Time drifted by gently, like water over smooth stone.
Xiao Se spent a beautiful night with Long Kui in the warmth of the wooden cabin — unhurried, quiet, and wholly theirs.
The following morning, he took his newlywed on a leisurely tour through the towns scattered across the outskirts of the Monster Mountain Range. To keep any would-be troublemakers from recognizing him and spoiling the mood, he swapped his usual attire for his old alchemist robes, slipping back into the unassuming disguise with practiced ease.
For two full days, he set cultivation entirely aside.
They wandered. They sightseeing. They found a young Amethyst Winged Lion cub and spent an embarrassingly long time teasing it. And then — because Xiao Se was constitutionally incapable of passing up a good opportunity — he slipped Xiao Yan a carefully prepared packet of laxatives, waited for the effects to set in with great patience, and then used his Sharingan to rouse an entire troupe of mountain apes into an enthusiastic chase. The resulting spectacle of Xiao Yan sprinting for his life through the forest while simultaneously dealing with a rather urgent digestive emergency provided Xiao Se with more entertainment than he'd had in weeks. He watched from a comfortable distance with the serene satisfaction of a man whose hobbies brought him genuine fulfillment.
Long Kui laughed until she could barely stand.
It was, by any measure, a good two days.
On the final night of Long Kui's temporary recovery, Red Kui surfaced one last time. The two of them spent the evening learning a new language from Xiao Se — cheerful and bickering by turns, exactly as they always were — and then, as the night deepened, both Red Kui and Blue Kui quietly dissolved back into their soul forms, the brief, precious window closing behind them like a door at the end of a dream.
[Ding. The one-month period has concluded. Congratulations, Host — you have received one additional draw and two additional exchange opportunities.]
Xiao Se blinked.
He was standing in front of the wooden cabin, beside the great beast-patterned medicine cauldron, the last of the pill-refining smoke still curling upward from the rim. He hadn't even noticed the month slipping past.
"Already a month?" he murmured. Then, silently: System — open my personal panel.
[Ding. Personal panel loading.]
[Host: Xiao SeGender: MaleAge: SixteenCultivation: Seven-Star Dou HuangSoul Level: Mid-Rank Seventh-Grade AlchemistDomain: Ice and Fire DomainSword Intent: 40%Battle Qi Attributes: Fire (trace Wood), Ice, Time, SpaceMartial Soul: Fire
Techniques: "Burning Technique" — High-Rank Earth; "Returning Origin Soul Technique" — Grade Unknown
Strange Flames: Azure Lotus Earth Core Flame, Ice-Fire Dragon Flame, Sea Heart Flame, Fallen Heart Flame
Battle Skills: "Mirror Flower Destruction" — High-Rank Earth; "Crimson Flame Sword" — Mid-Rank Earth; "Ethereal Smoke Step" — High-Rank Xuan; "Mad Lion's Roar" — High-Rank Xuan; "Gathering Qi Technique" — Grade Unknown; "Eight Layered Peaks" — High-Rank Xuan
Exchange Count: 18Lottery Count: 9
System Warehouse: "Five Wheels of Fire Technique," System Patch ×1, Palm Heaven Bottle, Douluo Continent Tour Voucher (Permanent), Fox Spirit Matchmaker Tour Voucher (Permanent), Sword Dao Supreme Tour Voucher (7 Days)]
System — install the patch, then run a five-draw.
[Ding. System patch installing. Estimated completion time: three days.]
[Ding. Congratulations — you have drawn an Inflatable Doll.]
[Ding. Congratulations — you have drawn an Inflatable Doll.]
[Ding. Draw failed. Thank you for your patronage.]
[Ding. Draw failed. Thank you for your patronage.]
[Ding. Congratulations — you have drawn a Douluo Continent Tour Voucher (3 Days).]
Xiao Se stared at the results in silence for a long moment.
"…Seriously." Two inflatable dolls and a duplicate travel voucher. He exhaled through his nose. "System. Three more draws."
[Ding. Congratulations — you have drawn a Painting Rivers and Lakes: Bad Guys World Tour Voucher (Permanent).]
[Ding. Congratulations — you have drawn a bottle of Mother-Child River Water.]
[Ding. Draw failed. Thank you for your patronage.]
Xiao Se's eye twitched slightly at the Mother-Child River Water. (T/N: The Mother-Child River is a location in Journey to the West — its water causes women to become pregnant upon drinking it.) This thing had exactly one use, and that use was being profoundly inconvenient to whoever consumed it. He could think of several candidates. Yu Xiaogang. Tang San. Dai Mubai. And if Xiao Yan ever managed to irritate him sufficiently, well — there was always that option too.
One last draw.
[Ding. Congratulations — you have drawn a Young Swordsman World Tour Voucher (Permanent).]
Xiao Se's expression immediately brightened.
The Ballad of the Young Swordsman. He hadn't been back in nearly two years. He'd have to make time for that — after the wedding with Medusa, most likely. And the Fox Spirit World. And Douluo Continent. The list was growing, but he was a patient man when the destination was worth it.
He was also, he reminded himself, a responsible one.
Whether it was Bibi Dong or Dongfang Huaizhu — anyone he had courted, anyone he had made feel something — he intended to follow through. Some of them he couldn't formally take in yet, for reasons that were complicated and real, but he would still return to visit. Often. That was not negotiable.
Nine draws spent. Time to exchange.
System. Exchange the first item.
[Ding. Congratulations — you have obtained the corpse of Doctor Mo from the Mortal's Journey to Immortality world.]
"What." Xiao Se looked at the corpse that had materialized before him with the expression of a man who had expected something reasonable and received something deeply, specifically unreasonable. "Why is there a body. Why did the system give me a body."
[Ding. Congratulations — you have obtained the corpse of Jin Renfeng from the Battle Through the Heavens world.]
"Absolutely not." Xiao Se pointed at the second corpse. "I dragged this thing all the way to the Monster Mountain Range and personally executed it. Its body should not exist anymore. System — replacement. Now."
[Ding. Congratulations — you have obtained the corpse of a White Tiger Cub from the Hundred Broken Mountains, Perfect World.]
Xiao Se went still.
Perfect World. An actual fragment of that world, appearing in his hands. And a White Tiger at that — he remembered the original story well enough. The young Desolate Emperor, the Ghostly Lord's sword, the cub's death that left behind a bloodline of staggering purity. The strength contained in those veins was the kind that didn't come along twice.
The applications were significant. He could use it to refine a Heavenly Soul Fusion Blood Pill. Or, when the time came to give Long Kui a permanent body, it could potentially serve as a replacement for the essence bloodline of a seventh-tier magical beast. He'd keep the option open — if something stronger presented itself down the road, he could always reassess.
He was still turning the possibilities over in his mind when the cabin door opened behind him.
"Brother, are you done refining?" Long Kui's voice carried its usual warm lilt, easy and bright. "Come eat — it's ready."
Xiao Se let the thoughts go. He closed his hand around the matter for later, turned, and offered her a quiet smile. "Coming." He walked over, rested a hand briefly on the top of her head, and nudged her gently back toward the door. "Let's go."
Long Kui smiled — the unhurried, content kind of smile she'd been wearing all week — and led the way inside.
It had been a good stretch of time. She'd been happy. He could see it in everything about her, and it settled something in him that he hadn't realized needed settling.
After the meal, Long Kui stepped back into the Demon Sword Space, and Xiao Se set out toward the Tagore Desert.
He climbed high, letting the winds carry him above the canopy of the Monster Mountain Range, the landscape spreading out in vast green waves below. A waterfall came into view before long — a white curtain of rushing water that caught the morning light. Beside it, a shirtless boy covered in bruises was hurling himself in every direction, arms flailing, doing his very best to avoid being flattened by a barrage of enormous tree trunks. Beside him, the hazy figure of a phantom old man floated serenely, his soul power threading through the roots and branches around him with practiced ease, directing the assault with the calm focus of a craftsman at work.
Xiao Se looked down at the spectacle.
Xiao Yan, battered and determined and desperately, earnestly trying — cultivating with everything he had, as he always seemed to be doing whenever Xiao Se happened to glance in his direction.
"Still playing with wood," Xiao Se remarked, to no one in particular.
A faint smile touched his mouth. He flapped his wings once, and his figure became a streak of light that arced across the sky and faded into the horizon.
Below, beside the waterfall, Yao Lao went still.
His soul power retracted. The great tree trunks he'd been sending flying halted mid-air and then crashed harmlessly to the earth. He turned his head slowly, gaze fixed on the distant point where the light had vanished.
That direction, he thought, his brow drawing together. The Tagore Desert.
Could he also be going there to search for a Strange Flame?
The thought arrived with a quiet, cold weight. He held it, turning it over, and liked it less each time.
Xiao Yan, who had been in the middle of a very athletic attempt to not be crushed, suddenly found the incoming trees stopping without warning. He crashed face-first into the mud with a wet, inglorious splat.
"Ptooey. Ptooey." He spat out a mouthful of dark earth and pushed himself upright, rubbing his face with the back of his wrist. He looked over at Yao Lao with the expression of someone who felt they deserved at least a brief explanation. "Teacher, what happened? Why did you stop?"
"Xiao Yan." Yao Lao's voice was grave. Unusually so. "Get dressed. We're leaving for the Tagore Desert. Now."
"Now?" Xiao Yan blinked, mud still dripping from his chin. "But Teacher, you said we'd go after I broke through to Dou Shi. I'm only at three-star Dou Zhe — I'm not even close—"
"It can't wait." Yao Lao's tone brooked no argument. "If we delay, someone else may reach the Strange Flame first. And if that happens, our chances of obtaining it drop to nearly nothing." He paused, and something in his expression shifted into the practiced calm of someone who had already made their calculations. "My soul power is still more than sufficient. I can support your breakthrough while we travel. Now move."
Xiao Yan opened his mouth. Closed it. Looked at the mud on his hands and the bruises across his ribs and the old man's expression that very clearly meant the conversation was over.
He got up and started getting dressed.
(End of Chapter)
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