The carved vermilion-lacquered doors were shoved open with force.
A woman hurrying along the road stumbled toward the bedroom with an indigo paper umbrella in her arms. The rain had only just stopped, and dripping eaves happened to dot her cheeks. No one could tell whether it was tears or rainwater. Her steps faltered.
She stepped on her skirt and fell, yet protected the paper umbrella with both arms, leaving it completely unharmed. Ignoring the mud, she scrambled to her feet and continued running.
With a bang, she crashed open the door, shoved aside the servants and maids, and rushed to the bedside.
Suddenly.
The paper umbrella clutched tightly in her arms slipped free, opening with a swish. Embroidered flowers bloomed across the blue paper umbrella. The gravely ill scholar, pale-faced and with cracked lips, felt warm sunlight fall across his body. Dazedly, he opened his eyes and saw the paper umbrella floating in the air, slowly turning, as though it belonged to no mortal world. Fluorescent light spilled down, dispelling Filth Qi, sickness, and pain...
The woman fell to her knees with a thud, and the sobs she had suppressed for so long tore her heart apart.
That faint, ethereal thread of hope had become reality.
Speckled golden rays slanted through the lavish hollow-carved window lattice. The paper umbrella spun gently in midair, bringing reunion and health to this family. This was the proper path of magic—this was what one blessed with cultivation should do.
The haggard man visibly began to recover.
"Cough, cough. It's good to be alive..."
Bai Yujun casually raised her wine jar.
She gulped it down in hearty swallows, wetting her collar. It was not strong liquor, merely low-proof fruit wine bought from the shop next door. It was fragrant, sweet, and mellow without