[Mending Heaven Waystation · Lone Isle in the Ink Sea]
"You're here. Rested enough?"
Elder Mo set down his teacup, lazily lifting his eyelids to regard the two figures before him.
Yin Wuwang stood atop the Ink Sea in his crimson robes, Xie Qingyan beside him. The purple-gold python robe had vanished, replaced once more by the Sword Sovereign's white vestments. The weariness of the previous world had faded—that court of schemes and machinations, those halls of treachery and deceit, now reduced to a single page in memory's fading scroll. Yin Wuwang stole a glance at Xie Qingyan. The man remained as cool and distant as ever, like the eternal ice atop Cangqiong Peak that never thawed.
But our relationship should have improved, right? After all, we fought side by side... Yin Wuwang couldn't help thinking.
Xie Qingyan sensed the gaze from beside him but didn't turn. Yin Wuwang was watching him again—this man was always like this, thinking he was being subtle when every single glance landed clear as day. But Xie Qingyan didn't call him out. After a full world of cooperation, he'd grown accustomed to these seemingly casual yet ever-present stares.
Elder Mo produced an abacus with unhurried grace, clacking the beads a few times.
"A-rank evaluation. Six million points." His fingers danced nimbly across the beads. "Minus the ten thousand you still owed from the ABO world..." He flashed a benevolent smile. "Congratulations. Current total: 5,990,000 points."
"5,990,000?" Yin Wuwang's interest piqued. "How many points does this sovereign need to save my world?"
Elder Mo's fingers paused on the abacus. He looked up with that same benevolent smile, slowly raised his hand, and spread all five fingers: "Fifty million."
"Fifty million?!"
"Points." Elder Mo emphasized. "Cannot be exchanged with spirit stones."
Yin Wuwang sucked in a sharp breath. His spirit stones were utterly useless here.
Xie Qingyan's brow furrowed as well. He'd gone into the final battle with Yin Wuwang carrying only his natal sword, prepared to leave all his wealth to his sect should he fall... How could he have anticipated this? He didn't have so much as a single pill on him—even poorer than Yin Wuwang. Fortunately, points could be earned by completing missions.
"Nine worlds of missions." Elder Mo tucked away his abacus. "If you achieve A-rank in each, that's exactly enough."
He narrowed his eyes. "But if any world drops to B-rank or below... tsk tsk, things get complicated. You'd better purchase the premium spirit assistant Heavenly Mechanism soon, before—"
Yin Wuwang let out a cold snort. Nine worlds—they'd already finished one. Based on their previous experience, it wasn't that hard. He feared nothing under heaven or earth. Over forty million points to earn? Why would they need some premium spirit assistant? Did they have spirit stones to burn?
"Enough talk. Not buying. What's next?"
This wasn't the first time Elder Mo had been refused. With an exaggerated expression of regret, he rose and swept his sleeve. Above the lone isle, the void shimmered, and a painted scroll unfurled before them.
"Modern crime investigation."
Yin Wuwang raised an eyebrow slightly. He didn't understand any of those four characters.
Elder Mo seemed to see right through his confusion and chuckled: "Like the previous ancient world—no spiritual energy, no cultivation system, just a mortal realm. But civilization has advanced considerably. Everything runs on various machines. There are many things you've never seen before. People travel in metal boxes, and killing doesn't require swords—they use poison, knives, ropes. 'Crime investigation' means solving cases."
Xie Qingyan listened with an impassive expression, thinking: Solving cases? Using mortal methods to uncover the truth? He found himself somewhat intrigued. In the cultivation world, he'd handled his share of inter-sect conspiracies and internal betrayals—ferreting out the masterminds was part of his duty as sect leader. He simply didn't know how different mortal methods might be from a cultivator's.
Yin Wuwang scoffed. How hard could a mortal case be? The cultivation world had mortals too—it all came down to love, hate, anger, obsession, greed, pride, doubt. He sighed internally. Not just mortals—cultivators had these problems too. Wasn't he the perfect example? Loving without being loved in return, so he'd started an immortal-demon war just to force Fuguang to look at him... But come to think of it, when he'd made that hot-headed decision, was it truly his own choice, or had the author arranged it?
"This author wrote a crime story, then wrote themselves into a corner. Settings went haywire, plot collapsed, and they eventually abandoned it. Readers were furious." Elder Mo shook his head with an air of lamenting wasted potential.
"Another mess to clean up," Yin Wuwang said coldly.
"Worse than the last one, actually—that's why we need you two to fix the plot." Elder Mo waved dismissively, then tapped his finger on the light screen with a note of complaint: "I kindly recommend you buy the premium spirit assistant, but you refuse. This story isn't as simple as the last one. Little Deer Assistant won't cut it, so I'll have to explain things myself."
The scroll came alive with vivid imagery. A desk appeared, covered with documents—handwriting crooked and messy, corrections everywhere. Entire paragraphs were crossed out, with annotations scrawled beside them: "Change to poisoning," "No no no change it back," "Forget it just have him confess and close the case."
Yin Wuwang's frown deepened. What a disaster. If anyone in the demon realm dared present something this shoddy to him, he'd slap both the document and the person clear across the room.
Xie Qingyan's gaze fell on those annotations, searching for useful information. Why was this author's thinking so chaotic? This so-called crime investigation probably wasn't simple at all. Some of the strokes pressed heavily into the paper—the author had clearly been frustrated.
"This story has five collapse points." Elder Mo's tone turned serious.
The image shifted with his words, text floating into view:
Collapse Point One: The Vanishing Cyanide.
The outline of a corpse appeared on screen, with two lines of text beside it: "Cause of death: Cyanide poisoning." This line flickered, then was crossed out. Next, "Cause of death: Beaten to death with a bottle" appeared—also crossed out. Finally, a new line emerged: "Cause of death: Strangulation (mechanical asphyxiation)." This one enlarged and blinked smugly.
Elder Mo: "The author changed the cause of death three times—poisoning, bludgeoning, strangulation. All three causes now exist simultaneously in this story world."
Xie Qingyan frowned. A person could only die once. Three causes of death coexisting—how would this world's heavenly dao resolve that logic? This "cyanide" was presumably the poison.
The image faded, replaced by new text and illustrations.
Collapse Point Two: Invalid Motive.
A man's silhouette appeared, two labels floating above his head: "Kind and Soft-hearted" and "Murderer." The two labels repelled each other, colliding repeatedly as if arguing.
Elder Mo: "The suspect's character setting is that of a kind, soft-hearted good person. Everyone who knows him says he couldn't possibly hurt anyone. Yet the author made him the killer without providing any reasonable psychological transformation. You'll need to find the motive for murder and confirm whether he's actually the culprit."
Yin Wuwang sneered: "Can't even write a proper character, yet dares pick up a pen?"
Xie Qingyan asked: "Does this mean there's a high probability he isn't the killer?"
Elder Mo chuckled twice: "Maybe yes, maybe no—you'll have to investigate carefully. I cannot say. Let's move on to the next problem!"
[End of V2_Chapter 01]
Next: Five collapse points down, but the real shock is yet to come—the character assignments.