Chapter 93 – The Unaffordable Puppetry Art

Like a deity gazing down upon the world from on high, or a gamer manipulating a game from beyond the screen.

At this moment, Mu Lin’s Divine Soul vision felt somewhat detached from the mundane world.

This situation made Mu Lin inwardly tense.

‘This is… my Transcendence talent being triggered, I’m being influenced!’

Just as this emotion surged within him, Mu Lin observed something peculiar: as Teacher Meng Rui above posed her question, the group of youths below all answered with infatuated expressions.

Their answers were varied and strange, yet each revealed the most genuine thoughts in their hearts.

“Puppetry Art is safe; after learning it, I can send puppets to fight while I stay behind…”

“What is a puppet? A useful tool, a servant…”

“A puppet that awakens consciousness is still a puppet, still my servant—keep the obedient ones, destroy the disobedient…”

“I want to become friends with puppets…”

“The most perfect puppet is naturally the strongest…”

In an extremely short time, everyone revealed their innermost thoughts.

Even the listless youth Mu Lin had glanced at earlier was no exception.

“Puppets? What they are doesn’t matter; as long as they help me take revenge, they’re the best thing!”

Under the seductive voice, all the youths quickly gave their answers. Because of this, Mu Lin, who remained motionless, stood out as unusual.

On the stage, Puppet Master Meng Rui also glanced in Mu Lin’s direction with slight surprise.

“Interesting, you can actually resist my voice. No wonder Dongfang Ya and that person from the Chu Family recommended you… But since everyone else has spoken, why don’t you share your own views on puppets?”

This made Mu Lin hesitate for a moment. He could vaguely sense that the Puppet Master before him walked the emotional Cultivation Path.

That is, she pursued granting puppets consciousness, making them family.

Such a path was not uncommon, and its emergence was quite reasonable.

In his past life, some people kept dogs or cats, and over time, they came to regard them as family.

Puppet Masters dealt with puppets year-round; if they became obsessed, viewing certain puppets as family or companions, and then sought to give them emotions, it wasn’t unusual.

However, this was the Puppet Master’s path, not Mu Lin’s.

Influenced by numerous movies and novels—like the rise of intelligent machines, Skynet, The Matrix—Mu Lin regarded mechanical beings that developed consciousness as a great crisis, one capable of destroying humanity.

Because of this, Mu Lin never sought to give machines emotions; he viewed puppet machinery as tools.

Useful, affordable, practical—that was his pursuit.

His own Cultivation Path conflicted with that of the Puppet Master before him, which was why Mu Lin hesitated. He could guess that expressing his path would undoubtedly displease the Puppet Master.

Yet, after some thought, he still voiced his true inner thoughts.

He had no intention of changing his beliefs, nor did he believe he could completely conceal his principles in future studies.

If discovered later, it would be deception, potentially bringing him great trouble.

Given that, it was better to clarify things from the start.

“Teacher, I believe puppets are tools. Puppets developing emotions is not my pursuit… Obedient and useful tools make the best puppets.”

“Hmph!”

As soon as these words were spoken, Master Meng Rui herself remained unfazed, but several maidservants behind her grew visibly displeased.

“Foolish commoner, we are not tools!”

Hearing their voices, Mu Lin realized that the maidservants behind Meng Rui were not real humans but puppets. Moreover, judging by their ability to express anger, they were clearly puppets that had developed emotions.

‘As expected, she follows the path of sentimentality.’

With a sigh, Mu Lin knew he would be sidelined from then on. However, he did not regret his choice.

…

“Treating puppets as tools—another person devoid of aesthetics and ambition. Still, you are honest, and that is commendable.”

After this evaluation, the puppet master named Meng Rui pondered for a moment before saying, “You may become my nominal disciple.”

Having said this, Meng Rui turned her gaze to the other youths who had spoken earlier. Since most of them viewed puppets as servants, their situations were even worse than Mu Lin’s. While Mu Lin could still become a nominal disciple, these others could not even qualify as such.

However, the puppet master before them did not dismiss everyone entirely. Though they could not become nominal disciples, they could still study the Puppetry Art under Master Meng Rui. The catch was that without an official status, they would have to pay for their lessons—a hefty sum of Spirit Stones.

What raised Mu Lin’s eyebrows was that most of them chose to stay.

Of course, while some had displeased Meng Rui, others had earned her approval. A young girl who wanted to befriend puppets was accepted as a nominal disciple. Additionally, a young man and a young woman, despite giving the same answer as Mu Lin, were also taken in as nominal disciples out of consideration for personal connections.

None of this was particularly surprising. What truly astonished Mu Lin was the despondent youth, who, consumed by hatred, viewed puppets as tools for revenge. Yet, despite this, Meng Rui accepted him as an inner disciple—the only one among them—and even entrusted one of her maidservants to him as a guardian.

This drew everyone’s attention, and they began speculating about his identity. Even Mu Lin felt a flicker of curiosity. However, he could restrain his inquisitiveness and had no intention of probing further.

…

After the apprenticeship ceremony, the next step for everyone was to begin their studies. However, that would happen the following day; for now, they were free to do as they pleased.

Originally, Mu Lin intended to return directly to the Dao Palace to continue his cultivation. But before he could leave, he was stopped.

The one who called out to everyone was another youth who had been exceptionally accepted as a nominal disciple—his name was Luo Shan. His reason for stopping them was to invite everyone to a meal to foster camaraderie.

“Since we’ve all become disciples under Master Meng Rui, we are now fellow apprentices. This is fate. So today, let me treat everyone to a meal.”

After saying this, he specifically addressed Mu Lin and another nominal disciple: “Brother Mu, Miss Qiao, let me take care of today’s meal. Please don’t try to outdo me.”

At this, Qiao Huihui snorted coldly: “I have no interest in playing house with you all.” With that, she left directly.

As for Mu Lin, Luo Shan’s words made him roll his eyes. He stated bluntly:

“I can’t compete. I’m poor and can’t afford to treat anyone.”

“Haha, Brother Mu, you jest. To be exceptionally accepted as a nominal disciple by Master Meng Rui is no simple feat…”

Knowing that the person before him had misunderstood, Mu Lin explained:

“Don’t misunderstand. Master Meng Rui made an exception to accept me due to a favor owed to my teacher, not to me personally. And Teacher Dongfang Ya only owes me one favor—once used, it’s gone.”

Upon learning that Mu Lin wasn’t a scion of a prominent family like himself, Luo Shan’s attitude did shift somewhat, though he concealed it well.

Afterward, he continued enthusiastically inviting Mu Lin and the others to the banquet.

Qin Yuan, the sole inner sect disciple, and Weng Ya, the young woman genuinely fond of puppets, were particularly the targets of his fervent invitations.

Unfortunately, the former was consumed by resentment and didn’t give Luo Shan any face.

Seeing him leave, Mu Lin declined with a few polite words and departed as well.

Setting aside a night of cultivation, the next day, Mu Lin arrived early at Master Meng Rui’s courtyard, awaiting her lecture.

Unfortunately, to Mu Lin’s disappointment, the initial instruction wasn’t conducted by Master Meng Rui herself but by her maidservants.

They were a pair of twins, appearing very young, akin to little girls of twelve or thirteen.

However, being puppets, their strength couldn’t be judged by age.

Simultaneously, these twin lolis harbored quite a poor attitude toward Mu Lin and the others. Clearly, being treated as tools had left them with considerable resentment.

Fortunately, although the twin puppets had a poor attitude, they were very diligent in their teaching. Any questions asked were inevitably answered.

And from their mouths, Mu Lin indeed learned much knowledge.

“Hmph, you commoners, remember this well. Puppets mainly consist of four components: the energy core, the Mind Crystal, the puppet body, and the external reinforcement Arrays.”

“Among these, the energy core and the Mind Crystal are the most important. For us puppets, they are equivalent to your humans’ heart and brain…”

The explanations from the twin puppets gradually helped Mu Lin understand the inner workings of puppets.

Then, three days later, he prepared to abandon the path of furthering his studies as a Puppet Master.

He had no choice but to give up—the path of a Puppet Master was not easy to tread.

Conventionally, puppets crafted by Puppet Masters, made from superior materials and inscribed with runes and Arrays, were countless times more powerful than the Paper Figures of Paper Artisans.

And indeed, this was true. Simple Paper Figures truly couldn’t compare to the puppets of a Puppet Master.

Moreover, due to the embedded Spirit Stones, Puppet Masters consumed less energy when using their puppets compared to Paper Artisans.

However, despite the myriad advantages of puppets, they also had a fatal flaw—they were expensive!

All puppets required materials, and the stronger the puppet, the better the materials used.

Furthermore, puppets weren’t just costly to construct; every moment of their operation also consumed Spirit Stones.

After battles, puppets needed repairs, which was another significant expense of Spirit Stones.

It could be said that Puppet Masters were a profession built by piling up Spirit Stones, and the combat power of puppets could be directly equated with the amount of Spirit Stones invested.

“No wonder Master Meng Rui, though displeased with those young men and women, didn’t drive them away. She too lacks Spirit Stones!”

After this realization, Mu Lin appreciated the benefits of the Paper Artisan Lineage.

“Individually, Paper Figures may indeed be weaker in power, but they’re cheap. With a single breath and a sheet of paper, one can summon a combatant—infinitely more convenient than puppets.”

“And when a puppet is shattered, a Puppet Master would be heartbroken. But if my Paper Figure breaks, I can replace it anytime.”

“They say, the ancestors of the Paper Artisan Lineage chose paper figures as the vessel for Taiyin Life-Nurturing Qi not only because paper has high compatibility, but also… perhaps because paper figures are cheap?”

“Probably not… right?”

(End of Chapter)