NOVPUB"Three minutes!"
"Didn't even need to threaten twice."
Su Xiaobai leapt down, landing softly behind her, hands in his sleeves.
She didn't look at him, she was still watching the crimson blood.
"I must say…" he murmured, circling her like a scholar admiring a new artifact, "you disappointed me just a little. I expected resistance. Tears. Screams. But you didn't even hesitate."
He leaned in, plucked the bracelet—Gu Ren—right off her wrist before she could react. Su Yiran turned, her eyes darkening beneath the faint veil of frost.
The way she looked at him...As if he was filth incarnate.
He smiled back, cheerfully, mockingly. Like he hadn't just turned her into a murderer.
"Don't be such an angry little bird," he said, spinning Gu Ren between his fingers. "I just wanted to know if you were with them."
Su Yiran's brow creased. Her voice was clipped, cold.
"You could have asked."
Su Xiaobai barked a laugh. "Right. And I'd believe whatever came out of that pretty little mouth?"
He turned back toward the two still-burning corpses—Ming Xue and Ming Kai—charred beyond recognition in a lap of infernal fire. The forest reeked of cooked flesh, and Su Yiran instinctively shut her nose, turning away in disgust.
"Kill the remaining three when they return," he said casually, flames dancing in his palm. "I'll immobilize them for you."
Su Yiran blinked. "...What?"
Her voice cracked slightly, uncertain whether she heard him right.
Kill more?
He didn't even glance at her. Just fed another blast of fire into the corpses, as if talking about cleaning up spilled wine.
"Hmm…" she exhaled softly, unsure whether to scream or laugh.
Su Xiaobai glanced over his shoulder and chuckled.
"Huh? No protest? But I thought you were a good girl. Where's the righteousness? Shouldn't you say something noble, or are you really so cruel you'll kill your teammates without blinking?"
Su Yiran's voice was cold, but precise.
"They're not my teammates."
She didn't yell, just said it like she meant it.
Su Xiaobai studied her with faint amusement, like a predator sizing up a smaller, colder predator.
"Tch… harsh."
He stepped behind her again—his movements loose, casual, yet deliberate in his intrusion of space.
Before she could shift away, his hand slid over hers, guiding the sword she still held.
"You wield swords, huh? That's wonderful! I'm a swordsman too." His grin widened as he moved her hand in lazy arcs. "You know sword aura? Intent? No? Want me to show you?"
Su Yiran stiffened.
His body was too close. His voice.... His presence, like a blazing sun against her cold skin.
She could feel it.
He was doing it on purpose.
"Let me show you something fun."
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
Three arcs.
Three trees—cleanly severed.
Then—BOOM.
The trunks didn't just fall.
They exploded, splinters shot through like shrapnel. One shard pierced Su Yiran's shoulder. "Hiss.." She winced, recoiling—
Su Xiaobai, the bastard, ducked behind her like she was his personal shield maiden.
"Oops," he said, peeking past her hair. "That was cool, wasn't it?"
"You… you're insane," she muttered, jaw clenched.
He tilted his head—and then he noticed something. A faint shine under her collarbone. Tucked deep within the fabric, nestled between two—
Melons.
Wrapped in black silk.
He reached, slowly, eyes narrowing.
"Oh? So now we're hiding locket secrets in the Valley of Melons? What's this time? A pendant? A secret message from your sect boyfriend?"
Her hand snapped to her chest.
"Don't touch it!"
Too late.
Now he really wanted to.
"Hoh?" Su Xiaobai's grin returned. "I thought you said 'ask and I'll tell'? Why so defensive now, little miss contradiction?"
She bit her lip, then sighed, her fingers tightening over the locket.
There was no escape.
No lie that would satisfy him.
So she told the truth.
"It's… a family heirloom. The last thing my mother gave me. I don't even know what's inside."
Her voice softened, her eyes dimmed.
She remembered the cold fingers of Eternal Su, placing it in her palm the day she was sent away.
[Take it. You'll understand one day.]
She never did.
And now? She wasn't even sure it mattered.
Su Xiaobai tilted his head like a cat hearing a bedtime story.
"Aw. So a sob story and a mystery box."
"Let me guess—you're here to find your lost mother? Or your tragic past? Or some ancient inheritance your sect forgot to tell you about?"
"Or wait—let me guess again."
Su Xiaobai leaned forward, that villainous smile carved across his lips like he'd personally offended three sects with it.
"— You're looking for a key, right?"
Su Yiran's expression twitched.
He'd struck.
Right in the soft spot.
"Where?" she asked, barely a whisper, her eyes scanning his with a sudden hint of desperation. "Where did you see it?" 𝑛𝘰𝘷𝑝𝘶𝑏.𝑐𝘰𝘮
But the bastard smiled wider, eyes gleaming like a pervert saint.
"What key? How does it look? I have many! Is it the white one? The one shaped like a White Tiger?"
Her mind blanked.
"...I— I don't know. I was just told it's a key… that I'd feel it when I touched it... it should be here. Can you show me… please?"
She looked at him, genuinely. Innocently.
And that was her mistake.
"Here."
Su Xiaobai blinked once, then grinned.
"This key opens the door to the White Tiger."
He pointed—between his legs.
Su Yiran's gaze fell—automatically.
And what she saw made her soul attempt to self-immolate.
The Key.
The so-called sacred divine object.
It was just that. That shameful, demonic, heaven-defying rod, coiled beneath his robes like it had its own Dao title—capable of opening the sacred gates of the White Tiger Realm. [A/N: "White Tiger" refers to the pristine, hairless flower of a maiden.]
Su Xiaobai let out a laugh so genuine, so psychotic, that even the birds nearby shut up in fear.
"Oh no... sweet fairy. You got scammed."
Su Yiran stood frozen, face pale, soul evaporating.
She had never wanted to kill someone so much in her life.
Not the Hunters.
Not even the Sun Dynasty.
This Tyrant—this filthy, dick-waving, Dao-spitting madman—deserved eighteen lifetimes of heavenly tribulation.
"Leave me alone," she said, voice flat, like she was exorcising a demon with every syllable.
Her eyes turned frosty and wet.
She didn't know if it was grief, shame, or the realization that this entire realm was scripted by lunatics.
Su Xiaobai, of course, smiled wider.
"How could I?"
"As your senior… it is my sacred duty to teach you the proper path of sword cultivation."
"No... No need..."
She tried to back away.
But he was already behind her.
Su Xiaobai reached for her hand, which still clutched the sword, and guided it with his own, his hot breath brushed against her ear.
"Swordplay, is just like dual cultivation. You need rhythm. Grip. Soul. You don't just swing it like a limp stick.... You pierce. You penetrate."
Her spine straightened like a disciplined disciple under Sect Master's glare—but she didn't move her hand. She didn't pull away either.
His chest pressed against her back, muscles hard like forged spirit-steel, and unfortunately, so was something else—something that seemed eager to cultivate the Dao of Depth.
This wasn't a man.
This was a walking tribulation with an eight-pack and boundary-breaking audacity.
WHOOSH—WHOOSH—SHHHK!
The sword danced in their joined hands, three innocent trees fell like courtesans during Spring Blossom Festival—limp, sappy, and moaning on the wind.
They exploded. Again.
She hissed—part pain, part pride, part wildly inappropriate arousal. He laughed, the kind of laugh that made sect aunties clutch their prayer beads and whisper curses. He kept harassing her—pressing, teasing, coaxing her to finally spit out the truth about the key.
Su Yiran said a little, enough to bait, not enough to bind.
And then, like a slap from a karmic lightning tribulation—realization struck.
There might be no key.
Just a shiny rock.
Just a prophecy with the spiritual depth of a puddle.
And two scheming elders—Eternal Su and Ouyang Xue—who just wanted her gone.
"Oh," Su Xiaobai said, his voice dripping with the kind of fake sympathy that could make a phoenix cry. He reached to pat her shoulder—but oh no, that was her breast. A very intentional detour.
"So they gave you a riddle, a rock, and a one-way ticket to demon-infested hell?"
"Yes…" she muttered, staring into the dirt with the solemnity of a betrayed protagonist.
"You poor idiot." His hand descended again—this time to her rear. He gave her buttocks a squeeze so reverent, it was practically a spiritual ritual. "By the Heavens... your back has more Yin Essence than a peak-grade cauldron maiden."
And that was it.
Su Yiran snapped.
She shoved him hard enough his cultivation base wobbled.
"WHY are you like this?!"
"I am," he said proudly, "a man of profound virtue... and sword mastery."
If Bai Yujian heard him, she would descend from the Immortal Rain Valley just to skewer him with her divine blade, and then charge him for the honor.
Su Yiran grabbed her sword, now sticky with tree sap and shame, and hurled it—CLANG—straight into a boulder that never asked to be part of this drama.
She turned, wild-eyed, hair whipping like an untamed qilin's mane, chest rising with rage.
"I don't care anymore. Kill me. Expose me. But I'm taking you down with me."
"Huh?" Su Xiaobai blinked, head tilting, brow furrowing like he had just heard the concept of "monogamy" for the first time. "Like… sexually?"
Su Yiran nearly yanked her own hair out. Her entire soul recoiled, preparing to scream—
But Su Xiaobai, cunning like a fox in heat, moved faster. He grabbed her shoulders with a grip that was somehow both steady and criminal.
"???"
Her confusion bloomed.
His hand moved—and the veil fell.
The sacred barrier between her shame and his gaze—gone with a flick of his godless fingers.
"W-What are you doing?!" she gasped, staggering back, her veil half-lowered, her face flushed with the kind of heat that could boil pills.
But he didn't stop.
This demon had no brakes.
He reached out again—this time for her hand. She flinched. Her heart beat like a deer caught beneath thunderclouds.
Is he really…?
Was he about to kiss her?
