Day nine, early morning.
Bai Yao, who had slept all night in the Grandmaster’s Chair, opened her eyes and instinctively looked toward Xiao Yi on the bed.
Xiao Yi was lying face down, breathing heavily, and the whole room reeked of alcohol mixed with the sour stench of vomit, completely overpowering the magnolia fragrance that originally belonged to the room.
“If I let you keep sleeping like this, my bed is going to reek of alcohol. Disgusting.”
Bai Yao pushed the door open with a look of disdain, went outside, and had a maid prepare hangover soup in the kitchen, then personally drew a basin of warm water.
She had only intended to give this Young Prince a quick wipe-down, but the moment her palm touched Xiao Yi’s forehead, she jerked her hand back.
Xiao Yi’s forehead was burning hot, shockingly so.
Bai Yao frowned deeply.
Cultivation crippled, meridians weakened, plus a cold turning into a high fever—if this spineless Young Prince died in her room, what would happen then?!
“Trouble…”
She stood before the bed in silence for three breaths, then finally walked to the outer courtyard and found the maid approaching with the hangover soup. In a stern tone, she ordered:
“Give me that. You wait outside. Tell anyone who comes that I’m in secluded cultivation. If you let anyone in, tomorrow I’ll sell you off to the brothels south of the city.”
Everyone in Xia Manor knew Bai Yao’s methods well, so the maid nodded fearfully, handed Bai Yao the soup, and quietly retreated to the side.
Bai Yao returned to the room, took a deep breath, and looked at the half-dead body on the bed, the corner of her mouth twitching.
“In my past life, I never even took care of a girlfriend. But in this life, I’m straight-up playing mother to you.”
She tried to feed the hangover soup three times, and each time Xiao Yi choked it back out.
Bai Yao had no other option, cursing under her breath as she pried his mouth open again and forced it down like watering livestock.
“Swallow it! The Saintess of Xuan Yu Sect is playing nursemaid to you—at least cooperate a little!”
She stripped off Xiao Yi’s outer robe, her movements like unwrapping a zongzi during the Dragon Boat Festival.
The faint plum blossom fragrance of the Hehuan Sect on his collar kept making her stomach churn, so she wadded it up and tossed it straight out the window.
But when she loosened his inner garment, Bai Yao’s movements froze for an instant.
This Young Prince’s body was terrifyingly thin now, far more frail than she had imagined.
His ribs showed clearly one by one, and around the spot where his heart lay against his chest was a ring of dark red bruising, as if something had crushed him there.
“This is the Hehuan Sect’s domineering extraction technique? Liu Linglin, you really didn’t hold back. If you’d drawn just a bit more, he probably would’ve been dead.”
She wrung out the cloth and wiped slowly from Xiao Yi’s neck down to his spine.
When the cloth touched his skin, Xiao Yi shivered in his coma, and a muffled whimper rolled from his throat.
Bai Yao unconsciously froze for a moment, hesitated, then lightened her touch.
When changing his clothes, she dug out one of her own plain white robes.
It actually hung somewhat loose on Xiao Yi.
While tying the sash, she grumbled: “The way you look now, you can’t even fill out my clothes. Seven years of martial arts training, all wasted… giving up on yourself… I suppose I can’t blame you.”
In the afternoon, the sun hung high, and the temperature in the courtyard rose a bit.
Bai Yao placed a damp cloth on Xiao Yi’s forehead, replacing it every half-incense stick.
She dozed off on the edge of the bed, her head bobbing, jerking awake every time she nearly toppled over, then unconsciously reaching out to check his breathing.
It wasn’t until evening that the maid returned from the south city pharmacy with cold-remedy herbs and handed them to her.
While decocting the medicine, the whole courtyard filled with bitter smoke.
She fanned herself, coughing and choking, eyes turning red.
Fortunately, in the vast Xia Manor, with Xiao Yi unconscious and the Old King and Lady Wang absent, she as the legitimate consort was the absolute authority.
No one would dare spread idle gossip.
The medicine finished brewing, pitch-black and thick.
Bai Yao propped Xiao Yi up, letting him lean against her shoulder.
Even through two layers of underclothes, she could feel his back burning like a branding iron.
“Young Prince, bear with it. This is the first time in my life I’ve fed someone medicine. Don’t pull any funny business on me.”
She scooped up a spoonful of medicine and brought it to Xiao Yi’s lips.
But his jaw was clenched tight, and the medicine ran all the way down his chin and into his collar.
Bai Yao’s forehead broke out in sweat. She tried twice, and simply couldn’t get it into his mouth.
“Tsk… Do you really think I’m your damn mother?! Who are you putting on this dead act for?”
But curses aside, Bai Yao immediately switched tactics.
She took a mouthful of the bitter medicine, pressed her palm against Xiao Yi’s back heart, and channeled the faint golden righteous qi in her dantian.
The true qi threaded into his meridians like silk, gently lifting at his throat.
Seizing the moment Xiao Yi’s Adam’s apple rolled, Bai Yao pressed her mouth directly against his lips to push the medicine in, guiding it with her true qi. The liquid finally slid down through his unclosable jaw.
After finishing one bowl, Bai Yao’s back was drenched in sweat.
She wiped her mouth, laid Xiao Yi back down, and tucked in the bedcovers.
She felt no qualms whatsoever about her first kiss with a man.
Instead, she cursed:
“If you choke it out again next time, I’ll learn from those duck farmers back home and shove a big, thick, black pipe down your throat and force-feed you like a Peking duck!”
Late at night, Xiao Yi’s fever finally broke.
Half-conscious, he turned his head and grabbed Bai Yao’s wrist just as she was pulling away.
His fingertips were not only cold, but carried an indescribable loneliness.
“Mother… don’t go.”
Bai Yao didn’t pull her hand back.
She just sat on the edge of the bed, watching his brows gradually relax in sleep.
“Sleep… By the time you wake up, we probably won’t see each other again.”
Moonlight leaked through the window crack, cutting a pure white line across the blue bricks.
Bai Yao slumped in the Grandmaster’s Chair, gazing at Xiao Yi breathing steadily on the bed.
She suddenly felt that although she’d been busy all day, it had been strangely peaceful.
No Liu Linglin’s seductive smiles, no Xuan Yu Sect deacons looking at her like merchandise, and even the peeping servants in the manor seemed to have been pressed into the earth by an invisible hand.
“This is… a rare moment of peace in my life.”
She closed her eyes, a smile that finally matched her age tugging at her lips as she relaxed calmly.
“Tomorrow I enter the Cangjie Grotto-Heaven. Life and death are uncertain, and I don’t know if we’ll ever meet again.”
Her voice was very soft, as if speaking only to herself.
“Young Prince, perhaps after tonight’s parting, we’ll never cross paths again.”
The candle flame flickered. She leaned against the Grandmaster’s Chair, her head tilting to one side as she fell into deep sleep.
Early morning, urgent knocking shattered the tranquility of the eastern courtyard…
“Saintess, it’s almost time. Please dress quickly and head to the south city altar. Don’t delay the Grotto-Heaven’s opening.”
Bai Yao jolted awake in the Grandmaster’s Chair, her first reaction to look at the bed.
Xiao Yi was still asleep, his complexion clearly much better than yesterday.
She let out a relieved breath, then called back: “Understood, Senior Brother. Wait a moment, I’ll be there shortly.”
She changed into Xuan Yu Sect’s standard inner-sect robe—green fabric with white patterns, the cuffs embroidered with the exquisite magnolia emblem of the sect’s Saintess.
It had been a long time since she’d worn this.
The fabric clung to her skin like a shackle from the past.
Bai Yao weighed the fine iron sword hanging at her waist.
The blade was heavy—the only decent weapon she’d managed to dig out from the bottom of her dowry chest.
Before leaving, she glanced back at Xiao Yi.
“Live, Xiao Yi. Don’t waste my twelve hours of bedside care.”
The carriage rumbled over the blue stone slabs, heading toward the south city.
Bai Yao stroked the sword hilt, but her right eyelid kept twitching uncontrollably.
“Something’s wrong.”
She didn’t know what was wrong, but the righteous qi in her dantian was faintly restless, vibrating like a silent alarm.
In the grand hall of Xia Manor, the morning light made the rosewood furniture gleam with a dark luster.
Xiao Yunshan sat in the main seat, his face as gloomy as the sea before a storm.
On the guest seat to his right sat a man and a woman.
The man was young, dressed in the direct-disciple robes of Qinglan Sect, his features handsome yet carrying an aloof coldness that kept others at a distance.
The woman was likewise only fifteen or sixteen, with Qinglan Sect’s signature cloud-pattern silk cord wrapped around her sword scabbard.
The calm in her eyes concealed an arrogance toward mortals below the mountain.
The woman spoke, her voice crisp like shattering jade:
“Old King, the stripping of Bai Yao’s title as Saintess of Xuan Yu Sect was decided by the Enforcement Hall of Qinglan Sect, the superior sect. As long as you agree to let me and Junior Brother Luo enter the Cangjie Grotto-Heaven, I, Ye Tingyu, can guarantee that Bai Yao remains the legitimate consort of Xia Manor, and she can live on just fine.”
Xiao Yunshan’s fingers clenched the armrest, trembling slightly.
In his entire life, he had never hesitated so deeply over a single matter.