Lying under the covers, Qing Xuan felt a deep pang of sorrow.
At this moment, the red-dressed ghost bride, headless and still in her wedding gown, no longer seemed so terrifying.
Low sobbing echoed throughout the room.
The ghost bride slowly raised her right hand and placed it on Qin Ming's face.
Her hand was ice-cold, like it could touch one's very soul.
Shiver! A pleasant chill ran through Qin Ming's body.
His vision exploded like a shattered lake surface.
The entire spirit realm began to distort and dissolve.
Moments later, he and Qing Xuan reappeared in the Qingchi Palace.
Da Kui, Zhou Chang, and the others had vanished without a trace, their bodies completely destroyed.
Just then, three sparkling spirit crystals appeared in Qin Ming's hand, and two in Qing Xuan's.
Qin Ming pocketed the crystals—and found a red ring tucked away in his sleeve.
Three engraved characters read: Groom's Ring.
[Groom's Ring: Gift from the ghost bride. One-time consumable. Allows the ghost bride to act once on your behalf.]
Not bad at all!
The ghost bride had clearly been incredibly powerful—anyone below the Spirit-Linking level was essentially defenseless against her.
Having her help once was like gaining an extra life.
Qing Xuan was still breathing heavily, recovering from the fright.
"Qin… Qin Ming, is it over?"
"It's over."
"That spirit realm was terrifying. But I have to ask you—what did you do in the bridal chamber?!"
"…What do you mean, what did I do?"
"I mean, it was the bridal chamber! You and that headless ghost bride—did anything… happen?"
"Weren't you there the whole time? What could've possibly happened?"
"But Zhou Chang was a eunuch, and he died right away! Yet you… survived. So what exactly did you do?"
"You can ask Master about that later. For now—what were you coming to the palace for?"
"Right! Almost forgot." Qing Xuan quickly sobered up.
"Master told me to tell you—we found your records. Your home was in Snow Peach Village, Hanye City. Your entire family's dead.
You came to Fluorite City with two others—Xiao Liuzi, who's dead, and Tang Wei, who's now working as a bookboy outside Tianyi Academy."
Qin Ming felt a wave of relief.
"You came just in time, Junior Sister! I was headed to Tianyi Academy anyway.
If you hadn't told me, I would've walked straight through the main gate and right into their trap."
Seeing the time, Qing Xuan got ready to leave.
"I've passed the message—I'm heading off."
Qin Ming grabbed her sleeve and handed her one of his spirit crystals.
"This is for you."
"What for?"
"Master took your spirit crystal to give me last time. I'm just returning it."
"I don't want it! What do you take me for? Besides… you did save me just now."
With that, Qing Xuan turned and ran toward a side door.
"How are you getting out?"
"Our Five Elements Alliance has secret routes."
"Be careful, little Junior Sister."
"Got it, Senior Brother."
—Oh? The little rascal finally called me Senior Brother!
Qin Ming chuckled, straightened his robes, and hurried toward Tianyi Academy.
As he walked, Qin Ming mentally reviewed the spirit realm experience.
This one had been very different from the first.
The first time, a transmigrator had been immoral and bullied the locals—this created the grudge of the white-robed scholar.
But this time, a transmigrator helped the emperor for years—only to be betrayed and killed.
Over a thousand years, there must have been many such events.
Could all these resentments be the true origin of the tension between transmigrators and natives?
But deep down, Qin Ming felt it couldn't be that simple.
After all, transmigrators had limited influence.
At most, they could affect a few people or even a few thousand.
That alone shouldn't have led to the current situation, where everyone in Dayan Kingdom wanted to see transmigrators dead.
This wasn't just personal hatred anymore.
So what was the truth behind it all?
Qin Ming focused his mind into the Sky-Locking Gourd.
Now that he had three spirit crystals, he immediately chose to upgrade Talent Duplication.
[Talent Duplication upgraded successfully to Sequence 9.
You can now copy 3 talents.
Remaining available copies: 1]
"Hulu, is it true that the lower the sequence number, the stronger the talent?"
[Generally yes. But people differ—execution matters.]
"Then tell me where I can find top talents—I'll go copy them."
Actually, Master's talent was probably great too… but copying it without him bleeding was tough.
[Sky-Locking Gourd Tip: The top 10 talents have self-protection mechanisms. Copying them is difficult.
You may have better chances once Talent Duplication is upgraded to level 5.]
"So I need to get it to level 5 before I can copy top-10 talents?"
[Correct.]
"Then where do these talents come from? Who gave them to the transmigrators?"
[Question exceeds Sky-Locking Gourd's knowledge. Please explore on your own.]
"And what's the relationship between the natives and the beasts?"
[Also beyond knowledge. Please explore on your own.]
Ugh! What's the point of you, you stupid gourd!?
While grumbling, Qin Ming arrived at the side gate of Tianyi Academy.
He deliberately scouted the area.
Sure enough, there was a bookboy standing at the main entrance.
His face looked familiar… probably someone Qin Ming had glimpsed the night they all transmigrated.
No doubt about it—that was Tang Wei.
A major liability.
But there were many powerful figures around him.
Qin Ming currently had neither the reason nor the means to eliminate the threat.
He turned away from the gate and slipped inside the academy.
Inside, a towering Poetry Pavilion greeted him.
The placard said great poems could be inscribed there for public admiration.
But oddly, it was completely blank.
In a typical transmigrator world, a "plagiarist" could easily shock everyone by quoting a few famous lines.
But here, doing that would probably get you chopped into mincemeat.
Moving on, he saw classrooms flanked by massive beast skeletons.
Each was at least five meters long—some reached up to thirty!
Scholars and students stood around them, gesturing and learning.
Qin Ming wanted to understand the relationship between natives and these beasts.
But the classrooms were heavily warded.
Every time he tried to get closer, he was repelled.
Even the students' conversations couldn't be heard through the barriers.