Song Miaozhu had changed her outfit style and hairstyle multiple times.
Row after row of little paper servants sat neatly arranged on the table, each in a different style. She had already run out of naturally shed hair and had started plucking strands from her own head to make them. Still, not a single one could be successfully activated.
Eventually, she gave up on sticking to convention. She abandoned the standard upright posture, gave up on smooth, realistic arms, and directly trimmed the paper servant's arms into a pose where they were hugging its chest. She even folded a properly sized gold ingot for it to hold.
She scrapped all the usual styles from her wardrobe and made a cute little skirt from gold-foil paper instead.
She ditched her usual hairstyles like loose hair or a ponytail and tied two braids, using twisted gold-paper strips to secure them.
No more measuring proportions or calculating symmetrical features. She just drew a chibi-style face with glowing gold eyes.
Paper servant:(◕‿◕✿)
In the end, Song Miaozhu thought it didn't look much like her at all. Still, it was definitely the most beautiful and adorable one among all the paper servants she had made so far, perfectly in line with her aesthetic taste.
"Well, even if it doesn't work, at least it's cute," she comforted herself while tapping the paper servant's forehead with a thread of spiritual energy, just to give it a try.
That familiar sensation of spiritual energy being drawn out hit her again. But this time, there was something else, something faintly different.
She focused and felt it carefully. It seemed to be just as the Secret Art of Paper Crafting described—the subtle connection between her and the substitution paper servant.
"!!!"
It worked?
She stared at the paper servant in disbelief. A faint spiritual glow shimmered across its surface, clearly different from the pile of failed ones beside it.
And yet she hadn't even tried to make it resemble herself this time. Somehow, that was what made it succeed.
Song Miaozhu was thoroughly confused.
"But the book said it needs either physical or spiritual likeness to succeed…"
Once again, she questioned her own judgment.
She snapped a photo and sent it to Chen Yuanyuan.
Her friend had been studying illustration—surely her eye for detail was sharper.
[Miaow Zhu]:[Image]
[Smooth as Yuanyuan]:OMG! Is this you? So cute!
[Miaow Zhu]: (⊙_⊙)
[Miaow Zhu]:How can you tell? It looks nothing like me!
[Smooth as Yuanyuan]]: That money-grubbing expression is 100% you! Every time you got paid for a part-time gig, you'd look just like that counting your money.
[Miaow Zhu]: …
Song Miaozhu had no idea what her "money-grubbing" face looked like.
But she did grasp the key now—this time, she'd captured the essence of herself.
She had never worn that skirt. She just thought it looked cute.
She hadn't had braided hair like that since elementary school.
And she'd certainly never hugged a giant gold ingot.
Physical resemblance was impossible. It had to be spiritual.
Whatever the reason, it had succeeded.
She first took out a spirit stone to restore her spiritual energy to its peak. Then she summoned a few little paper servants and had them carry the substitution paper servant out the back gate, heading up Xiaozhu Hill.
Meanwhile, she stayed home, quietly focusing on the connection between herself and the paper servant. As the distance increased, she could feel the connection gradually weakening. Before the connection disappeared completely, she told the little paper servants to stop.
According to the Secret Art of Paper Crafting, as long as the connection remained, it was still within transmission range. She could activate the transfer by using just a thread of spiritual energy to link with the substitution paper servant.
The difficult part of the art lay in crafting the substitution paper servant. Using it was actually quite simple.
Song Miaozhu focused a wisp of spiritual energy and activated the paper servant. In a blink, the floor-to-ceiling windows of her paper-crafting studio vanished. In their place was a dense bamboo forest. Birds chirped and insects buzzed all around her. Song Miaozhu was still trying to process what had just happened.
The little paper servants seemed just as shocked, circling around her in a flurry. She walked downhill for a bit and only felt it was real when she saw the roof of her own house peeking through the trees.
She had really teleported from home to the back mountain forest in an instant. There was no discomfort, no sense of spatial distortion at all. A straight-line distance of nearly three li—about fifteen hundred meters—had passed as easily as taking a single step.
All her hard work had paid off. She had even fallen behind on designing new styles of Yin Paper Clothes because she'd been focused on this. But the substitution technique truly was amazing.
When she returned to the yard, she saw the little paper servant standing at the floor-to-ceiling windows of the paper-crafting studio, holding the gold ingot, dressed all in shimmering gold.
It stood exactly where she had been moments ago.
Its shape hadn't changed, but its spiritual glow had completely faded.
It even seemed to lack the lively aura it had before.
Song Miaozhu knew that this was the aftermath of the substitution. The paper servant had lost its spirituality and was now just a lifeless figure. She cut it open with a blade. The hair strand hidden inside had already turned to ash.
But that was fine. She could make more.
Now that she had grasped the key to crafting a substitution paper servant, the possibilities were wide open. The same type of servant could also be used as an Injury Substitute or Life Substitute. They required similar standards, only the activation method was slightly different.
Life Substitute servants had even higher demands for both appearance and spiritual likeness, but if nurtured with spiritual energy over time, this level of craftsmanship would already be enough. The missing bits of resemblance could be replenished through slow spiritual cultivation.
But for now, substitution was the most urgent.
Based on her earlier success, Song Miaozhu continued to make more money-loving paper servants.
One after another, they came out with golden clothes and gold ingots in hand. She activated them using the substitution technique and stored them carefully in a shaded wooden box in her ghost shop's warehouse.
If she ever found herself in danger, her little paper servants could retrieve one instantly and allow her to escape through substitution.
The little paper servants were extremely thin and agile. Great for reconnaissance—and great for escape too. The only caveat was that they needed to be spread out. They couldn't all stay with her. If she ever got surrounded or imprisoned so tightly that nothing could get out, the paper servants around her wouldn't be able to help her escape by deploying the substitution paper servant.
Only those hidden in other places would be able to find a safe location and activate one for her. This was much safer and more flexible than leaving a substitution paper servant planted somewhere as a backup.
After all, a damaged paper servant could be revived just by cutting out a new body. But a substitution paper servant took five to seven days to make. If someone destroyed it before she even got to use it, that would be a huge waste.
She decided to post this chapter first. She wasn't sure if she could finish the next one in time.