Twenty-One Frames

After Qiao Ranran finished the first stage of treatment, the mangled flesh on the ground still looked the same. The only change was a slightly more noticeable rise and fall, proof that her treatment had worked: it had one more breath in it.

But only one.

When she first found the person, the injuries had been too severe for her to risk moving them, so she had carried out the initial treatment in the seawater. Even now that their condition had stabilized a little, moving them recklessly would be extremely dangerous.

But leaving them there was even more dangerous. There was no telling how long that one breath would last with them soaking in seawater. As the tide came in, countless tiny sea creatures washed up, each eager for a share of the flesh.

If it stayed there much longer, there would soon be no flesh left. None at all.

After a moment's thought, Qiao Ranran took a piece of clothing from her storage bag and carefully wrapped the mangled flesh before lifting it. She carried it to a safer spot under a tree not far from the beach, where she had just been cooking seafood over a fire.

Then Qiao Ranran shrieked, "My seafood!" She had forgotten to eat as soon as she got busy. Wasting food was enough to get her struck by lightning!

Once she had settled the injured person, Qiao Ranran crouched beside the long-dead fire, wondering how to salvage the seafood that had gone completely cold. A shadow suddenly fell over her huddled figure.

Pei Ling said with a faint, unreadable smile, "Senior Sister, have you forgotten something?"

Qiao Ranran looked baffled. "Hm?"

Pei Ling waggled a finger and bent slightly, fixing her with a dark gaze. "Have you forgotten why we came to the South Sea?"

"Uh..." Qiao Ranran really had almost forgotten. It seemed this junior brother of hers had brought up Blood Jade Nectar in the course of their conversation, then whisked her off to the South Sea so she could have it as fresh as possible.

So?

"Junior Brother Pei, it's fine if you didn't find any. I'm not in a hurry. We can come back when our cultivation is higher. Blood Jade Nectar is hard to find in the first—mmph!"

Before Qiao Ranran could finish, a cold hand covered her mouth. Pei Ling's hand was so large it hid most of her face, leaving only her wide eyes staring up at him, innocent, bewildered, and surprised.

Something cool, soft, and jelly-like, with a strange sweet and briny scent, was pushed into Qiao Ranran's mouth. It instantly turned into a warm current and vanished.

Qiao Ranran: ...Wait. I wasn't even ready. What was that? Was it really all right for it to absorb on its own?

Pei Ling's hand still rested against her face. Unlike his icy hand, her skin was warm, soft, and smooth.

"Senior Sister, doubting me is a bad habit."

Chapter 21: Twenty-One Frames

What Pei Ling had fed Qiao Ranran was Blood Jade Nectar. It felt much like jelly and melted the moment it entered her mouth. She had no time to react; she had not even needed to swallow before it disappeared.

It felt as though she had eaten a fake tonic. Even Zhu Bajie had choked a little when he swallowed the ginseng fruit. She had felt nothing at all!

And it had come so easily that Qiao Ranran had no sense that he had just fed her a legendary, top-grade spirit medicine. It seemed Pei Ling had merely stood by the sea for a while. In the time it took her to cook seafood and save someone, he had wandered off, come back, and brought Blood Jade Nectar with him.

"I assume you know exactly what Blood Jade Nectar does, Junior Sister. Do you need help?"

Blood Jade Nectar's greatest advantage was that it improved the meridians and Spirit Root gently and gradually. It greatly unlocked a cultivator's potential without harming their foundations, improving both physique and talent.

Its greatest drawback, aside from how difficult it was to obtain, was that dissolving it and bringing out its full effects was also extremely hard. It was a long, arduous process, no easier than cultivation, though the benefits were immense.

At Qiao Ranran's Qi Refining Stage, drawing out the first trace of Blood Jade Nectar would be the hardest part. Pei Ling had asked because he wanted to see what she looked like when she needed someone's help.

But Qiao Ranran waved a hand as if eager to avoid just that. "I know, I know. You've already helped me so much, Junior Brother Pei. I can handle the rest myself, so I won't trouble you."

Pei Ling should have been pleased that she would not trouble him, but he was not. He stared at her plainly delighted eyes, curved into a smile and bright as stars. His fingers twitched.

He wanted to crush something to settle the irritation stirring inside him.

Qiao Ranran was not being polite. She really did know what to do; it would simply take longer. Obtaining Blood Jade Nectar for her was already the greatest help Pei Ling could have given. She had not expected this junior brother of uncertain origins, odd as he was, to be such a good person.

Pei Ling had no idea she had already decided he was a good person.

Then he heard Qiao Ranran ask, "Junior Brother Pei, when are we going back?"

Pei Ling raised an eyebrow at the bundle beneath the tree. "What about that one? You're leaving them here?"

Abandoning a treatment she had begun for her own convenience was not Qiao Ranran's style. But the injured person's current condition posed a serious problem. "I suppose we'll have to take them back?"

They certainly could not stay here. There did not seem to be any Spirit Plants nearby, either. Healing this person would require not only acupuncture but a large supply of pills. Even low-grade ones would do if she could not get anything better. Ideally, she could make a medicinal cocoon. Given the state they were in, who knew how long it would take for them to regain human form?

Pei Ling had kindly obtained Blood Jade Nectar for her, but Qiao Ranran told herself he only wanted to repay her for saving his life. He did not look like someone who helped others for the pleasure of it. At least, he clearly saw no value in saving that bundle of mangled flesh.

Pei Ling took one sharp look at her and saw her dilemma. "I can't carry them."

Qiao Ranran's brows twitched. For some reason, she heard another meaning in his words. She frowned at Pei Ling. When he had "come back," she had been fully absorbed in treating the injured person. Then he had distracted her by suddenly feeding her Blood Jade Nectar. She still had not taken a proper look at him.

Ranking List

|

Transmigration into a Book

Sweet Romance

Time-Travel and Rebirth Romance

Dahei Loves Eating Fish

Double Rebirth

Cultivation Fantasy