After Chasing The Villain With A Clueless System - Chapter 1

At three in the morning, Huanhai City had already fallen asleep. Most of the apartment lights had gone dark, and the noise and bustle of the day had finally died away.

Yet one unit on the twenty-fifth floor of Building B in Mingyu Gardens was still brightly lit, stubbornly continuing its struggle while the rest of the world lay silent.

Song Qi sat before her computer desk, her fingers clattering rapidly across the keyboard. Words charged onto the document one after another like soldiers rushing into battle.

Song Qi was a web novelist, but the reason she was working so diligently right now was not because inspiration had suddenly struck.

She was writing a review.

Song Qi had just finished reading Tianxing, a wildly popular martial arts novel. Under Song Tianxing’s leadership, the main cast eventually joined forces and defeated the villain.

But instead of applauding, Song Qi was devastated. Her heart ached unbearably for the villain who had died.

The final boss of Tianxing was named Wen Wanxi. She was the lord of Wucheng, and before Song Tianxing’s rise, she had been the greatest martial artist under heaven.

At first, she had also been an innocent and carefree young woman. Later, however, she was betrayed by the person she loved and nearly killed by the master she respected most. After falling from a cliff, she accidentally learned her family’s inherited martial art, Yellow Springs and Azure Heavens, and thus attained peerless martial prowess.

Only afterward did Wen Wanxi discover that her master had adopted her solely for the sake of obtaining Yellow Springs and Azure Heavens. Her master had even murdered her entire family for it.

To take revenge, Wen Wanxi fought her way back to Wucheng and cut down her master within ten moves. Anyone in the city who refused to submit was slaughtered, and through sheer force, she became the new lord of Wucheng.

Her methods were ruthless, her behavior erratic, and she acted entirely according to her mood. She did not even need a reason to kill someone, earning the contempt of the righteous martial world.

Naturally, her final fate was to be defeated by the combined efforts of the main cast.

Before her death, she seemed to return in a dream to the days of her youth, when she had been carefree, free of schemes and calculations, and her hands had never been stained with blood.

The novel described it like this:

“In her daze, Wen Wanxi seemed to see someone in the distance waving to her.

“It was her younger self—the pure and kindhearted girl she had once been.

“She walked toward the smiling young woman. The instant she saw that radiant smile, tears streamed down Wen Wanxi’s face.

“Only then did she realize how long it had been since she had smiled like that.”

By the time Song Qi reached that part, tears were pouring down her face too. She continued reading while cursing the author for having a heart made of stone.

In the end, Wen Wanxi closed her eyes. Her soul entered a dream—the dream in which she had once wished to protect all the goodness in the world.

After finishing the ending, Song Qi was overwhelmed by frustration and grief. She had not written a single word of her own novel all day, yet she immediately opened her computer and began preparing a long review for Tianxing.

Once she started, she could not stop. Her mind and heart were completely consumed by the tragic fate of that beautiful, powerful, and pitiful villain.

Wiping away her tears, Song Qi murmured miserably, “Author, you have no heart.”

Song Qi loved martial arts novels. She had read the works of Master Jin and Master Gu more than once. After hearing that Tianxing had received excellent reviews, she had begun following it.

Three years of following the novel had come to an end with Wen Wanxi’s death.

Song Qi felt as though her heart had shattered.

She loved Tianxing and always became deeply immersed whenever she read it. The long review she was writing now contained all the affection she had accumulated for the novel over the past three years, along with all the lingering pain she felt over Wen Wanxi’s character.

She could not deny that the author’s control and portrayal of the character had been masterful.

But the author had been far too cruel to Wen Wanxi.

Her entire life had been a tragedy, and no one had ever tried to save her. Her obsession and cruel methods in the end were naturally unforgivable, but they still made people ache for her.

After Song Qi typed the final word, she checked the time and discovered that it was already past five in the morning.

She had accidentally stayed up all night.

All for her beautiful, powerful, tragic villain!

She copied what she had written in the document, pasted it beneath Tianxing as a review, and clicked Send.

Then Song Qi let out a long breath and collapsed bonelessly into her gaming chair.

She switched back to the document and took another look.

Ten thousand three hundred words.

She had worked more diligently on this than she ever did when updating her own novel!

After staring blankly for a while, she reached for her thermos and was about to take a sip of water when a sharp pain suddenly tore through her heart.

Terrified, she immediately pressed a hand against her chest and tried to steady her breathing.

Her heart had never been very healthy. It occasionally skipped a beat, but she had never imagined that it could hurt this violently.

It felt as though an invisible hand were squeezing her heart with all its strength.

She could not even breathe.

It’s over, it’s over. I’m done for.

All Song Qi could think about was whether she was about to die.

She stretched out a hand, trying to reach her phone and call an ambulance. It might already be too late, but she still wanted to struggle.

Unfortunately, her struggle was useless.

Countless thoughts flashed through Song Qi’s mind.

She thought of her parents, who had never paid much attention to her.

She thought of her best friend.

She thought of her writing career, which had only just begun to set sail…

Mom, I don’t want to die!

Song Qi lost all sensation. Her mind buzzed loudly, and then a system notification rang inside her head.

“Ding—”

It was the last sound she heard in this world.

What was that sound?

Song Qi wondered.

Then everything plunged into darkness.

It was as though she had died.

**

Song Qi felt as though she had been drifting through the darkness for a very long time.

Yet her consciousness gradually returned.

She found it extremely strange. Hadn’t she died? Why was she becoming more and more awake?

She could even…

She could hear people speaking around her.

And they seemed to be calling for her.

“Junior Sister! Junior Sister, wake up!”

Who was that?

So noisy.

And what was all this “Junior Sister” and “Senior Sister” nonsense? What were they talking about?

“Senior Sister Bai, why did you strike so hard? If Senior Brother Song finds out, he’ll definitely be angry!”

Senior Brother Song?

With great difficulty, Song Qi opened her eyes.

A beam of sunlight darted into them. It was so dazzling that tears immediately sprang forth, and she quickly closed them again.

Sorry for disturbing you.

She never should have opened her eyes.

As an author who slept during the day and came alive at night, she rarely went outside, let alone during daylight hours.

To her, sunlight was practically a natural enemy.

Whenever possible, she avoided it entirely.

Wait.

Why was she here?

Shouldn’t she have collapsed in her room?

Song Qi’s eyes flew open again, no longer caring how blinding the sunlight was.

She shot upright so abruptly that the person supporting her stumbled a step backward in fright.

Before her lay a vast open-air training ground. Beside it stood a stone monument engraved with four bold, forceful characters:

Heaven Rewards the Diligent.

Why did this scene look so familiar?

She had clearly never been here before.

“Junior Sister, thank goodness you’re awake. You suddenly fainted and scared me to death.”

The woman whom Song Qi had frightened away stepped forward again and anxiously examined her, as though she were genuinely worried that Song Qi had been injured.

Song Qi looked down at her clothes.

She was wearing a long silver-white robe trimmed with golden thread. The character “Sword” was embroidered over the left side of her chest.

A broad white belt woven with silver thread circled her waist, and hanging from it was a wooden token engraved with the character “B.”

What the hell?

Th-this…!

Wasn’t this the uniform of the Divine Sword Sect in Tianxing?

Song Qi abruptly whipped her head toward the woman beside her.

The woman was frightened into stepping back again and was just about to speak when Song Qi interrupted her.

“White clothes, a longsword, a wooden token marked ‘B’ hanging from your waist, a butterfly-shaped jade hairpin in your hair, and flirtatious eyes… Don’t tell me you’re that green-tea bitch, Meng Tian?”

This time, it was Song Qi who shuffled backward.

She was stunned.

How had she ended up in the world of Tianxing?

And the characters she had read about were now standing alive right in front of her.

That was somehow even more terrifying than seeing a ghost!

“What madness are you spouting?”

A cold female voice sounded from behind her.

Only then did Song Qi realize that while retreating, she had bumped into someone’s legs.

She immediately turned around and saw a tall woman looking down at her from above.

“The Blackwater Sword, a wooden token marked ‘A’ hanging from your waist, an aloof and ethereal appearance, and an expression that warns strangers to stay away… Y-you’re Bai Luoyin?”

It was over.

It was over!

Was this real or fake?

She had to be dreaming!

At that thought, Song Qi pinched her own thigh as hard as she could.

She immediately sucked in a sharp breath.

It hurt!

It hurt so much!

Why did she pinch herself that hard?!

Bai Luoyin moved the Blackwater Sword behind her back and looked coldly at the noisy woman sitting by her feet. Her brows drew together as she wondered inwardly:

Did I beat her stupid just now?

No, that couldn’t be it. I didn’t hit her head.

“You were the one who challenged me to a duel. Do not blame me.”

Bai Luoyin slid the Blackwater Sword back into its sheath, turned, and walked away.

Beneath the blazing sun, Song Qi sat on the training ground, the heat of the stone burning her backside.

For a long time, she could not recover.

Her mind was filled with only three questions:

Who am I?

Where am I?

What am I doing?

“Junior Sister.”

“Don’t bother me.”

“…”

Song Qi staggered to her feet.

Her leg hurt a little, probably because she had been injured during that so-called duel.

In a daze, she walked away from the training ground. But after taking only a few steps, she realized that she had no idea where to go.

She was familiar with the places described in the novel, but the Divine Sword Sect was enormous.

She did not know the way around!

“Junior Sister Song, what’s wrong? Are you injured? Shall I take you to see Senior Brother Song?”

Junior Sister Song?

Senior Brother Song?

Could it be that I’m Song Qi, and Song Tianxing is my older brother?

Oh my god!

I’m actually Song Tianxing’s younger sister—the Divine Sword Sect’s queen of arguments, who was useless at everything except running her mouth!

“Take me, take me! Let’s go right now.”

Song Qi rarely left the house in her original world, so navigating unfamiliar places was completely foreign to her.

Meng Tian led her through twists and turns, across two training grounds and past three lecture halls, before they finally reached the entrance to the male disciples’ dormitory.

Naturally, female visitors were not permitted inside the male disciples’ residence.

Thus, when the male disciples saw two women standing outside, they all turned to look.

Once they recognized them, one thin disciple playfully called toward the inner hall.

“Senior Brother Song! Your little sister has come looking for you again!”

The others could not help smiling.

Only then did Song Qi remember that the Song Qi in the novel often picked fights with people and then came running to her older brother, Song Tianxing, for comfort whenever she offended someone.

So Lu Xiaoming’s use of the word “again” was extremely appropriate.

Oh, right.

That person was Lu Xiaoming.

He was thin, lively, and mischievous. He had a close relationship with Song Tianxing and was also the person Song Qi loved arguing with most.

Song Tianxing hurried out of the inner hall and ran anxiously toward Song Qi.

“What happened? Did someone bully you?”

Song Tianxing merely nodded to Meng Tian in greeting.

Meng Tian, however, kept her eyes fixed on him, looking as though she wanted nothing more than to throw herself into his arms on the spot.

“I-I’m fine.”

Song Tianxing.

The protagonist of Tianxing.

He had sword-like brows and bright, starry eyes, with a clean and upright bearing. He was exceptionally handsome, and his white robes further emphasized his refined, scholarly elegance.

The sword at his waist was the Seven Stars Sword, and he carried himself like a graceful young nobleman.

When Song Qi first read that description, she had even associated him with Lin Pingzhi.

Now that she had seen him in person, however, she felt that he possessed more masculine strength than Lin Pingzhi. Standing before her, he resembled a towering mountain—calm and steady, entirely different from Lin Pingzhi’s character.

Most importantly, he adored his younger sister.

He protected this sister, who was useless at everything, as though she were a precious treasure!