Genius Demon Empress Chapter 2

Big changes in some t.i.tles and names for this novel. I went with the direct names for mountain now, since I feel like it has to do with the story (might not), but these names at least tell you it’s related to beasts.

Secondly, the t.i.tles. Dictionary lied to me, so I went on google and found some even better replacements for my previous translation. I made a note on the first chapter, in the status updates page by the side bar. 

Main reason I took so long with this is because I was not satisfied with how I translated the names and t.i.tles of things, so I went though a big search and this is what I came up with. I might make minor vocab changes in the future if I ever find a need to, I hope you can understand. I already made changes to chapter one, so if you want to re-read it with the new terminology, please do, it sounds sooo much smoother in my head. 

I also took the liberty to translate the setting of the story for both your and my benefits. It will be posted up later, because tumblr doesn’t want to cooperate, and I really need some rest first, so it’ll be posted up in each respective novel’s page. 

Comments: This chapter is only showcases an appetizer to her personality, more to come in the future! I guarantee you, if you like arrogant, yet comical when overpowering opponents, you will love her character. She likes calling herself “Great Grandaunt” when she does things in an upcoming chapter, so look forward to that! OH! And my G.o.d, the author threw in some many male characters that I have no clue WHICH is the exact male lead, I narrowed it down slightly, but..yeah….Quite novelty. Having to guess which is the male lead, so look forward to that! 

Anyways, enjoy!

The sky just began to light up, but a group of people crowded around at an open, flat area located at the entrance of Arcane Beasts Mountain, looking at something interesting.

Among the crowd of observers, most of them wore coa.r.s.e and crude chain armor, and carried along light-weight and durable bows, and daggers. These people were all some low-ranked mercenaries who made a living hunting and killing dark-beasts near Hundred Beasts Mountain. They’re willing to do anything, as long as it doesn’t involve risking their lives.

Normally, during around this time, it should be when these mercenaries replenish their fresh water and herb supplies, and prepare to depart for their missions. But today, the situation was slightly different.  

Under a eucalyptus tree which takes three to four people to be able to hug the entire trunk, hung a stark naked man. A smelly stocking was stuffed in his mouth, and only a piece of cloth covered his lower half. The cloth was dripping with blood.

“Is that the Shadow Rats Mercenary Group’s Qi Feng? How did he end up in such a terrible state?” Someone among the mercenaries recognized Qi Feng.

The early morning’s sunlight shined upon Qi Feng’s face. His eyes were staring straight ahead while being filled with panic and terror, making whimpering sounds.

There was no one who went up and let him down. The Shadow Rats Mercenary Group had a habit of going around pilfering, so their reputation was so-so.

“Move,” after an angry reprimand sounded out, a mercenary standing in the front row was crudely pushed aside.

“Looking for deat…” Death hadn’t been completed yet, but after getting a better look at the valiant and intrepid arcane-qi emitting from the person arriving, that third-rank human arcanist mercenary who was only about as strong as Qi Feng immediately stopped talking.

A red arcane light faintly emitted from the arriving person’s body. Red arcane light signifies that the arriving person is practicing fire type arcane arts. Among the five types of arcane arts, it’s the only type which can only be practiced after reaching jade arcanist rank.

At the outskirts of Hundred Beasts Mountain, a place where only the lowest grade of arcane beasts would appear, so for a jade arcanist to appear here, it can be compared to a mid-ranked arcane beast appearing. Just with one hand, they can easily sweep away more than ten human arcanists. Thus, the entire crowd of human arcanists all didn’t dare to whimper even a sound.

The person who walked out of the crowd was precisely the female mercenary which disappeared last night. She had already changed into a new set of clothing.

After getting a nice sleep, she woke up early in the morning to rush to the free market all because she wanted to see “Yue Jing Hua”’s embarra.s.sing situation, but who would have known that she would see Qi Feng in such a terrible state instead.

Her fair hand waved and the wind created from the palm of her hand made the eucalyptus tree chaotically shake back and forth. The rope tied onto the tree snapped, but at that very moment, the place below where the female mercenary was standing, sunk in and became a pit.

The female mercenary was very surprised. She saw with her own eyes that the ground had become a giant hole. In the hole, over ten sharpened wooden stakes were coldly set up in the ground. Good thing her mind was calm enough; with a beautiful turn like a flying sparrow-hawk, she had use the tip of her foot to lightly leap unto the tip of the stake then quickly leapt away and nimbly landed on the ground.

If the female mercenary’s reaction had been even slower for half a second, she would have immediately been p.r.i.c.ked into a hornet’s nest.

The woman while gasping for breath, threw the dagger in her hand and the rope tied on Qi Feng’s hand was immediately cut apart.

Just as she got close to Qi Feng,

The lush eucalyptus leaves began to tremble in a strange way. A few black shadows like poisonous hornets rapidly scurried out and attacked towards her throat, chest, sub.u.mbilical region, abdomen, and knees.

“Hidden traps!” Knowing that things were turning bad, the female martialist could only throw away Qi Feng. Within her wide sleeves, she utilized both her hands and feet, and a few arcane blades shot out.

In a split second, the tree was ablaze in red light. The hidden traps and arcane blades collided into each other.

The pitiable Qi Feng didn’t receive anyone’s help. He fell into the big pit, and even before he could make it in time to make a m.u.f.fled sound, he had been stabbed into bits and pieces.

That female martialist was someone who has a wide range of experience. After withstanding multiple attacks from different angles, she was finally able to clearly see the real appearances of the hidden traps from the different directions. There was something made of a type of poisonous wood found in Hundred Beasts Mountain – iron-thorn wood crafted poisonous arrows. This poison in this these poisonous arrows were deadly and immediately upon contact, it will create death; the weapon’s ability to kill is very high.

Over ten wooden arrows shrouded the vital areas all around her body. If it wasn’t for the fact that she had already broken through human arcanist, improving her five senses, then she probably would have fallen into those traps.

Though even if it was like so, when the female martialist had landed down, she was still in a state of sorry plight. Several places on her clothing had already been torn apart.

Yue Jing Hua? It can’t be Yue Jing Hua. She’s only trash who can’t even condense together arcane-qi, there is no way she can capture Qi Feng, and even more so unable to set up such sinister and vicious traps.

There must have been someone who saved her.

The female martialist coldly stared at Qi Feng who had stopped breathing long ago. She quickly looked among the crowd, but hadn’t found any suspicious looking people, and even more so, she wasn’t able to spot that ugly face of Yue Jing Hua’s.

It failed, and now next is to…the female martialist muttered to herself for a short moment, and then the beautiful face under the mask recovered back to normal.

Hundred Beasts Mountain is very large, it won’t be easy to find the Yue Jing Hua who strayed away from the group of schoolmates she was going training practice with, but that doesn’t matter, as long as that person is still at Xuan Li Academy, Yue Jing Hua will definitely need to get into the magic branch. If she wants to pa.s.s the exam into the magic branch, then she must obtain a second grade arcane beast’s arcane stone or a plant’s spirit gem. Neither arcane stones nor spirit gems are that easy to obtain.

Yue Jing Hua, we’ll sit back and see how things play out. On the contrary, I want to see if you’re able to actually live to return to the capital.

The female martialist left behind Qi Feng’s body. She swung her sleeves and left.

Based on the sentiments that they were both mercenaries, a few mercenaries in the crowd of observers dragged Qi Feng out of the pit, and carelessly buried him in some uncultivated place outside of the Hundred Beasts valley. There are at least a thousand mercenaries who die in this region every year.

After the crowd dispersed, one person was concealed in a small thicket not too far away.

From the appearance of the female mercenary to her leaving, and the whole process of the trap being ensnared and eliminated, Yue Jing Hua had been hidden on the side. She had hid her breath, so no one had discovered her movements.

The female mercenary of unknown ident.i.ty is much more difficult to deal with than she thought she would be. If she had to compare then, Qi Feng who had died by her hands would be an infant who could barely walk, and she herself is a child who only started to learn how to walk because of her past life’s skills, then that jade arcanist woman is a child who already knew how to run.

The Yue Jing Hua as of now is definitely not the other’s opponent.

But sooner or later, one day, she will definitely return that person with tenfold or even a hundredfold of revenge.

After getting nothing much from interrogating Qi Feng last night, Yue Jing Hua was only able to force out that the real culprit pulling the strings from behind to scenes who wanted to entrap “Yue Jing Hua” could possibly appear in the free market during daybreak.

After utilizing the limited time she had to set up the traps, she waited on the side, and sorted out the remaining memories the body had of “Yue Jing Hua”.

This continent “Yue Jing Hua” lives on is called Azure Dragon Continent. Azure Dragon Continent is a mysterious and ancient continent. In the air of continent, there is an endless amount of arcane spirit-qi. Under the influence of that arcane spirit-qi, even normal inhabitants of the continent could live until eighty years old. There is also a special group of people on the continent who calls themselves G.o.d’s Children.

The natural const.i.tutions G.o.d’s Children possess differ from those of normal people. They are able to convert the arcane spirit-qi drifting above in the continent’s air into their own arcane energy. These people have been given the t.i.tle of arcane martialist by those who inhabit the continent.

In addition, due to the existence of the spirit-qi in the continent’s air, the plants and animals on the continent also differ from organisms on earth. Some of the high grade ones can even take on a human form, and possess intelligence like a human does. No matter high grade or low grade, all of these organisms are called arcane beasts and spirit plants.

“Yue Jing Hua” was originally one of “G.o.d’s Children”. “She” was born into a n.o.ble family of the powerful country Long Zhan Empire in the East Continent. For many years, she had always been treasured deeply by her family clan, due to “her” having quite good natural talents in the arcane-qi aspects. “She” had received teachings on being an arcane martialist which hadn’t differed from what males would have received, but these teachings were mostly textbook knowledge, “she” had never actually put it into practice.

The reason she entered Hundred Beasts Mountain, the place where arcane beasts gather, is because after “she” became unable to condense arcane-qi and also encountered her family clan’s bankruptcy, she had to go seek refuge her maternal family’s family clan in the country of Shang, she could only enter into Imperial Xuan Ji Academy, to seek a cure for her situation.

In order to obtain this one chance to qualify to enter into Imperial Xuan Ji Academy, “Yue Jing Hua”’s mother had to sell off a part of her dowry to gather enough for “her” equipment and travel expenses. “She” must pa.s.s this training practice session, and for the training practice session, she must obtain a second rank arcane stone or a spirit gem.

While sorting out the memories, Yue Jing Hua also found out that this body which may seem like a good-for-nothing, still concealed quite a few secrets.

First, “Yue Jing Hua” isn’t really a good-for-nothing, “she” is very intelligent, “she” can clearly remember all of the existing basics of Azure Dragon Continent she had learned from before she was eleven. But due to certain reasons, after being poisoned when she was thirteen, she could no longer condense arcane qi.

Secondly, and also the most important discovery, “Yue Jing Hua”’s dan-tian was never damaged, “she” is only unable to use it.

In order to get a better understanding of the secrets of “Yue Jing Hua”’s body, the Yue Jing Hua who had rebirthed, i.e. Yue Xiao Qi, went into a general store in the free market.

Since the free market was the main supplying point for people before entering into Hundred Beasts Mountain, all sorts of items and facilities you need are here. The market consists of weapon shops selling different types of weapons and defense items, small restaurants and inns providing meals and lodging, pharmacies selling herb supplies, and also general stores specializing in selling different kinds of parts from arcane beasts.

All of these shops have one common point, and that is that all of them are built up on trees, in order to provide a somewhat more effective defense against sneak attacks during the night from arcane beasts.

“Ol’ Xia’s General Store” is a very normal looking, average general store in the free market. The location of the store is a bit remote, having been built on top of a hundred year old pinewood tree at the northern most side of the free market.

When a female customer walked into the general store, the shopkeeper of the general store, Ol’ Xia, was wiping clean the store’s most conspicuous item, an old and worn-out book like always. This book was something he had gotten only recently.

The general store’s wooden door had been pushed open, “Shopkeeper, I need a set of silver acupuncture needles.”

The shopkeeper pushed up the presbyopic gla.s.ses which rested on the bridge of his nose. He was already over sixty years old, and had a bit of presbyopia. After getting a clearer view of the appearance of the person who came in, Ol’ Xia enthusiastically asked questions.

“Honourable customer, what are these silver acupuncture needles you mentioned? I don’t believe I have ever heard of it before.” Ol’ Xia felt embarra.s.sed, he had been running this general store for so long, but it was his first time hearing this silver acupuncture needle thing.

“I forgot that this place probably doesn’t call it acupuncture needles, then just give me a set of embroidery needles. I want needles of different sizes, and also needles of all kinds of constructions. Aside from those, also give me a bottle of strong alcohol and a few flint stones, as well as waterproof oilpaper, a sack for water, salt, and powder for eliminating insects too. Before “Yue Jing Hua” had been taken over, aside from the deerskin armour for defense and that decoration dagger, she didn’t have any tools for surviving in the wild. Looks like her cheap mother was just like “Yue Jing Hua”, n.o.ble ladies who didn’t have half an inkling of common sense on how to survive in the wild.

Ol’ Xia gave her a response then hurriedly rushed off to gather the items the customer needed.

While waiting for Ol’ Xia to gather the items, Yue Jing Hua strolled around in the general store.

There was everything you needed in the general store, but the kind of items which had been stocked up the most with were things related to low grade arcane beast, like seeds of lizard gra.s.s or a fire wolf’s fur for example…the goods in the general store were all very complete, and each item had a corresponding price marked for it, ranging from several silver coins to one gold coin.

Among the items, the most expensive things were the arcane beast’s arcane stones. Just the price for a normal one rank Wood Weed’s beast gem is already fifty gold coins, a second rank Wind Fox’s arcane stone is as expensive as two hundred gold coins.

“The things you requested are all here, altogether it is twenty one gold coins. May I ask, you do have any other things you require?” The prices of goods in the Arcane Beasts Valley are very high, so twenty one gold coins isn’t some high number, but Ol’ Xia was still treating her with enthusiasm like before, this gave Yue Jing Hua a rather good impression of him. After she paid the money, she began to engage in some small talk with him.

“It must be your first time going into the wild for training practice. The reason why an arcane stone’s price is so high is because arcane stones are rare. Among every ten or even twenty or thirty low rank arcane beasts, sometimes you can only obtain one arcane stone.” Ol’ Xia didn’t have any expectations for these newbies entering in Arcane Beasts Valley for the first time, but after hearing Yue Jing Hua proficiently listing out a whole pile of items needed for surviving in the wild, his view slightly changed.

“I still have one thing I want to ask you. Why is the price marked for that book so high?” Yue Jing Hua suddenly changed the topic, and pointed towards that book, which is precisely the book with an old and worn-out cover Ol’ Xia was wiping clean in the beginning. The marked price was ten thousand gold coins.

Ol’ Xia turned around and looked. Some pride appeared in his aged eyes: “Because that book is no normal book, that is a book which only the Shaman Summoner Tribe can use, the Canonical Text of Summoning.”