044 Bloodline Suppression
As for the lesson, Qin Ren didn’t punish Luo Yao too harshly.
He pinched her cheeks. In the elevator on the way up, he had intended to scold her a bit, but the Pixiu interrupted him with a series of vague, coquettish hums, forcing Qin Ren to swallow his words. Then she clung to his neck, all sticky and affectionate.
“Qin Ren, you’re home so early today. Were you too impatient to wait to boil Coke for Yaoyao~?” Luo Yao was very pleased that Qin Ren could be so mindful of the High Immortal.
“Luo, I’ve discovered that you’re a bit thick-skinned.”
“This eminence is a Spirit Beast.”
Wasn’t it normal for a Spirit Beast to be thick-skinned?
“Fine, thick-skinned, are you?”
Qin Ren’s eyes widened, and he raised his thick palm.
“What… what are you doing…”
Luo Yao glanced at the display screen in the elevator. It was climbing so slowly. There was no escape.
“Come here! Let me see how thick your skin is!” Qin Ren was fierce, scolding Luo Yao.
“I’m not coming.”
According to her conversation with Tang Bobo just now, Qin Ren was about to do something perverted to the High Immortal.
Luo Yao blushed, blinked her eyes, and glanced at Qin Ren in a fluster. Then she retreated to the corner of the elevator, one hand tightly clutching the hem of her skirt, the other covering her little bottom.
Although her bottom was small, her hands were also small. Unlike Qin Ren, who could cover it all with one palm, her movements seemed a bit clumsy.
“Pinching my face is enough for today. No spanking… I’m using a big band-aid. If you hit it, it’ll… it’ll cause a hemorrhage…”
“…”
Qin Ren’s mouth twitched. Luo Yao thought he didn’t believe her, but in truth, she didn’t believe it herself.
Ding—
The elevator arrived. Qin Ren was about to become the cleaver, and Luo Yao the fish. She had no choice but to compromise one more step.
“If… if you really have to hit me, don’t do it in front of Little Fish. I… I’ll go to the bedroom with you…”
This was the High Immortal’s last bit of stubbornness. On the surface, Qin Ren kept a straight face, but inwardly he was both amused and annoyed. In the end, because it was too hot from riding his bike in the summer and he really didn’t want to move, he didn’t lay a hand on her. After grabbing her and pinching her cheeks a couple more times, he went straight to open the door and go home.
…
“I’m back.”
“Ge.”
Yu Yourong got up from the sofa. Seeing the guilty-looking Pixiu following behind Qin Ren, she knew she had probably made her brother angry again. It was a common sight.
“You, go wash your hands after playing downstairs.”
Qin Ren sent Luo Yao to the bathroom, loosened his tie, and took off his jacket. Yu Yourong silently took it, hung it on the coat rack by the door, straightened it, and patted it twice.
“Meow~” Tuantuan called out seductively and jumped into Qin Ren’s arms, but after just a couple of flutters, she was pushed aside by Qin Ren as he stood up.
“Meow?”
“Don’t. It’s too hot. I don’t want to touch you right now.”
“Meow…”
Hah, men.
Tuantuan resentfully licked her soft fur, let out a cold meow, and turned to walk away.
“Ge, is it very hot outside today?” Yu Yourong brought Qin Ren a bottle of iced Coke.
“Yeah. You didn’t go out today?”
“No, I was at home watching TV.”
“I see you’ve been studying the map for a few days. Didn’t you go look for your master?”
“I’m not looking anymore.”
Yu Yourong shook her head.
“The TV is good.”
“…”
Qin Ren was speechless. This was a case of “too happy to think of home.”
But in reality, it was precisely because Yu Yourong had studied and understood the map that she realized that searching for her master in such a carpet-bombing, spread-out fashion was futile without her cultivation. For now, she could only wait for information from Qin Ren’s old friends.
“What are you watching?” Qin Ren took the Coke and sat down in the living room, seeing that a commercial was playing on the TV.
“A story about the snake clan.”
“There are stories about your snake clan on Earth?”
“There are.”
Yu Yourong followed him with a lint roller, sat down beside her brother, and started to remove the cat hair Tuantuan had just left behind.
“Let me guess. Are there two snakes who cultivated into spirits?”
“Mhm.”
“And they’re sisters?”
“Mhm.”
“And their magic is very powerful?”
“Mhm.”
“Legend of the White Snake!”
Qin Ren said the name confidently. This TV series, like the 1986 version of Journey to the West, had accompanied his childhood.
“White Snake? I think… no.”
“No?”
However, Yu Yourong shook her head. Just as Qin Ren was wondering, the commercial on the TV ended, and the main show resumed. Qin Ren took a look and saw that it was Calabash Brothers.
“Hiss… oh right.”
Qin Ren remembered. The snake spirit in Calabash Brothers also had a younger sister, who had more magic treasures than her older sister and was also more emotional. Qin Ren had quite liked her when he was a child.
The two snake spirits in Calabash Brothers both had human faces and snake bodies. Qin Ren had originally thought that Yu Yourong would have some complaints about their appearance, but in fact, he learned that she was very envious of the snake spirit sisters’ half-human, half-snake form.
“From ancient times to the present in the Flowing Cloud Sect, the only ones who have cultivated to that realm are those demigod ancestors from thousands of years ago.”
“Demigod…”
Mentioning thousands of years ago, Qin Ren couldn’t help but think of those ascended Demon Progenitors.
“Those demigods, did any of them come to Earth?”
“They did.”
Yu Yourong thought for a moment.
“There was the Ba Snake, the Nine-headed Infant, the Transforming Snake, Xiangliu, and the Torch Dragon…”
Yu Yourong listed a few names. After hearing them, Qin Ren was impressed. They were all big shots.
The Ba Snake. The Classic of Mountains and Seas records that “the Ba Snake eats an elephant and spits out its bones after three years.” This was the origin of the idiom “a snake swallowing an elephant.”
The Nine-headed Infant. It had nine heads, controlled the power of water and fire, and dominated the great wilderness. In the end, it was killed by the arrow of the ancient great power, Hou Yi.
The Transforming Snake. “It has wings, moves like a snake, its voice is like a shout, and it summons great floods.” It felt like its power was similar to the Nine-headed Infant’s but it wasn’t as famous. In the modern literature Qin Ren had read, the only memory he had was seeing some writings about it in Ghost Blows Out the Light: The Worm Valley.
Xiangliu. Qin Ren’s deepest impression of it was that it was said to have nine heads and could find food on nine mountains. Its blood was highly toxic, and the land it touched would become barren. “Wherever it went, it would become a swampy country.” Later, it seemed that the Great Yu had taken care of it.
The Torch Dragon, needless to say, was famous. When it opened its eyes, it was day; when it closed them, it was night. In legends, it was like a creation god.
Among these Flowing Cloud Sect ancestors that Yu Yourong mentioned, the Ba Snake, the Transforming Snake, Xiangliu, and the Torch Dragon all had human faces and snake bodies. This made Qin Ren have a bold thought.
“Yourong, among those ancestors of yours, there aren’t a Nuwa and a Fuxi, are there?”
“Never heard of them.”
Yu Yourong denied it. Qin Ren breathed a sigh of relief. If he suddenly learned that the descendants of Yan and Huang were actually descendants of snakes, then even if these snake clan ancestors were fierce, he would more or less feel his worldview collapse and feel uneasy.
As for the saying “descendants of the dragon,” Qin Ren became even more convinced of it.
After all, the Great Yu and Hou Yi were both ancient Chinese people. If they were descendants of the divine dragon, then it would be a reasonable bloodline suppression for them to kill the Transforming Snake and Xiangliu.
Translator’s Notes
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Too happy to think of home (乐不思蜀): An idiom originating from the story of Liu Shan, the last emperor of Shu Han during the Three Kingdoms period. After his state was conquered, he was taken to the capital of the rival state and enjoyed the life there so much that when asked if he missed his homeland, he said he was too happy to think of it. It’s used to describe someone who is so content in a new environment that they forget their origins.
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Calabash Brothers (葫芦娃): A classic and beloved Chinese animated TV series from the 1980s.
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Classic of Mountains and Seas (山海经): A classic Chinese text and a compilation of mythic geography and beasts.
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Hou Yi (后羿): A mythological Chinese archer, famous for shooting down nine of the ten suns.
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Ghost Blows Out the Light: The Worm Valley (鬼吹灯之云南虫谷): A very popular Chinese web novel series about a group of tomb raiders, which has been adapted into numerous films and TV series.
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The Great Yu (大禹): A legendary ruler in ancient China famed for his introduction of flood control.
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Nuwa and Fuxi (女娲和伏羲): Major deities in Chinese mythology. They are often depicted as having human faces and snake or dragon bodies and are credited with creating humanity and establishing order.
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Descendants of Yan and Huang (炎黄子孙): A common term for the Chinese people, referring to the mythical emperors Yan Di and Huang Di as their ancestors.
