The Empress’s Gigolo

“Checkmate!” Zhuo Hua excitedly slammed the chessboard. It immediately shattered as wood shavings were scattered all over.

Ren Baqian’s general and Zhuo Hua’s horse were reduced to dust. Part of the chessboard was also destroyed.

“See? I won, right? Teacher, you said before that you would pay for a month’s worth of meat if I won, right?” Looking full of emotion, Zhuo Hua held the chessboard with both hands and stared at Ren Baqian.

“Where are the chess pieces?” Ren Baqian remained calm in the middle of her excitement.

“Even though the pieces are gone, I checkmated you!”

“If we don’t even have the pieces, how are we to judge whether you have won or lost?” Ren Baqian laughed as he swept the pieces on the board to one side.

“Ah? Teacher, you are refusing to acknowledge that you lost!” Zhuo Hua’s eyes were wide open, and she looked infuriated.

“Remember, the closer you are to success, the more you have to keep your composure. Otherwise, you will very easily fail due to the lack of final effort!” Ren Baqian smiled charitably at Zhuo Hua, stood up, and left.

Ren Baqian stretched as he walked away and thought to himself that he had to find someone else to play chess with next time.

After having only played two matches with him, Zhuo Hua won a match just like that. She didn’t think during the match and made all her moves based only on intuition…

He hated playing against players like this the most.

“Principal!” Qing Lian caught up to him.

“What?” Ren Baqian turned around and questioned.

Qing Lian threw an object at him that was wrapped in silk and said, “As promised!”

Ren Baqian stretched out his arm and knew that it was an animal hide scroll as soon as he caught it. He stuffed it into his coat, turned around, and waved his hand as he left.

Back at Pingle Park, he saw Tiantian and Gungun lying on the ground in a deep sleep. The ling ting monkey was lying on top of Gungun’s head and was seemingly digging something out from its fur.

Ren Baqian originally thought that it was picking lice. However, he didn’t expect that it actually dug out a few dried fruits and stuffed them into its mouth. It even tossed one over to Ren Baqian and winked at him.

“So the witness has a share?” Ren Baqian took a whiff of that fruit as he held it in his fist. He thought that it would be best if he didn’t eat since he saw hair growing on it.

Ren Baqian casually tapped the ling ting’s head and went back to his room. He took out the scroll and unwrapped the silk packaging, revealing an unadorned book. It was made out of animal hide, but he didn’t know which animal it came from.

The animal hide book gave him a very familiar feeling. It was simply too familiar…

This was because he had already been reading an identical animal hide book for a year…

He could remember every word, picture, and detail in that book. He was quite familiar with the feel of the animal hide, and it was to the extent that he could recognize it the moment he touched it.

Regardless of whoever it was, a person would definitely be familiar with the feel of it if he had been in contact with it for the past year.

“This can’t be?” Ren Baqian’s heart skipped a beat.

The [Ruyi Visualization] that he possessed only entailed the practice methods up to the Earth Embryo Realm. There wasn’t any information about the transition from the Earth Embryo Realm to the Spirit Wheel level, let alone information about levels above that.

It was because of this that he placed his hopes on Earth. He wanted to first impart to them the basic martial arts manuals before giving them the intermediate ones. Under the circumstances of having enough test specimens, he hoped that he could one day deduce the later portions of the [Ruyi Visualization] with the help of supercomputers.

Qing Lian previously mentioned that this animal hide book was the second volume of the [Ancient Scroll of Methods] . It contained the methods of mental cultivation, which was also extremely useful in attaining the Spirit Wheel level through the Celestial Path.

This book couldn’t be part of an integral whole with his [Ruyi Visualization] and have the same fundamentals, origin, and sets of martial arts, could it?

At the thought of this, Ren Baqian immediately opened up the animal hide book. The first thing he saw was a sentence that said, “The existence or destruction of this book can make a tremendous difference in this world.”

The characters were very imposing and full of the flavor of perfection. Ren Baqian had his eyes glued to those words for a long time and couldn’t return to his senses. The characters kept breaking apart as new characters were constantly born from the ashes. This creation and destruction went on an endless loop.

Ren Baqian’s eyes were attracted to that page. Over and over again, he watched as the countless imposing characters were obliterated and recreated. Not knowing how long it had been, Ren Baqian felt lethargic and dived straight into his bed.

At that moment, the metal chain and golden spear sprang out from his mind. The metal chain crawled along his body like a snake, coiling around him and tying him up tightly. It was as if it was taking revenge on him for having emerged out of his consciousness.

Exactly four hours later, Ren Baqian slowly opened his eyes and felt dizzy.

“What happened?”

Ren Baqian wanted to get up, but found that he had been tied up tightly and that he wasn’t able to move at all.

He lowered his head to take a closer look and realized that it was actually the metal chain that had wrapped him up like a dumpling.

“Let go!” When Ren Baqian lashed out, the metal chain reluctantly loosened up. As if his head was hollow, the chain dived straight back in and vanished completely,

Ren Baqian sat up and touched the animal hide book that he had been holding the whole time. If he guessed correctly, he had probably over exhausted himself just now?

This book was indeed a little scary. He was already immersed in it after only looking at the first page. He was completely unable to break free from it and eventually even ended up passing out.

One wouldn’t even be able to read it if he or she wasn’t strong enough.

It seemed like he had to attain the Earth Wheel level before he could start reading this book.

One thing that he was very mindful about were the characters written on the first page of the book. The handwriting was very similar to that of the [Ruyi Visualization], and they both probably originated from the same author.

Unfortunately, Ren Baqian had seen too little of its contents and wasn’t sure if it was what he imagined. The [Ruyi Visualization] contained the methods of cultivating the fundamentals, whereas this book contained more advanced methods.

As for the name [Ancient Scroll of Methods], it probably originated from the sentence in the book.

“Sir Ren, Her Majesty is calling for you.” Qing Yuan knocked on his door.

“Got it. Give me a moment,” Ren Baqian yelled back in response as he dug out the [Ruyi Visualization] from his room. He held both books and was prepared to show them to the empress.

After Ren Baqian stepped out of his room, Qing Yuan asked when she saw his face, “Are you okay? You don’t look so good, Sir Ren.”

“It’s nothing much.” Ren Baqian smiled. At the moment, he still felt a little tired, but he was already feeling much better after sleeping.

“Her Majesty asked about you twice this afternoon!” Qing Yuan laughed as she covered her mouth.

Ren Baqian followed Qing Yuan to the empress’s quarters and saw her sitting there in a state of boredom as soon as he entered the room. In front of her was a table that was occupied by a boiling hot pot as well as meat, vegetables, and fruits that were all already cut up.

“Your Majesty,” Ren Baqian stepped forward and greeted.

“What are you holding? I heard that you went straight into your room after you returned and haven’t stepped out. Why do you look so tired?” The empress felt a little suspicious when she looked at his face.

“Look, Your Majesty—is this book the second volume of the [Ruyi Visualization]? I took a peak at it and ended up passing out.” Ren Baqian forced out a smile after handing over both books to her.

As the empress flipped through the books, she asked, “Oh? Where did you get this?”

Ren Baqian explained its origins to her.

The empress first flipped through the [Ruyi Visualization] before opening the other animal hide book. As soon as she saw the first page, she said, “The author of this book must be extremely incredible. Even though I don’t know much about calligraphy, I have seen some people infusing their writing with the thoughts of their weapon. Those people can’t hold a candle to this author.”

After that, the empress stopped talking and concentrated on reading the contents of the book. After some time, she put it down, looked up, and said, “You are indeed lucky to have gotten this book so easily. You are correct. This book and the [Ruyi Visualization] are an integral whole. One contains methods of physical cultivation, whereas the other involves spiritual cultivation. This set of martial arts is far more superior than I thought it was. After you have mastered the [Ruyi Visualization] and have attained the Earth Wheel level, you can try to practice according to this book. Eventually, you will be able to transcend to the Celestial Path and enter into the Spirit Wheel level. When the conditions are right, success will follow naturally without obstacles. Furthermore, the power of this set of martial arts will only emerge after attaining the Spirit Wheel level. It’s extremely superior.”

When speaking of this, the empress began to smile.

Since Ren Baqian had obtained this set of manuals, she wouldn’t have to worry about his future cultivation anymore.

“How superior is it?” Ren Baqian was immediately in good spirits.

The empress’s words made him feel like the concerns he had always had were now completely gone.

“Extremely superior—like a tall building!” The empress winked at Ren Baqian and actually revealed a mischievous look.

Ren Baqian was stunned. “Your Majesty, there’s something on your eyelashes…”

“What?” The empress touched her eyelashes, lifted her head, and asked, “Are you lying to me?”

“Let me do it.” Ren Baqian extended his finger toward the empress’s eyes.

Her eyelashes shook slightly as she allowed his fingers to touch them.

“When you winked just now, my heart got stuck in your eyes!” Ren Baqian said as he quickly touched her eyelids.