“Young Master, I am afraid I can no longer instruct Young Master Lingyou.”
The moment Cen Xianyun pushed the door open and stepped inside, he caught the slightly apologetic voice of Wang Ting. Looking up, he saw Wang Ting sitting on a small daybed with his outer robe halfway undressed, his wound already neatly bandaged.
Whatever he feared most truly had to happen.
Cen Xianyun sighed inwardly. Bleeding on the very first day of taking up a job, putting himself in the man’s shoes, he would not be willing to continue either.
“It is not that I am unwilling,” Wang Ting said, as if sensing what Cen Xianyun was thinking. He waited until the medicine boy gathered the blood-stained silk strips before speaking to explain, “Surely you already know the full sequence of events, Young Master?”
“Young Master Lingyou seems to suffer from a mental ailment and refuses to stay in my presence for long. If this issue remains unresolved and we force these lessons upon him, I am afraid it will only backfire.”
A mental ailment?
Cen Xianyun tugged slightly at the corner of his mouth. Compared to Wang Ting being too angered to teach Xie Lingyou, a mere mental ailment was hardly worth mentioning.
Besides, what kind of mental ailment could that little cat possibly have? It was nothing more than going crazy whenever he was out of his sight.
Wang Ting could not be allowed to leave, and these lessons were an absolute necessity.
If Xie Lingyou failed to establish a good student-teacher relationship with Wang Ting right now, where else could they find the mental cultivation method meant to lay his foundation for immortal cultivation?
“Reasonably speaking, I was the one who asked you, Senior Brother, to instruct Lingyou, only for you to get injured on the very first day. I truly ought not to be thick-skinned enough to press you further. It’s just,” Cen Xianyun smiled apologetically, cupped his hands in respect, and said, “apart from you, Senior Brother, I truly cannot think of anyone else who could teach Lingyou.”
Before Wang Ting could speak, he skillfully shifted the conversation and added quickly, “However, you need not worry, Senior Brother. What happened today will strictly never happen again.”
With matters pressed to this point, Wang Ting naturally had no room to decline. He nodded in agreement: “If you can make Young Master Lingyou sit through his lessons at ease, Young Master, I shall naturally do my utmost to instruct him.”
A gentleman keeps his word. Hearing those words, Cen Xianyun finally set his mind at rest. Yet, before he could exchange a few more pleasantries with Wang Ting, the pitter-patter of fast footsteps echoed from outside the door.
He looked up, but before he could see clearly, a soft white bundle plunged straight into his arms. There was no need to look further, who else could it be besides that clingy little cat?
“Yeah-Yeah!”
The moment cold fingers touched the sensitive soft flesh at the nape of his neck, Xie Lingyou jerked his head up. He had rushed through his bath and hurried over without stopping for a moment. A flushed red glow from the warm steam still lingered on his cheeks, making him look pleasantly soft and fair, which temporarily masked his usual frailty and thinness.
Having grown vigilant from Cen Xianyun’s previous attempts, the little cat ducked his neck before Cen Xianyun could pinch that soft flesh at his nape. He immediately squirmed back and forth inside the warm embrace, attempting to escape his fate of being thrown aside by Cen Xianyun.
Yet, now that he was already inside Cen Xianyun’s arms, how could he possibly escape the control of those devilish hands?
“N-Not dirty anymore!” Caught by his vital spot once again, the little cat froze on the spot. He blinked his teary eyes pitifully and emphasized over and over, “I’m not dirty anymore!”
Cen Xianyun’s expression turned inscrutable. So what if he was no longer dirty? Why did he keep squirming into his arms?
He showed no mercy, pinching the back of Xie Lingyou’s neck to pry him away, and pointed at Wang Ting: “Apologize.”
Xie Lingyou’s eyes rested on Wang Ting for a mere fraction of a second before quickly darting away. The overflowing joy on his face vanished in an instant, his lower lip pouting high in a complete display of reluctance.
In his mind, this person was the sole reason he could not stay by the young master’s side. How could he possibly apologize willingly?
“Xie Lingyou,” Cen Xianyun called out with an implicit warning, instantly piercing through the little cat’s thoughts and forcing the stubborn head to lower.
Though he lowered his head, the little cat still held his ground, biting his lower lip without making a sound.
“There is no need for this; he was merely frightened,” Wang Ting waved his hand to brush the matter aside. He then looked toward Cen Xianyun, “How do you plan to make Young Master Lingyou sit at ease for his lessons, Young Master?”
A way?
Cen Xianyun glanced sideways at Xie Lingyou, who was clinging tightly to his side and gripping the corner of his sleeve for dear life.
It was actually quite simple.
A new guest arrived inside the study reserved exclusively for the young master.
The door connecting the inner and outer rooms of the study was shut tight, but the window remained wide open. Whenever the uneasy little cat turned his head, he could clearly see Cen Xianyun sitting in the outer room practicing calligraphy and reading books. This arrangement finally allowed him to settle down on his seat and listen obediently to Wang Ting’s guidance.
Except…
Cen Xianyun stared at the scroll in his hands, which he had flipped through three or four times already and could recite completely by heart, sinking into deep thought.
Ever since Master Yuan mentioned yesterday that there was nothing left to teach, he genuinely stopped coming, merely sending people over with several baskets of books for Cen Xianyun to read whenever he had free time. For Cen Xianyun, this was originally a blessing from the heavens, since it meant he no longer had to endure the torment of six in the morning wake-up calls.
The reality, however, was that while he no longer needed to attend Master Yuan’s classes, he now had to accompany Xie Lingyou through his.
To make matters worse, this little cat was adept at pushing his luck. Earlier on, he would wait until the dead of night to sneak onto the bed. Now that he had been exposed, he brazenly climbed onto the bed in broad daylight.
He could not help but recall the scene from last night after he finished washing up and returned to his room. The little cat, dressed in thin inner garments, was snuggled inside the blanket. Upon hearing the door open, he sat straight up with the quilt resting on his head. Who knows where he learned such a bad habit, but he slapped the bed board and invited him to bed with slurred speech.
At the same time, the system’s overly dramatic voice echoed in his ears with an exaggeratedly high pitch: 【Master, come play with me!】
Just recalling it was enough to give him a splitting headache.
As his mind wandered, Cen Xianyun’s gaze settled on the scroll in front of him. In the painting, a young boy sat upright by the window sill, holding a scroll in his hand, his eyes lowered in quiet contemplation.
This painting had taken him two or three days of effort. The brushstrokes were meticulous, the composition tight, and the shadows arranged in orderly contrast. Even the flickering flame of the oil lamp looked lifelike, making it look almost indistinguishable from a real person sitting there when viewed from afar.
Cen Xianyun put down his brush with satisfaction. These two or three days of companionship had completely drained his remaining patience; he had hired Wang Ting to instruct Xie Lingyou, not to torment himself.
Xie Lingyou harbored fear in his heart. If he failed to see the young master for even an hour, he would jump around in utter panic. Since that was the case, he had no choice but to gift Xie Lingyou a replica of the young master.
Cen Xianyun looked back and saw Xie Lingyou frowning deeply, baring his teeth in a fierce expression of utter misery. He gripped the brush handle, which was barely a finger thick, with both hands, as though that slender stick weighed a thousand pounds and required every ounce of his strength just to move it.
He exerted too much force, slamming the ink-soaked tip of the brush hard against the Xuan paper. Ink splattered outward, leaving tiny black specks on his fair little face. The cool sensation made him pull back his neck slightly.
Since his hands were occupied, he had no choice but to raise his elbow, burying his head inside it to rub his face recklessly.
The ink stains, of course, were not wiped clean at all. Instead, his entire face was smeared even messier, turning him into a little calico cat. Xie Lingyou remained completely oblivious, keeping his head lowered as he struggled painfully against the unruly brush handle and the paper he had accidentally poked several holes through.
Even without looking closely, Cen Xianyun knew there was likely not a single decent character on that paper.
Fortunately, his role was to become Xie Lingyou’s master after he entered the immortal mountain. If he were tasked with instructing the current Xie Lingyou…
Cen Xianyun did not believe he possessed a temper as good as Wang Ting’s. Taking advantage of the fact that Xie Lingyou’s entire attention was consumed by the paper, he stepped softly and hung the painting onto a bamboo pole he had prepared earlier.
He had measured the distance and angle days ago. From the inner room, it looked exactly as if he were sitting by the window sill reading a book.
Standing behind the scroll, a wave of pleasure slowly welled up from deep within Cen Xianyun’s heart. He walked briskly out of the study without making a single sound throughout the entire process.
Standing at the doorway, he let out a long breath of relief. Looking up at the azure sky and breathing in the subtle fragrance of flowers and grass, the discomfort that had accumulated over the past few days seemed to dissipate in an instant.
So this was what freedom felt like.
The corners of Cen Xianyun’s lips curled upward, his brow unreservedly lit up with lighthearted joy. Carrying his hands behind his back, he walked away without ever looking back.