Uncanny Immortal 106

Chapter 106

Xie Qingzheng’s eyes flew open.

The moment their lips touched, her senses became exceptionally acute. The sand behind her, grain by grain, was felt distinctly, but the fishy smell of the mud was covered by the cool fragrance before her.

Mo Jiangxue’s eyes were tightly closed, her long eyelashes trembling slightly.

Xie Qingzheng looked at her master, and ripples spread in her heart.

She was held in her master’s arms, enveloped by the sand, with no room to struggle. Her hands had nowhere to go and could only wrap tightly around her master’s waist, clutching her master’s clothes, as if she were clutching the only life-saving straw. After a moment, she let go, and then clutched tightly again. This cycle repeated, and she gradually crumpled the white robe.

Those ice-cold hands held her face, gently stroking and rubbing, moving from her cheeks to the back of her head. In the enclosed space, it was as if an invisible barrier had been added, separating her body from the sand that was pouring in from all directions.

The tip of her nose was pressed against her master’s cheek, a touch like soft suet jade.

A soft warmth held her lips, and their lips pressed together. This time, they both knew to turn their heads slightly.

A gentle breath slowly came over, and a rich, cool sensation assailed her. The feeling of drowsiness, dizziness, and ignorance suddenly faded. She felt as if she were about to be melted by that gentle, cool breath. Her body trembled slightly, and her breath grew hotter.

Softness and wetness, hot and cold, were entangled.

Her consciousness began to grow hazy again, as if she were in the clouds, and as if she were in a dream. But the wetness and warmth of their lips and teeth were so real, so beautiful.

This was a ghost city, full of resentful spirits. The surroundings were incomparably cold, and the air was also cold and heavy. Yet, at this moment, her whole body was burning hot and soft.

She kept her eyes open and watched the person before her, with her eyes tightly closed, kissing her.

The last time in the romantic illusion, the kiss between them had been uncontrolled, their lips and tongues intertwined, too forceful, accompanied by a disordered breath, full of the color of desire, kissing her until she was dizzy, her lips swollen and numb…

The swollen pain on her lips, after she had woken up, she had released her spiritual energy to heal it, and only then had it subsided.

This time, the kiss was just a gentle press. The other seemed to be treating a priceless treasure with great care, not kissing with much force, but their lips were pressed very tightly together, and a cool, gentle breath slowly entered her body.

“Mm… mm…”

It seemed like a long time had passed, and it also seemed like only a moment had passed. It was too comfortable. She rubbed against the other’s lips and let out a few soft “mm” sounds.

I’m going to die…

The other was giving her breath to save her life, and she was making such a soft and charming sound…

Mo Jiangxue’s eyes suddenly flew open.

Meeting those light-colored pupils so close, Xie Qingzheng’s whole body trembled. A dazzling golden light suddenly flashed around her, and then the surrounding sand exploded. In a moment, the golden light dispersed, and she saw the dazed faces of the crowd.

“Elder Mo! Little Junior—”

Min He’s words stopped abruptly, and she stared at the master and disciple in a daze.

Their pressed lips separated. Mo Jiangxue’s chest rose and fell, and she took a few shallow breaths. Only then did she catch her breath and look at the crowd with a calm and composed air, a look of composure that would not change even if Mount Tai were to collapse before her.

A soft, numb feeling still lingered on both of their lips. Xie Qingzheng turned her head away, not daring to look at Mo Jiangxue’s reaction.

The crowd seemed to have frozen into stone statues in the great desert, which would disperse with a gust of wind. Some had their eyes wide open, some had their mouths agape, and some covered their eyes, not looking at what was improper.

Seeing the master and disciple hugging and kissing, Xie Youke’s expression changed drastically. She raised her left hand to her lips and coughed a few times, a mouthful of blood coming out. It was unknown if it was from anger or from the over-consumption of spiritual energy.

She stared at the master and disciple with cold eyes, and the gaze under her golden mask was as sharp as a knife.

Mo Jiangxue was a little uncomfortable being stared at by Xie Youke, but her face was still calm.

She rarely explained what she did. Someone would naturally speak for her.

Xie Qingzheng’s back was crawling from being stared at by Sect Master Xie. She was afraid that Sect Master Xie would brand her with the crime of a master-disciple affair and a great transgression, and would shoot her in public with a bow and arrow.

She pressed her lips together, let go of her master’s hands, took a few steps back, and explained to the crowd, “No, no, no, it’s not what you think. My master was giving me breath. She was afraid I would be suffocated to death!”

The crowd was dazed for a moment, and then they came to their senses. They thought to themselves, Elder Mo’s cultivation is indeed profound. She can even give someone breath while being buried in a ghost wall. The group’s shocked expressions faded, and they all asked with concern, “Elder, Little Junior Sister, are you two alright?”

“Sob, sob, we almost thought we wouldn’t see you again!”

“This time, it’s all thanks to Sect Master Xie!”

Xie Youke said nothing, waved her hand, and a female cultivator from the Tianshu Sect came forward to wipe the blood from the corner of her lips.

She looked at Xie Qingzheng and whispered a sentence in the female cultivator’s ear.

The female cultivator suddenly walked towards Xie Qingzheng, took out another clean handkerchief, and also wiped Xie Qingzheng’s lips.

Xie Qingzheng was so shocked she was incoherent. She snatched the handkerchief from the female cultivator’s hand. “Don’t, don’t, I’ll do it myself…”

She wanted to say more, but she had been possessed by Black General’s soul before and had consumed a lot of her yuan qi. Her emotions had been up and down, and she had been buried in a ghost wall for a while. Now that she was out safely, her body finally couldn’t take it anymore. Her vision went black, and she fainted.

The moment she thought of the few soft “mm… mm…” sounds she had made when she was being kissed by her master, she felt she had no face to face her. If it weren’t for fainting, she would have wanted to dig a hole and bury herself in it.

Before she fell, she thought to herself: So good. I don’t have to face the awkward situation…

Her consciousness was in a daze. She dreamed of many things.

She seemed to be wearing the attire of the Tianshu Sect, a light-colored brocade robe with gold thread orchid patterns, and a cinnabar mark on her forehead. She looked at herself in the mirror, and what was reflected in the mirror was Xie Fuyun’s gentle face, the corners of her eyes and brows filled with a wanton smile.

Xie Youke said from outside the window, “Senior Sister, quickly come with me to pay our respects. Don’t dawdle. If we’re late, Master will punish you again.”

She pushed open the window, jumped out, and stood side by side with Xie Youke. “I’m coming!”

Xie Youke frowned. “You won’t go through the proper main door, but you have to jump out of the window. What kind of behavior is that?”

She covered her ears and pleaded, “Hey, I just jumped out on a whim. Junior Sister, you should say a few less words.”

Xie Youke shot her a cold glance and said nothing.

But she found it too quiet and kept trying to get her to talk all the way…

The scene changed. She was sitting at a desk, with a piece of Xuan paper spread out on it. She looked out the window. In the courtyard was a young girl, her clothes luxurious, her figure slender, and she had an air of aloofness.

She took a brush and painted on the Xuan paper, drawing the appearance of that noble young girl, and even wrote a Dian Jiang Chun by the side.

Graceful in the cold forest, a jade cluster reflects the pines and bamboos. A phoenix hairpin is slanted, smiling proudly in the east wind.

This poem was about an orchid:

The orchid grows wantonly in the cold forest, as crystalline as jade, and quietly blooms under the cover of the pine trees and bamboos. Like a magnificent phoenix hairpin, it is slanted in the scattered long leaves, smiling proudly in the east wind…

A Dian Jiang Chun, not a single word mentioned the orchid, but every sentence was about the orchid.

Xie Youke came in from the courtyard and asked, “Senior Sister, what are you doing in the room? Spar with me.”

She hurriedly put away the painting. “Oh, I’m coming. I was just practicing calligraphy.”

Xie Youke was suspicious. “Practicing calligraphy, why are you hiding it? Let me see how you’re doing.”

She wouldn’t let her see and feigned anger. “Hey, insolence! How can a junior sister speak to a senior sister in a commanding tone?”

Xie Youke sneered. “Now you remember you’re a senior sister? When you took those junior sisters to skip class and go down the mountain to drink and hunt, why didn’t you think that you were the head senior sister of the Tianshu Sect?”

She still hid it and would not let her see. She rambled on and on, changed the subject, and then went to the courtyard to practice the sword with Xie Youke.

As they were practicing, everything around them turned red, and countless bodies of righteous path members lay beside them.

In a fiery red maple forest, she and Xie Youke’s swords clashed, and they exchanged blows. After dozens of moves, Xie Youke cut her arm with her sword. Her arm was in great pain, and her eyes went blank. She stabbed Xie Youke’s right shoulder with her sword, and with a clang, the longsword in Xie Youke’s hand fell to the ground.

She had defeated her junior sister many times, but it was the first time in her life she had injured her. The hand holding the sword was trembling badly.

Xie Youke’s hand was covered in blood. She looked up at her, her eyes filled with both pain and hatred.

She held her sword and took a few steps back, warning Xie Youke, “Youke, let me go. Don’t follow me anymore.”

Xie Youke clutched her right shoulder and walked towards her, step by step, and said angrily, “Xie Fuyun! Stop practicing those evil arts! Haven’t you noticed that your state of mind is not as good as before? Come back to the Tianshu Sect with me, and admit your mistake to Master. Master will surely be soft-hearted. Master will surely save you!”

She smiled sadly. “Junior Sister, I can’t go back. I have killed many people. If I go back, I will surely die without a whole body. I don’t have many years left to live. I will die sooner or later. Why do you have to have me go back to my death now? You should show filial piety to Master for me and take good care of the junior sisters and brothers of the sect.”

Xie Youke’s eyes were wide open. “No, I won’t let them kill you!”

A trace of coldness flashed in her eyes. She said slowly, “Youke, what right do you have to say such a thing now? You can’t protect me at all. When you become the Sect Master, then you can say such big words.”

Xie Youke said, “Then you hand her over! Give her back to me! She’s only years old. She doesn’t know anything. Are you really going to possess her?”

She sneered. “What? You’ve raised her for years, and you really think of yourself as her mother? Don’t forget, that child’s life was given by me. My blood flows in her body. It is only right that she will nourish my soul in the future.”

Xie Youke said stubbornly, “She was revived by the infant-refining art. If you possess her, she will never be able to be reincarnated again! Do you want her soul to be scattered?”

She said, “Junior Sister, she shouldn’t die. Should I die? And what have I done wrong? If she doesn’t die, then the one whose soul will be scattered is me!”

Xie Youke stared at her. “Xie Fuyun, look at what you’ve become now.”

She sneered and glanced at Xie Youke sideways. “Isn’t it just the appearance of an evil demon that you and Master hate the most? I am a demon that everyone has the right to kill. I am insane. You are the young sect master of a famous orthodox sect. You are as bright as the moon. But even if I have become a demon, Junior Sister, you still can’t beat me.”

Xie Youke closed her eyes, and when she opened them again, there was a trace of tears in her eyes. She softened her cold and harsh tone, lowered her head slightly, and also lowered her eyes, as if she were pleading, “Senior Sister, come back with me. I would rather lose to you for a lifetime.”

Her head had always been held high. She had never been so humble and pleading…

Xie Qingzheng had a very restless sleep, and her dream was full of other people’s memories.

When she woke up, she rubbed her sleepy eyes, sat up, and found that she was in a strange yet familiar room.

Golden and magnificent, luxurious and rich… she seemed to remember this place, but it also seemed she had never been here before.

She sat up, rubbed her head, and sorted out the content of the dream. Combined with Black General’s memory, she could guess:

Something must have happened in the more than half a year that Xie Fuyun and Xie Youke had been in the Ten Directions Domain, which had caused Xie Fuyun to turn to cultivating the evil path, her state of mind had changed greatly, and she seemed to have also suffered a backlash from some evil art. Otherwise, why would she say that she didn’t have long to live?

Eighteen years ago, in the chaos of war in the Wumo Kingdom, her biological mother had died. At that time, as a fetus, she was half-dead. Xie Youke had cut her out of the dead person’s belly.

She had died in the end, and Xie Fuyun had revived her with an evil art, planning to use her body to be reborn after she died.

Perhaps it was because Xie Youke was unwilling for Xie Fuyun to commit the act of body-snatching, and had also not been able to persuade Xie Fuyun to give up cultivating the evil path. After the two of them had raised her for years, Xie Fuyun had left with her alone, and the two senior and junior sisters had parted ways.

In the next two years, it was unknown what had happened. It had led to Xie Fuyun’s soul being scattered, and she and the Tianxuan Sword had been sealed in Wen Family Village.

She couldn’t even guess if she had really been possessed by Xie Fuyun in those last two years…

Or was it as Sect Master Wangqing and Sect Master Xie had said, that she was she, and Xie Fuyun had already had her soul scattered…

If Xie Fuyun’s soul had really been scattered, then who had instilled these extra memories in her mind?

Her mind was in a mess, and her head ached. Xie Qingzheng stood up in a daze, pushed open the door, and ran into a female cultivator from the Tianshu Sect.

“Hey, you’re awake!”

Xie Qingzheng had some impression of this female cultivator. She seemed to often stand behind Sect Master Xie, and she also had a cinnabar mark between her brows. She must be Sect Master Xie’s personal disciple.

Seeing Xie Qingzheng wake up, the female cultivator cupped her hands and smiled, introducing herself, “Tianshu Sect, Xie Hanlin.”

Her smile was bright and wanton, and it vaguely reminded Xie Qingzheng of the carefree and bright young girl from the dream.

Xie Qingzheng was taken aback for a moment and returned the salute. “Xuanji Sect, Xie Qingzheng.”

She silently recited the three characters “Xie Hanlin” in her heart, and then she suddenly thought of the poem that Xie Fuyun had written in the dream: Graceful in the cold forest, a jade cluster reflects the pines and bamboos. A phoenix hairpin is slanted, smiling proudly in the east wind.

She asked Xie Hanlin, “Was your name given by Sect Master Xie?”

Xie Hanlin nodded and smiled. “That’s right. It was given by Master. What’s wrong?”

Xie Qingzheng smiled faintly. “Nothing. It’s very beautiful.”

She could vaguely guess that if Xie Fuyun had given her a name as a child, she would definitely have also chosen a name from that poem.

These two senior and junior sisters, in raising a child, had raised the child’s personality to be like the other’s… The two of them clearly cared about each other, but in the end, they had parted ways. Sigh…

But then she thought of the matter of body-snatching, and the smile on Xie Qingzheng’s face faded.

She asked Xie Hanlin, “Am I in the Tianshu Sect now? I want to see Sect Master Xie.”

Xie Hanlin said, “My master is with your master. Come, I’ll take you.”

She walked to a courtyard, where Mo Jiangxue and Xie Youke were standing opposite each other, as if they were discussing something.

Seeing Mo Jiangxue, all the blood in Xie Qingzheng’s body rushed to her head. The soft, numb feeling on her lips came back clearly, and also those few, ecstatic moans.

Her face flushed to the roots of her ears. She forced herself to bow in salute. “G-greetings, Master… greetings, Sect Master Xie…”

Xie Youke frowned. “Why is your face so red?”

Mo Jiangxue smiled faintly. “She is nervous and shy when she sees an elder.”

Xie Qingzheng did not dare to look at her directly.

Xie Youke said, “Is it so nerve-wracking to see me?”

Xie Qingzheng thought to herself: Sect Master Xie, the elder my master was talking about is not you…

Author’s Note:

Note: The poem Dian Jiang Chun and its interpretation are from the Ancient Poetry website.