San Lang’s residence was an extremely spacious, extravagant mansion. When Xie Lian entered, he thought it was almost the equal of some of the garden palaces within the greater imperial palace of Xianle, which only further cemented the fact that San Lang was no ordinary man.
As Xie Lian lay alone in bed that night, he tossed and turned. He was mired in a storm of outrageous, hazy dreams. He wanted to move, but someone was pinning him firmly down. The voice that whispered in his ear was sometimes a man’s, sometimes a boy’s. Sometimes it called him “Gege, gege,” and sometimes it called him “Your Highness” as it coaxed him, “Don’t be afraid, Your Highness.”
It was intensely gentle, intensely evil—and all throughout, he felt intensely cherished by the one he was with.
Xie Lian woke with a start, his clothes completely soaked with sweat. He clenched his fists and panted. Feeling both furious and powerless, he punched the bed violently and tangled his fingers in his slightly damp hair.
When will I be able to forget about this?! Just wait. When I catch that shameless jerk, I’ll definitely…
He noticed then that there was a set of clothing laid next to his pillow that he’d never seen before—robes in his favored white color, and they were even in the style he preferred. Greatly relieved, Xie Lian hurried to the back of the room to take a quick bath.
Stripped and soaking in the water, he discovered that he had a fine, thin silver chain around his neck. A crystal-clear ring hung at the end of it. He didn’t know how long he’d been wearing it, but he hadn’t noticed it at all.
Do I have a pendant like this? he wondered. The ring was genuinely so beautiful that he stared at it, mesmerized—but that didn’t mean he dropped his guard.
A silver glint flashed by.
“Who’s there?!” Xie Lian shouted.
He struck the water and sent forth a splash that scattered like iron pellets, hitting the wall with resounding rat-a-tat bangs. Yet his attack didn’t reveal a person but…a scimitar?!
He held the sturdy blade up to inspect it, incredibly confused. Suddenly, a silver line on the hilt opened like an eyelid, and the eyeball beneath started spinning.
This shocked Xie Lian even further. What was this strange thing?!
The scimitar had a long, slender body, and it seemed almost alive—it enthusiastically tried to throw itself into Xie Lian’s arms over and over. Caught off guard, Xie Lian let it succeed in its endeavor, yelping and shuddering at the cold metal pressed against him.
Perhaps it was because he didn’t sense any killing intent, but Xie Lian’s instincts told him that this scimitar posed no danger. He didn’t want to react harshly toward it, send it beyond the clouds with a slap or anything like that, but this reluctance left him constantly—and arduously—trying to push it away.
Just then, a red shadow flashed in and snatched up the scimitar.
“So this is where you were…”
Xie Lian looked up to see that San Lang was standing next to the bathing pool with the scimitar choked in his hold. Although a smile still hung upon his face, faint veins had surfaced on his forehead.
He gave the scimitar a hard smack. “Didn’t I say you’re not allowed to be in here right now?” he admonished.
“San Lang, is that scimitar…your spiritual weapon?” Xie Lian asked.
San Lang turned toward him, the veins on his forehead disappearing in an instant and his calm, composed demeanor regained.
“It’s nothing but a worthless piece of scrap,” San Lang said. “Gege…your gege made a fool of himself. Please excuse me.”
Xie Lian, however, looked at him with bright eyes and immense respect. Catching the hem of San Lang’s red robe, he exclaimed, “No, no, no. San Lang-gege, you’re amazing! I can’t believe you forged a spiritual weapon like this, one that possesses its own consciousness!”
The scimitar’s eye had scrunched up after San Lang had smacked it, its grievance plain to see, but it was set happily spinning once more by Xie Lian’s praise. It tried again to sidle toward him, but San Lang coldly gave it another smack—and it simply would not have it. It collapsed to the floor with a thud and started rolling back and forth, looking for all the world like a small child bawling after being spanked by an adult. Xie Lian could almost hear its loud crying voice, and he felt a little sorry for it. He quickly stood up.
“Wait, San Lang! Let it go—don’t hit it anymore. I’m sure it was just being a little mischievous as it paid me a friendly visit. There’s no need to be so hard on it.”
It was only after he emerged from the bathwater that he remembered he was naked. His face turned intensely red again, and he sank back down awkwardly. However, San Lang had already turned around with artless ease and left.
Xie Lian quickly climbed out of the water and changed into the new robes. He was even more grateful when he felt the superbly fine material of the underclothes—at last, he wouldn’t feel so chafed anymore.
When he left his room and went to the receiving hall, San Lang was already at the head seat waiting for him.
Xie Lian didn’t know how San Lang had disciplined his scimitar, but it was behaving as it hung at his waist. When it wasn’t moving, it had a surprisingly cold and murderous appearance—it was hard to imagine that it had just been rolling on the ground making a scene.
San Lang smiled when he saw Xie Lian. “You’re up? Did you sleep well last night?”
“I don’t know why I was disturbed by dreams for the first half of the night…but the second half was fine,” Xie Lian answered honestly.
“Maybe you were too tired,” San Lang replied.
The two made idle chitchat and sparred for a few easy rounds; that was how they spent the whole day. He expected that they’d pass the time this way until Hua Cheng was available to meet him.
However, when Xie Lian lay alone in bed that night, he once again had that heated, restless dream.
He tossed and turned this way and that, and after he’d had enough, he jolted awake completely drenched with sweat once again. Angry and helpless, he had to get up for some fresh air. He wanted to take a stroll to calm down, but then he suddenly heard voices coming from a house at the far side of the complex.
It was San Lang’s master residence. The sound insulation of the house was excellent and the voices were quiet, but Xie Lian had keen senses and caught the noise. He held his breath and went over silently.
Peering through the crack of the door, he saw San Lang sitting in the head seat inside. He held a brush and seemed to be writing—his expression was cold, completely different than it was when he was with Xie Lian. Beside him, there was a black-clad man wearing a ghost mask who bent at the waist as he made a report in a low voice.
Xie Lian didn’t know why, but the man in the ghost mask had barely any presence—he could easily go completely unnoticed if one wasn’t careful. The man in the ghost mask had already mostly finished his report when Xie Lian began listening, so he only caught some scattered words here and there: “That monster has been causing trouble for a long time,” “He might’ve gotten into an accident when he went out to handle prayers,” “This is the location I’ve pinpointed,” and other such things.
He was still trying to process what he’d learned when he heard San Lang say, “I need to attend to him right now and can’t leave. Catch that monster before tomorrow night and bring it to me.”
“Yes, sir. Shall I leave it one last breath?” the man in the ghost mask asked quietly.
San Lang put down his brush and glanced at what he’d written, which he then crumpled up and tossed away, apparently dissatisfied.
“Leave it a few. Make it spit out what it swallowed, then crush its worthless head to dust. Make it slow and painful.”
His tone and his expression were both quite frightening, yet Xie Lian didn’t find him repulsive or alarming.
The man in the ghost mask acknowledged San Lang’s order and was about to take his leave, so Xie Lian quickly dodged away and hid.
When he made it back to his room, Xie Lian was even more wide awake than before. He paced back and forth, wondering, Who exactly is San Lang? What is that monster he spoke of?
It sounded as though some monster that had been causing havoc for a long time had swallowed something important, and San Lang was very angry about it—but he couldn’t head out and smash the monster’s head in because he had to stay with Xie Lian.