Floating in the seawater, feeling the gentle current flowing around her body — peaceful and serene — the neighing of a horse came from the shore. Cyan opened her eyes and turned her head. She saw Unabi, who had been dragged into the water by Nishi and was now shaking the water off its body.
Nishi was laughing happily, but her joy didn't last long. Unabi kicked her with a hoof, sending her tumbling into the seawater. She swallowed a big mouthful of salty, fishy water, made a disgusted face while sticking out her tongue, then scrambled ashore. She grabbed a bottle of cola from an ice bucket, rinsed her mouth, and gulped down a large mouthful before finally feeling better.
Cyan swam toward the shallows. The small fish swimming around her scattered.
When she reached the shallows, she stood up, touched the hair sticking to her neck, and shook the water from it.
Is it getting a bit too long?
"Long?" Asuka glanced at her own hair, then looked at Cyan's long layered hair and raised an eyebrow. "You don't like long hair?"
"Long or short is fine."
Cyan had no particular preference when it came to hairstyles. Long or short made no difference to her.
"Tsk tsk tsk~!"
Asuka wagged her finger and clicked her tongue. "You really don't get it, do you? There's a huge difference between long hair and short hair."
"Difference? It's longer?"
Cyan stared at Asuka's sunset-orange long hair and tilted her head. "Doesn't it get in the way during battle? What if an enemy grabs it?"
"Cough cough!" Asuka cleared her throat, took a sip of iced lemonade, and put on a serious "teacher about to give a lesson" expression. "Then allow me to properly educate you, someone with zero common sense! Hair is an extremely, extremely, extremely important treasure for women!"
Ten minutes later…
Cyan sat on the hot sand in a daze. She had gained a bunch of useless knowledge and a deeper understanding of hair. She touched her own hair.
So hair was that important…
Maybe…
Sometimes killing the enemy wasn't the best option. Cyan thought that when facing female enemies, she could use their hair as leverage. It might not be a bad method. Since hair was a woman's treasure, they definitely wouldn't want to lose it.
Asuka had no idea that her words had opened a brand new door for Cyan.
"What were you two talking about?"
Erni walked over in a bikini. She glanced at Asuka, who was sitting on a beach chair with a smug smile, then looked at Cyan sitting on the sand. As she walked, her ample chest swayed, looking like it might spill out of the sexy swimsuit.
"About hair."
Cyan stood up and patted the sand off her butt.
"Hair? Cyan, you're not thinking of cutting your hair, are you?"
When Erni heard that, she quickly walked over and placed both hands on Cyan's shoulders. "You look perfectly fine right now. Don't you dare cut it!"
With short hair, Cyan looked like a beautiful boy from the outside. It made people want to pull her into their arms and kiss her, or even turn into a wolf and drag her back to their den to do all sorts of (indescribable) things. She couldn't let her attract even more women!
Long hair would immediately make people recognize Cyan's true gender!
Erni's peripheral vision flicked toward Asuka, who had come uninvited, and toward Nishi, who was playing around with Unabi.
"I'm not planning to cut my hair."
Cyan didn't understand why Erni was reacting so strongly and looked at her with confusion.
Was it because hair was a treasure for girls?
Come to think of it, Asuka and Erni always spent a long time taking care of their hair…
At that thought, an image of Erni and Asuka with towels wrapped around their heads appeared in Cyan's mind.
In the evening, Cyan sat quietly on the sofa. The ripple energy inside her body suddenly surged. The flowing ripples raced through her bloodstream at high speed. Faint golden light began seeping out from her pores, forming a mist-like golden glow around her body.
"What… what's happening to Cyan?"
Asuka stared in shock at the mist-like golden light surrounding Cyan.
"Don't tell me her skill leveled up?"
Nishi guessed while taking a bite of the cake in her hand.
"Cyan's ripple energy is increasing rapidly."
Erni, who had also cultivated Ripple Qigong, could clearly sense the changes happening to Cyan.
Could it be that Ripple Qigong leveled up?
"By the way, what kind of qigong are you two practicing? Can I learn it too?" Asuka looked at the light around Cyan with a hint of anticipation and turned to Erni.
"This… you'll have to ask Cyan about that."
Erni knew very well that with her half-baked level, it would be difficult to teach Asuka Ripple Qigong. Not to mention, the first and most important step in cultivating Ripple Qigong required Cyan to use her own ripple energy to help the person perceive the existence of ripples and obtain the skill.
Without that crucial first step, knowing the breathing method was useless.
The light returned into her body. Cyan opened her eyes. The total amount of ripple energy inside her had increased by about 1.5 times, and it continued to slowly grow with her breathing.
Cyan clenched her fist. She could clearly feel the changes in her body.
[Ripple Qigong (Special Passive)]
[Skill Level: LV2]
[Creates energy in the blood through a special breathing method. STR +2, AGI +2, CON +2, SPI +2.]
[Note: This is a special passive skill and cannot be upgraded with skill points.]
Does the attribute increase from Ripple Qigong scale with the skill level?
Cyan remembered that when she first learned Ripple Qigong, the skill didn't increase any attributes. Only after the total amount of ripple energy in her body reached a certain level did it start raising her stats.
Or maybe it wasn't like that. It was more likely that as she continued practicing Ripple Qigong and the ripple energy in her body grew, her physical qualities would slowly change. Or perhaps her body's potential was being unlocked by Ripple Qigong?
[Survivor No. 11766, please enter the survival space within 10 minutes to begin the fourth survival game.]
While Cyan was thinking, the survival brand on her chest grew slightly warm. She received a message from it.
"Nishi, we're leaving. Survival game." Cyan stood up and walked over to Nishi.
"Ohhh!"
Nishi quickly stuffed the half-eaten cake into her mouth, chewed a few times, and swallowed.
A neigh rang out, followed by the sound of hooves. Unabi walked over and turned into a chess piece that fell into Cyan's hand.
Cyan focused on the survival brand. This time, the feeling of being knocked unconscious was much weaker.
After a brief dizziness, Cyan and Nishi returned to their private room.
After changing into their equipment, they spent 10,000 Survival Points to expand their inventories. Each of them added five more slots.
In the Round Table Knights world, considering the limited inventory space, the two of them had given up on quite a few pieces of equipment that had mediocre stats but could still be sold for some Survival Points and exchanged them instead. Now that they had expanded their inventories, they could carry more items.
"Teleporting…"
[Target World: Dynasty Warriors 7, Survival Difficulty: C-rank.]
"Late Eastern Han Dynasty, five years after the Yellow Turban Rebellion. A conflict broke out in the capital Luoyang between court officials and the emperor's maternal relatives. Dong Zhuo, a powerful warlord from Xiliang, took advantage of the chaos and marched on Luoyang.
After seizing control of the emperor, Dong Zhuo took the position of Grand Commandant and ruled with tyranny.
In order to judge the lawless Dong Zhuo, Yuan Shao, a noble from northern China, stepped forward. He sent out a proclamation to various regions, calling for people to form a coalition army to defeat Dong Zhuo. Many warlords responded and led their troops to the vicinity of Luoyang, launching an attack on Sishui Pass."
[This survival game is a multiplayer survival game.]
Deafening battle cries rang in their ears. A thick smell of blood filled the air.
Cyan, who had regained consciousness, sprang up from the ground and looked around warily, her hand resting on the hilt of her demon blade.
She found herself next to a large tree. Not far away was a battlefield where soldiers from both sides were locked in combat. There were also soldiers carrying banners representing different warlord factions.
Whenever those soldiers ran past, they would pass through an invisible barrier and appear on the other side, completely unaware of it.
[Survival Mission 1: Defeat five officers.]
[Survival Mission 2: Stop Dong Zhuo from escaping and kill him in Luoyang.]
[Special Mission: Defeat Lü Bu alone without any help.]
[Rescue Mission: Prevent Dong Zhuo from burning Luoyang.]
[Warning: Survivor squad Black Smoke, Survivor No. 8437 and Survivor No. 7961 have used an Avenger's Warrant against you!]
[Warning: Survivor No. 11766, your location will be transmitted to Survivor No. 8437 and Survivor No. 7961 every 10 minutes.]
[Warning: Survivor No. 11766, since you are the target of the Avenger's Warrant, you will suffer a special effect of -3 to all attributes when facing Survivor No. 8437 and Survivor No. 7961. This effect is nullified when you are more than 100 yards away from them.]
Black Smoke squad… Zhang Chengfu's teammates…
Cyan frowned upon receiving the message from the survival brand. If they hadn't suddenly come after her, she would have almost forgotten that Zhang Chengfu still had teammates.
She just hadn't expected to run into Zhang Chengfu's teammates in this round. Not only did she have to complete the special mission to revive the Black Widow Spider, but she also had to face two enemies of unknown strength.
On top of that, their location would keep being transmitted to them. It was an overwhelmingly disadvantageous situation.
Nishi, who had regained consciousness, patted her cheeks and walked over to Cyan. When she saw Cyan's bad expression, she asked quietly, "Master, where are we?"
"Dynasty Warriors 7 world. This time, my enemy's teammates came to take revenge for him." Cyan glanced at the countdown, which had two minutes and thirty seconds left.
"Enemy's teammates…" Nishi looked confused for a moment before suddenly remembering what Cyan had once said about her enemy. She suddenly understood. "Ah! Master, you mentioned them before…"
"Mm. They used a special item to enter this world. While completing our missions, we need to be careful of their sudden attacks." Cyan briefly explained their current situation while they still had some time.