Xian'er

Shen Jingchuan's brows slowly knitted as he stared at the crystals and the old booklet on the table.

He suddenly came to his senses—the carriage had belonged to the scholar who had been ambushed and killed. Lin Weiyuan had made it clear that day: the men in black had left the escort wagons and valuables untouched. After killing their target, they had searched everywhere, inside and out. Clearly, they had been looking for something.

Could the stones in this box and the old book be what they had been after?

The moment the thought occurred to him, his heart sank.

Should he go back and mention it to Uncle Lin?

He had barely turned the idea over before he pushed it aside. He wasn't very old, but he had read plenty of books and understood how the world worked.

If these things were unimportant, that was one thing. But if they really were something the other side had been desperate enough to kill for, telling anyone today would drag him into these muddy waters for no good reason.

He was an outsider who knew nothing of the grudges and feuds of the jianghu, and he had even less reason to risk his wonderful life testing people's hearts.

Better to have one less trouble than one more.

Having made up his mind, Shen Jingchuan stopped dwelling on it.

He picked up the velvet and wrapped the six crystals one by one. Then he laid the booklet back in the bottom of the box, put the crystals on top, and closed the lid, fastening the clasp with a click.

With a thought, the small wooden box vanished into thin air, safely stored in the ring's space.

With it kept there, even if someone turned the entire residence upside down, they could never find the slightest trace of it, and it wouldn't get lost.

The moment the box entered the ring, Shen Jingchuan's fingertip suddenly grew hot. Light immediately began to shine from beneath the face of the ring.

At first, there were only red and yellow, shining dimly. Before he could react, more colors emerged, layer upon layer, multiplying as the light grew wildly brighter. Dazzling rays streamed through his fingers, splashing his whole hand with a riot of colors.

His heart skipped. This is bad. It's far too conspicuous. He hurriedly pulled a quilt off the bed and stuffed his hand and the ring beneath it.

After two seconds under the quilt, he came to his senses and glanced out the window. It was broad daylight, and the sun was shining brightly. The little bit of light in the room couldn't possibly show outside; it only brightened the space right in front of him. His racing heart finally settled.

He lay down at the edge of the bed, lifted a narrow gap in the quilt, and poked his face inside to stare at the ring. Nine colors cycled back and forth across its face, flickering and flashing until his eyes swam.

He couldn't say how long it went on. It felt like only a minute, yet also like ten-odd minutes of waiting. Only when his eyes had grown sore did the dazzling light gradually begin to fade. The colors receded layer by layer, finally vanishing entirely into the face of the ring without leaving the slightest afterglow.

The instant the light vanished completely, a voice suddenly rang out in his mind. It was a woman's voice, soft and husky with the drowsiness of someone who had just woken, tinged with a dazed bewilderment, as though she had just roused herself from a long dream and was still half asleep.

"There's Spiritual Qi?... I haven't dissipated yet?"

The voice in his head gave Shen Jingchuan a fright. He thought he was hearing things.

The voice paused, as though it had suddenly noticed something, and a note of surprise entered it. "No... this ring has actually already acknowledged a master?"

The voice in his mind asked, "Who are you?"

Shen Jingchuan steadied himself. The voice had sounded clear as day in his head; it definitely wasn't his imagination.

His Adam's apple bobbed, and he spoke hesitantly, keeping his voice very low. "I... my name is Shen Jingchuan."

The voice in his mind paused for a moment, then gave a soft sigh, carrying a trace of unmistakable disappointment.

"You don't have the slightest bit of cultivation. You're a mortal."

Shen Jingchuan frowned and pressed her. "Who are you, then? How can you talk inside my head?"

After he spoke, there was no answer for a long while. The room was so quiet that all he could hear was the wind outside the window. He blinked, doubts stirring in his mind again.

He muttered under his breath, "Did I really hear wrong?"

"Idiot."

The voice suddenly surfaced again, lazy and a little irritable. "You don't need to open your mouth and say it. I can hear whatever you're thinking. Just communicate with your mind."

Shen Jingchuan's heart jolted, and a thought instinctively crossed his mind. My mind?

"Yes, just like that."

The voice answered quickly, then slowed again, taking on a vague, hollow quality. "I'm this ring's artifact spirit... just call me Xian'er."

Xian'er?

No sooner had the thought occurred to Shen Jingchuan than he pressed her further. An artifact spirit? What on earth is going on?

Xian'er's voice lost some of its vigor, still laden with the lingering heaviness of sleep.

"I can't remember a lot of things either. All I remember is that I kept sleeping for a very, very long time, and when I woke up, things were like this."

Shen Jingchuan asked again, You were fine, so how did you end up falling asleep? And why did you suddenly wake up?

"What else could it be?"

Xian'er gave a soft huff. "The Spiritual Qi in this ring was completely used up. I couldn't hold on, so naturally I fell into a deep sleep."

She paused, as though using the ring's senses to sweep through the space inside it. Her tone suddenly turned knowing.

"Oh, that explains it. You just put Spirit Stones into the ring, didn't you? The ring absorbed the Spiritual Qi in the Spirit Stones on its own, and with that energy, I naturally woke up. Take a look inside the space yourself. Those grayish-white Spirit Stone remnants are what's left after they were used up."

With a thought, Shen Jingchuan sent his consciousness sinking through his fingertip into the ring.

Another slight turn of his thoughts, and the small wooden box dropped out of the space into his palm.

He lifted the lid. Inside were six little parcels, tightly wrapped in velvet. Before, they had bulged against the cloth, but now every one had collapsed, lying limp against the bottom of the box. He casually unwrapped one and found nothing but fine grayish-white powder, with none of its former translucent luster remaining.

He stared for a moment, then it suddenly struck him. These are the Spirit Stones Xian'er was talking about?

He had read cultivation novels and had long known about these treasures, the hard currency of the cultivation world, useful for cultivation and artifact refinement... So the crystals he had found in the carriage's hidden compartment were actually Spirit Stones? Yet before he had even had time to warm them in his hands, the ring had sucked them to dust in the blink of an eye.

"What? Does it hurt to lose them?" Xian'er's voice drifted out unhurriedly, with a teasing note.

"No, no," Shen Jingchuan hurriedly denied in his mind. "It was just my first time seeing something out of the legends, and it was gone before I could get a good look. That's all I regret."

As soon as he finished speaking, a faint, gentle light suddenly spread through his mind, and a figure slowly took shape.

It was the illusory image of a woman, veiled as if in a thin mist. He couldn't make out her outline clearly, but he could tell that her figure was slender and graceful, her wide sleeves and flowing skirt drifting lightly as though immersed in clouds and mist. Her features were exquisitely beautiful, her nose and lips delicate and flawless. Yet, separated from him by a hazy halo, she lacked the vivid life of a real person. Instead, she seemed like a celestial maiden descended from the moon, bearing an air of distant, languid immortality.