Rong Yao hadn’t expected him to be so direct. Her lips trembled. ”I…”
Before she could finish, the young man’s face loomed closer, and then Rong Yao felt his slightly cool lips press against hers.
He had never kissed anyone before, but the moment his lips met the girl’s, he seemed to know instinctively how to conquer territory.
Rong Yao had never imagined he would kiss her. Her body went rigid, and she was so stunned she even forgot to push him away.
Yin Yanxiu’s arms wrapped around the girl’s slender waist. Feeling the softness in his palm, he realized for the first time that a woman’s waist could be this impossibly slim.
“Mmph…”
Rong Yao was pinned against the bookshelf and kissed with overwhelming force, until the corners of her eyes flushed red and she could barely breathe.
She couldn’t understand why he had suddenly kissed her out of nowhere!
Only when the young man finally pulled away from her lips did he say, “How can you not even know how to breathe?”
Yin Yanxiu tilted up the girl’s chin, his tone laced with mockery and a hint of amusement. “Did Shen Jichuan never teach you?”
After all, things between the two of them had already progressed to the point where she called him “husband.”
Recalling how the girl had woken up earlier, mistaken him for Shen Jichuan, and thrown herself into his arms calling him husband, Yin Yanxiu’s grip on her waist involuntarily tightened.
“Jichuan-gege would never…” would never kiss her like that.
Rong Yao’s face was now flushed an utterly scandalous red. She had never imagined he would kiss her.
Hearing her words, Yin Yanxiu’s eyes grew even colder. Shen Jichuan would never—never what?
Never kiss as terribly as he did? Or would he be a hundred times gentler when he kissed her?
Sensing the growing chill in the young man’s eyes, Rong Yao was about to speak when she suddenly felt her body go weak.
Thanks to the medicine, the bite marks on her neck had mostly healed, but the fox clan’s Love Gu Mark the young man had planted on the side of her neck now began to glow with a dark, eerie light.
The Love Gu of the Nine-Tailed Clan was something they placed only on the one they loved. Once implanted, it could never be undone, and a member of the Nine-Tailed Clan could mark only one person in their entire life.
Though Yin Yanxiu was born a Half-demon, his bloodline carried the heritage of three races: human, Crimson Snake, and the Nine-Tailed Clan.
He had once utterly despised the Nine-Tailed bloodline within him.
At this moment, Rong Yao felt scorching fire surge through her entire body. Her legs went weak beyond control, and just as she was about to collapse to her knees, the young man steadied her firmly in his arms.
The girl was burning hot, her snow-white skin flushed an abnormal red. This was clearly the Love Gu taking effect—because he had kissed her, the Love Gu’s one-month period had been moved up.
Yin Yanxiu gazed at the girl’s stunningly beautiful face with an indifferent expression.
After a long moment, he bit open his own wrist. Crimson blood slid down his arm, and he pressed his wrist to the girl’s lips.
“Drink.”
Rong Yao felt her whole body go limp. Before she could even process what was happening to her, a taste of blood suddenly spread through her mouth.
She opened her eyes and saw what the young man was doing—realized he was feeding her his blood—and her eyes went wide.
What was he doing?
Rong Yao didn’t know where the strength came from, but she shoved him away violently. Yin Yanxiu stumbled back several steps, blood welling from the wound on his wrist.
Without the young man’s support, Rong Yao’s legs gave out, and she crumpled to the floor with a thud.
Only then, aware of the strange state of her body, did she finally realize something was wrong. “You… what did you do to me?”
The young girl knelt on the ground, her exquisite little face glistening with tears. Having just drunk his blood, her lips were stained a vivid red.
Yin Yanxiu watched as she pushed him away, his expression darkening as he stared at the blood dripping drop by drop from his wrist onto the floor.
He gave a soft scoff. What a waste!
He raised his eyes, looking at her with a gloomy expression, and said coldly, “You’ve been infected with my Love Gu.”
As he finished speaking, Rong Yao watched him bite open his own wrist, then crouch down and lean toward her with those blood-stained lips.
The young man wrapped an arm firmly around her waist and fed a mouthful of his blood into her mouth.
The thick, cloying taste of blood filled her mouth. Rong Yao felt nauseated and wanted to spit it out, but the young man pinched her cheeks. “Swallow it if you want to live.”
Rong Yao had no idea what this Love Gu even was, and her instinct was to spit out the blood he’d fed her. But hearing his threat, she realized she might die if she didn’t drink it. Terrified, she quickly swallowed.
She didn’t want to die at all!
Only after the girl swallowed did Yin Yanxiu finally release her.
The moment he let go, Rong Yao turned aside and dry-heaved. The heavy taste of blood lingering in her mouth made wave after wave of nausea rise within her.
“What exactly is the Love Gu?” Rong Yao asked him.
Yin Yanxiu had no intention of hiding it from her, and told her everything truthfully.
When Rong Yao learned that the young man had planted the fox clan’s Love Gu in her that night, and that it would flare up once every month from then on, she was so filled with regret she wanted to die.
Rong Yao was on the verge of tears. “Isn’t there any other way?”
She didn’t want to drink his blood every month!
“There is,” Yin Yanxiu said.
Rong Yao’s eyes lit up. “What way?”
“Dual Cultivation with me.”
Rong Yao: “??”
“One session of Dual Cultivation lasts three months.”
The young man said this without so much as a blush, as if it really were a perfectly good solution.
Rong Yao’s face was already red beyond words. If it came down to doing that with him, she’d rather drink his blood every month.
Just as she was thinking this, she suddenly noticed the young man undoing his belt. Rong Yao recoiled in shock. “What are you doing?”
Yin Yanxiu looked at her. “Don’t you like it? Didn’t you say… you like me?”
Faced with the young man’s sudden double question, Rong Yao found herself at a loss for how to answer.
Then she met the young man’s indifferent, icy gaze. His eyes were deep and dark, without a trace of desire in them.
Rong Yao thought back to how he had just fed her his blood.
No—wait. If he really wanted to do that with her, he wouldn’t have fed her blood just now.
In her past life, having stayed by his side, Rong Yao knew his mind was extremely meticulous and that he was deeply wary of others.
The way he was acting now might well be a test—a test of whether she truly liked him the way Taotao said she did.
In the span of mere moments, Rong Yao’s little brain spun rapidly.
Finally, blushing, she pressed her small hand against the belt he was trying to undo and stammered, “This… this isn’t really appropriate. Besides, this is the Treasure Pavilion. Doing something like this here will get us struck by lightning.”
As she spoke, she shyly lowered her head.
Yin Yanxiu stared at the crown of the girl’s head, his eyes growing darker and darker. He was wondering how much of her words was true, and how much was false.
After all, she was the one who had snuck into his room in the dead of night wielding the Abyss-Devouring Sword, trying to kill him—and now she was the one insisting she liked him!
“Your wound is still bleeding. Let me bandage it for you first.”
Rong Yao felt a chill run through her body under the boy’s stare, and she hurriedly searched for a topic.
Yin Yanxiu watched as the girl pulled out a Storage Brocade Pouch from beside her, taking out gauze and golden wound salve.
After taking out the items, Rong Yao saw that the boy wasn’t moving at all. She thought for a moment, then took the initiative to pull his hand toward her.
The boy’s hand was beautiful—long, slender fingers with well-proportioned knuckles. But it was also this pair of hands that had killed many people in her past life.
Rong Yao applied the salve to him and wrapped his hand with the gauze. “There… done.”
As she finished speaking, she instinctively looked up—and met the boy’s gloomy eyes directly.
He just stared at her like that, and who knew how long he had been watching her.
Yin Yanxiu’s gaze fell on the bandaged wrist, and the next second he said to her, “Stay away from Shen Jichuan from now on!”
Rong Yao froze, puzzled. “Wh… why?”
Hearing her ask why, the boy’s eyes immediately turned cold, his gaze dark and menacing as he stared at her. “What? You want me to be the third party?”
Rong Yao’s eyes widened in shock. He… what did he mean by that?
He knew she liked him, so did he want to become her cultivation partner now?
Was he crazy?
Yin Yanxiu stared at the girl’s stunned face. “Unwilling?”
Rong Yao jolted and quickly shook her head. “N… no, I’m just a little surprised that you’d be willing to be my cultivation partner. Do you also like… me?”
Hearing the word “like” from the girl’s mouth, Yin Yanxiu’s expression froze for a moment. Then he suddenly reached out and gently caressed her cheek in an ambiguous manner.
“Of course I like you. After all, Yaoyao, you’re… so beautiful.”