.2 - Abuse the protagonist or we won't pay money

translator: xiin

editors: alamerysl & BlueBug

It wasn't that Xue Ling felt pity for Ivan, but changing the end of his story hinged on changing Ivan's fate. And in order to change his fate, the first thing he needed to do was to go up against those three 'gongs'.

One was the King of mankind, one was the Devil King, and one was the Beast God… When this kind of line-up was compared to Xue Ling's current weak body that had absolutely no fighting power, the situation was simply laughable.

The most miserable thing in this world - aside from the Holy Saint Ivan - was probably Xue Ling's current body.

The wolf cub was originally a three-star Flame Ink Wolf. Its black fur contained traces of red that formed a flame-like pattern on his body that would emit heat when touched. Flame Ink Wolves had very high attack power, and fully grown Flame Ink Wolves could match up against four-star demonic beasts. Oliver's childhood was quite good thanks to his parents' power. After all, the rank above four-star was that of the legendary demonic beasts who lived in the heart of the Demonic Beast Forest and rarely emerged.

But his parents had been encircled and captured by Kent's men and poisoned to death. Kent wanted to gift their beautiful, warm fur to his royal mother to fight for his position as heir. Sure enough, his future path did become much smoother because of his good performance at that birthday party.

Back then, Oliver had been hidden in the grass by his parents, a witness as Kent poisoned Oliver's parents, killed them, and then skinned them for their fur. After that, due to Kent's discovery, the value of Flame Ink Wolves soared, and everyone wanted to wear clothes made of their fur. From then on, Oliver could do nothing but continuously flee. If he hadn't encountered a fortuitous event while fleeing and discovered a legendary demonic beast's inheritance that allowed him to take on human form, he probably would have had no chance to reach Kent at all.

His hatred for Kent was what allowed Xue Ling to take over this body. That towering hatred still existed in this body, and it was probably due to this hatred that Oliver had no way to accept Ivan's betrayal. To make it worse, Ivan added the curse to their contract, and pushed his anger to the extreme. He forcibly annulled the contract between them, even damaging his demonic core to the point where he could no longer take on human form.

In the later part of the story, even though he entered the Devil World and became a true 'demonic beast', Oliver never became a man again. Xue Ling smiled as he asked the system, "Shouldn't you explain what this is about?"

The system acted silly and sweet as it replied, "The one who can't take human form was him, not you. Host, you have already experienced so many worlds where you changed shape - you've even been a tree before. What's there to be scared of?"

Xue Ling laughed dryly, and was thoroughly convinced that his system was incredibly unreliable. He picked through his own memories to find everything related to the legendary demonic beast's inheritance, and after looking for a while, finally found some information about the Sacred Pool that could be found in the deepest part of the Demonic Beast Forest in a corner of his mind.

Rumor said that the Sacred Pool was the holiest spring on the entire continent. It could completely baptize a person's soul, and give them a new life.

But the Sacred Pool could choose; only people that it liked could see it, and only people it liked would be allowed to enter.

If the Sacred Pool liked a Holy Saint like Ivan, then Xue Ling would have no chance of success. But he also had no way to change the plot in his current situation. What could a weak, powerless wolf cub who couldn't even speak accomplish? Ha-ha.After arriving in this world, Xue Ling inexplicably wanted to laugh about all kinds of things.

After making the system provide him with a map, Xue Ling discovered that the place he was now hiding in was an entrance to the Demonic Beast Forest. However, the entrance had been abandoned for many years, and ordinary adventurers would not pass by, which was why he had been able to hide safely until now.

Xue Ling was not interested in exploring why a good entrance like this had abandoned. He stretched out his head, and then promptly lay back down on the ground again…

Forget it, he would leave when the pain receded. Waiting a while wouldn't hurt.

The continent was vast, but the Demonic Beast Forest covered two-thirds of the continent, and the rest was where people lived. Xue Ling was now at the Elder God Academy where Ivan and Kent studied. According to the legends, it was an academy that had been built by the God of Light. It should have been a very famous academy, but the God of Light had already fallen, and the light magic he left behind has been gradually fading away, so this Elder God Academy gradually disappeared from everyone's view.

Kent came to this Academy because there was a rule handed down in the royal family that those who to become king must attend the Elder God Academy for further studies. And Ivan came here because he had a once-in-a-century light magic physique. After the God of Light fell, these kinds of blessed physiques no longer appeared on the continent, but now that it appeared on Ivan, he became the hope of the Elder God Academy.

The Elder God Academy was situated close to the southwest entrance to the Demonic Beast Forest. It was abnormally busy every day as students and hunters entered the Demonic Beast Forest to hunt. But similarly, demonic beasts would hunt human beings that entered the forest. This high-stakes game had existed ever since human beings first stepped foot on this continent.

In fact, the huge Demonic Beast Forest had boundaries that divided it into three layers.

The outermost and largest area was the demonic beast layer. Ordinary demonic beasts and some beasts that had not yet gained awareness and could not communicate were situated here. They were the most prolific, their numbers basically inexhaustible, and consisted of the largest part of the demonic beast population. There were many hunters and warriors who depended on hunting and selling what they killed in the Demonic Beast Forest for their livelihood.

The Elder God Academy guarded one of the entrances. After entering, the hunters were required to pay a certain percentage of what they hunted as a fee when they left. Although students did not have to pay the fee, they had to rely on patrolling and maintaining order in the outer ring of the Demonic Beast Forest to obtain the qualifications to enter.

Although the Academy's reputation had slowly declined and light magic had lost its prestige, their lives here were still comfortable due to the proceeds from this business.

The second layer of the forest was not a place where anyone who had money could simply enter. The Demonic Beast Forest had maintained its own boundaries since its inception. For the second layer, only magicians or knights who had magical ability could enter. If one was unable to apply magic to their weapons, they would be unable to enter as the boundary would keep them out. The second layer contained demonic beasts three-star ranked or above who could already speak and think on the same level as human beings.

Unlike the demonic beasts that tended to gather together in the outer layer, these powerful demonic beasts chose to spread out after they gained their consciousness, and it was not easy to find their tracks. Even hunters who had many years of experience dare not boast that they could find demonic beasts in the second ring.

Back then, Oliver and his family had been tracked for months before finally dying at their hands. If the orphaned Oliver had not been lucky, he would probably have already been killed and stripped down to the bone before he even met Ivan.

The innermost layer was the most mysterious place in the Demonic Beast Forest. It was said that the most advanced legendary demonic beasts lived within - the theoretical five-star and above demonic beasts as well as the Beast God that had existed in rumors ever since humankind came into being. However, nobody was able to enter that place, and those who accidentally found their way in were always sent back out immediately. If some people hadn't seen five-star demonic beasts on the continent before, perhaps the innermost layer of the Demonic Beast Forest would have remained a legend.

Xue Ling now needed to enter to the innermost layer. After all, he had no chance of success if he chose to enter the Devil World, so the innermost layer was his only hope. Even if he was here now, if he couldn't change Oliver's destined path, there would be no way to implement any of this plans. He had no way to change the weird fates of those protagonists in this power-orientated world at all if he didn't rely on some sort of cheat.

"Why does this world reject me so much?" This was something that Xue Ling could not understand. This was the first time Xue Ling had encountered a world that disliked him so much, to the point where it openly and brilliantly stabbed him with a knife of pain the second he entered the world. If it hadn't been for this world's will, he would not be paralyzed, lying here staring at the abandoned entrance to the Demonic Beast Forest and thinking about various things.

"It's probably because it doesn't want you to change Ivan's fate." The system could communicate with the will of the world, but the will of the world had clearly conveyed its rejection, and the system was actually left speechless. "I think the author of this story probably has a deep hatred towards the Holy Saint, and wrote this story in order to create this world where they could heap malice onto Ivan. The first part of the story treats him very well, and made him seem like a god who belonged in heaven. The second half… However holy his life had been before, became directly proportional to how much revenge he suffered through. You've seen Ivan's future fate. If it's not np, then he's simply being endlessly passed round to humans, beasts, and all kinds of beings… Perhaps because the author's malice is too obvious, so the will of the world is also disgusted with Ivan. Although he is the protagonist, they still insist on having him suffer misfortune."

Xue Ling: "…" Oh, he had forgotten that there was another type of literature in the world that was specially set up to abuse the protagonist - the kind where readers wouldn't pay money if they weren't abused enough.

Fine, then. He felt no sympathy for that Ivan, and it wasn't as though he couldn't abuse him during the process of changing his destiny.

Xue Ling remained where he was for an entire day. At night, he finally recovered enough that it no longer hurt so much that he couldn't even walk. He had just gone over his life as a Nine-Tailed Fox in his memories, so he felt no resistance towards walking on four feet. He pulled up the map the system had provided in his mind as he stepped directly into the Demonic Beast Forest, even though it was forbidden to enter the forest at night.

The outermost layer of the Demonic Beast Forest had a large enchanted boundary. It required someone to activate it before they could enter. It was because the Elder God Academy controlled this activation method that they had managed to remain as local tyrants for so many years. Xue Ling had originally been a demonic beast from the Demonic Beast Forest. Although his powers had downgraded and he could no longer speak human words, he was still considered a three-star demonic beast and had the qualifications to enter the forest.

When Xue Ling really stepped into foot into the Demonic Beast Forest, he realized why human beings were not allowed to enter it at night. Even those who had entered the forest would stay within the protective areas set up by a mage or in a protected tent purchased beforehand.

The Demonic Beast Forest became a world filled with demonic plants at night. All sorts of odd plants glowed in the dark, and while the scenery was very beautiful, it was full of danger.

A unique scent permeated through the forest and a light mist covered the earth. If any humans were still awake at this time, they would be disturbed and affected by this scent and unconsciously step into the demonic plants' traps. They would disappear and become nourishment for the forest, feeding these living plants that seemed mundane during the day, yet turned active and grew to several times their original size at night.

Even as a demonic beast, Xue Ling found himself greatly affected as he made his way through the forest.

Due to the damage to his demonic core, Xue Ling could no longer use any of the abilities that belonged to the Flame Ink Wolf. He also had no way to make use of the inheritance from the legendary demonic beast. The only thing he could do was use his own flexible body to fight off these terrible plants.

After crossing numerous swamps filled with living vines and tentacles, and jumping over lakes full of man-eating algae, Xue Ling finally lay breathlessly atop a large lotus leaf. The lotus leaf wrapped up his wolf cub body and seemed to want to devour him, but Xue Ling completely ignored it.

This was not the first plant that had tried to swallow him up. Compared to the slippery ones from before, this lotus leaf was merely trying to wrap him up and use the bumpy spots on its surface to rub him up and down. He just regarded it as a massage; as long as he didn't stay within the leaf for ten days or so, this lotus leaf wouldn't be able to harm him at all. After all, it had taken it a lot of effort simply to wrap him up.

At daybreak, the plants in the entire forest ended their night hunting carnival and began to quiet down. Xue Ling slid and fell off the lotus leaf as it could no longer bear his weight after it shrank back to normal. He landed directly on the ground, and the impact shocked him awake.

Xue Ling's back legs pedalled in the air as he was abruptly woken up from sleep, and he seemed to hear someone laughing quietly in his ear as he jolted awake…

He looked around in a trance, but there was nothing around him. The system appeared beside him, confused, and said, "Host, we should be on our way."

Xue Ling nodded, but he was not entirely convinced. He felt rather listless; after all, having gone through so many worlds, this was the first time he had to work hard for himself without anyone to take care of him. In order to sober himself up, Xue Ling went to the lake and splashed some water on his face.

He didn't know if it was an illusion, but the water by the edge of the lake seemed warm… it was as though someone had heated up the entire lake.

The Demonic Beast Forest was really strange. Xue Ling ignored these inexplicable and unreasonable things, and continued on.

He was really small now, and his four legs were very short. He still had a long way to go, and it was better if he didn't waste time on the way. He didn't want to run into the protagonist shou at the Sacred Pool just as he was about to enter.

any suggestions/recommendations for an 'adventurer/quest' type BL? like the japanese dungeon/farming ones, but chinese. translated or just raws both work~