Chapter 21

◎Feeling the Bones◎

“Fireworks…” Chi Lu didn’t react for a moment.

Then, she felt as if she was being held by an invisible big hand. That hand enveloped her entire body, gently and warmly stroking her black hair on top of her head.

“If you allow it, I will set off a show for you.”

Jing Shuxing’s demeanor was humble and reasonable, but there was no connection between his demeanor and the meaning in his words.

In the book 《Heavenly Fate》, that’s how he killed people.

As the biggest villain in the later part of the book, he often presented himself as a weak first young master, and then killed people invisibly.

After killing, he would use the dead as bait to provoke the next fight. Even Fengyue City, which he had slaughtered, became bait for him to provoke a great war in the cultivation world.

Later on, there were countless corpses piled under Jing Shuxing, but he was still that pure white, thin, and handsome young man.

Chi Lu originally thought that Jing Shuxing, like her, was also a blackened existence in the book. After all, his character and habits were quite different from what was written in the book.

She suddenly realized that Jing Shuxing had not yet become the image described in the book 《Heavenly Fate》, but it was just that the opportunity had not yet arrived. 

When the curse mark formation exploded, didn’t all his restraint and integrity collapse at the same time?

Chi Lu swallowed, and a bead of sweat appeared on her forehead.

She slightly tilted her head back, examining Jing Shuxing’s appearance. Jing Shuxing was holding her hand, his pale face added a touch of spirit, and his pale lips were also stained with blood.

He still maintained a devout and expectant look.

The book said that Chi Lu was the biggest push for Jing Shuxing’s darkening. Chi Lu originally didn’t believe it at all, but now she couldn’t help but start to doubt the truth of this matter.

But what does that matter?

Behind her, the rolling red flames surged. Chi Lu raised her hand, her warm palm lightly covering the whitened knuckles.

“I don’t want to see it, but I will allow it.”

She paused, “Actually, there’s no need. I didn’t understand your situation at the beginning, and I spoke smartly. If you still have doubts about me, you don’t need to let me know what you want to do specifically.”

Jing Shuxing slightly tilted his head back, and a hint of a smile crossed the corner of his mouth. 

“No.”

He interrupted Chi Lu’s words, his tone soft, with a hint of affection in his voice.

“Since you were willing to save me in the formation, I…”

Before he could finish his words, waves of heat rushed towards Chi Lu’s face.

When she turned her head in fear, she found that in the next second, her hair would be burned. The surging fire wave, which was the spiritual power of the Out-of-Aperture Stage cultivator, disappeared abruptly, just like before.

Between the two of them and Jing Xiangtian, only a gentle breeze remained.

Jing Xiangtian finally realized something was wrong. He put away his hand, looked at Chi Lu with his back, and muttered to himself, “What’s going on?”

He had looked down on Jing Shuxing for a long time, and he couldn’t imagine that it was him who extinguished his flames. He could only think that Chi Lu was hiding her strength.

“Who exactly are you?” He asked aloud.

But, no one paid attention to him.

A strong sense of unease filled his heart. Jing Xiangtian thought he was being vigilant of Chi Lu, or feeling her invisible killing intent.

“You——” 

Chi Lu just turned her head, wanting to talk to Jing Xiangtian. Before she could open her mouth, she suddenly saw the cultivator, who was safe and sound a second ago, explode like fireworks the next second.

It wasn’t an internal explosion, but rather as if it was squeezed by an invisible big hand, like a fruit exploding with juice. Because the squeezing speed was too fast, the blood splattered as if it had exploded.

The whole process happened in the blink of an eye. The cultivator didn’t even have time to “groan”, and he was dead beyond dead.

She suddenly let out a scream, couldn’t help but let out an ‘ah’, her legs went soft, and she fell backwards.

In fear, Chi Lu forgot that her hand was still firmly holding Jing Shuxing’s. As she fell backward, Jing Shuxing also lost his balance and fell forward towards the ground.

The two of them let go of their hands in mid-air and fell to the ground in a disheveled manner. Chi Lu was worse off, her back of the head directly hit the ground.

The blood and pulp that had been crushed beyond recognition lost control and “pitter-patter” fell down. After the crisp sound of raindrops, a chaotic and indescribable dots of ink painting^[1]點墨畫(diǎn mò huà) = dot ink painting, I think ‘dot ink painting’ in this context is a metaphor for the blood stains that appear on the ground after the blood rain. appeared on the ground.

That very clear movement came to Chi Lu’s ears, and she couldn’t help but feel a wave of nausea. Before she could turn her head to retch, that ink painting disappeared with a ‘swish’.

Chi Lu heard a sigh. Jing Shuxing gently exhaled a turbid breath, his expression relaxed, as if he had just been rushing and finally remedied a mistake. 

He tried to prop himself up from the ground, but his outstretched palm touched a soft skirt.

Jing Shuxing’s movement paused, maintaining a posture with both hands propping on the ground, he lowered his head slightly stiffly.

Chi Lu lifted her knee and gently kicked Jing Shuxing’s inner thigh, “Get up quickly.”

What had just happened in front of her was somewhat disgusting and terrifying, but it only happened in the blink of an eye.

Through this incident, Chi Lu understood why the guards in the courtyard were gone. But after thinking about it for a long time, she didn’t think she could comment on it.

Even if we take a step back, it was Fengyue City that made the first move. Jing Shuxing’s only mistake was not warning her in advance, which scared her half to death.

So all she could do was kick Jing Shuxing lightly with a hint of displeasure.

The grace of saving a life, there is no way to repay it, can’t be hit, can’t be scolded, so a light kick should be okay, right?

When confronting Jing Xiangtian, even though the flames were raging, Jing Shuxing’s eyebrows were always calm and cold, showing a cold and arrogant demeanor. But as soon as Chi Lu spoke, his face turned half red instantly.

However, Chi Lu didn’t understand anything, “Why are you always blushing? Could it be that Fengyue City has put more curse on you?”

Jing Shuxing shook his head slowly and stiffly, “No.” 

He seemed to want to explain something, but quickly gave up. He prepared to get up from the ground with one hand, while the other hand went to cover his face that was as red as a burning cloud.

As Chi Lu was struggling to straighten up from the ground, Jing Shuxing’s hand just brushed past her nose tip.

Jing Shuxing could imagine Chi Lu’s slightly upturned nose. He recalled the playful words spoken by the beautiful girl in the curse mark formation.

“How can you be sure that I look exactly like the one in the curse mark formation?”

Jing Shuxing pursed his lips, wanting to withdraw his hand.

Knowing what he had said during the outbreak of the curse mark formation, he wished he could dig a hole and crawl into it. She was very good to him, even if he had doubts, he shouldn’t have shown it so blatantly.

It’s one thing not to repay a favor, but to speak ill of a benefactor, isn’t this behavior no different from a beast?

Jing Shuxing didn’t know how to explain to Chi Lu. He wanted to try to trust Chi Lu, so he decided to be honest and straightforward, and simply took the opportunity when Jing Xiangtian was present to demonstrate his abilities while making a move.

As for whether she would be scared or disgusted, that was not something he could control.

Since he wanted to trust Chi Lu, he shouldn’t doubt her appearance.

Jing Shuxing thought so, and controlled himself not to doubt Chi Lu’s appearance.

His hand was halfway retracted when Chi Lu grabbed it.

“I know what you’re thinking.”

Chi Lu smiled, and pulled Jing Shuxing’s wrist down, leading his fingers to cover her face.

“Aren’t you curious about what I look like?”

She was happily calculating in her heart. As long as Jing Shuxing confirmed her appearance, when he saw the disguised “Young sect leader of Linghua Sect” in the future, he would definitely not think that they were the same person.

Jing Shuxing was caught off guard by her pulling his wrist, his face turned even redder, and he desperately wanted to pull his hand back.

But Chi Lu wouldn’t let him go, and she determinedly started a tug-of-war with him.

“Aren’t you curious? You must be curious, right? Why not touch it, and after feeling the bones, you will know what I look like.” She said, trying to tempt him.

Chi Lu was very confident in her appearance, that she was definitely one of the outstanding ones.

The author has something to say:

The innocent Little Jing now: Help! There’s a pervert!!!