Chapter 29

There was no sun or moon in the Dongyue Temple, but people still kept their own rhythms.
Mu Xue sat cross-legged in her room, clearing her mind and calming her spirit, putting all her focus into stabilizing the new realm she’d reached in the Sea of Desire.
In the inner world of her Spirit Chamber, heaven and earth were just coming into being: blazing fire clouds rolled across the sky with a hidden dragon’s roar, the ground blanketed by tranquil waters, clear as a polished mirror, all the way to the bottom.
Opening her inner vision, Mu Xue instantly saw her own primordial spirit seated serenely by the edge of this watery mirror.
Suddenly, a fierce tiger leapt up from its crystalline depths, eyes locked on her.
But unlike before, instead of baring its fangs, the tiger shook out its wet fur, circled halfway around her, and settled down right at her side.
Mu Xue glanced over in shock, and watched as the tiger melted into the shape of a man, dripping wet, crouched at her feet.
His perfect shoulder blades flexed beneath a cascade of water droplets that slid down his skin. Muscular arms held his body up as he pushed back his soaked hair and looked up at Mu Xue, slitted eyes gleaming.
Drops of crystal water still clung to his lashes, revealing a face so striking it took her breath away.
Mu Xue had just seen that face before, a memory of him laughing wildly, blade in hand, blood smeared on flawless skin as he steered a lone boat through a haunting sea of shadows.
But after all those thousands of sails had passed, the boy was already gone.
He lifted his eyes to her, and a bead of water traced down his neck, slipping over his rounded shoulder, rolling steadily downward.
He was drawing closer, those eyes dark and restless like the ocean before a storm breaks,
“Master, do you really not recognize me?”
My Xiao Shan isn’t like this.
That thought barely flashed through Mu Xue’s mind when Cen Qianshan’s face changed. The features were the same, but the gloom had faded, brightening into a gentle handsomeness. Light shimmered in his eyes like autumn reeds swaying in a tranquil pool, he looked just like he had at eighteen.
His damp hand reached out, resting lightly on Mu Xue’s knee, his neck arched to expose a faint constellation of love marks scattered across damp skin.
“Master, after everything you’ve done to me, why do you still not want me?”
Mu Xue’s composure collapsed completely. She tumbled from her meditation back to reality, eyes snapping open to the dim shadows of her room, evening sun eternally frozen outside the window.
She focused on steadying the chaotic qi surging within her.
What was happening to her? Was she slipping into a demonic state?
Mu Xue sneaked a glance at the book peeking out from under her bed, kicked it deeper out of sight, then tried to regulate her breathing and return to meditation.
Sometimes, once a stray thought blossoms, it’s like a scarlet blossom blooming in snow, the more you struggle to ignore it, the more fiercely it steals your focus.
No matter how she tried to still her mind, that Water Tiger in her Spirit Chamber kept morphing into Cen Qianshan at the worst moments.
He emerged from the depths of still water, hair dripping wet, skin glowing as he draped his long arms along the pool’s edge.
Sometimes, he was downcast, a lonely, brooding soul. Sometimes, the sunlight sparkled on him, young and bashful. Occasionally, he’d blush as he gently squeezed her hand. Other times, he’d shamelessly murmur the filthiest lines straight out of romance novels.
Plagued with frustration, Mu Xue suddenly recalled a comment from Senior Brother Yang Jun at the noodle shop:
“Once you come off the mountain and run into a charming young man, just wait, the next time you meditate, his face is all you’ll see, even with your eyes closed.”
Mu Xue buried her face in her hands, finally resigning herself to seeking advice from her senior brother and sister.
By now, Senior Brother Fu Yun was awake, sitting upright at the head of the bed, a robe pulled over his shoulders. He offered Miao Hong’er a polite, distant nod as he accepted the bowl of congee she handed him: “Thank you.”
Miao Hong’er muttered to herself, It really is impossible to get this guy to call me “senior sister,” huh? She straightened her robes and sat neatly at the foot of Fu Yun’s bed.
“My advice? You and Xiao Xue rest here and recover. I’ll go ahead and scout the path.”
“No, I’m fine. We can leave at dawn,” Fu Yun interrupted coldly.
Just then, Mu Xue poked her head through the doorway.
Miao Hong’er waved her over and pulled out a paper bag holding white-sugar frosted tanghulu. “I picked these up from those folks from Fuwang City in the Demon Spirit Realm. It’s a local snack, bet you’ve never tried them, Xiao Xue. Here, open up!”
Mu Xue opened her mouth and the tangy, crisp candied fruit burst with sweet syrup on her tongue.
A flood of nostalgia hit her, this was a snack she’d eaten since she was little.
“Can I ask you something, Senior Sister, Senior Brother? What if, during dragon-tiger union, the Water Tiger starts acting up?” she mumbled, cheeks stuffed with sweets.
Fu Yun looked intrigued. “What’s wrong with the Water Tiger?”
Miao Hong’er chimed in, “What sort of problem?”
Even with her thick skin, Mu Xue could never confess she’d been reading raunchy novels, and now her Water Tiger, which should embody the essence of the Moon, was suddenly taking on the face of her own little disciple.
She just stammered, “Well... he’s getting restless. Avoiding what he’s supposed to do, running wild everywhere…”
Fu Yun sat up straight: “The Water Tiger is the source of all vitality under heaven, it’s wild by nature and must be tamed and guided, only then can it refine the ultimate essence and produce the Golden Core.”
Mu Xue stammered, “So… how do you actually tame and guide it?”
Fu Yun replied, “Subdue the dragon to refine the self, tame the tiger to steady the mind. Our master once passed down a Tiger-Subduing verse. I’ll teach it to you now.”
Mu Xue hurriedly straightened, ready to memorize the mantra.
She heard her senior brother intone: “Seek truth by the tiger stream, where the bristling tiger reigns. Tame the beast and lead it home, one day to ride as your own steed.”
“Ride… ride it as a steed?” Mu Xue was stunned. Thinking of Cen Qianshan’s face, she could not even imagine that scenario without blushing to her ears.
Miao Hong’er couldn’t help but laugh at her blank expression.
“The path you practice is different from your brother’s. His method might not work for you. Here, have another? Say ‘ahh’, ” She stuffed another tanghulu into Mu Xue’s mouth. “Did you see something you weren’t expecting, Xiao Xue?”
Mu Xue’s cheeks bulged as she crunched the sweet, mumbling, “Is there, uh... anything else weird about this?”
“It’s nothing unusual.” Miao Hong’er raised a finger. “‘The Classic says: Heaven and Earth mingle and all is transformed. Man and woman unite their essence, and everything is born anew.’
So the union of yin and yang gives birth to all things. In cultivation, our practice is to harness that union, the merging of vitality and spirit. Yes, cultivation manuals talk about dragons and tigers, but symbolically, they can appear as anything.”
Mu Xue mulled this over, muttering, “But Li Dragon, Kan Tiger… Li corresponds to yang, Kan to yin. Shouldn’t the Water Tiger at least be… a woman?”
Heaven and earth, dragon and tiger, yin and yang, surely the Water Tiger could not be a man, much less look exactly like Xiao Shan. How was she supposed to keep practicing now?
“Not so,” Fu Yun said firmly. “Li is yang, outwardly yang, but inwardly yin. Kan is yin, outwardly yin, but inwardly yang. Which means, in the cycle, Kan aligns with the ‘palace of the moon’, so the Water Tiger can be male.”
He pulled out a thin silk manual and flipped to the illustrated dragon-tiger union page for Mu Xue to see. On one side, a pale, handsome youth was seated riding a tiger; on the other, a woman in red astride a dragon.
The commentary read: “The pale youth rides the Water Tiger, the woman in red mounts the Fire Dragon. After they meet at the cauldron’s side, all the essence is sealed within.”
That pale-faced gentleman, with his long hair spilling over his shoulders and those sharp, winged brows, burst from the water astride a tiger’s back. When Mu Xue saw him, something inside her stirred, she felt on the brink of understanding, yet at the same time more lost than ever.
At dinner, with most of the furniture rotted away, Mu Xue and Miao Hong’er each had to cradle a bowl of steaming lamb offal soup, squatting together in the chilly courtyard to eat.
“Xiao Xue, you’re still young. Don’t force yourself to figure things out before you’re ready. Take your time, there’s no rush, most people hit a wall or two when they first level up.” Miao Hong’er had a circle of red oil around her lips as she looked up at Mu Xue. “It’s good, right? Honestly, the food in the Demon Spirit Realm is pretty amazing.”
“Yeah, it’s delicious,” Mu Xue murmured, her lips slick with broth. “When you first reached the Dragon-Tiger stage, what did you see, senior sister?”
“Me? Oh, that…” Miao Hong’er laughed, a bit bashful, still holding her bowl. “All I saw was a giant hotpot, half red chili, half rich milky broth, swirling together and filling the air with mouthwatering smell. I swear, just thinking of it now makes me hungry.”
Mu Xue laughed along with her, and all the restlessness and anxiety brought on by her internal struggle melted away.
The last rays of sunlight fell into the dilapidated courtyard.
Two silhouettes, one tall and one small, sat beneath the eaves, their bowls warming their hands as steam curled up into the golden dusk.
“So that means you’re taking me with you, right?”
“Yeah. If you want to go, then let’s go together. After all, you’re part of Xiaoyao Peak now. As long as I’m still standing, nothing’s going to harm you on the road.”
This desolate land, forever frozen in twilight.
The pale sun hung low on the horizon. At the world’s edge, smoke and sand danced with the wind, shifting and changing at will.
Somewhere, someone played a haunting tune; a bowed string instrument sang, its mournful notes drifting through miles of clouds,
Atop a crumbling wall, a lone figure gazed in silence at the endless sky. Beside him, a battered iron puppet lay on the broken bricks.
“Hey, who’s that sitting up there? He’s been there forever.” A passing demonic cultivator nudged her companion.
Her friend followed her gaze; the black-clad figure atop the shattered wall made her jump. Quickly, she tugged her companion back into the shadows of the alley. Only when she peeked back out and confirmed that figure hadn’t noticed them did she finally let out a breath, her nerves settling.
“Who, who is that? Why so jumpy?”
“You don’t know him?” her friend mouthed, barely making a sound. “That’s the one who guarded the cold kiln for 180 years.”
“Master Cen? What’s so scary about him?” The female cultivator stuck her head out again to admire the striking profile lit by the setting sun, giving a soft sigh. “Wow. He’s even more handsome than the stories.”
“You’re still young, you never saw him when he lost it.” Her companion shook her head and dragged her away. “That guy’s a real nightmare. You’ve no idea how crazy he can get. I saw him with half his body turned to bone and still grinning in the middle of a pile of corpses. Gives me chills just thinking about it.”
The man on the wall didn’t care about gossip whispered below the roofline.
He had sat there for a long time, eyes wandering aimlessly over the drifting sand and clouds. In his mind, the dust shimmered into a familiar smile and voice, like the lover he’d spent a lifetime longing for, hiding unreachable among the clouds.
A trickle of spiritual energy flowed steadily from his body, down the slope, seeping into the little iron puppet. Slowly, its stiff limbs began to twitch, struggling awkwardly upright.
It moved with soft, creaking sounds, pacing back and forth near the man atop the broken roof. At least he wouldn’t be quite so alone.
In the distant alleys, voices echoed closer and closer,
Cen Qianshan finally pulled his gaze from the horizon and spotted a tiny figure darting beneath the eaves.
“Are you sure you don’t want to rest one more day, senior brother? We’ll be walking the Road of the Dead next, and they say restless spirits wander those roads. It won’t be easy.” The little girl chattered as she walked.
That senior brother, all in white, strode ahead in total silence, expressing his stubbornness without a single word.
Miao Hong’er shook her head at Mu Xue. “He’s not gonna listen. I’ve known him forever, our Lord of the Clouds is exactly that kind of person.”
All that ‘untouchable ice prince’ and ‘noble flower on the mountain’ talk? Total front. Underneath, he’s like fresh rice dumplings, silky skin on the outside, but scalding hot inside.
She leaned in, whispering confidentially to Mu Xue, “When Ye Hangzhou first entered the sect, Yang Jun from Tiezhu Peak knocked him flat in a spar. Our Junior Brother Fu spent three days lying in wait at Tiezhu Peak for payback. After that, no one in Yang Jun’s crew dared leave Ye Hangzhou out of anything.”
Mu Xue burst out laughing. “No wonder Senior Brother Yang and Senior Brother Ye are so close!”
The trio chatted and joked as evening deepened, strolling together into the gathering twilight.
Up above, the little iron puppet’s strength gave out and it slumped, until a bandaged hand scooped it up and cradled it close.
The lonely figure atop the ruined wall rose, drawn by the warmth of laughter and the bustle of life, almost against his own will, he started quietly following behind them.