Jiang Xidai heard a small gasp behind her. When the female lead of this text spoke again, her voice was already a little dejected. “That must have hurt a lot.”
?
Jiang Xidai clutched her chest and glanced back in surprise.
Yan Huirou’s eyes were slightly red, as if she had returned to that day’s scene.
Seeing Jiang Xidai looking at her with a strange expression, she didn’t have time to cry, but she gently curved her eyes and wiped the corners of her eyes to hide it. “Sorry… I was just a little touched because I feel that you’ve had a hard time all these years.”
What a sentimental little girl.
Crying at the drop of a hat.
Is this the female lead?
Able to cry for someone else’s suffering?
Why didn’t I see her shed a single tear for the years she was imprisoned and tortured?
Jiang Xidai glanced at her, as if she had seen a holy light emanating from the little girl again, bright and hazy, stinging her eyes.
“What’s there to cry about? Those people are all dead.”
Speaking of which, Jiang Xidai’s gaze fell on her own fingertips, clean and spotless, but unfortunately, it only looked that way.
She said with a lack of interest, “They all died at my hands. I don’t even know how many times they’ve been reincarnated. You’re lucky to be alive. If you feel sorry for them, you might as well feel sorry for the souls who were reduced to ashes at my hands, hmm?”
Yan Huirou rarely answered, only silently wiping her tears, as if she hadn’t heard what Jiang Xidai had said at all.
Jiang Xidai was really starting to get a headache. She hated it when Yan Huirou cried like this, silently, without a sound. But if she just left her alone, it felt very strange—after all, Yan Huirou seemed to be crying for her.
Jiang Xidai rubbed the space between her eyebrows. With Yan Huirou around, even bathing was not peaceful.
She leaned back a little, closer to Yan Huirou, and raised her eyes, studying Yan Huirou’s face for a few rounds.
Her face was pure and gentle, but still had a bit of a young person’s immaturity.
Jiang Xidai stared at her for a long time. “Little girl.”
“Put away your excessive pity.”
“Let me give you a piece of advice. Being too soft-hearted is not a good thing in the cultivation world.”
Those peach blossom eyes curved slightly and met Yan Huirou’s gaze, without their usual coldness or impatience, actually looking a lot more tender: “Especially don’t cry for me. I’m not a good person either.” I’ve always just wanted to kill you.
Yan Huirou lowered her eyes and stared at the woman in the pool in a daze.
This was the first time Jiang Xidai had looked at her so seriously. Being watched by her, Yan Huirou had a strange illusion.
It was as if everything around them had fallen silent, then surged like a shadow, and then swept past like dust.
A pearl-like tear fell from the corner of Yan Huirou’s eye.
She herself was completely unaware of it.
This matter itself seemed to have surpassed the scope of Yan Huirou’s sadness.
The tear fell into the pool, creating ripples.
Jiang Xidai looked at her in surprise. Why was she crying even harder?
“Sect Master Jiang, I don’t know why, but…” Yan Huirou quickly wiped her tears. She was stunned for a long time, not knowing how to describe the familiar feeling of sorrow from just now.
“Have I… met you before?” she asked in a daze, “I seem to have seen you in a dream.” The first time she looked up at Jiang Xidai, apart from the daze of being stunned by her beauty, there was an extraordinary sense of destiny.
“How old are you? Impossible. I haven’t been to the Qingxu Sect in the past few years, so I wouldn’t have seen you.” Jiang Xidai didn’t take her words to heart. “Don’t try to get close to me here.”
A figure broke out of the water, splashing water everywhere.
Before Yan Huirou could react, after a series of splashing sounds, Jiang Xidai had already put on her clothes and walked out of the pool. She held her clothes to her shoulders, the red fabric covering the flower branch on her back.
Water droplets slid down her calves, darkening a few of the bricks on the ground.
She looked very comfortable in this outfit. But in a moment, her clothes and long hair were dried by spiritual energy, becoming soft and flowing again.
“Rest for a day. You should also soak in the medicinal pool.”
With that, Jiang Xidai left.
Yan Huirou’s gaze fell on the trail of water droplets and did not move for a long time.
A day later, the tables had indeed turned.
This time, Yan Huirou was pressed into the pool. The hot spring in Bright Moon Pavilion was too small, and Jiang Xidai looked down on it, so she ordered her to come to the secluded pavilion in the main hall of Qionghua Hall, which was also where Jiang Xidai usually bathed.
Yan Huirou slowly submerged herself in the water. Some medicinal herbs from the Haoran Sect were poured around her, scattered densely, leaving only her shoulders exposed.
That sack of “Nirvana,” like lime mixed with water, was unceremoniously ordered by Jiang Xidai to be poured into the pool.
Actually, she didn’t need that much. Such precious medicinal herbs, she was quite extravagant with them.
Who could blame her when Jiang Xidai, in a fit of anger, had wiped out the entire nest of those demon beasts.
Sect Master Jiang had probably never been frugal in all these years. Whenever she got a treasure, she would play with it for a few days until she got tired of it, and then she would either reward it to Wen Xianyin or the disciples below her.
Senior Sister Wen’s savings had accumulated quite a bit over the years. She had even developed a mindset of treating money like dirt. When the Sect Master rewarded her, she was also very calm.
Therefore, even though Jiang Xidai’s reputation was so bad that it made people outside tremble in fear, there was still a group of desperate people, like Bi Luo—who were willing to follow her.
Yan Huirou shrank in the pool, motionless.
It wasn’t that she was naturally reserved, but ever since that sack of “lime” had been added, she felt as if her whole body had become sticky, as if she had been dipped in a large pot of porridge, and she was so constrained that she could barely move.
—Xie Minting’s words were still ringing in her ears: “I’ve asked a few old friends. This method has had two precedents, but the success rate is very low. Mainly because there are very few cultivators who can reach this level, and it also requires some rare medicinal herbs during the process. The number of people who can prepare them is even smaller.”
This level.
For some reason, after Jiang Xidai had learned that besides herself, there was no one else in the entire cultivation world who had reached “this” level—
Her gloomy face had, after comforting herself for a long time, continued to be gloomy for a long time.
Doesn’t that mean she’ll have to suffer again?
The woman’s chilly gaze looked at Yan Huirou darkly.
“Sect Master, I don’t know what harm this method will do to you. How about…”
Yan Huirou was still asking her to reconsider, because Jiang Xidai’s expression really didn’t look good, and her face was haggard, showing no signs of spirit.
Jiang Xidai snorted coldly.
She had slaughtered the demon beast, had gone to the Shenji Pavilion, and had found everything. It had cost her a piece of clothing and a strand of her hair.
The arrow was on the bowstring. To give up now would be a problem.
Forget it.
It wouldn’t hurt to fight against this destiny and see what the result was.
On the day of the reshaping of her meridians, Yan Huirou had endured a lot of pain in her life. But she was a gentle and forbearing person. Those pains were like sand on a beach, and they wouldn’t leave too many shadows in her heart.
Except this time…
Really.
It was too painful.
She felt like she had been shattered, from her skin to her bones. There was not a single intact part of her body.
Yan Huirou’s eyelashes drooped, trembling like the tender tips of grass in the wind. Her lips were bitten through, and threads of blood flowed down her chin, almost covering her entire neck.
Jiang Xidai’s profound spiritual energy poured into her body. According to the cultivation manual, she reshaped everything in her.
The pain of this process was no less than dying and coming back to life.
It was as if something sharp had pierced her internal organs, and then it was stirred with a wooden stick, and then a stick came down, smashing her flesh and blood everywhere.
Sect Master Jiang…
She really… couldn’t take it anymore.
The familiar, nauseating pain made her subconsciously want to end her own life.
Just like in those dark cave prisons.
Yan Huirou’s consciousness was hazy, and she remembered the desperate years from long ago.
But she struggled to lift her eyes and slowly looked forward.
This time, it wasn’t completely dark in front of her, but faintly lit.
There was no one else there.
Only a woman holding an embroidered umbrella, in a red dress with a blood-red sword, stunningly beautiful, had opened up a bright sky for her with a single sword strike.
If one saw the light, no matter how dark the long night was, they could always hold on step by step. What was frightening was the endless pain without knowing the end.
She was not alone anymore.
How wonderful.
When her consciousness was hazy, Yan Huirou gently moved her fingers. With her last bit of strength, she held Jiang Xidai’s hand, as piously as a person falling off a cliff grabbing the last rock, and then she did not move again.
And on Jiang Xidai’s side—
Sect Master Jiang didn’t have time for many thoughts. She didn’t even feel the little girl unintentionally holding her hand.
After all, she was already numb.
Numb.
Completely numb.
She had just despised Yan Huirou for crying over a small matter, but now, the tables had turned, and a line of clear tears was flowing down the corner of her eye.
Damn it, it was purely from the pain.
The sun moved, moment by moment, and the time seemed to be exceptionally long between the two of them.
Jiang Xidai had an exceptionally high aptitude for cultivation. She had only casually flipped through that Inner Scenery of the Origin a few times, but she had used it without any mistakes.
Under the influence of the medicinal properties and cultivation, Yan Huirou’s whole body’s meridians were slowly reborn from the ruins.
Over time, the pain subsided, and she felt a rare sense of peace. Her bitten lips gradually relaxed, and her expression also became peaceful.
A warm current was flowing through her meridians, throughout her body. It was Sect Master Jiang’s aura.
After the last round of cultivation was over, Yan Huirou opened her eyes. She felt a weight on her shoulder. Someone was pressing on her shoulder, and the fragrant cloth leaned forward, stirring the water with a splash.
“Sect Master Jiang?”
Yan Huirou raised her hand but touched the woman’s profile. “Are you alright? Are you tired?”
Her hand paused.
Jiang Xidai leaned wearily against her. She had wanted to push her away, or push away the restless hand that was touching her face.
But she was really too tired. Even staying alive took all her strength. So she simply used Yan Huirou as a wall and leaned against her for now.
She was motionless. Her clothes spread out in the water, swaying around Yan Huirou, like a pond full of red lotuses.
^