Before she could finish her sentence, a hand lightly patted her head.
“Why are you blocking the entrance?”
Jiang Rui squeezed her way in from behind, sweeping her gaze over the new disciples who had yet to come to their senses. Her brows furrowed deeply. “Have you all finished your coursework? Have you practiced your spells until you're proficient?”
The cultivators nudged each other, none of them daring to answer.
“What? Your eyes were glued to the crane just now, but now that I ask about serious matters, you've all become tight-lipped?” Deacon Jiang tucked her hands into her sleeves, her gaze scanning over each of them.
“You lot, what are your rankings in the monthly exams? Tell me.”
The disciples shrank their necks in unison.
“Ah! You don't know?” Deacon Jiang let out a cold snort. “If you don't know, then why aren't you hurrying back to your cave dwellings to practice another thousand times?”
“Yes!!!”
The crowd quickly dispersed, as if a high-grade demon beast were chasing them from behind.
Once the area was completely clear, Deacon Jiang finally pulled her hands out of her sleeves and crossed them over her chest.
She looked up in the direction the Cloud-Plume Crane had disappeared, a trace of envy flashing in her eyes.
Young female cultivators of similar ages holding hands, riding together, laughing, and being intimate—no matter how one looked at it, it was a pleasing sight.
She also wished she had a junior sister with whom she could share her innermost thoughts. Regardless of the nature of their relationship, walking together for a stretch of the journey would be wonderful.
Yet for some reason, whenever she spoke a few extra words to any female cultivator, the other party would become so nervous that they wouldn't know what to do with their hands and feet, and they couldn't even answer coherently.
She was clearly just expressing concern about their cultivation progress, but the girls reacted as if a mouse had seen a cat.
At this thought, Deacon Jiang unconsciously touched her own face.
Was her face really that terrifying?
If Shen Qingci were still present, she would probably silently complain in her heart: “It's not that you're terrifying, it's just that you give off a major ‘school dean vibe.’”
Just standing at the entrance, the air pressure would drop by thirty percent. Any female cultivator would feel a bit intimidated.
A gentle breeze blew across the crane's back.
Shen Qingci leaned her nose close to her Senior Sister's neck and sniffed, catching a whiff of the scent of night-closing flowers.
The night-closing flower was typically used as the primary ingredient for youth-retaining pills.
She understood immediately.
Her Senior Sister must have realized that her junior sister was a sucker for good looks, so she had specially gone to the Pill Chamber today, asked for a few bottles of youth-retaining spiritual salve, and carefully applied it before coming to pick her up.
【Senior Sister's love is so incredibly presentable!】
Shen Qingci's heart swelled with warmth. She arched her instep and lightly tapped the crane's back.
Having spent decades in the sect, the Cloud-Plume Crane had received all kinds of guests. The moment the wealthy Qi Refining stage guest on its back tapped its foot, it understood most of it.
Its wings tilted slightly, causing the crane's back to bump a few times in response.
Using the swaying motion, Shen Qingci leaned forward, her lips brushing against Chi Yuan's auricle.
Taking advantage of the position, she took her ear in her mouth and nibbled on it a few times...
The first bite was light, her teeth grazing the ear cartilage.
The second was slightly heavier, taking the earlobe in her mouth and gently grinding it...
The third, the fourth... each bite was more teasing than the last...
Shen Qingci had already spotted the silhouette of Yunqi Cave ahead and knew they were about to land, but she refused to restrain her greed in the slightest.
She insisted on using this final stretch of the journey to indulge herself to her heart's content.
Only when the seventh rub and nibble came to an end did the Cloud-Plume Crane happen to fold its wings and land steadily in front of the cave dwelling's courtyard.
Releasing her hold with lingering desire, Shen Qingci turned her head and gave the “sensible crane” an appreciative look.
Chi Yuan flipped down from the crane's back and walked toward the cave dwelling without looking back. Her movement technique was thirty percent faster than usual, and a faint ring of teeth marks remained on the base of her ear.
Shen Qingci fished a storage bag out of her storage ring and hung it around the Cloud-Plume Crane's neck.
The bag was filled with one hundred mid-grade spirit stones.
The spiritual crane lowered its long neck, its black, bead-like eyes staring at the storage bag, momentarily dazed.
One hundred mid-grade spirit stones!!!
Its monthly allowance was only three mid-grade spirit stones.
For a single trip, after the sect took its cut, what landed in its beak was twenty low-grade spirit stones at most.
One hundred mid-grade spirit stones were enough for it to live comfortably through two bountiful years.
The spiritual crane suddenly threw back its long neck, letting out a series of high-pitched cries from its throat. Its wings flapped so wildly they nearly uprooted the spiritual herbs in front of the cave dwelling.
It circled Shen Qingci twice, curved its long neck, and rubbed the downy feathers on its head against her sleeve.
Translated, its posture roughly meant: “Wealthy patron! No, Eldest Young Lady! Next time, please remember to order Number Sixty-One. On call at any time, rain or shine, even flying at midnight.”
The Cloud-Plume Crane spread its wings and took to the air, flying in a wobbly path, so overjoyed that it even flew in the opposite direction of the Spirit Beast Park.
Shen Qingci turned and entered the cave dwelling.
Chi Yuan was already sitting on the couch, her head lowered as she flipped through a Mystic-grade sword manual.
The teeth marks on her ear had not yet faded, and her Senior Sister did not use her spiritual energy to conceal them, leaving them exposed in plain sight.
Shen Qingci nudged her way over to sit down, reaching out to grab the sword manual in her Senior Sister's hand.
Chi Yuan shifted the sword manual aside, refusing to let her have it.
“Is Senior Sister angry?”
“No.”
“Then why won't you look at me?”
Chi Yuan flipped through another two pages of the sword manual, her tone indifferent. “To teach you a lesson. Fiddling around on the crane's back... next time, are you going to do it on Master's Sword-Falling Terrace too?”
Shen Qingci awkwardly withdrew her hand.
【That's going a bit too far. Nibbling Senior Sister's ear on Master's turf... I don't have the guts for that yet.】
【Now that I'm with Senior Sister, Master's status is basically equivalent to a mother-in-law.】
However, when her Senior Sister said “teach you a lesson,” her tone did not sound truly angry.
She smiled to show her weakness, retrieved a jade bottle from her storage ring, and stuffed it into Chi Yuan's hand.
“For you, Senior Sister.”
Chi Yuan looked down at the jade bottle in her palm. Roughly guessing the purpose of the pill inside, she raised her eyes to look at Shen Qingci.
“Little Junior Sister, if I didn't have this beautiful face, would you grow tired of me and discard me?”
Shen Qingci was instantly tongue-tied.
She opened her mouth, wanting to explain, but felt that no matter how she answered her Senior Sister's question, it would be a trap.
If she said yes, she would be admitting to being a shallow person who lusted after beauty. If she said no, then what was the point of gifting the Everlasting Youth-Retaining Pill?
“Senior Sister...”
“Acting spoiled won't work.” Chi Yuan swept the jade bottle into her storage ring and flicked her sleeve toward the outside. “Go practice your swordplay on your own.”
Shen Qingci did not budge.
“What? Are you already refusing to listen to me now?”
“Fine, I'm going!” She stood up, then turned back to look at Chi Yuan with tearful eyes. “Senior Sister, you have to watch me from the side of the sword-practice platform!”
“Mhm~”
Chi Yuan ultimately agreed.
Only then did Shen Qingci walk toward the sword-practice platform. After taking two steps, she looked back, and indeed, her Senior Sister was following behind her.
The sword manual was still in her hand, looking as though she planned to flip through it while watching her practice.
Shen Qingci stood in the very center of the sword-practice platform and summoned Jinglei.
Sinking her waist and relaxing her shoulders, her opening stance was steady as she began to practice systematically, move by move, from the very beginning...
Chi Yuan sat on a stone bench by the side of the sword-practice platform. The sword manual was spread across her lap, but her mind was no longer on the pages.
Her gaze was firmly fixed on the figure in the center of the platform.
Once her Little Junior Sister gripped Jinglei, a heroic spirit would naturally arise between her brows, and every single move of hers would be filled with sharp edge.
Chi Yuan stared somewhat dazed, a thought rising in her sea of consciousness: her A-Ci was second to no genius in this world, meant to be a bright moon hanging high in the sky!
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