My body made thunder as I slammed against the storming water, the wind knocked out of me. I coughed and sputtered, wheezing as mouthfuls of polluted water flooded into my throat. 

“Gah-!” 

Thankfully, spending more coins to upgrade my physique level made up for most of the 

pain, but my body still throbbed and ached from the force of impact. I would definitely have a nasty purple bruise in a few hours. 

Before I had time to recover, the upper body of the sea serpent dove back down into the water, its body barely leaving a ripple in the raging waves. 

Damnit! There was no way I could get through this. It wasn’t possible in my novel, and in a world governed by rules, my written word triumphed. 

The sea serpent suddenly whizzed past me, its gaping jaws wide open and unhinged as I jerked my body sideways to avoid it. I looked back up toward the collapsing bridge, squinting my eyes to see if the rest of the group made it.

“Good,” I whispered to myself, a little smile on my face as I saw them reach the end of 

the bridge, peeking over the cliffside. Yang could take care of all of them. With Sun Wukong and Archangel Michael with them, they would be just fine without me.

I quickly shook my head, disappointed in my own reaction. Yang and Amelia were the only non-characters; there was no need to get caught up over characters. After all, did they even have free will?

Looking down, I saw the sea serpents' wide jaws snap open beneath my legs before it flew upwards, sending me into the sky. My arms flailed in the air while I hovered in between its gaping jaws, looking down its burgundy and fleshy throat.

I let out a surprised scream, and my eyes were squeezed shut out of sheer terror at the sight. This was far scarier than what I had originally imagined—what would the rest of this world look like with giant demons, horrific ghouls, and vile cannibals??

I grabbed onto the fang of the serpent, holding on and trying to swing myself onto its scaly nostrils.

A blue flash appeared before me as a small dragon popped up. Seeing these two side by side, they looked incredibly familiar.

[My my, look at what we have here! It’s very impressive you haven’t died yet, but you’re sure to meet your end soon.]

That damn money hungry broadcaster. I dug my nails into the serpent’s scales, slowly pulling myself up and grabbing its whiskers. It let out a horrific cry, its voice reverberating throughout the air all around it.

The sea serpent was one of the most powerful beasts. Unlike dragons where there were hundreds of tales involving their brutal deaths, tales of a serpent’s death were much less common—except for when Medusa was involved. 

The serpent slammed back down into the water, dragging me along as I struggled to hold my grip. It flung me into the riverbed as I gagged, quickly spitting out mixtures of water and saliva down my china. 

I grabbed the pigeon’s lung that started floating up toward the water’s surface and reattached it to my mouth. It formed a small air bubble around me, but it wouldn’t last long.

[You’re still putting up a pretty good fight. I’m surprised you’re not dead yet, Peijin.] 

The Azure Dragon laughed under the water, bubbles exiting its mouth and floating up to the top as it cackled. 

[This is such fun! You really don’t want to die!]

I quickly swam into a small cave in the riverbed, hiding as the sea serpent raged outside, slamming its wide-open jaws into the rock to try and grab me. I swam farther into the cave before reaching a small air pocket. Gasping for air, I pushed my slick hair off my face. 

“Chang! I want to sign a contract with Athena!” I cried out at the creature, wet hair clinging onto my skin in the dark.

[A contract? With Athena?] 

He burst out laughing, holding onto his stomach before his eyes turned menacing. Chang’s fangs seemed to grow before me as he took on a horrific look reflecting that of the sea serpent outside. 

 [You think you can open a contract with her? You’re weak. Here you are about to die after making it past just the introduction to this world.]

I scowled under my breath; the constant attacks of the sea serpent caused small rocks to crumble and smack down into the water beside me. Had I known it would play out like this, I would’ve done more to gain Athena’s favor. My eyes glistened blue in the cave as I activated hindsight to try and find a way out.

I opened the Azure Dragon store, quickly swiping.

It was that expensive? It wasn’t that strong of an item outside of any arcs involving Medusa, but I needed to try and replicate the original story to have a chance at escaping.

 

 

 

Was my skill seriously bargaining with me? Well, there goes all of my coins. I made the purchase and grabbed the item as it appeared before me, taking it into my hand. It was a large stone shield with good weight to it, but only half of it was present; a large crack ran down the center horizontally, but it thankfully still shielded most of my body. 

 

I glared at the notification before looking up at Chang. 

 

“Don’t send me coins right now, Athena. I don’t need money,” I declared loudly as I continued to search the Azure Dragon store for what I needed. “I need you to sign a contract with me.”

Sending back constellation coin sponsorships wasn’t even something the disciples dared to do in Surviving my First Run. Admittedly, I desperately needed the money, but I had to get the contract signed if I wanted to survive. 

“Chang, open up the contract.”

Chang puffed out his chest and crossed his arms in a stubborn gesture. 

[You’re making a lot of enemies, Peijin. I’m going to have to put up an ad break if this continues. You’re bringing me in a lot of viewers, but it’s crashing my system.]

“Put on the ad break. I’ll let you have a say in the contract terms.” My voice was firm and serious, and I was no longer playing around.

[Deal.] 

I could virtually see Chang’s eyes fill up with dollar signs as he floated up into the air, batting his long gold lashes. [I’m so sorry to all my beloved viewers, but unfortunately the next segment will be ads. Feel free to buy the Platinum subscription to my channel to skip them in the future!]

 

… Okay.

He winked at the camera, bringing two of his claws beside his eye in a humorous peace sign before flicking off the broadcast.

[I’m sure they don’t mean they want you to die. It’s just so exciting!]

The bright blue screen opened up in front of my eyes, yet this time it was iridescent, gleaming with an almost gold sheen. Half of my small cave had collapsed now, and I could see the sea serpent’s bright orange eye staring at me through a gap, its thin line of a pupil flickering back and forth. Gold and brown veins gave it a horrific look as it continued to peer at me.

My face remained completely nonchalant as I proposed my plan. If other constellations discovered that Athena was making this deal, she could face severe backlash—same for Chang, but I didn’t care about what happened to him.

“My constellation Eternal Wish isn’t one anyone should recognize. Eternal Wish doesn’t exist,” I stated confidently, looking up at Chang.

“More importantly, one of my skills is ‘Editor’s Pen’. I can fully rewrite aspects of the arcs to go the way I want to. That’s how I afforded the shield,” I declared, lifting it up before me.

“Despite my ability to make edits, I couldn’t influence anything involving Eternal Wish. Do you know why?”

Chang blinked absentmindedly at me, clearly confused—but the blue notifications appearing before me gave me enough of a sign.

I smirked at the blue screen, looking up at Chang with a cocky grin. “Eternal Wish is a completely unknown constellation, but he has enough power to influence the early arcs. That should be impossible for any constellation given the parameters of the story. That’s what Editor’s Pen told me when I tried to change my constellation sponsor.”

Editor’s pen hadn’t explicitly stated that; however, the fact my edits were impossible in the story implied that Eternal Wish had unspeakable power. Editor’s pen wasn’t even able to provide an alternate edit like it just did for the shield.

[Eh?! How could you have put all of this together? Are you really an oracle?] 

Chang replied, completely stunned as he stressfully tugged on his whiskers. 

[Ahh, I could make so much money off of this! A disciple this powerful in my broadcast? But I thought Yue said you weren’t an oracle.]

“She lied,” I replied in an annoyed tone as I thought back to Yue.

“No assumptions if I’m an oracle,” I wink. “Besides, what other disciple could have a skill as powerful as mine? Athena, grant me Medusa’s head so I can survive this. If you do, I'll show you the best story out of any other disciple here. I’ll uncover the Eternal Wish.”