Chapter Six

Preoccupied with clearing his name and grasping at his one chance at survival, Chu Rong had momentarily forgotten there was still the matter of the marriage contract to consider.

In the original text, the original owner had entered into the marriage contract with Cen Yan for two reasons: partly because he liked Cen Yan, and partly because he wanted to use the contract to gain Cen Yan's protection.

And so, in the original storyline, whenever He Ming had tried to hint that the contract should be dissolved, the original owner had refused every single time.

But in truth, the so-called Heavenly Dao marriage contract was not difficult to dissolve at all. As long as both parties were genuinely and wholeheartedly willing to dissolve it, a dissolution deed could be written out using a talisman, and heaven informed once more. That was all that was required.

It was simply that, because marriage contracts with the Heavenly Dao were so rarely formed among cultivators, neither Cen Yan nor the others knew this.

Right now, with the critical plot point that had led the original owner to his death already avoided, Chu Rong had no objections to Cen Yan wanting to dissolve the marriage contract.

One might even say that Cen Yan's words were exactly what Chu Rong had been hoping to hear.

The thing was, resources were scarce in the cultivation world, competition between the hundred immortal sects was fierce and bloody, and the casualties were heavy. Starting from a hundred years ago, to protect the safety of their disciples, every immortal sect had laid down a Guardian Formation. The formation would open once every two, three, or ten years, allowing disciples to go out to train or make purchases.

The Qingyang Heavenly Sect's Guardian Formation opened once every two years. When the original owner and Cen Yan returned to the sect, it happened to be the day of the biennial opening.

And the next time the Guardian Formation would open was exactly half a year away.

During these six months, in case something unexpected happened, Chu Rong still needed the protection of the marriage contract. Therefore, he had no intention of telling Cen Yan the method for dissolving it.

"Alright." Chu Rong's throat, having endured such prolonged pain, was still very raw. His voice, muffled further by the mask, sounded even more hoarse and unpleasant — but his agreement came easily and without hesitation.

Cen Yan's expression faltered slightly. Clearly, he hadn't expected Chu Rong to be this agreeable, to give in so cleanly and readily.

He looked at Chu Rong with a hint of bewilderment, a vague strangeness flickering across his expression. Hearing these two words from Chu Rong's mouth was, in a way he couldn't quite put into words, deeply unsettling.

Cen Yan was single-mindedly focused on cultivation and had never shown any warmth toward Chu Rong. But bearing in mind that Chu Rong was his savior, he had never mistreated him either.

All along, it had only been Chu Rong clinging to the marriage contract and refusing to let go.

Still, it was best that Chu Rong agreed. It saved him a great deal of trouble.

Cen Yan thought no further on it, and spoke in a coldly detached tone, his voice carrying an icy chill that sent a shiver through anyone who heard it: "I hope you mean what you say."

He meant: don't come clinging and entangling yourself again after half a year is up. By then, he would show no more mercy.

"Don't worry." Chu Rong saw through Cen Yan's thoughts, raised his eyes, and his thick lashes brushed lightly against the grey-blue mask. He gave a weary nod, his voice flat and muffled behind the mask, without a shred of hesitation: "I will absolutely not bother you."

"Tianxiao Records" was a danmei novel, true, but the intimate scenes between the protagonists were not plentiful. Chu Rong had always read it as a feel-good power fantasy.

At his core, Chu Rong was essentially a straight man. The idea of entangling himself with another man held absolutely no appeal for him.

Let alone the fact that the original owner was nothing more than a cannon fodder gong. Cen Yan had never developed the slightest feeling for the original owner from beginning to end. The two of them had never had any intimate contact whatsoever. In fact, when the original owner had attempted to defile Cen Yan in the original text, he hadn't even managed to touch the corner of Cen Yan's robe.

Cen Yan said nothing. The strange look on his face deepened by three more degrees.

His gaze drifted inadvertently to the bloodstains at Chu Rong's collar. A few strands of hair wound their way along the bloodstained, luminously white neck, damp and trailing, with sweat.

Chu Rong's clothes were also somewhat disheveled. Sweat had soaked through his inner robe, leaving patches of dark moisture here and there across his outer garment.

"Why are you sweating so much?" Cen Yan frowned and asked.

"The illness flared up." Chu Rong answered honestly.

Cen Yan was briefly taken aback. When he had made the decision to bring Chu Rong back to the sect, it had been precisely with the intent to treat the chronic condition the fire had left behind, in repayment of the debt of saving his life.

Though he and Chu Rong had lived under the same roof for the past three years, he hadn't paid much attention to Chu Rong. He had never actually witnessed him in the throes of an illness flare-up.

He hadn't expected it to leave him looking this wretched.

A flicker of something complicated passed through Cen Yan's eyes. What a pity — in not even three years, everything had changed beyond recognition.

In the front hall, Chu Rong had proven his innocence before everyone under the watchful light of the Truth Pearl, refuting every single piece of evidence he had assembled. Yet Cen Yan didn't believe for a moment that all of it was false.

Suspicion was a living seed — once planted in the heart, it could never be uprooted. Cen Yan found it impossible to look at Chu Rong with the same equanimity as before.

In his eyes, everything Chu Rong did, every word Chu Rong spoke, carried some ulterior motive, some hidden calculation — and he couldn't stop himself from feeling revolted.

Cen Yan turned his gaze away coldly and walked off.

Chu Rong hadn't missed the shift in Cen Yan's expression. He watched the young man's retreating figure, his thin eyelids lowering softly, the light in his eyes shimmering and fluid.

He knew Cen Yan still suspected him.

But Chu Rong had no regrets.

Judging by the state he'd been in back at the apartment before he lost consciousness, it seemed likely he was in a bad way — and he didn't know whether he could even return. And until something changed, he would give Cen Yan no opportunity to catch him at anything.

The daylight streaming in through the window settled over Chu Rong's body, and as the breeze stirred, a rich, subtle fragrance of orchids wafted outward.

So much had happened on this single day. Chu Rong had just been thrust from the modern world into a book and hadn't quite adjusted yet. His thoughts churned and churned, and before he knew it, he had drifted off leaning against the couch railing, fast asleep.

When Chu Rong awoke again, rosy clouds were spread across the sky beyond Misty Pine Residence, the white clouds at the horizon's edge tinged with the orange-gold of the setting sun. The light all around was dim and indistinct.

The deep bone-ache had faded completely. Only a residual languor remained after such intense pain. Chu Rong sat for a while longer to recover, and then, remembering how thoroughly soaked in sweat and blood he had been before falling asleep, he felt sticky and uncomfortable all over.

Chu Rong had something of a cleanliness fixation. He could barely wait any longer — he wanted a bath.

Chu Rong pushed himself up off the edge of the couch, lit the candles in the room, and took out a clean set of clothes from the cabinet.

The original owner had a taste for vibrant colors. All of his clothes were in relatively loud shades — crimson, purple, cyan-green — the complete opposite of Chu Rong's own preference for muted tones.

But he was currently occupying the original owner's body. He had no choice.

The original owner, having used Cen Yan's name to accumulate substantial wealth in the mortal world, had his clothes made from the finest silk. They were cool and fine to the touch, flowing and weightless.

Chu Rong casually picked out a set of curved-water purple brocade silk robes, tucked them under his arm, and walked out of Misty Pine Residence.

"Tianxiao Records" was written from the perspective of the protagonist Cen Yan, so naturally everything related to the protagonist was described in great detail. And Misty Pine Residence, as the protagonist's dwelling, had received no small amount of narrative attention.

Chu Rong remembered the descriptions in the original text: behind Misty Pine Residence, in the back mountain, there was a natural spring.

The back mountain was not particularly rugged. Following the winding mountain path downward, Chu Rong quickly found the wisps of mist rising from his destination.

He walked closer and looked. His eyes involuntarily lit up — it was actually a living hot spring.

Chu Rong rolled up his sleeve and dipped two fingers into the spring. The temperature was not too hot and not too cold — just right.

The delight in Chu Rong's eyes grew even more vivid. He raised his hand and removed the mask, setting it on top of the clean clothes. He pinched the silk cord at his waist, tugged it open with a slight effort, and shrugged off the blood-soaked outer robe.

His fingers released. The outer robe swayed and dropped, pooling at his feet.

Then the middle robe, the inner robe, the undershirt, the underpants...

As each sweat-soaked garment was shed, the man's pale white back was exposed to the open air without reserve. Long hair like a waterfall cascaded down, spreading across the evenly-muscled, immaculately white body, its ends reaching below the hips. A faint sheen of sweat trailed along the smooth lines of his back, and his snow-white skin gleamed with a lustrous sheen, like the most exquisite porcelain.

Two long, fair legs, straight and slender, without a single ounce of excess flesh. The heels were delicate, flushed with a faint, soft pink.

Chu Rong looked down at himself. There were even six defined abdominal muscles in front, their lines clear and distinct, a subtle ridge barely raised — not exaggerated in the slightest, and actually one more than his original body had.

And on his body, he could find no burn scars or wounds of any kind either.

Chu Rong's eyes flickered slightly. He pressed down the questions stirring in his mind, extended his long legs, and stepped into the spring in two strides, wading toward the center.

Ripples spread outward in rings. His dark hair floated on the surface like soft, gentle seaweed, drifting and swaying with the current. Through the mist rising from the hot spring, the man's outstanding figure was soft and hazy, his lean waist barely the width of a hand's grasp, now visible, now hidden in the pool — enough to make one's mouth run dry.

Chu Rong cupped a handful of water and poured it over his face from above. His devastatingly beautiful features, like a crabapple flower dripping with rain, could have bewitched away a person's very soul.

Chu Rong bathed with complete absorption, and did not notice that in the drifting mist beside the spring, a faint apparition had materialized out of thin air.

The apparition was very faint, barely there, as though a single gust of wind could disperse it. Looked at carefully, one could just barely make out the silhouette of a tall, upright human figure.

The figure's head turned slightly from side to side, as though taking in its surroundings. After a moment, it stepped forward twice, walking to the edge of the hot spring.

The water splashed softly, ripples spreading outward. The figure's eyes at once caught sight of someone in the pool.

The person in the water had ink-black long hair spread open, their long lashes curved gently upward, dampened by the mist of the hot spring into wet, clustering strands.

A flush of warmth rose across their cheeks, steamed to the surface, as though a person had been rendered in ink and water, then touched with the vivid bloom of a peach flower.

Just then, moonlight emerged from behind the clouds and fell into the hot spring, casting its glow across that face — radiant as the moon's own light, like a water spirit conjured to ensnare the heart.

The figure's movements visibly stilled. For a moment he seemed to be entranced, as though completely spellbound, standing motionless at the edge of the spring for a long time.

It was only when a loud sound of breaking water rang out that the person in the pool rose straight up from the water, and the figure just barely came back to his senses.

The hot spring was not deep. The man waded step by step toward the edge, his jade-like fingers spreading slightly to push back the hair at his temples, sweeping it up over his head. His black hair, trailing a cascade of water droplets, traced an arc through the air before falling back against his pale, luminous body.

Chu Rong stepped out of the hot spring, and bent sideways at the waist. His water-streaked, jade-white arm reached out and hooked up the clean underrobe set beside the pool, slipping it on. He stood poised before the figure, graceful and still.

The robe's collar fell slightly open, and through the fabric soaked by water the faint outline of skin could be seen, along with the smooth, porcelain-clean lines of his collarbone.

Delicate collarbones, their curve exquisitely beautiful.

The figure, as though scalded, side-stepped hastily to one side.

The apparition was truly very faint, and the back mountain was dark and dim to begin with. Hidden within the drifting mist of the hot spring, Chu Rong had absolutely no awareness of it.

He then took out his white gauze inner robe and wrapped it around himself. With a turn of his wrist, the sleeve slid back slightly, revealing a section of luminously white, jade-like wrist, and his palm closed around a silk cord.

Chu Rong tied the cord at his waist, cinching his robe shut, then reached back and replaced the mask on his face. He gathered up the clothes he had changed out of and walked back the way he came.

The ripples in the spring slowly settled. The figure stood at the edge of the pool for a while, then followed at an unhurried pace behind Chu Rong.

Only Cen Yan and Chu Rong lived in Misty Pine Residence — not even a disciple for sweeping came. And Cen Yan always returned very late.

Chu Rong's trip there and back went entirely unnoticed by anyone.

Chu Rong set down the dirty clothes and gathered his dripping wet hair to one side of his neck, wringing out most of the water with force, then took out a clean silk handkerchief to pat it dry.

The thin inner robe on his back was already soaked through by his wet hair, clinging tight to his skin, the contours of his lower back fully on display.

The figure who had followed him inside took this in, and went still again, stopping at the doorway without advancing further.

About half an hour later, the figure, like a wisp of smoke, vanished on the spot without leaving a single trace.

Chu Rong had no idea someone had come and gone. He carefully finished drying his hair, and once his locks no longer dripped, he put on the curved-water purple gauze outer robe.

The inner robe of white gauze was like snow, the white silk cord at the waist cinching and shaping his lean, slender waist. The purple outer robe draped over it was thin as a cicada's wing, its sleeves layered in cascading tiers.

Gone was the original owner's sinister, duplicitous air. In its place was a warmth and radiance, a dazzling, captivating beauty — like fine jade glowing with an inner light, enough to make anyone's heart stir and soul tremble at the very first sight.