Kenja looked at himself as he began moving his hands and legs around to gauge the maneuverability of his outfit. After a small dash and a couple of jumps, he stood up straight and closed his eyes. Snail was admiring his handiwork when Kenja spoke up."I have to pretend to be a girl. Fine. But must I wear such clothes? Normal daoist robes would have sufficed."
Snail held his mouth open with a shocked expression as if Kenja just suggested the most outrageous idea known to humanity.
"What the h.e.l.l are you saying? I am the very zenith of perfection. It"s only natural that my students are the same. If we decide to do something, we must do it perfectly and with conviction!" he held a pose as if pointing the nose that he didn"t have up to the sky.
Kenja did not relent. "But I don"t think this dress is enough to fool people."
Snail let out a dry laugh. "You haven"t taken a good look at yourself yet, have you? Go to the bucket of spirit water and peer inside."
Kenja walked over to one of the buckets of spirit water and looked at his reflection. He was astonished to find an unfamiliar face. The defining features were the same, but his skin seemed a lot smoother and glossier than before. The small amount of facial hair he had on the bottom of his chin was gone, and his jawline was more refined. The white of his eyes were devoid of any redness and his eyebrows seemed a lot cleaner and slimmer. The biggest change, though, came from his hair. Originally, his hair fell slightly short of his earlobes, but now they extended past his shoulders. If he didn"t know better, he would have had trouble immediately determining the gender of such a person.
"Surprising, yes? Breakthroughs are truly wondrous happenings. If a woman reaches the next stage, her body becomes more beautiful and perfect. If a man reaches the next stage, his body does the same thing. There are several theories why this occurs, but my favorite is the Yin Genesis conjecture."
Kenja turned his face to look at Snail while rinsing the grime off his hair with the spirit water. "Yin Genesis conjecture?"
"Yes. Some snooty cultivator came up with the idea that all humans begin as females and that some of them end up transforming into males before they are born. So when a person reaches a new stage, the body expels a lot of the excess dirt, grime and filth acc.u.mulated in the body and regresses to a higher state of purity which just so happens to coincide with the image of an ideal woman."
Kenja was rendered speechless as Snail waited to gauge his reaction. He continued after a breath.
"Preposterous, right? Everyone starting off as a woman. Imagine! Me, a woman? Now that would be an injustice for women everywhere, depriving them of my amazing body and charm."
Sakura began vibrating as if laughing at his comment. Snail quickly twisted his tentacles and squinted his eyes at her. He exhaled a loud snort before turning back to Kenja.
"The other theories have some merit, but I am tired of explaining every little thing to you. Don"t be scared, your bamboo stick won"t get chopped off, and you can cut your hair if you don"t like it long. The only dangerous part is that your body will become attractive to more than one gender, but it"s okay. You have me! The professional ladykiller. You can consider yourself lucky if a fly so much as lands on your nose."
Again, Sakura vibrated merrily which caused Snail to look at her once more in irritation.
Kenja had finished cleaning himself up and equipped the scabbard on his left side. He picked up Sakura and cleaned her once more before sliding her into the scabbard. He could feel her humming in appreciation as she slid inside.
"Perhaps I may look like a woman, but I definitely do not sound like one."
Snail suddenly looked at something to the left of Kenja. Kenja turned his head mentally readying himself for a surprise. As soon as his head stopped turning, he felt a slimy sensation on his face. Despite steeling himself, he was still surprised by the sensation.
"Do you have to keep jumping onto my face??!" Kenja asked aggrieved.
"Do you have to keep being annoying? Now, hush." Snail retorted. He slithered to his ear and situated himself on Kenja"s right earlobe.
"When I get bored of here, you mind letting me switch to the other lobe?" Snail asked seriously.
Kenja grabbed his head again.
"I"m going to be an Immortal who ascends past the sky, and I will still be getting headaches."
"Like I said, I don"t sound like a..." Kenja trailed off as he realized his voice sounded quite different from before.
"Hoho, I"ve outdone myself! Now that is the voice of a woman! Go check your reflection now and tell me again, "which one are you?""
Still shocked by the new voice, he walked back to the buckets of water and looked at his reflection once more. Staring back at him was the same face as before except the eyelashes were much longer and more numerous. The eyebrow line seemed to end in a slightly more seductive curve. Kenja"s lips were marginally pinker and more luscious. Even his hair seemed to adopt a slightly wavy and alluring temperament, and on his right ear, a stylish sh.e.l.l hung from his ear as if it were common jewelry. His aura, too, became much more feminine and enticing.
Kenja heard a laugh coming from his right ear. "Now you can tell people you"re a man, and they won"t believe you. I told you! If we do something, we gotta do it one hundred and ten percent!"
"How did you do it?" Kenja was baffled.
"Blah, that"d take too long to explain. I am adjusting the ratio of the Yin and Yang particles that your body discharges to align with the woman"s Golden Ratio on top of some other things. Let"s just hurry up and get out of here."
Snail turned his head away from Kenja and began coughing repeatedly. After a dozen coughs, a soul-like and transparent ent.i.ty exited his mouth and floated in the center of the glade. It looked like a transparent blue ball with a white ball at its core.
Snail turned his head back to Kenja. "Ok, we can go now."
Kenja didn"t feel like asking the snail for an explanation about his actions right now, so he made his way to the edge of the glade, and as he was about to go through the shrubbery, Snail stopped him.
"WAIT!"
Kenja paused and moved his eyes to the right. "What now?"
"...Can I switch sides?"
Kenja"s eyes bulged.
"It"s important," he declared.
"Why???" Kenja was honestly curious about why the side mattered.
"On that side...if I aim properly, I think I can hit the harlot with my spit...and other things."
Kenja didn"t respond. He merely lifted his right hand"s finger and thumb and flicked his earlobe with the full power of his Qi Flourishing stage.