Chapter 331: Heal

Chapter 331: Healing

Ji Xiuyun: "..."

Under the Guide's icy gaze, he forcibly swallowed the rest of his twisted, slanderous words and quickly cut to the chase: "Anyway, Qi Yi isn’t very likable. We all can't stand him."

After speaking, Ji Xiuyun mentally kicked himself.

This was supposed to be a carefully crafted conversation to build rapport, but instead of bringing them closer, it seemed to have pushed them further apart.

Offending a high-status Guide within the White Tower’s jurisdiction was anything but amusing.

Lu Liu: "..."

The system angrily poked at the cake, thinking to itself, "Why isn’t he following the script?"

Ji Xiuyun still had a whole chunk of lines left unspoken, and he himself had a few lines yet to deliver.

Without these lines, how could the plot proceed?

Thus, Ji Xiuyun noticed the atmosphere suddenly grow colder.

The Guide across from him lowered his gaze, the afternoon tea and cake laid out before him, but the Guide was clearly distracted, absentmindedly poking at the cake as if stewing in silent frustration.

Ji Xiuyun: "...Lord Lu Liu? Are you alright?"

With the plot derailed, Lu Liu had little interest left. He robotically delivered the final line of the afternoon tea script: "I’m fine. Leave me your light brain ID—let’s add each other as contacts."

In the original plot, the protagonist had been quite pleased with Ji Xiuyun, this observant Sentinel, and had considered furthering their relationship. Meanwhile, Ji Xiuyun intended to use this opportunity to probe for Qi Yi’s whereabouts, waiting for a chance to infiltrate the White Tower and retrieve him. The two were perfectly aligned.

And Lu Liu still needed to "unintentionally" leak internal White Tower information to the Sentinel through their light brain, making it easier for them to rescue Qi Yi.

Ji Xiuyun’s eyebrow jumped, clearly surprised that despite the conversation falling apart, the Guide was still willing to add him. Nevertheless, he smiled: "Of course, it would be my honor."

They tapped their light brain bracelets together, adding each other as contacts.

Then, the afternoon tea came to an end, and it was time to part ways. The Guides left arm-in-arm with their favored Sentinels, ready for a night of partying, while Lu Liu stood up and walked alone toward the exit.

Ji Xiuyun glanced back at him.

The Guide moved against the crowd, his figure disappearing into the depths of the White Tower, his back looking cold and alone.

Ji Xiuyun thought to himself, "Weird."

He lowered his eyes and sent a message to his companions: "Change of plans. Successfully added the Guide’s light brain, but couldn’t get Qi Yi’s location. Pressing further now would be too obvious—I’ll try again later."

*

Back in his quarters, the ostensibly aloof Guide opened a group chat and rapid-fire posted hundreds of messages in one go.

"Anyone else have this problem? Worst luck ever."

"I was dutifully following the plot, and then I ran into this really strange NPC. Couldn't figure him out."

"Everything was going fine, and then out of nowhere, he just stopped saying his lines! I didn’t even get to finish half of mine!"

"So annoying!"

The group responded with both sympathy and teasing. Xie Yu, who was walking home with Shen Ci after their stroll, kissed his wife on the cheek before typing, "By the way, Lu Liu, have you picked tomorrow’s movie yet?"

"Yep." Lu Liu sent a thumbs-up emoji. "Don’t worry, I’ve got plenty of awful movies lined up. But honestly, compared to bad movies, there’s something else I’m more worried about right now."

Xie Yu took a sip of coffee from his wife's hand and asked, "What?"

"It's just that playing bad movies in the Spirit Sea isn't enough," Lu Liu typed in frustration. "I might have to do something to his body too."

"Pfft—"

Xie Yu spat his coffee onto the floor.

He took the tissue Shen Ci handed him, coughing while typing with difficulty, "Dude, listen to me, watch your wording."

Lu Liu sent a [scoffing emoji]. "I meant it literally. What are you thinking?"

The original possessor was never a patient person. He had invaded the Sentinel's Spirit Sea, gone through great effort to plant mental implants, yet in the following days, the Sentinel showed no reaction at all. He remained hanging on the punishment rack, head lowered like a lifeless doll.

Lu Liu didn’t enjoy tormenting puppets. He ran out of patience and wanted something with immediate results.

He wanted Qi Yi to grovel and beg for forgiveness, to admit how wrong he had been to walk away all those years ago. He wanted Qi Yi to kowtow and humble himself, just like all those other Sentinels who had once fawned over him.

Lu Liu: "Basically, for the later plot, we need both the soul and the body—a two-pronged approach."

Everyone in the group chat: "..."

As Lu Liu's first Host, Xie Yu hesitated before typing, "Wait, with so many people in this group, has no one taught 66 proper language? My Chinese isn’t great, but isn’t there at least one cultured person here?"

Xiao Shao rolled his eyes [eye-roll emoji] in restraint. "Your culture is the issue here. Don’t drag us into it."

He paused, then added with dignity, "My wife was a top-tier Scholar (Tanhua)."

Xie Yu: "?"

He replied coolly, "What does that have to do with you? My wife is a straight-A student too. A wife’s achievements have nothing to do with one’s own illiteracy."

Jiang Xun chimed in with equal dignity: "Fancy that, my husband was also a top-tier Scholar (Zhuangyuan)."

Xiao Shao: "(Handshake)(Handshake) He scored top-tier again in later exams."

The rest of the group: "..."

Since several of the Hosts had strong personalities—the type to provoke chaos and stir the pot in any situation—Lu Liu worried things might spiral out of control if left unchecked. He quickly interjected, "So, what I’m asking is, are there any methods that affect the body but aren’t too harmful?"

He @'d Xiao Shao and Jiang Xun, adding a [curious peek emoji]: "Your Highnesses, any ideas?"

Xiao Shao shrugged. "I only know methods that affect the body and are extremely harmful. After all, the feudal period lacked humanitarianism."

Ye Wang: "...And you’re aware of feudalism and humanitarianism?"

After a few days, they had roughly figured out each other’s backgrounds.

Jiang Xun raised a hand: "That was me. Xiao Shao said he wanted to study modern materials to learn advanced theories, so I sent him a bunch of Marxist theory and political ideology materials."

The two emperors had much in common.

The rest of the group: "."

Jiang Xun replied, "Sorry, 66, I really don’t remember. It’s been three reincarnations—I only used those things in the first one."

The modern-day members had even fewer ideas.

Bai Yu, who had been silent for a while, suddenly popped up: "@Lu Liu, does your target have any injuries on his back?"

Lu Liu paused: "Yes, and quite deep."

Before Lu Liu arrived, there had already been a round of interrogation. He had seen Qi Yi's back, which bore deep wounds that hadn't healed due to the suppression collar, still bleeding steadily.

Bai Yu: "I'll show you how to stitch."

Lu Liu: "!"

A genius! The second one after Xie Yu!

Qi Yi was suspended and couldn't see his own back. Stitches hurt but don’t cause real harm—once the stitches were removed, who would know what he had done?

Lu Liu updated Bai Yu’s label from "Bai Yu - Low Tier" to "Bai Yu - Low Tier - Genius 2."

Bai Yu: "You're a system yourself. Just locate the points—easy to learn. Just remember..."

After silently studying for two days, Lu Liu practiced on two chickens.

During this time, Ji Xiuyun reached out twice through the neural link. But since they hadn't indulged in romantic encounters like the original host, and the guide showed no signs of infatuation, Ji Xiuyun didn't dare ask directly as in the original plot. Instead, he circled around with meaningless greetings like "Good morning," "Good night," "Have you eaten?" or "Slept well?" to pretend to bond.

Lu Liu was pissed.

—If you won’t follow the damn script, why bother? He was busy practicing sutures—who had time for small talk?

His frustration with NPCs who strayed from the plot reached its peak, as if venting all the rage from every disobedient host before.

Lu Liu: "Don't bother me if it's nothing. I'm not interested. Signing off."

Perfectly embodying the haughty arrogance of high-tier guides.

Ji Xiuyun shrunk back, too scared to reply, and immediately logged off.

Over these two days, Lu Liu revisited Qi Yi's Spirit Sea twice, leaving more mental clutter before retrieving needles and sutures from the medical room for hands-on practice.

Activating the Facial Paralysis System, he reentered the room.

Qi Yi remained in the same position, eyes closed, didn’t bother looking.

In the original text, the guide's behavior during the second interrogation was far more aggressive than the first.

The original host, arrogant and prideful, was used to being the center of attention. While he could feign composure the first time, being ignored the second time was the last straw.

Lu Liu said coldly, "Qi Yi, it seems you still don’t realize what’s coming today."

He tilted his chin up like a smug villain sneering down: "This is your last chance. You didn’t think what I did in your Spirit Sea earlier was all, did you?"

Qi Yi kept his eyes shut, silent.

Lu Liu: "Last chance." He waved the toolkit containing needles and protein sutures. "Otherwise, I’ll have to use these."

Qi Yi couldn’t care less to look.

But even a Dark Sentinel as formidable as Qi Yi tensed when the guide moved behind him with that mysterious kit.

With a loud *tear*, Lu Liu ripped away the shredded remains of Qi Yi’s shirt, exposing his entire back.

He discreetly admired the Sentinel’s defined muscles and what seemed like tantalizingly smooth skin.

Lu Liu loved drinking milk and eating chocolate, especially milk chocolate. The Sentinel's muscles were perfectly sculpted and gleaming, and when paired with the glistening cold sweat, he looked remarkably like edible chocolate from a distance.

Mouth watering at the thought, he decided to treat himself to a chocolate cake tonight.

Lost in these random thoughts, Lu Liu picked up the alcohol spray.

It sterilized and disinfected—and hurt like hell.

When Lu Liu sprayed the alcohol onto the wound, the muscles around it twitched involuntarily before settling again under the Sentinel's forced restraint.

Lu Liu glanced at his lines and stated flatly, "I told you, if you refuse to speak, it will hurt."

His tone was as detached and indifferent as ever.

Once the Sentinel had composed himself, Lu Liu picked up the needle and thread again. "And next, it will hurt even more."

As he spoke, Lu Liu placed his fingers on the Sentinel's back.

Though he had practiced several times on chicken skin, when it came time to actually insert the needle, his hand trembled slightly against the skin.

"......"

Neither the Sentinel nor the Guide spoke.

Lu Liu pressed his lips together. He disliked blood and gruesome wounds, but for the sake of the plot, he still pushed the needle into the skin and worked wordlessly.

Not being a professional, his stitches were messy and irregular—some deep, some shallow. By the time the largest wounds were roughly stitched up, both of them were soaked with sweat.

Meanwhile, in the Sentinel's Spirit Sea, the spectral cheetah tilted its head slightly, puzzled.

As the Sentinel's subconscious, the cheetah relied more on instinct than rational judgment.

—Why did the wound feel oddly familiar? A hurt that somehow brought relief, like the sensation of healing after a treatment spray?