Li Jiong took a while to open his eyes. This time he felt that his strength had not been drained as before, he had not lost blood and consequently it was not absorbed by the matrix. A strong smell of putrefaction reached his nostrils. He started to get up slowly, carefully observing his surroundings.

Only then did he remember that he was not alone! Meng Fei was also sucked into the matrix along with him! He looked around, looking for him. Meng Fei was lying on the ground some distance away from him, but his condition was not good. The energy in this world, negative or otherwise, was much denser than the other and Meng Fei's fine meridians were being forced to expand and absorb that huge amount of energy without any preparation.

As a result, he was being crushed by this spiritual pressure. Meng Fei felt like he was pressed to the ground and all of his organs were going to explode!

He directed a pleading look at Li Jiong since he couldn't speak or breathe no matter how hard he sucked in air.

"Meng Fei!" Li Jiong rushed to him and started blocking a few acupuncture points, thus slowing down the absorption of qi.

A sense of relief swept through the contractor's mind. He was afraid that now that Li Jiong was back, that he would dismiss him as nothing. After all, like it or not, he was Meng fei, a natural enemy for the cultivator. Maybe their time together meant nothing to him. Feeling the pressure lessen, he took a deep, grateful breath, but an acrid, rusty taste rose in his throat and he spat out a mouthful of blood, choking.

Li Jiong was alarmed by this. Had he taken too long to help him? And the worst, with all that noise, soon some demon would notice their presence. Immediately, Li Jiong activated the communication matrix, to see if anyone had survived the last ambush and thus get some help.

Meng Fei wasn't aware of the predicament he was in, and feeling a little better he got up, groaning a little.

"What a horrible place! I didn't think your world was so bad. Cough, cough, where are we?"

"Keep it down, this is Meng Fei's lair. They'll hear us!" What the hell! Are we still in danger?

As expected soon one of the demons, the bigger ones and wearing a heavy set of armor, appeared. "What else is a cultivator? Wait! Li Jiong!?" He turned around and saw Meng Fei beside the other, a trickle of blood drying on his chin.

"Master! Did he attack you? I'm going to finish you off!" The demon roared, drawing his sword. Li Jiong was about to do the same when someone came between them.

"WAIT! STOP! Who said I'm hurt?" Meng Fei laughed nervously.

"Uh, humm there's blood on your mouth..." the demon pointed at the trickle of blood, sensing that there was something off about its leader. He has never spoken this way before.

"Why! Who said this blood is mine!" Meng Fei retorted, he needed to embody the evil character. "Turns out you didn't capture him, did you?"

"Y-yes, we didn't capture any of the cultivators..."

"Oh, so I forgot his name, what is it?"

Li Jiong was paralyzed with shock. Meng Fei's idea of impersonating the demon cultivator was understandable and came at a good time.

But, by Heavens! He was very bad at it! He hoped these demons were dumb enough to fall for that.

"You never asked my name." The demon replied confused.

"Oh, no? Well, I'm asking now. Where have you seen not knowing even the names of the underlings! I must be a son of a bit**!"

Li Jiong and the demon "..............."

"I am General Man Han, sir."

"Fine, General Man Han, let's start again. It turns out that I captured Li Jiong myself. As you can see, he is under my control now and has done nothing against you. Now let's find a way to catch the others."

Li Jiong's heart leapt. Was this part of the act or was he really serious? Could it be that this was actually the real Meng Fei all along, who had created some sort of illusion to capture him? For now, he would just watch.

"Ok, so you take all the demons to the end of this abyss and I'll go with Li Jiong to the top, right?"

"Why sir? "

"Of course I'm going to use him as bait! As soon as they see us up there, his other friends will show up!"

"But you are going to face over 30 cultivators!"

"Uh, so what? I'm not the big boss here? Then I make a signal and then you can attack, do you really think the mice will appear if the cats are all in sight??"

"Big..., no, I don't think so..."

"Just do what I'm told, look, I'm on my way, be efficient and bring all the evil people down here!" He grabbed Li Jiong's wrist and waved at the demon as he walked away.

"Y-yes sir!" The demon stammered in confusion, usually Meng Fei's plans weren't so audacious. He then quickly disappeared from their sight without asking any further questions. Li Jiong wanted to trust that person who was urgently dragging him along, but until that plan made sense.

Though he wasn't under his control and he wasn't helpless. As he thought about that, he heard the voice in the communication matrix calling him, "Li Jiong! Are you alive?! Where are you?"

"Wang Hui, are you in hiding?"

"Yes! We were here as you instructed us! You're injured, we'll get you!"

"I'm going up the Gorge, er…, with a Meng Fei..."

"WHAT?" Someone blurted out in the background.

"Wait! But it's not the same Meng Fei, this is another one! I need you to come to the Peak's entrance, but not to attack him, do you understand?"

"Don't attack him, but if it's Meng..."

"He is and he isn't! You'll understand when you see him."

"Alright, we're going." Wang Hui finally answered.

Li Jiong felt a little anxious, it would be really bad if all of the cultivators suddenly attacked that harmless Meng Fei at once. Not even a shadow of him would remain.

He saw that the plan had worked, all the demons were descending as they climbed the steep walls. Meng Fei was even skilled at climbing the narrow path, even running like that.

"Your group, do you know if they are far away?" He asked, in no time he let go of Li Jiong's wrist as if he feared losing him.

"I already called them."

"Ah great, now that all the demons are down there, it'll be easy for you to catch them."

"...... Did you even think about that?"

"Of course! There's no way out down there, you cast some cultivation spells over there, lock them up and please don't kill the other Meng Fei until he sends me back! With that demon getting in the way, I couldn't even copy the array and without her how am I going to get back?" He was out of breath from blurting everything out so quickly and running, so Li Jiong stopped and held him against the wall so that he could rest for a while.

"We're out of time........." Meng Fei muttered.

"I know. You're not used to the qi here, from now on I'll take you."

Meng Fei "........."

Before he could speak, Li Jiong picked him up and jumped using his qinggong. Caught off guard, Meng Fei clung to the cultivator's shoulder.

Despite expecting some physical contact since this was not the first time he had carried someone, Li Jiong had a pleasant surprise: feeling the warmth of the other's body, his breath on his neck, the sensation of the fingers holding his waist, the smell of her hair... he never noticed that on others! Why was this person different? However, that good feeling didn't last long, in a few seconds they were at the top of the Gorge.

"Er, can you put me down now?" Meng Fei was not very comfortable in this position, his heart was beating so hard that it felt like it was going to escape through his chest. The other who carried him might find this strange. Li Jiong carefully placed him on the ground.

"Thank you, cultivators are definitely another level of human beings." He thanked her and then looked at the long way they had traveled in just a few moments.

Li Jiong smiled. "Was that a compliment?"

"What else could it be? When will the others arrive?" Meng Fei laughed. He was strangely calm considering the fact that he'd fallen into a world very different from his own.

The cultivator lowered his beautiful dark eyes to the view below the Peak.

"Have they arrived." He answered calmly.

Author's Note:

Mini theater 1:

Meng Fei: I am the Big Boss here.

Man Han: Big what?

Li Jiong: He means he's the master here, you have to interpret it by context.

Meng Fei: Yeah! That's it! (HOW DO I COMMUNICATE HERE??? - Inner Panic 1).

Mini Theater 2:

Meng Fei: Li Jiong! You shouldn't take me like that!

(GAAAHHH! I'M BEING CARRIED OUT LIKE A PRINCESS! Inner Panic 2).

Li Jiong: Why can't I carry it like this? I like it.

Meng Fei: Because it's embarrassing! Put me down!

Li Jiong: I don't feel like it.

Meng Fei: ...... (There goes my face...)

Author: Neither do I, kkkkkkk. I'm having so much fun writing this story. Meng Fei pretending to be a villain was the biggest failure and well caricatured, but at least it worked, that's what matters.