Yue Fang, after running away from an old man's cane, went straight to the biggest structure she could see inside the sect: The temple dedicated to the previous martial masters. She admired it eyes wide open, the paintings on the wall were very intricate, most of them picturing burly men in battle, with only two women taking place in the scene - one tall and strong, who held a blood red bow, and the other with an almost fairy like appearance, carrying a thin sword with a lotus ornament in its handle.
She then moved her eyes to the enormous golden statue in the middle - the figure of a man… Well, Yue fang at least thought it was a man, she wasn't sure since, in her mind, he had quite an effeminate face. His hair and clothes were portrayed so beautifully, it seemed almost like a goddess. Besides the eye lashes so long that were almost infuriating.
"The craftsmanship of this piece is so intricate, it doesn't seem like something that could be done in this era…" she thought.
She went to the center of the room, grabbed a few incense and lit it up. Sitting on the floor for a few minutes, just to appreciate her surroundings.
Camila had seen multiple art museums, most of them held paintings from all kinds of famous artists, such as Manet, John Singer Sargent, Caravaggio…But, being honest, they almost always bored her to death. Her parents complained how uncultured their daughter was, it was almost embarrassing for them.
This time, though, her heartbeat was fast, not because these pieces are better than those previously mentioned, but because she thought there was an almost ethereal feel to it, as if there was something really important behind those scenes, which she needed to know.
Yue Fang then stood up and went to the walls to get a closer look at the faces printed, especially on the two women that stood out. She analyzed it for a few moments before saying:
"The one holding a bowl seems quite sad, she looks at the other one so eagerly…"
A voice then suddenly appeared out of nowhere.
"It's because her friend stole the man she loved from her."
Yue Fang looked immediately behind, there was a girl staring at her for god knows how long. Scary that she hadn't noticed it before.
The girl seemed a bit younger than herself and wore two cute buns on her hair which really didn't match the look on her face, with ice almost bleeding out from her stare.
Although tiny, Yue Fang couldn't deny that she was a beauty. More on the cute side, but she still held a somewhat cold elegance.
Both remained silent for a while.
A text box appeared above the girl's head: "Ming Shan - Female lead"
"Ah, so you are THE girl all this show is about" Camila thought.
"You know," the girl said, "I think Shijie could learn a lot from the story of these two women. It teaches some very interesting lessons about betrayal and selfishness."
Pretending to not notice what she was implying, Yue Fang gave her a polite smile and resolved to play dumb to continue the conversation.
"She stole her loved one? Which of the men in the painting is he? I can't recognise him from the other's faces. "
Ming Shan didn't reply for a moment, she just stared at her shijie, clearly looking for a fight. Then, she forced the corner of her lips to lift into a smile before explaining:
"I think my senior is confused, he isn't in the painting. The man I'm referring to is the founder of our sect, his statue is just in front of you, in case you didn't notice."
Yue Fang looked back at the statue before replying.
"Oh, I guess I just didn't notice, heh? Forgive me if I'm a little slow, I haven't been feeling well these few days… So could you do me a favor and help your shijie out?"
Ming Shan rolled her eyes.
"In what way could I possibly help senior out? Since you tried helping me find my bracelet before, I might as well help you, but I'm afraid my knowledge won't be to your satisfaction."
Camila Thought: "What bracelet is she talking about? And why is she saying it so sarcastically?
Although Camila doesn't know, because she hasn't read the book. This bracelet was the one that Ming Shan's mother gave to her, the object of greatest importance to the protagonist.
In the original story, Yue Fang had stolen that bracelet and, to play with the protagonist, went in a useless search for the object with Ming Shan, who was clueless of her schemes.
In the end, not only did Yue Fang not return her bracelet, she even made the protagonist go into trouble by saying that she saw it in shizun's possession. Suggesting her to sneak into his room, because she insisted on saying that he had stolen it! She reluctantly agreed.
Ming Shan ended up being caught and was severely punished for disgracing her teacher… But she never mentioned Yue Fang's name, who was the cause of it all.
But, again, Camila knew nothing of that. So she just improvised.
"Well… Good for you to remember that!I always try to help my juniors out, especially you! I know I can seem a little tough sometimes, but it's just because I care, you know? hahaha…"
"..."
Yue Fang coughed a bit, then continued.
"Well, I guess you can assist me in revising some old lessons, I didn't really like history back then and the story of our founders wasn't actually my cup of tea.. I guess I'm just a little rusty since I learned it so long ago haha…
To Camila, this was the perfect opportunity to get to know the world building. Although it was probably not the best idea to do it now, with an angry looking rat in front of her.
Both of them stayed silent, as if Yue Fang was waiting for her to start explaining the whole plot of that universe and help her get out of that book.
"You… really never study, do you? You don't even know the story of our old masters, how can shizun like you so much?"
"..."
The girl sneered and looked at Yue Fang in a condescending manner, almost as if she was looking at horse shit.
Suddenly, it was as if she had the most funny realization, immediately changing her expression.
"Oh, I forgot you are really good at handling swords, shizun must really like your abilities, doesn't he? The boys say you are very skilled, after all."
She deviated her eyes before laughing a bit, not showing a drop of concern.
Although Camila knew Yue Fang was probably an ass, that girl was asking to get punched in the face. However, the anger soon turned into worry, as she started to realise that she really didn't understand her character at all.
She thought: "Wait, does Yue Fang have a romantic affair with this 'shizun'? Wasn't she in love with the first male lead? Who the fuck is this guy?"
Even though Camila was angry, she knew that Ming Shan actually HAD reasons to hate her. Not only did she try to rob the first male lead, but she also had a bunch of other affairs!
"No wonder she hates me" she sighed "If I was in her shoes, I would actually have done something much worse to my character than just passive aggressive speech… If Yue Fang did that to my man, I would have headbutted that bitch."
Yue Fang didn't know the specifics of their relationship, their backstory, anything… But she could imagine it. The best thing she could do was what she had intended to do since the beginning, TRY to apologise.
"..."
"Huhfm! Why are you making that face? Don't pretend it isn't true. Shijie is so popular, a lot of hearts must have been broken by you-"
Yue Fang didn't even let Ming Shan finish her sentence, before slowly bowing her head. Camila was trying to be polite and follow what she thought was their culture, however, that slow bow suddenly became really fast and hard, as if she had lost control of her body and a ton of weight came straight onto her head.
This was so sudden, Ming Shan had no time to fend off such a strange attack, colliding the two heads. Even the sight of that view was painful to see.
Her posture was wrong and the bow just seemed really over dramatic, making the hit too hard.
Ming Shan fell straight into the floor and seemed unconscious.
Yue Fang, on the other hand, just held her head in a gunite pain, as the video game text box suddenly appeared once again.
"OCC DETECTED! The system was forced to intervene and take action. Please try to maintain the character's personality and way of speech. You have used one of the three mishaps you are allowed to have. If you exceed this limit, the system will be forced to delete your consciousness from the server."
Wait… What?!
"Why can't I apologise to her? Do you want me to die?! How do you expect me to survive by continuing to be an asshole?"
The text box changed.
"Your character development can't be too sudden. If you want to disable the OCC function, you must first complete the beginners mission, which will soon take place."
"..."
Yue Fang thought: "This fucking video game didn't even say what mission there is, how can you expect me to complete or even start the task?"
While she was thinking, Ming Shan started regaining her consciousness before clumsily trying to get up from the wooden floor.
"You shameless… How dare you attack me here? I told you before, I'm… no longer going to be silent about your bullying… I'm not gonna be as cruel as you and hurt you, but what do you think is going to happen when I tell Yu Xuan about this? He's never going to talk with you again and he will hate you!"
Yue Fang 's face didn't express a drop of concern.
"You foolish girl" she thought "Do you think I care about that? Why do I need to be upset to not talk with some random boy? I'm just gonna do what I need to do and go back to my world as fast as possible. It's going to be only an 'au revoir' and 'adieu'."
She was just starting to laugh when someone appeared on the door.
"I'm going to hate who?"
Ming Shan eyes suddenly glowed.
"Yu Xuan!"
She started running straight into that man's arms, without a drop of concern about Yue Fang.
Yu Xuan wore another generic fantasy white uniform, long hair falling from his shoulder, with a face so pretty it was hard to look away.
It was no surprise that he was the first male lead! Such elegance, such beauty! It was almost ethereal!
"But why is every guy here just another flavor of 'soft boy'? Don't they have a REAL man here?" Camila thought.
He stared deep into the eyes of his girl before moving his attention to Yue Fang, bloodshot.
For some reason, the atmosphere in the room changed.
Everything went quiet, there were no more birds singing outside and there were no footsteps to be heard from other students.
The room was darker and the handsome statue from before looked like he was watching her, as if he was curious to see how the scene would unfold.
Like there were insects crawling up in her stomach, Yue Fang started sweating and no longer felt that confidence from before.
Yu Xuan gripped his fist, it seemed he wanted to strangle that girl to death.
Camila just wanted to slap herself in the face from her carelessness from just a few moments ago.
"Im afraid he is going to do more than just stop talking to me…" she sighed.