The Little Peacock Raises a Snake (GL) Chapter 15

After Qu Linyan took Fu Xiaoba away from Wuyou Valley, a new snowfall hurried in and laid a white cover over the broken bamboo courtyard, as if trying to hide everything beneath it.
In the dirty, leaking study, the note that seemed almost like a provocation was burned at the fingertips of the person who had returned.
Ash drifted down without touching him.
When the flame faded, only a green stone remained between his long fingers. He sent spiritual power into it and began speaking to someone unknown.
“She was taken by the black flood dragon.”
“I know.”
“Several months ago, that black flood dragon went to Qixia Mountain. She tried to steal Coldwater. After she failed, she fled here and took Xiaoba away. Do you know what that means?”
“I know.”
“You know everything, yet you can still sit still?”
“Since she willingly left with that black flood dragon, if she is hurt one day, that can also count as passing through this tribulation.”
If she had to pass through a tribulation, it should be with a person, not with some arrogant demon.
Fu Zhuochen took a deep breath and pressed down his anger. “Demons do not have short lives like humans. They will never speak with you stubborn old fossils in the heavens about staying with one person for one lifetime. If she passes through this tribulation with a demon, there will be endless trouble later!”
The person on the other side of the transmission stone was silent for a long time, so long that Fu Zhuochen nearly used up the last of his patience.
In the end, that person only needed one sentence to set him off.
“Right now, she is a demon. Matters of the demon realm are not convenient for the heavenly realm to interfere in.”
“Is it not convenient, or do you simply not want to?” Fu Zhuochen closed his eyes, drew the green stone into his palm, and clenched his hand hard around it. After waiting a long while without even half a reply, he could not help saying angrily, “If you will not handle it, I will!”
As soon as he finished speaking, the green stone vanished from his tight fist. No second voice remained inside the broken room.
The moment he opened his eyes, he flicked his sleeve and turned around. Behind him, the desk shattered into countless splinters.
*
After Qu Linyan took her to see a large-scale human courtship scene, Fu Xiaoba began thinking about life.
Back when she had lived in Wuyou Valley, who knew how many male peacocks had fought to please her?
Every mating season, so many peacocks came to spread their tails in front of her that they could start fighting each other. If she wanted to choose one, she could surely pick out the most handsome of them all.
But she simply had not wanted to choose from them. There was no special reason. If she did not like them, she did not like them.
She had never imagined that the human men before her now could not even compare to the peacocks who rushed right up to her face and spread their tails in Wuyou Valley.
Those men hugged women on both sides, smiled in greasy ways, reeked of wine, or shouted with bad tempers. Just looking at them a few more times made her annoyed.
Embarrassed, she rushed out of that strange courtship place and squatted on a silver-white roof, propping up her chin.
Qu Linyan soon found her and sat down beside her, sounding very amused. “What, none of them caught your eye?”
Fu Xiaoba shook her head, then nodded again. She listened to the laughter downstairs, all those winding voices with long, coy endings. After a long while, she finally said, “Little Black, be honest with me. Have you never believed a word I said?”
Qu Linyan was slightly startled. “Why say that?”
“I know very little about this place, but from what little I do know, marriage among humans is not like what is happening down there. It is not supposed to be women spreading their tails in one special place while men choose them…”
“Spreading their tails?”
“Showing themselves off!” Fu Xiaoba raised her eyes to Qu Linyan and said seriously, “Little Black, do you not believe I can pass my tribulation and ascend? Are you afraid I will harm an innocent person, but you do not want to expose me and hurt my pride, so you made these bad illusions to make me behave and go back?”
Qu Linyan paused.
In all fairness, it was not like that.
She lifted the corner of her mouth and had meant to laugh at this ignorant little girl. But for some reason, she suddenly could not bear to mock her.
She had clearly meant to tease her. Who knew this little fool would notice something was wrong, yet still prepare a perfect excuse for her in her heart?
How silly. Was Qu Linyan really such a kind person?
There was no moon that night, yet the night was much brighter than a moonlit night in the mountains, because the human world had lamps everywhere.
Candlelight shone through the dark, and human hearts seemed warm too.
Qu Linyan suddenly did not want to tease this little fool anymore.
She rubbed her wrist, lowered her eyes, and smiled. “This place is called a brothel in the human world. It is where human men spend money to seek pleasure. You should have heard of it in some story.”
Fu Xiaoba’s eyes widened. “Little Black, you…”
“I brought you here to broaden your view!” Qu Linyan immediately stretched out one finger and pressed it against Fu Xiaoba’s mouth. She explained, “If you had never come here, would you know that those neatly dressed people in the daytime can become another kind of person once they arrive here?”
“I…”
“I was afraid you were too inexperienced and would be tricked, so I gave you a lesson first…”
Qu Linyan made her excuse sound perfectly reasonable. Fu Xiaoba listened and did not know how to argue. Her little mouth opened slightly, but for a long time, she could not say a word.
At last, Qu Linyan lowered her head, grabbed a handful of snow beside her, and, under Fu Xiaoba’s confused gaze, squeezed it into ice. Then she changed it into a clear, sparkling flower and gently placed it in Fu Xiaoba’s palm.
Fu Xiaoba lowered her head to look at the ice flower in her hand. The feeling at her fingertips was cold, but her eyes were full of joy.
There were thousands upon thousands of flowers in Wuyou Valley, but from childhood until now, no one had ever given her one.
There were no flowers here, yet someone had made one for her.
When Qu Linyan saw this, she could not help glancing up at the sky. “Do not think too well of me. I do not have that much free time to weave an illusion for you. You are so easy to fool. If I truly wanted to make you happy, would a piece of candy or a flower made of ice not be simpler than the method you imagined?”
Fu Xiaoba bit her lip. She wanted to return the ice flower to Qu Linyan, but no matter what, she could not push it back. So she took it back and muttered unhappily, “I am not easy to fool…”
Qu Linyan smiled. “Fu Xiaoba, can you tell right from wrong, good from evil?”
“I can!” Fu Xiaoba raised her eyes and said seriously.
Qu Linyan asked, “Then am I good or evil?”
Fu Xiaoba answered without thinking, “Do you even need to ask? You are definitely not a bad person!”
Qu Linyan asked again, “What about your brother?”
Fu Xiaoba said firmly, “Brother is not a bad person either.”
Qu Linyan shook her head. “If neither of us is bad, why does he want to kill me? Between me and him, one of us must have done something bad, right?”
Fu Xiaoba was stumped by Qu Linyan’s question.
She held her knees and the flower with one hand, propped up half her face with the other, and looked at the street that was no longer lively. She thought for a long time.
At last, she said, “At least you are both good to me.”
“You cannot trust everyone who is good to you. Some people are good to you because they have a purpose. You said yourself that you know very little about this world. If you keep trusting people so easily, are you not afraid of meeting someone bad?”
“You are different. You are good to me because I saved you. Besides, with you here, I do not have to be afraid.” As Fu Xiaoba spoke, she raised her head to look at Qu Linyan, her brows curving. “Are you not going to help check people for me?”
Qu Linyan seemed not to have expected Fu Xiaoba to say this, and for a moment, she was a little surprised.
She wanted to speak, then stopped, again and again. In the end, she could not help asking, “Why do you never ask why Fu Zhuochen and I became enemies?”
Fu Xiaoba lifted her head and glanced at Qu Linyan, then turned to look elsewhere. “If I ask too much, I am afraid you will silence me.”
Qu Linyan was briefly speechless. In the fifty years inside the dream, Fu Xiaoba had asked this question before. It was just that every time she asked, Qu Linyan blocked her with the words “silence you.” After enough time passed, Fu Xiaoba stopped asking.
“Then… do you truly not want to know?” Qu Linyan asked carefully.
“You are willing to tell me?” Fu Xiaoba’s eyes were full of disbelief.
Qu Linyan was momentarily dumb. In the past, she had never allowed Fu Xiaoba to bring up this question. Yet now, facing it again, she was the one who had raised it first. Thinking about it, she found it almost unbelievable.
She thought in silence for a long time. Finally, she nodded and said hesitantly, “A-Qing… was my elder sister.”
Fu Xiaoba blinked. There was surprise in her eyes, but she did not interrupt.
“Her name was Qu Muqing. She was once the clan leader of our flood dragon clan.”
She had been gentle and kind, yet careful and strong. She looked soft, but she could always do every task Qu Linyan could not do. Because of this, the clan’s hopes for Qu Muqing had always been far greater than their hopes for Qu Linyan.
To Qu Linyan, Qu Muqing was like a tall mountain, standing between her and every worry. She could not cross it, and she did not need to try.
After all, she had never cared about winning. She did not want to carry responsibility. She only wanted to play every day.
But one day, the mountain suddenly collapsed, and everything changed.
Qu Muqing was gone. She died in the human realm while her younger sister’s mind was still young.
The woman who brought that cold body back from the human realm was named Xiangsi. She spent half her cultivation to keep all three souls and seven spirits of Qu Muqing in this world, but the person who slept forever still never opened her eyes again.
The child no one had expected much from suddenly had to shoulder every heavy burden.
“Everyone placed their hopes on me, but I knew they had no other choice.” As Qu Linyan spoke, she lifted her brow and smiled as if it did not matter. “If there had been a choice, I would have wanted to live more freely too.”
“Xiangsi begged me to save her. The clanspeople begged me to save her. But I did not need anyone to beg me. For more than a thousand years, I have wanted her to wake up more than anyone. Then I could ask her why she suddenly left back then… She clearly said she would always protect me, but she turned around and broke her promise.”
So for more than a thousand years, she had chased every empty, distant legend, searching for a method that could wake Qu Muqing. For that, she had never feared death.
“Legend says the bird clan’s spirit stone, Coldwater, can clear a thousand poisons, heal a hundred illnesses, revive the dead, and regrow flesh on bone. Every hundred years, it draws an omen of heaven and earth, and only on the day of that omen will its location be revealed.” Qu Linyan closed her eyes and sighed softly. “I knew that trip was more dangerous than a dragon’s pool and a tiger’s den, but I still wanted to gamble on that one chance.”
Fu Xiaoba had never thought that A-Qing, who had been so good to her in the dream, had long since left this world.
And Qu Linyan, who usually looked so carefree, had actually clung for more than a thousand years to something that seemed completely impossible.
“Brother was at Qixia Mountain then… Was he the one who hurt you and made you lose that chance?”
If that was true, then Little Black must hate Brother to death…
Fu Xiaoba pressed her lips together and frowned, guilt hard to hide in her eyes. She had thought Qu Linyan would react fiercely, but to her surprise, Qu Linyan only smiled and shook her head.
“Even without him, do you think no one else would have stopped me that day?” Qu Linyan said as if it did not matter. “He was only one obstacle among thousands.”
As she spoke, she suddenly grew more lively. She copied Fu Xiaoba and hugged her knees. “Let me tell you something interesting.”
Fu Xiaoba paused. She wanted to comfort her but did not know how, so she obediently nodded along with her wish.
“That day at Qixia Mountain, I saw that Coldwater was inside a fox demon. That fox demon’s life soul was damaged, and she had already lost the ability to continue cultivating. Her whole life was tied to Coldwater…” Qu Linyan could not help sighing softly, then gave a bitter smile. “If I had succeeded that day, she would have died.”
“Ah…” Fu Xiaoba instinctively covered her mouth.
“I knew that so many people loved and protected her. If I killed her, I would leave so many people in pain and guilt for the rest of their lives.” At this point, Qu Linyan shook her head with self-mockery. “But if I had been strong enough, I absolutely would not have gone soft. Is it not just one life traded for one life? Other people’s lives are worth nothing to me. Other people’s pain has nothing to do with me either…”
Fu Xiaoba fell silent.
“So, right and wrong, black and white, how could they be as simple as you see them?” Qu Linyan looked at Fu Xiaoba. “Fu Xiaoba, do you still think I am a good person now?”
Fu Xiaoba was silent for a long time. She only shook her head and did not make any judgment.
Qu Linyan could not help feeling curious. “What, is this question hard to answer?”
“It is hard…” Fu Xiaoba lowered her head and murmured softly, “I am thinking that if it were me, if there was someone I cared about very much waiting for me to save her, what would I do…”
Her tone was very uncertain. “I cannot figure it out. I resist it very much, but I also would not want to give up just like that. I…”
“I seem… not to be a good person either.”