The night stretched on. Once Shen Nanyin finished cultivating and handled the pressing sect affairs, he let his hair down to prepare for rest.
As he untied his hair crown, he caught sight of the crane carved into the jade, lifelike and vivid, and felt an odd sense of familiarity.
This was the hair crown he’d worn the night everything happened.
His grip on the crown tightened slightly as he recalled the scene of changing clothes afterward.
He’d stared for a long time at the hair Cheng Xueyi had combed for him before finally moving to undo it. The jade crown had been placed at the very back of the cabinet—yet somehow it had ended up at the front again.
Counting the days, only seven had passed since the Demon-Suppressing Tower was restored. Seven days was but an instant to a cultivator, yet certain memories he hadn’t deliberately erased kept crashing over him like a tide in the dead of night.
Shen Nanyin hadn’t slept in seven nights. Even with his cultivation, he was starting to feel the strain.
He knew he should rest properly for a night, but the moment he thought of everything that had happened in that damp cave, sleep eluded him entirely.
When the junior sisters who’d come looking for him surrounded him, he hadn’t seen Cheng Xueyi among the crowd.
He supposed that, dressed as an outer disciple, she wouldn’t have had access to the inner disciples’ circles, so the news likely hadn’t reached her.
Later, when Master had made the truth of the Tower’s breach public and cleared his name, he had no idea whether she’d heard of it.
Elder Su had refined a highly effective qi-restoring pill, and every junior sister had received one—except Cheng Xueyi.
Shen Nanyin looked at the pill bottle sitting on his desk, and those dewy, downcast eyes surfaced in his mind again.
So he knew that if he didn’t personally see this matter through to its end, he’d likely stay caught in this confusion of mind forever.
That clearly went against his cultivation of the heart, so the next morning, Shen Nanyin went in person to Taixuan Palace to find Cheng Xueyi.
He brought the bottle of qi-restoring pills with him. When he arrived at Taixuan Palace, he found Chen Suqing—who had been with Cheng Xueyi that day—present, but not Cheng Xueyi herself.
“Eldest Senior Brother is looking for Xueyi?” A Qing’s voice trembled as she spoke to Shen Nanyin, her hands clutching her sleeves nervously. “Xueyi isn’t feeling well today. She’s taken leave and is resting in her quarters.”
Shen Nanyin stood beneath the eaves of Taixuan Palace. Disciples passing back and forth all paused to bow and greet him.
There were so many disciples, and he could call most of them by name, greeting every one of them with a patient, tireless smile—his manner so flawless it left no room for fault. Black Lotus novel Translations · Black Lotus Novel
A Qing was timid by nature, a little nervous, but she gradually settled under his composed presence.
Only then did Shen Nanyin continue, “She’s unwell? The two of you are close—do you know how she’s doing?”
He made no attempt to hide his concern for Cheng Xueyi’s condition. His grip on the pill bottle tightened slightly. He assumed her weakness came from having her qi drained by that demon, leaving her too depleted to rise from bed.
After all, she was only an outer disciple of ordinary talent—even the inner disciples, with their far greater aptitude, had needed the qi-restoring pills to recover.
Before that, they’d had no appetite and couldn’t focus on anything.
At the time, everyone had assumed it was simply heartbreak from being coldly treated by a lover, never suspecting their vital essence had been devoured.
The face-changing demon had exploited exactly this: the female cultivators’ willingness to endure anything just to be with Eldest Senior Brother—even pretending to be ordinary senior-junior siblings by day, waiting for the right moment to make the relationship known, content with that arrangement.
He’d succeeded again and again this way, and it was only after he was sealed in the Demon-Suppressing Tower and could no longer maintain the ruse that the truth came to light.
A Qing glanced at Shen Nanyin a few more times. She’d heard about the face-changing demon too, knew Eldest Senior Brother had been wronged and the senior sisters deceived. Thinking of how Xueyi had been the one to bring him back that day—could this be connected somehow?
She thought it over and said, “Eldest Senior Brother needn’t worry. It’s Xueyi’s old trouble—every month around this time her body acts up. She’ll be fine in a few days.”
She hesitated before adding, “If Eldest Senior Brother has something to tell her, you can let me know. I’ll pass it along when I’m off duty.”
Shen Nanyin turned the pill bottle over in his hand and said quietly, “These few words have already taken up enough of Junior Sister’s time. I wouldn’t dare trouble you further—please, go on with your duties.”
With that he turned and left. A Qing stared blankly at his retreating back. As for the inner sisters falling for the face-changing demon’s trick, she understood completely.
Had it been her, she doubted she could have resisted Eldest Senior Brother’s pull either.
He carried none of the arrogance so many heaven-favored geniuses wore, none of that condescension. He was simply too beautiful—like an immortal stepped out of a painting and into the mortal world. When he turned, the snow-white Daoist robes rippled outward in an unrestrained, effortless arc, like wind sweeping into someone’s chest, setting a heart pounding wildly.
A Qing shook her head hard, telling herself not to let her thoughts wander.
For someone like him to exchange even a few words with her was already a rare thing. That breath of ease belonging to a great cultivator—she could chase it her whole life and never catch up.
Was this what a pure, unmixed spiritual root looked like?
She’d heard Eldest Senior Brother possessed a Solitary Water Root—three years to Foundation Establishment, ten to form his core, thirty to form his nascent soul, and before he’d even reached a hundred years of age he’d already ranked among the Daoist Lords. Among the younger generation of disciples, he was, without question, first.
Even Jingci Fazong in his youth hadn’t matched such speed.
A Qing, with her mixed root, felt refreshed just standing near him a little longer—no wonder everyone wanted to be close to him, and no one doubted his character even without yet having a name to claim.
The face-changing demon really had known how to pick his targets.
She wondered whether Eldest Senior Brother’s visit to Xueyi had anything to do with the face-changing demon affair. If it did, then Xueyi had hidden it remarkably well—she hadn’t shown a trace of it. Had she been hurt? Was she in pain inside?
The outer disciples’ quarters lay at the foot of the mountain; Cheng Xueyi walked a full two hours each day to reach her duty post. For Shen Nanyin, the same distance took barely a thought.
The moment he arrived, he already knew exactly where Cheng Xueyi was.
Her presence was so familiar to him that he sensed her location instantly.
Now that he’d actually found her, Shen Nanyin found himself suddenly unable to move his feet.
Standing in a secluded corner, away from prying eyes, he looked down at the pill bottle in his hand. After much deliberation, caught between turning back and stepping forward, he chose the latter.
Some things had to be settled.
In years past, this was the time he would already have set out for Heart-Devouring Valley, to perform the spirit-suppression rite upon the demons imprisoned within.
The so-called spirit-suppression rite was exactly what it sounded like: flooding the entire valley with spiritual power. It sounded like a benevolent act, but in truth it was a torment.
He disliked doing it, but Master always assigned it to him. Once he became sect leader himself, there would be no escaping such duties—so no matter how much it went against his wishes, he always went.
The demonic race ravaged the mortal realm, brought suffering to countless lives, harmed the innocent, and refused to change no matter how many times they were taught—their imprisonment was more than justified. He always told himself this.
Every time he stood outside Heart-Devouring Valley, channeling spiritual power in to destroy whatever cultivation the demons had managed to scrape together over a mere season, the wails and curses never stopped ringing in his ears. Even though Shen Nanyin never said anything, Jingci Fazong knew he hated it, and had once suggested he simply block out his hearing—it would make things easier. But Shen Nanyin never did. — B L A C K L O T U S Novel | Black Lotus Novel
Every single time, he forced himself to listen closely, as though punishing himself, though he himself didn’t know what for.
Fortunately, that duty wouldn’t fall to him this season.
But what lay before him now was more difficult than any spirit-suppression rite.
It was the busiest hour of the day, and the outer disciples’ quarters stood nearly empty—only Cheng Xueyi’s room held any presence at all, and even that presence was faint.
The closer Shen Nanyin drew, the more clearly he could sense it. He walked quickly to her door and knocked. No answer came from within.
He announced himself: “Junior Sister Cheng, it’s Shen Nanyin. Are you well?”
The presence within grew suddenly agitated, but still no response came. Shen Nanyin couldn’t wait any longer.
“Forgive the intrusion.”
Even given everything Cheng Xueyi had put him through, he still extended her every courtesy she was owed.
He seemed to hold no grudge whatsoever against her for humiliating him.
Cheng Xueyi watched the man push the door open and step inside, and that was the thought that surfaced in her mind.
Why isn’t he angry?
Surely no one could be tormented that way and feel anything but rage.
Especially someone of such exalted status.
Had their positions been reversed—had she been so misunderstood and mistreated, whatever the reason, whatever the excuse—she would have paid it back with the cruelest, most vicious means she had.
Death, by the time she was through, would have been a mercy.
Yet Shen Nanyin hadn’t done any of that. He’d even come to check on her health.
In the instant the door opened, she couldn’t make out the face of the man standing with the light behind him.
But that didn’t stop her from recognizing the urgency in his footsteps.
Urgent as he was, he remained deliberate. Only after confirming her clothes were properly arranged and the blanket covered her did he let his gaze move freely.
Shen Nanyin walked to the edge of the bed. On his fine snow-white robe was embroidered the crane motif that only someone of his rank could wear.
The crane held sun and moon in its beak—a symbol of Qiantian Sect’s ambition to command both.
A gauze layer over the white robe wrapped his lean waist. Cheng Xueyi remembered all too well the muscle beneath that fabric.
She opened her mouth to say something, but no words came—only a fit of coughing.
How wretched, to be seen like this. He must be savoring it.
As a gentleman—or at least, outwardly an impeccable one—he couldn’t voice cruel words, couldn’t confront her directly for what she’d done. But surely, in his heart, he still resented her.
Why had he come today? If he’d meant to hold her accountable, why hadn’t he come sooner?
Cheng Xueyi’s thoughts grew hazy as she felt a coolness draw near. The heat scorching her body eased, and she instinctively leaned toward it.
Shen Nanyin had been sitting at the very edge of the bed, taking up only the smallest space, careful not to overstep—it also made it easier to tend to her.
But she leaned into him herself, her face pressing against the dark hair falling over his shoulder and his sleeve. Shen Nanyin’s hand paused for a moment as he opened the pill bottle, then continued after a long beat.
“This is the qi-restoring pill Elder Su refined. Junior Sister had your vital essence drained by the face-changing demon—this will help restore it.”
…A qi-restoring pill.
So that was what it was.
She hadn’t gone to collect hers because she couldn’t get out of bed.
But the demon hadn’t drained much from her—she’d barely been affected. If Shen Nanyin had come all this way just to deliver this, it was rather unnecessary.
“Eldest Senior Brother didn’t come all this way just to bring me this, did he?”
She didn’t believe that was all. Her voice came out hoarse and weak, the pain in her body leaving her mind in disarray. BLACK LOTUS NOVEL Novel Translation Site · Black Lotus
After all these years, she still hadn’t grown used to this searing pain that arrived like clockwork every month.
All because of cultivators.
This one especially.
Cheng Xueyi watched him with cold, distant eyes, expecting him to say something else.
Instead Shen Nanyin said, “Just this.”
“…” Cheng Xueyi mustered what strength she had left. Her gaze swept over his composed, elegant features and she said quietly, “I treated you like that, and you still bring me a qi-restoring pill?”
“You should be wishing for me to suffer.”
Shen Nanyin looked at her, silent for a moment, then pressed two fingers together and used spiritual energy to wipe away the fine beads of sweat on her forehead.
He said calmly, “The fault in this matter was mine. Junior Sister was only deceived. Had the Tower not been breached, had the face-changing demon not gone about stirring up chaos to strengthen itself quickly and take revenge on me, you would never have had reason to… go to such extremes.”
“Fortunately, it feared drawing too much attention to itself, so no greater harm came of it.”
“As for what happened… I am a man, it caused me no real harm. If it eases the resentment in your heart—what happened, happened. Let it be.”
Cheng Xueyi stared, stunned, at his merciful, tolerant face touched with something almost divine, and felt a sharp ache behind her eyes.
What kind of saintly radiance was this?
