“Speaking of which, I still have to wait nearly five hundred years before I can return to being a man…”
“If my relationship with Xuechang keeps improving during this time and actually develops to the point of dual-cultivation, what am I supposed to do then…”
Hua Yan extended her slender, fair hand from the bathwater, placing it before her eyes and examining it over and over.
“Maybe… just use this female body for dual-cultivation? After all, I tried it earlier, and it was quite comfortable…”
“No, no, no! I’m a proper man—how could I actually use this female body to dual-cultivate with Xuechang!”
She shook her head violently, trying to dispel these absurd thoughts.
“I say, with how naive Xuechang is, she definitely doesn’t know how to dual-cultivate anyway. In these next few hundred years, we’ll just kiss and cuddle, and at worst, I’ll go into seclusion or something—it’ll pass in no time!”
“When the time comes to form a contract and enter the bridal chamber, I’ll just coax her a little, and it’ll be fine! At worst… at worst, I’ll help her out!”
“That clueless Xuechang, who even needed me to teach her how to kiss—she definitely won’t know what to do about that! Even if that time comes, I’ll be the dominant role!”
“If I’m the dominant role… well… it doesn’t seem like such a big deal?”
Thinking this over, Hua Yan nodded in satisfaction, stood up from the bath, and stopped soaking.
“Yan’er, you’re out.”
Yun Xuechang, who had been waiting in the courtyard for a long time, finally saw Hua Yan.
Today, Hua Yan seemed a bit off—not only bathing in the afternoon, but also taking an unusually long time.
And… was it because Yan’er had just bathed? Her face seemed particularly flushed today, making her look even more charming than usual.
Yun Xuechang approached and asked with confusion:
“Yan’er, did you change your fragrant bath today? You seem exceptionally refreshed after bathing.”
“What? Fragrant bath? I didn’t—”
Hua Yan was startled by the question. Just as she was about to retort, she met Yun Xuechang’s clear, ethereal face—the very image she had unconsciously fantasized about in the bathhouse.
Her face instantly turned red.
“R-right, right! I did switch to a new fragrant bath! This bath salt from the South Sea really works well, hahaha…”
She quickly changed her tune, following Yun Xuechang’s lead.
“Let’s go, let’s go! We need to pick up Rongrong and head home!”
“Alright.”
Yun Xuechang nodded and walked out of the courtyard with her.
The two held hands, fingers intertwined, just as they stepped out the gate—
“Senior Sister! Senior Sister!”
Lin Qianqian flew over urgently on a Qingguang Sword.
“Junior Lin, what’s the matter? Why are you in such a hurry?”
Seeing Lin Qianqian’s frantic expression, Yun Xuechang stopped alongside Hua Yan.
“It’s, it’s my master—”
Mid-sentence, Lin Qianqian noticed the two of them leaving hand in hand:
“Senior Sister, are you going out with Daoist friend Hua? Am I interrupting?”
“I’m just going with Yan’er to pick up Rongrong. What happened with Junior Aunt-Master Yue? Speak first, Junior Sister.”
“Oh, right!”
Lin Qianqian snapped back to attention and said urgently:
“It’s my master. She ran up a debt at the Hehuan Sect and refused to pay, so now they’ve detained her. They’re saying she has to pay off the debt with her body!”
???
Yun Xuechang and Hua Yan exchanged glances, both wearing expressions of varying degrees of awkwardness.
“Well… Yan’er, I’ll go rescue Junior Aunt-Master Yue first. You go pick up Rongrong alone; I’ll return shortly.”
“Alright.”
Hua Yan nodded, then took out a storage pouch and handed it to Yun Xuechang:
“I don’t know how many spirit stones that Yue Jue owes at the Hehuan Sect. Bring more with you; I’ll cover it for now.”
“Alright.”
Yun Xuechang hesitated briefly but didn’t refuse. After all, the priority was to get Yue Jue out.
And since she was using Hua Yan’s spirit stones, she would make sure to hold Yue Jue accountable for paying them back later.
“Thank you so much for your help, Daoist friend Hua!”
Lin Qianqian thanked Hua Yan emotionally, inwardly marveling: ‘Looks like my senior sister has really latched onto a wealthy beauty. At this rate, she’ll never have to worry about spirit stones for the rest of her life.’
/
“Sigh, tell me, how did Xuechang end up a Mojing? What can two women accomplish together!”
On a street corner, a tipsy, lavishly dressed purple-haired man staggered along, flanked by two companions.
Beside him, a refined young man in a jade-colored wide-sleeved robe and a square hat steadied him with a helpless expression, cautioning:
“Daoist friend Li, don’t speak carelessly like that. If any senior practitioners who have married women hear you, Fellow Daoist Chu and I won’t be able to save you.”
“Hmph, so what? I’ve long been fed up with these matters. Even if others hear, what dare they do to me, Li Chengfeng?”
The burly purple-haired man irritably brushed off his hand.
“Brother Li, do you really have to be so fixated on Fairy Yun? Ten years ago, she came down from the mountain and ‘taught’ us all one by one. That woman scared me and Brother Lu so much we couldn’t avoid her fast enough, but you actually fell for her—what were you thinking?”
A golden-haired youth beside them said bluntly.
“Hmph, Chu Ming, you and that coward Lu Wenyuan naturally don’t know Xuechang’s worth. Hmph, only the strongest woman deserves to be mine, Li Chengfeng.”
The purple-haired youth, named Li Chengfeng, sneered disdainfully.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah—you’re the bravest, the most ambitious, the strongest… I wonder what you plan to do by bringing home a wife you can’t even beat? Have a daily beating session?”
The golden-haired man, Chu Ming, rattled off his complaints:
“Besides, Fairy Yun already has a family now. The entire Yuxin Island knows. Any later, and news will spread across the entire cultivation world. She’s a Mojing, with a wife and child, and you’re still pining away? Just give up already.”
“Hmph, even if she has a child, I’ve never heard of her forming a contract with anyone. Xuechang is the Sword Head of the Xiaoyao Sword Sect—if she were to form a contract, the sect would not be unprepared.”
Li Chengfeng said coldly:
“Before this, we heard no rumors of Xuechang forming a contract with anyone. That red-haired lover of hers, Hua Yan’er, and that daughter—they seem to have dropped from the sky out of nowhere. It’s highly suspicious!”
“I suspect that woman named Hua Yan’er seduced Xuechang somehow, secretly got pregnant with her child, and then tried to use moral blackmail to cling to her side.”
“She deliberately waited until the daughter grew up, all to make the noble-minded Xuechang feel indebted—what a scheming mind! Hmph!”
“But what can you do about it? Even if that’s the case, according to information from the Hehuan Sect, those two are getting along splendidly now. It probably won’t be long before they actually form a contract. What can you do?”
Chu Ming spread his hands:
“You can’t be planning to beat up that Hua Yan’er and then kidnap the bride, can you?”
“Hmph.”
Li Chengfeng let out a cold snort, took another swig of wine, and nodded silently.
“Hey, hey? Brother Li, you can’t do something like that!”
Chu Ming’s eyes widened:
“They say it’s better to destroy ten temples than break up one marriage—don’t you understand!”
His face was full of pain:
“Besides, word has it that Fairy Yun’s lover Hua Yan’er has red hair, a beautiful face, and a slender figure, and their little daughter has pink hair and is adorable.
The family gets along great—there’s no room for you to come barging in and cause trouble!”
“Uh… huh…”
As he spoke, Chu Ming suddenly looked puzzled, staring at a red-haired young woman holding a pink-haired girl by a nearby stall.
“Why do I feel… that description just now… kind of… fits those two over there…?”
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