The boat drifted lightly onward, the breeze fluttering her robes-in the faint morning light, Ling Yier steered the Magnolia Boat back through towering waves and flying spray.
The waves that swept up to brush the sky could not come near them; whenever a surge taller than a person reached the two girls, it shattered into countless droplets, reflecting the faint sunlight in the eastern sky like morning dew and casting a pale rainbow beside the boat. However treacherous the wind and waves, however the Magnolia Boat rose and fell, sank and floated, that delicate ribbon of watery radiance remained beside them. With no spray touching their robes and rainbow mist curling around them, only the winds ranging across the sea could stir their hair, sending their cascading locks and skirts fluttering wildly with a rustling swish.
Perhaps hearts truly did share an unspoken understanding when love ran deep. All Ling Yier's thoughts, all the myriad threads of her affection, were now bound to the young man who had set out on his distant expedition. Without realizing it, she had come to feel that she could not bear even a moment apart from him. Even without speaking, merely watching him from afar filled her heart with an indescribable contentment. Thus, with Xing Yan away, her exquisite heart, pure as an icy lotus and jade-white lotus root, grew all the more sensitive. As she sped across the surging waters, an unease unlike anything she had felt before swelled within her like a dark cloud gathering on the horizon before a storm. In an instant, its black shadow covered her heart, leaving her bewildered and restless with dread.
Preoccupied by such inexplicable worry, she inevitably overlooked her surroundings. As her heart fluttered anxiously, she suddenly heard little Qiong Rong call beside her, "Look,