IVYSCP - Chapter 70

Chapter 70

"Something has been watching me."

She had sensed it before they entered the secret realm. She had assumed it was someone from the immortal sects, but after all the skyships departed, that palpable gaze remained—even more pronounced than before. It came from the depths of Crouching Dragon Valley.

Pei Yin's eyes went cold in an instant.

The depths of Crouching Dragon Valley were even colder, stretching almost to the belly of the Torch Dragon's corpse.

The Torch Dragon's skeletal frame curved into a mountain of bone. The two walked through it, and even with formations and protective robes in place, their breath misted white with every word.

A layer of frost had formed on Ling Qingyue's eyelashes, and the ends of her hair had gone white. She turned to look at Pei Yin and found she was the same, her hair nearly all white, which only made her look even more like a snow doll.

After staring for a moment, Ling Qingyue laughed aloud.

Pei Yin looked over, and the chill in her eyes melted at once into spring water.

Ling Qingyue blinked, feeling her ears grow warm. She cleared her throat and said, "Back at Linshui Town, I once heard a saying."

"To win one heart and share white hair till death parts us."

Pei Yin's gaze stirred slightly, catching the snow caught in Ling Qingyue's hair.

Ling Qingyue went on. "At that time I still didn't know I was Ah Xi. I figured I'd have to leave eventually. When I left, Ah Xi would come back, and you and Ah Xi would grow old together. It made me so sad."

Pei Yin lowered her head until their foreheads touched, both of them cool to the touch. "Right now, we are already sharing white hair."

That was exactly what Ling Qingyue had been thinking. Hearing Pei Yin say it aloud lifted her spirits completely.

"Achoo!"

A loud sneeze suddenly rang out. Both their expressions shifted as they went on alert.

"Who's there?!"

"Achoo!"

Belatedly, Ling Qingyue realized the sound seemed to be coming from her own person. A chill ran down her scalp. After some fumbling, she pulled a palm-sized Dream-Eating Tapir out of her Qiankun Pouch.

Ling Qingyue: "..."

Snot hung from the Dream-Eating Tapir's long trunk like noodles. She was shivering so hard she could barely stand.

"Achoo!"

Ling Qingyue tilted her head and dodged the flying snot.

"You—how did you..." Ling Qingyue started to ask how she got out, then thought again. She must have hidden inside the Qiankun Pouch and followed them.

"What are you following us for?"

The Dream-Eating Tapir couldn't help burrowing into Ling Qingyue's palm, where it was a little warmer. Ling Qingyue, disgusted by the snot, refused to let her touch her. In the end, Pei Yin cast a cleansing technique to tidy the Dream-Eating Tapir up, then placed a small cold-resistant formation on her.

No longer so cold, the Dream-Eating Tapir answered, aggrieved, "I don't want to go hungry anymore. Back there, I'd only run into people once every few decades, maybe centuries. Those yao kept fighting and killing all day, and their dreams were all the same anyway. Tasteless. And they wouldn't let me eat their dreams either."

Ling Qingyue poked her. "But if you come here and get found out, a whole lot of people will want to capture you."

Humans and beasts could also form bonds, but a beast contract was not the same as a Dao companion's Dao contract. The beast contract was also known as a slave contract. Once bonded, the yao beast became a human's servant, compelled to follow its master's every command. For yao beasts, this was the deepest shame. They would sooner die than enter such a bond with a human.

The Dream-Eating Tapir was an ancient yao beast. She devoured dreams and created them, could plunge people into nightmares with ease, and was comparable to a divine weapon or artifact. If word got out, the Dream-Eating Tapir would likely become an object fought over by countless people.

"Aren't you two really strong?" The Dream-Eating Tapir looked at them both. "Just protect me and it'll be fine."

Such an entitled tone.

Ling Qingyue's mouth twitched. She pinched the Dream-Eating Tapir's nose and wobbled it, making her snort and wheeze.

"I—I can help you!" The Dream-Eating Tapir shoved at Ling Qingyue's hand to free her nose.

Ling Qingyue stopped. In the next moment, a bright, colorful little girl stood before her, still wearing the clothes Ling Qingyue had given her back then.

Now the three of them were dressed in similar styles, as if they were one family.

The Dream-Eating Tapir's nose was bright red. She cupped her hands over it and said, muffled, "I didn't come for nothing. You let me eat dreams and protect me from being found, and then when you need me, I can help you."

After all these days, she'd figured it out. These two never suffered a loss without return.

Ling Qingyue was still hesitating when she heard Pei Yin say softly, "The Ancient Yao Forest secret realm has already closed. She can't go back. Rather than let her run around on her own, we might as well keep her close."

The Dream-Eating Tapir heard this and nodded rapidly. She took two steps to Pei Yin's side, grabbed her sleeve and wouldn't let go, and stared wide-eyed at Ling Qingyue.

Ling Qingyue: "..."

What an odd feeling.

"Let's do that for now, then."

Ling Qingyue had to admit Pei Yin made a very good point. And looking at how the Dream-Eating Tapir was acting, even if they didn't let her follow, she'd just sneak after them anyway.

The Dream-Eating Tapir's eyes lit up. She ran to stand between the two and took a hand of each. "You two are so nice!"

Ling Qingyue's instincts told her this Dream-Eating Tapir wasn't very old. She was silly and naive.

"How old are you?"

The Dream-Eating Tapir thought about it. "A little over two thousand years."

Ling Qingyue: "..."

Oh. So she was just born a fool.

"Let's be clear first. You can't randomly transform into your yao body here." Ling Qingyue felt she needed to set some rules for her.

The Dream-Eating Tapir's appearance was distinctive; her yao body would be recognized far too easily.

"Alright!" The Dream-Eating Tapir nodded her agreement, then her eyes shifted. "But can I change when it's just the two of you?"

Her yao body was still more comfortable and natural.

Ling Qingyue thought about her enormous yao body and fell silent. It was a while before she spoke. "Do it less often. Only the small form, not the big one."

"Oh."

Pei Yin asked, "Do you have a name?"

The Dream-Eating Tapir shook her head. Yao beasts recognized each other by aura.

Ling Qingyue felt that wouldn't do. They couldn't just go around calling her hey, hey, hey.

She shook the Dream-Eating Tapir's hand. "Think of a name for yourself."

The Dream-Eating Tapir looked at the two of them and blurted out, "Pei Xi."

Ling Qingyue: "..."

Pei Yin: "..."

The Dream-Eating Tapir saw them exchange a glance and then look away, and couldn't help asking, "Is the name no good? I think it's pretty good. You can hear right away that I'm connected to you two. They definitely won't dare bully me. Then from now on, I'll be Pei Xi!"

Pei Yin gave a small nod. "Mm. You make a very good point."

Pei Xi turned to grin at her, and then the two of them looked at Ling Qingyue at the exact same time.

Ling Qingyue: "..."

That odd feeling surfaced again.

"Fine, fine, fine. You're Pei Xi."

With the name settled, they continued deeper inward. Ling Qingyue shifted Pei Xi to her other hand, then moved closer and took Pei Yin's hand.

Pei Xi had no objections. She sniffled and asked, puzzled, "What are you guys doing here anyway? So strange. Why do you people always like crawling into yao beast corpses? This is a Torch Dragon's corpse. Any further ahead and you'll be in its belly. It'll get even colder."

Ling Qingyue had also noticed that the deeper they went, the colder it became. And still that gaze persisted, following her faintly, sometimes stronger, sometimes weaker.

"Who's there?!"

Pei Yin shot forward in a flash of gold light. Ling Qingyue's heart jolted and she followed on instinct.

A black dot in the distance flickered repeatedly, moving at extreme speed—so fast that even Pei Yin was left trailing behind.

Pei Xi saw a chance to show her skills and hurried to seize it. "I'll carry you after them!"

Ling Qingyue felt only the wind speed beside her ears increase, scraping her face raw. In the blink of an eye, she was carried ahead of Pei Yin, drawing closer and closer to the black dot.

Soon they were within a hundred meters. Ling Qingyue could see clearly. The black dot was a person, dressed entirely in black, with concealment from head to toe.

"Pei Xi, faster!"

"Got it!"

The black-clothed figure also seemed to notice the unexpected complication and sped up even more than before.

"Stop right there!" Ling Qingyue shouted harshly, forming ice blades in her palm and launching them straight ahead.

The black-clothed figure dodged the ice blades and slowed in doing so. In an instant, Ling Qingyue was right behind her.

Drawing on the surrounding ice and snow, she condensed an ice sword and unleashed a burst of sword qi. Ling Qingyue saw the black-clothed figure suddenly turn around. The only visible part—her eyes—stared straight at her.

Ling Qingyue's breath caught. A form of address slipped out before she could stop it. "Aunt Lan?!"

In that brief window, a teleportation array materialized behind the black-clothed figure and swallowed her in an instant.

Pei Xi came to a stop. Carefully, she raised her eyes to look at Ling Qingyue and said dully, "Didn't—didn't catch her."

"It's fine. She had a magical artifact on her. We were never going to catch her anyway."

Ling Qingyue frowned, still thinking about the eyes she had just seen. Could it really have been Aunt Lan?

Pei Yin caught up to them. The two exchanged a glance and said in unison, "She led us here on purpose."

That person had both a speed-enhancing magical artifact and a teleportation array. If she'd wanted to shake them off, she could have done so with ease. But she suddenly revealed herself and then deliberately controlled her speed so that they never quite caught up.

A weight suddenly fell around Ling Qingyue's waist. She looked down and found Pei Xi had latched onto her.

Pei Xi's nose was red from the cold. "She led us straight into the Torch Dragon's belly."

This was the deepest part of Crouching Dragon Valley.

"The one pulling the strings from behind has finally made a move." Ling Qingyue looked around. The place resembled a giant cavern—dark, lightless, battered by wind and snow, and bitterly cold.

"Is she trying to make us notice something? Or is there something here?"

Pei Yin strengthened the cold-resistant formation around the three of them. "Let's look around first."

Ling Qingyue took her hand and found it had no trace of warmth at all—cold as a block of ice. Her heart aching, she brought it to her lips and breathed on it to warm it as she spoke. "Don't use any more spiritual energy. I'm still all right."

Pei Xi shuddered from the cold and asked, curious, "Do you two have something from a Golden-Haired Hou on you?"

"Golden-Haired Hou?" Ling Qingyue was baffled.

Pei Xi nodded. "Right. The Golden-Haired Hou and the Torch Dragon counter each other. If you didn't have something from a Golden-Haired Hou on you, you wouldn't be able to get in here. The cold qi here would have already invaded your meridians and frozen you both into ice sculptures."

She herself could endure this cold qi, but she really didn't want to suffer the freeze either. So if they had anything from a Golden-Haired Hou, could they share a little with her too? Even just two hairs would be fine.

"We don't." Ling Qingyue shook her head.

Pei Xi immediately scrunched up her nose. "Don't be so stingy."

Ling Qingyue sighed with exasperation. "We really don't."

Pei Xi spun around to look at Pei Yin.

Pei Yin also shook her head. "We don't."

Ling Qingyue: "..."

What was this? Not believing her, but believing Pei Yin?

"Could it be this Torch Dragon's heart crystal is gone?" Pei Xi muttered under her breath.

Ling Qingyue caught her words. "Heart crystal?"

Pei Xi nodded. "Mm. A great yao like the Torch Dragon, even when it dies, doesn't want its bones trampled by other yao beasts. It will condense a heart crystal. The heart crystal gathers some of the power it possessed in life and can repel most yao beasts. This Torch Dragon must have been dead for over a thousand years. Otherwise, with all this cold qi, you wouldn't be able to get near its bones at all. That you can now walk straight into its belly is probably because the heart crystal is gone."

Pei Yin recalled a line from an old text she had once read and said quietly, "For one whose soul has scattered into nothingness, the Torch Dragon's heart crystal can gather it again."

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