The exhausted Jiang Xunyi managed to roll his eyes. Just as he was about to speak, Yun Xie speedily pulled him into an alley to continue running. Jiang Xunyi had always had a highly retentive memory, so he could not help but startle: “This road…… How come I remember… this alley wasn’t here last time?”
Yun Xie didn’t even look back: “That’s right, it wasn’t. What, you want to double back?”
As another bolt of lightning struck down, Jiang Xunyi let out a wry laugh and his temper instantly disappeared. But just at this moment, both his and Yun Xie’s feet slipped at the same time. Caught off guard, both staggered in place. Amidst the deafening crack of thunder and lightning, Jiang Xunyi instantaneously stretched out to push Yun Xie away. But Yun Xie had long been prepared for this. He threw himself onto Jiang Xunyi, protecting him in his arms.
Shocked, Jiang Xunyi hurriedly tried to elbow Yun Xie’s chest: “Get away, I don’t need you to block for me.”
At this moment between life and death, Yun Xie instead smiled. His shallow breath brushed past Jiang Xunyi’s ears, suddenly carrying an indescribable gentleness: “Ah-Xun, in fact, I’ve always…”
Jiang Xunyi: “Huh? Where’d the lightning go?”
Yun Xie choked on his own words on the spot. He only felt the second half of that sentence had just slammed back into his stomach, and he almost couldn’t take a breath. While stewing on this annoyance, he finally reacted: Given the speed of that lightning, in the time that he and Jiang Xunyi had been shoving each other back and forth, they should have long since been killed by the lightning strike. However, their surroundings were now entirely calm. Even that booming and rolling thunder could no longer be heard.
He observed their surroundings and was immediately taken by surprise: not only had the dark clouds and lightning disappeared, but even the small alley they had passed through to get here was gone without a trace. Above them was a clean dark blue sky, without even a shadow of a cloud. Two bright moons hung high above, one full and the other crescent, their distant light illuminating each other.
He and Jiang Xunyi were actually lying on top of a vast black ocean, so infinite that he could not see the water’s end even when straining his eyes. Yet they did not sink; the water did not even dampen their clothes. However, the sea surface still wasn’t calm——each wave seemed to move with fiercer momentum than the last, overlapping and crashing down in front of them. Even experts of Lightness Skill1 like Yun Xie and Jiang Xunyi had trouble standing steady.
In this hollow emptiness, there was only the boundless sea and boundless sky. Even those with mighty powers could not help but feel immense awe and reverence, as if they had become naught but a lone soul between the heavens and the earth, incapable of understanding from whence they came and to where they will go…..
Yun Xie bowed his head to meet Jiang Xunyi’s eyes. With rare seriousness, he sighed: “Only today do I now realize the sense of scale in the phrase ‘Akin to a single reed, drifting over infinite vast emptiness’2.”
Jiang Xunyi expressionlessly patted his back: “Is Sect Master Yun snug and cozy pressing down like this? Could you first get off this little brother’s body?”
Yun Xie: “……”
He slowly climbed up and shook his head: “How in the world have I managed to stay friends with a dull log like you for so many years?”
Jiang Xunyi scoffed and stood up too. He strolled forward on the surface of the sea and murmured to himself: “A fantasy scape?”
Yun Xie stood on the sea surface, his body continuously rising and falling with the waves. He shook his head: “Who could have that level of skill to make both you and I unconsciously fall into an illusion? In addition, the most important thing to note is——” He maliciously glanced over Jiang Xunyi’s body: “Those in a fantasy scape should lack a sense of olfaction and taste, but Ah-Xun, I can smell your body fragrance really strongly~!”
Jiang Xunyi smiled coldly and waved his hand to strike the air. A dragon of fire suddenly ascended in the empty air, and rushed towards Yun Xie.
Yun Xie elegantly dodged to the side, but he noticed that under the fire dragon’s light, the sea waves appeared somewhat strange and eerie. Distracted, he quickly said: “Wait a second. Ah-Xun, illuminate these waves again.”
Jiang Xunyi saw he didn’t appear to be joking, so he followed Yun Xie’s words to stretch out his hand and open his palm upwards. A cluster of flames immediately ignited on his jade-white palm and slowly floated into the air. The flames gradually grew larger, brightly shining over their surroundings.
This time they both saw the truth. When every wave rose to its crest, it would take the shape of a huge human face, making menacing gestures3 as it crashed back into the sea. Although each human face had different expressions, from joy or anger to sadness or pain, every single one was exaggerated to the extreme.
Jiang Xunyi involuntarily exclaimed: “The Heart Demon Cave!”
Yun Xie: “What’s that?”
Jiang Xunyi’s eyes were fixated on the changing faces, as his mouth explained: “The Heart Demon Cave is a forbidden place on the Hidden Spirit Mountain. It’s said that after entering this cave, the emotions4 in one’s inner heart will be greatly magnified, stimulating people to breach their shackles and act as best suits their heart’s desires. I’ve never been in there, but I have seen some picture scrolls showing what the inside of the cave looks like. These human faces look exactly the same as those painted on the walls of the cave.” He now had a fairly good idea of what was going on: this boundless ocean was most likely the Heart Demon Sea, the location where Demon Sovereign Xuan Li’s body was hidden according to legend.
After hearing this, Yun Xie frowned: “But how come I feel this wave is deliberately hiding from us? Check this out.” As he spoke, he stepped forward in the direction of the current, and the sea waves indeed retreated backwards. They still lapped against Yun Xie’s feet, but not a single drop of water splashed onto his body.
Behind him, Jiang Xunyi held his sword out and spoke coldly: “Reckless and heedless thing. Since it knows to fear us, it shouldn’t appear here and try to threaten us!”
As he spoke, he flew into the air and leapt in front of Yun Xie. He raised his hand to call Extinguished Flower to him, and the sword blade suddenly flared up with a bright light. Jiang Xunyi grasped the hilt with both hands, and chopped straight at the huge waves before them!
The sword energy overflowed, akin to a bolt of lightning splitting open a mountain, the crackling electricity dazzling the eyes. Powerful enough to make the mountains cry out and the seas howl, the sword sliced to the very end, actually splitting this monstrous tide into two clean halves.
Yun Xie couldn’t help but cheer and applaud at this breathtakingly perfect execution.
With a roaring boom, the seawater parted open along Jiang Xunyi’s strike. A high platform covered with ice and snow broke out of the water. Right in the middle of the platform sat a dark black wood coffin.
The instant Yun Xie saw that coffin, his heart inexplicably jumped in his chest. His head began to spin from dizziness, and he hurriedly massaged his temples.
Jiang Xunyi directly formed a secret seal to ride his sword up to the high platform. Worried he would run into something, Yun Xie refocused his attention and followed him up too.
Jiang Xunyi did not notice his strange behavior. Hearing Yun Xie come up, he didn’t even turn around: “The way I see it, this coffin definitely holds Demon Sovereign Xuan Li’s body. No wonder we suddenly broke in here——we must have hit the enchanted boundary.”
Standing behind him, Yun Xie only felt his heart beat faster and faster, seeming like it was about to burst out of his chest. His ears buzzed incessantly, to the point where he could hardly understand what Jiang Xunyi was saying. He only felt that Jiang Xunyi’s voice was so clear and bright as to touch his heart, seemingly right next to him yet also far away. An infinite longing suddenly rose within him, a longing that Yun Xie had bitterly repressed for years.
It seemed as if a voice in the bottom of his heart was madly and frantically repeating: “Possess him——make him become completely yours——make him never able to leave you again!”
Something was wrong! Was this an Inner Demon? Or something else? Yun Xie used all his life’s willpower to restrain the thought of rushing to Jiang Xunyi’s side. He stretched out a hand to firmly grip the sharp edge of Bright River’s blade, and the sudden jolt of severe pain managed to clear his mind.
However, on the other side of the high platform, the ignorant Jiang Xunyi slowly pushed open the coffin lid——
Inside the coffin, a pale face with abundant charm and allure appeared, the hair on its temples as black as ink. Its exquisite facial features were arranged in a serene expression, with the hint of a smile on its lips.
Jiang Xunyi leaned forward on the coffin and reached out to touch its chin: “This Demon Sovereign looks deceptively decent…”
Upon speaking to this point, something tightened around his waist. He was dragged straight down from the side of the coffin and fiercely pressed down on the ground.
Jiang Xunyi’s back stung from the fall. Just as he was about to let loose a string of profanities, he looked up to see Yun Xie staring at him with red eyes, a touch of insanity in his expression.
Jiang Xunyi was shocked: “Yun Xie? Ah-Xie5! What are you doing?”
Yun Xie gasped heavily, apparently trying to struggle against something. But ever since the moment Demon Sovereign Xuan Li’s face had been revealed, he could no longer suppress his heart’s surging desire. While Jiang Xunyi was still calling his name, Yun Xie abruptly bowed his head and began to kiss Jiang Xunyi’s cheek in a frenzy.
But amidst this madness, a faint feeling of sorrow and despair sprung from the bottom of his heart, like the millennium-old eternal ice at the center of a blazing fire: inconspicuous, yet unignorable.
Like a poisonous worm eating away at one’s bones.
The utterly dumbstruck and stupefied Jiang Xunyi could now completely confirm Yun Xie had been bewitched. While struggling to turn his head away, he managed to extract a hand from Yun Xie’s crushing grasp, and gathered his strength to strike at Yun Xie’s neck.
Out of fear of hurting Yun Xie, he did not dare to use his full might, but this strike was still by no means light. However, Yun Xie only trembled slightly at this blow. He instead formed a secret seal to call out his Binding Spirit Rope, and tightly tied up Jiang Xunyi’s hands.
This Binding Spirit Rope was a Solar Envy Sect magical instrument which tightened the more one struggled and moved. With the apparently insane Yun Xie pressing him down on the ground and then binding up his hands, even with Jiang Xunyi’s level of skill, he was still at his wit’s end.
Yun Xie’s kisses moved downwards from Jiang Xunyi’s cheek. All of a sudden, he bit straight into Jiang Xunyi’s neck. This bite used enormous force, and fresh blood immediately began to pour out of the wound.
Jiang Xunyi sucked in a breath, and couldn’t resist yelling: “Holy shit——Yun Xie, you fucking…… take a clear look at who I am!”
Yun Xie’s entire body quaked, and he slowly raised his head. His lips were covered with Jiang Xunyi’s fresh blood, his hair in a mess, his phoenix eyes entirely bloodshot. That normally warm6 face no longer showed even the slightest trace of a smile. Instead, his expression was one of indescribably desolate sorrow and grief.
Jiang Xunyi had not expected him to actually look like this, and he felt some inexplicable sadness himself. But he soon discovered that Yun Xie’s expression was rapidly changing and his body could not stop trembling, as if he was struggling against something.
He immediately realized that Yun Xie’s own consciousness was currently fighting hard to regain control of his body. Jiang Xunyi quickly took the opportunity to kick his body off of himself. He then rapidly retreated backwards to lean on the coffin. Numerous thoughts raced through his mind, but none could explain the situation in front of him.
Yun Xie boasted immense spiritual power as well as a firm and resolute will—in this respect, even Jiang Xunyi was far inferior to him. The two of them had also constantly been together all this time. No matter what, there was no way he could have been controlled by some demonic creature without either of them noticing whatsoever!
Jiang Xunyi didn’t have the time to think about it any further. With great difficulty, he managed to form a secret seal with his bound-up hands to call Extinguished Flower out and slice apart the Binding Spirit Robe tying him up. But just as his hands regained freedom, a heavy weight landed on his body—Yun Xie once again tackled him onto the half-opened coffin lid.
The hard edge of the coffin banged right into his waist. Immediately afterwards, the entire weight of a well-built man pressed down on him. Jiang Xunyi saw stars from the sheer pain. On the other hand, the crazed Yun Xie’s strength seemed to have multiplied; he held Jiang Xunyi down to the point where he could barely move.
Jiang Xunyi lay helplessly on the coffin cover. He felt Yun Xie lowering his head down, seeming about to kiss his lips. He subconsciously turned his head away, and happened to see the face of Demon Sovereign Xuan Li still lying in the coffin.
That face which had clearly just been still and tranquil, was now actually twisted into a bizarre smile!
Author’s Notes (translated): In short, at present, Little Jiang and Little Yun are still tracing through these past events in the illusion—Blame me for not saying it clearly. They are currently lost in the “past”, though Little Jiang is about to wake up soon~ after this intimate contact ^_^ The main story is also coming back soon~
Footnotes:
1. 轻功 = Lightness Skill = the ability to lighten the body and move with great agility & swiftness. At high proficiency, practitioners of this skill can run across water, leap to the top of trees, or even glide through the air. Credits again to https://immortalmountain.wordpress.com/glossary/wuxia-xianxia-xuanhuan-terms/
2. Oh boy poetic phrasing. The original phrase is 纵一苇之所如，凌万顷之茫然, originating from Su Shi’s piece of rhymed prose 前赤壁赋 [Former Ode on the Red Cliffs]. I believe it’s used to describe a single boat floating along a vast river. Please let me know if you have a better way to translate this 😛
3. 张牙舞爪 lit. “bare teeth and brandish claws” = to make threatening gestures
4. 喜怒哀乐 = the four emotions of Happiness, Anger, Sorrow, Joy
5. 阿歇 = Jiang Xunyi’s childhood nickname for Yun Xie, taking Yun Xie’s name and adding “Ah-” in front. While Yun Xie still frequently calls Jiang Xunyi “Ah-Xun”, it’s implied that the very proud Jiang Xunyi quit using this affectionate childhood nickname a while ago—except for rare circumstances like this.