Ye Chenyan handed him the menu, his gaze quietly drifting to the side.
Amid the curling steam, Yu Qingtang’s face had been flushed faintly pink by the heat. Beads of water clung to his skin, while only his eyes remained bright and clear as he studied the menu with great enthusiasm.
“This one—this was delicious last time. I’ll order a serving for you.”
Ye Chenyan stared without blinking. “All right.”
Yu Qingtang asked again, “What about this one?”
“All right.”
Yu Qingtang abruptly turned and caught him looking straight at him.
“You weren’t even looking at the menu, were you?”
“No.” Ye Chenyan propped up his chin and laughed, now openly lounging there to watch him. “I’ve never cared much about food in the first place. If you say something tastes good, it usually does.”
“Fine, fine.” Yu Qingtang took the menu into his own hands. “I’m the great general of enjoying life, after all. Leave eating, drinking, and having fun to me.”
He ordered several dishes in one smooth burst, remembered to order some for Scholar Xiao as well, then turned and mischievously splashed water at Ye Chenyan.
“Hey!”
Ye Chenyan could effortlessly evade a killing move from an Out-of-Body cultivator, yet somehow failed to dodge Yu Qingtang’s splash attack.
Water dripped down his face.
“I’m fighting back!”
Yu Qingtang immediately stopped. “All right. Truce!”
Unconvinced, Ye Chenyan reached over and tapped the top of the wooden partition.
“Shouldn’t I at least get to retaliate once?”
“No.” Yu Qingtang was perfectly righteous. “I’m far too weak. Not even once.”
Ye Chenyan said nothing, but he did not withdraw his hand either. He clearly looked ready to make trouble.
Yu Qingtang poked his finger.
“What are you doing? You’re crossing the boundary—ow!”
Ye Chenyan caught his finger between two of his own.
“Are you a crab or something?” Yu Qingtang demanded furiously.
He could not pull his hand free and could only watch as Ye Chenyan drew it toward his side.
“What are you doing? What are you doing? I’m going to scream!”
“You already did.” Ye Chenyan laughed and squeezed his finger, saying wickedly, “Now that I’ve caught you, tell me...”
Fortunately, the food arrived before he could continue, gliding toward them along streams of light.
Yu Qingtang carefully wiggled his finger.
“Truce! Eat first. Come on, take the dishes down!”
“It wasn’t easy for me to gain the upper hand.” Ye Chenyan sounded reluctant as he squeezed his finger again. “You might not take the bait next time.”
“There’s no ‘might’ about it,” Yu Qingtang said honestly. “I definitely won’t.”
“I knew it.”
Despite saying that, Ye Chenyan released him.
He turned and moved the dishes to the edge of the pool, then leaned around the wooden partition.
“Over here. Put the food here—it’ll be easier to eat.”
He muttered, “It would be easiest if we just removed the partition.”
“Hm?” Yu Qingtang immediately clutched the wooden board. “Keep your hands off my board!”
“Your board?” Ye Chenyan raised an eyebrow.
“Nobody-Likes-Me’s board.” Yu Qingtang let go and raised his chopsticks. “This mushroom banquet is delicious. We ordered it last time too!”
Ye Chenyan leaned against the edge of the pool just as he did and glanced at him from the corner of his eye—
More than half of Yu Qingtang’s body was currently above the water. In the hazy steam, even his cool, pale skin had been tinted pink, all the way to his fingertips.
Ye Chenyan abruptly tore his gaze away. Deliberately looking elsewhere, he randomly picked up a bite of food and asked, “Last time, did you also...”
“Last time, we had private bathing rooms. It wasn’t like this,” Yu Qingtang casually clarified, completely unaware of himself.
He shifted into a more comfortable position, exposing his jade-pale back, still dotted with droplets of water. As he moved, the droplets slid down the shallow groove of his spine and disappeared beneath the water past the curve of his waist.
Ye Chenyan closed his eyes.
Yu Qingtang stuffed a piece of meat into his mouth and narrowed his eyes in bliss.
“Something unexpected happened when we came last time, so we never got to enjoy the bath properly.”
Ye Chenyan’s ears were red. He no longer dared look in Yu Qingtang’s direction and forced his racing heart under control, making his mind focus on the subject instead. Only after a delayed beat did he remember.
“Oh. That day.”
He lowered his eyes.
“The day you came to help put the Spirit-Locking Ring on me.”
“I told Candle Nine Yin not to bring you, but he...”
Yu Qingtang turned around with half a scorpion dangling from his mouth.
Ye Chenyan’s eyelid twitched.
Yu Qingtang was clearly trying to frighten him with the menacing-looking scorpion, but Ye Chenyan had no attention to spare for it.
“Really?” Yu Qingtang deliberately leaned closer to peer at him. “You truly didn’t want to see me then?”
Unable to avoid him and no longer capable of restraining himself, Ye Chenyan simply allowed himself to look into his eyes.
“...That was a lie,” he said, his voice slightly hoarse.
“I wanted to see you very much.”
He laughed quietly.
“But I wanted to act a little more sensible. A little calmer.”
He reached out and touched Yu Qingtang’s forehead.
“As though I could still keep my composure. As though I wasn’t already that desperate.”
The scorpion nearly fell from Yu Qingtang’s mouth with a plop.
He hurriedly hid his face behind the wooden partition, leaving only his eyes visible.
The hand Ye Chenyan had touched him with was shockingly hot, and Yu Qingtang’s face seemed to burn along with it.
Eyes round, he clung to the partition and mumbled, “Th-that’s fine.”
“It’s rare for you to have something I can help with.”
He hurriedly changed the subject.
“Are you all right? Why is your hand so hot? Should I add some cold water for you?”
“I may not be all right.” Ye Chenyan closed his eyes, his brow tightly furrowed as his throat moved. “I think I’m...”
Yu Qingtang’s eyes widened in panic.
“Don’t—don’t say anything...”
Ye Chenyan exhaled deeply.
“About to break through.”
Yu Qingtang froze. “Huh?”
He stared blankly.
“A breakthrough?”
“Oh. Oh.” He nodded with some confusion and leaned over the partition. “Do you need me to guard you?”
Ye Chenyan had already sat cross-legged in the water. His aura rose steadily, and he entered late Nascent Soul almost as naturally as water flowing into a channel. The entire process could not have gone more smoothly.
Yu Qingtang smacked his lips.
“Seems like you don’t. It’s already over?”
Ye Chenyan opened his eyes. The sharp light within them withdrew, and his presence was even stronger than before.
Seeing him complete the breakthrough with such effortless calm, Yu Qingtang sat back down and breathed a sigh of relief.
So he had merely been about to break through.
As expected of Long Aotian. Even breakthroughs were as casual and easy as drinking water for him.
After marveling inwardly for a moment, Yu Qingtang said casually, “We had to leave early last time, so nobody got to enjoy themselves. Chi Yantian originally said we should come back another day and have a proper soak.”
“But I thought we would have to bring you once you were free to move around, so I told him to postpone it.”
“Then we happened to run into Nobody-Likes-Me tonight, and I remembered.”
He narrowed his eyes and sank into the water, reclining comfortably against the pool’s edge as he talked to Ye Chenyan.
Once he submerged, Ye Chenyan could no longer see him. Yet his voice still came through the wooden board, separated by a wall that did not quite seal them off. Somehow, that made him feel both near and distant at once.
Ye Chenyan stared at the partition and slowly sank down as well.
“Then hopefully nothing will happen this—”
“Shh—” Unable to cover his mouth, Yu Qingtang could only interrupt aloud. “Don’t raise a flag like that!”
“What?” Ye Chenyan asked curiously.
Yu Qingtang glanced around warily, checking for any potential safety hazards.
“Just don’t say things like that!”
He lay back down.
“Brother Chi missed out again this time... but maybe that’s good. Now we have another excuse for everyone to come together next time.”
Leaning against the wooden partition, Ye Chenyan laughed softly.
“We don’t actually need an excuse. We can simply come whenever we want.”
The sound of water came from Yu Qingtang’s side.
“Oh, that’s just finding a way to make an unfortunate situation sound better.”
Ye Chenyan chuckled. His water-beaded fingers lightly traced the wooden partition before curling to tap against it.
They had not done anything in particular, yet whenever he was alone with Yu Qingtang, even talking about meaningless nonsense seemed interesting.
He was especially restless today, unable to calm himself or sit still no matter what he did, yet he also could not force the corners of his mouth down.
“What is it?” Yu Qingtang asked curiously.
He raised his hand and knocked back twice.
“I don’t know.” Ye Chenyan leaned against the wooden partition, his fingers tapping out a quiet rhythm. He lowered his eyes. “I suppose... I’m happy.”
“I’m happy too.” Yu Qingtang splashed the water and breathed out. “Living like an immortal—”
Ye Chenyan tilted his head back and looked at the sky.
The sun had already set. Night lay deep over the mountain, and the star-filled sky above Great Wilderness Mountain seemed almost close enough to touch.
For the moment, he set aside everything they had heard over the past few days—the complicated events of ancient times, the coming collapse of heaven that they were still too weak to prevent, and the secrets of the Heavenly Dao.
Yu Qingtang suddenly said, “Give me your hand.”
Ye Chenyan raised an eyebrow. Instinct told him Yu Qingtang intended to do something mischievous, but he still obediently reached across.
“What are you doing?”
Yu Qingtang refused to tell him immediately.
“You’ll find out soon.”
“All right.” Smiling, Ye Chenyan looked up at the stars as he felt Yu Qingtang fiddling with his fingers on the other side.
After a moment of hesitation, he spoke.
“I used to... feel as though I had nothing tying me down.”
“Even after coming to Nanzhou, when Candle Nine Yin told me about my origins and I learned that they were famous figures who shook the ancient world, none of it felt real.”
He let out a breath.
“It was as though none of it had anything to do with me.”
“But while traveling with you and slowly seeing the traces they left behind, I somehow...”
On the other side of the wooden board, Yu Qingtang was still holding his fingers and quite obviously doing nothing good.
Yet being touched by him, feeling Yu Qingtang’s warmth pass through their joined fingers, somehow made Ye Chenyan feel steadier.
Yu Qingtang finished for him.
“Somehow feel happy?”
“Mm,” Ye Chenyan answered.
Yu Qingtang muttered, “How does even this get credited to me? I haven’t done anything.”
“How is it not your doing?” Ye Chenyan raised an eyebrow and laughed softly. “Only after meeting you did I realize how vast the world was, and that it contained so many interesting things.”
Yu Qingtang modestly thanked him.
“You flatter me. You flatter me.”
He seemed finally to finish his work. With a wicked chuckle, he pushed Ye Chenyan’s hand back around the partition.
“Here. A thank-you gift for you. Divine ability—Scorpion Pincher Claws!”
Ye Chenyan silently stared at the scorpion pincers fitted over the tips of two fingers and experimentally bent them.
Yu Qingtang burst into loud laughter from the other side.
Ye Chenyan closed his eyes, but could not hold back either. Leaning against the pool, he laughed until his body rocked back and forth.
“Honestly.” Tears nearly came to his eyes. “I never did anything this stupid even when I was at Foundation Establishment.”
“What’s wrong with it?” Yu Qingtang protested, splashing some water toward him.
Ye Chenyan tilted his head, smiling as he stared at the pincers on his fingers. A faint light flickered in his eyes.
After hesitating, he said, “Qingtang.”
“Hm?”
Yu Qingtang was leaning against the edge of the pool, fitting two pincers onto his own fingers.
Ye Chenyan crooked his claws at him.
“Stay with me a little longer.”
Yu Qingtang turned to look at him.
Ye Chenyan held his gaze.
“We can take our time and do every stupid thing in the world together.”
“And then...” His voice lowered. “Then stay with me a little longer after that. Let me take up a little more space.”
Yu Qingtang’s eyes slowly widened.
Ye Chenyan smiled as though plotting something wicked and lowered his voice.
“Let’s slip out of Nanzhou.”
“If the old Pill King won’t come looking for me, then we’ll go looking for him and see what Fire Cauldron Sect is really up to.”
Yu Qingtang sucked in a sharp breath.
Countless concerns flashed through his mind at once—the balance between immortals and demons, the Esoteric Sect, the plot, the Heavenly Dao... everything tangled together into a chaotic mess.
But the person before him had such bright eyes that Yu Qingtang could not bear to see that light go out.
He swallowed and cautiously tapped his own pincer against Ye Chenyan’s.
“We won’t die, right?”
Ye Chenyan burst out laughing.
“Don’t worry.”
“If the sky falls, I’ll hold it up for you.” He caught Yu Qingtang’s finger between his pincers and shook it like a promise, his eyes shining brilliantly. “We agreed on that long ago.”
Yu Qingtang nodded in a daze.
Only afterward did the realization belatedly strike him—
He was probably doomed.
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