Dax stood at the door of the abandoned warehouse behind the Tudi Temple, holding two discounted Family Mart bento boxes.

  He'd just finished dealing with tonight's mess—including but not limited to: falsifying the scene report, erasing the drunk guy's short-term memory, and filing a "all quiet in the jurisdiction" work log with the higher-ups. Now he just wanted to get this new troublemaker settled as quickly as possible.

  "Hey, little ghost, still alive in there?" He fished out the key and pulled the door open a crack—

  "WHOOOOSH—"

  The rolling shutter had barely lifted halfway when a torrent of pink came flooding out.

  Countless pink, faintly glowing flower petals surged through the gap like a dam bursting, instantly burying Dax up to his waist.

  "…"

  At the same time, an overwhelmingly rich fragrance hit him in the face.

  This wasn't the smell of cheap mortal perfume. It was the aroma of top-grade "Nine-Turn Drunken Immortal Lotus" blended with "Heavenly Pool Morning Dew." This kind of scent usually only appeared at the Heavenly Court's highest-level Peach Banquets, or in Queen Mother of the West's bathwater.

  The ultimate luxury. A single whiff could extend a mortal's lifespan by three seconds.

  "Cough cough cough!" But Dax was nearly knocked dizzy by this overly concentrated "premium" fragrance.

  He stood there expressionless, letting the petals pour out around him. It took a full thirty seconds before the flood stopped.

  Dax calmly plucked a petal that had gotten hooked on his ear and examined it. Faint spiritual luster, light as air, dissolving the moment it touched the ground.

  This was a byproduct of the "Celestial Maiden Scatters Flowers" skill.

  According to factory settings, this skill was supposed to work like this: "Slender hands gently wave as petals drift elegantly from fingertips, bestowing blessings from the Heavenly Realm upon the mortal world."

  The visual was supposed to be ethereal. Graceful. Healing.

  But now…

  Dax looked at the pink "mudslide" covering the floor, and the corner of his mouth twitched.

  He struggled to pull his legs out of the petal pile and shoved the rolling shutter all the way open, then waded through the petals into the warehouse.

  The scene inside was even more devastating.

  In the center of the petal mountain, Ling was spinning. More precisely, that Maiden was spinning.

  She looked like a broken music box doll—standing on one foot, arms spread wide, holding an extremely difficult "Flying Apsara" pose—spinning in endless circles. The rotation speed wasn't slow either. By rough estimate, about forty or fifty rotations per minute.

  Even worse was her condition: that face, which should have been devastatingly beautiful, now had two alarming streaks of bright red nosebleed running down it—capillary rupture from hardware overheating. White smoke was sizzling from the top of her head. Her eyes had already gone unfocused, clearly on the verge of a total system crash.

  But her face still wore a standard, rigid, sweet smile.

  Spotting Dax entering, Ling seemed to want to stop, or at least wanted to curse him out. Her lips trembled violently as she summoned profanity from the depths of her soul, covering all three realms:

  But when this vulgar torrent from the Abyss passed through the body's "civilization filter," what came out was a standard, sickeningly sweet synthesized voice:

  "Tudi Jiang… (bzzt)… wishing you… blessings vast as the Eastern Sea… (stutter)… longevity rivaling the Southern Mountains…"

  She spun and bled, while elegantly waving her long sleeves, sending even more petals gushing from her cuffs like they were free.

  "Peace… every year… (bzzt)… joy… for the whole family…"

  Dax set the bento boxes on a crate that hadn't been submerged by petals, crossed his arms, and commented: "Oh my, quite polite aren't we. Giving me such an elaborate New Year's greeting the moment we meet? Though judging by your ‘blood loss’, if you keep this up much longer I'll be the one sending you flowers."

  Ling's eyes blazed with fury, but every word that came out of her mouth was like handing out candy. She could only hang onto that smile, bleeding from the nose, spinning in circles, scattering flowers and sending blessings all the while.

  Meanwhile, in the corner of the warehouse, an ancient CRT television was playing the "product manual" for this body.

  It was a recording of Grand Immortal Wei Xu's speech at the "Heavenly Court's 50th Anniversary Celebration of Stationing in the Greater Han Region" two thousand years ago. A line of golden clerical script scrolled across the bottom of the screen: "Seven Celestial Maidens · Ding-Chou Model (Greater Han Flagship Limited Edition) Grand Release."

  The Wei on screen wasn't wearing his purple official robes that symbolized authority. Instead, he wore a minimalist black high-collared fitted Daoist robe, linen trousers below, standing barefoot in the center of an all-black stage.

  On the backdrop behind him, a massive golden seal-script character for "Han" was slowly morphing, eventually transforming into a peach-shaped logo wrapped in cloud patterns.

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  A spotlight beamed down on him from above.

  He extended his slender fingers and elegantly adjusted the single crystal monocle hanging from a fine silver chain over his right eye. His gaze was deep, filled with the confidence of someone about to change all three realms.

  "We've always asked ourselves," Wei's voice was low and magnetic, "what is the perfect vessel?"

  "Not more powerful magic. Not a harder-forged destiny."

  He paused, extending one slender finger.

  "But—ultimate purity."

  The image cut away.

  The background music shifted to the solemn, resonant toll of ancient Chinese bronze bells——accompanied by the lingering echoes of a . The visual quality instantly transformed into the style of a premium food documentary.

  Under 4K high-definition lenses, a crystalline jade knife slowly sliced through a segment of lotus root, pale and tender as jade.

  The crisp sound, acoustically enhanced, triggered an ASMR response.

  The lotus root separated with silken threads still clinging, golden spiritual liquid stretching like honey between the pieces, shimmering enticingly before the camera.

  Next, two elderly immortals appeared on screen, wearing dust-repelling cloud-silk Taoist robes and spotless heavenly silkworm caps. They held tweezers finer than a strand of hair, their expressions solemn as if performing heart transplant surgery, as they implanted a glowing tendril of "Thousand-Year Snow Lotus" stamen into the lotus root cavity.

  One of the old immortals straightened up, stroked his beard, smiled gently at the camera, and slowly nodded.

  Wei's voiceover came in right on cue, dripping with the arrogance of a master craftsman:

  "For this 0.01 millimeter of skin translucency, our team went into seclusion at the bottom of the Heavenly Pool for a full five hundred years."

  "Using only the finest ten-thousand-year spiritual lotus root, infused with the essence of Tianshan Snow Lotus. We abandoned the previous generation's flashy sensuality and redefined what it means to be 'devastatingly beautiful'!"

  Then a strange figure appeared on screen—a man with four arms and flowing long hair. He was wielding a carving knife, furiously working on a clay model, his hands moving so fast they blurred into afterimages.

  "Personally sculpted by the Court's Chief Aesthetic Consultant, Grand Master Michelangelo DiDuo." Wei spread his arms wide. "This is not a body. This is a work of art."

  On the television screen, the launch event entered its final crescendo.

  The stage lights suddenly dimmed. A massive, luminous full moon slowly rose, hanging against the black backdrop.

  Accompanied by ethereal celestial music, six maidens draped in rainbow-feathered gossamer robes, cradling pipas, guqins, and jade flutes, drifted down from the moon.

  Their features were so exquisite they might have been measured with calipers. The curve of their smiles was precise to two decimal places. They shifted formations in the air, perfectly synchronized, even the frequency of their swaying skirts in complete unison.

  "These are our first six prototype generations."

  Wei stood at the edge of the stage, a hint of regretful criticism in his tone.

  "They possess absolute symmetry. Absolute standardization. But as you can see—"

  Wei shook his head with a sigh. "Beautiful, yes, but they lack soul. Too formulaic. They've lost that most captivating spark of spiritual essence."

  He snapped his fingers.

  The six maidens instantly faded, retreating backstage. A spotlight slammed down onto center stage.

  "And so, we shattered the traditional definition of 'perfection' and created—her，Ding-Chou Model · Final Form.”

  Under the gaze of multitudes, the seventh maiden made her entrance.

  She didn't fly. Instead, she walked down from the void, barefoot, step by step. In that moment, every immortal in the audience held their breath.

  A string of grandiose descriptors popped up at the bottom of the screen, perfectly timed with Wei's aria-like narration:

  "Skin of ice and bones of jade." The camera swept in close-up across her skin—that nearly translucent, sacred texture built from ten-thousand-year spiritual lotus root and Tianshan Snow Lotus essence.

  "Bright eyes and gleaming teeth." She raised her eyes slightly, and in that instant her gaze was crystal clear to the depths, as if capable of cleansing all the filth in the world.

  "Lotus blooming with every step." With each step she took, a pink phantom lotus flower bloomed in the void beneath her foot, cradling her sole before dissolving away.

  "Beauty to topple nations." She didn't need to make any expression. Simply standing there quietly, that fragile, heart-wrenching delicacy was enough to make the most iron-hearted Demon King kneel down, just to wipe away tears that didn't exist from the corners of her eyes.

  "Perfection."Wei closed his eyes, speaking in rapture. "This is the pinnacle of the Human Realm."

  Meanwhile. Reality.

  "Perfection?! Kiss my—"

  Ling's "perfect" body had finally stopped spinning due to low battery.

  She immediately tried to seize the chance to stabilize herself, but her limbs felt like they'd just been attached—completely unresponsive. The "Lotus Blooming with Every Step" function was still stuck in the ON position.

  And so, Dax witnessed the bizarre scene before him:

  Ling was shuffling forward like a stroke-afflicted zombie, left foot tripping over right foot, staggering along. With every shuffling step, a pink lotus flower effect sizzled and burst open beneath her foot—some of them, due to rendering errors, turned directly into pixelated blocks.

  On that "skin of ice and bones of jade" face, two streams of nosebleed continued their stubborn flow, running all the way down to her chin, dripping onto the pristine white gauze of her dress, blooming into one horrifying red plum blossom after another.

  The soul inside was already gritting her teeth, face twisted with rage. But this body's "fragile beauty" filter was too powerful. Even with blood streaming from her nose and limbs spasming, her facial muscles were still forcibly locked by the system into "pitiable maiden" mode.

  And so, she presented a state of: brows slightly furrowed (appearing melancholy, actually migraine), eyes glistening and shifting (appearing lovestruck, actually dizzy), lips slightly pursed (appearing shy, actually about to vomit).

  "Jiang… Uncle Jiang…" Ling twitched while producing a saccharine, cutesy voice.

  But Dax knew she was cursing filthily.

  Her left foot stepped on the lotus effect generated by her right foot, and once again she face-planted, falling flat onto the ground. Lotus blooming with every step had become stumbling with every step.

  "Shit!—" (System auto-corrected sound effect: "Teehee~")

  Cold sweat instantly drenched Dax's back. He looked at the sacred, immaculate goddess on the television, receiving the worship of ten thousand immortals. Then he looked at the madwoman on the ground, sprawled among pixelated lotus flowers, face smeared with noseblood, pounding the floor with her fist (which looked like she was throwing a cute tantrum).

  Dax sucked in a breath of cold air and remarked with genuine feeling: "Wei Xu, that old bastard's promotional video… the fraud level alone deserves a life sentence."

  Behind him on the television screen, the celebration continued.

  A wildly rising red K-line chart appeared—the projected growth of incense offerings and merit.

  Wei's voice turned fervent and sacred:

  "This 'Seven Celestial Maidens' Descent project isn't for anything else!"

  "It's to let mortals experience the Court's ultimate goodness, ultimate beauty, ultimate truth!"

  "We project that this cycle's incense conversion rate will increase by 300%! Our Human Realm will surely present a perfect report card before that Supreme Lord—the great Primordial Origin!"

  Below the stage, countless immortals rose to their feet in cheering applause, thunderous ovation, as if they could already see this cycle's bountiful merit dividends.

  Wei on the television bowed elegantly, basking in the glory.

  The screen faded to black. Only eight large characters remained:

  "The Beauty of Purity, Salvation for All Beings."

  In the warehouse, Ling twitched once and went completely still.

  Dax stepped over Ling's "ultimate goodness and beauty" corpse, kicked apart the pile of priceless flower petals, walked over and switched off the television.

  "Salvation for all beings my ass."

  Dax opened his bento box, picked up a piece of braised pork with his chopsticks and stuffed it in his mouth, letting out a cold laugh at the darkened screen.

  "All con artists."