Chapter 21

“Junior Brother,” Jiang Yu called softly.
He didn’t look back, but his steps slowed a fraction. Jiang Yu hurried to catch up.
Even a fool could see Shen Anzhi’s hostility toward Ning Hechi had gone from vague to cuttingly obvious. Ning Hechi might not know why, but he could feel it.
Jiang Yu lifted her hem and walked at Shen Anzhi’s side, glancing over the crooked tombstones and shivering once in spite of herself.
He cut her a sideways look, then deliberately slowed more, using the coin sword to slice a path through the weeds. He popped a chestnut candy into his mouth and let it melt lazily on his tongue.
The deeper they walked into the burial ground, the wilder the wind became. It howled so hard they could barely keep their eyes open. When Jiang Yu raised a hand to shield her face, she caught a whiff of sweetness coming downwind.
Shen Anzhi walked just ahead of her, only a step away. The scent drifted from him, not the clean soap of his usual smell, not the sugary chestnut candy, but a light, honeyed fragrance, like date blossoms in bloom.
And then it vanished.
Jiang Yu took two quick steps to draw even with him. Soon enough, a cave half-hidden under a blanket of grass came into view, a beast’s maw carved into the mountainside, yawning open beneath the moonlit graves. The wild grass grew up to their waists; moss and ivy crawled over the stone.
Peering around him toward the cave entrance, Jiang Yu couldn’t help thinking it all felt too easy, which only made her more nervous.
Once inside, the temperature plunged. Goosebumps sprang up across her arms. Outside had been crisp, autumn-bright; in here it was bone-deep winter.
Ning Hechi and Shen Anzhi, high cultivators that they were, barely flinched at the cold. Only Jiang Yu’s reaction was that dramatic.
“Very cold?” Shen Anzhi asked.
“Isn’t it obvious?” She sniffled and edged closer to him whenever the chill bit too hard. For some reason, it was noticeably warmer in his immediate vicinity.
As if she’d found the ghost in the room and clung to it for heat.
Shen Anzhi pulled a fresh cloak from his storage bag and tossed it into her arms. “Try not to freeze to death here, Senior Sister.”
Jiang Yu laughed and caught it. “Not happening.”
“Senior Sister does cling to life,” he remarked, striding on. Out of the corner of his eye, he watched her pull the black cloak around herself with quick, deft motions, her pale fingers looping the ties into a neat, elegant bow.
He snapped his gaze forward again at once.
They continued on, alert, until a rustling rose from deeper in the cave. Countless red insects poured out, surging toward them and cutting off every path.
“Back,” Ning Hechi barked. His long sword appeared in his hand, and as he chanted, violet flame flared at his fingertip. He swept the spiritual fire over the swarm.
The stench of charred insects clung to the air long after the last one fell.
Nothing they couldn’t handle, but nasty all the same.
Jiang Yu glanced reflexively at Shen Anzhi, puzzled. He had one shoulder against the stone wall, arms folded, lashes lowered, utterly uninterested. Normally this was exactly the kind of scene that put a gleam in his eye.
When she saw how swiftly Ning Hechi cleaned up the threat, she looked away again and quietly moved a little nearer to Shen Anzhi. “Junior Brother, you seem a bit… off. Are you feeling sick?” she asked under her breath.
His fingers paused on the coin, then resumed. He snorted softly, turning his head to avoid her gaze. “The sooner we break the core, the sooner we go back,” he said, arms still folded as he walked on.
They pushed through three layers of traps and mechanisms before finally reaching the heart of the formation.
Moonstones covered the walls, glowing with a cold silver light. Five paper effigies stood guard around the formation core, and flew at them the instant they stepped inside, each aiming straight for a fatal point.
Jiang Yu twisted aside on instinct, spinning away. Her hand flashed to the dagger hidden in her sleeve; steel hissed through the air and slashed across a paper face. The sound of tearing paper cracked through the cave as white scraps scattered everywhere, revealing the swollen, purpled flesh underneath and the glint of jagged fangs dripping foul black fluid.
She slapped a hand over her own mouth and nose, brow furrowing. Rot and scorched paper burned the back of her throat.
Lucky she’d dodged when she did.
The copper coin sword flashed. Shen Anzhi’s blade batted aside a clawed strike, sparks leaping where steel met ghostly talon. Out of the corner of his eye he glanced at the circular opening in the ceiling above them.
A round, frost-white moon hung directly over the formation. It was rising slowly toward the exact center of a carved circle; pale light spilled down to fill the intricate lines of the array.
He arched a brow and smiled faintly. “Young Master Ning,” he said, “let’s make this quick.”
“Agreed.” Ning Hechi pulled every talisman he had left from his sleeve and thrust them into Jiang Yu’s hands. “Miss Jiang, we’ll buy you time. While we hold them off, you place the talismans and blow the core.”
“Got it.”
As the two men stepped forward, swords flaring as they engaged the paper guardians, Jiang Yu sprinted for the formation core.
Any effigy that tried to intercept her was neatly knocked aside by Shen Anzhi’s sword.
She raced in and slapped talismans one after another around the array. Drawing on every shred of spiritual power she could muster, she fed qi into the seals. Flames blossomed across the paper; cracks spiderwebbed across the protective barrier, and dazzling white light spilled out from the gaps.
The sudden sense of danger prickling down her spine was nothing like before. Her stomach dropped.
She grabbed her skirt and bolted back, only to smack into solid warmth. Startled, she turned, her forehead bumping straight into the tip of a finger that poked her lightly between the brows.
Following the line of his hand, she looked up into Shen Anzhi’s slightly lowered lashes. His lips were pale, but the smile there was unmistakably amused. “Afraid already?”
“Junior Brother, there’s something wrong with that formation core…” Jiang Yu nearly yelped, then swallowed the rest of the sentence.
He dropped his hand and casually pressed a palm to his chest, breath coming just a bit rougher as he studied the shattering array.
Ning Hechi dispatched the last paper guardian and looked over, face draining as he took in the sight. “Something’s off. Fall back, now!”
The three of them fled the way they had come. Behind them, the last shard of light in the formation winked out, and the entire cavern began to shudder, stone tearing loose as the mountain started to collapse inward.
Without thinking, Jiang Yu grabbed Shen Anzhi’s wrist. “Shen Anzhi, ” You can’t die.
But the pain she braced herself for never came. When she cracked one eye open, she stared up at the shimmering surface of a shield, a barrier stretched tight above their heads with barely a finger’s breadth to spare, just enough space for three people to endure the storm of falling rock.
Ning Hechi threw his strength into the barrier as well, feeding it everything he had left.
A sweet scent touched Jiang Yu’s nose, laced with the metallic tang of blood. She turned her head and saw a thin trickle of red at Shen Anzhi’s mouth. A huge dark patch of blood had soaked through the front of his robe. On black cloth it should have been hard to see, but there was simply too much of it.
Jiang Yu’s breath stuttered; her fists clenched so tightly her knuckles went white.
When did his chest get hurt this badly?
She didn’t have time to ask. The unending tremors were enough to make her stomach roll. By the time the quaking finally eased and she opened her eyes again, half the cavern had already caved in. The formation core was gone, the caster clearly had never intended to let the intruders live. The entire area had sunk deeper underground, tunnels branching out in all directions.
Ning Hechi had poured out nearly half his spiritual power and now sagged against the rock face, panting.
Jiang Yu, scraped and bruised, struck a fire-stick and forced herself upright, ignoring the protest in her limbs. Her gaze swept the rubble until it landed on a figure in the corner, Shen Anzhi, unconscious on the ground.
“Shen Anzhi!” She hurried to his side and dropped to a crouch, fingers pressing to the side of his neck. Feeling a pulse, she didn’t hesitate, she tugged open his robe.
Beneath his collarbone, old scars stitched across his chest. One, though, ran directly over his heart, a dark, vicious gash that churned her stomach just to look at it. The flesh was torn and ragged; fresh blood seeped from the reopened wound, soaking the fabric and blooming into a wide, sticky stain.
The cloying reek of iron and damp cloth clung to every breath he took.
With her left eye, Jiang Yu caught a faint red gleam flash across the very center of the wound. She blinked hard and rubbed at her eye. When she looked again, it was gone.
Her lips trembled, opening and closing twice before any sound came. With an injury like this… how had Shen Anzhi managed to act as if nothing was wrong at all?
He hadn’t even groaned from the pain…
Not once. Not even a word.
Jiang Yu’s eyes stung, the corners reddening as she took in the sight. The sound of fabric tearing cut through the silence as she ripped his sleeve and quickly bandaged the wound as best she could.
By the time Ning Hechi dragged his exhausted body over, Jiang Yu had already finished, lowering her gaze so he wouldn’t see her expression.
Ning Hechi didn’t seem to notice anything amiss with Shen Anzhi beyond the obvious.
He took out a small bottle of spiritual medicine. “Miss Jiang, tend to Young Master Shen’s injuries first. I’ll look for an exit.”
“Thank you. Young Master Ning, please be careful as well.”
Hearing the concern in her voice, Ning Hechi’s lips curved faintly as he turned away. He glanced back once at the scarlet figure outlined in the dim light. “All right,” he said, and after a tiny pause added, “Wait for me here, Miss Jiang.”
Once his footsteps had faded into the distance, Jiang Yu used the weak glow of the fire-stick to examine Shen Anzhi’s face. His complexion was bloodless, his usually relaxed brows drawn tight. Even unconscious, his jaw was clenched, as if he refused to open his mouth to take the pill.
“Shen Anzhi… Shen Anzhi…”
She called his name twice in a low voice, but he remained completely unresponsive.
Her trembling fingers had no choice but to grip his pale jaw and force it open. The bright red pill, wrapped in rich spiritual energy, went straight down his throat, and the bleeding at his chest finally began to slow.
From this distance, she could clearly smell a faint sweetness, coming not from his mouth, but from the blood seeping out of his wound.
Don’t tell her… he’d eaten so much candy that even his flesh and blood had marinated in sugar?
On her knees, Jiang Yu leaned closer to check, her warm breath brushing across the lines of his collarbone and chest. The touch was enough to jolt Shen Anzhi awake; a flush of red crept into the corners of his eyes. He lowered his lashes, breath unsteady, blood still at the corner of his lips, yet his mouth curled into a familiar, mocking smile.
“Senior Sister is in such a hurry…” His voice came out hoarse, lazy. “Afraid I’ll die and no one will be left to walk you out?”
The moment she heard his voice, Jiang Yu’s head snapped up, and she met that shadowed pair of phoenix eyes head-on.
“Junior Brother, you’re finally awake…”
“Not dying,” Shen Anzhi said lightly. He pushed himself up, shifting to sit back against the rock wall. Wiping the blood off his mouth with the back of his hand, he cocked his head and stared straight at her.
His gaze drifted to the faint redness at the corners of her eyes.
So she really had been worried, calling his name like that? And she hadn’t even bothered with “Junior Brother” just now, she’d gone straight to his full name.
Lounging as if he had all the time in the world, he leaned forward slightly. “Senior Sister used to call ‘Junior Brother’ so fondly,” he drawled, “yet now you keep using my full name. Makes us sound awfully distant, doesn’t it…”
The teasing lilt on the last word was obvious.
Jiang Yu let out an awkward little laugh. Her mouth had clearly moved faster than her brain; in her old life, she was used to calling people by their full names.
“It was an emergency. Special cases, special treatment… Besides, I was worried about you,” she said, mind already racing, she really was going to have to watch her wording going forward.
Hearing her say “worried” again so openly, something hot surged up from deep inside Shen Anzhi’s chest, almost slipping free before he caught it. Heat pulsed along his veins, burning under his ribs.
He pressed his hand over his heart. Jiang Yu took it for renewed pain from his wound.
She crawled a little closer, bracing one hand on his shoulder as she leaned in. Seeing that the bandage wasn’t seeping again, she finally let out a breath. “Does it still hurt?”
“No.” Shen Anzhi exhaled slowly, his Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallowed down whatever restless emotion was clawing its way up. He lifted his hand, fingers curving as if to touch the corner of her eye.
Her lashes fluttered, and he froze mid-air, then drew his hand back and closed his fingers into a fist.
Not missing the hesitation in his movement, Jiang Yu instinctively leaned back a fraction.
His gaze darkened. Pressing his thin lips together, he lowered his eyes and rolled the cold copper coin between his fingers.
When he remained silent, she shifted forward again and blinked up at him, voice soft. “Junior Brother, how are you feeling now?”
“Just a scratch,” Shen Anzhi said with a quick laugh. Without another word, he smoothed out his rumpled robe over his chest, breathing slowly until the agitation in his heart calmed. His fingertips brushed lightly over where his wound lay beneath the bandage where she had wrapped him up.
“A scratch?” Jiang Yu echoed, incredulous. She stared at the easy smile on his face, her own voice dropping into a faint tremor. “That’s a scratch? Did you not see how terrifying that wound was? And it’s right over your… heart.”
If this was “just a scratch,” then what on earth counted as serious?
The thought made her stomach twist. Her fingers dug into her sleeve, pale knuckles biting deep crescents into her palms.
Why hadn’t she noticed earlier? And why had the original text not said a word about such a hidden injury?
“Junior Brother, when did you get hurt?” His robe had been intact before; that ugly, dark-red scar definitely wasn’t from today.
Shen Anzhi leaned back against the rock with arms folded over his chest, the position conveniently hiding the bloodstains on his robe. He turned his face away and shut his eyes. “Why ask?” he said lazily. Then, with a faint, self-mocking curl of his lips, “For someone like me, a little wound like that isn’t worth mentioning.”
“Junior Brother…” Jiang Yu’s breath caught in her throat at his nonchalant smile. An unreasoning anger flared up, pushing her closer until she was right in front of him, eyes fixed on his closed lashes.
Her teeth ground on the words as they finally broke free. “I care.”
She almost wanted to force him to look at her. “Shen Anzhi, your life is a very expensive thing, your Senior Sister is going to protect it.”
He froze. His long lashes trembled once, and he unconsciously pressed his lips together before opening his eyes.
Those phoenix eyes, usually as still and impenetrable as a dead lake, rippled for the first time.
He would never have believed that a day would come when a single sentence, one that didn’t even quite count as a promise, would be enough to disturb the surface of his emotions.
Shen Anzhi lowered his gaze to hide the shift in them and suddenly smiled, the cinnabar mole at his eye burning bright. His little finger hooked around the silk belt at her waist, rolling it between his fingers as he leaned in, voice dropping to a low murmur by her ear.
“Senior Sister,” he said, husky, “you never fail to surprise me…”
He didn’t wait to see how she took that, just leaned back against the rock again and closed his eyes.
Surprise him how, exactly…
He decided, somewhat forcefully, that what surprised him was this: someone he’d once loathed now followed at his side day in, day out, chattering like an endlessly energetic little scarlet finch, dexterous, lively, impossible to pin down.
What was she after?
Images from the past flickered unbidden through his mind. Countless words, countless nameless feelings, condensed at last into that question he’d posed under the truth spell.
That single, unguarded “I like you”…
He, of all people, was not someone who deserved such a thing.