Chapter 269: Between a Rock and a Hard Place
When she entered Bing Mei’s Sea of consciousness, Shui Qingqing didn’t immediately realise that something was wrong.
Like Bing Lan, Bing Mei’s Sea of consciousness was an ice field.
However, her ice field was a little blurry and more translucent than transparent.
Although Shui Qingqing felt that the blurriness was a little strange, she didn’t dwell on it.
She thought it was because Bing Mei’s cultivation was originally low and she hadn’t had time to temper her sea of consciousness.
’I should find her soul first.’ Shui Qingqing thought and began to walk around.
However, the more she walked, the stranger she felt.
As an origin-forging realm cultivator, Bing Mei’s Sea of consciousness shouldn’t have been more than one hundred mu.
Unexpectedly, Bing Mei didn’t conform to this logic and her sea of consciousness was almost ten thousand mu.
This size was equivalent to the sea of consciousness of a nascent soul realm cultivator and Shui Qingqing couldn’t help but be confused.
’How is this possible?’ She wondered and then an idea came to her.
’Is it because I forcibly increased her cultivation?’
The idea seemed plausible but Shui Qingqing knew it wasn’t so.
The size of a cultivator’s sea of consciousness depended on their cultivation and soul power.
In this case, Bing Mei’s cultivation was high but her soul power hadn’t kept up.
No matter what, there was no reason for Bing Mei’s Sea of consciousness to be so big.
"Unless..." She suddenly said and her heart went cold.
She rushed toward the opening of the sea of consciousness and found that it was closed.
At the same time, an amused laugh reverberated in the sea of consciousness and Shui Qingqing turned pale.
"Who are you?" She shouted and spun around to take a look.
However, she didn’t find anyone and her mood became more solemn.
"Bing Mei, come out and meet master." She said and forced herself to calm down.
"Master? What kind of master are you?" A voice filled with disdain echoed in the surroundings.
"Shui Qingqing, do you think I am stupid? Do you think I don’t know that you want to seize my body?"
"You...you..." Shui Qingqing stammered and her heart filled with anger.
"Did you trick me?"
"So what if I tricked you? Since you want to devour my soul and seize my body, why can’t I react in kind? I don’t care about your body but your soul should be delicious."
When she heard that, Shui Qingqing shuddered.
Although she was a nascent soul realm cultivator, the current Bing Mei scared her.
Shui Qingqing felt like she had entered the belly of a beast.
If she wanted to come out and save her life, she would have to shed nine layers of skin.
"You are not Bing Mei. Who are you?" She asked while her mind spun wildly.
Now that Bing Mei had closed her sea of consciousness, Shui Qingqing only had two choices.
The first choice was to devour Bing Mei’s soul and seize her body as planned.
Shui Qingqing preferred this choice but there were many problems involved.
The first problem was that she couldn’t locate Bing Mei’s soul.
This problem was not big and only required her to spend some time canvasing the sea of consciousness.
However, the second problem wasn’t so easily solved.
This was because Shui Qingqing was no longer sure if her soul was powerful enough to devour Bing Mei’s soul.
In that case, Shui Qingqing gained bias for the second choice which was to escape from Bing Mei’s Sea of consciousness.
Unfortunately, this choice wasn’t without its disadvantages.
For one, forcing Bing Mei to open her sea of consciousness would take a lot of effort and Shui Qingqing’s soul would likely be injured.
As if that was not enough, she had already transferred her life’s cultivation and her original body was effectively mortal.
If Shui Qingqing escaped and regained her original body, she would have to face her mortal fate.
’Is this what they call being stuck between a rock and a hard place?’ She wondered.
Since she became a nascent soul realm cultivator, she hadn’t experienced any problems.
After thousands of years, she had forgotten what despair and fear felt like that.
However, at this moment, these familiar but unfamiliar emotions appeared in her heart.
’If escaping is the same as not escaping, why don’t I fight?’ She resolved and her heart hardened.
In the next moment, a flower appeared from the depths of her soul and began to attack Bing Mei’s sea of consciousness.
.....
One month after the martial contest, Yu Nianzhen and Jiang Yue finally left the Fair Plum inn.
Both had taken a disguise pill and they looked nothing like themselves.
However, if someone was familiar with them, they would notice the similarities in the way interacted with each other.
Fortunately, everyone who knew them well was an ally and they were still hiding in the Fair Plum inn.
[Our wanted posters are everywhere.] Jiang Yue transmitted and pulled Yu Nianzhen towards the wall.
[I can’t believe we are worth so much.] Jiang Yue continued and a contemplative look entered his eyes.
[What are you thinking?] Yu Nianzhen asked and flicked his forehead.
Even without being told, he knew what his husband was thinking and he was tempted to sigh.
[Azhen, think about it...]
[I know what you want to say but we shouldn’t take unnecessary risks. Since everyone knows that they can’t track us using teleportation residue, they have surely thought of other ways. If we use our qi in front of others, they may capture a trace and use it to track us.]
[I know.] Jiang Yue said a little dispiritedly.
He looked at the wanted posters and tried not to think about the spirit stones they would lose by not reporting on themselves.
[The total of our bounties is less than five billion spirit stones. What is five billion compared to the six hundred billion we won from the wager?]
When he was reminded, Jiang Yue immediately turned happy.
Since they couldn’t collect their winnings, Xuan Ke was tasked with the matter.
Fortunately, he didn’t encounter any problems and he smoothly collected the winnings.
Later, he found a chance to visit the cave and deliver the winnings.
[You are right. Who cares about five billion?]
Jiang Yue sneered at the wanted posters and pulled Yu Nianzhen away from the wall.
[Let’s go shopping.] He said and Yu Nianzhen couldn’t help but smile.
However, his heart wasn’t as calm as he seemed.
Bing Lan’s bounty was two billion spirit stones and his master’s was one billion spirit stones.
As for him, he had a bounty of eight hundred million while Jiang Yue had five hundred million.
Fortunately, the bounties were for information and capture rather than dead bodies.
’We have to be careful.’ He thought and held Jiang Yue’s hand.
"Azhen, what do you want to buy?" Jiang Yue asked.
"I don’t need anything. Let’s buy what you want."
Jiang Yue thought about it and didn’t actually have anything he wanted to buy.
Since neither had a clue, they decided to walk around and enter a store if the treasure compass reacted.
Unfortunately, their luck was not good.
They walked for half a day and didn’t encounter any treasures.
In the end, they went to a restaurant and had a leisurely lunch at noon.
However, no matter they went, the martial contest was still the most popular topic.
Since they went into hiding, Jiang Yue and Yu Nianzhen didn’t know much about the outside world.
However, after walking around for half a day, they knew everything.
They knew that Xuan Dong and Bing Mei had conducted the Taoist ceremony and become a couple.
Other than that, they knew that the palace master had gone into a death retreat and wasn’t expected to come out for at least a year.
However, what surprised them the most was that Bing Mei had retreated for a few days and her cultivation had skyrocketed to the first level of the origin tempering realm.
"Bing Mei couldn’t escape in the end." Jiang Yue said and sighed.
"The weak don’t get to decide how they die." Yu Nianzhen said.
His words weren’t because he was unfeeling, they were because he recognised this terrible truth.
Without strength, it was impossible to live or die as one wanted.
This was the eternal truth of the Cangxing world and thinking otherwise was merely deceiving oneself.
"Do you want to continue walking around in the afternoon?" Yu Nianzhen changed the subject.
"Why not?" Jiang Yue answered stubbornly.
He didn’t believe there were no treasures in the entire Ice Palace city.
After hitting blanks the entire morning, he was determined to find something in the afternoon.
As it happened, their luck did turn around.
When passing by a certain store, the treasure compass finally reacted.
In excitement, Jiang Yue looked around and saw that the store sold demonic beast parts.
’Is the treasure related to demonic beasts? Could it be the egg of an ancient beast? Maybe a dragon or a phoenix?’ He wondered and hurriedly pulled his husband into the store.
