Chapter 1650: Chapter 996: Three Thousand Wishes (2)
"Miss Fang, you’re becoming more and more inscrutable to me."
Fang Geyu glanced at him dismissively, "Though it makes sense to endure small grievances for the sake of the bigger picture, Immortal Lord Mu pretends to be indifferent in all things just to keep up a façade of depth and cool aloofness.
Pretending too much and repressing too much, it’s only natural to end up constipated with hemorrhoids. Would you like me to introduce some famous courtesans from Shifang City to help you relieve some stress?"
Mu Yunye’s eye twitched, and the gloom he had managed to suppress was about to resurface.
He took a deep breath and forced a smile, "I appreciate the kind offer, Miss Fang, but I’ll pass."
Fang Geyu lifted her chin, "Take care, Immortal Lord. I won’t see you off."
Feeling thwarted, Mu Yunye didn’t gain a thing from Fang Geyu’s sharp tongue.
On the altar, Baili Yu was equally exasperated by the antics of Ying Ji and Baili An, mother and son, and hurriedly left in anger using his Sword Control.
He feared that if he stayed a moment longer, he’d develop a Heart Demon and be trapped by it for life.
Due to the commotion, what was supposed to be a three-day Sea God Festival ended in less than a day, leaving everyone disgruntled.
The crowd dispersed, and a Unicorn not far from the altar, without anyone to guide it, trotted away into the thick fog.
Back inside the tower, when no one else was around, Ying Ji couldn’t hold back any longer. She pinched Baili An’s cheeks with both hands, one on either side.
She seemed to be meeting her son for the first time, astonished, "Is this really my little An? You teamed up with your mother to bully your father? Truly eye-opening."
Sitting on the terrace, Yin Baishuang sipped the muddy wine in her hand, her eyes smiling but her tone mockingly disdainful:
"What kind of little lover of the Empress, strange that the Lady would admit to such a thing, but Baili Yu’s nose almost got crooked from anger, it was truly amusing."
Baili An tilted his head back, evading Ying Ji’s hand, but his expression remained indifferent, ignoring her teasing words.
He took out bandages and medicine from his Qiankun Bag, gently holding Ying Ji’s injured wrist, applying the medicinal powder, and wrapping it carefully.
Yin Baishuang, with her keen eye for detail, put her wine gourd next to her leg, resting her chin on her hands:
"I can see it clearly now; despite Baili Yu’s considerable anger, little An is even more incensed."
Upon hearing this, Ying Ji’s expression froze, and the humor in her eyes subsided, replaced by a rush of warmth and emotion she couldn’t contain.
She gingerly pinched Baili An’s nose, her beautifully ink-black phoenix eyes reflecting a faint smile, as clear as spring water.
"Some things I had set aside two hundred years ago. In Baili Yu’s heart, sacrificing for the greater good and the people of the world is not something he’s done just once.
If he were a person who cared, he would not have let me leave Bai Tuo Mountain. I am beyond being controlled now, so why should you, my child, trap yourself in distress?"
Baili An lowered his eyes, casting shadows in the shape of fans with his long lashes, obscuring the shimmering light in his eyes, speaking so softly it was almost inaudible.
"I’m just a little angry..."
Ying Ji replied softly, smiling, "I understand what you’re feeling, little An, just like when that Young Sect Master from the Tiansheng Sect was so arrogant and provocative, yet Baili Yu punished my child instead. It’s understandable to be angry."
"And a bit disappointed..."
Ying Ji’s smile was gentle, "This sulking look of yours, it’s more than just a little anger and disappointment."
Baili An lifted his moist, dark eyes, a shade of deep, obscure melancholy in his gaze.
"Today, when I saw Father lowering himself to protect Mother, I was... caught between nervousness and joy.
In my childhood memories, Mother and Father rarely got along in harmony.
I know he’s proud and solitary, unwilling to bow his head to others, not even to those closest to him.
Watching him today, so cautious and careful, was a sight I’ve never seen before.
I felt as if he actually regretted his past coldness and distance, hoping from this moment on he might treat Mother better, placing her above the world he holds dear, more important even than the Xijian Sect.
But, when faced with Golden Immortal Feng Xu’s provocation, I saw him restrain his sword.
Despite appearing so angry and agitated, his sword remained sheathed.
While he kept remembering this and that, ultimately he let go of that person very easily — it could only be my mother.
Accompanying father for so many years, mother must have seen many similar things. Her feelings at those times must have been so sad, I shudder to even think about it.
Baili An’s black, clear eyes were covered with a thin layer of mist, as he slowly exhaled, as if letting go of a heavy obsession and burden from his heart:
"It’s really strange, during my childhood, the wish of flying to the Central Netherworld to bring mother back to the Xijian Sect to enjoy familial happiness with father, in the end went missing..."
Immediately he laughed softly: "Why? Should he be allowed to keep a secret from mother with that Princess?
Shouldn’t mother also be allowed to upset him? Otherwise, just because he is highly favored by women, does he think he can bully mother for being honest, thinking she can’t find any other good man aside from him?"
Ying Ji was amused again by Baili An’s stubborn and defiant words, but as she laughed, traces of moisture appeared in her eyes, and the slight curve at the corner had a hint of mournful arc.
Five hundred years of acquaintance and entanglement, two hundred years of betrayal and despair.
How could today’s brief words erase the resentment in the heart?
She suddenly reached out, holding Baili An’s back head, their foreheads gently touching, gentle ripples lightly floated in her phoenix eyes.
"It’s mother’s fault, it’s mother’s mistake, the wish that Xiao An lost, mother can’t retrieve it either. How about mother granting Xiao An three thousand wishes in the future?"
The breeze and clouds arose from the pavilion, the sun gradually bowed to the mountains, distant green mountains stretched timelessly, the cool breeze swayed the shadows of dusk, yet no matter how strong the wind is in this Mortal World, it still couldn’t blow away all the gentleness.
...
...
The night fell over Four Seas and mountains, the sky vast and boundless.
The mountain wind roared wildly, shaking the ancient woods and forests, making the continuous mountains outside Shifang City appear even more majestic.
Tracing back in history, Shifang City originally belonged to a place of Wilderness and abundance, except for the prosperous Silver City amidst the ice and snow, the mountains were desolate and barren, with extremely adverse climate.
The night sky was thick with clouds, like lead, like grave, black clouds piled into a whole, like a city of black iron suspended upside down, not a sliver of moonlight to be seen.
Heaven and earth seemed to be sinking within the sorrowful and angry howl of the wind.
In the distant mountains, the long howl of wild wolves faintly echoed.
Chen Xiaolan wrapped in the fox fur freshly hunted by Master Meng Zifei could not resist the bone-chilling cold.
Her lips were frozen deep purple, her face flushed red from the cold, eyelashes hung with ice and snow.
Her hands tightly clutched the collar of the fox fur, yet it continued to be difficult to resist the chill seeping into her garments.
The cold-defying Fire Talisman under the fox fur seemed to be gradually losing its Spiritual Power, cooling and losing warmth, under the invasive Han Shuang, she shivered endlessly from the cold.
Her teeth chattered, looking at Meng Zifei walking ahead amidst the wind and snow, her voice was already blown weak in the wind and snow:
"Master, why aren’t we using Sword Control to travel to Shifang City?"
In the mountains of Shifang City, the wind and snow were great, even someone like Meng Zifei, a cultivation practitioner, seemed to have been blown to hunch his spine slightly.
He held a guiding torch in hand, crackling as though it might be extinguished by the snow at any moment.
Meng Zifei lightly coughed twice, his voice somewhat breathless and weak with fatigue:
"Shifang City has its own rules, for loose cultivator disciples like us from unknown backgrounds, entering Shifang City is essentially out of reach.
Only with sincere walking, enduring the trials of mountain wind and snow, receiving the blessing imprint of the Snow Spirit, one becomes qualified to enter the city."
Chen Xiaolan was very puzzled, feeling Meng Zifei was excessively stubborn: "The world is vast, where cannot cultivation be done? Why must master insist on coming to Shifang City to endure this hardship?"
The endless mountains seem unseen, to walk through, the two of us might freeze to death here."
Upon hearing this, Meng Zifei paused, slowly turned around, his face even paler than snow, with a hint of a thin sickly look.
Yet his gaze still attentively observed Chen Xiaolan’s complexion, softly asking: "Have the Fire Talismans’ Spiritual Power for warmth already been almost used up, shall I draw more talismans for you?"
