Why Aren’t You Cultivating Immortality? (GL) Chapter 6

The little orange cat looked at the bowl of cat food placed in front of her, then raised her head with an aow. “Bai Moqing, do you misunderstand what taking good care of me means?”
Bai Moqing pondered. Her hand swept over the coffee table, and with that motion, ten more bags of cat food appeared on the table.
On the middle finger of her right hand, she wore a black jade ring that shone with a cold, dim light. It was her storage ring. It could hold ten thousand square spaces of items, and other than Bai Moqing herself, no one could see it.
“Is this enough?” Her gaze swept from the little orange cat’s head to her belly. Under the orange-and-white fur, the little orange cat was small and thin. Bai Moqing had asked the pet shop owner, and the owner had said that cats with this build did not eat much.
But at the end, the pet shop owner had added one more thing. If it was an orange cat, it might be able to eat quite a lot.
“I don’t eat cat food!” The little orange cat grew excited and changed into human form, standing naked in front of Bai Moqing. “I want spiritual energy!”
Bai Moqing had no choice but to cover her eyes again. One hand blocked Feiyue’s chest. “Feiyue, if you have something to say, say it properly. Don’t do this.” Again and again. Although they were both women, she did not want to look at Feiyue’s body.
Feiyue looked down at her own figure, pushed out her chest, and said, “Am I that shameful to look at? If you look a few more times, you’ll get used to it.” Every time she transformed, she forgot to transform a set of clothes onto herself. But she felt that being naked like this was very comfortable.
Seeing that Bai Moqing kept refusing to look at her, Feiyue turned, picked up the thin blanket from the sofa, and wrapped it around herself. “I’m wrapped in the blanket now.”
Bai Moqing lowered her hand and looked her up and down. Then she produced a set of wide-sleeved Flowing Immortal rainbow robes. Holding the shoulder and collar, she measured them against Feiyue, and the clothes instantly appeared on Feiyue’s body.
The long skirt shimmered with flowing colors and carried a faint trace of spiritual energy. Feiyue sniffed like a little dog, threw aside the blanket, grabbed her own lapel, and said excitedly, “Bai Moqing, this… is this for me?”
This was not ordinary clothing. This was a magic artifact that could withstand a lightning tribulation!
Cultivators really did have a lot of treasures on them.
“When you change back to your true form, these clothes will turn into spiritual energy and hide inside your body.” Bai Moqing did not mention one truth: after Feiyue changed back into a little orange cat while wearing this outfit, Bai Moqing would be able to find her anytime. “When you transform, it will appear automatically. From now on, don’t appear naked in front of me.”
Remembering that this was not ancient times, she said, “If you go outside, it is best to wear ordinary clothes so you don’t draw attention.”
Feiyue was so excited that Bai Moqing had given her the Flowing Immortal Dress that she nodded again and again. “I’ll listen to you.”
Taking advantage of Feiyue’s happiness, Bai Moqing took out the jade slip and asked, “Can you tell me what is written on it now?”
Feiyue’s smile stiffened. She lowered her hand and blinked. The contents of the jade slip could not be told to Bai Moqing this early. At least, Feiyue had to wait until after she survived her tribulation and raised her cultivation by another stage.
But if she did not tell her, she could only lie. And Feiyue was not good at lying, especially in human form. Whenever she lied, her face turned red.
“Do you not know, or can you not tell me?” Bai Moqing fixed her eyes on Feiyue, not missing the slightest expression on her face.
“Can I tell you later?” Feiyue asked tentatively, her round eyes unconsciously acting cute.
Bai Moqing clenched the jade slip and nodded. “It’s fine.” Her eyes lowered slightly. “Even if you don’t tell me, it is fine. I…” She gently swallowed the final words back down. I am not cultivating immortality anymore.
She took Feiyue’s hand and placed the jade slip in it. “You should keep this thing on yourself.” Then she turned and returned to her room.
Bang. The door closed softly. Click. It locked.
A door and a lock could block people, but they could not block demons. Feiyue understood what Bai Moqing meant. Do not go in and disturb her.
That night, Feiyue still slept on the carpet outside Bai Moqing’s door, curled into an orange fur ball with her head tucked against her belly and her paws covering her face.
When she woke, Bai Moqing was no longer at home. She did not know when Bai Moqing had silently left.
In the office, without An Huaigu, the room was so quiet that only the hum of the computer tower remained. As usual, Bai Moqing left the computer on and read a book.
Xiao Xing’s words entered her mind again. “I am transferring you to my side. I lack a secretary.”
Bai Moqing remembered her own answer. “President Xiao, I know my own abilities. I am not suited to be a secretary. I am sorry for disappointing you.”
She had refused Xiao Xing. She would rather stay in this archive room with no future and be a document clerk.
Some things could not be escaped simply by refusing.
When the clock hand pointed to ten, footsteps sounded outside the door. Bai Moqing’s ears pricked up. Judging by the rhythm, it sounded a lot like Xiao Xing.
She raised her head. Xiao Xing appeared at the doorway with her Assistant Tang.
Bai Moqing quickly stood. “President Xiao.” Her gaze swept over Xiao Xing’s shoes. Today, President Xiao was not wearing high heels. She wore a pair of casual flats.
Xiao Xing nodded to Bai Moqing and looked toward An Huaigu’s seat. Bai Moqing followed her gaze and said, “Sister An isn’t here. She went to handle something.”
She felt a little guilty.
Luckily, President Xiao did not ask what An Huaigu had gone to handle.
Xiao Xing turned her head and said emotionlessly to Tang Yue, “Go upstairs first.” Tang Yue did not hesitate for even half a second. She immediately left, and when she went, she actually closed the door behind her.
Bai Moqing’s heart began to beat wildly out of her control. Seeing Xiao Xing walk toward her step by step, she instinctively backed away. Behind her was the chair, blocking her path. She had nowhere to retreat.
Across the desk, Xiao Xing saw the fear of her in Bai Moqing’s eyes. She frowned lightly and said, “Open the archive room. I need to find a document inside.”
So she was only looking for a document.
Bai Moqing let out a breath of relief, took two keys from the drawer, walked around the desk, and went to unlock the archive room.
The archive room door had two keyholes. The four-edged key slid into the lock. Bai Moqing turned it clockwise. Click. The lock opened.
Creak. She pushed the door open, and the old smell of paper came toward them.
The windowless archive room was dim and unlit. Bai Moqing stepped in first and turned on the lights. Sixteen bright white LED ceiling lights came on at the same time, illuminating the entire archive room.
Beside the light switch was another switch for the indoor air circulation system. When she pressed it, the rumble of airflow sounded in the archive room.
Xiao Xing stood behind Bai Moqing, staring at her back in a daze. The past played backward frame by frame like a film. Hearing Bai Moqing say, “President Xiao, you can come in,” Xiao Xing returned to herself and walked calmly into the archive room.
Inside, rows of gray-white iron cabinets stood neatly, sorted by department. At the innermost wall, a row of reddish-brown wooden cabinets stood. One glance was enough to know that the files stored there were more important than those in the iron cabinets.
Xiao Xing walked straight toward that row of wooden cabinets. Bai Moqing, standing at the door, was hesitating over whether she should leave when Xiao Xing reached the cabinets, stopped, and turned back to her. “Come help me look.”
A superior’s order could not be disobeyed. Bai Moqing hesitated only briefly before walking over.
Xiao Xing pointed to the innermost cabinet. “Start looking from that cabinet.”
Bai Moqing looked in the direction Xiao Xing pointed. That corner was blocked on three sides. There was only this one path in and out. Bai Moqing felt uneasy. Once she went in, Xiao Xing would block her inside.
In that moment, she forgot she was a cultivator. She forgot all the cultivation in her body. Only unease remained in her heart, so strong she wanted to leave immediately.
While she was still letting her thoughts run wild, Xiao Xing had already opened a cabinet and begun searching.
Bai Moqing looked at the narrow space, just wide enough for one person to pass, then looked at Xiao Xing. Her lips moved, but she was too embarrassed to ask Xiao Xing to move farther in.
Bracing herself, she turned sideways and squeezed through the gap.
The instant her body touched Xiao Xing’s, a familiar feeling suddenly rose within her. But it vanished too quickly, gone in a blink.
Sensing that the person behind her had stiffened, Xiao Xing shifted half a step inward and reached for the files on the top shelf, as if she had only happened to need to move in and had not noticed anything wrong with Bai Moqing.
Bai Moqing returned to herself. She looked deeply at Xiao Xing, pressed a hand to her chest, and walked to the innermost part.
Stopping in front of the cabinet, she lowered her hand and secretly glanced at Xiao Xing. She opened the cabinet and suppressed the turmoil in her heart. “President Xiao, what document are you looking for?”
Without turning her head, Xiao Xing said, “A record book that notes all major events from the first five years after the company was founded.”
“President Xiao, I remember everything in the archive room is arranged by timeline. Since it is from the first five years after the founding, shouldn’t we be able to find it by time?”
Xiao Xing was silent for a moment. “The things in these cabinets are not arranged by time.”
The archive room quieted. Only the friction of books and files remained, along with the sound of two people’s breathing and heartbeats.
Bai Moqing’s fingers moved over the spines one by one, searching for the record book Xiao Xing described, while her divine sense crept little by little toward Xiao Xing.
From inside to outside, from top to bottom, Xiao Xing had not the slightest aura of a cultivator, nor any demonic or spiritual aura. She was completely an ordinary person.
Suddenly, a trace of spiritual energy seeped from Xiao Xing’s body. Bai Moqing’s heart clenched hard and trembled beyond control. Only after her divine sense carefully investigated did she discover that the spiritual energy did not come from inside Xiao Xing’s body. It came from the black bracelet on her left wrist.
Inside the black bracelet was a dark jade-red bead, round, clear, and glowing with rosy light. A seal seemed to lie over the black cord, locking the spiritual energy and light firmly inside.
If Bai Moqing’s divine sense had not stayed on Xiao Xing the whole time and happened to catch that tiny thread of spiritual energy flowing from the bead, it would have been very hard for her to discover that Xiao Xing carried such a treasure.
Then again, why did Xiao Xing have such a thing on her? Thinking of Xiao Xing’s identity, Bai Moqing understood. With Xiao Xing’s wealth, it was normal to buy an object for safety and peace.
Looking closer, Bai Moqing saw that the seal on the bracelet was a talisman to ward off demons, evil, and ghosts. Once something unclean approached Xiao Xing, the talisman would activate and borrow the spiritual energy inside the dark jade-red bead to form a protective shield around her.
Bai Moqing tried to send her divine sense into the bead, wanting to see how much spiritual energy was inside. Unexpectedly, the moment her divine sense entered, dense spiritual energy surrounded her and then poured continuously into her divine sense.
Is that spiritual energy repairing my damaged divine sense?
Thinking that this object protected Xiao Xing, Bai Moqing quickly withdrew her divine sense and panted lightly. If she absorbed all the spiritual energy inside, the item would no longer be able to protect Xiao Xing.
Her every move fell into Xiao Xing’s eyes. Seeing Bai Moqing’s divine sense run out of the Xuangu Pearl, Xiao Xing curved her lips slightly. What an upright cultivator.
If it had been another cultivator, they would already have stolen the thing from her wrist and taken it for themselves.
Bai Moqing steadied her mind and did not dare drift toward Xiao Xing again. She searched seriously for the file.
“President Xiao, I found it!” Seeing the words First Five Years on a spine, Bai Moqing pulled out the book, lifted it, and said to Xiao Xing, “President Xiao, take a look. Is it this one?”
“Found it?” Xiao Xing’s face was calm, showing no joy or excitement. She walked up to Bai Moqing, took the book from her hand, flipped through two pages, and said, “This is it.”
She raised her eyes, and their gazes met. An atmosphere called ambiguity suddenly rose around them.
Xiao Xing’s eyes were beautiful. Her pupils were like stars in the night and also like a deep, vast sea. When she looked at someone, those eyes were very focused.
Bai Moqing felt as if she were drowning, sinking into Xiao Xing’s deep sea. “President Xiao…”
“Mm.” Xiao Xing answered coldly, withdrew her gaze, and turned to leave. Before leaving, she added, “Sort the files in these cabinets and arrange them by timeline.” The ambiguous atmosphere was destroyed without a trace.