At first light Gu Ning drifted awake, and Qingxiao was not beside her.
Recalling all the ways Qingxiao had been close to her the night before, a flush spread over that cold, aloof face.
But in the end Qingxiao had only stroked her belly, and had done nothing else that overstepped what lay between master and disciple.
"Could it be that I only assumed it? That what Master feels for me is nothing but an ordinary master's feeling for a disciple?"
Gu Ning began to doubt her own deductions, and felt ashamed of having believed Qingxiao coveted her body.
Nor could Gu Ning be much blamed for it. She was the sort who grows strong against the weak and weak against the strong. Seeing her master's cultivation set so high, she put herself in the weaker position, while faced with the likes of Su Qiuyin she put herself up top.
Put simply: she bullied the soft and feared the hard.
A whimper came out of Gu Ning's throat. She felt there was nowhere on earth to hide her face, and would have liked nothing better than to bury the whole of it in the soft pillow.
"Ning'er, why are you still lounging in bed?"
Familiar footsteps came from beside the bed, together with a clear and lovely call, and pulled Gu Ning up out of her whirlpool of self-doubt.
Gu Ning hurriedly sat up straight, turned her head, and saw Qingxiao, already dressed, watching her.
"Y-yes, Master, I am getting up at once."
So saying, Gu Ning hastily straightened her robes and got out of bed.
Qingxiao watched Gu Ning in all this rushing about and found her unbearably endearing, went absent for a moment, and let out a soft laugh.
And Gu Ning, scrambling out of bed, heard the sound of Qingxiao's stifled laughter, went hot with embarrassment, and hurried all the more.
"Mnh, my robes are all crooked!"
"And the hair over here seems to be sticking up"
Gu Ning's hands and feet were all at cross purposes.
Qingxiao had watched about long enough. She reached out and tucked the loose strands of Gu Ning's hair behind her ear, and said gently.
"Ning'er, you truly have changed."
Gu Ning felt the pad of a finger brushing past her ear, and the base of it went red.
"Let me tidy you," Qingxiao said.
"A-all right."
Gu Ning did not refuse.
Qingxiao's hands were very light. Gu Ning's waist-length hair was gathered up behind her head and fixed there with a single pin.
The long tail of it fell down her back, half hiding, half not, the pale nape beneath.
The tidying done, Gu Ning had turned back into her stock configuration.
It was not that she was being difficult. She genuinely did not know how to dress herself up, and the flustering just now had not been an act either.
And looking at herself in the bronze mirror, she was still wearing last night's flowing cloud robes.
Last night the lamps had been dim, and Qingxiao had held her attention besides, so she had never taken a proper look at herself.
Counting the last time she had studied herself, this was the second time she had looked herself over carefully.
Unlike the first time, when all she had felt was the coldness and the strangeness.
At this moment Gu Ning could only think that the girl in front of her gave off, in her expression and in every movement, a definite pull.
And those eyes, once cold and without a ripple in them, had ripples spreading now at the bottom of them, reflecting a gentleness belonging to a woman that she had never once imagined in herself.
"Is this really me?"
Gu Ning was not quite certain, and at the same time perfectly certain: this was her.
A strange emotion welled up in her. Was it quiet delight? Or was it distress?
Quiet delight, because she had become beautiful, and had become powerful.
Distress, because she carried this wretched constitution, and was watched by predators for it, and could not be at ease.
Thinking so, Gu Ning made up her mind.
She was going to deal with this broken constitution and raise her cultivation, and never mind the Mary Sue. Since she had crossed over and become Gu Ning.
Then Gu Ning was the Mary Sue.
"Mnh, calling myself the Mary Sue is still a bit odd. Embarrassing."
Gu Ning was, in the end, still male on the inside, and agreeing with her own words still carried some embarrassment.
Still, she could feel that she was building up an immunity.
Qingxiao, beside her, looked at Gu Ning, vivid enough to drip, and ripples spread through her heart again, and she could not pull her eyes away.
Several deep breaths, and only then had she settled herself enough to speak.
"Ning'er, I have fetched 《The Cloud Sea Origin-Condensing Art》 for you."
So saying, Qingxiao produced the art and handed it to Gu Ning.
Gu Ning took it, and looking at the art in her hands, felt a small flush of pleasure.
This 《Cloud Sea Origin-Condensing Art》 was not an art of slaughter. What it did was open a second sea of qi, and refine spiritual power.
The equivalent of carrying a spare power bank. In a war of attrition above all, a cultivator who had trained in this art held better odds.
But on Gu Ning's side the use of it differed somewhat.
Because as the original book had it, the Mystic Maiden Violet Yin Body cultivated fast up through the Golden Core stage and no further, and breaking into Nascent Soul was extraordinarily difficult.
And the reason was that her own spiritual energy was tainted by the constitution and impure.
But opening a fresh sea of qi elsewhere would ease the problem of slowed cultivation to some degree.
Qingxiao watched Gu Ning wearing the delight of a child handed a sweet, and thought her still as devoted to cultivation as ever, and tireless in it.
"With your grasp of things, I am confident this art will not be difficult for you."
"If there is anything you do not understand, you may come and ask me."
Whether Qingxiao had formed a particular attachment to Gu Ning's soft hair, or had simply become addicted to the act of patting, she once again stretched out a pale hand toward Gu Ning's head.
Perhaps because the cover of night was gone, Gu Ning felt at this moment that countless pairs of eyes were watching her, and went shy on the instant.
She spoke up abruptly, thanked Qingxiao, and found an excuse about needing to cultivate, wanting to escape those demon claws.
"Master, if there is nothing else, I shall go and cultivate."
That said, she bolted.
***
"Reaching the late stage should be no trouble now."
Gu Ning looked at the 《Cloud Sea Origin-Condensing Art》 in her hands and thought over her plans.
By the original plot, if she wanted to break through to the late Golden Core it would be difficult past describing.
Even with Yu Ruo's help it had been the barest scrape.
And now she had drunk down Tao Yao's cultivation, and gained the art, and had all the various cultivation pills from the secret realm to help besides.
And she still could not break through?
Then she might as well uninstall and hand the whole thing to Yu Ruo.
"Speaking of Tao Yao, though..."
From what Su Qiuyin had told her, ever since Tao Yao had been escorted back to the sect she had been held in the sect prison.
And the Mystic Nether Sect had got word and sent an elder over to take her back.
Word was, though, that Tao Yao's master had left again before long, red in the face.
By the look of it they had parted on very bad terms.
Hardly surprising. The Sword Sect had no kind looks for the demonic path, and opening the lion's mouth wide just to sicken the other side was normal enough.
Gu Ning had no interest in the open and hidden struggles between sects, but Tao Yao, one of the original book's heroines and the future overlord of the demonic path, was certainly someone to keep an eye on.
Turning it over, Gu Ning resolved to find a time to go and look in on her.
For the present, though, the hour she had agreed on with Su Qiuyin for training had arrived, and keeping that appointment came first.
Before long Gu Ning reached the Nourishing Origin Hall.
And Su Qiuyin, waiting inside, heard Gu Ning's voice, felt her heart lift, and went out to meet her.
The moment Gu Ning came into view Su Qiuyin's eyes went wide, her gaze locked hard onto her, her small mouth falling slightly open.
Stared at under that scorching gaze, Gu Ning grew uncomfortable, her face flushing red, and asked
"Is there something on me?"
Only then did Gu Ning remember that she was still wearing those flowing cloud robes.
"So... so big"
It came straight out of Su Qiuyin.