Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations
Time unknowingly passed, and Qin Xi finally regained his consciousness.
A narrow space, dim lighting… The entrance to the cave had been covered by another huge mass of devil aura. Fortunately, there was a protective barrier layer which kept it outside.
He felt some weight on his body. He turned to look, only to see Mo Tiange sitting motionlessly next to him. Her head was askew, leaning on his body. Two pairs of palms were intertwined, causing him to feel an ice-cold but soft sensation.
There was a stinging ache on his back. It came from the wound created when the giant eagle tore his back. However, he also felt something soft, so he extended his hand and groped around—as it turned out, Mo Tiange had padded his back with an outer robe.
What was going on? Why did he not perceive his injuries to be heavy?
“Tiange!” he called softly while giving her a light push.
Mo Tiange stayed still.
He had a bad feeling about this, so he reached out to feel her pulse. As soon as he did so, however, he was thoroughly stunned.
Her meridians… were empty.
What had happened suddenly dawned on him. He immediately moved the spiritual aura inside his body—sure enough, his meridians and dantian were intact, and his spiritual aura was also plentiful. The only difference was that he now had a lot of Yin spiritual aura which spread to even the deepest part of his dantian and mixed with his neutral aura.
A moment later, Qin Xi finally snapped out of his daze.
Almost every time after he used Yang Spiritual Bead, his body would feel extremely weak and he’d take a very long time to recover. This was why so he rarely used Yang Spiritual Bead—without thorough preparations, his life would be difficult to protect after he used it. But this time, because of Mo Tiange, he actually didn’t even suffer any internal injuries.
She was already in the Core Formation realm now. Even though there was a vast difference between the early stage and the peak stage of the Core Formation realm, all the spiritual aura inside her body was still enough to heal him. That was why his dantian and meridians were able to recover to their normal states in just a short while.
…
He sat in a daze for a while before he slowly recovered his senses.
This cave was very small. They sat side by side, but they almost couldn’t move around; she’d practically curled up to treat his injuries. However, although she wasn’t tall and had a small stature, this kind of posture must’ve still been hard for her.
After some thought, he leaned to the side and laid her down on the ground in his attempt to heal her. However, he discovered that as long as he made even the slightest movement, the wound on his back would cause him acute pain. Nevertheless, he still endured it.
But this attempt ended in failure. Although his stature wasn’t sturdy, he was very tall. Even turning his body around was very challenging, not to mention sitting up. He spent a long time trying to figure out an ideal position, but in the end, he could only lean forward, barely hanging above her body. Just as he was about to transfer his spiritual aura to her, he suddenly discovered that his current position… made him look like he was going to take advantage of her.
After realizing this, heat seemed to spread across his face, and he could no longer proceed. He deliberated back and forth, but eventually, he could only sit back and pull her up so that her back was towards him. He then placed his right palm on her Lingtai Point, slowly transferring his spiritual aura to her.
The best acupuncture points to input a great amount of spiritual aura were the Shanzhong Point on one’s chest and the Lingtai Point on one’s back. The first one was naturally inappropriate for him, so he could only choose the latter.
At that moment, her body and meridians were almost empty; only her dantian still had a little bit of spiritual aura which was rotating slowly. The second his pure Yang spiritual aura entered her body, the spiritual aura cycle in her body seemed to be triggered. In just an instant, his spiritual aura surged into her body almost uncontrollably.
Despite seeming uncontrollable, the aura went into her body very smoothly. When his Yang spiritual aura entered her body, her meridians almost immediately compiled her Yin spiritual aura. Five elemental Yin and Yang circulated round and round on end.
Her face gradually regained some color, although the deep furrows on her brows persisted. He knew her divine sense was injured, but he was helpless regarding this point. Treating divine senses was unheard of—one could only nurture it slowly in their sea of knowledge.
When his train of thought reached that point, he shook his head, stopped transferring his spiritual aura then sat upright next to her. However, he thought for some time and felt this arrangement also wasn’t good, so he put his hand into his Qiankun Bag, fumbling for a piece of clothing which he then placed behind her to serve as padding. The stones around them were very hard; with the padding in place, she should feel a bit more comfortable.
The pain on Qin Xi’s back became more and more excruciating. He knew he had lost quite a lot of blood, but this cave was too narrow. In such a small space, he couldn’t even take off his clothes, let alone treat his wound. He could only let it be. In any case, for cultivators, this was only a small wound—he wouldn’t die because of it.
Nevertheless, he lost a lot of blood and endured such a dangerous battle, and just now, he also lost a lot of spiritual aura, so his mind started to become fuzzy. In just a short moment, he fell into a deep slumber.
…
Mo Tiange opened her eyes, feeling warm all over. Such a warm feeling nearly made her want to stretch her body, but before she could do so, her head bumped into something.
She called out in pain, but just as she was about to hold her aching head, she heard a very gentle voice: “What’s wrong?” Immediately afterward, a pair of hands came towards her and held her head up. Someone seemed to examine her head then said reproachfully, “How could you be so careless? Are you aware you’re a cultivator or not? So muddleheaded…”
She hadn’t fully woken up, so of course she was muddleheaded… But she didn’t say this out loud, because she suddenly thought her current situation was extremely strange.
In fact, there really weren’t that many times when she was muddleheaded. Most of the time, she was always very calm and clear-headed, but why was it that her rare muddleheaded moments were always witnessed by him?
Her thoughts were a mess, so she shook her head, dumping these baffling notions from her mind.
As her gaze shifted around, she suddenly remembered what happened before. They were attacked and injured by giant eagles on the cliff, so they took shelter in this place to recuperate. But… but what was his current attitude all about?
“Senior Martial Brother… Shoujing?” she called inquisitively in a low voice.
“What?” His voice sounded displeased, but his expression didn’t look like he was displeased.
He then asked: “How are your injuries? Have you recovered your spiritual aura?”
Spiritual aura? She promptly maneuvered the spiritual aura inside her body and right afterward, she was completely dumbfounded.
Her expression made Qin Xi a bit nervous. “Is there a problem?”
Mo Tiange shook her head, but she still seemed rather dazed. “No,” she said. Not only was there no problem, but… she had never felt better! Originally, she only had a very tiny amount of Yang spiritual aura inside her body, but now, it had practically formed a cycle around her Gold Core! No matter how stupid she was, she also understood what had happened. She transferred her spiritual aura to him to treat his injuries. After his injuries recovered, he transferred his spiritual aura back to her. Despite this back and forth process, not only did they not lose any spiritual aura, but it even initiated the spiritual aura cycles in their bodies.
She suddenly understood why their master was so obsessed with serving as their matchmaker. It wasn’t at all because he liked to be a matchmaker. Rather… it was because of their cultivation techniques and the attributes of their spiritual auras. If they practiced Dual Cultivation, they would bring out the best in each other.
However, upon realizing this point, she once again felt extremely unhappy. Just because Dual Cultivation would be beneficial to each of them?
“There are no issues with your dantian and meridians—what about your divine sense?”
Once she heard his question, she once again felt a headache. She held her head for a moment then slowly shook it. “My divine sense… is quite heavily injured.”
Qin Xi nodded, not at all surprised by what she said. “Although the Soul-Refining Art is a good technique which allows you to take your enemies by surprise, its shortcomings are also deathly. In the future, you should be cautious in using it.”
“En,” she answered softly. When she used the Soul-Refining Art before, she could even defeat enemies stronger than her. This time, however, because those giant eagles grew in an unusual environment, using the Soul-Refining Art instead caused her to sustain heavy injuries. Her body was completely fine now, but her injured divine sense would need at least several years of nurturing to recover.
“Right! Senior Martial Brother, are your injuries better now?”
He nodded and said, “They’re alright thanks to you…”
“Nothing.”
The two of them weren’t accustomed to such politeness like thanking each other back and forth, so they stopped at that point.
Mo Tiange always felt like she’d forgotten something. She thought for a while, but it was only after she saw the bloodstains on her lapels that she finally remembered. “Oh, Senior Martial Brother, the wound on your back…” She reached out, wanting to push his body away from the rock wall and take a look at his wound.
Qin Xi struggled away, unwilling to move. He only said with a smile, “It’s alright.”
“How can it be alright?!” Mo Tiange ignored what he said, still giving him a push. “There’s so much blood, and you can’t treat it on your own. Rest assured—I’ll be gentle.”
“It’s not…”
Before he could finish speaking, Mo Tiange already cut him off insistently: “Senior Martial Brother!”
Seeing her harsh frown really rendered him speechless. In the end, he could only let her do as she wished.
Thus, Mo Tiange managed to push him, making him sit with his back facing her. Sure enough, his back was mangled. A frown formed on her brows. She tried to tear off the clothing on his back, but Xuanqing School’s uniforms were either spirit tools or magic tools, so it was very hard to tear. With no other choice, she reached out to untie his belt.
Her actions were very natural. While Mo Tiange didn’t perceive anything to be wrong, Qin Xi instantly became rigid the moment he felt her hands coming from behind and winding around his waist, groping about as she tried to untie his belt.
However, their clothes had long been a tangled mess. She couldn’t untie it no matter how hard she tried.
A good while later, she stretched her neck, wanting to see what was wrong, but in the next second, her hands were caught.
“What’s—” She suddenly stopped mid-speech.
This position… seemed very wrong.
He grabbed her hands with his. To untie his belt, her hands had circled around his waist, so now that he grabbed her hands, her body was glued to his back.
There was only silence and the sound of their breaths.
In this narrow space, they only heard each other’s breaths and heartbeats. The whooshing gales outside couldn’t pass through the small crack, thus sounding distant and indistinct. All that was left was the two of them, squeezed together.
Mo Tiange felt her hands were burning. The spots pressed to his waist felt hot, and the backs of her hands, which he was holding onto, also felt very hot. She wanted to pull her hands, but his grasp became increasingly tighter.
“Tiange…” After some time, she finally heard Qin Xi speaking. His voice seemed to quiver, but it also carried a water-like gentleness which she had never heard before.
Her heart beat wildly. She seemed to be waiting for something, but she also felt she couldn’t wait even one second longer and wanted to escape. Should I answer? That was what she thought, but in reality, she couldn’t even find her voice.
Qin Xi finally moved. He pulled her hands apart but he didn’t let go. Then their clothes rubbed against each other as he slowly turned around.
This place was too narrow. The space he could occupy when he turned around was very limited, so after he turned around, he was practically glued to her body.
Mo Tiange felt she couldn’t breathe. She desperately tried to retreat, wanting to put a bit of distance between them.
But in the next second, he still leaned over. Although he finally let go of her hands, his hands now circled around her waist.
She tried to retreat but it was useless—
An ice-cold kiss.
It happened so suddenly and so naturally.
She opened her eyes, seemingly not able to believe what was currently happening.
Another face right in front of hers. Their intermingling breaths.
Also, the ice-cold but soft sensation on her lips.
It was a very novel feeling.
She must be dreaming, she must be.
But as her eyes continued to widen, she heard a helpless sigh from him. Then a hand came to cover her eyes.
From their lips to breaths, everything started to heat up.
