Xi Village was a calm, normal place. Most of the time, there was little worthy of discussion, and when people felt the need to spread rumours or share news, it would generally be about a successful hunt or some wild beast or an especially fruitful harvest.

Now, however, Song Ming had something – well, someone – that she couldn’t stop thinking about.

A woman that seemed extremely strange in comparison to others that she had met, and yet she left quite the impression. She was easily one of the most beautiful women Song Ming had met in her brief life, and unlike some of the gorgeous women from the Sacred Rivers sect, whom she had met around ten years ago, there was no cultivation, no fancy alchemical products, and seemingly no influence from a cultivation.

Her looks were also unusual, with features more common in the Western Continent, and the way she looked back at her… Song Ming’s thoughts were devoured by the woman calling herself Bianca.

It didn’t help that she met this woman, if such a term could even be used considering the circumstances, in a very compromising position. She had seen other women of the village naked before, but it was always when they were bathing, or changing together with them, so the combination of these factors completely changed the way she interpreted the situation.

With Bianca, it was amidst during her training out in the woods, thanks to feeling something amiss.

This feeling led her into the deeper portion of the forested region, a few mountain terraces away from the village, and to a naked woman just lying there on soft foliage, seemingly placed down there by the heavens themselves.

There was no trace of others around her, nothing for Song Ming’s fledgling spiritual perception to pick up, nor any hints of planar energy gathering around the mysterious woman. Such factors might have distracted her, but without them, all that she was left with was the naked being before her, clean and tidy, as if someone had moulded the body only minutes prior and breathed some semblance of life into it.

When that thought entered her mind, she realised that she had no clue whether the mysterious figure was even alive, prompting her to get nearer.

‘Heavens, she is so… so…’ Song Ming found her mind blanking out, unable to think of a proper description, prompting her to keep her gaze upon the stranger while she attempted to think, only leading to more staring.

She looked at the woman’s face, the pink lips and soft skin. Dark brown hair that wasn’t exceptional in its shade, yet it was straight and pristine, silky soft, as if it had not endured the wear and tear of life. A lithe body, barely showing any hints of physical exertion and exercise, but a large chest, with pink nipples that drew Song Ming’s attention more so than the slight rise and fall of Bianca’s chest, or the subtle flaring of her nostrils as she inhaled and exhaled. Really, there was plenty to suggest that the strange woman was alive, yet she refused to see any of it.

Instead, her gaze wandered down the woman’s body, past her nearly flat belly and onto her legs, and what was between them.

A nearly cleanly shaven groin was certainly an unusual sight in Xi Village, where most weren’t cultivators, and hence couldn’t nor wouldn’t waste their time on trimming body hair. Even Song Ming, whose cultivation permitted her some influence over her bodily processes, was content with trimming her pubic hair and armpits using a short blade, leaving her with a neat bush.

‘N-No, I shouldn’t be staring… why am I staring? Why… why is my heart beating like this?’ Song Ming clutched her training clothes near her chest, feeling her cheeks grow strangely warm.

She knew it was wrong to be looking at another person in a manner like this, especially when they were unconscious and unable to say a single thing, but this event proved her self-restraint to be completely and utterly lacking.

The puffy nether lips revealing an area of pink flesh completed the strange sculpture, the one that invaded her dreams in the two days that she had waited for Bianca to awaken. Song Ming wasn’t sure what exactly fascinated her to such an extent, nor was she sure what she would do if Bianca accepted her interest, but she understood her own body just a little.

Hence, she had to address the curiosities and… desires… in the only manner she knew.

In the dead of night, when her father was long asleep and the village was mostly quiet, with the few that were still awake residing far from her residence, she pulled her lower undergarments down to her knees and brought her hand to her own petals, her lower lips.

They had grown slick from her fantasies, a sticky nectar spilling onto her inner thighs. She slid her middle finger up her thigh, feeling a tingle run down her spine, and then brought it to her tight lower lips, dragging her finger along her slit until she reached the top. There, as she knew from many previous experiences, was an especially sensitive spot, a small nub that brought her great pleasure whenever she rubbed it.

This time, she felt the pleasure all the same, but as her thoughts wandered back to Bianca’s naked body, that sensation suddenly felt a dozen times greater. It was as if a roaring flame lit up within her, turning her cheeks red as her mind plunged into a fantasy that, blurry and uncertain as it was, made her continue without hesitation.

She had never touched another woman – nor a man, at least in that way – so all she could imagine were sensations. The warmth of Bianca’s touch, the gentle caresses of her fingers, whispers that seemed so sweet even when she could not imagine specific words.

Before she knew it, she went from massaging her sensitive point to prodding at her entrance, her wet finger easily prying open her light nether lips and sliding into her. Song Ming had to subdue a gasp with her other hand, afraid that her voice would reach someone else, but she couldn’t stop herself from sliding in deeper while keeping her lips parted with her other fingers, slowly bringing it in and out, biting her lip as the sensation intensified.

Unfortunately, that was the extent of her knowledge about her own body. It would be impossible for her to ask someone else about ways to pleasure herself, and she had never slept with someone else that could provide her with ideas, so she could only continue in this manner, accelerating her fingering as she felt her excitement climb.

It climbed, and climbed, and climbed, until-

“Hey, Song Ming?”

“Ah? Y-Yes?” she felt her cheeks burn again as she snapped out of her thoughts and looked into fine blue eyes, “Can I help you, Bianca?”

Aside from the lustful thoughts, she also had some caution towards Bianca – at first. From Xi Wu Lin’s occasional lectures to her and the other people of the village, done through one of the few windows in his residence, she knew that not all people were trustworthy, and that there were those that would lie about losing their memories to avoid questions and sneak into places that they might not be permitted into otherwise.

However, nothing about Bianca’s behaviour in the few days since her awakening suggested this. If anything, the amount that she had clearly forgotten completely and utterly was pitiable, making Song Ming feel even worse about the things she did while thinking about her at night.

“I’ve been meaning to ask, but… how do you keep yourself looking this good? Do you have any special ways of washing your hair, for instance?” Bianca asked her this time.

“No, unfortunately,” Song Ming responded as calmly as she could, raising her hand in a futile attempt to obscure her blushing cheeks, “It’s just my regular cultivation and training. Nobody in this village is rich enough to afford alchemical items, and certainly not pills. One of those might be able to fund half the buildings Xi Village has.”

As usual, Bianca seemed confused at her reply – she had previously asked about how Song Ming’s skin was so soft, how she was able to travel so far out within half an hour and how she seemed so lively in both the day and night, as if her energy was limitless – but didn’t press for an answer.

Song Ming would have happily explained whatever Bianca was confused about, but it was hard to tell what she remembered and what she did not, and she didn’t want to speak down to her when their ages were so similar. Hence, she waited for full questions, and answered those as well as she could, hoping that it would prove useful in recovering the poor woman’s memories and letting her return to some semblance of normalcy wherever it was that she came from… even if Song Ming would want her to stay for as long as possible.

She just couldn’t stop herself from looking on when Bianca dressed, even though she knew it was wrong. It was very, very wrong, maybe even perverse.

It made her blush all the more as she considered it, but she happened to be paying enough attention to find that Bianca kept looking, her cheeks also flushing with red. Clearly, she had noticed Song Ming’s frequent blushing – though Song Ming knew that she was not exactly subtle most of the time – and was now thinking about something as well.

That brought up many thoughts at once, and more emotions. Excitement, fear, anticipation, trepidation, and so many more that she could never list even if she was asked at that very moment, but all she knew was that she was not prepared to handle them.

Hence, she glanced aside, spotted another resident of the village, and quickly excused herself.

She knew right away that it didn’t help, but the only thing she could do now was regret it, ‘Why did I do that! Ah Ming, you’re so silly! She doesn’t know what you do, but this just makes you even more suspicious! AH!’

It was difficult not to physically hit herself for her stupidity, but she contained herself and put herself to helping out another and letting her current concerns and thoughts be buried for the moment.

 

‘That’s cute and all, but… what exactly is she thinking about me?’ Bianca couldn’t help but wonder as Song Ming hastened off yet again, ‘At this point, it’s obvious she can’t get something off her mind, and it’s likely to be me, naked, but it’s so hard to tell whether it’s just embarrassment or something… more.’

Although Bianca seemed to be more experienced than Song Ming in the realm of love and lust, that was only due to Song Ming seemingly remaining isolated from such things. Bianca’s experience was limited to a romantic relationship that lasted less than a year, combined with a bunch of nights where she and another woman got sufficiently intoxicated to overcome their own hesitation and spend some quality time together.

In other words, while she was more experienced than a virgin, she had a lot of learning ahead of her.

‘Anyway, since I haven’t been able to get any tips from her this time, either, I should just go and bathe like normal,’ Bianca decided to shelf the other topic for now and focus on keeping herself as clean as possible in a world that seemingly lacked proper soap, not to mention shampoo, shower gel, conditioner and the vast suite of cosmetics and makeup that she had mostly stayed away from.

On the way, she grabbed a change of clothes and ran her fingers through her dark-brown hair, grimacing as she felt many years of care being destroyed by a few days in some other land. The only type of hairbrush in Xi Village was rudimentary, some bristles stuck into a thin wooden block, and so it was getting more tangled by the day. With no haircare products, it was also losing its silky smooth texture, though it wasn’t decaying as quickly or quite as much as Bianca had initially expected, which was a plus – even if it was a miniscule one.

The village had no structures dedicated to bathing, nor to showers or washing in general. Instead, it was commonly accepted that one would head out to a nearby stream or small lake on a close mountain terrace, with some being commonly used by men, and others by women.

As she didn’t want to be near strangers while figuring out how to keep herself clean using nothing but cool water – and because Min Yu’s affection often got rather excessive – she got information on a few other good spots from Song Ming, whose training apparently brought her all over the mountain and yet failed to make a visible impact on her body or muscles.

This spot was at least fifteen minutes away from the edge of Xi Village, to the west, though it was both impossible to confirm the time, and worth it.

As she arrived, she went past a layer of trees that obscured the vision of anyone simply passing by, and arrived at a clearing with an open sky, letting the morning sun shine onto her and the river before her. The steady stream was clear, glistening like a polished jewel, and ran in between two shores of mostly rock, with plenty of rock on the riverbed as well. It was no fine sand beach, where the only issue would have been cleaning sand off herself, but it was better than swimming in dirt.

The stream rose up to her knees at the deepest part, but there was both enough room to lie down, and a convenient stone to lean again, or to sit on if she wanted to. Additionally, if she went to the south, there was a small waterfall within a few minutes of walking, meaning that she could get something resembling a shower if she wanted to.

In the mornings, especially when the sun was in the right position to shine onto the water, it got warm enough to be entirely comfortable to enter, though exiting always felt cold.

Another benefit was that it was not used by any of the village’s residents, at least not to Song Ming’s knowledge. Hence, she didn’t have to worry about the likes of Kong Xi getting anywhere near her and seeing her undress, which she did the moment she arrived at the rocky shores.

Bianca put her current clothing onto one of the nearby stones, and the new clothing on a different one, closer to the river shore and therefore easier to grab once she was dry. In order to dry herself, she also brought a strange fabric that was almost miraculous in the manner in which it absorbed liquid, letting her remove most of the river water from her skin – though not her hair, unfortunately – within seconds of stepping out of the water.

‘Tch, I don’t have anything to trim all this with, either,’ she sighed as she looked down, feeling the hair on her groin, ‘No proper razors around here, but Song Ming seems to take care of it, somehow…’

Obviously, this was low on her list of priorities – she had no clue how she would handle her period, for instance – but after keeping herself shaven down there for the past five years, it just felt strange to go back to a natural appearance. She also wasn’t especially fond of it, since she personally knew what a pain it was to give oral to someone that didn’t shave. Lia likely remembered the incident clearly.

Her armpit hair was also starting to grow, though more than anything, it made her glad she didn’t have especially hairy legs or anything like that. At least only the typically unseen parts of her body would remain unkempt, and not everything.

Again, Bianca sighed, then stepped into the cool water, shivering for a moment as she acclimated to the temperature. The sun had only risen to an appropriate height recently, so it had not had the chance to warm up the water yet, but after the first two times, she was starting to get used to it. If she had to stay in the village for long enough, she might even become so accustomed to it that she would have an issue with warmer water in the future, when the season inevitably changed to summer and she had to figure out ways to cool down without air conditioning or even something as basic as a fridge and freezer.

‘But I will never not miss soap… and shower gel… and shampoo… and-’ her thoughts were interrupted by rustling from the direction of the village, prompting her to turn and cover up, just in case.

However, there didn’t seem to be anyone there. All she could find was a faint wind that caused the leaves to rustle and the grass to shuffle about. It was strangely coincidental, and didn’t seem quite right, but unless she had been targeted by some magical entity that shouldn’t exist in any world, it must have just been the wind.

‘I mean, unless Song Ming is trying to spy on me, there shouldn’t be anyone here anyway,’ Bianca shrugged, removing her arm from her breasts though keeping the other hand by her groin, ‘I’ll let her look, but just in case it’s someone else, I won’t show too much.’

She would have much preferred to simply have a reasonable conversation with Song Ming and then look upon one another’s bodies without the veil of secrecy, but she didn’t want to move too quickly in any regard. There were bound to be dozens of different cultural reasons to let Song Ming act when she was ready rather than rushing ahead, and she was not going to jeopardise her current situation just to look at another woman’s naked body.

In a few days or weeks, she might change her mind in this regard, but she would also have the chance to learn more about the customs of the world.

 

“What have you been doing, Song Ming?” Bianca spotted the young woman blushing again, making her question whether there might just be some issue with her body that caused a constant flushed face. It would certainly make more sense than the most attractive woman she’d met so far just happening to be attracted to her in some way.

“I- uh… There’s actually a ceremony today,” she glanced to the east and managed to dull her blush just a bit, “You’re not from the village, so you don’t have to participate, but if you want…”

“Ceremony? What kind of ceremony?”

“It’s, well, a ceremony from the God’s Grave Temple – it’s to the south, so far away that I’d never seen a single hint of it,” Song Ming explained, pointing in a vaguely southward direction, “Their monks visited some generations past, and we’ve adopted some of their traditions… or so dad says. Honestly, I’m not too clear on the details, but I’d be happy to explain the ceremony itself. It’s very basic, really, so I’m not sure it’s even worth calling a ceremony…”

‘She was doing so well, but then the blushing came back… She is cute that way, though,’ Bianca couldn’t stop the small smile growing on her face, “I’ll have a go, I guess. Is that where most of the village has gone?”

“Yes, exactly. It’s usually in the middle of the month, though we sometimes get it wrong by a day or two,” the young woman began walking over to the east, and Bianca followed, crossing over to a part of the village that she had previously seen, but wouldn’t have associated with any ceremony except for one – a burial.

On the east, to the right of the village if one looked from above, was a large field of gravestones, arranged in vaguely straight rows across the uneven field, rising the further east one went.

At the moment, most people of the village had gathered there, so before they got too far, Bianca casually distanced herself from Kong Xi’s location, forcing Song Ming to adjust her own route to remain beside her. The young woman didn’t seem to notice this particular detour, though she had already learnt of Bianca’s dislike for certain guys in the village, so it wouldn’t come as any surprise even if Bianca had been more obvious.

Their movements placed them near to Old Man Song, who heard them and turned to greet them.

“Oh, Bianca, I hadn’t been sure if you’d be free right now,” he spoke quietly, glancing about to make sure that nobody was being disturbed, “Did Song Ming already introduce you, or do you need an explanation?”

“She said very little. There’s some kind of ceremony going on here?”

“Yes. Do you recall anything about grave temples yet?” Old Man Song asked, watching as Song Ming headed deeper into the group of villagers, “Judging by your expression, it seems not. To put it simply, just as we worship the heavens and Dao, we pay respects to fallen heroes – great people with great knowledge or cultivation attainment that have lost their lives, yet nourish our lands.”

As he spoke, he got even quieter due to the villagers collectively kneeling down besides the front row of graves, keeping their hands together in front of their mouths as they exhaled, almost feeling their hands with their breath.

“As the God’s Grave Temple preached, by constructing graves for our fallen heroes, we can elevate them to gods that allow our lands to remain prosperous for hundreds of thousands of years to come. However, if they are to be left alone, without the breath of their descendants and those that have chosen to make these lands their home, the graves will wither and the hint of divine grace will fade,” he spoke, kneeling down as well, “It would bring decay, famine, and frailty to all the people of our village. It would ruin everything they dedicated to Xi Village, and in turn would prevent any of our children from prospering.

“So, in the middle of each month, we come to grant them a breath of our own, to allow their nourishment to come back to them, if only for a moment. We honour their fall, and feel the weight of their pledge so that we may know what it is that we will one day dedicate our meagre power to, together with our ancestors. We feel the combined divine grace that will one day be gifted to our descendants, and their descendants, and their descendants after that.”

He brought his hands to his mouth and exhaled, the breath seeming to take visible form in the moment before he brought it to the stone grave.

It, just like most of the others, was simple, standing at about a metre tall with a rounded top, no obvious inscription upon the stone. Despite that, as he pushed his breath into the stone, Bianca felt something deep within her mind or body stir, just a little bit.

The sensation vanished as quickly as it came, but it got her curious about this ceremony.

So, she glanced to Old Man Song and asked, “Should… no, can I?”

“You’ve lived in the village for three days, so you have made use of their grace as well. If you are grateful for it, you may contribute,” he nodded, rising and taking a step back.

She kneeled beside a different gravestone – her knees were certain to get covered in grass and dirt, but that hardly mattered when she was still wearing what amounted to rags – and took a moment to concentrate. It was likely a simple tradition from ancient times, but if there was something to the beliefs of this God’s Grave Temple, then she wanted to give herself a proper chance to feel whatever she had felt when Old Man Song had contributed.

Hence, she took this ceremony seriously. She let out a hot breath into the small space between her hands, then brought them to the stone, effectively pressing her breath against it as she turned her hands.

In the moment that her skin touched the stone, Bianca felt the strange sensation within her again. It was somewhere within her chest, or perhaps her stomach, or perhaps even within her head, but this time it was stronger, making her feel like her very core was grabbing at something in the grave, wanting to pull it out and feast upon it.

Obviously, it was unreasonable to feel something like this. There should have been no natural process to cause such a sensation – according to her limited knowledge, anyway – other than some placebo effect, or whatever the correct term was. It was insane to consider, even after having appeared in some other world for seemingly no reason at all, and so she refused to accept it, rising back up as calmly as she could before turning away, trying to think of something else.

There, however, she spotted a strange glow in the distant mountains, near one of the vast structures supposedly belonging to strangely-named sects.

“W-What is…”

“It seems like this decade’s sect is already preparing to visit,” Song Ming muttered after a gasp.

“This decade’s? Why is there a glow like that?”

“It’s probably some movement technique of the Calm Skies Sect. My dad ought to know more than I, since I only recall the Sacred Rivers Sect’s arrival and training…”

‘Training? Arrival? In mountains like these?’ she turned to Old Man Song, who, along with most of the village, turned his attention towards the glowing western mountain, “Is that correct? Is the Calm Skies Sect going to… what, fly?”

“No, they have a group movement technique of some sort. It should let them use the mountains as anchors and make their way over by the end of the month.”

“But… how?”

“Do you not recall anything about cultivation? Group movement techniques are quite normal for those in the fourth realm.”

‘… What the fuck? Magic?’ she thought, and although she didn’t say a word, her emotions clearly showed on her face, as both Song Ming and Old Man Song were taken aback before sharing an understanding look.

“We… we hadn’t thought that you may have forgotten this, as well,” Old Man Song said apologetically, “Please forgive me for not considering this. Song Ming, you…”

‘What… surely not, right?’ Bianca knew that he kept talking, but she couldn’t process his words any longer as the realisation that the differences in the world were even greater than she had initially presumed. Every bit of confusion and shock that had been supressed since she found the world to be somewhat sensible returned at once, intensified by a dozen times, and she felt one of the worst headaches she had ever experienced.

Next thing she knew, she had already fallen, caught at the last moment by soft hands.

She did not lose her consciousness, but she might as well have.