Qin Churan clenched her teeth and turned her head away.
"Then I'll just live on my own. It's not as if I can't survive without a man."
Ye Pianran looked at her daughter, who stubbornly refused to admit how she felt, and stopped trying to persuade her.
She changed the subject.
"According to the information your father received from Capital City-"
Ye Pianran lowered her voice, enunciating every word.
"Chen Lin is an immortal cultivator."
The room fell silent for a moment.
Qin Churan whipped her head around. Her gaze froze for an instant.
"What?"
"An immortal cultivator." Ye Pianran remained calm. "The higher-ups have already consulted the Six Great Daoist Ancestral Courts and confirmed it. He Daoran, Zhang Jinling, Li Guangfu... You may never have heard those names, but your father said this-any one of them could shake the entire Daoist community just by stamping his foot. Men like that lined up in Chen Family Village to bring Chen Lin gifts."
Qin Churan sat back down on the edge of the bed, her hand unconsciously tightening around the sheet.
An immortal cultivator.
These beings from novels actually existed?
A complicated emotion welled up inside Qin Churan.
It was not fear.
It was a sense of distance.
A clear, cruel sense of distance.
She was a mortal.
And he stood above everyone.
Ye Pianran watched the changes in her daughter's expression.
She spoke softly, a hint of coaxing in her voice. "Immortal cultivators live long lives and remain young forever. Just imagine, when you're eighty, you'll still look the way you do now-"
"Mom."
Qin Churan interrupted her.
She raised her head.
Her eyes were a little red, but her gaze was steady.
"I like him for who he is. Not for eternal youth, and not for a long life."