As Yi Sheng predicted, Xiao Xue woke up by the end of the day. At first, she felt dizzy and slow. Her body ached but thankfully it’s not the kind of pain that was unbearable. Aside from feeling unusually sore and somewhat weak, Xiao Xue was in better shape than she anticipated.

“Take it slow,” Xie Yuan fussed as he helped her sit up. “Here, drink this.” A cup of something warm was immediately placed by her mouth.

Xiao Xue wanted to decline only to realize she was indeed severely parched. With trembling fingers, her hands weakly held the cup and slowly tilted it towards her cracked lips. Xie Yuan, afraid that she would hurt herself further, supported her hands and gently wiped the corner of her lips after she finished drinking.

By this time, everyone was accustomed to their young lord’s uncanny behavior. Since they cannot do anything about it they decided to take it as it comes and perceived such occurrences as something natural. After all, who would dare to tell the young lord what he should and should not do for the Priestess? Although none of them voiced their opinion it was regarded as a tacit understanding within the group. All of them have not lived long enough yet and would want to live a few more years longer. The young lord was free to serve the Priestess and they, as subordinates, would silently support him.

“Little girl, how are you feeling?” Yi Sheng interjected bravely. Being thirsty is a good sign. Xiao Xue’s complexion is still wan but her eyes were alert and didn't seem to be confused. “Do you feel any stabbing pain?”

Xiao Xue slowly turned her head towards the old man who was standing by the foot of the bed. She’d never seen him before but she has a natural fondness towards comely old people and this old man in particular was especially attentive and looked very amiable. He reminded Xiao Xue of a wandering monk who once passed by the village in her previous life.

Now that she’s aware of her surroundings Xiao Xue noticed they were not in Spirit Temple. She could not see beyond the bed but from the wood of the canopy and the curtains she could tell they were in a private residence, no inn would be this richly furnished. She belatedly noticed the other people in the room. She hadn't seen or met them before and although they tried to minimize their aura she could tell how strong everyone was. The only person in the room who was familiar to her was Xie Yuan.

In order to accurately answer the old man’s question, she internally examined the state of her body and was stunned to find that some of her injuries have already healed while the others are rapidly healing. The biggest surprise was…

Xiao Xue’s shocked gaze moved from the old man to her left leg and back again. It’s been years since she last felt anything on her left leg aside from pain. She has not been able to move her toe since she could remember. But now, miraculously, not only could she feel her leg but she could also wiggle her toe! How?

Yi Sheng, who seemed to hear her unvoiced question, explained, “Your leg was originally easy to fix but was left untended so the bone had gone crooked. This old man had to be brutal in order to heal it the proper way. Once your leg heals, the bone will not only be straight but stronger. Little girl, I hope you do not blame this old man for being impolite.”

Yi Sheng desperately wanted to leave a good impression on Xiao Xue. He did not want her to misunderstand his actions and look at him as someone who was crass and vicious to his patients. Upon careful consideration, he ultimately decided that explaining everything in detail would not only make his affable intentions known but also give him the opportunity to provide subtle hints about the healing process so when the young lady encounters a similar problem in the future, she would be able to deal with it.

Yi Xin, who was standing on the side with the others, was taken aback by his Master’s gentle and flattering attitude. The others might not know but he knew very well that this is the first time his master is giving a thorough explanation of the procedure he has done and why he had to do it. Yi Xin had never heard or seen the old man act in such a way towards anyone before. Even when teaching his Master would mostly show a technique or a procedure once or twice, three times if he was being generous, and would nastily scold him if he dared to ask any question. At the end of every lesson the old man would say ‘Figure it out yourself!’ in a huff. Yi Sheng would leave him to study dozens of scrolls and manuals until he makes progress or when the old man feels that he’d read enough. Yi Xin was so shocked he almost walked up to the old man to check if he really was his stingy master.

“How could I blame Master when you took the initiative to help me?” Xiao Xue answered hoarsely. Her lips slightly curving into a grateful smile. “Xiao Xue is thankful for Master’s benevolence and would remember this favor.”

Yi Sheng beamed in delight when he heard the young lady call him ‘Master’. Although her meaning and his meaning of the word might be different, for now, it doesn’t matter. Since the young lady willingly recognizes him as someone who could be called ‘Master’ then he will not shy away. Yi Sheng privately decided he would definitely teach all he could to the young lady regardless of what the young lord said.

“Little girl, did you know you have Body Eroding Poison in your system?” Yi Sheng solemnly asked. He wanted to know if she was aware or not in order to understand how she managed to contain and survive the effects of the poison for so long.

In Yi Sheng’s mind the issue about Xiao Xue’s broken dantian is not as serious as the poison on her system. With the help of a Phoenix Revival Pill and spiritual energy transfusion, her dantian would be easily fixed. The real problem lies in the poison. The dantian cannot be fixed until the poison is detoxified and her body is thoroughly cleansed. If remnants of the Body Eroding Poison is left on her system even if they manage to fix her dantian the young lady’s cultivation progress would be stalled and scrapped after a few years.

“Body eroding poison?” Xiao Xue was puzzled. She’d never heard of such poison before. Knowing the strength of Xiao Xue’s comprehension of Dao, her Master made her cultivate a lot of special skills and one was a technique that could make a person immune to most poisons. Not to mention that Xiao Xue has been consuming dragon grass along with other herbs regularly in order to manage the pain on her left leg. It’s a mystery how she could still be affected by poisons. Xiao Xue cannot think of when or how she was poisoned unless the incident occurred before she crossed over and her soul took over the body.

“From my observation the poison has been plaguing you for at least ten years. Due to the Body Eroding Poison your left leg has been slowly deteriorating. And at some point, spiritual energy cannot be circulated on your leg anymore.” To prove that he knows what he is talking about, Yi Sheng continued with, “The scars on your face have been spreading and as it spreads it causes a burning sensation under the skin, like something is clawing at your flesh. When you are overtaxed, your head hurts and on worse days you would faint.” Yi Sheng stopped and considered for a moment before finally saying, “If my old eyes are not deceiving me, your left eye is now blind.”

Xiao Xue gasped in surprise and Xie Yuan’s arms tightened around her shoulders. How did he know? She never told anyone that her left eye was blind. No one would be able to guess just by superficially looking because the thick scarring on the eyelid covered most of the eye. In addition, she exerts a lot of effort not to display this particular weakness and rigorously trained her body to react as if there was nothing wrong with her vision.

When her eyesight started to fade Xiao Xue was afraid it would hinder her cultivation and worried that it would affect the inheritance process, she immediately told her master. But because her progress was steady and aside from her no one was a suitable candidate for the succession, the old priestess thought there would be no problem as long as Xiao Xue worked hard to make up for the loss. Thankfully, the vision loss was only on her left eye and her right eye developed as it should as her strength grew.

“My left eye has been blind since the previous spring.” Xiao Xue answered honestly. “And to answer Master’s question, I did not know I was poisoned. When my meridians healed and I began to cultivate again I felt something was wrong because sometimes my spiritual energy would stall in short intervals. The previous Priestess thought perhaps it was an unavoidable result of having my meridians severed. This is the reason she made me cultivate body refinement techniques. She thought my body was too weak and was unable to cope with the sudden change once I started cultivating spiritual energy. But even after cultivating both internal and spiritual energy, there was still an odd sensation in my meridians that I could not explain. The more I progressed, the more it became apparent that something was wrong with my body.” Xiao Xue slowly explained, remembering how she felt and what she observed during those days. “I don’t know how exactly but I noticed I could suppress the uncomfortable feeling for a time. After a while I realized I could move it somehow and when I did the meridians that once felt uncomfortable and weak felt more robust and healthy. It did not leave any bad effect on my body or hinder my cultivation progress so I gradually shifted the odd sensation and contained it all on my leg and face.”

Halfway through her speech Yi Sheng shivered in excitement. Genius! This young lady is a once in lifetime genius! The body eroding poison is virtually traceless but without prior knowledge the young lady managed to sense its presence and even more, she learned how to cleanse her meridians and shift the poison elsewhere and suppress it. If Xiao Xue was not a natural born genius, Yi Sheng does not know who is!

Yi Sheng was elated to find such a rare treasure. He wanted to rush up and hold the young lady’s hand to make sure she’s real. If before Yi Sheng was half hearted about paying attention to Xiao Xue, now, after what he heard, Yi Sheng is thoroughly obsessed with the idea of teaching her. He would do anything to cultivate this type of rare talent.

Yi Sheng was just about to float to heaven with his euphoric dreams but was stopped, cold, by Xie Yuan’s murderous expression. “What should we do now? How do we get rid of the poison? Can we still fix her eye?” Xie Yuan asked in succession. He was so upset his whole body was shaking. He doesn’t understand what he’s supposed to feel at this moment.

Basically, Xie Yuan was happy that Xiao Xue is finally awake but at the same time sad and worried that she’s still injured and relatively weak. He’s angry to find out she’s been poisoned for so long and no one knew and at the same time terrified that her body has been deteriorating at such an alarming rate. Xie Yuan was close but did not notice anything beyond what he could see. His feelings were such a jumbled mess he felt like he would do something extreme with very little provocation.

Xiao Xue seemed to sense his agitation and lightly scratched his chin. “We’ll figure it out.”

Xie Yuan wanted to harden his heart and scold her like he did when she hid the issue about her leg but when he opened his mouth what came out were mere complaints. “Little Xue, you promised no more secrets. You promised you would tell me everything! Am I unreliable? Am I so useless that you do not want to depend on me?”

Xie Yuan was thoroughly aggrieved and whiny, like a wife cheated by her husband. Hearing him release his grievances in one breath, the group of people waiting on the side felt suffocated and restless. What sort of situation is this? Is this really all right? 

But Xie Yuan cannot be bothered by what others think. The anxiety and stress that have been accumulating since the beast tide have doubled in weight. And after learning Xiao Xue was not only severely injured but poisoned as well that anxiety has now turned into full-blown fear.

Xie Yuan has never encountered this sort of feeling before and doesn’t know how to vent. He cursed his failure to protect Xiao Xue. He’d never been helpless before and it’s not a feeling one could get accustomed to. His heart felt heavy and painful. Xie Yuan wanted to let out his bad feelings but did not know how and even if he did he knew that he could not, not right now.

“I’m sorry…” Xiao Xue did not know what else to say. She felt that apologizing was wrong but what else could she do?

Disregarding the other people in the room, Xie Yuan held Xiao Xue from behind. He buried his face on the crook of her neck and wrapped his arms around her waist.

“After the ritual you fainted. You were so still and there was so much blood! They wouldn’t let me take you away so I had to fight! I called for you, again and again, but you weren’t waking. Little Xue, didn’t you hear my call?” Xie Yuan mumbled incoherently as his arms tightened around Xiao Xue’s waist. It hurt but Xiao Xue had no way to stop him from squeezing her so she silently and good naturedly endured.

Seeing the young lord disregard the young lady’s fragile condition, Yi Sheng took a step forward intending to separate the two but was stopped by Zhang Lao. Yi Sheng’s temper flared and he wanted to argue but when he noticed Xiao Xue’s indulgent gaze and assuaging gestures, he held himself back. It appears the feelings between the two are not entirely one sided.

When Xiao Xue felt something warm slide down her neck and shoulder, she gestured for everyone in the room to leave. These people were Xie Yuan’s subordinates but she doesn't know how trustworthy each one was. Xie Yuan was currently exhibiting unusual vulnerability and they do not need to witness this side of him. It is enough that only she could see this side of him.

The group, led by Zhang Lao, bowed respectfully towards Xiao Xue and Xie Yuan before excusing themselves and discreetly filing out of the room. Yi Sheng wanted to be contrary but was forcefully pulled out by Yi Xin. Once the door was closed, Xiao Xue reached out to stroke Xie Yuan’s head.

“This is the first time I learned about the poison. The pain I feel on my scars is constant and sometimes I tend to forget or overlook the feeling.” Xiao Xue started to explain. She could understand Xie Yuan’s distress. If it were her she would have reacted just as strongly. But they cannot change the past. Xiao Xue is conscious of her shortcomings therefore she will not utter promises but instead strive to do better in the future. “I wanted to tell you about my blindness but I couldn’t find the opportunity to do so.”

Xie Yuan did not respond. He continued to hold her silently and didn’t let go even when Xiao Xue gently nudged him so they converse face to face. In the end, Xiao Xue had to compromise and allow him to hold her close while she leaned her body on his.

“Ah Yu, what are we going to do now?” Xiao Xue asked, attempting to shift his gloomy mood. “Where will we go first after leaving the valley?”

Xie Yuan knew what she was trying to do but had no will nor resolve to refuse her. He slightly bit her neck to show his frustration before stating boldly, “Get married! But before that, we have to cure your poison and mend your dantian. My wife cannot be left defenseless.”

Xie Yuan cannot take Xiao Xue to higher realms if she cannot cultivate. He would always be by her side regardless but because of his complicated identity there are hidden dangers lurking around him. Xie Yuan could arrange secret guards to protect Xiao Xue but accidents do happen. Moments when she’d be unintentionally left alone and would be open to an attack is always a possibility. Xie Yuan doesn’t want Xiao Xue to be too vulnerable and he would resent it if anything bad happens to her because she had no way to defend herself.

Most importantly, if Xiao Xue cannot cultivate her life span would be shorter than his. He cannot lose her so soon after finding her. If there is a chance Xie Yuan would grab it regardless of what he had to pay in order to obtain it. And if, this is only if they’ve exhausted all their resources and explored all possible avenues, there is no other choice but to accept their fate, they could live in seclusion to keep her safe. 

Xie Yuan is willing to spend his life with Xiao Xue, no matter how long or short it is. They could build a world together, just for the two of them, away from all the dangers and problems of the world. As long as he’s with Xiao Xue, it’ll be alright.