1303 Why Don't I?
Mae threatened to burst into tears again hearing Ryu's caring voice, but she managed to force it down. He had already spent so long comforting her, she didn't want him to have to do that again. So, she slowly explained, even though she knew that he was only trying to distract her.
She went through her experiences in the Samsara Wheel, recounting the countless lives she had experienced, before she finally described how her talent and cultivation had changed in the end.
"... I'm certain that it's because of your help. I didn't have any confidence in performing so well in the past, but now I'm not even 20 years old, but I'm already on the verge of entering the Sky God Realm. I never thought that I would be that face. Maybe only geniuses on the Eighth Heaven would be as fast or faster than me."
Her story had been long enough that she had been distracted to the point of smiling again. But when she mentioned her cultivation speed and remembered that Ryu could likely never cultivate again, her eyes brimmed with tears once more. However, before she could cry again, she felt a sharp pinch on her bottom that made her yelp a bit.
"Don't worry about that sort of nonsense. Is a mere Dao Heart shattering capable of stopping my steps? You look down on your man too much."
Mae shuddered as she looked into Ryu's eyes.
Now that she thought about it, normally when a Dao Heart shattered, a person's eyes would be vacant. Even moving around would be difficult for them, let alone smiling and joking around. At first, she thought that Ryu was just putting up a fa?§ade for her, but such a thing also required some mental fortitude. It wasn't easy to act like you were happy when you were in despair.
This made Mae a bit confused. It felt like everything she had known about Dao Hearts wasn't quite adding up in the moment. She looked into Ryu's eyes and suddenly felt that he was far too attractive in the moment. After spending so long comforting her, allowing her to sit on his lap despite the state of his body, she felt an overflowing love coming from within her chest. If it wasn't for his injuries, she might very well press him down right this moment.
Ryu, of course, had come to understand Mae's sudden infatuation now. She had experienced countless lives while never quite experiencing something like him. It made her realize that the Ryu she had come to know wasn't something that could be easily found again.
This wasn't something that would normally make Ryu feel proud. He was someone that didn't even blink after he had formed a Founding Dao, almost as though he was naturally someone who should be able to form such a thing. He hadn't even smiled or chuckled, he simply continued about his way to the Inheritance he was on his way toward.
But for some reason, at the moment, he felt a emerging pride within his chest, as though this was the happiest news he had heard in his entire life. It was quite a foreign feeling to him, and it was the feeling that made him realize that while the shattering of his Dao Heart wasn't as aggressive as he had thought it would be, that didn't mean that there weren't any adverse effects at all.
That said, he wasn't sure if these effects were actually a bad thing. He had a lot of thoughts floating in his mind right now about what Dao Hearts truly represented and what their purpose was, but he didn't immediately conclude anything.
He wanted to silently bask in this feeling for a bit longer... Because he felt an unprecedented serene at the moment, a calm he hadn't felt ever since he failed his Awakening that day oh so long ago... And he wanted to understand where this peace was coming from. Would it vanish if he reformed his Dao Heart? Was it even possible to reform his Dao Heart in the first place?
"What foolish words."
The voice came from nowhere, or more accurately, it came suddenly. After Mae had entered her room with the water buckets to clean off of Ryu, something that she had done twice a day since the moment he lost consciousness, she hadn't closed her door. The two had seemed lost in their own world and seemingly hadn't noticed the presence of another individual.
However, though Mae started, Ryu turned an indifferent gaze toward the door. After the rampage of Mae's Primordial Yin, his Spiritual Sea had taken quite the hit. For others, their soul cultivation path would practically be crippled at this point, but Ryu's Perfect Blackbody was designed to grow and morph. What he had lost could simply be replaced by recultivating again.
Even with this weakened soul, though, there were very few that could hide from his Void Spiritual Sense, and even fewer that could sense it. He had kept tabs on his surroundings the entire time.
He was too acquainted with the intrigues of powerful families. After his failure, this was no longer the Clan of his in-laws, he might as well be in enemy territory. As such, he was always vigilant.
He could have healed himself long ago, in fact, he had Embryonic Qi, after all. Of course, it would be harder than normal, or else he would have woken up in a perfect state already as his qi circulated on its own in his sleep. But it was still very much possible with a more aggressive stance. The reason he hadn't was to keep up pretendings and he liked these sort of recollections of failure. It reminded him that he still had a very tall mountain to climb.
At that moment, a woman that Ryu had never met before entered the room. When she saw that the bandaged Ryu had Mae on her lap, her gaze couldn't help but narrow.
Ryu's crotch was only partially obstructed by Mae's thighs, so it wasn't even very difficult for the woman to get a full view of it from her vantage point. However, Ryu only calmly looked at her, seemingly having no intention of hiding himself.
The woman gazed at Ryu's crotch without the slightest hint of embarrassment herself, sizing it up with an inscrutable expression before she suddenly shook her head.
"Is that thing the reason my niece can't seem to think straight anymore? Why don't I cut it off?"
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