Wang Xiaoer's Inner Monologue, My Master is in Trouble

Volume 3: A Nobleman

Opening Lines:

Human fear is extremely terrifying. It often forces people to do some irrational things.

Zhang San has been wondering why he almost lost his life for no reason. Was it to overcome his own fear?

Baijun Marquis also often asks himself one question.

"What should a person do to overcome their own fear?"

Lu Gaosheng said to him: "Then you have to first know why you are afraid."

After hearing this, Baijun Marquis fell into contemplation, and then said: "People always sow fear in the name of love. This fear cannot be overcome."

Humans cannot defeat their own fears.

Because if you have won, why would you be afraid?

...

...

Hmm.

First of all, please allow me to introduce myself.

My name is Wang Xiaoer. I am a normal, sensitive young man of the new era with no bad habits.

I am currently practicing martial arts, qinggong, neigong at the prestigious assassin sect—Decent Sect.

And in preparation for my future career, I am working hard to learn professional skills including but not limited to blacksmithing, masonry, cooking, painting, medicine, etc.

As for what these skills have to do with being an assassin?

I swear.

I don't really know either.

But I am not worried at all. As the next generation head of the sect, the undisputed successor, I personally have great confidence in the development of my sect in the next 50 years.

I have recently been discussing with my master whether we should sell some of the new black market bonds I invented, given the promising future of our sect.

Of course the purpose is to benefit the wider community of grassroots fellows in the black market, since they are foolish but have lots of money.

For example, I once met a bandit called Li Dahu. He is as fierce as his name suggests. I personally feel that he is pretty easy to deceive...oh no, he is quite kind-hearted. His only shortcoming is that he is foolish, but not rich in money.

Of course, please don't be too envious and jealous of me. As a person, I also have strengths and weaknesses.

Let's start with the strengths.

First, I am a prodigy in martial arts.

Back then, my master had begged my mother for a long time before she reluctantly agreed to let me join Decent Sect.

After all, with me on board, it is like laying an extremely solid foundation for the future of the sect.

Second, despite my young age, I am actually a handsome man.

Back when I was in Tian Ruo City, I happened to meet a girl named Bai Xiaoyu. I have to say, she was quite good-looking.

However, just like my master, I stay away from women and belong to the aloof type of men. Even though she tried all kinds of moves on me, I still rejected her verbally. But in the end, I unintentionally fell for her charm in a moment of weakness. Shame on me, shame on me.

That being said, let me get back to the main topic.

Why is there thunder in the sky while I'm doing a monologue? Wasn't it sunny just now? This world is so strange!

So honesty has actually become a sin!?

Now onto my weaknesses.

Regarding weaknesses, I was tossing and turning all night yesterday before finally finding a weakness in myself.

My weakness is...I have no weakness!

You may wonder, how can having no weakness be a weakness?

The logic is simple. When you are a person, especially a man or boy, if you are too perfect, you tend to incur jealousy from those around you, like your master for example.

The most intuitive example is that I don't know why, but my master has discovered a strange trait about me in the past six months - narcissism.

Am I narcissistic?

Of course not.

I'm just simply confident, with the extent of the confidence open to discussion at best.

Besides, do I not have the capital to be confident?

Take for example, my master is the undisputed successor of the previous generation of Decent Sect, and I am the undisputed successor of this generation of Decent Sect.

Since we are both undisputed successors, rounding it off, doesn't that make me equal to my master!?

And given that my master is at the Heaven Realm, wouldn't I then be...hmm, thinking about this makes me a little excited. As expected, without racking your brains as a person, you wouldn't know how capable you actually are.

But back to the main topic.

It has been almost half a year since I narrowly escaped death.

And recently, as my master's injuries have gradually healed, our job seeking has also been quite smooth, and everything seems to be moving in a good direction. But during several recent tasks, I have strongly sensed that my master has become extraordinarily steady!

Or in other words, my master has changed remarkably.

After careful thinking, I finally determined the reason for my master's remarkable change - it is mainly because of the near-death experience half a year ago.

After all, according to my master, in the 20 years since he became an assassin, let alone someone killing him, rarely anyone could even get near him.

That is to say, it was the first time in 20 years that my master had come so close to death after becoming an assassin.

Reasonably speaking, for a normal person who has gone through a life-threatening crisis, changes in personality and outlook would usually occur, with two common directions.

The first is that he would gradually become more cautious and prudent.

There is a saying - once bitten by a snake, afraid of ropes for the next ten years.

The second is that he would gradually become bolder, even fearless of death.

After witnessing death, some people instead become less afraid of dying, or more indifferent about it.

Of course, it has to be said, there may also be a third outcome - no change at all. Who said there must be change after going through life and death?

Perhaps for that person, life goes on following the usual pattern after the life-death experience, unchanged.

But my master is special in that he belongs to a fourth category!

In simple terms,

For a person who was already extremely afraid of death or extremely steady to begin with, when it comes to the word "steady", he has already reached the limit. Therefore, death cannot make him become even steadier.

But according to my master,

He believes that with his martial arts cultivation getting higher and higher, plus getting to know Xiu Wangchou, the steadiness that he once had has shown signs of regression.

That is to say, my master realized that he was not as steady as before.

Therefore, my master swore that from now on, he would pick up the prudence he had when he was 17 years old!

Because the lessons of this past year have made him fully realize just how dangerous the Jianghu is.

My master also earnestly advised me,

"Xiaoer, let's talk about Xiu Wangchou first. Reaching the Lower Heaven Realm at 30 with superior sword skills, paired with Star Sea Sect's famous sword 'Star Color', if not for the sneak attack, he almost took out Hei Shanke. Is he good enough at fighting!?

"And then there's Lu Gaosheng. By just walking into our shop, looking at some books and paintings, noticing things like the painting style, paper quality, yellowing of blank areas, he was able to dig up virtually everything about me. Is he smart enough!?

"So what if you can fight well? Or how smart can you be? It's all useless if you lose your life!"

"So Xiaoer, take your master's advice. The water in the Jianghu is too deep. We can't handle it!"

In Wang Xiaoer's eyes recently, my master has indeed picked up the prudence he had when he was 17, because he has been so steady lately that I have never seen before, to the point of being unreasonable!

In summary,

My master...he has become remarkably steady!!