Mingming narrowed her eyes and saw the candle tightly clenched in Mo Ying’s hand.
At that moment, it was giving off a faint, ghostly glow. As she drew closer, the flame burned even brighter.
Lord Wuya… stole it…
What did any of this have to do with her?
Mo Ying was anxious to capture Mingming and take her back to claim credit.
She raised her hand, and the silver bells around her wrist gave a soft chime. The crisp ringing became almost tangible as it coiled toward Mingming.
Mingming stood where she was without dodging, allowing the ringing to bind her hands.
Suddenly, the cluster of pearl flowers adorning her hair trembled slightly, shattering the bell chimes Mo Ying had summoned.
Lu Xuan’s low, gritted voice reached Mingming’s ears. “You knew how to dodge me last night. Why can’t you move now?”
“Last night?” Mingming did not realize this was a private conversation between her and Lu Xuan, and muttered aloud.
“Exactly, last night!” Mo Ying had already summoned her attendants to surround the small courtyard where Mingming lived. “You skipped the banquet, so you must have sneaked into Mount Jia and stolen something.”
Mingming thought that she really had brought back something she probably should not have, so she nodded. “Someone else didn’t want the prey, so I brought it back.”
“And then?”
“Then I ate it.” Mingming had already prepared this explanation in advance.
A thought flashed through Mo Ying’s mind. She immediately concluded that one of Lu Wei’s spirit pets must have gotten lost, wandered into the mountains, and then been caught and eaten by this utterly clueless girl, Mingming.
How could she eat anything?
The spirit pet was already in her stomach. That was why Lord Wuya’s life candle glowed whenever it approached her. That had to be it!
“Do you know what you ate?” The bell chimes rang out once more, flying toward Mingming again. This time, instead of aiming for her hands, they shot straight for her neck.
The chimes came a little too close to Lu Xuan, who was perched atop Mingming’s head, so she reluctantly raised a hand to block them.
Mo Ying stood there, shaking the bells over and over, but to no avail. She glared at Mingming, secretly wondering since when the Second Miss had attained such cultivation.
Could it be because she had eaten Lord Wuya’s spirit pet?
Everything suddenly fit together, and unexpectedly, the reasoning seemed perfectly sound.
“It’s already dead. Isn’t it allowed to be eaten?” Mingming replied patiently. She remembered Mo Ying. The girl was an orphan the Shen Clan head had taken in. She got along very well with the younger members of the Shen Clan.
Of course, that did not include Mingming.
“Go summon Lord Wuya.” Mo Ying turned around and noticed that several other members of the Shen Clan had also come over. Afraid someone else would steal her credit, she hurriedly gave the order.
“Who is Lord Wuya?” Mingming asked.
At high noon, she had not finished sleeping, had not even eaten, and now she had been dragged into this absurd farce. And it had all been caused by this Lord Wuya.
She lazily lifted her eyelids and thought, ‘Lord Wuya is so annoying.’
“You don’t know who Lord Wuya is?!”
“The only elder in my clan. My uncle.”
Mo Ying’s voice, on the verge of going mad, and Lu Xuan’s low voice sounded at the same time.
“Oh.” Mingming found a place to sit in the courtyard and merely responded with a faint acknowledgment.
“He’s looking for me.” Lu Xuan let out a soft snort. “And here I am, reduced to being called a ‘thing.'”
“How dare you show such disrespect to Lord Wuya! If my adoptive father finds out, he’ll definitely punish you!”
Once again, Lu Xuan and Mo Ying spoke to Mingming at the same time.
Mingming automatically ignored Mo Ying and answered only Lu Xuan. “You’re not a thing?”
With her calm expression, she spoke those words as though she were mocking Mo Ying instead. A few attendants nearby, who normally could not stand Mo Ying putting on airs like the eldest young lady, turned their heads aside and chuckled.
“You stole Lord Wuya’s property. You’re already guilty as charged, and yet you still dare say…”
Mo Ying choked on her own words. She suddenly remembered that, in the Shen Clan, she was ultimately just an outsider. The Shen Clan had countless rules. No matter how low Mingming’s status was within the clan, she was still a member of the Shen Clan, while Mo Ying was only an outsider.
Why? Why should such a good-for-nothing, who lazed around sleeping all day and thought of nothing but eating, get to be the Shen Clan’s Second Miss, while she had to endure being humiliated by her?
The more Mo Ying thought about it, the angrier she became, until her face turned deathly pale.
“Shen Ming…” Lu Xuan held it in for a long while, yet in the end, he did not even know what to say to Mingming.
“Mhm.” Mingming responded to every single thing he said.
“She’s about to die from anger because of you.” Lu Xuan had been watching the entire commotion, of which he himself was the root cause.
“Die from anger?” Prompted by Lu Xuan’s reminder, Mingming finally deigned to look at Mo Ying.
After confirming that she was still breathing, Mingming calmly said, “I don’t think so.”
The words Mingming had been muttering to herself reached Mo Ying’s ears as: “Mm. Die from anger? I don’t think so.”
“Shen Ming, do you really think you’ll still be the Shen Clan’s Second Miss after today? Do you even realize the disaster you’ve caused?” Mo Ying could no longer tolerate Mingming.
She raised the silver bell in her hand. Before the attendants around her could even react, all of her spiritual power had already poured into the magical treasure.
“Today, I’ll punish you on Lord Wuya’s behalf!”
“Father! We’ve caught the one who stole Lord Wuya’s treasure!” Entrusted by Mo Ying, Shen Ji hurried over to report the matter.
“I knew Second Sister was acting strangely. Yesterday, she caught a black-and-green snake and even said she was going to take it back and cook it,” Shen Ji shouted as she rushed into the great hall.
Inside the hall stood Shen Fu and Lu Wei, along with guests from several other cultivation families. The moment Shen Ji’s words fell, frost instantly spread through the immortal hall in the midst of spring.
A biting chill swept through the hall. The guests hurriedly cast spells to ward off the sudden cold, and even Shen Fu’s eyebrows became coated with a layer of ice.
“Lord Wuya?” Shen Fu turned pale with shock. In his fury, Lu Wei had directly broken through the restrictions protecting Mount Jia’s interior, plunging this thousand-year-old hall into an icy seal.
If… Lu Wei wished it, wouldn’t Mount Jia be his for the taking at any moment?
It seemed he had been far too courteous earlier.
“A snake?” Lu Wei, his eyes covered by a strip of white silk, descended the steps of the great hall one step at a time. He pondered for a moment before realizing what had happened.
When Lu Xuan was younger, he had been willful and difficult to discipline. Lu Wei had occasionally been strict with him. After secretly looking through some paintings in Lu Wei’s study, Lu Xuan had transformed into that appearance. Whenever he did, he could always coax Lu Wei into letting him off.
As Lu Wei’s thoughts settled, the ice throughout the hall gradually melted with each step he took. Shen Ji, who had been frozen stiff where she stood, felt warmth slowly return to her body as she watched Lu Wei approach.
For a fleeting moment, she stared at him in a daze, wondering what kind of detached, desireless eyes lay beneath the strip of white silk covering the face of such a peerless man, pure as snow.
“Lead the way.”
Lu Wei’s two words, as sharp as blades, snapped Shen Ji back to reality. In the next instant, the two of them vanished from where they stood.
At that moment, in the secluded little courtyard, Mingming still had her eyes half-closed, drowsy with sleep. She did not notice in the slightest that Mo Ying had already raised her magical treasure to attack her.
“Miss Mo!” One of the attendants panicked at the sight. Everyone knew the Shen Clan’s Second Miss was hopelessly lazy and possessed meager cultivation. If that attack landed, she would surely be gravely injured.
“Shen Ming.” Lu Xuan coldly called out to warn her.
“Hm?” Mingming opened her eyes. Before she could even make out the magical treasure Mo Ying had raised, a golden radiance filled her vision.
Lu Xuan, who had been about to stop the attack himself, withdrew his hand and resumed being a quiet pearl hair ornament.
Because someone had already appeared behind Mo Ying.
He stepped out of the void, and even as he walked, his toes remained an inch above the ground.
Lu Wei merely walked forward. He did not seem to make any move at all, nor was there the slightest fluctuation in the surrounding spiritual energy.
Yet in that very instant, the silver bell that Mo Ying had raised high into the air exploded apart, letting out one final, shrill peal.
The ringing rebounded into Mo Ying’s ears. Blood streamed from them, a clear sign that she had suffered severe backlash from the destruction of her magical treasure.
“Lord Wuya said that if the life candle lit up, we were to go and find him. Why… why did you come here yourself…?” Shen Ji caught Mo Ying as she collapsed and hurriedly asked.
The sound of the silver bell shattering finally managed to draw a bit of Mingming’s attention.
She turned toward the sound and saw Lu Wei, dressed in robes of white and gold.
The familiar face, the familiar figure, the familiar aura. Every detail about him, apart from his clothing, was deeply engraved in Mingming’s memory.
Even after sleeping for a hundred years, those memories remained crystal clear.
After all, they had once traveled ten thousand miles together across the sunless Wilderness of Eternal Night, accompanying each other for years, never apart day or night, inseparable in every way.
It was him.
The blind, unlucky fellow from the Wilderness of Eternal Night!
In that instant, Mingming’s thoughts raced faster than anyone else’s.
The unlucky fellow was Lu Xuan’s uncle, Lu Wei, her supposed target.
Back then, she had searched for her target using the portrait provided by the system and ended up finding him instead. Since they were uncle and nephew, sharing a close blood relationship, it was perfectly reasonable that they looked so alike that she had mistaken one for the other.
Mingming stared at Lu Wei, her eyes widening more than they ever had before. There was not the slightest trace of her earlier lazy demeanor.
‘Th-This… what am I supposed to do? He shouldn’t recognize me… right?’
‘And didn’t I cure his eyes? Why is he still wearing that blindfold? There’s no way my prescription was wrong!’
Lu Wei walked toward them step by step, his very presence as cold as frost and snow.
Mingming grew so nervous that even her breathing quickened. Her gaze remained fixed on Lu Wei, not daring to look away for even a moment.
Lu Xuan spoke in a chilly tone identical to that of his own uncle.
“He’s just an old man. What are you staring at?”
As he conversed with Mingming through divine sense, there was naturally no way to keep it from Lu Wei’s ears.
Lu Wei had already arrived before Mingming. His attention was focused solely on Lu Xuan as he reached out a hand toward Mingming.
Mingming did not even dare make a sound.
Th-This guy’s hearing was unbelievably sharp.
If she spoke, wouldn’t he recognize her? He probably would not remember her voice, but what if…
“An old man?” Lu Wei pinched the pearl hair ornament that Lu Xuan had transformed into from atop Mingming’s head between two fingers and reprimanded his nephew through divine sense.
“What did you transform into last night?”
“Those paintings in your study. You’ve been painting that same snake for over a hundred years. Aren’t you tired of it?”
The two of them treated Mingming as though she did not exist and simply began conversing through divine sense.
Mingming: “…”
‘Aaaah!!!!! Unlucky fellow, just kill me already!!! Becoming a god isn’t something I absolutely have to do!!!!’
She screamed soundlessly inside her head. For the first time, she lost her usual composure, and even her heart pounded like a war drum.
Lu Wei’s expression grew slightly colder. His fingers curled inward, almost crushing the pearl ornament atop Mingming’s head.
As his fingers pressed down, they brushed against the loose strands of hair atop Mingming’s head. Soft as silk, they curled around his fingertips, lending the moment an oddly intimate air.
To an outsider, the scene would have looked rather beautiful.
Only Mingming herself was so startled that it felt as though her heart were about to leap out of her chest.
So tense that she could barely breathe, her cheeks flushed a rosy red.
Lu Xuan had always thought Mingming was simply born slow-witted and dull. He had never expected her to react like this upon seeing Lu Wei.
“Shen Ming.” He called her name again, trying to pull her out of this “utterly captivated” state.
“Shen Ming?” Holding the pearl ornament that Lu Xuan had transformed into, Lu Wei took two steps back, putting a little more distance between himself and this member of the Shen Clan. For some reason, he found his fingertips slightly itchy.
“You dare use that name as well.”
Leaving behind that mocking remark, Lu Wei turned to leave. He truly found the Shen Clan rather unpleasant to look at.
Mingming froze for a moment before coming back to her senses.
If she was not called that name, then what else was she supposed to be called?
She resisted making a sound and began pondering another problem.
Her intended target had been taken away by the person she had previously mistaken for her target.
So… what was she supposed to do now?
After Lu Wei had walked two steps away with the pearl ornament, he sensed that something was wrong.
Because as Lu Xuan moved farther away from Mingming, his heartbeat had weakened considerably.
Had his mechanical heart really not started beating again when the life candle drew near?
But with so many eyes watching, Lu Wei could not very well take out such a secret object and inspect it in public.
So he coldly said to Mingming, “Follow me.”
Mingming remained glued to her chair, unwilling to move.
It was hard to imagine that the unlucky fellow from before would speak to her in such a tone.
She had always thought he would do nothing but call out, “Mingming,” over and over again.
No, this was not the time to be thinking about that. She should be thinking about something else.
For example, he still smelled as nice as before.
No… she should not be thinking about that either…
How had things ended up like this?
The chaotic thoughts swirling through her mind left Mingming sitting there in a daze, motionless as a stone statue.
Lu Wei stood where he was, waiting for Mingming to follow. His patience was limited. If she made him wait much longer, he would not mind dragging a corpse along instead.
Given the current situation, it looked very much as though Mingming had been caught red-handed trying to control the Young Lord of Wentian City.
“Ming’er, Lord Wuya told you to follow him. Hurry up… honestly, child, why are you so slow?” Shen Fu had no idea what was going on either.
But complying with Lord Wuya’s wishes was what mattered most right now. So Shen Fu stepped forward and gave Mingming a shove.
Still stunned, Mingming stumbled forward, nearly crashing into Lu Wei’s back. But he was nimble enough to sidestep her with ease.
“Is everyone in the Shen Clan made of wood?” Lu Wei mocked.
Mingming still followed after him.
After all, Lu Xuan really could not be too far away from her.
Once aboard the Rainbow Light Flying Vessel, Lu Wei set up restrictions throughout the craft before allowing Lu Xuan to return to his human form.
Although the Young Lord of Wentian City also wore a cold expression, he was nowhere near as imposing or as unapproachable as his uncle.
Mingming edged a little closer to Lu Xuan, hoping only to stay as far away from Lu Wei as possible.
“The mechanical heart stopped working all of a sudden. Because when she appeared… my own heart started beating again.”
Only after a long silence did Lu Xuan reluctantly say those words.
“Now isn’t the time for storybook fantasies,” Lu Wei said, mocking even his own nephew.
“It’s the truth,” Lu Xuan replied.
Mingming sat beside him without saying a word.
Lu Wei tapped the center of Lu Xuan’s chest with a finger, and the mechanical heart slowly floated out. Sure enough, even without that mechanical heart, Lu Xuan still had a heartbeat.
Though his eyes were covered, Mingming could still feel a gaze as sharp as a blade settle upon her.
He was scrutinizing her.
Let him look.
She had never been afraid of him. Now that she had recovered from her initial shock, Mingming naturally was not afraid of Lu Wei.
She coughed several times, disguising her voice, then spoke in a deliberately high-pitched tone.
“This has nothing to do with me. He had passed out, so I brought him back and saved him.”
“Since Lu Xuan is… is someone from Lord Wuya’s family, then that’s a relief. If fate allows, I’ll visit him in Wentian City someday. By the way, where is Wentian City?”
Hearing her voice, Lu Xuan looked at her in surprise.
“Your voice?”
“I’m going through voice change.” Mingming strained her throat until it felt tight to maintain the altered voice.
When Lu Wei heard Mingming speak, his handsome brows furrowed slightly. In the end, however, he detected nothing unusual. She had completely altered her voice with a spell.
“Wentian City does not welcome members of the Shen Clan,” Lu Wei said as he quickly restarted the mechanical heart.
It had never been broken. It was simply that, once Lu Xuan regained his own heartbeat, it assumed its duty had been fulfilled and stopped operating.
Mingming had barely warmed her seat before Lu Wei had her thrown off the Rainbow Light Flying Vessel.
The young cultivator escorting her off looked at her with a complicated expression.
“You’re the first member of the Shen Clan who’s ever been allowed aboard this flying vessel.”
“Oh. Could you tell me where Wentian City is?” Mingming did not want to lose the only lead connected to her target.
“You still want to go to Wentian City?” The young cultivator laughed.
Lowering his voice, he said to Mingming, “Don’t tell me you’ve fallen for our Young Lord after spending just one night with him?”
Mingming thought that winning over her target was her ultimate objective anyway, so the cultivator was not exactly wrong.
She nodded and admitted it openly.
“Yes.”
“Haha, I knew it! Our Young Lord is wonderful. But what you may not know is that our Lord Wuya is single too…”
The cultivator was clearly quite the gossip.
What he did not realize was that nothing happening aboard the flying vessel could escape Lu Wei’s ears.
“Get her off.”
Lu Wei’s voice, cold as snow, rang out with unquestionable finality.
Lu Xuan, who had heard it as well, raised an eyebrow.
Mingming returned to the Shen Clan all by herself.
By then, Lu Wei had already sent someone ahead to explain the whole matter clearly.
In short, Wentian City’s message was that they thanked the Shen Clan’s Second Miss for safeguarding the item Lord Wuya had lost for one night. Those spirit stones were a token of gratitude for her.
After going around in circles, those spirit stones had somehow ended up in Mingming’s hands after all.
Hearing this, Shen Fu was overjoyed. Believing that the Shen Clan had established ties with Wentian City, he naturally did not hold Mingming accountable. Instead, he allowed her to return to the main residence in peace.
For the time being, Mingming had no opportunity to go to Wentian City and continue searching for Lu Xuan, because she had promised Madam Lan one thing.
She would go meet the future Dao companion Madam Lan had arranged for her.
Mingming thought that, now that she knew Lu Xuan’s whereabouts, there was no need to rush. She might as well do as Madam Lan wished and simply go through the motions.
Meanwhile, the Rainbow Light Flying Vessel was slowly making its way back to Wentian City. There was no need to hurry on the return journey, so the vessel spent several days traveling.
That night, Lu Wei, his eyes still covered with white silk, dipped his brush into ink and pigments, sketching graceful curves across the paper, like the posture of a snake winding its way forward.
“Having that mechanical heart is enough. That girl from the Shen Clan isn’t highly cultivated. A hundred years from now, if she dies, then she dies. Your life must not be placed in someone else’s hands.”
But how could an inborn heartbeat compare to the cold, artificial pulse of a mechanical heart?
Lu Wei understood that truth as well. He was merely reminding Lu Xuan.
“As long as you stay away from her, the mechanical heart will be fine. The Shen Clan is hopelessly old-fashioned, the most tiresome sort of people. You’d better keep your distance from her…”
“Lu Xuan?”
Lu Wei laid down the final brushstroke, painting an adorable snake’s tail curling upward.
Only after emerging from the world of his painting did the absorbed Lu Wei realize that Lu Xuan had fallen completely silent.
He had run away.