Shen Gurong's heart stopped.
Shen Gurong saw the world through a mortal lense.
The second senior sister, Su Xiyan, had a gentle temperament. Although she was born a boy, she preferred to wear women's clothing. It is said that when she was a child, she went to find Nan Yangjun and begged the master to change her name.
Su Xiyan was born in a filthy land of demons. Nan Yangjun named him "Xi Yan" because he wanted him to cleanse himself from the ink stains and devote himself to the Tao, but he didn't expect that he didn't like the name.
"What do you want to change it to?"
Su Xiyan said shyly: "How about Su Xiyan?"
Nan Yangjun: "..."
Nan Yangjun was blinded by the name "Su".
Nan Yangjun has been highly cultivated since he was a child. Even hearing a curse word would stain his ears. When he names the disciples, he can tell that each one has extraordinary abilities and is by no means an ordinary person.
For example, the third disciple is Xi Guxing, the fourth disciple is Jing Zhuchen, and the fifth disciple is Chao Jiuxiao.
The tenth disciple was considered special. At that time, Nan Yangjun was probably bored with the name. Seeing that his tenth disciple always went out to collect medicines and forgot to return home, he simply chose the name "Bu Gui".
Even if it was taken randomly, it sounded much better than the "Su Xiyan" that his second apprentice wanted to change it to.
Fortunately, Nan Yangjun's temper wasn't that bad back then. He patiently asked, "Why do you want it to be this?"
"Su Xiyan" said, "It sounds like a girl's name, and I like it.
Nan Yangjun asked calmly, "Then why a girl's name?"
Su Xiyan blinked: "I am a girl."
Nan Yangjun: "..."
Su Xiyan, who was born a boy, believed herself to be a girl. Even after she grew up and learned about the differences between men and women, she remained stubborn in her opinion.
Even though she has a deep male voice, her tone is still soft and her every move and smile is charming and graceful.
Over time, all the senior brothers on Liren Peak called her Second Senior Sister, and she did not feel embarrassed or ashamed, but responded gracefully.
Su Xiyan put Shen Gurong down, bent down slightly, and said softly: "Eleven?"
Shen Gurong was still immersed in the collapse of the beautiful senior sister who turned into a beautiful senior brother. He raised his head and looked at Su Xiyan's face that was obviously that of a woman. He still couldn't accept it for a while.
He said in a painful tone: "Second senior...sister."
Su Xiyan smiled: "I brought you some gadgets from Youzhou. I will give them to you after I repair the Spirit Boundary Tablet."
Shen Gurong said with difficulty: "Okay."
Su Xiyan touched his little head, turned around and left.
Shen Gurong ran back to Fanjiang Residence in shame and anger, feeling that his boyish heart was about to be broken.
Su Xiyan, dressed in flowing red robes, was graceful and elegant. When she arrived at the Spirit Tablet of Liren Peak, Xi Guxing and Lou Bugui were already waiting there.
The two of them saluted together: "Second Senior Sister."
Su Xiyan nodded slightly.
Xi Guxing raised his eyebrows and said, "Have you seen Shen-shidi?"
Su Xiyan smiled like a flower: "Well, it's really different from before. When he saw me, he was so scared that he fell down from the tree."
Xi Guxing mocked mercilessly: "Hahaha, after going through a qi deviation, he's become much more timid than before."
Lou Bugui whispered from the side: "Eleven used to be timid too. Once, he even cried when he encountered fire."
While the three of them were talking, Wen Liubing came slowly up the thousand-story stone steps of Liren Peak with the Lanting Sword in his hand and a frightening aura. The sword was covered with dazzling blood, slowly dripping down.
He stepped forward, lowered his sword tip, nodded and saluted: "Martial Uncle, the demons at the foot of the mountain have been cleaned up, and no traces have been left behind."
Su Xiyan looked at the blood on his body, sighed softly, and said: "Sanshui, you have been killing for three days, but I don't know how many of the missing demons are still hiding in the dark."
Wen Liubing looked up in confusion: "But there is no scent of other demon cultivators or ghost cultivators on Liren Peak."
Su Xiyan just sighed: "You underestimated the attraction of the artifact."
The world is full of suffering and calamities, but possessing a divine artifact can give one the chance to defy fate and escape the cycle of reincarnation. Even if it's just a rumor, countless people will go to any lengths for such an artifact.
Su Xiyan turned around and walked to the spiritual stele. She raised her slender fingers and tapped lightly on the Spirit Tablet. A burst of dense red letters suddenly appeared on the stone stele covered by moss, and quickly followed Su Xiyan's fingers and crawled into her body.
She gently closed her eyes and absorbed the inscription into her body's spiritual veins little by little. A sudden and earth-shaking ferocious roar suddenly came from the dead silence.
After a moment, Su Xiyan pressed her palm on the Spirit Tablet, and the spiritual power was returned. An extremely complicated formation on the huge stone monument flashed away and disappeared.
And as the words on the Spirit Tablet reappeared, a spring breeze-like spiritual power slowly formed a blue barrier, offsetting the originally broken barrier until it was completely replaced.
Outside the barrier, countless fierce ghosts were torn apart by the spiritual power on the Spirit Tablet, turned into ashes and dissipated in mid-air.
Wen Liubing was a little stunned.
Those things that were crushed to ashes...are they the ghost cultivators who have been hiding in Liren Peak in the past few days?
So many?
Su Xiyan took a clean breath, slowly opened her eyes, and took her hand back.
Xi Guxing waited patiently aside. Seeing that she had withdrawn her hand, he said, "Senior sister, how many days can you stay?"
Su Xiyan shook her head: "I won't leave again for a while. The spiritual veins of Liren Peak are inherently unstable, and more people will come to break the formation in the future. If I leave for too long, the barrier may be easily broken."
Xi Guxing finally breathed a sigh of relief, feeling that Liren Peak finally had someone more reliable.
He was about to discuss the important matter of Liren Peak with Su Xiyan and asked her to help him come up with an idea, but he saw Su Xiyan turned around and left after getting ready.
Xi Guxing hurriedly stopped her: "Senior sister? Where are you going?"
Su Xiyan said: "Let's play with Eleven."
Xi Guxing: "..."
Before he could stop them, Su Xiyan and Wen Liubing left quickly.
Lou Bugui said "Ah" and said slowly: "Senior Sister finally repaired the Spirit Tablet."
Xi Guxing: "..."
In Fanjiang Residence, Shen Gurong was lying on the window lattice to pay homage to his broken boy's heart. He accidentally glanced around and caught a glimpse of Mu Zhe walking towards the side courtyard holding a book.
Since Shen Gurong became a child, Xi Guxing, Lou Bugui, and Wen Liubing hugged him rebelliously, and now there is a second senior sister who can pick him up effortlessly. Almost everyone is crushing Shen Gurong's self-esteem and shame to the ground.
The only thing that made him feel relieved was that Mu Zhe would never hug him.
——Because he couldn't carry him.
Shen Gurong hurriedly called out to Mu Zhe, "Mu Zhe!"
The footsteps outside stopped, and after a while, Mu Zhe opened the door of Fanjiang Residence and bowed to Shen Gurong at the entrance.
"Master."
Shen Gurong, disregarding any sense of embarrassment, beckoned to him and called out in her childish voice, "Is there candy today?"
Mu Zhe: "..."
Mu Zhe sighed silently in his heart, stepped forward, and reached out his hand through the window lattice.
Lying in his palm was a piece of sugar icing wrapped in colorful oil paper.
Shen Gurong was about to take it when he seemed to realize something and asked in confusion, "Why didn't you come in?"
Mu Zhe lowered his eyes slightly and said softly, "Senior Brother said Master needs to rest and didn't want us to disturb Master without permission."
Shen Gurong tilted his head, startled. He then understood why he hadn't seen his two little disciples for the past few days; it turned out Wen Liubing was vying for favor and hadn't allowed them to come.
“Ignore him.” Shen Gurong didn’t take the candy, but instead gently tapped Mu Zhe’s palm twice with his soft fingertips, tilting his head and saying, “You can come to me anytime you want.”
Mu Zhe stiffened at the touch.
Shen Gurong said, “Come in.”
Mu Zhe’s heart skipped a beat. He mumbled a reply and went into the room with the candy in his hand.
As soon as he entered, Mu Zhe caught sight of his little master, dressed in dazzling red robes, lazily sitting on a soft couch, peering out the window. He wasn’t wearing shoes, his little feet tucked into his robes, occasionally dangling.
If he didn’t know this person was his master, Mu Zhe would have mistaken him for a real child.
Shen Gurong propped his head up with one hand and reached out to him for the candy.
Mu Zhe always habitually kept his head down in front of him. He had just handed him the candy when he suddenly felt a warm little hand grasp his fingers.
Mu Zhe instinctively tried to pull his hand back, but Shen Gurong pulled him forcefully. The force of his pull caused Shen Gurong's small body to stumble forward, almost falling off the soft couch. Mu Zhe hurriedly steadied him.
After settling down, Shen Gurong squeezed Mu Zhe's fingers and asked, "Why do you always keep your head down?"
Mu Zhe stiffened, remaining silent.
Shen Gurong had no choice but to jump off the soft couch, squatting down with his knees drawn up to look at him.
"Hmm? Why aren't you saying anything?"
Mu Zhe's voice seemed to have been stolen; he tried to speak for a long time but couldn't utter a single word. His forehead was sweating with anxiety.
Because of the angle at which he instinctively looked down, his gaze met Shen Gurong's questioning light-colored eyes.
Mu Zhe stared blankly for a long time before taking a deep breath and murmuring in a soft voice, "Ugly..."
Shen Gurong didn't hear him clearly: "What?"
Mu Zhe's voice was unsteady, like a small animal cornered but stubbornly refusing to leave because of some unknown hope. He stammered, "Because of the birthmark on my face... it's ugly."
Shen Gurong paused for a moment before saying strangely, "So what if it's ugly? Master is blind."
Mu Zhe: "..."
Mu Zhe looked at him blankly, seemingly not expecting his master to say such a thing.
After speaking, Shen Gurong realized his mistake. He coughed lightly, trying to maintain his master's dignity, and said, "The body is merely a shell; cultivators need not concern themselves too much with beauty or ugliness."
Mu Zhe asked, bewildered, "Is that so?"
Shen Gurong nodded, "Exactly."
Mu Zhe tried circulating his spiritual energy, and heard his master say in his mind: Of course, this applies to everyone in the world, except for your master.
Mu Zhe: "..."
Mu Zhe, unsure of what to think, swayed and left.
After Shen Gurong finished a candy, Su Xiyan indeed came to give him a small trinket.
“These are things many children in Youzhou like,” Su Xiyan said softly, picking up a rattle drum and gently shaking it. The drum made a clear, ringing sound. “It’s said these two drums are made from the soft skin of the jaw of a Netherworld Beast, and they won’t rot for a thousand years.”
Shen Gurong: “…”
Jaw…skin…
Shen Gurong stammered, “Senior Sister, I don’t play with these.”
Su Xiyan then took out a pile of children’s toys, all made from the bones, skin, or melted blood of demonic beasts, each one more gruesome than the last.
“If you don’t want to play, you can let your two little disciples play,” Su Xiyan said gently. “Right now, the most important thing is to recover your health. Bugui and I have discussed a few methods; we’ll try them tomorrow.”
Shen Gurong tentatively said, “No, we don’t need to see Fifth Senior Brother, do we?”
He was truly terrified of that dragon.
Su Xiyan smiled, “No need.”
Shen Gurong finally felt relieved.
Su Xiyan took out another piece of ice silk, saying, "This is a new piece of ice silk I got from your sixth senior brother when I passed through Xianyun City. He said he made it especially for you. Try it and see if it works."
Shen Gurong, who had been terrified by the small trinkets made of skin, bones, and blood, became interested when he saw the new ice silk.
He removed the ice silk from his eyes and tied the new one on.
After the new ice silk was on, his vision seemed less clear than before, and he experienced a very strange sensation.
As Shen Gurong looked left and right, adjusting to the new sight, a group of hanging ghosts suddenly fell before him, their faces contorted in grotesque expressions, all screaming at him with hoarse cries.
"Give me back my money!"
"You came to me fifteen years, three months, and seven days ago to collect the pills. When are you going to pay me?!"
"Shen-shidi, give me back my hard-earned money!"
Shen Gurong: "..."
Shen Gurong: "Ah—"
Shen Gurong screamed, his limbs going weak with fear. He ripped the ice silk off and threw it away violently.
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