Maybe My Soulmate! (GL)

Chapter 243: The start of a new arc. 1.

The wedding had already become the kind of story people in Azure Dragon City would tell for years.

Not because it had been the grandest celebration the city had ever seen, though it probably was. Not because the Su family had thrown open its gates for seven days straight, though it had. And not even because the entire city still seemed half dazed that the two women who could shake heaven and earth with a careless wave of spiritual power had stood before everyone and tied their lives together with a smile.

No, what people remembered most was how simple they had looked.

Mo Yuxin in red, smiling with lazy confidence that hid a blade-sharp calm beneath it. Su Yubing beside her, cold-faced as always to the outside world, yet unable to stop the softness in her eyes whenever she looked at her wife. Together they looked less like terrifying Nascent Soul experts and more like two people who had somehow found the one place in the world they could finally rest.

And after all the noise and all the congratulations and all the envy and awe, that was exactly what they did.

They rested.

For the first few days after the wedding, the Su family estate stayed lively. Guests came and went. Branch family elders still found excuses to bring gifts. Important people from the city kept trying to strengthen relations with the Su family. Servants walked around with dazed smiles, as if they too had not quite recovered from seeing the newlywed couple openly cling to each other whenever no one was looking.

But Mo Yuxin and Su Yubing cared very little about any of that.

Most mornings, they woke up long after sunrise.

The room prepared for them in the main Su residence was large, refined, and full of expensive decorations, but after the first day it already looked lived in. Outer robes were tossed over screens. Hair ribbons were left on tables. Books on formations, cultivation methods, and old ruins were stacked beside tea cups and fruit plates. The bed curtains were rarely tied neatly because neither of them ever seemed to have the patience for that.

On one such morning, pale golden light slipped through the window lattice and fell across the bed.

Su Yubing woke first.

She didn’t move at once. Mo Yuxin had one arm around her waist and her face half-buried against Su Yubing’s shoulder, breathing slow and warm. The blanket had slipped low sometime in the night, and their legs were tangled together in the kind of complete, thoughtless closeness that only came when two people had long since stopped guarding themselves.

Su Yubing looked down and brushed a strand of hair away from Mo Yuxin’s face.

Mo Yuxin’s lashes trembled. "You’re staring at me again."

Su Yubing’s lips curved faintly. "You were awake."

"Only because your fingers are cold."

"You’re lying."

Mo Yuxin opened one eye and smiled. "Maybe."

Su Yubing leaned down and kissed her forehead. It should have been a brief kiss, just a gentle one, but Mo Yuxin tilted her face up and caught her lips properly. That turned one kiss into several, soft and sleepy at first, then lingering enough that Su Yubing had to brace one hand against the mattress.

When they finally pulled apart, Mo Yuxin looked much too pleased with herself.

"We were supposed to cultivate at dawn," Su Yubing said.

"We can cultivate later."

"You said that yesterday."

"And we still cultivated later."

Su Yubing gave her a look, but there was no force in it.

Mo Yuxin took her hand and kissed the center of her palm. "Wife, we’ve already gotten married. If we keep acting so proper this early in the morning, won’t heaven laugh at us?"

"Heaven should mind its own business."

Mo Yuxin burst out laughing and dragged Su Yubing back down into the bed.

Their days settled into an easy rhythm after that.

They trained together in the mornings when they felt disciplined enough, and in the afternoons when they did not. Since both of them were already at the Nascent Soul stage, ordinary cultivation in Azure Dragon City no longer meant much. The spiritual energy here was too thin, the resources too poor, and the limits of the city too low for people like them. Still, cultivation was not only about absorbing spiritual energy. It was also about stabilizing the heart, polishing comprehension, refining techniques, and keeping the body and soul in harmony.

Sometimes they cultivated in the same courtyard, sitting facing one another under the shade of flowering trees, their spiritual energy moving in quiet circles that made the air tremble faintly. When servants passed by, they lowered their heads and hurried away, not daring to disturb the two terrifying yet strangely affectionate mistresses.

Sometimes cultivation lasted only an hour before Mo Yuxin opened one eye, saw Su Yubing’s hair lit by the sun, and decided concentration was overrated.

Then she would crawl across the mat and lean into Su Yubing’s lap.

At first Su Yubing had tried to remain serious.

"Yuxin."

"Hm?"

"We’re cultivating."

"I know."

"You are currently not cultivating."

"I am cultivating my wife’s affection."

Su Yubing had looked down at her in silence.

Mo Yuxin rested her cheek against her thigh and smiled up at her. "Any results?"

A moment later, Su Yubing sighed and lowered a hand to stroke her hair. "Barely acceptable."

From that day on, Mo Yuxin became even less restrained.

The Su family eventually got used to seeing their aloof young matriarch with a faint flush on her ears while Mo Yuxin shamelessly leaned against her wherever they happened to be.

Of course, their married life was not only kisses and lazy mornings.

They spent a great deal of time with their families.

Since Shen Mingyue had come to Azure Dragon City for the wedding, the Mo family had, for once, truly gathered together. Mo Lan was still gentle and quiet, still carrying that strange softness of someone whose memories had been torn and scattered by fate. She knew Shen Mingyue mattered to her.

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To be continued.