanting to ask the green-haired yao if all bird yao were this noisy.

However, when he shifted his gaze, the green-haired yao had already retreated back into the crowd, his demeanor entirely as if he ‘didn’t recognize’ him.

It was then that Fu Li understood. It turned out that the bird yao these day not only had low cultivation and were noisy but were also very skilled at adapting to the situation. Compared to these bird yao, Fu Li felt that the sparrow yao at the entrance of his cave dwelling was much more reliable, despite the fact that it constantly churned out a bunch of ugly and useless items.

“Can you release my clothes before we continue this conversation?” Fu Li sighed helplessly. “This set of clothes is newly bought; the tags are still on it.” He had specially bought these new clothes for this exam.

“Then tell me honestly why you only defended and didn’t attack. Is it because you look down on me and deliberately wanted to taunt me?” The crested ibis’ voice was a little shrill. Unable to stand this sort of voice, the little yao at the side covered their ears and retreated a few meters.

“I was afraid that my attack would cause your feathers to fall out,” Fu Li replied seriously. “According to our country’s endangered species law, you are an endangered animal in our country. I don’t want to violate the law.”

“Don’t talk big in front of Laozi. What endangered species law are you talking about in the yao world? If you have the ability, let me see the feathers falling out. Bragging without taking any responsibility; aren’t you scared of it backfiring!”

The crested ibis had just finished speaking when he felt something swat him. When he landed on the ground, he was still somewhat dazed.

Several strands of hair dropped off his head and floated to the ground, transforming into blackish-red feathers.

Fu Li walked to the crested ibis and picked up the fallen feathers on the ground. Squatting, he held them out towards the crested ibis. “Look, haven’t they fallen out now?”

He stuffed the feathers into the crested ibis’ hand before standing up and tugging at the slightly wrinkled lapel of his clothes. Shaking his head, he sighed, “It’s my first time encountering such a silly yaoguai who voluntarily asked to be hit by other yao.”

The crested ibis lay slumped on the ground and watched Fu Li slowly walk into the distance. He was unable to get up even after half a day had passed.

“I-I’ll f*ck your ancestors’ coffins.”

“Brother, brother,” The green-haired yao caught up to Fu Li. “Our encounter is fated. It’s almost time for dinner, let me treat you to authentic Hong Kong healthy hotpot. It’s particularly tasty.”

Fu Li looked at the electronic display screen on the wall and shook his head. “I can’t go.”

The green-haired yao thought that Fu Li was disappointed by his failure and thus patted his shoulder, saying consolingly, “Brother, be a bit more open-minded. It’s normal to be unable to join the management bureau. Succeeding means you have both luck and virtue. What’s more, you might not have joined the bureau, but you’re on good terms with the bigshots inside. In our yao world, you would be considered a yao with connections.”

Which was why he wanted to hug the thigh of this yao with connections. It would be a task of herculean difficulty if he attempted to build a relationship with the management bureau now.

“That’s not it, I still need to participate in the next stage of the competition,” Fu Li pointed at the large screen. “It’s starting in half an hour.”

The green-haired yao, “…”

This person who walked through the backdoor was someone with strength!

“Big brother, I’ll treat you to drinks!” The green-haired yao’s attitude became even more cordial as he jogged out.

In the short span of half a day, the green-haired yao’s way of addressing Fu Li changed from brother to big brother. The pace of this development could even be termed incredible.

The next stage of the competition was a mass battle with only fifty spots for advancement.

Perhaps Fu Li’s action of slapping the crested ibis had etched itself too deeply in the hearts of the yao, but when the mass battle commenced, almost no yao took the initiative to challenge Fu Li. Even at the end of the competition, his position hadn’t changed much.

“The second stage of the competition has ended, the third stage will commence in an hour’s time,” Chao Yun appeared on the combat stage.

A few yao cultivators who had attained spots for the third stage of the competition complained upon hearing Chao Yun’s words, “One hour isn’t enough for us to regain our strength, how are we supposed to compete later?”

“The evil yao you will need to catch won’t give you an hour’s time to rest,” Chao Yun laughed coldly. “If you want to join the management bureau, you had better be mentally prepared to fight to the death with evil spirits at any time. If you can’t even endure a competition at this level of intensity, you had better withdraw from the competition sooner rather than later. That way, you can avoid losing your life for some obscure reason when facing evil spirits.”

Cultivators who had obtained the fifty spots didn’t dare to utter any more complaints after hearing Chao Yun’s remarks. They saluted Chao Yuan respectfully before leaving the combat stage.

Chao Yun cocked her head slightly, her gaze landing on the yao cultivator who was walking right at the back. Since the start of the second round of the competition, her attention had always remained on the stage, so she had realized that this yao cultivator hadn’t attacked much from start to end. The other cultivators didn’t seem to dare to provoke him either.

Turning, she headed back to the refereeing counter. Chao Yun flipped through the examinees’ registration information and found the examinee’s information. Her gaze swept across the information.

“Fu Li?”

This name was not bad.

“Chao Yun,” Chu Yu drifted over. “Is there anyone outstanding in this batch of examinees?”

Chao Yun was preoccupied with looking through the information and didn’t have the inclination to answer Chu Yu’s question. Just as she was about to answer half-heartedly, she saw Zhuang Qing standing behind him. Her expression became a bit more solemn. “There are a few good candidates this year. The more interesting one is an examinee called Fu Li. Almost no yao cultivators dared to pick him as an opponent on the combat stage.” She stood up and picked out Fu Li’s information, passing it to Zhuang Qin.

“I suspect he has more than three thousand years’ worth of cultivation, since neither me, Ning Xuan, nor the other colleagues can make out his original form.”

Zhuang Qing took the registration form filled in by the examinee himself and glanced at the crooked letters written on it. He handed the form back to Chao Yun. “En.”

What did ‘en’ mean?

Chao Yun carefully ran her eyes over the form once again and saw the examinee’s number at the corner of the form.

1356?

Wasn’t this Chu Yu’s benefactor?

Chao Yun raised her head and looked at Chu Yu somewhat suspiciously, “Chu Yu, you didn’t use your authority to open the backdoor for this examinee, right?”

“Even if you want to insult me, don’t insult my benefactor. Is he the kind of person who needs to go through the backdoor?” Chu Yu was furious.

“Who knows…”

“He won’t,” Zhuang Qing interrupted Chao Yun. “He doesn’t need to.”

T/N: As someone guilty of cooing over cute pandas, I’m feeling a strange sense of embarrassment >.>