That giant python went “Bang!” and turned into a ring of white mist. Soon after, a woman in white with her hair tied up slowly revealed her figure from the mist.
Wenren Sheng curiously sized up this “Wenqu Star.”
She stood with her hands clasped together, rouge on her cheeks, and smoky makeup at the corners of her eyes slanting into her temples. It was like she wore a vivid floral mask, her appearance strikingly gorgeous and novel, like a character from a play.
Wenren Sheng’s pupils dilated slightly as he couldn’t help but whisper in admiration:
“So tall…”
She felt almost as tall as the Mountain God.
Wenren Sheng couldn’t help but feel envious. His feet unconsciously tiptoed, trying to make himself look less like a little bean.
After Wenqu Star took human form, she didn’t pause for a moment. She strode right up to Wenren Sheng and gently lifted his chin with her fan.
“You’re a heavenly spiritual root?”
She scrutinized Wenren Sheng with a doubtful gaze.
“Demon?”
Wenqu Star’s floral mask suddenly drew close, which was quite startling. Wenren Sheng let out an “Ah!” and hurriedly hid behind He Mu, only peeking out with two round eyes as he watched her.
“Not a demon,” he clung to He Mu’s robes with both hands and weakly retorted. “Do you have proof?”
After saying that, he opened his mouth again, wanting to call out to Wenqu Star once more, but He Mu promptly covered his mouth.
“Don’t casually call a god’s dharma name,” He Mu gave Wenqu Star a look and said. “What should we call you?”
Wenqu Star immediately held that azure-white jade fan in front of her lips and said reservedly, “Call me Yi Jinxiang.”
Wenren Sheng, mouth covered, mumbled:
“Yu Jinxiang?”
What a strange name.
Yi Jinxiang glanced sideways at Wenren Sheng a few times, her eyes turning as she asked, “The student you want me to take is him?”
He Mu nodded and said, “Smart, easy to teach.”
Seeing He Mu introduce him, Wenren Sheng quickly let go of his robes and took a few steps forward.
He looked up at Yi Jinxiang, then lowered his head and obediently bowed.
“Hello, Teacher.”
“…”
“…Oh, oh!” Yi Jinxiang jumped in surprise. Her eyes blinked as she awkwardly replied, “Oh, um, h-hello.”
After responding, she hurriedly fanned herself to cover her fluster and stole a few glances at Wenren Sheng from time to time. She muttered softly to herself, “Looks pretty obedient.”
After hearing that, He Mu’s expression shifted. He silently pulled Wenren Sheng back.
“If you’re not taking him,” he said bluntly, “then I’ll teach him myself.”
Yi Jinxiang snorted lightly as if she’d heard a joke, saying mockingly, “You, a mere mortal, acting like a teacher after descending to the mortal world?”
“But perfect timing. I don’t want to commute from Cang Province to this rundown mountain every day to teach either. My time is precious.”
“If you really want me to teach him, then I have to take him back to my place. Keeping a heavenly spiritual root by your side doesn’t do him any good anyway, right?”
“My place might be a bit cold, but it’s at least the Immortal Sect, third on the Heavenly List. Maybe this kid would prefer it…”
She kept muttering on and on, rambling for ages, but He Mu only gleaned one meaning from her words:
She wanted to steal him away.
“Keep dreaming,” He Mu frowned, held Wenren Sheng down, and interrupted. “He lives here. He’s not going anywhere.”
Seeing He Mu’s uncompromising attitude, Yi Jinxiang didn’t even bother pretending anymore. She tsked darkly and rolled her eyes hard.
Then, with a flick of her wrist, she folded her fan, tossed it casually onto the long table, conjured a chair, and sat down with her legs crossed.
“To be honest with you,” Yi Jinxiang propped her forehead and drawled lazily, “the Heavenly Court has been hunting for heavenly spiritual roots lately. I need to lay low.”
She paused, then turned her gaze to Wenren Sheng.
“Little one, your spirit root is incomplete, isn’t it?”
Wenren Sheng touched his chest upon hearing this and nodded.
He Mu had said before that his violet palace was empty, his sea of consciousness unstable, and his constitution too weak. He needed to nourish his body first before the other half of the spirit root could fuse back, or else he wouldn’t be able to withstand such powerful spiritual flow all at once.
But a spirit root wasn’t food that could be stored outside the body indefinitely. Fusion had a time limit.
Yi Jinxiang said, “That’s right. A heavenly spiritual root is fated for ascension. Once the spirit root separates from the body for a period, the Heavenly Court will inevitably detect it.”
She narrowed her eyes at Wenren Sheng and said slowly:
“So, you’re in great danger.”
Great danger.
Wenren Sheng repeated it in his mind.
For some reason, he didn’t feel scared at all. Instead, he felt a faint thrill.
Compared to holing up in the Scripture Pavilion reading books, he much preferred swinging a sword in battle himself. That felt far more like becoming a great hero.
Imagining himself with robes billowing, sword in hand, cutting down foes across the martial world, Wenren Sheng couldn’t help but puff up his cheeks and grin sneakily.
Seeing this, He Mu pinched his ear. “I say you’re in danger, and you’re grinning like an idiot.”
“No.”
Wenren Sheng stubbornly denied it and immediately schooled his little face.
“I don’t want trouble,” Yi Jinxiang switched legs and continued lazily. “Besides, if I drag this kid back to the Heavenly Court, I’d take first place in this year’s Immortal Registry Grand Competition for sure. You’re asking for my help—aren’t you worried?”
He Mu tugged at the corner of his mouth but didn’t reply.
He hadn’t invited Yi Jinxiang just to teach Wenren Sheng literacy. The main goal was to help him improve his enlightenment and sense the heavens and earth.
Over this past month, He Mu had tried every day to suppress the other half of the heavenly spiritual root’s power, aiming to return it to Wenren Sheng’s body as soon as possible.
Yet he’d still underestimated the heavenly spiritual root’s growth speed.
It absorbed natural qi almost daily. In just half a year, its power had now reached the Soul Formation Realm level.
If this continued, the Heavenly Court would discover the heavenly spiritual root sooner or later. They might even strike Wenren Sheng down.
He needed help.
Wenqu Star was the best choice. She could help Wenren Sheng improve his enlightenment the fastest and fuse the heavenly spiritual root early.
He Mu smoothed Wenren Sheng’s hair and said, “Half a year ago, this kid used my Amber Gold Sword to kill a Mahayana Realm sword cultivator. Is that qualification enough for your student?”
Yi Jinxiang immediately scoffed. “What a joke. A kid who hasn’t even grown hair yet…”
Halfway through, she glanced at the obediently standing Wenren Sheng nearby and lightly coughed, changing her tune:
“He only has half a spirit root. Even if it’s a heavenly spiritual root, it’s nowhere near enough to wield divine weapons. What nonsense.”
Wenren Sheng grew anxious at this and cut in before He Mu could speak. He mustered his courage and said, “No joke. I did it with my own power. I can talk to these weapons.”
Yi Jinxiang still didn’t take it seriously upon hearing this.
“Is that so?” she said offhandedly. “If you really have that ability, then I must have been blind.”
Seeing her disbelief, Wenren Sheng pursed his lips unhappily.
Wenqu Star, such a pretender.
But Wenren Sheng wasn’t one to give up easily. His gaze passed over Yi Jinxiang and landed on the azure-white jade fan on the long table behind her.
Facts speak louder than words.
That was something he’d learned from reading these past few days.
The Mountain God had told him that a heavenly spiritual root could communicate with all things in the world—it was “nature” itself. If he could resonate with Color Kill, he could definitely communicate with this azure-white jade fan too.
Wenren Sheng’s mouth turned down as he tried hard to mobilize the thin spiritual power in his body, attempting to resonate with the azure-white jade fan.
The fan had never touched Wenren Sheng, unlike Color Kill which was proactive. But luckily, he’d had one enlightenment experience before, so responding to a divine weapon would be much easier now.
He held his breath until his face turned red, exhausting all his mental power, and finally made the azure-white jade fan tremble slightly.
He Mu coughed lightly, signaling Yi Jinxiang to look at her weapon.
Yi Jinxiang turned her head and sneered. “Just this level…”
Before she finished, under her gaze, the fan slowly floated into midair. Like a flower bud in spring, it gradually unfurled its ribs.
And at the center of the fan surface, spiritual power spontaneously gathered into three clumsy characters.
Yu Jinxiang(Tulip).
Yi Jinxiang: “…”
Wenren Sheng felt it would be impolite to touch her fan without permission, so he didn’t try to make it land in his hand. It just hovered in midair like that.
After doing all this, Wenren Sheng let out a long breath and looked back at Yi Jinxiang, speaking with much more confidence.
“No lie. It’s real.”
He really could take down a Mahayana Realm sword cultivator, and he really could talk to divine weapons.
Yi Jinxiang stared at the azure-white jade fan, her eyes deep. She was silent for a long time.
Weapons ascended alongside their cultivators. When the cultivator gained a divine graven, their held weapons would transform into spiritual “divine weapons.”
The bond between wielder and weapon was closer than blood kin.
And on their first meeting, Wenren Sheng had directly manipulated this divine weapon that had been with her for centuries.
That was a terrifying ability.
Yi Jinxiang was truly silent for a very long time—long enough that Wenren Sheng started to panic—before she finally turned her gaze back to him.
This time, without scrutiny, more like an equal stance. She nodded at Wenren Sheng and asked:
“You’re called Wenren Sheng?”
Wenren Sheng nodded vigorously. “Yeah!”
“What do you want to learn?”
Wenren Sheng thought for a moment and replied, “Things that can make me a better great hero after entering the jianghu, and then, later, help me cultivate and ascend faster. I want to learn it all.”
Yi Jinxiang raised her hand, and the hovering azure-white jade fan flew back into her grasp on its own.
“Alright, I’ll take you as my disciple,” she paused, then emphasized, “Just for this half year. But I’ll do my utmost to teach you the ability to gain enlightenment of heaven and earth.”
Wenqu Star was still Wenqu Star after all. As a teacher, she was far more reliable than He Mu.
Just in arithmetic alone, in one afternoon, Wenren Sheng had surpassed He Mu’s clumsy arithmetic skills. He could solve any chicken and rabbit problem effortlessly.
When Yi Jinxiang left that night, Wenren Sheng was a bit reluctant. He pestered her to tell a few more Heavenly Court anecdotes before finally saying goodbye.
Before leaving, Yi Jinxiang gave Wenren Sheng a scroll called Heavenly Court Secret History, which recorded various Heavenly Court trivia. She instructed him to read it secretly when He Mu wasn’t around.
Wenren Sheng hugged the scroll, bouncing along beside He Mu as they happily headed toward his bedroom.
He Mu glanced sideways at him. Under the bright moon, he could see Wenren Sheng’s blue eyes sparkling brighter than the stars.
“So happy, huh?” He Mu looked away and said sourly. “How come you were never this happy when I was your teacher?”
Wenren Sheng immediately dropped his smile and retorted, “Don’t talk nonsense.”
He Mu shrugged and asked the same trick question again. “Nonsense? So, do you like her more, or me more?”
Wenren Sheng wasn’t falling for it anymore. He pouted, grabbed He Mu, and earnestly lectured him. “The Mountain God is so childish.”
He Mu smiled and deliberately poked Wenren Sheng’s forehead. “You ignore me, and I can’t even get mad? You kid don’t make sense.”
Wenren Sheng shook his head.
“Not making no sense.”
Then he beckoned to He Mu mysteriously. “Squat down a bit. I have something to tell you.”
He Mu squatted down as told and leaned toward him.
“Go on. I’m listening.”
Wenren Sheng scooted closer to He Mu’s side, leaned into his ear, and said in a sweet voice, “Wenqu Star is great. She can teach me everything, and I learn super fast…”
He Mu snorted lightly and interrupted. “Alright, alright. I get it, you like her. Why make me hear it again?”
With that, He Mu braced his knee to stand up.
Wenren Sheng panicked and quickly grabbed him. “I haven’t finished yet!”
“So what do you want to say?”
“I-I-I…”
Wenren Sheng swallowed and blurted out anxiously,
“I just realized, she’s great, but, but…”
“The person I like most in my heart is still you!”
After saying that, Wenren Sheng closed his eyes and planted a “Muah!” on He Mu’s cheek. Then his face flushed red like a little firecracker, and he darted into his room.
Bang!
The door shut.
The corridor air suddenly fell deathly silent, leaving He Mu alone, stunned in place.
He was stunned for a moment before he touched the spot that Wenren Sheng had just kissed.
“………”
The person he liked?
And… the most favorite one?
He Mu blinked, then laughed out loud belatedly.
He suddenly realized that the shy kid who used to blush easily and stutter when speaking had somehow learned how to express his affection.
He looked at his palm and muttered to himself,
“This is really…”
Before he could finish his words, the rainwater accumulated at the eaves untimely splashed onto his head, wetting half of his bangs.
