Shen Mo’s face turned pale as paper, his body swaying.
This was what he feared most.
While Su Wan’er didn’t care for him, in this female-dominated world, Husbandly Virtue was paramount.
If the charge of “infidelity” was proven, he faced more than just divorce—he could be sent to the gallows or sold into the lowest brothels, a fate worse than death.
“I didn’t…” Shen Mo said. “Peak Master Qin and I… are innocent…”
“Innocent?” Lin Jingzhe laughed as if she’d heard the greatest joke in the world. “Then was that bite mark from a dog? Did you just find that Ice Soul Jade on the side of the road? We’re all adults here; if you did it, own up to it. Why act like a chaste martyr?”
She leaned close to Shen Mo’s ear. Her warm breath brushed against his earlobe, but her words were ice-cold:
“You’d better pray that Chao’er returns from the Secret Realm alive. As you are now, only that silly girl Chao’er still treats you like a treasure.”
“As for Qin Shuying…” Lin Jingzhe straightened up, a ruthless glint in her eyes. “She can’t protect you forever. Once Master finishes her seclusion, or if I report this to Sect Master Yun He, I’ll see how she saves you then!”
At the mention of “Yun He,” Shen Mo’s body trembled violently.
‘That old witch… if she found out Qin Shuying was involved, she might lock me in the dungeons of Yunyin Mountain and torture me day and night.’
Looking at Shen Mo’s terrified expression, Lin Jingzhe felt a surge of vengeful pleasure, mixed with an inexplicable irritation.
She despised this man’s weakness and his supposed fickle nature. Yet, seeing him abandoned by the world, struggling to survive in the cracks between the powerful, she felt…
Her throat went dry.
The feeling annoyed her.
“What are you standing around for? Gather the herbs!” Lin Jingzhe barked. She turned toward the Cold Pool without another look. “If you don’t gather enough Blood-Congealing Grass, I’ll throw you in to feed that flood dragon.”
The previous herbs had been scattered and destroyed by the Cold Pool Flood Dragon’s rampage. Some had vanished, while others had broken roots, losing their medicinal properties.
Shen Mo took a deep breath and silently straightened his disheveled collar to hide the bite mark. He picked up his medicinal hoe, stepped onto the crushed ice, and walked toward the woods.
The wind and snow grew heavier, making his hem flutter loudly. His silhouette looked as fragile as a withered leaf that could be blown away at any moment.
Lin Jingzhe stood not far behind him, watching that humble back. Her hand on her sword tightened, then loosened, then tightened again.
In that moment earlier, when the Cold Pool Flood Dragon lunged at him, the thought that flashed through her mind wasn’t “Master’s reputation,” but… a secret… unspeakable emotion.
‘Damn it!’
She wasn’t someone who cared about looks, so why was she…? She blamed it all on his Succubus Physique.
Lin Jingzhe decided she needed to be harsher toward him, act more roughly, and ideally, stay as far away from him as possible.
“Damn it.”
Lin Jingzhe cursed under her breath. In her frustration, she swung her sword, shattering a nearby boulder into pieces.
Meanwhile, Shen Mo was crouching in the woods. His fingers trembled as he dug out a spiritual herb swaying in the cold wind.
Snow soaked through his trousers, and the chill crawled up his legs. But he didn’t feel the cold.
The hole in his heart was colder than the wind and snow of the Luoxia Mountains.
‘Chao’er, you must come back alive… but what did that promise really mean?’
‘Peak Master Qin, I don’t want to see you again… but if I run into trouble, I suppose, sigh.’
‘Wan’er, it would be better if the two of us just lived our lives well, but you won’t even show your face.’
Distracted, Shen Mo cut his finger on a sharp root. Blood seeped out, dripping onto the white snow in a piercing shade of red.
Lin Jingzhe clearly didn’t want to stay by this foul-smelling pool any longer. She summoned the Qingluan Bird and mounted it first.
Shen Mo followed closely behind. Afraid of falling, he instinctively reached for the saddle or the corner of Lin Jingzhe’s clothes.
“Don’t touch me!” Lin Jingzhe shouted as if she’d been burned.
Shen Mo’s hand froze in midair, hovering awkwardly before he eventually grabbed the feathers on the Qingluan Bird’s neck. The Qingluan Bird beat its wings and soared high. The cold wind cut like a knife.
Shen Mo sat at the very back, half his body hanging in the air. He could only grip the bird’s body tightly with his legs.
Snow blew into his collar, making him shiver. Halfway through the flight, Lin Jingzhe’s icy voice drifted back, broken by the wind:
“Put this on.”
A heavy outer robe, carrying the scent of pine and a woman’s body heat, was tossed into Shen Mo’s face, covering his head. Shen Mo clutched the robe, stunned.
“Don’t misunderstand,” Lin Jingzhe said without looking back. “If you freeze to death, your stiff corpse will be hard to carry back. And… if you’re left with scars, Chao’er will just cry and whine when she gets back. It’s annoying.”
“Thank you,” Shen Mo whispered, wrapping the robe tightly around himself. His voice was so soft it was nearly lost in the wind.
“Shut up. You’re too loud.”
The Qingluan Bird sped up, passing through layers of clouds. Suddenly, a mass of black clouds surged from the horizon.
It was a swarm of over 100 Iron-Feathered Ravens. Every single one was at the Foundation Establishment stage, and the leader emitted the pressure of the Rank 3 Early Stage.
Lin Jingzhe’s expression changed instantly.
“Are you fucking cursed?” she hissed through gritted teeth. “Do you attract monsters everywhere you go?”
Shen Mo was covered in snow, his lips purple with cold, yet he managed a small smile. “Probably… yes.”
Lin Jingzhe didn’t bother scolding him further. She steered the Qingluan Bird to turn around, but the swarm of Iron-Feathered Ravens had already surrounded them.
These beasts were fast and aggressive. Their iron feathers were like blades, leaving bloody gashes on the Qingluan Bird with every dive.
The Qingluan Bird cried out in pain, its flight becoming unstable. Shen Mo gripped Lin Jingzhe’s belt tightly, half his body dangling in the air.
An Iron-Feathered Raven lunged from the side, its sharp beak aiming straight for his eyes—
A flash of sword light erupted.
Lin Jingzhe turned and struck down the raven, but in her effort to save him, she left herself exposed.
The lead raven seized the opportunity and dove. Its talons tore across her shoulder and back, ripping through flesh.
“Ugh!”
Lin Jingzhe grunted in pain but swung her sword back, slicing the beast in half. Blood splashed onto Shen Mo’s face, warm and sticky.
“Hold on tight!” she growled. “I won’t fish you out if you fall!”
Shen Mo didn’t have time to think. He wrapped his arms tightly around her waist. Lin Jingzhe’s body stiffened, but she didn’t yell. Instead, she drove the wounded Qingluan Bird into a steep dive.
The swarm of Iron-Feathered Ravens pursued relentlessly. The sound of the wind, shrieks, and flapping wings blurred together.
Something was wrong. Extremely wrong.
While Iron-Feathered Ravens were fierce, they were also highly intelligent. Their instinct was to seek luck and avoid calamity.
That wave of attacks wasn’t hunting—it was as if they were being driven.
Shen Mo’s face was pressed against Lin Jingzhe’s back. He could feel her heavy breathing from the exertion and smell the scent of blood mixed with pine in the wind.
The Qingluan Bird pierced through the mist, the icy peaks and snowy valleys of the Luoxia Mountains blurring beneath them.
“There!” she suddenly pointed down. “The Cold Pool!”
The absolute law of the monster realm: territoriality. A high-ranking monster’s territory would never allow a low-ranking monster to step foot inside.
The aura of the Cold Pool Flood Dragon was enough to deter all birds and beasts within 100 miles.
“Down!”
The Qingluan Bird dived straight toward the pool. The ravens chased them to the air above the pool’s entrance but suddenly stopped.
They circled and shrieked, yet they dared not descend a single step further. The lead raven gave an anxious cry and finally led the swarm away, as if fleeing from something even more terrifying.
The sheer momentum threw both of them off. Lin Jingzhe scrambled up from the snow, her hair disheveled. Ignoring her scrapes, her first instinct was to look for Shen Mo.
Shen Mo was halfway buried in the snow. He slowly climbed out, brushed off the snow, and straightened his messy collar. Aside from being a bit paler, he was miraculously unharmed.
The Cold Pool remained deathly silent. A thin layer of ice covered the surface, and a faint mist drifted around the area.
The blood-stained robe slipped from Shen Mo’s shoulder. He leaned down to pick it up—
“Don’t move.”
Lin Jingzhe pinned him down, her eyes fixed on the depths of the Cold Pool.
After they landed, the world had suddenly gone quiet. Eerily quiet. So quiet that even the wind had stopped.
The surface of the Cold Pool was vibrating. Fine cracks appeared in the thin ice, and ripples spread outward from the center.
“This is…”
A corpse floated to the center. It was the Cold Pool Flood Dragon.
The same dragon that Lin Jingzhe had repelled with a single strike earlier was now floating on the water like a dead snake.
A massive, slimy black tentacle was wrapped tightly around its vitals.
Crack, crack.
The hair-raising sound of bones shattering echoed across the silent snowy plain.
Under the crushing force of that tentacle, the Cold Pool Flood Dragon—as hard as iron—was being crushed inch by inch like a fragile cracker.
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