Wang Yi was nothing if not dramatic!
He had been pacing before the Song Family's gate for an hour. After such a long, bitter wait with no sign of Song Ciwan's return, all sorts of terrible speculations had already begun to form in the depths of his heart.
As dusk approached, clouds suddenly gathered. At one point, a fine snow began to fall softly. Wang Yi looked up at the sky, and a wave of sorrow welled up from his heart.
He felt that he truly did have feelings for Song Ciwan!
After all, they had a marriage pact, they had exchanged love letters, the pangs of first love... all those past affections were so vivid in his memory. How could he possibly forget?
"Oh, Lady Yue..." The wind and snow beat against his face, yet he felt no cold. Instead, a bellyful of poetic sentiment burst forth, unable to be contained. "Life is meant for hopeless romantics; this sorrow has nothing to do with the wind or the moon!"
Painting his emotions with poetry, two streams of clear tears trickled from the corners of Wang Yi's eyes amidst the wind and snow.
His heart surged with emotion. He felt himself wasting away from grief. In this moment, with this feeling, this wind, this snow—surely, shouldn't an inch of Celestial Spiritual Light descend to help his Talent flourish and make him a true Scholar?
Who would have thought that at this perfect moment—perfect wind, perfect feeling, perfect snow, perfect scenery—Wang Yi would see, through his tear-filled eyes, Song Ciwan returning with another young man, holding an oil-paper umbrella.
From a distance, the scene was absurd from any angle.
Wang Yi felt as if he had been struck by lightning. The wind and snow now seemed to press down on him, and he felt an unbearable chill.
He pointed a finger at Song Ciwan. "You... you two..."
For a long, bitter moment, he couldn't manage to form a complete sentence.
It was Song Ciwan who was kind enough to offer him a gentle smile at this moment. "Young Master Wang, long time no see."
She addressed him politely as "Young Master Wang" out of respect for this treasure of a boy!
Seeing her calm and gentle smile, Wang Yi staggered back a step as if dealt a massive blow. A wave of bitterness rushed to his head.
As his emotions churned, he finally blurted out the panic and rage that had been festering in his heart. "Yes, long time no see! A day apart feels like three years. We haven't seen each other for months, which might as well be a lifetime! Lady Yue, I must be seeing things. Is that someone new by your side?"
His tone was one of utter heartbreak, as if every word was a sob of blood.
But as soon as the words left his mouth, Wang Yi suddenly turned his head away, covering his face with his sleeve to hide his unbearable shame and anger.
'It really is shame and anger...' Wang Yi even felt that, having blurted out such words, he must look absolutely pathetic right now!
'Why did I have to run my mouth and say something so sour? Doesn't this just make me look like an incompetent, jealous husband?'
Wang Yi was both ashamed and furious. The Heaven and Earth Scale materialized, and a ball of energy appeared on one of its Balance Plates.
[Human desires. Greed, anger, and delusion. The pain of separation, the suffering of unfulfilled want. Weight: two jin, one tael. Can be traded.]
Song Ciwan: ...?
This was actually a bit unexpected. She hadn't even had a chance to do anything yet!
'As expected, a mature sheep should know to shed its own wool.'
'A proper ex-fiancé should learn to invent his own drama and convince himself, shouldn't he?'
Song Ciwan actually wanted to laugh. At this very moment, a "HA HA HA" was stuck in her heart, just dying to get out.
But out of respect for this sheep that was so good at shearing itself, she thought for a moment and found a suitable reply for the occasion.
As if possessed by an award-winning actress, Song Ciwan said with a melancholic sigh, "Young Master Wang, since we have already broken off our engagement, our past fate has run its course. What does it matter if there is someone new by my side? Even if you were the one with someone new, I wouldn't have a single complaint."
This clear-cut disavowal stimulated Wang Yi greatly once again. He immediately dropped his sleeve, turned back, and stared straight at Song Ciwan. "But Lady Yue, last time you said that as long as I was resolute, we could be together, regardless of life or death!"
'Last time? Which last time?'
'Oh, right. The time when I first awakened and obtained the First Layer of the Sutra of Sitting and Forgetting from Wang Yi.'
Song Ciwan recalled what she had said last time and immediately decided to continue in the same vein: speak the gentlest words and stab the cruelest daggers into his heart.
So she replied gently, "And were you resolute? Wang Yi, did you go home and stage a hunger strike? Did you convince your mother? Or did you decide to join me in the Washing Room, to live and... together?"
Before she could finish the word "die" from "live and die together," she saw Wang Yi, his eyes red-rimmed, suddenly cry out in a low voice, "My mother is dead!"
What?
Song Ciwan instantly fell silent. This was a little awkward.
For her, it was just a little awkward. For Wang Yi, however, shouting that sentence seemed to have taken all the courage he possessed in his life.
Wang Yi said again in a loud voice, "Lady Yue, my mother is dead! There was a demon disaster last night. My mother couldn't escape. She's dead!"
His voice trembled, on the verge of a sob. As he spoke, he lifted his feet and walked toward Song Ciwan, one step at a time.
In the fine snow, his slender figure seemed to be flanked by a cool breeze.
"Lady Yue, my mother is dead. I'm in so much pain. 'The child wishes to provide, but the parent is gone.' Do you know that feeling?"
Song Ciwan: ...
'Of course I know. Isn't my situation worse than yours?'
But she didn't say this out loud. She had a feeling this treasure of a boy was starting to hype himself up again.
Wang Yi continued, "A soul grieves most for a home a thousand miles away; with tears, one sees an empty seat in the hall! My mother passed away. I don't have a mother anymore! At first, I felt like my world was collapsing, but afterward, I actually felt a faint sense of joy... Lady Yue, there's no one left to stop us from being together!"
Song Ciwan: ...???
To be honest, that sudden twist from Wang Yi was... it was enough to give every filial son in the world whiplash!
'Does he even know what he's saying?'
Wang Yi's situation was completely different from Yang Taixuan's!
Song Ciwan didn't know what to say. She could see Wang Yi was getting more and more agitated.
He was still talking. "Lady Yue, quit your job at the Washing Room, and let's get married. From now on, I will manage the world outside, and you will manage our home. I will study hard, and you can be the beautiful muse by my side. We'll be like lovebirds in the sky, like intertwined branches on the earth. Bound as husband and wife, our love without a doubt..."
Of course, Song Ciwan was going to refuse, but before she could get the words out, she suddenly saw a golden light flash in the night sky ahead.
This golden gleam lit up the sky high above Wang Yi's head. It was like a stray star fragment from another world, shattering the quiet serenity of the snowy night, or like a spark falling from the heavens into the mortal realm.
No, where it truly fell was onto Wang Yi's head!
Wang Yi stopped walking. The tiny golden spark landed on him, and in that instant, his entire body seemed to be enveloped in a clear, pure, golden flame.
A moment later, the flame contracted and vanished into the space between his eyebrows.
Wang Yi opened his palm. Two three-dimensional seal script characters appeared there in a faint golden light: No Doubt!
They were just two short words, and they even looked illusory, but standing opposite him, Song Ciwan felt as if she could sense a power as heavy as a mountain from these phantom words.
Wang Yi stood there, his expression flickering. Song Ciwan couldn't describe the complexity of his look at that moment. She only saw him stare wide-eyed, his lips twisting and his mouth twitching several times before he finally burst into wild laughter.
"HA HA HA! The Spiritual Light has entered my body! Qi Nourishing Realm! So this is the Qi Nourishing Realm... I've become a true Scholar!"
He finished laughing, then started crying. "Mother, I did it! Haha! I really did it! Waaaah..."
Song Ciwan: ...Ho-holy shit?
'Alas, my kind is uncultured. A single "holy shit" is all I need to get by.'
The Heaven and Earth Scale slowly materialized. A new item had appeared on the Balance Plate: an illusory word, the character for "Doubt."
[Scholar's Illusion Text, generated by Spiritual Light. Through the resonance of heaven and earth, a wisp of Qi was taken and manifested as "Doubt." Level: Qi Cultivation. Can be traded.]