"..."
Lou Yunxiao studied Ning Xiaoxiao's face and saw what the young girl was thinking.
So he made no attempt to hide it. "Junior Sister, you've already figured it out, haven't you?"
"Mingxin is A Ke."
"???"
Zhuang Yusheng had only just caught his breath when those words sent it shooting back up.
"Cough, cough..."
Without missing a beat, he coughed up another mouthful of blood.
The senior sister who was a Pill Cultivator hurried over, covered his mouth, and fed him a pill.
Once he had swallowed it, even his voice rose in pitch.
"Mingxin is A Ke?? Didn't A Ke die?"
"Lou Yunxiao, what the hell are you talking about?!" He waved a hand in front of Lou Yunxiao's face. "Have you gone crazy again?"
But just as he finished speaking, Ning Xiaoxiao went rigid, then broke into a smile.
It was a rare, genuinely heartfelt smile.
"I knew it. He's my brother." Her voice choked up as she spoke, and she said through reddened eyes, "Thank goodness, thank goodness. He isn't dead... My brother is still alive..."
"..." Zhuang Yusheng froze in place.
Seeing Ning Xiaoxiao crying with joy, he really couldn't bring himself to question the news again.
He only moved closer to Lou Yunxiao and asked quietly, "Are you sure this is true?"
Lou Yunxiao murmured an affirmative, then suddenly smiled as something occurred to him.
But his smile was self-mocking, steeped in bitter irony.
He told Ning Xiaoxiao, "But he left again. He left me in the Secret Realm and disappeared without a trace, all alone. He didn't even leave a farewell letter."
"I think he must be sick of me."
"So sick of me that spending even one more day with me disgusted him."
Lou Yunxiao remembered Qing Ru telling him that A