Wanyan Chongjie shifted awkwardly and said with an unnatural expression, "Just support my mother. I can use qinggong myself."
Song Qingshu replied, "You're too slow, and we need to make haste." After a pause, he added, "Don't think I'm taking advantage of you. If I wanted to take advantage, I'd do it openly. I wouldn't sneak around like this."
Before the two women could protest, he wrapped an arm around each of their waists and sped toward Hailing King's Mansion like the wind.
In an alley outside the walls of Hailing King's Mansion, Song Qingshu gently set the two women down. Wanyan Chongjie immediately leaped away with a flushed face. Puchai Alihu, meanwhile, reacted far more calmly, tidying her windblown hair to conceal the embarrassment in her heart.
Song Qingshu tapped the ground with the tip of his foot and flew into a nearby tree. He plucked a leaf, placed it to his lips, and played a uniquely melodic yet highly rhythmic tune.
Looking at the man in the tree, his robes fluttering in the breeze and giving him something of an otherworldly air, Puchai Alihu pulled her daughter aside. "Chongjie, Mother had the wind blowing in her eyes the whole way and couldn't open them. Your martial arts are better—could you tell how good his qinggong was?" Thinking of how she had been able to do nothing but bury her face in a young man's chest, Puchai Alihu discovered that she actually felt a faint flutter in her heart, like when she had been a young girl.
Wanyan Chongjie shook her head. "I couldn't see clearly either. But Heavenly Prison is more than halfway across Daxing Prefecture from here, and we got here so quickly. His qinggong far surpasses mine. It's already beyond the limits of human capability."
Puchai