Villains Aren't Stepping Stones!

The air around the colossal white-stone square seemed to violently warp and pivot around the precise coordinate where Shen Haoran and his circle had walked.

The surrounding atmosphere, dense with the ambient liquid qi of the Academy City, hung heavy like liquid iron.

At this moment, Chu Yan, his modern analytical mind firing at a blinding, frantic velocity, immediately saw the elegant, white-and-gold silks of Qian Yunxi shifting as she prepared to seamlessly follow behind the golden-haired young master’s shadow.

His heart leaped directly into his throat. If she vanished into the labyrinthine residential sectors of this dimensional metropolis with that group of monsters, his carefully formulated narrative strategy to plant the seeds of her absolute romance would be completely, thoroughly obliterated before the week even opened.

Without a single second of hesitation, he broke his stance, stepped aggressively out from his independent position, and forcefully called out across the stone tiles.

”Wait! Miss Qian Yunxi, please wait for a single moment!”

The sudden, loud exclamation caused the entire group of Shen Haoran to instantly pause their forward stride.

Shen Haoran, his majestic gold silk robes swaying softly as his kinetic momentum ground to a smooth halt, slowly turned his upper torso around.

Beside him, Huo Yue, Zhu Ziyan, the rest of the Ten Crowns along with the other girls all narrowed their eyes into sharp, clinical lines, their collective spiritual pressures dropping the ambient temperature of the square by several degrees as their gazes locked dead onto Chu Yan’s advancing figure.

At that moment, upon seeing Chu Yan, for a brief, almost imperceptible fraction of a second, the deep liquid gold of Haoran’s pupils violently flashed with a blinding, magnificent rainbow-colored light.

It was a silent, subconscious activation of his Karmic Light Observation technique analyzing the underlying causal fate and destiny of the youth.

However, it only lasted for a mere instant before smoothly returning to its original, unbothered aristocratic gold.

”Miss Qian Yunxi, imperial greetings,” Chu Yan spoke quickly as he closed the physical distance between them, stopping a mere five paces away from her.

He tilted his chin perfectly and flashed a bright, open smile that his mind had thoroughly practiced and believed to be remarkably charming, confident, and entirely trustworthy.

Qian Yunxi tilted her beautiful head slightly to the side, her flawless golden hair catching the shifting light of the high spires.

Her bright blue eyes blinked in an absolute, unadulterated confusion as she carefully assessed the stranger’s features.

”Um... please forgive my lack of etiquette, but do I... actually know you from somewhere? And how precisely do you happen to know my personal name?”

Two months ago, during the chaotic opening hours before the massive obsidian gates had officially opened, she had briefly, politely asked this exact young master to step aside so she could pass through and greet Huo Yue and the others.

But with trials after that, especially how they had to endure thousands of lifetimes, along with a full month of grueling thinking to create a unique object, had made her forget that minor interaction.

Not to mention that to her, it was nothing more than a brief, completely insignificant passing shadow, so her mind couldn’t actually remember his face or his voice in the slightest.

Chu Yan knew this would happen, of course.

As an enlightened transmigrator who possessed the absolute meta-knowledge of the pre-written text, he had already anticipated her natural forgetfulness—especially since they haven’t even had proper interaction—and had proactively, perfectly manufactured an absolute masterstroke of a psychological plan to instantly win her trust and unlock her gratitude.

”Um, Miss Qian Yunxi, you see, it is entirely natural that you do not recall my insignificant face,” Chu Yan spoke smoothly, his tone lowering into a deeply sincere, emotionally charged register. ”But two years ago, during that horrific, world-scorching border catastrophe where the giant had invaded the Eastern Region... I was actually one of the young practitioners who voluntarily took up arms and went to the frontlines to defend the borders.”

Qian Yunxi frowned. After all, not all who joined the resistance actually did anything.

”Back then, when I was brutally injured during a fierce clash, it was a group of saintly medical cultivators originating from your magnificent Spirit Hall who personally and selflessly healed my shattered channels and saved my life.”

Chu Yan felt smug. All those years of reading novels and watching dramas finally paid off!

”I have carried that profound debt of gratitude within my soul ever since that day, and I have always fiercely desired to repay them. Seeing you, the Saintess of Spirit Hall today, I wanted to pass that repayment directly through you. I happen to know a perfect residential location where you can easily stay during your tenure here, and more importantly, it is exceptionally easy for us to take away from the current occupant.”

Yes.

Chu Yan’s inner mind let out a triumphant, self-satisfied chuckle.

Although this specific historical background detail had never been explicitly mentioned within the Chapters of the web novel, his fusion with the original, dead body of Chu Yan had granted him full access to the original host’s childhood memory files.

The original owner of this flesh really did travel all the way to the Eastern Region alongside the geniuses of the empire to participate in the defense against the giant invasion.

Unfortunately, that pathetic dude had been so utterly, primitively terrified of the physical reality of blood and slaughter that he had spent the entire war hiding directly behind the lines, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with the equally cowardly Crown Prince in the safest sector of the rear vanguard, simply watching the distant smoke from a secure wall.

That entire moving speech about getting brutally, critically injured on the battlefield and being miraculously saved by the grace of the Spirit Hall?

It was nothing but absolute, unadulterated bullshit.

The day the war concluded, his luxurious silks hadn’t even been dirtied by a single speck of border dust.

But who on earth was ever going to know the hidden truth?

The dead don’t speak, and the crown prince was currently wearing a cloak of shame at the back of the city.

To a gentle, pure girl like Qian Yunxi, this story should be the ultimate, foolproof key to cracking her defensive walls.

And like he thought, Qian Yunxi’s bright blue eyes did indeed soften slightly upon hearing the specific mention of her ancestral home and the sacred medical acts of her Spirit Hall.

She politely cupped her slender hands in a brief sign of respect, her voice remaining remarkably elegant. ”I see... I am deeply glad to hear that you survived that dark catastrophe and are currently okay, young master. However, there is absolutely no need for you to waste your precious time helping me search for a residential property. I already have perfectly established plans to secure a home alongside them.”

She gracefully extended her slender arm, her finger pointing directly toward the towering, golden-haired figure of Shen Haoran and the tight, protective circle of companions standing around his shadow.

Chu Yan followed where she was pointing and in that instant, his entire conscious mind completely, thoroughly short-circuited.

His breath caught entirely in his throat, his eyes widening into massive circles of absolute shock as he looked past her finger, finally, fully realizing that Qian Yunxi was not standing near their group by a random coincidence—she was actively, legitimately a core part of this specific circle!

’But how is this even remotely possible?!’ his mind screamed in a panicked, breathless desperation. ’It’s one thing for her to be naturally grouped up and friendly with the likes of Shen Haoran and Huo Yue, since the book explicitly labeled all three of them as the primary, toxic villains... but what on earth is up with Xu Xiansu standing right next to them?!’

’Xu Xiansu is the undisputed primary female protagonist of this entire web novel, you know!’ his thoughts raced, a cold, icy sweat breaking across his spine. ’According to the immutable laws of the genre, you two were supposed to be natural, pathological mortal enemies who traded slaps and political plots across every single Chapter of the academy arc! Why are you standing together in one group looking like sworn sisters?! Damn it all, did my simple transmigration into this world truly cause a butterfly effect so incredibly massive that the entire narrative structure has been completely turned upside down before the first day of class?!’

Despite the absolute panic roaring within his chest, he forcefully shook his head, his transmigrator hubris quickly re-asserting its dominance over his fear.

He couldn’t back down now. He had the absolute cheat code of knowing exactly the future timeline, so this minor setback isn’t going to hinder him.

”Miss Qian Yunxi, please listen to my words!” Chu Yan stepped forward, his tone rising with an intense, calculated urgency as he tried to completely override her refusal. ”I do not know what kind of dangerous, high-risk residential sector you and your group are currently planning to go and challenge... but I assure you with absolute certainty that the specific property I am recommending to your path is far, far easier and safer to take!”

That was the absolute truth.

In the original novel’s timeline, that magnificent, array-fortified primary villa plus its massive, spirit-gathering courtyard was currently owned by a commoner senior student who operated entirely as a lone wolf across the campus, completely unaffiliated with any of the major, bloodthirsty student factions ruling the academy dimension.

That senior was exactly 150 years old this year, and he had recently, successfully managed to break through his personal bottlenecks to sit at the first stage of the Nirvana Rebirth Realm, making him officially eligible to receive his graduation papers from the elders and leave the pocket dimension for the outer world.

Since he was actively preparing to pack his bags and permanently leave the academy within the next few days, and because he was a total lone wolf who possessed absolutely no junior disciples, clan relations, or faction heirs to pass his valuable properties down to, he was planning on simply selling the entire villa to the highest bidder at an auction house.

However, this man’s character design was that he was a man of intense martial pride.

If a newly arrived junior could step into his courtyard, prove the absolute structural validity of their generational strength to his face, and gain his profound personal recognition through a clean spar, he would willingly and proudly hand over the ownership deeds of his entire property to them for free as a gift to the new generation.

This was precisely how the original Chu Yan and the protagonist Xu Xiansu had managed to effortlessly secure their luxurious base of operations during the original Chapters of the book without spending a single spirit stone.

”I am deeply, truly sorry, young master, but—” Qian Yunxi’s brows knitted together into a sharp, uncomfortable line.

For some reason, she felt an intense, instinctual aversion to the stranger’s aggressive, overly familiar demeanor, causing her to take a deliberate step backward, her posture turning completely cold as she prepared to forcefully refuse his advance.

But Chu Yan, driven by a sudden, desperate surge of panic as he saw his perfect romance plot sliding out of his fingers, completely lost his aristocratic composure.

He took a violent, aggressive step forward, completely breaching her personal space as his modern mind forgot the strict protocols of ancient cultivation etiquette.

”Don’t worry for a single second, miss! I promise you on my life that I won’t cause a single shred of harm to your path! I only want to—!”

In a moment of absolute, reckless desperation to physically halt her retreat, his hands shot out through the air, his fingers reaching forward to try and firmly grab her slender wrist.

But the exact moment that his fingertips cleared the space within a foot of her white dress, the physical laws of the square suddenly violently collapsed.

Before his hand could even touch a single thread of her silk, the golden-haired figure of Shen Haoran vanished from his standing position a dozen paces away, leaving a sharp, space-shearing vacuum of wind behind his shadow.

Before Chu Yan’s mind could even register the physical movement, Haoran materialized dead in front of his face like a grand, executioner deity descending from the heavens.

*SNAP!*

A hand seemingly forged from solid, unyielding iron shot out through and effortlessly clamped around Chu Yan’s right wrist with a crushing force that instantly ground his momentum to an absolute, violent halt.

Chu Yan’s eyes violently widened to the size of saucers, his entire body freezing in place as the absolute, planet-shattering weight of Haoran’s gold-tinted gaze locked straight into his pupils from a mere inch away.

The sheer density of the aura rolling off the golden youth was so immense that it felt as if a heavy, invisible mountain had been placed directly on top of his head.

”What exactly do you think you are doing, trash?” Haoran spoke, his voice a low, chillingly flat drone that held absolutely zero human emotion, yet carried the absolute, space-cutting finality of a sovereign’s blade.