(NSFW Warning! This chapter contains explicit content!!)
Word Count: 9847 Words
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Xiao Yan watched Little Fairy Doctor edge backward like a startled fawn, and a slow, wicked thought curled through his mind.
Jie Jie Jie… there are only three of us here. Where exactly do you think you're running? Jie Jie Jie…
Of course, he knew better than to force the moment. Patience was its own cultivation. He rubbed his nose and smoothed his features into a picture of perfect innocence, then turned toward Xun Er, who 'had no experience' and 'knew nothing at all,' and offered her an easy, disarming smile. "Since that's the case, I'll refine the Demon Flame energy together with Xun Er first."
Clad in robes woven entirely from milky-white Demon Flame, he closed the distance between them. A wave of heat rolled over Xun Er like a tide crashing against a shore the moment he drew near.
"Xiao Yan ge-ge..." Her heart hammered against her ribs. His body was essentially bare beneath that thin veil of fire. Every carved muscle and hard contour showed clearly through the translucent flame, as though he wore nothing at all.
And this was a completely sealed space. No elders waited outside the door, and no interruptions loomed. How could she possibly forget the promise between them?
Three years… In three years, Xun Er will be yours completely.
Those words she had whispered in the Ye Clan manor echoed through her mind like a bell struck in an empty temple.
Two little playmates who once chased each other through sun-dappled courtyards. Childhood sweethearts who swore their hearts under a canopy of stars. Now they were dry wood set before a raging fire.
The timing was right. The place was right. The people were right!
Well. The people seemed to be one too many…
Off to the side, Little Fairy Doctor didn't even register that her own breathing had turned shallow and quick, or that her pearly teeth had sunk into the swell of her lower lip. Whether it was some peculiar property of the Purifying Lotus Demon Flame or simply the charged air between the two lovers before her, vivid and unbidden images flooded her mind. Heat pooled low in her belly. She pressed her thighs together and forced her gaze aside, though her eyes kept drifting treacherously back.
She had, after all, guessed at more than a few things.
The only one who looked genuinely composed was Xiao Yan himself. He stilled his mind. His eyes observed his nose, his nose observed his heart, and his heart observed stillness until his expression settled as placid as a windless lake. His tone came out perfectly measured, as though they were discussing the weather. "Xun Er, in a moment I'll use the Purifying Lotus Demon Flame's Essence to purify the surrounding energy and channel it into your body. You just need to circulate your Qi Method and use the Gold Emperor Incinerating Heavenly Flame to protect yourself while you absorb it."
"Hm? Oh, yes." Xun Er snapped back at the sound of his calm, unruffled voice. She hurriedly reined in her wandering thoughts, shame burning hot beneath her skin. Here he was kindly helping her raise her cultivation, and here she was letting her mind drift to such indecent places. It was truly...
"Ahem. Hold out your hand. I'll transfer the Heavenly Flame energy to you." Xiao Yan smiled faintly and extended his palm, his long fingers open and waiting.
Xun Er gave a small nod, drew a steadying breath, and slipped her jade-like hand into his waiting grasp.
Little Fairy Doctor watched that slender, snow-white hand disappear into Xiao Yan's larger one and mourned silently in her heart.
It's over. She has fallen straight into his claws...
Xiao Yan's fingers closed around Xun Er's soft, seemingly boneless hand, and the Flame Mantra began to circulate. The ambient energy stirred and surged throughout the Demon Flame Space, pouring into his body like rivers converging on the sea. The energy passed through the Purifying Lotus Demon Flame's Essence and the Fallen Heart Flame, refined into something of breathtaking purity. He split off half and guided it along the meridians of his arm.
A thread of pure, milky-white flame energy sped through him and flowed into Xun Er's body through their joined palms under Little Fairy Doctor's watchful gaze.
The energy boiled over the instant it left the suppression of the Flame Mantra.
The terrifying heat of the Demon Flame collided head-on with the Gold Emperor Incinerating Heavenly Flame already coiled in Xun Er's meridians. The two flames began to merge and clash.
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
Milky-white fire roared upward in a single breath. An ordinary person without such profound cultivation and the Gold Emperor Incinerating Heavenly Flame shielding their flesh would have been reduced to cinders before absorbing even a fraction of that Demon Flame energy.
But a Heavenly Flame guarded the body. It did not guard the clothes.
The enclosed world instantly felt as though spring had descended in full force. A breathless warmth thickened the air. The scorching temperature reduced every scrap of fabric clinging to Xun Er's body to fine ash. Golden hairpins dissolved like morning frost, and the silk sash at her waist simply ceased to exist. Every garment disintegrated beneath the hungry flames layer by layer until nothing remained but bare skin kissed by firelight.
"Ah!" How could Xun Er have anticipated any of this? The sudden devastation tore a startled cry from her lips, her heart lurching into her throat. She scrambled to cover herself, crossing one arm over her chest and clamping the other low against her abdomen. Her pearly teeth bit deep into her lower lip. Her face flushed beyond words, and her glistening eyes fixed on Xiao Yan with an accusation so tender it could draw water from a stone.
She understood now. She finally understood what Little Fairy Doctor's guarded expression had meant!
On purpose. This was definitely on purpose!
"Xiao Yan ge-ge, you…" Her mind went completely blank. She stammered, unable to string together a single coherent thought, and what emerged was a soft, trembling grievance. "You're so bad."
That plaintive whisper, threaded with honeyed warmth and an unwitting breathlessness, struck Xiao Yan harder than any Dou Technique. His eyes darkened, and his breathing turned deep and rough.
Three thousand strands of raven-black silk spilled like a midnight waterfall past slender, snow-white shoulders to cascade down past her willowy waist. Perhaps the Demon Flame stirred hearts and loosened the chains of restraint, because the Xun Er before him had shed every last trace of her former ethereal elegance. A devastating allure had taken root upon her exquisite face, and it paired with the shy flush coloring her cheeks in a contrast that left him entirely captivated.
The firelight painted her body in shades of molten gold and warm cream. Her elegant collarbones caught the glow and drew his eye down the graceful slope of her shoulders. The arm crossed over her chest only pressed her lush globes together. Pale flesh spilled generously over the barrier of her forearm, quivering with each agitated breath. Her waist tapered as narrow as a willow branch before flaring outward into wide, plush hips that her usual robes had always concealed. Her thick, creamy thighs pressed together instinctively, leaving the narrow gap between them shadowed and inviting.
The blush deepened with every heartbeat. The crimson hue sharpened the devastating contrast between innocence and temptation until the two concepts seemed to burn together on her skin.
Xiao Yan's large hand still held her jade-like one, refusing to let her flee. He drew her straight into his embrace with the lightest tug.
He had held Xun Er many times before, but never like this.
Her body collided against his chest, bare warmth pressing flush against bare warmth. The thin membrane of Demon Flame that served as his only covering offered no barrier at all. Her soft orbs flattened against the hard plane of his chest, and the stiff pink peaks crowning them dragged across his skin. That intimate contact sent a jolt racing through every nerve in both of them.
Xiao Yan lowered his gaze. Their eyes met. Dark pupils reflected blue ones, and twin universes of desire and affection rippled in tandem. His voice dropped to a murmur against the delicate shell of her ear, his breath scorching against her sensitive skin.
"How bad am I?"
"Just very much... wuwu." Her feeble protest came out as barely a breath before it dissolved into a soft, involuntary whimper. He had already tilted his head, and his lips claimed hers.
It was not a light brush. His mouth took hers with a searing intensity that swept the last of her composure away. His tongue traced the seam of her lips, and she parted them without resistance to let him inside. Their tongues met and tangled, tasting each other with desperate hunger.
Xun Er melted against him at once. Her fingers, pressed flat against his chest in some last vestige of protest, slowly curled. Her nails dragged lightly across his skin, as though she could not decide whether to push him away or pull him closer. The decision made itself. Her arms slid up to wind around his neck, and she parted her lips wider, tilting her head to deepen the kiss.
"Mm... hn~..." A helpless, needy sound vibrated against his mouth as she surrendered to the current pulling them both under.
Xiao Yan's hand slid up the bare line of her spine, mapping every gentle ridge, and she shivered beneath his fingertips. He pulled her closer until absolutely no space remained between them. The full-body contact drew a startled gasp from her throat. Her hips jerked forward against him rather than pulling away, and the hard heat pressed against her lower belly made her legs feel suddenly unsteady.
He broke from her lips only to trail hot, open-mouthed kisses down the delicate line of her jaw. Her whole body went rigid when his mouth found the sensitive hollow beneath her ear. He lingered there, savoring the frantic flutter of her pulse against his tongue.
She bit down on her lip to trap the sound, but it escaped anyway, muffled and trembling. Her neck arched of its own accord, baring more of her throat to him and pressing the softness of her body harder against his own.
"Xiao Yan ge-ge..." His name escaped her in a hushed, aching whisper so soft it was almost lost to the crackle of the surrounding flames.
Xiao Yan's hands roamed lower. One settled at the small of her back with fingers splayed possessively along the curve of her spine. The other traced the arc of her hip and slid over the swell of her rear. He gripped her there. One round, supple cheek filled his palm entirely. He kneaded the pliant flesh before pulling her flush against his own hips. Xun Er buried her face against his neck, and a whimper vibrated against his skin as her nails bit crescents into his shoulders.
His palm glided up from her hip and trailed fire along her ribcage. His fingers found the full, heavy weight of one soft globe and cupped it, warm flesh spilling generously through his fingers. The pale pink bud crowning it was already stiff and pressed into his palm like a tiny brand. He circled it slowly with his thumb, rolling the sensitive nub between his fingertips, and her whole body shuddered against him.
Her own hands rose to explore with shy, curious strokes. She traced the hard ridges of his abdomen and the sculpted planes of his chest, learning him by touch. Each tentative brush of her fingers sent lightning down his spine, and the knowledge that it was her hands, hesitant and untutored, made every touch a thousand times more devastating than any practiced caress could have been.
Xiao Yan's mouth descended along her throat. He paused to press a hot, open kiss against the pulse that fluttered wildly beneath her skin, then his lips traveled to the hollow of her throat, the ridge of her collarbone, and lower still. He traced a slow, burning path down the upper slope of her breast. Her back arched hard when his mouth closed over one stiffened peak. Her fingers flew to his hair and gripped tight.
Suck… slrp…
Xun Er bit her lower lip until it whitened. Each wet, obscene noise seemed magnified in the sealed silence of the space.
Xiao Yan lavished attention on one soft mound while kneading the other with his free hand. He squeezed and shaped the yielding flesh until it spilled between his fingers. His tongue swirled around the captured bud, alternating between slow, wet licks and firm pulls that made her vision blur at the edges.
"Hahh... Xun Er can't... it's too..." The words came scattered and lost between bitten-off gasps.
Xiao Yan answered by easing her down. The surface beneath them was not cold stone but a bed of condensed Demon Flame energy, warm and yielding and luminous. Her black hair fanned out around her like a dark halo against the milky-white glow. Firelight played across her bare form, gilding every curve and hollow. For one suspended heartbeat he simply looked at her.
Her twin peaks were full and round, rising and falling with each unsteady breath. The flushed tips still glistened from his mouth. Her waist dipped dramatically before swelling into those wide, lush hips. Her thighs pressed together shyly, her creamy skin flushed warm with arousal. The shadowed cleft of her most intimate place glistened with slick need, just barely visible where her legs met.
"Don't stare so much..." she whispered. One hand rose to partially cover her face, her fingers spreading just enough to peek through. Her ears burned scarlet.
"I can't help it." Xiao Yan's fingers slid between her thighs, and her entire body jolted. She caught his wrist, but her grip held no real strength.
"Xiao Yan ge-ge, that is... mmph!"
He kissed her forehead, gentle and reassuring, even as his fingers traced along her slick folds. She was soaking. Her arousal coated his fingertips the instant he touched her. He found the sensitive bud at the apex of her sex and circled it slowly. The moan that slipped past her sealed lips was raw, unguarded, and devastatingly soft.
"Ahhhn~! Ahh~! S-so... hahh...!"
Her hips moved against his hand on instinct to chase the sensation. Her thighs fell open wider as all pretense of modesty burned away. He slid one finger inside her, slowly and carefully. Her tight heat clenched around him, wet walls fluttering wildly around the intrusion.
"Nnghhh~!!"
Xun Er turned her face into the luminous surface beneath her and bit down on her own wrist to muffle the sound that ripped from her throat. Her free hand found his arm and gripped it, her fingernails leaving small crescents in his skin.
She was trembling from head to toe, her chest heaving, when he finally withdrew his hand. He settled between her thighs, his broad shoulders pressing her knees gently apart. She felt the blunt, thick crown of his length press against her entrance. Her breath caught as anticipation and nervousness tangled tight in her chest.
Xiao Yan caught her gaze. Desire was leashed by iron restraint in his dark, burning eyes, and beneath it all lay a love so deep it eclipsed everything else.
Xun Er reached up to frame his face in both hands and pulled him down. She whispered against his lips so softly the words were barely formed. "Make Xun Er yours... Xiao Yan ge-ge."
At those quiet words, he began to push forward with infinite care.
The wide head alone stretched her entrance in a way that was foreign and overwhelming. Xun Er's breath hitched, and her fingers tightened on his shoulders. Her inner walls pulsed around just that small intrusion, involuntarily trying to draw him deeper even as they resisted. He pressed forward another inch. Then another. Her virgin passage clung to every fraction he fed her. The silken folds molded tight around his girth as though memorizing his shape.
He paused. Xun Er squeezed her eyes shut and caught her lower lip between her teeth. A fine tremor ran through her thighs.
"Look at me," Xiao Yan said softly.
Xun Er's lashes fluttered open. Those blue eyes, usually so clear and composed, were glazed with sensation and shimmering with unshed tears. She met his gaze, and the tenderness she found there melted the last knot of nervousness beneath her ribs.
Xiao Yan pressed deeper. Her walls yielded around him in slow, reluctant surrender. Each fold spread to accommodate his thickness. The sensation of being filled, stretched, and claimed from the inside was so intense that her mind went white at the edges.
He kissed the tears from the corner of her eye. "Are you alright?"
"Mn." The sound barely qualified as an answer. Xun Er dug her nails into his back, not in pain but in pure sensory overwhelm. "Don't stop... please don't stop."
Xiao Yan obeyed and slowly sank deeper. Her walls clenched and released in rhythmic waves, trying to pull him in even as they struggled to accommodate his size. The wet heat of her arousal eased his passage. Slick, delicate sounds filled the space between their bodies with each fraction he advanced.
And then he seated himself fully inside her with one final, careful push.
"Mmmphhh—!"
Something broke open within Xun Er the moment he reached her deepest point. Her entire body went as taut as a bowstring. Her inner walls clamped down around him in sudden, frantic spasms. A rush of warm, sweet-scented fluid pulsed around his buried length and soaked the place where their bodies joined. Her lips parted in a silent cry, and her back arched off the surface. Her eyes went distant and unfocused, blue irises clouded and impossibly sensual beneath her half-fallen lashes.
"Xun Er is incredible..."
Xiao Yan felt the rhythmic squeeze of her walls and the warm flood coating him. His jaw clenched with the sheer effort of holding still. She was tight and devastatingly hot, gripping him with a desperate, involuntary need that tested every shred of his control. He pressed his forehead against hers and breathed through the sensation, waiting for her spasms to ease.
Xun Er's eyes slowly refocused. The flush on her face burned all the way down to her collarbones. She could not believe what had just happened. Her body had simply reacted the moment he filled her completely. Mortification and lingering pleasure warred across her features in equal measure.
"We're truly one now," she whispered. Her hands pressed against his chest, feeling his heartbeat thunder beneath her palms. A single tear rolled down her temple and disappeared into her dark hair, but the smile on her lips was radiant. "Xun Er has been waiting... for so long..."
Xiao Yan kissed that smile. Then, carefully, he moved inside her. Her tight heat gripped him in response. The way his breath shattered against her lips made something inside Xun Er bloom with quiet, fierce pride.
The world ignited when Xiao Yan began to move. He drew back just a fraction before easing forward again, letting her body adjust and letting the lingering soreness dissolve into mounting waves of pleasure. Her arousal welled up to coat him thickly, turning his strokes slick and easy. Her walls fluttered and clung as though reluctant to release him each time he pressed home.
Xun Er clung to his shoulders, her gasps warm against his neck. She turned her face into the crook of his throat to muffle the sounds spilling from her lips, but each soft, breathless whimper still vibrated against his skin. Her body arched to meet his in a rhythm as ancient and instinctive as the tides.
Xiao Yan shifted his angle to seek her most sensitive spot. Xun Er's reaction was immediate when the next thrust pressed against it. Her head sank into his shoulder to trap a scream, and her entire body went rigid beneath him. Her nails raked down his back in desperate lines.
Her body jolted with every stroke. She squeezed her eyes shut, furrowed her brow in intense concentration, and pressed her lips tightly together. But the flush spreading down her throat, the way her toes curled, and the desperate grip of her fingers told him everything words could not.
Xiao Yan gradually increased his pace. He shifted from gentle to hungry, from reverent to primal. His hips drove forward with growing force, and Xun Er's bitten-off sounds grew harder and harder to contain.
Plap! Plap! Plap! Plap!
The sharp sound of flesh meeting flesh echoed through the Demon Flame Space. Her thick thighs locked around his waist. She pressed her heels into the small of his back to draw him impossibly deeper. She kissed him to drown the sounds, her mouth desperate and clumsy against his, swallowing her own moans along with his groans. She buried her face against his neck again when the kiss broke, her whole body trembling.
"Xiao Yan ge-ge... more." The request came out muffled against his skin, barely audible and tinged with embarrassment even as her hips rolled to meet him.
His name dissolved on her tongue into soft, shattered sounds. Each one sent electricity through his veins and drove his pace higher. He kissed her temple, her closed eyelids, and the corner of her mouth, answering with a low, rumbling groan whenever she tightened around him.
Something was building inside her. A pressure unlike anything she had ever known coiled tighter and tighter at her core with each thrust. Xun Er's eyes went wide and unfocused.
"Something... something is..."
"XIAO YAN GE-GE—!!"
Her mouth opened in a silent scream. Every muscle in her body seized, her passage clenching around him in desperate, pulsing waves. A hot gush of fluid splashed around his buried length. Her vision whited out, and her entire being was reduced to the molten pleasure crashing through her in relentless surges. Her thighs trembled uncontrollably against his sides. When sound finally returned to her, it emerged as a single, breathless whisper pressed against his lips.
"Xun Er, I can't hold back anymore." Xiao Yan's voice was hoarse and completely ragged.
The vise-like grip of her spasming walls shattered his last line of restraint. He drove forward one final time with a deep, guttural groan and buried himself as deep as her body would allow. His release surged in thick, hot pulses, flooding her still-convulsing passage. Xun Er gasped at the searing warmth filling her. Her walls clenched reflexively to milk him for every last drop.
"Xun Er can feel it," she whispered against his chest, her voice dazed and small. "So warm... inside."
She clung to him as aftershocks rippled through them both. They lay joined together, trembling and breathing each other's air. Xiao Yan gathered her close with one arm beneath her shoulders and the other stroking lazy patterns along her hip. Xun Er kept her face pressed against his chest, unable to meet his eyes, but her fingers traced slow, unhurried circles over his heart.
And then, without warning, the Flame Mantra and the Gu Clan's Qi Method erupted into motion simultaneously, as though the act itself had unlocked some hidden resonance between their cultivation bases. Heavenly Flames surged up around both their bodies. They began cultivating even as they lay joined, drawing that ocean of Demon Flame energy into themselves through the bridge of their intertwined flesh.
Milky-white and golden Heavenly Flames rose and twined together. They swelled into a single blazing sphere that wrapped them completely. The Purifying Lotus Demon Flame and the Gold Emperor Incinerating Heavenly Flame intertwined within that cocoon, no longer clashing but harmonizing, feeding on each other, and spiraling ever higher. All the Heavenly Flame energy saturating the space poured toward that fireball like a tide drawn by twin moons.
Something miraculous unfolded within that flaming cocoon. Xiao Yan's Heavenly Flame energy condensed into a dense, unyielding torrent that surged into Xun Er's Dou Qi cyclone, then coursed along the eight extraordinary meridians to every inch of her body. Wherever it passed, it polished, tempered, and elevated. It scoured impurities from her channels, widened her meridians, and refined her Dou Qi into something purer and more potent than anything she could have achieved alone. Their cultivation bases climbed steadily, fueled by the ceaseless flood of Demon Flame energy.
And so they did not stop. The flames demanded more, and their bodies answered.
Xiao Yan hardened again inside her while the energy still surged between them. Xun Er's eyes widened at the sensation. A soft gasp escaped her before it melted into a sound of welcome as he began to move once more. Each thrust pushed another wave of refined energy into her meridians. Each clench of her walls sent golden energy flooding back into his.
Cultivation and union became one and the same in an endless cycle feeding upon itself. Xun Er pressed her face into the crook of his neck, her lips parting against his skin. Muffled sounds of pleasure vibrated against his pulse as the dual cultivation carried them both higher.
"Xiao Yan ge-ge… Xun Er is… again—!"
…
Outside that blazing sphere, Little Fairy Doctor was in agony.
Her gaze had slipped past the shimmering veil of flame for only a moment, and through the rippling, translucent layers she had seen too much. Two silhouettes were pressed so tightly together they seemed carved from a single piece of moonlight and molten gold. Xun Er's slender legs were locked around Xiao Yan's waist, her spine bowed in an arc of unmistakable ecstasy, and her raven hair spilled across the luminous surface beneath her like ink across silk. His hips drove between her thighs in a slow, hypnotic rhythm. Rising and sinking. Rising and sinking. Each downstroke was punctuated by a wet, percussive slap that Little Fairy Doctor felt in her own bones. Two rivers of fire coiled around them like mating serpents, the golden and milky-white flames braiding together in a dance that mirrored the rolling motion of the figures within.
The Demon Flame energy saturating the sealed space vanished into that cocoon, drawn inward with each rhythmic pulse of the intertwined flames. The temperature climbed with every passing second, and the air itself soon felt thick enough to chew.
She could hear them. The wall of fire distorted the sounds into an indistinct, maddening murmur, yet she heard enough. Enough to know that the soft, broken cries slipping through the flame were not born of pain. Enough to catch that faint, wet percussion her body understood without any need for clarity.
A barrier of flame stood between them, but Little Fairy Doctor was neither blind nor deaf.
She swallowed hard. Her mouth had gone parched, and her tongue felt as dry as sand. Whether the suffocating heat of the Demon Flame Space had done this to her, or something else entirely, she could not bring herself to name.
Her whole body burned. Sweat beaded at her temples and slid down the graceful line of her neck to trace the ridge of her collarbone before vanishing into the shadowed hollow beneath her robes. Every inhale drew more of that intoxicating, flame-laced air into her lungs, and each breath fanned the fire smoldering low in her belly.
It's the Demon Flame's influence. It's just the Heavenly Flame stimulating my body. It's not... I'm not... She clung to the thought like a drowning woman clinging to driftwood.
Her hand flew to her mouth. She bit down on her knuckles hard enough to bruise, and still the low, betraying sound crawling up her throat nearly escaped. Between her thighs, a shameful wetness had already soaked through the thin silk of her undergarments.
She spun around on a strangled breath, her silver hair whipping through the heated air. She could no longer bear to look. She could no longer bear to listen. She could no longer bear to think about what was happening barely a hundred and fifty feet from where she stood, or about those unbearable sounds clawing at the edges of her sanity with every passing heartbeat.
Stop thinking about it!
Her movements grew hurried and almost frantic. She drove her Dou Qi inward and slammed shut every sensory gate she possessed. The world plunged into a black and soundless void. She sank cross-legged with her back to the blazing cocoon and forced herself into cultivation with the grim determination of a soldier building a fortress under siege.
Yet even with every sense locked away, an inescapable heat still lapped at the edges of her awareness like waves against a crumbling shore. Left with no other choice, she drew on the power of the Woeful Poison Body and forcibly wielded that deathly chill to suppress the maddening warmth before it consumed her from within.
…
The fragile peace lasted less than half a day.
A pair of large, warm hands slid around her slender waist from behind, and her sealed world shattered like glass beneath a hammer.
"Ah! Xiao Yan!"
Having shuttered away all five senses, she had not detected his approach at all. His arms tightened and drew her back against a broad, familiar chest. Her body gave one soft flutter of resistance before her heart launched into a frantic gallop.
"Th-that... Xun Er is still right there," she whispered, her voice barely more than a breath.
Xiao Yan leaned closer, pressing his bare chest flush against her back, and his lips curved into a smile against the delicate shell of her ear. "Xun Er is rest... is cultivating."
A flutter of foreboding rose in Little Fairy Doctor's heart, tangled inseparably with something achingly, wonderfully sweet.
She shook her head hurriedly all the same. Her nature had always been this way. Her heart inevitably caught between contradictions, torn between what she wanted and what she dared to reach for.
This Demon Flame Space was entirely cut off from the Dou Qi Continent. It was no different from Creation Valley in years past, where a great mist had carved them away from the rest of the world and left no need to mind the dust and clamor of the mortal realm.
And Xiao Yan, for his part, had already concluded his earlier... affairs. Behind him, Xun Er lay on her side atop a lotus of condensed milky-white flame, and the Gold Emperor Incinerating Heavenly Flame draped over her body like a shimmering quilt. Cocooned within the twin Heavenly Flames, she absorbed their energy steadily and cultivated even in peaceful slumber. A faint, satisfied smile curved her lips, and her cheeks still held a rosy, freshly loved flush.
Xiao Yan was the Xiao Clan's Little Clan Leader, after all, shouldering the sacred mission of spreading branches and scattering leaves!
The Xiao Clan's strength was more than sufficient now. Its numbers merely needed to keep pace!
"Little Fairy Doctor, your cultivation has reached the Dou Saint realm. Has the Poison Pill shown any abnormalities?" Xiao Yan asked with a tone of genuine seriousness, though his arms didn't loosen by so much as a fraction.
"Ah?" The abrupt shift in topic caught Little Fairy Doctor off-balance. She blinked, her mind still reeling from his sudden arrival. "The Poison Pill hasn't changed. The Thousand-Eyed Night Zhen has evolved to Rank 9, so it can also absorb the poison produced by the Woeful Poison Body."
She glanced back at the peacefully slumbering Xun Er, and the sight of that tranquil sleep loosened something knotted tight in her chest. If Xun Er could rest so contentedly, then perhaps... Her tense shoulders relaxed by degrees. She stopped resisting entirely and let herself settle against him, resting her back against the broad wall of his chest as she savored the warmth she had been denying herself.
"And the Woeful Poison Body itself? No one on the Dou Qi Continent with a Woeful Poison Body has ever broken through to the Dou Saint level, from what we know. The one who originally created the Poison Pill Method most likely died at that very threshold." Xiao Yan gently lifted her, settled her onto his lap, and wrapped both arms around her waist. Then he simply started chatting, as if holding a beautiful woman in his lap were the most natural thing in the world.
Little Fairy Doctor let her head fall back against his chest. She could hear his heartbeat, steady and strong, and the sound made her own pulse slow by a fraction. "There haven't been any changes. Same as before. Only the upper limit of poison I can absorb has increased."
"Oh? Then it seems a more thorough examination is in order."
Little Fairy Doctor's silver eyes flew wide the moment his tone dipped low and playful. She recognized that voice. She scrambled to stand, pressing against his arms and twisting frantically. But with Xiao Yan holding her, how could she possibly escape?
"N-n-no, there's no need! I feel perfectly fine." Her voice came out barely above a whisper, as if she were terrified of waking Xun Er.
"That won't do. I'm your attending physician, after all. I need to understand your physical condition thoroughly, Little Fairy Doctor. If the Woeful Poison Body harbors any other hidden dangers, we should discover them early." Xiao Yan narrowed his eyes with amusement. He blinked twice with an air of perfect innocence and cast an appreciative glance around the sealed space of fire.
This Demon Flame Space is truly wonderful. Isn't this the very definition of a secret chamber?
Jie Jie Jie... a secret-room escape game, and I, Yan Tianzun, have always been best at playing the ghost.
Little Fairy Doctor's body went rigid, and her silver eyes rounded in alarm.
You unlicensed, uncertified quack... this violates every medical ethic in existence!
She felt the body pressed against her back growing hotter with every heartbeat. Whether it was the Purifying Lotus Demon Flame or the Mysterious Yellow Flame beginning to stir, she could not tell. She only knew the heat was unmistakable, insistent, and growing against the curve of her lower back.
"W-wait a moment..." She fought to keep her voice hushed, but it came out breathless and laced with a charming indignation that only made the sound more alluring.
Xiao Yan cupped her delicate face in both hands, turned it gently toward him, and smiled. "What's this? Going back on your promise? You agreed to everything in the Xiao Realm, you know."
Little Fairy Doctor wanted nothing more than to find a crack in the earth and vanish into it forever. Back then, Xiao Yan had coaxed and sweet-talked her until she had been reduced to a complete daze, and she had fallen for it hook, line, and sinker.
She shot him a coquettish sidelong glare that was equal parts shy reproach and unwitting bewitchment. Deep down, she had always known. From the moment she charged into this Demon Flame Space a year ago, she had severed every last path of retreat.
Besides... across the entire Dou Qi Continent, aside from Xiao Yan, was there truly anyone else?
With the Purifying Lotus Demon Flame refined, calling Xiao Yan the overlord of the Dou Qi Continent would hardly be an exaggeration. In this world that cared nothing for principles and everything for raw strength, who would dare compete with him for a woman? Were they truly not afraid of death?
And in her heart, there could never have been a second person. This man had claimed her entire lifetime.
"F-first... let me put my clothes away. Don't burn them again." Her voice was as quiet as a falling pin. By now, her mind had long since gone blank.
The instant that shy, whispered consent reached his ears, the Mysterious Yellow Flame that had barely settled from his earlier exertions flared back to life within his core. Xiao Yan knew he couldn't rush her, though. His movements slowed and turned infinitely gentle as he gathered her more closely against him. He began to circulate his Dou Qi, sending careful threads deep into her body to examine the Woeful Poison Body's condition, tracing every meridian with the meticulous precision of a master physician.
Little Fairy Doctor's breath caught as she felt his energy slip inside her. It was not invasive but intimate, like being wrapped in an embrace from within. Her own Dou Qi rose unbidden to meet his, and the Woeful Poison Body's chill yielded to his warmth like frost before a spring dawn.
Her fingers trembled as she reached for the clasps of her robes. Xiao Yan watched from over her shoulder, resting his chin lightly against her hair, and found he could not look away.
She unfastened the silver lotus brooch at her collar first, and the high neckline of her white and purple robes loosened. The translucent outer sleeves, gossamer-thin and edged in delicate violet embroidery, slipped down her arms like shed wings. Next came the ornate sash cinched at her waist. Its silver filigree flowers and dangling crystal pendants chimed softly as she coiled it away. Without the corset-like sash holding everything taut, the fitted bodice gaped open to reveal the pale inner lining beneath. She tugged the fabric free of her shoulders, letting the layers pool at her elbows before guiding it all into her storage ring in a shimmer of spatial light. The purple butterfly hairpins followed, each one dissolving into the ring until her silver hair tumbled free and unbound down her bare back.
She was winter moonrise made flesh.
Her silver hair spilled past her shoulders like a river of liquid mercury, catching the ambient firelight and throwing it back in opalescent gleams. Her skin held no color of the sun, and that very pallor made the blush creeping down her neck and across her chest all the more striking, like rose petals scattered across virgin snow.
The graceful column of her throat flowed into delicate collarbones and narrow shoulders. Her waist was impossibly slim, a span his hands could nearly encompass, and it only served to accentuate the swell above and below. Her breasts were fuller than her willowy frame suggested, sitting high and round now that they were freed from their confines, tipped with pale pink buds already drawn tight from the charged air. Yet what her layered robes had truly concealed lay lower still. Her hips flared with a lush, unmistakable femininity, and the twin curves of her rear were plump and generous mounds that seemed to demand a man's hands upon them.
Xiao Yan had glimpsed the outline of that shape through her robes countless times, second only to her tiny waist in drawing the eye. Now, with nothing left to hide them, they were simply soft, ripe flesh waiting to be kneaded. Her legs stretched long and finely toned beneath, drawing clean and elegant lines in the dancing firelight.
She curled into Xiao Yan's arms with her knees drawn up, unconsciously making herself smaller, and felt the mingled warmth of their bodies seeping through every point of contact. His heat was scorching, while hers was cool and slowly thawing.
She listened to the steady beat of his heart against her back. For a moment the world shrank to just that sound, just his warmth, and the gentle way his hands moved over her skin as though she were something infinitely precious.
"Is this alright?" he murmured. His lips brushed her shoulder.
She couldn't speak. She only offered a tiny dip of her chin that said everything.
Time dissolved in the heat.
Xiao Yan's hands continued their exploration, but his touch lingered in places no physician had any reason to explore. His palms cupped her breasts and weighed the soft, heavy fullness gently, and his thumbs circled her stiffened peaks until she squirmed in his lap and bit back a moan. His fingers traced down her ribs and across the jut of her hipbone. Then, without warning, one large hand slid behind her and closed possessively over the plush swell of her rear. He kneaded the pliant flesh slowly, savoring the way it spilled between his fingers, and she gave a strangled gasp against his shoulder.
"Your meridians are in remarkably good condition," he said against the curve of her neck. His voice was low and clinical even as his hands told a very different story. "The Poison Pill is stable. But here..." His fingers pressed against a point low on her abdomen, and a thread of warm Dou Qi slipped beneath her skin. She gasped and arched involuntarily into the touch. "There's a concentration of turbid energy that needs to be dispersed."
"You..." Little Fairy Doctor twisted in his arms, her silver eyes flashing with accusation and desire in equal measure. "You're making that up."
Xiao Yan's smile widened. "Am I?"
His hand rose to cup the back of her head, fingers threading into her silver hair, and he tilted her face toward him. The playful light in his eyes softened the moment their gazes met at that close distance. He closed the remaining space between them and kissed her.
It was not the first time their lips had met, but it was the first time without pretense. He kissed her slowly, coaxing away her rigid tension one gentle press at a time, his thumb stroking the line of her jaw.
She resisted for exactly one heartbeat. Then a small, defeated sound escaped against his mouth, and her hands rose to grip his shoulders, pulling him closer instead of pushing him away.
"Mmph... hahh..."
Xiao Yan eased her down onto the warm, luminous surface, and Little Fairy Doctor let herself fall. Her silver hair fanned out in a shimmering halo against the milky-white glow, and the firelight painted her porcelain skin in shades of cream and pale gold.
"You're mine." The words fell from Xiao Yan's lips with quiet finality. He kissed them into her mouth before she could respond, sliding one hand beneath her to cradle the small of her back.
Little Fairy Doctor's eyes glistened. The fortress she had built around herself for so many years crumbled at those two simple words like sand walls before the tide. All the nights she had convinced herself she was content to stand beside him and nothing more...
Gone.
She pulled him down. This time there was no protest and no hesitation. There was only the quiet, aching relief of finally, finally letting go.
Xiao Yan began at her throat, pressing hot, open-mouthed kisses along the pale column of her neck. His mouth traveled lower, tracing the ridge of her collarbone and lingering in the hollow between before descending to the soft rise of her chest.
When his lips closed over one pale pink bud, her composure cracked wide open.
"Ah! Xiao Yan! Mmmhhhn~!"
Little Fairy Doctor's back arched off the glowing surface, and her fingers flew to his hair to grip tight. He suckled firmly, his tongue flicking across the stiffened peak and his teeth grazing it with just enough pressure to draw a sharp, electric cry from her throat. His free hand found her other mound, kneading the yielding flesh and rolling the neglected bud between his fingers until she writhed beneath him.
"Hahh... hahh...! So... so sensitive... I can't...!"
He released her peak with a wet sound and kissed his way down her stomach. Each press of his lips made her muscles jump and flutter beneath the skin. He traveled lower and lower still, until he settled between her thighs. His broad shoulders pressed her legs apart, and the warm air of the sealed space kissed her most sacred place.
"D-don't look!" She tried to close her legs, but they were already draped over his shoulders. His hands held her thighs open with gentle, unyielding pressure.
"Let me take care of you," he murmured. His breath fanned hot over her slick, swollen folds, and the sensation alone made her hips jerk.
His tongue dragged through her slit in one slow, deliberate stroke from bottom to top.
"Ahhhnn~!"
A scream ripped from her throat, raw and unrestrained. Her hips bucked violently, but his hands on her thighs pinned her open. Her slick arousal coated his tongue the instant he tasted her, and the scent of her flooded his senses.
Suck... slrp...
Wet, obscene sounds filled the sealed space as he licked, lapped, and suckled with unhurried greed. His tongue traced every fold, circled her throbbing pearl, and dipped inside her tight entrance before returning to that sensitive bud.
"S-so embarrassing... the sounds... ahhhnn~!"
He sealed his lips around her sensitive bud and sucked firmly while two fingers slid inside her, curling upward against her front wall. She was incredibly tight. Her unused passage clenched around his fingers in frantic, rhythmic pulses, and her arousal dripped down his knuckles.
"Something's... Xiao Yan... I'm... I'm going to...!!"
Her climax detonated without warning. Her spine bowed completely off the surface, and a wordless scream tore from her lips. Her inner walls clamped down in violent, rippling waves, and a rush of slick fluid gushed over his hand and chin. Her thighs clamped around his head, and her entire body shook as wave after wave crashed through her. All those hours of agonized restraint, all that suppressed desire from listening and burning alone in the dark, released in a single devastating flood.
He guided her through it gently, his tongue easing its pressure and his fingers slowing to languid strokes that never withdrew until the last tremor faded from her limbs. Then he kissed his way back up her body. Over her hip, her navel, and her ribs. Beneath the underside of one breast and into the hollow of her throat. When he finally hovered above her, she could see her own slickness glistening on his lips.
He kissed her, and she tasted herself on his tongue. Instead of mortification, a fresh wave of heat pooled low in her belly.
"You..." she panted, her silver eyes hazy and accusing beneath her lashes.
Xiao Yan's grin held no trace of remorse. He settled between her thighs and guided himself forward until the thick, blunt head of his length pressed against her entrance. The searing heat of him drew a sharp gasp from her lips, and her hips tilted instinctively upward before she could stop them.
"Little Fairy Doctor. Are you sure?"
Little Fairy Doctor reached up and wrapped her arms around his neck. Tears she couldn't explain gathered at her lashes, blurring the firelight into a warm smear of gold. Her voice came out fierce and trembling all at once. "If you stop now, I will actually poison you."
Xiao Yan laughed, warm and low against her lips. He kissed her forehead, her nose, and the corner of her eye where a tear had escaped. Then he pressed forward.
She was impossibly tight. Her virgin passage resisted every inch, and he moved with patience, easing in slowly, pulling back, and pressing deeper to let her body yield at its own pace. His lips stayed on hers the entire time, swallowing every whimper and every sharp intake of breath. Her fingers dug into his shoulders. The stretch burned and ached and filled her so completely she forgot how to breathe.
"Hnn... nnghh...!" Small, bitten-off sounds escaped her with each fraction he advanced, muffled against his mouth.
He paused halfway to let her adjust, stroking her hair back from her damp temple. Her walls pulsed around him in hot, involuntary ripples. She drew a shuddering breath and nodded against his cheek before he had even asked. He pressed deeper, and deeper still, until he sheathed himself to the hilt in one long, steady push.
"Nnghhh...!!"
Her back arched off the glowing surface. A sharp cry tore free that she couldn't have muffled if she tried. Her nails bit deep into his shoulders, and her long legs locked around him to draw him even deeper as though her body refused to let him retreat even a fraction.
"Xiao Yan... Xiao Yan..." His name came out cracked and raw, half sob and half moan, repeated like a prayer against his skin.
"I'm here." Xiao Yan kissed the tears from her cheeks and held perfectly still, buried deep inside her, letting her body adjust around his girth. Her walls fluttered and clenched in slow, involuntary ripples, gradually easing from resistance to acceptance. He pressed his forehead to hers and breathed with her, matching her rhythm until the tension in her brow smoothed and the pain dissolved into a heavy, pulsing fullness.
She experimentally rolled her hips against him. The moan that escaped her was involuntary and utterly lewd.
"Y-you can move..."
The whisper had barely left her lips before he obeyed. He drew back slowly, dragging along hypersensitive walls that clung to him as though unwilling to let go, then pressed forward in a smooth, deep thrust that made her see white. He set a careful rhythm, letting her adjust to the fullness and the overwhelming sensation of being filled completely. Her arousal quickly slicked their joining and turned his strokes wet and smooth.
Squelch... squelch...
"Xiao Yan! So deep... hahh...!" Little Fairy Doctor buried her face against his neck, her breath scorching and ragged against his skin. Her body rose to meet his in an instinctive rhythm that needed no teaching, her hips rolling upward each time he drove home.
"Don't hold back," he murmured against her ear, his voice a low rumble that vibrated through her chest. "No one can hear you here."
The last chain of her restraint snapped.
"Ahh! Ahhhhn~!"
Her voice rang through the sealed space, mingling with the roar of Heavenly Flames and the obscene, wet percussion of his hips driving against hers. Her legs locked tighter around his waist, and her heels dug into the small of his back to demand more.
He gave it to her. His pace climbed, his hips driving forward with a force that jolted her entire body. Each impact sent her soft mounds bouncing sharply with every stroke. He shifted his angle to seek the spot that made her voice crack, and once he found it, he hammered against it without mercy.
Plap! Plap! Plap! Plap!
"Xiao Yan... I'm going to—!!!"
Her climax ripped through her like a bolt of heavenly lightning. Her entire body clenched. Her inner walls clamped down in crushing, milking waves. Her spine arched off the surface, and her nails shredded the skin of his back in desperate red lines. A gush of hot fluid splashed between their joined bodies, and her scream echoed through the Demon Flame Space as wave after wave of pleasure crashed through her with relentless force. He continued to thrust even as she broke apart, prolonging the peak until her voice gave out entirely and all that remained were broken, sobbing gasps pressed against his shoulder.
The vise-like grip of her convulsing walls dragged him over the edge with her. A guttural groan tore from his throat as he buried himself to the hilt and released. Thick, searing pulses flooded her insides, filling her until warmth spilled from where they were joined and dripped onto the luminous surface beneath them.
Little Fairy Doctor whimpered softly, her walls still clenching weakly around him in fading aftershocks. Her limbs trembled against his body, boneless and utterly spent. She could feel his warmth pooling inside her, and the sensation drew one last shiver through her frame.
Xiao Yan kissed her again, softer this time. He gathered her close and held her there until the trembling stopped, until her ragged breathing turned slow and even, and until her fingers uncurled from his shoulders to simply rest against his skin. She pressed her face into the crook of his neck, and a single, quiet laugh escaped her. Whether it was joy or relief, even she could not say.
Within the sealed Demon Flame Space, the firelight rose and fell in languid waves. Sometimes bright, sometimes dim. It bore silent witness as bonds deepened and tangled until they could never be undone…
…
After a stretch of time that could have been hours or days, for time held no meaning in this sealed world, Xiao Yan finally turned his attention back to proper business.
He had, after all, only just refined the Purifying Lotus Demon Flame. He had yet to fuse it with his other Heavenly Flames and evolve the Flame Mantra to its next stage. The Purifying Lotus Demon Saint had also bequeathed him a High Tian Class soul illusion Dou Technique, along with a quasi-God Class formation technique of the same order as the Five Ring Flame Expelling Technique, one that complemented the Demon Flame beautifully. Both demanded dedicated study.
And Xiao Yan hadn't forgotten the Fire Cloud Water Flame still resting unrefined in his possession. Ranked sixteenth on the Heavenly Flame Ranking, lower even than the Sea Heart Flame, it was hardly an impressive prize. But a mosquito's leg was still meat.
So, after lying tangled with Little Fairy Doctor for a while longer, Xiao Yan set aside idle talk and returned to diligent cultivation…
…
Cultivation in the Demon Flame Space was hard, honest labor. Not so different from harvesting rice in autumn, really. One had to stoop low, plant one's feet, and bend at the waist, working the body in a steady, driving rhythm until sweat poured in rivulets and every muscle trembled with exertion.
Yet stooping to harvest was merely the final act. As the ancients taught, spring sowing begets autumn reaping. Before the golden stalks could be gathered, one first had to toil through the planting season, prying open the earth, driving deep into warm and yielding soil again and again with patience and unflagging vigor, until the ground itself grew soft and receptive beneath one's care.
"Ahhn~! Xiao Yan ge-ge... hahh... it's too deep...!"
"Nnghhh~! X-Xiao Yan… hahh... hahh...!"
Xiao Yan was, of course, a most diligent farmer.
It was much the same as when he had once cultivated a lotus. The planting of the green lotus had been a painstaking affair, pushing through unyielding resistance and coaxing something beautiful to bloom from stubborn, tight-clenched ground. But in the end, all that tireless effort had borne two precious little lotus seeds.
Two seeds. One golden. One silver-white. Both thoroughly planted.
Cultivation, stripped to its essence, was no different from working the land. It demanded raw physical strength, the kind that left one breathless and aching. It demanded moisture, copious and freely flowing. It demanded nourishment drawn from deep reserves. And it demanded the proper tools, sturdy and unyielding, capable of breaking open even the most reluctant soil.
Fortunately, Xiao Yan possessed all of these in abundance. Within the Demon Flame Space, he had Heavenly Flame energy to fuel his efforts and Heavenly Flames to serve as instruments of refinement. As for his other implements... well, they were of considerable quality. The conditions for cultivation could not have been more ideal.
"Hahh... hahh... Xiao Yan ge-ge... something is welling up inside Xun Er again... it's boiling over...!"
"Ahh! There... right there, don't stop... Xiao Yan, please...!"
On the Dou Qi Continent, where the strong reigned supreme, cultivation was the most fundamental discipline every practitioner had to master. Only through diligent, passionate exertion could raw effort be transformed into tangible results. Dou Qi rising. Foundations deepening. Breakthroughs achieved in shuddering, climactic surges that left one trembling in their wake. There were no shortcuts. One simply had to put in the work, session after relentless session, until the body was spent and the spirit soared.
Fortunately, Xiao Yan had always been exceptionally industrious. Had he not been, he could never have come this far.
From the humble garden of a hundred herbs to the mastery of three exquisite flavors. From the Ghostly Poison Flame to the Gold Emperor Incinerating Heavenly Flame to the Purifying Lotus Demon Flame. Every step of Xiao Yan's journey stood as proof of his tireless effort and iron determination. He had never faltered. He had never flagged. Where others might have spent themselves after a single harvest, Xiao Yan merely wiped his brow, rolled up his sleeves, and plowed onward into the next field.
His resolve was as hard as it was inexhaustible.
Even so, the task ahead remained formidable. Refining the Purifying Lotus Demon Flame had been one thing, but fully fusing the Heavenly Flames and evolving the Flame Mantra was a labor of an entirely different magnitude, grueling beyond measure and demanding a stamina that bordered on the inhuman.
But Xiao Yan had experience.
Not an enormous wealth of it, even he would admit that much. Yet when it came to the specific art of fusing disparate Heavenly Flames, coaxing them into harmony, guiding their wild energies along a single rhythm until they yielded completely... in that particular discipline, Xiao Yan could fairly call himself a seasoned hand.
"Xun Er really can't take any more, Xiao Yan ge-ge... won't you go trouble Sister Fairy Doctor for a while...?"
"D-don't look over here... I'm still sensitive from bef— mnghhh~!"
This time he had two Heavenly Flames to merge simultaneously, yet he did not rush. He had time, and patience. The approach was methodical. He would devote himself fully to the first, refining it with unhurried thoroughness, savoring every trembling nuance of its energy until it yielded completely. Then he would turn his full attention to the second. And only after both had been individually mastered would he bring them together for the final, explosive union.
"N-not both at once...! Xiao Yan, we can't— ahhhn~!"
The two Heavenly Flames were rebellious at first, resisting the Flame Mantra's guiding path with all the spirited defiance one might expect. They bucked and writhed, pushing back against Xiao Yan's control. Their energies clashed and repelled each other even as he worked to coax them into alignment. Taming two at once proved considerably harder than handling a single flame. Whenever he poured his efforts into subduing one, the other flared up in fierce protest.
But the Flame Mantra was a miraculous Qi Method, one whose depths had yet to be fully plumbed. Under its patient, relentless guidance, what once resisted gradually softened. What once repelled slowly learned to attract. Given sufficient time and unflagging effort, even the most stubborn flame would tremble, yield, and ultimately submit with a sweet, shuddering sigh. From the garden of a hundred herbs to the chamber of three exquisite flavors, the journey was long, but the destination was never in doubt.
"Xiao Yan ge-ge is such a bully... hahh... a big, big bully..."
By the end, both Heavenly Flames circulated in perfect, docile harmony within the Flame Mantra's embrace. Their earlier defiance was nothing but a distant memory. Their energies purred contentedly beneath Xiao Yan's masterful touch, spent and satisfied and thoroughly tamed.
And so their cultivation in the Demon Flame Space continued for another full year…