Chapter Text
“A-Huahua will grow up into a fine young man. He would be a good dada to his future son." cooed old lady Ming, her pale bony fingers peeling the sweet potato with a bone knife.
Old lady Shu Ming was the Shang family's neighbour, and was Airplane’s lao lao in everything but blood. She was the one feeding and raising him, while his merchant parents moved towns reselling goods.
Shu Ming never scorned the young child for his family's low value to society. Despite being a farmer all her life, she treated the lesser classes with respect and kindness. A pure, kind grandmother with a heart of gold.
In this world, the status for common people was decided by how hard they worked themselves, and how useful they were to society. Farmers and artisans were well-respected people of higher status than the merchants. Ancient society though of merchants as self-serving incompetent liars. Thus nobody liked merchants much.
The old lady elegantly took a big bunch of melon seeds, and lowered them into the young boy’s hands.
“Lao Lao, I'm too young to be a dada!” Shang Huahua puffed up his face, his cheeks were full of melon seeds. He put them all at once in his mouth, devouring them instantly. The crunchy slightly salty taste of it filled his mouth.
He resembled a hamster in moments like this. To Shu Ming, Shang Huahua will always be a cute little rodent, with cheeks just begging to be squished. Old lady Ming pinched the boy’s right cheek, and pulled it softly to the side.
Shang Huahua didn't appreciate his grandmother teasing him like that. Sure he was the transmigrated 21st century man, but he was a massive shut-in virgin in his past life. Ironic of the legendary papapa web novel author “Airplane Shooting Towards The Sky” to be a total novice in everything related to relationships.
“A-Huahua will see it this old lady's way, once he meets the one who would make his heart beat with thousands of flames.” Shu Ming replied to her adorable young nephew. Her warm brown eyes were overflowing with both fondness and sadness at the sight of her last remaining family.
“Lao Lao is thinking about her hardships again! Ugh i really wish i wrote a better backstory for Shu Ming! Why did she have to die in some wife plot #754 for another young lady to join the harem of Luo Binghe!?” Shang Huahua thought, unable to curse himself internally for subjecting his loving grandmother to a shitty life.
“I shouldn't have written Lao Lao to be the one who outlived her whole family. Shit, I even killed off children and husband in the Proud Immortal Demon Way to be the collateral damage from the demon Invasion in the X-village!” he snarled at himself in his thoughts, for rendering Shu Ming a widow with no family.
Old lady Ming fell into deep sorrow, refusing to eat for weeks, until she was given a young toddler to take care of. The young boy quickly wormed his way into her old bitter heart, endearing himself greatly to the farmer.
But she was past her age, and will inevitably part with the mortal realm too. Leaving her nephew alone, with no one by his side saddened her. Shu Ming swore to marry him off to a fine young lady. It would be for her own nephew's good, to have a fiance at his age. His future fiance would soften his edges, taking good care of him. Her nephew was already hitting his 10th birthday this month, the perfect age to have a fiance.
That's what old lady Ming thought, when she started looking around for good candidates for marrying her nephew. That was how she met Su Xiyan, the head disciple of the Huan Huan Palace.
The young Su Xiyan was serious, focused, yet also gentle and refined. She would have been a perfect fiance if not for her sect’s adamant refusal to let anyone touch their best disciple. The old Palace Master was especially firm in that regard, going as far as threatening to kill her nephew if he dared to even glance at his disciple.
The young ladies refused to marry a merchant’s son, scrunching up their noses in disgust at the mere thought of it.
Unable to find a good finance for her nephew, she laid on her bed in worry. The stress of all her worries, made her succumb to death. Her frail heart couldn't handle the constant stress she was under.
“A-Huahua, p-please grant this old woman's wish of h-her nephew being a good father one day.“ Old lady Ming coughed out her last words to her nephew, bidding her farewell to the mortal realm.
Those were the last words of his grandmother. Shang Huahua, the previously wildly popular Zhongdian Literature writer sobbed like a newborn.
“T-this is too cliche! Lao Lao can't just die like t-this! It's all just fiction, this isn't real. I'm just in a f-fictional world…” he cried out, unable to stop himself from crying. He cried his eyes out until he passed out next to his grandmother's deathly pale body.
Ding
[Congratulations User01, you have advanced through the plot.]
[Adding 500 B-points for character expansion. Current balance: 5000 B-points.]
“System-dage, this isn't funny! Lao Lao is dead, she's not coming to nag me ever again. She's gone from this w-world!” Shang Huahua’s voice shook with grief mixed with fury at his system’s nonchalant reaction to the death of his grandmother.
How could his system tell him that, when he's grieving the only person who loved him? How could this cruel world take away his grandmother?!
Ding
[Character “Shu Ming” was supposed to die far earlier. User01's intervention made the plot expand, filling one plot hole.]
“System-dage, please shut the fuck up! Shut your damn mouth, or whatever you have! I hate you, I despise you with all my body and mind!” Shang Huahua yelled at his cold system. To him, Shu Ming wasn't just a character, she was the only person who loved him like family in both of his lives.
Ding
[Deducing 150 B-points for OOC behaviour]
“What the fuck!” Airplane yelped, cursing the evil system for its unreasonable behaviour. Hsi system loved to bully him, deducing points for shit reasons was one of it's ways to do it.
Like karmic debt coming back at him, he buried his grandmother all by himself at only ten years old. The saying of "like creator, like creation" applied to Airplane. Would he be forced to undergo more angst he wrote for his protagonist? He sure hoped he wouldn't!
After that exactly twelve years had passed for the transmigrator. He grew into a competent Peak Lord of the An Ding Peak under the system’s watchful eyes. Which meant, that he was forced to become the Peak Lord of the An Ding Peak against his will. He sure tried to escape the sect, only for some canon-fodders to bring him back by the scruff of his robes.
Today was another shitshow of his slow descent to logistics madness. Another half-done report written incorrectly by yet another martial sibling of his. They all are fucking peak lords, why can't they ever do it right?
He was filling out the paperwork for the Bai Zhan Peak again. Liu Qingge decided to leave his peak alone to slay another rare demonic beast, leaving all the paperwork on his underappreciated shixioing.
Shang Qinghua swore that he will castrate Liu Qingge himself if that brute forgot to submit the mission report on time. Airplane regretted writting the Bai Zhan War God as a stubborn, arrogant, spoiled young master who would rather slay beasts than do a simple written report.
"Fucking spoiled brats, fucking stupid characters! Why did i write them all like that? They are all seriously pissing me off!" Shang Qinghua muttered under his breath, eyes half-closed from overworking himself daily. His head throbbed from the xianxian equivalent of energy drink he drank ten times this hour.
The worst thing was that nobody appreciated the work his peak did! Even demons looked down on his peak! Which was rude, logistics and finance management is what keeps this sect running.
In his time as the logistics Peak Lord, he surpassed the An Ding Peak Lords before him, simply by inventing, or more accurately using his the 21st century finance management skills. Airplane wasn't the top of his university class in the law and logistics degree for nothing.
"I can't do this anymore, why can't i just run off and live like a salted fish?" Shang Qinghua communicated his complaint to his cold system.
[Deducing 50 B-points for thoughts of abandoning the plot]
[User01 is not allowed to leave until all the plot holes are filled.]
"System-dage! Please stop deducing points, this author won't run away! Please, I can't lose anymore B-points." Shang Qinghua cried out, his system merely ignored him. Why did everyone love to bully him so much? His life is already hard, without all the bullying!
His only saviour in hard times like this were his bottles of baijiu under his work desk. Shang Qinghua opened the bottle, drinking its content to the brim. Instantly all his frustrations melted off, leaving him in a good bliss of peace for a short while.
He drank one bottle, then another. Soon enough all the seven bottles were gone, his mind no longer able to string logical thoughts. His anxious thoughts came to halt, the good wine was bringing his mind to a soft peaceful numbness.
A hard fuzz of the strong wine filled his stomach, making his head spin from his excessive alcohol consumption.
[Would User01 like to purchase a scenario pusher?]
Airplane’s system more often than not acted as if he didn't exist. It had never given him any power up, or a scenario pusher. His system only deducted B-points from him!
“What scenario pusher? Well whatever my life couldn't get even worse, I'm buying it." He said what his sober self would never agree to, because logical thinking has turned off for him on the 5th bottle of baijiu.
Ding
[Initiating the purchase]
[Purchase initiated]
[5000 B-points have been deducted.]
“W-wait what?! That many?” He spluttered, no longer in a hazy bliss of wine. The system's message had managed to sober him up in no time.
[Loading the scenario pusher]
[0%]
[5%]
[10%]
[50%]
[100%]
[Scenario pusher successfully loaded]
[User01 must arrive to the entrance of the sect immediately]
Shang Qinghua ran out of his Peak Lord’s house in a hurry. He hopped onto his blade, Heixiu. [2]
He flew past his whole peak. The An Ding Peak was bathed in yellow and orange trees. Clear flowing water reflecting the silver colour of the moonlight.
In no time, he jumped off his blade. A loud cry of a newborn clad in awfully dirty outer robe greeted him. Someone, unable to provide for the child, left him at the Cang Qiong Mountain Sect’s entrance. Many people left their children near the entrance of sects, in hopes the sects will take them in as disciples.
He gently picked the sobbing bundle of robes up. The newborn giggled, stopping his wailing to look Shang Qinghua in the eyes. He gasped upon noticing that the newborn baby was no other than…
“Luo Binghe!” Shang Qinghua muttered under his breath. It was too early in the story for the young protagonist to show up! The golden-fingered protagonist was supposed to be pampered by a kind washer woman, instead of freezing on the cold mountain entrance.
The baby was far much more adorable than he wrote about in the web novel! The eyes resembling his mother's, and his father's hair made him a super cute newborn. Just the cuteness of the baby protagonist would be enough to make aunties coo at him endlessly.
Ding
[Mission: “Single father deluxe” has started!]
[Failure to raise the protagonist will result in account termination.]
“System-dage, you can't just drop this on a man out of the blue! Fuck, how I'm going to even do this?! I'm not exactly a great father material!” Shang Qinghua panicked, he had no reference of a good father figure.
Both of his fathers in both lives turned a cold shoulder to him, never sending letters once he left the house. It was to be expected honestly, his parents never cared much about him anyway.
He was the embarrassment of the family, the child of the failed marriage. Nobody actually cared much about him, only covering his tuition, because he managed to get into a top Beijing university.
He once proudly showed off his high marks in the law degree he was studying, only to not even be spared a single glance. His parents were too busy admiring his half-siblings for being a genius scholars who studied overboard. Compared to them, he was just a useless, average nobody.
Coming back to the situation at hand, he really had no choice. His only hope of survival would be to take the one who was going to raze this sect to the ground under his wing.
Airplane decided to save the baby, only because he feared the OP protagonist would maim him to death for abandoning him as a baby. Definitely not because he couldn't leave a newborn to die slowly.
Maybe if he raised the young protagonist in a loving environment, then the white lotus won't blacken to a black lotus?
Also he couldn't forget one important thing. Human cultivators hated demon kind a lot, and would kill anyone who was associated with demons on sight. Shit, he has to think of schemes so both of them survive, and not get outed by anyone from or outside the sect.
He doesn't think even the bleeding heart Yue Qingyuan will spare him, once his collision with demons comes to the surface. He will be killed on the spot by either his sect leader or other martial siblings.
Shang Qinghua's heart dropped, he really didn't want to die! Perhaps if he clung enough to his sect leader’s thighs, then he will only administer a punishment? He greatly doubted that Cang Qiong Mountain Sect would take pity on the traitor to the human kind.
Well no matter, he's the creator god of this world! He will think of something! No soul knew the Proud Immortal Demon Way world better than him!
Shang Qinghua only hoped that Mobei-jun wouldn't kill the baby in his arms for being a half-demon. He can't hide the baby forever from Mobei-jun, but he couldn't allow his king to bring harm to his son. The protagonist he crafted day and night. The sleepless nights he had spent planning out Luo Binghe’s backstory, inventing the ridiculous wife plots.
Just his shitty luck at work again! He couldn't complain much right now, it was not as if he didn't want to raise his son. His second greatest creation on his list of ten thousand characters, his best original character. The first place on his list went to Mobei-jun, his handsome ice cold beauty!
“Who is the most adorable baby in the world? You are, you are!” Shang Qinghua managed to make his baby protagonist let out high-pitched baby giggles.
He did promised to his Lao Lao to be a good father to his son. To repay all the love his Lao Lao poured into him, he will fulfill her dying wish.
Without further actions, he scooped up the baby. He carefully held the newborn as they flew slowly back to his Peak Lord's house.