Quick Transmigration: The Villain is Destiny, the Protagonist Takes a Backseat

The ancestral hall was filled with the smoke of incense and was as bright as day, illuminating the hundreds of memorial tablets of all sizes clearly.

Of course, because of the strong incense offerings and the fear of fire, there were people keeping watch at night. Several people crouched at the door and let Li Yu in to handle the situation.

A short while later, Li Yu came out and made the OK sign he had just learned.

When Ji Qiuzhe went in, he found the man unconscious. He asked in bewilderment, "How did you do that?"

Li Yu: "Corpse poison."

Ji Qiuzhe: ...

So, he was poisoned?

Li Yu gave him an affirmative look. Ji Qiuzhe turned around and saw three identical blank faces. Compared with Pang Miao's blank face, he couldn't tell who had lost their mind.

Fine!

He knew his prince was very powerful, but no matter how powerful he was, the person could only be his!

He forcefully pulled Li Yu into his arms and stepped into the hall first.

The statue, which already looked rather ominous during the day, became even more eerie at night with its eyes lowered and a smile on its face, accompanied by the flickering candlelight. The emerald green snake coiled around its arm was particularly striking.

"Wait a minute," Ji Qiuzhe suddenly asked Ning Hao, "The earth immortal you're talking about, is it a snake?"

Ning Hao simply nodded, "Yes."

Ji Qiuzhe: "Is that one you're looking at?"

"Which one?"

That one.

Ji Qiuzhe pointed to the emerald green shadow on the statue's arm.

As everyone's gaze fell upon it, the previously motionless, lifeless creature suddenly began to wriggle, its belly coiling around the dry wood, emitting a soft rustling sound in the silent night.

The sound wasn't loud, but it was deafening to the people present.

"what--"

Ning Hao let out a cry, which was rather pathetic.

Ji Qiuzhe grabbed his mouth, "What are you shouting for? You're being incredibly disrespectful to your guardian spirit!"

Ning Hao was so frightened that he rolled his eyes.

He always thought that the idea of ​​a guardian deity was fake, just a rumor.

The snake looked small from a distance, but the sculpture was at least three meters tall. The snake, with its body outstretched, must have been at least two meters long. It was also green, with a triangular head and red eyes, and looked extremely venomous.

"Run, run!"

Ning Hao's mind was filled with nothing but escaping.

Ji Qiuzhe was too lazy to pay attention to him. Anyway, he couldn't escape, since he was carrying someone on his back.

He asked Li Yu, "Didn't you notice when you came in?"

"Found."

Li Yu answered calmly.

"Oh~"

That's right. Compared to Li Yu, nothing is a big deal, not even earth immortals or poisonous snakes.

"Then could you please bring that thing over, honey? I'd like to play with it."

"Play..." Ning Hao rolled his eyes again, but Yu Lou quickly caught him.

Li Yu replied, "Okay."

Since his princess wanted to play, Li Yu naturally had to oblige, so he walked towards the statue.

As if it could understand human speech, the snake's previously stretched-out body quickly tensed up, and it raised its head to flick its tongue.

"hiss--"

It sounded like a threat, yet also like a warning.

Li Yu ignored everything, reached out, pinched the drooping half of the snake's tail, and was about to pull the snake off the statue.

"wait wait wait!"

A clear, youthful voice suddenly came from the snake's opening and closing mouth.

Li Yu didn't stop what he was doing and was about to pull when Ji Qiuzhe called out to him, "A Yu."

Li Yu let go, wiped his hand on the hem of his clothes with disgust, and then returned to Ji Qiuzhe's side, taking his hand and covering the sticky feeling left on his hand.

Ji Qiuzhe looked at the green snake, "Since you can speak, I'll ask and you answer, otherwise... it wasn't easy for you to cultivate to become an Earth Immortal, you won't want to be forced back to your original form, will you?"

"M-Master." Fear appeared in the small red bean eyes of the Green Snake.

"Please tell me, and I will answer to the best of my knowledge."

"Well then, first of all, tell us why you don't want to get down from the statue."

"This statue is merely a symbol of the villagers' hopes for you. Your true form is entwined around it day and night, receiving offerings of incense. Even if you leave this statue, you can still absorb the power of the incense offerings, right? Unless this statue has some other meaning for you?"

"Yes." The green snake, being stared at by the zombie king, shrank its flat snake head in fright, just like a mouse seeing a lynx.

"My lord, please understand—" the green snake began to wail, "It's not that I deliberately wanted to obstruct you, but this statue suppresses an evil spirit. If you kill me, the evil spirit will be unrestrained, and the people of Qingning Village will likely suffer a backlash—"

"Damn it," Ji Qiuzhe thought, wanting to facepalm. "What kind of image do I have in this snake's eyes?"

but……

"Backlash?"

He grasped the key point: "You mean the people of Qingning Village did bad things with the help of this evil spirit, and therefore they are being punished?"

"Yes, it is."

The green snake hadn't expected this human to be so perceptive; it hadn't even said anything yet, and the human had already guessed it correctly.

"Hurry up and tell me the whole story."

“It’s like this…” Green Snake dared not be negligent.

"I have been entrenched in this mountain village for over two hundred years, and I have witnessed every move in the village. Three years ago, the village chief brought back an evil god from who knows where. He sculpted a golden statue of him and hid it inside my image, where it was worshipped by thousands. On the surface, all that incense is offered to me, but in reality, it is not meant for me."

"Later, a few months later, a wealthy merchant came, lit incense in front of my statue, and after returning home, donated all his wealth to the village for mountain repairs, road construction, and tourism development."

"A few days later, the wealthy businessman came in person to fulfill his vow. He did not show any signs of being destitute after losing all his wealth. On the contrary, he was radiant and looked as if he had been reborn."

The green snake hissed, "I have some divination skills, and I discovered that the wealthy merchant was originally supposed to die suddenly in a few months, but for some reason, his fate has completely changed, and he is destined to live to be a hundred years old."

"I suspected that the golden statue was unusual, so I stayed on my own statue day and night to watch over it. I discovered that on the 15th of each month, it would randomly choose one person's soul to absorb in order to replenish itself. I tried to stop it, but it seemed to be controlled by a powerful figure behind it. Instead, it injured me. I was powerless, so I could only use my body as a barrier to trap it inside my own statue to prevent it from causing a greater disaster."

As the green snake spoke, a hint of resentment appeared in its beady red eyes. "What's hateful is that I've tried to communicate with the village many times over the past three years, but not a single person can understand me. Humans, you are the first wave."

Ji Qiuzhe didn't know what to say. After thinking for a moment, he couldn't help but ask, "So, you're just relying on brute force to hold this position?"

The green snake hesitated, then finally managed to utter a few words: "What else?"

Ji Qiuzhe: ...

No wonder even as an Earth Immortal, he couldn't defeat this evil creature in three years.

"Do you know that even with your constant vigil, this evil creature can still devour people's souls?"

The green snake was horrified, "How could this be?!"

Ji Qiuzhe pointed helplessly at Pang Miao, "Look, she came to offer incense ten days ago and had one of her souls sucked away. Didn't you notice?"

Green Snake looked closely at Pang Miao, whose face was ashen, and said somewhat guiltily, "Perhaps, perhaps it was my oversight."