Ze Tian Ji

When she awoke, she realized that her clothes had already been put back, her belt fastened once more. The clothes were cleaned up extremely well, with not even a speck of grass on them. There was not even any evidence of last night’s escape upon them. She could clearly feel bandages underneath her clothes, and she did not know how the wound had been treated, but the pain had been greatly alleviated. She even felt that she could perform some small movements.

She opened her eyes wide, looking at her bosom, and felt where the bandages were applied. As she imagined the scene that had occurred previously, her expression became somewhat blank.

After a while, she began to strenuously look around, looking for Zhexiu’s figure.

Zhexiu was squatting at the edge of the grass, the place on this piece of solid ground that was the farthest from her. The hem of his clothes had been torn up, causing his two legs to stick out. His posture was rather ugly, making him seem just like a dog.

The torn off hem of his clothes had probably become the bandages wrapped around her abdomen.

She once again looked at her bosom, and for some reason, she felt extremely wronged. She thought to herself, "How could you take off someone’s clothes without even asking permission first?"

It was actually truly amazing. Once she no longer needed to conceal her gender, she seemingly began to think like a young lady. For instance, when referring to herself, she used "someone" instead of "I", only it had not become "this one" right away.

The more she thought about it, the more wronged she felt, especially since Zhexiu had not turned around from beginning to end. This made her extremely uncomfortable... and then she began to cry.

Squatting by the edge of the grass and hearing her cry, Zhexiu’s back began to tremble.

After a while, he realized why the crying had not stopped. Following the sound, he sat down in front of her and said as soothingly as he could, "Don’t cry anymore."

Qi Jian temporarily stopped crying, her small face covered in tears.

Zhexiu paused, then added on, "...or else it will attract more monsters, which is very troublesome."

This was what it meant to have nothing to say but still finding something to say.

Whether adult or youth, in general, men never understood that, in a situation where they had nothing to say but still insisted on saying something, it was the same as turning nothing into something, and also the equivalent of courting an early death.

Qi Jian stared blankly at him, and then began to cry once more. She made sure to not make any sound, which had her seem even more pitiful.

Zhexiu silently pondered on what to do, then explained, "You know that I can’t see anything right now, so..."

Without even waiting for him to finish, Qi Jian began to cry even more grievously. She thought with deep discomfort, although you didn’t see, this one’s entire body was touched all over by you, so are you saying you won’t admit it? Could it be that you aren’t taking responsibility?

Zhexiu felt his head hurt very much. He had lived for more than ten years, and who knew how many terrifying monsters and demons he had encountered on the snowy plains. He had been through countless life-and-death situations, but... he had never encountered such a situation. He thought to himself, what to do? If she continues to cry like this, what will I do if it affects the wound?

Hearing Qi Jian’s sobbing, he was rather restless, and also somewhat confused. He thought to himself, as the last disciple of Mount Li’s sect master, your cultivation is so high. At such a young age, you’re already at the middle level of Ethereal Opening. Your swordplay is so strong that perhaps even Guan Feibai isn’t even your match. Your skills in comprehension are great, such that at the Mausoleum of Books, you directly read up to the third monolith. No matter how one looks at it, you’re extraordinary, so how is it that against all expectations... you would cry?

He did not know how to solve this, so he just silently sat to the side. Little did he know that his response happened to luckily coincide with a famous maxim on man-woman interactions.

The problems of a woman’s mood could only ever be solved by the passage of time. In many cases, they simply felt aggrieved and sad and want to cry, so it was for the best to just let them cry. Accompanying them involved offering a handkerchief when necessary or proffering a shoulder when needed, but it certainly did not require sitting on the side with an incessant stream of consoling words. When they still did not calm down and did not feel like talking, anything you did was just making more trouble.

As expected, the crying finally died down. Like a startled bird, Qi Jian lowered her head, and asked a little ashamedly, "You... did you already know?"

This question had two meanings and it was exceptionally difficult to answer—if he had known beforehand, then all those times where their bodies touched afterwards, especially that scene which had just occurred, would incur an even more negative interpretation. Fortunately, Zhexiu was not very good with words, so he maintained his silence—silence had many meanings, so Qi Jian could pick the explanation that made her feel the most comfortable.

In truth, Zhexiu really did not know.

Over the course of their escape, there were a few times, especially when he was carrying her over the mountains and listening to her soft interjections, that he had thought this way, but these were just passing fancies that he did not dwell on much. This was because it was impossible for him to imagine that the last disciple of Mount Li’s Sect Master, the most cherished junior of the Divine State’s Seven Laws, the young genius who entered the Proclamation of Azure Sky at a mere twelve years old... was actually a girl.

He recalled the scene on the first day in the grass hut back at the Mausoleum of Books, but this time there was naturally a completely different explanation for it. Back then, it was the seven of them living under the same roof. Zhexiu, Chen Changsheng and Tang Thirty-Six stayed in the inner room while the four disciples of the Mount Li Sword Sect stayed in the outer room. Every day when they slept, Gou Hanshi, Guan Feibai, and Liang Banhu squeezed together while Qi Jian had a space for herself. Crucially, Qi Jian had a blanket for herself. At the time, Zhexiu and Chen Changsheng felt that Gou Hanshi and the rest pampered Qi Jian too much, or that the last disciple of the Sect Master must have had some special status. But now he understood that this was a division between men and women.

What should be done next? Zhexiu was silent while Qi Jian did not know what to say. An awkward atmosphere lingered between this young man and young lady.

Just at this moment, a rumble came from deep within the plains, closely followed by a thunderous roar. Zhexiu’s expression subtly changed as he inclined his ear to listen, confirming that it was some sort of extremely powerful and terrifying monster. He decided that it was not something he could handle, so he took out a powder that would eradicate their scent and scattered it all around them, then just like he had done every other day and night, he went up to Qi Jian then turned around and squatted down.

Over the course of that one day and night, they had repeated this sequence many times. Logically, they should have been very proficient at this, but perhaps because he had learned Qi Jian was a girl, Zhexiu’s movements were somewhat stiff, the two hands that were thrust back were rather rigid. He seemed just like a duck that was just about to get cooked.

Seeing this picture, Qi Jian’s tears broke into a smile. She lightly patted his back, indicating that he needed to squat a little lower. Then she slowly got on, her two hands very naturally wrapping around his neck.

Maybe it was his mind playing tricks on him, but Zhexiu felt that the feeling from his back was much softer than usual.

A dozen li away, the ground under the grass was constantly bulging and thunderous and terrifying roars came out of it as some strange animal was swiftly advancing forwards. The sun was blazing hot, and its rays penetrated through the grass into those pools of water, revealing the figures of countless monsters. It was like a tide, chasing after the two of them. It was an extremely breathtaking sight.

At the front of this monster tide, Zhexiu and Qi Jian faced the ever-rising and ever-brightening sun, wading through the water all the way. She was still his eyes, and he was still her legs.

"Which direction should we go?"

"In the southwest, there seems to be a big meadow. The ground seems to be higher there, so why don’t we go and see? That sound seems to be coming from the east, so you might have go a bit faster."

This conversation’s end was followed by a long period of silence, only broken by the sound of feet breaking through the water and splashing it around as the grass gradually grew higher.

After who knows how long had passed, Qi Jian whispered, "Were you really surprised?"

After a moment of silence, Zhexiu replied, "Yes."

She drew closer to his neck, leaned against his shoulders, smelled the familiar scent, and then whispered once more, "What are you thinking?"

Zhexiu did not answer, because he did not know how to answer. Thinking? Thinking about what? About how my fingertips on your slightly shaking body almost slipped once? No, at the moment, that wolf youth’s mind was completely blank. He was not thinking about anything.

She thought to herself... did silence mean he’s unhappy? After a while, she whispered even more softly, and rather nervously, "Then do you think it was better for me to be a boy or a girl?"

There was no evil motive behind the question, and it went straight to the point.

Zhexiu thought to himself, since yesterday all you did was ’mm’ and ’ah’ while tightly holding onto me all the way. If you were a man, then it truly wouldn’t have been very becoming. Thus, he said, "A girl is better."

Qi Jian felt slightly ashamed, and whispered as softly as a mosquito, "It’s always a good thing when women are together, this must be what you mean."

Zhexiu thought to himself, just because it’s worse than usual, your conduct is no longer as impressive as it was before, how come?

In this continent, there was a folktale, a story about how a boar demi-human carried his wife on his back.

Yes, whether it was a story or fact, in the vast majority of cases, it should always be the man carrying the woman. It was very hard to imagine the opposite.

So in this vast and boundless plain, Zhexiu carried the young girl Qi Jian on his back. On the other end of the plains, Chen Changsheng was also carrying a girl on his back.

He had waded through the plains for a long time, and yet he was still in the wetland. The blazing sun illuminated the reeds within the water as well as many unnamed grasses, as if it wanted to turn all plant life into gold and silver carvings. Yet he did not sweat a single drop as his body continued to emit that cold qi, dispersing the scorching heat and resisting the sunlight.

Her eyes closed, Xu Yourong leaned against his back, her eyelashes unblinking, and occasionally she would purse her lips. It seemed that with Chen Changsheng there to serve as a natural pot of cold water, she was sleeping very soundly.

Up until now, there had also been no sign of Nanke’s pursuit. Chen Changsheng thought to himself that even the demons would not be willing to adventure into these plains. They had most likely given up, which made him feel somewhat more at ease. As his mind relaxed, his wounds and exhaustion suddenly struck him like a rushing tide. Like sludge, they trapped his two legs, imbuing him with the desire to not take another step forward.

Around him was nothing but grass and wetland with no place to sit down and rest. Chen Changsheng gazed at the grass that was taller than a man as he was forced to continue walking with Xu Yourong on his back. Only this time, he was no longer walking forward, but in a circle, stamping down the reeds and grass all around him. Gradually, a piece of flat ground formed from crushed grass took shape before his eyes.

Under the cover of the surrounding reeds and grass, it was very difficult for people outside to see within, but if there was someone that flew up into the sky and looked down, they would see a little circle about a zhang wide made of grass. Her arms wrapped around her legs, Xu Yourong lay on that pile of crushed grass. She seemed very weak and pitiful, like a newly-conceived child.

Chen Changsheng sat by her side, his head lowered as he examined her face. He gazed at it for a long time, his expression very serious, as though he had just realized something.