“Does Su Liang not dislike being underground? Isn’t he… part bird?”
Su Liang yipped and made a long whining sound and looked towards his mother.
“He is, but he seems to like underground as much as above ground. No problem for him, and we would feel calmer like this. If something happens, we can hide the door quite quickly. He doesn’t give off any scent or aura and is very quiet, so he will be safer down here.”
No matter what, his mate leaving at this time was clearly making the beast nervous.
“He’s a particular one. He eats, but not because of hunger. I wonder if it’s Mingtian’s blood”, Xue Hua complained worriedly.
Considering that Su Liang hadn’t done more than lick up some milk and gnaw on some fish and sweets these days, he looked happily unconcerned and very content.
Ying Hua went to the other corner of the room to work at whatever was placed there without participating in the conversation. She sat down and moved her hands.
Su Liang struggled in Xie Yi’s arms, wanting to over and see. Xie Yi straightened himself. “No hurry, little guy. I’m going already.”
“He likes having a personal carrier1A/N: Taxi.. The moment we started working here, he did not stop watching. Try placing him on your head”, Xue Hua suggested, reaching out at the same time to do just that for Xie Yi.
Xie Yi lifted his arms and Su Liang, with Xue Hua steadying him, found his place on Xie Yi’s head.
His hind paws on Xie Yi’s shoulders and the front paws clawed into his hair, he happily howled and wriggled around. Xie Yi nervously kept his hands up. “Why do I think that this works better with MingMing’s horns?”
“Oh? He doesn’t sit on my head, interesting. I wonder why? As you say, he likes having Mingtian carry him like that. When it’s me, he prefers being held in my arms.” Xue Hua was thoughtfully observing his son.
“Birds’ necks are not very strong”, Ying Hua distractedly commented. “Their claws are the best for carrying. Besides that, many flatland beasts like certain canine and feline beasts enjoy high places for a better overview, even when being carried by their parents.”
“So he’s adjusting to his parents? The claws, or arms, for the avian parent, and the high head and shoulder for the canine parent?” Xie Yi placed Su Liang back on the ground when he sat down next to Ying Hua. Did that mean he counted as a canine in Su Liang’s eyes? What about Ying Hua and Shi Yue, then?
“That does make sense”, Xue Hua hummed. “When he sleeps leaning on Mingtian, he sleeps lying over his neck, when it’s with me, he burrows himself under my arms. Maybe it’s two natural behaviour sets?”2Like a chick sleeping under a wing or a puppy lying over another puppy's body
“He’s a special snowflake”, Xie Yi declared. Su Liang whistled. “Right you are. So what are we doing here?”
“Weaving”, Ying Hua said. Her fingers did not stop, but Xie Yi was at a loss on how she even controlled the weird movements.
“And… what?”
“A basket. As a base for the nest.”3Very flat, similar to a nest seat
“Is this the moment where I admit I don’t know how weaving works?”
Ying Hua glanced up and slowed her hands. “You move this here. Then like this, this, and this.”
“Okay.”
“There, and there. Just continue on like that.”
Xue Hua sat down on the other side and Xie Yi tensed up a bit. They were supposed to be easy movements, but he… couldn’t follow them at all.
“I do not need you to do this”, Ying Hua declared with a roll of her eyes. “Weaving isn’t something for several people at once. Don’t be stupid.”
Even Xue Hua’s face twitched into almost a grin at the relief on Xie Yi’s face. “We need a first layer on the inside already. The material for the base is good, but its smell isn’t ideal so it’s best to do this as soon as possible.”
Xue Hua tilted the lense-like structure a bit and Xie Yi peeked inside. The inner area was neatly freed from any splinters and then oiled to lose its smell.
A type of finicky work that Xie Yi knew he would hate, but Su Liang growled playfully and tugged at his clothes and he fell all quiet and continued plucking splinters.
Shi Yue came by somewhere during noon with a meal. He had expected to find Xie Yi helping, so the portion was larger. “How is it going? Are your eyes fine?”
“The light could be better but it works. What’s for lunch? I smell meat!” Xie Yi jumped up. His back cracked as he stretched his stiff limbs.
“Don’t eat down here. Go up”, Shi Yue scolded and pushed Xie Yi to the ladder while quickly tucking a few of Su Liang’s feathers out of the black hair.
“I’ll finish this corner first”, Ying Hua declared, not moving an inch.
Xue Hua hesitated, then agreed. “I’ll come in a minute.” ...Or a few.
Xie Yi did not question their motives, unlike Shi Yue who raised his eyebrow, and climbed out of the cellar to find his meal. He was truly hungry by now and his eyes did feel strained.
“Good lord, what did you do down there? Why are you covered in feathers?” Even as Xie Yi began eating, Shi Yue awkwardly found more and more small feathers everywhere on his disciple. Clothes, hair, some already slipping into his collar. “Did you pluck Xiao Liang?”
“He made himself comfortable on my head. Are there really that many?”
The pure white contrasted with his dark hair. The tiny feathers looked like snowflakes that had settled on him, not melting away.
Shi Yue had planned on eating as well, but he couldn’t stand the sight of his disciple being so messy and concentrated fully on picking all of them out.
Xue Hua had waited a few extra minutes before coming up, but found his partner gentle brushing through Xie Yi’s hair while the disciple nonchalantly ate, not letting himself be distracted.
It felt so much like intruding that he stood as long behind the wall as Su Liang managed to keep quiet. Once he squeaked in discontentment at not moving, Xue Hua walked around the corner. He couldn't stay hidden any longer anyway.
Shi Yue was just about finished with his work and returned to his place when Xue Hua came over. He put some fish and vegetables on the other’s plate, then prepared a third bowl for Su Liang.
The little one only got a thin soup with smaller pieces of fish.
“Thank you for the meal”, Xue Hua warmly whispered and placed Su Liang onto the table.
With Xue Hua being upstairs to interrupt the scene already, Ying Hua soon trailed in. She only took some dessert for herself and otherwise watched over Su Liang.
“Xu Yan went to get permission for going out to gather the materials that we need”, Shi Yue said between two bites. “He will likely go with Sheng Mu - he’s a talented disciple and the two of them are acquainted. I believe Sheng Mu should be back soon, then the two can leave.”
“Sheng Mu is out?”
“Don’t talk while chewing.”
Xie Yi swallowed his food and repeated his question. Xu Yan might have mentioned something like that but he forgot already.
“Short joined mission with some disciples from another sect.”
“...I never participated in a joined mission.”
“You never participated in any normal mission. Look at what happened when I sent you out to deliver a message! How am I supposed to pair you up with a normal disciple, hmm?” Shi Yue knocked his finger against Xie Yi’s forehead with a resigned expression on his face.
Having nothing to say against that, the young man went back to eating.
The meal was generally quiet, as out of five people at the table, two weren’t the types to talk while eating and one couldn’t even talk yet. Su Liang was very well behaved, not causing a mess and eating more with curiosity than hunger.
Shi Yue had only begun to relax when the scrambling noise of an attendant reached his ears. “Master Li, Master Li!”
The Grandmaster winced and cursed mentally. It was impossible to catch a break right now.
He set his food down and threw an apologetic glance at Xue Hua, who was soothing the shocked Su Liang’s feathers. The child was baring his teeth into the direction of the sudden noise, but the attendant did not enter the Grandmaster’s house and only paced around outside.
“I’ll be back soon. I’ll be leaving the clean-up to you”, Shi Yue said and left the house with quick steps. Xie Yi looked after him with a tilted head.
Shi Yue did not come back that day. He did not even come out the next one.
Sheng Mu had rings under his eyes and was half asleep on the chair in the small room near the sect leader’s office. He had been awake for three days now, which certainly was his limit even with the help of spiritual energy and herbs, especially since he had spent most of it running.
For a few minutes, he had been able to hear shouting from the sect leader’s room but now it was quiet.
Sheng Mu’s head fell forwards and jolted up again. He had troubles looking forward.
“I’m sorry for keeping you up for so long. You can go to sleep now”, Shi Yue’s voice came from the entrance and Sheng Mu dazedly looked over. He wanted to stand up and bow but failed.
I usually am not a fan of slow burn but this is one of the few books where not only did it make sense but it wasn't aggravating or boring. I think Xie Yi, like you said, needed more time to first figure out what feelings were and normalize at least marginally before even stepping onto the edge of the field of romance. His confession was the sweetest ever and if that had been rushed, I doubt I'd be as satisfied. Thanks for the chapter!
Well said! +1
I love slow burn. It makes me so giddy whenever I see little hints of love in their actions. Slow romance is so cute. Well, at least when it's well written.
I think my favourite part in a love story is when they feel a little more than a crush and both get really hyped/nervous around eachother. Sooooo heartwarming. Especially the fluff
I like slow-burn (at least when you're writing it). In this story it's allow us to get to know characters very well, to savour their relationship more (generally, not only romantic aspect). And honestly, although I really look forward to the parts when Shi Yue will suffer from love (more than steamy parts
), I really don't want this story to end, so for me it's just perfect if it's slow-burn.
At least it's likely that by the time GWD will be done, I'll have the next story ready or possibly finished already, since I usually jump around in writing several stories at once
Glances at google drive
But I'll definitely miss GWD....
Just not sure whether it's going to be one on the level of GWD, a happy-go-lucky story or deep deep darkness
If it has happy end, then I'll read anything you write, even the darkest darkness xD
It's just a little sad to think of times, when GWD will be over
I like slow burn, it is very gratifying. The worst is when it's stated that it's "slow burn" but ends up being "hinted that there is romance with a kiss in the last 10 chapters" lol.
——
Ah, and now there's gonna be some action! ^^
That is indeed the worst. No no. There's gonna be lots of relationship and lots of explicit content that I still have to think about whether it needs a declaration or not
idk, en mi opinión en tu historia se siente natural el slow burn, si hubiera una relación en el cap 100 o antes se sentiría extraño y muy occ por parte de XY y SY, pero bueno, entiendo a las personas que no les gusta jaja
ooo hljoo gave a hot take opinion! It urges me to write an overly long comment/critique.
Most that commented seem fine with the story pacing, but I'm gonna partially take hljoo's side on this one. I know the synopsis says it's a fluff/funny story, but when I read the first 50 chs or so I couldn't help but expect more with the set up of XY's mentally unstable, grossly misguided character. As the story has progressed, I would say it ended up being 80% fluff/slice of life in sect, 20% gore/drama. It's why I'm a bit excited now that owl says the pace will pick up. At certain points, there has been interesting developments/thoughts, at other points, the story content comes to me off as rather bland.
This is in part because most issues in the story resolve themselves with reasonable conversation. Parts I thought would be more dramatic were smoothly conquered. For example, instead of XY exploding with mental instability, he gets Juntian which effectively removed this worry from the story line. They storm the demonic sect, but XY and MT have everything in control, it's only SY who seems to be struggling. While this take on resolving issues is unique and often enjoyable, it sometimes takes away the edge of excitement. I just go 'oh, so that's resolved' then wonder what I am waiting for. It was the same for when XY was almost murdered on the hunting trip (many many chs ago), they discuss it and want revenge for that, but then it's just 'oh, we can't take action openly or right away, we'll just have to wait'. The story then transitions from these near climaxes into funny/fluffy sect life. Like going to hot springs or how XY doesn't have common sense. While it is true that many of these scenes were funny/good for reinforcing character personalities, they are still too numerous on the whole. It feels anticlimactic, and I think this is the basis for lorain's review that mentioned comedy falling flat/lack of gore or hjoo's comment on things dragging on. Some situations could have spun out of hand (for example like when XY killed that one demonic cultivator at the inn), while others could still have been reasonably resolved.
I still enjoy the story because of the characters and wanting to see how it all resolves, but I gotta be honest and say I've skimmed a few of the chapters when they were fillerish in content.
Me saying all this also ties into how the romance is paced in the story.
XY had maturing/insanity to get through, so it makes complete sense for the slow burn. SY is also in denial, so that's there too. I have no issues with slow burn in general, but I also recognize when the story is beginning to crawl pacing wise.
If XY doesn't dare ask for SY's love, then naturally it's gotta be SY who takes that step even if he's in denial.
Regarding this, even with the previous lulls in the story line, these most recent scenes where SY found out about all the previous life stuff and XY's open confession in front of everyone should have brought on a turning point within the next chapter or two, but instead readers are getting the happy family life of MT and XH while SH hasn't even owned up to his feelings yet. SY's reaction to all that was a bit lackluster. Of course, I didn't expect an immediate confession or for him to bring up the topic of XY's past immediately, but certainly hoped he would either realize his feelings or bring up a conservation sooner.
This ties into the "downward trend" hjoo mentioned. It isn't to say that HOW character development is unfolding is bad (good, actually) but that the most interesting parts are being watered down between other less important scenes, bringing the overall pacing of the story to feel rather slow. Scenes such as this chapter, for example. In essence, the main point of this chapter was how to raise Su Liang and that SY is called out? It could have been reduced to a couple paragraphs, especially since we've already gotten several chapters of cute SL floofball.
We'd reach this turning point in their relationship much sooner than ch. 179 with more careful consideration in inclusion of scenes. (Something that, as owl mentioned in previous comment, can easily be worked on if a beta reader addresses it/editing a period after writing the story.)
For the usual disclaimer, I am a reader who likes stories with a fair dose of character development/drama/action/plot alongside the BL/fluff. I understand that many other readers are happy with slice of life per chapter, and that's cool. All in all, this work still has enough going for it that it stands out from many other BL novels on this site. Lots of interesting elements, I would just offer the (Hot take!!) opinion that they are often sidetracked.
To end it, I still thank author for all the interesting content this novel brings
. But I also wanted to take a bit of time to acknowledge the faults I see and try to write them out into comprehensible words. It is difficult to pace a story by yourself. Good efforts !!
Okay, acknowledged xD
A problem of mine is also that I want a number of things included into the story - for example like SL being taken care of - even if they're, essentially, sidetracking. Maybe it makes sense to move scenes that aren't age bound and rather place more extras after the main story that can be read, instead of including them here
Technically I have the whole end-game setup existing after the next... I think 3 chapters, so I can work towards the actual conflict that circles around the end at any time. Looking at how long this story is already, I guess it makes sense to move more daily life towards the extras and get on with the main story 
As I've commented to hljoo, I hope that the pacing will get better - I'll certainly try to keep up the pace now, although it makes me uncertain to place so many (needed) timeskips so close with each other
@Owl first, thanks for reading my super long feedback, and extras are certainly a good idea. You could always buffer the time skips slightly, it just depends what all is happening during them and how long they are. A few months or weeks aren't a big deal to gloss over, if they are skips of yrs then it could feel more choppy
@Amarathia Well I'm not sure how it is for other writers but at least for me, my perspective is really twisted due to being the writer. I can't judge my pacing well at all, which is also because obviously the whole thing is different in my head with all its details. That's why, as long as someone actually explains what their problem is, I want to try reacting to it.... Meaning even if it's a long comment, I'll take it seriously
So let's see whether things get better in the next chapters, then I'll have a better idea on how to continue
Thanks for the chapter!
They'll probably get together by Chapter 300 or 30000, by the way things are going. The current 5-10 chapters read like filler material and make readers lose interest. It may be great to focus attention on others besides XY and SY but this story has been trending downwards for a long while now. It starts off very well, with a strong premise, gripping one's attention but it is now watered down with trivialities that don't move the plot by much per chapter. It's draggy and shows poor planning, that the author has lost control as new ideas are simply inserted without careful thought as to how the tightness of the plot is affected.
XY is so childish and lacking in common sense that it will not be possible for him and SY to get together in the real sense until he grows up a lot, but the author never sees it fit to develop this aspect of XY gradually. So he'll gain enough common sense in another 2000 chapters or so? Thanks but, by then, nobody will care anymore, at least not I. This story needs strict planning and implementation, with much tightening of the plot line needed.
The author is free to do what he wants, of course. It's only that stretching this out, dragging it out, really tests the readers patience. And you can't blame them - it's Chapter 179 by now.
Fair enough.
I've admitted before that planning is something I'm not very good at, so it's not that surprising for there to be readers (who knows how many) that dislike the pacing. I guess I'll take it as a lesson that I really need an editor for future stories, as a person who can judge the story from another perspective than my own - being the writer really twists your view a lot. I hope the pacing of the coming chapters will be better then, since we are over the peaceful in-between now
This doesn't even feel like slow burn to me. Usually in those types the author seems to throw in more n more problems in the couples way until it becomes unnatural.
However this just feels likes natural progression so it doesn't have the same annoying feel that most slow burns do.
Because you've done that so well it just becomes fun to watch all the little moments as they slowly get closer.
That's true, I didn't use the classical tropes for messing their relationship up
While some misunderstandings are normal, I really don't want to write them endlessly....
I like that this is a story with fleshed out world, legends and characters. The romance is simply another facet of their lives and adventures.
I personally really love character development. So I find it very satisfying to watch our characters grow, develop, stumble, get frustrated, melt, explain commonsense, be frustrated about being small/chibi sized, daydreaming about your best friend being a dragon ...
After all, we all know that shu yue never stood a chance at resisting, so its kinda like a prearranged engagement with two lifetimes of courtship. Flirting. Only this time our mc is actually getting good advice on what gifts to give and as such he has not yet presented bloody fresh kills to his loved one.
Which really reminds me of a cat presenting its staff (humans) with dead mice or birds then getting really confused when you freak out at finding it on your pillow or doormat...
Yep, XY kind of courted very unusually.... Hunting trophies....