ATAVID CH70

Wei Xun never again brought up that ethereal dream—the one only he remembered—in front of Jiang Qunyu.

The two of them seemed to return to their relaxed and casual way of interacting from long ago. Aside from Wei Xun stubbornly insisting on holding him tightly in his arms every night to sleep, Jiang Qunyu felt that these days were actually quite interesting.

For five days every month, he could even possess Wei Xun’s body, taking full control of its usage. Under Xie Chuan’s intensely admiring gaze, he would raise his hand and hurl the red scythe toward the treetops, the blade slicing through the flowering branches, causing rustling blossoms to flutter down and cover the ground.

Whenever this happened, Wei Xun would droop his eyelids, stand off to the side with his arms crossed, and watch the two of them listlessly, his entire being radiating displeasure.

Jiang Qunyu, highly flattered and thoroughly pleased by Xie Chuan’s extravagant barrage of compliments, had absolutely no time to pay attention to Wei Xun on the sidelines.

Instead, it was Xie Chuan who turned his head with an alert expression, saying surreptitiously, “Master, I constantly feel like someone is watching us.”

Hearing this, Jiang Qunyu turned around, hitting right upon Wei Xun’s eyes which were filled with deep resentment. Feeling an immediate surge of annoyance, he promptly hollered at Wei Xun via their divine sense: “The right to use this body belongs to me for these few days. It’s useless no matter how much you stare; I absolutely will not return it to you until the time is up.”

Wei Xun asked moodily, “So now, I am not even allowed to look at myself?”

Jiang Qunyu was completely righteous and confident, refusing to yield a single inch: “Of course not!”

Wei Xun fell silent, yet he stubbornly remained standing on the spot, his gaze firmly glued to “himself” without any intention of shifting away.

Jiang Qunyu: “…”

Fine, let him have his way.

As a result, the only one suffering was Xie Chuan.

Xie Chuan felt that the demon servants and maids in Cloud Palace City were sometimes right—Master truly was unpredictable.

Every month, during those specific few days, the aura around Master would soften entirely. The corners of his lips would unconsciously carry a shallow smile, and he treated people with a touch more gentleness.

But once those few days passed, the gaze Master leveled at him instantly became cold and frosty, and he would always assign him to do dirty, exhausting errands. Fortunately, the compensation was generous, so Xie Chuan didn’t object; he would roll up his sleeves and huff and puff to get it done.

A few days later, Master would slowly revert to his usual chilly and detached demeanor, looping back and forth without exception.

Jiang Qunyu didn’t actually live all that comfortably either.

Every night, Wei Xun would somber-facedly pull him into his arms, holding him so tightly it felt as though he feared Jiang Qunyu would dissipate in the next second.

With an expressionless face, Jiang Qunyu suddenly recalled the winter of the year they first met. Back then, he had wanted to drive Wei Xun to sleep on the roof beams, and the two had ended up fighting over a disagreement.

In the end, neither would submit to the other, which was why they squeezed onto a single bed.

As he slept, his leg had accidentally draped over Wei Xun’s waist. Wei Xun immediately woke him up with a cold voice and a very harsh tone, telling him to beat it back to the roof beam if he couldn’t sleep properly.

The next day, he had even deliberately disassembled the legs of those little snowmen, a blatant threat!

Tsk, times surely have changed, Jiang Qunyu tilted his head slightly, attempting to move a bit further away from the person buried in the nook of his neck.

Only, he didn’t succeed; Wei Xun clung even closer instead.

Jiang Qunyu thought wickedly to himself: If I had told Wei Xun back then that he would have to hold me to sleep every night in the future, Wei Xun would definitely have been utterly dismissive, scoffing coldly at my wishful thinking.

At the thought of that image, Jiang Qunyu couldn’t help but let out a soft laugh.

Another thought floated into his mind—since they were both straight guys, holding each other to sleep shouldn’t be much of an issue, right?

However, the thought flashed by and was quickly scattered by his wildly drifting reflections. Before long, Jiang Qunyu fell into a deep sleep.

In his grogginess, he had a very light dream.

In the dream, apricot blossoms bloomed across the entire sky. He and Wei Xun sat beneath a tree as the warm sun filtered down through the dense leaves, casting a ground full of fragmented shadows.

Wei Xun looked at him, pulling at the corner of his lips as he said, “He doesn’t like you.”

Jiang Qunyu snapped awake.

He didn’t know who the “he” in the dream referred to, but a sudden burst of anger flared inexplicably in his chest, leaving him feeling suffocated and irritable.

Opening his eyes, he saw Wei Xun still holding him in his arms, sleeping peacefully. Jiang Qunyu’s irritation flared instantly. Without a second thought, he raised his foot and delivered a fierce kick—

With a loud thud, he kicked Wei Xun directly off the bed.

Wei Xun was jolted awake the moment he was kicked off. His body crashed heavily onto the freezing floor. As a dull ache throbbed, he was dazed for a brief moment, his pitch-black eyes still carrying the sleepiness of having just woken up. Then, slowly recovering his senses, the aura around his body sank bit by bit.

Supporting himself against the floor, he stood up sinisterly. His gaze was damp and cold, locking firmly onto Jiang Qunyu on the bed, his voice incredibly raspy: “You don’t want me holding you to sleep?”

His eyes were pitch-black and deep, resembling a gloomy pool.

Influenced by the emotions from the dream, Jiang Qunyu was entirely filled with irritation. He paid absolutely no heed to Wei Xun’s expression, scrambling up directly to glare down at him from above, shouting out without a single thought: “Go sleep by yourself!”

With that, he reached out to violently yank the bed curtains shut, wrapping himself tightly in the blanket.

Wei Xun didn’t leave. He sat cross-legged outside the bed curtains, still holding the pillow Jiang Qunyu had thrown down. Propping his face up with one hand resting on his knee, he stared somewhat aggrievedly at Jiang Qunyu inside the curtains.

For several consecutive nights, Wei Xun spent the night guarding outside the bed curtains like this. Jiang Qunyu watched coldly, assuming he was merely putting on an act again. Sure enough, after a few days, Wei Xun silently climbed back into bed to sleep.

Jiang Qunyu secretly made up his mind that the moment Wei Xun dared to reach out and hold him again, he would immediately kick him down once more. However, to his surprise, Wei Xun merely lay down quietly and closed his eyes to sleep, making absolutely no overstepping movements throughout the entire process.

Jiang Qunyu found it strange for a long time, but then he became overjoyed, assuming Wei Xun had finally returned to normal and would no longer pester him so clingily.

As the days passed one by one, Jiang Qunyu had almost forgotten why he had kicked Wei Xun off the bed in the first place when Wei Xun, just like before, pulled him tightly into his arms during the night. A warm breath spilled across his neck, causing a bit of an itch. Jiang Qunyu felt a bit annoyed, but in the end, he simply let him have his way.

Spring departed and autumn arrived, cold years yielded to summer heat. This kind of life flashed by in the blink of an eye, and in a turnaround, it arrived at the Xiping Year 84.

News of Shen Peiqiu residing in Cloud Palace City had leaked out from some unknown source.

Xie Chuan leaped down nimbly from the roof beam, walking quickly over to Wei Xun’s side, and said, “Master, traces of Xuanjian Sect cultivators have recently been discovered near the Blood Moon Pavilion. It is highly likely they are coming for Immortal Venerable Shen.”

Wei Xun didn’t have much interest in this. His fingertips were currently flipping through the storybooks piled high on Jiang Qunyu’s desk. Any that depicted romantic entanglements between men and women were casually tossed aside by him, leaving only those chronicling love between men, which he stacked neatly to one side.

Only then did he lift his eyelids, asking in a flat tone, “When can Shen Peiqiu break through to the Mahayana Realm?”

Xie Chuan replied, “Immortal Venerable Shen is currently at the peak of the Great Circle of the Nascent Soul Realm.”

Wei Xun drooped his eyes listlessly: “Still one major tier away?”

He let out a light sneer, his brows making absolutely no effort to hide his disdain: “More than forty years have passed, yet he hasn’t even reached the Mahayana Realm. Truly a piece of trash.”

Xie Chuan: “…?”

He really wanted to tell his master that Shen Peiqiu‘s cultivation had been entirely scattered and his foundation completely destroyed back then. Being able to recultivate to the peak of the Nascent Soul Realm within forty-odd years, leaving him just one step away from the Mahayana Realm, was already considered exceptionally gifted and astonishingly brilliant within the entire cultivation world.

Not everyone was like Wei Xun, who was on the verge of stepping into the Body Integration Realm before even reaching a hundred years of age.

“Master,” Xie Chuan asked, “should we handle it?”

Seeing that Shen Peiqiu wasn’t far from the Mahayana Realm, if they sent him some more spiritual stones or spiritual herbs, it was likely he could soon extract the Spiritual Spirit Deer blood.

At that time, if people from the Xuanjian Sect were present, perhaps they could loosen the guard of those demon cultivators and allow the Xuanjian Sect people to take him away. This way, he wouldn’t have to worry about Jiang Qunyu constantly thinking about visiting Shen Peiqiu after the blood extraction was finished.

“No need,” thinking up to this point, Wei Xun’s tone was indifferent. “Just don’t actually let them take the person away.”

“Oh.” Xie Chuan obediently acknowledged the order without asking further questions. Turning around, he walked toward the window behind Wei Xun. With a light tap of his toes, he flipped out of the window, his movements incredibly swift.

Wei Xun: “…”

Stupid thing. No idea where he picked up such a bad habit of refusing to use the door and insisting on jumping through windows instead.

Just as he retracted his gaze, within moments, the window behind him moved slightly again.

Before Wei Xun could even turn around, he saw a figure flip inside lightheartedly. After landing, Jiang Qunyu clapped the dust off his hands, unable to resist complaining in a low voice: “The branches of that old tree outside the window are too much in the way. Every time I flip through the window, I get snagged. It’s exhausting.”

“Oh.” Wei Xun responded expressionlessly. The next day, that tree outside the window was gone.

Behind him, the commotion of flipping through the window became increasingly brazen—sometimes it was Xie Chuan, and sometimes it was Jiang Qunyu.

Xiping Year 85.

While strolling down the street with Wei Xun, Jiang Qunyu passed by a small stall at the corner, and his gaze was firmly captured.

The stall owner was an old demon cultivator with exquisite craftsmanship. With the rise and fall of the carving knife in his hand, ordinary blocks of wood transformed into lifelike puppets in an instant, their facial features and clothing folds exceedingly delicate.

Jiang Qunyu’s heart grew itchy with desire, and his hands tingled to try it out. He immediately bought a large pile of wood materials and carving knives, eagerly carrying them back to the Jade Capital Tower, determined to carve out beautiful little trinkets.

But clearly, Jiang Qunyu didn’t possess much talent in this area; the carved puppets he produced were uglier than the last.

Clearly, I am very good at making snowmen.

Refusing to accept defeat, Jiang Qunyu threw himself headfirst into the pile of wood. He pulled several all-nighters in a row, refusing to sleep even at night as he cradled the wood and carving knife, burying his head at the desk to carve his puppets.

Looking entirely gloomy, Wei Xun urged him: “Jiang Qunyu, you should go to sleep.”

Jiang Qunyu: “Oh!”

He continued to carve his puppets regardless.

Since he wouldn’t sleep, Wei Xun had no one to hold while sleeping, so he didn’t sleep either, choosing instead to sit on the bed and watch him. His pitch-black pupils were deep and heavy.

It wasn’t until the latter half of the night that Jiang Qunyu truly couldn’t resist the drowsiness any longer. His head nodded up and down, and clutching the carving knife, he slumped over the desk and fell fast asleep.

Only then did Wei Xun rise from the bed to carry him back.

Following that, he sat down at the desk in the spot where Jiang Qunyu usually sat. Looking at those crooked, ugly blocks of wood and half-finished puppets, he remained silent for a moment before picking up a sharp curved knife from the side. With a slight movement of his fingertips, he began to carve with meticulous detail.

When Jiang Qunyu woke up the next day and saw the row of puppets on the table, his eyes widened in surprise: “Wow! Wei Xun, you actually know how to carve puppets!”

Wei Xun’s long eyelashes trembled slightly as he lifted his eyelids to look at him. Jiang Qunyu didn’t know if it was his own illusion, but he constantly felt as though a trace of anticipation lingered deep within Wei Xun’s eyes.

Under Wei Xun’s expectant gaze, Jiang Qunyu inexplicably felt that the puppet in his hand had become somewhat burning to the touch. He instinctively lowered his eyes to look closely at the puppet’s face, and a bizarre sense of familiarity rose inexplicably from the depths of his heart.

The brows, contours, the bridge of the nose, the corners of the lips, and even the slightly upturned angle of the puppet in his hand grew increasingly familiar.

Jiang Qunyu froze for a few moments.

After a long while, he suddenly snapped out of it. A loud boom echoed in his mind, leaving behind only a frantic string of inner thoughts:

Holy shit, holy shit, holy shit! Why does this puppet’s face look so much like his own?!

How did Wei Xun know what he looked like?!

Terrified, Jiang Qunyu dropped the puppet from his hand.

Wei Xun frowned, picking up the puppet Jiang Qunyu had discarded. Pressing his thin lips into a straight line, he asked him, “Do you think this puppet looks good?”

Why would Jiang Qunyu dislike it? Was it because it didn’t look like him? He had never seen what Jiang Qunyu actually looked like, but he simply remembered that when they were in the illusionary realm, he had traced his face bit by bit with his fingers. In his mind, Jiang Qunyu looked exactly like this. Very beautiful.

Much, much more beautiful than himself.

Jiang Qunyu’s scalp tingled with numbness; how could he dare to say this puppet looked identical to himself?

With a stiff face, he braced himself to offer a dishonest evaluation against his conscience: “An ugly thing.”

Wei Xun was somewhat displeased, even rising to its defense: “It looks good.”

Jiang Qunyu bit down firmly and refused to yield: “It doesn’t look good!”

“Does it really not look good?”

“Really.”

“Alright then,” Wei Xun responded softly, no longer disputing it. He merely thought silently to himself that it was probably because his carving skills weren’t good enough yet.

It doesn’t matter. When I reconstruct a physical body for Jiang Qunyu in the future, I will do it better.

Seeing that he stopped speaking, Jiang Qunyu finally let out a sigh of relief. With an obvious intent to cover up, he shoved all those puppets into his Qiankun Pouch, never carving another puppet from that day forward.