Enchantress

The chill of the bluestone slabs pierced through her gauzy skirt and into her knees. Enchantress pressed her forehead tightly to the ground and held her breath.

Jing Wen's oppressive aura loomed over her like a mountain, leaving her, with her mere Qi Refining, First Layer cultivation, barely able to breathe.

"Tell me where you came from."

The voice came from above, neither warm nor cold, like a blunt knife slowly scraping down her spine.

Enchantress slowly straightened, not daring to raise her gaze beyond the jade pendant at his waist.

"My birth name is Su Yurou. I was born into the Su Family of Green Mountain City." Enchantress's voice was gentle as water, each word like a painstakingly polished Yuzhu.

"My father ran a silk business, and locally, he was considered..."

"Get to the point." The sound of Jing Wen's fingertips tapping the armrest cut short her reminiscence.

Enchantress's lashes trembled slightly, and she swiftly adjusted her account. "When I was sixteen, someone schemed against my father's business. To save the family, he gave me to Venerable Golden Light as a concubine when he passed through."

She would always remember that rainy day:

Her father knelt in the ancestral hall, his once-straight back hunched like a shrimp.

"Yurou, only you can save the Su Family." Rain dripped from the tiled eaves, so much like the tears in her father's eyes.

Dressed in her finest clothes, she was delivered into Venerable Golden Light's carriage. From that moment on, Su Yurou was dead. The one who survived was Enchantress-Venerable Golden Light's eighteenth concubine.

"When I first entered the manor, I washed my face with tears every day." Enchantress's nails dug into her palms, but her voice remained steady.

"Only when I discovered the third wife putting drugs in my food did I understand that this was no maiden's chamber. It was a battlefield."

Jing Wen's gaze shifted slightly. The oppressive aura that had weighed on her like a mountain quietly eased a little, and the faintest trace of interest even appeared at the corner of his lips.

This woman was more interesting than he had expected.

Enchantress keenly caught that slight softening and knew her chance had come.

She lowered her head and eyes, speaking even more softly, yet every word remained clear. "Knowing I had no means to compete for favor, I turned instead to... observing everyone's weaknesses."

She spoke at an even pace, as though recounting the most ordinary household affair:

"The Fifth Madam loves her drink. Every full moon, she drinks Drunken Immortal Brew without fail. Once drunk, she has no restraint and once revealed the location of the venerable's secret treasure chamber;

The seventh wife has an affair with the night patrol guard at the western side gate. At midnight on the third day of every month, she invariably meets him by the rockery in the rear garden under the pretext of admiring the flowers;

The ninth wife..."

At this point, she suddenly paused, her lashes trembling as though some memory had pricked her.

Her thoughts drifted helplessly back to that bitterly cold night-

The moonlight was deathly pale, the courtyard desolate.

Venerable Golden Light sat alone on the stone steps, the jade cup in his hand already empty. His drunken eyes were bloodshot, and he muttered curses like a trapped beast:

"If not for my inferior spiritual root, why would I have been trapped in early-stage Qi Refining for decades?

Those people with heavenly spiritual roots merely had the luck to be born that way!

Heaven is unjust! Heaven is unjust!"

The concubines filling the hall knelt trembling, not even daring to breathe loudly.

Only Enchantress stepped slowly forward. Holding a wine pot in her delicate hand, she filled his cup with Dew-Congealing Wine that shimmered with a pale blue glow, her voice soft as spring water:

"I have heard that in the world of cultivation, three hundred years are but spring, and five hundred years are autumn.

You are only thirty, venerable. Why fear that you cannot stand proud above the sea of clouds?"

Venerable Golden Light half narrowed his drunken eyes, studying the delicate face before him with an ambiguous smile. "Where did you hear that?"

"When I was a child, my father knew several wandering rogue cultivators. From what I saw and heard, I learned a little."

Enchantress took the opportunity to kneel beside his feet, allowing just the right trace of admiration into her eyes. "If you would not disdain me, venerable... I would gladly attend you day and night and listen to the true teachings of the Great Dao."

Enchantress had only hoped to earn a little more affection within this secluded manor. She had never expected Venerable Golden Light to actually teach her cultivation.

The next morning, after sobering up, Venerable Golden Light casually tossed her a cultivation formula, his expression still languid and mocking from his hangover. "Not one in ten thousand possesses a spiritual root. If you can draw qi into your body, I will grant you a chance at immortality."

His tone was as dismissive as though he were teasing a caged bird, but Enchantress solemnly knelt and bowed, engraving that obscure formula deep in her heart.

That night, moonlight flowed like water. She sat alone beside the courtyard's lotus pond, circulating qi according to the formula.

At first, she felt only the night chill sinking into her bones. Then, near midnight, ripples suddenly spread through her sea of consciousness, as though countless silver fish had broken through a frozen lake. A cool, pure current wandered through her meridians, bringing spring to withered wood wherever it passed.

Spiritual qi!

Her whole body trembled, and she nearly wept.

The next morning, Venerable Golden Light examined her himself. His Divine Sense swept through her meridians, and his expression abruptly changed. "You... actually have a spiritual root?

And the rare metal attribute, no less!"

But his delight lasted only an instant.

He immediately sneered and flicked his sleeve, his tone suddenly turning cold. "Unfortunately, my cultivation method is unusual. It requires a yin fiend body as its foundation. With that metal spiritual root of yours... at most, I can teach you the qi-drawing section for Qi Refining, First Layer."

Enchantress bowed deeply, her forehead touching the icy ground, concealing the fiercely burning sparks in her eyes.

"This disciple... bows in gratitude for your teachings, Master!" Her voice held precisely the right catch of emotion.

"Do not call me Master!" Venerable Golden Light swept his sleeve in disgust, the gust it raised scraping across her cheek.

"If a single word of today's events gets out, I will rip out your soul and burn it in a sky lantern!"

Watching that golden figure stride away, Enchantress slowly straightened.

Her fingertips unconsciously stroked the spot over her dantian, where that faint but tenacious strand of spiritual qi lingered, as though she were caressing the only light in the darkness.

Five years had passed.

That tiny spark from back then had never gone out, but it had gradually dimmed through day after day of barren cultivation.

Venerable Golden Light was stingy with resources, and the spiritual qi in this mortal manor was as sparse as in a desert.

Looking into the mirror, she saw that her cultivation had not changed at all in five years. A dry, bitter curve tugged at her lips.

The bronze mirror reflected the hooked crescent moon outside the window, as well as the shadowy light gathering anew in her eyes.

Since this road leads nowhere, I must find another path.

"So you decided to find a higher branch to perch on?"

Jing Wen's voice sliced through the silence like an icy blade, instantly dragging Enchantress out of her memories and back to reality.

Her heart clenched-she had reached the knife-edge between life and death.

Her fingertips trembled, but she forced herself to remain composed.

She lightly bit her lower lip, seeming both shy and timid. Tilting one shoulder, she let her collar slip quietly down, exposing a stretch of neck as smooth as congealed cream, glowing softly beneath the dim lamp.

"Please see the truth, Senior..." Her voice was slightly husky, carrying just the right measure of fear and sincerity.

"What I have sought was never glory or favor. I only wished for someone along the path of cultivation who could guide me out of confusion and lead me free of this cage."

She quickly raised her eyes and glanced at Jing Wen-a look as fleeting as a dragonfly touching water, timid yet respectful-then swiftly lowered her head again, as though even looking directly at him overstepped her bounds:

"Venerable Golden Light... is already in the palm of your hand, Senior.

I... only wish to find a way to survive."

Before her words had faded, Jing Wen suddenly leaned forward!

Fingers as cold as iron clamped around her chin, forcing her head up with irresistible strength.

Enchantress was forced to meet his eyes-

They were two bottomless pools of icy water, devoid of desire, anger, or feeling.

Not a single ripple stirred at her beauty. There was only pure, almost cruel scrutiny.

In an instant, Enchantress felt as though she had fallen into an ice cavern, the blood throughout her body nearly freezing.

She understood-she had gambled wrong.

Before this man, flesh was mere dust. Beauty carried no weight.

"With that paltry cultivation of yours?" Jing Wen's voice was low, each word a needle. "Or with those modest looks?"

Enchantress's breathing quickened, her thoughts racing.

With life and death hanging in the balance, she abruptly pulled a silk booklet as thin as a cicada's wing from her sleeve and raised it above her head with both hands, her voice urgent but steady:

"Forgive me, Senior!" "These are the secret records of Golden Light Manor that I have compiled in secret over the past five years-including the locations of three hidden treasuries, a list of twelve trusted death-sworn retainers, and... the other seven wives' secret dealings with outside factions!"

Jing Wen's eyes flickered slightly. He released her, and the silk booklet floated lightly into his palm.

Enchantress took the opportunity to quietly steady her breathing, her fingertips still trembling slightly-cold sweat had long since soaked the clothes on her back, leaving them clinging to her skin, icy to the bone.

That booklet was her life-saving trump card, earned through five years of walking on a knife's edge.

It not only detailed the manor's treasuries, secret passages, and trusted retainers, but also contained stray remarks Venerable Golden Light occasionally let slip when drunk.

Yet in Jing Wen's eyes, it was merely a pile of wastepaper.

He sneered inwardly:

Venerable Golden Light's ancestors might once have enjoyed prominence, but they had long since fallen into decline.

The man himself was only at Qi Refining Third Layer and could barely take a step beyond the Market. Everything he knew or had heard amounted to scraps of hearsay.

The "secrets of the Cultivation World" Enchantress had heard from him were probably worth less than idle chatter in the teahouses of Yellow Maple Valley's Market.

As for beauty?

Jing Wen's gaze swept over her slightly exposed shoulder and neck, his eyes utterly untroubled.

To him, this body was nothing more than a fading flower in the wind.

Still, she had managed to cultivate to Qi Refining, First Layer in a mortal land with scant spiritual qi, right beneath Venerable Golden Light's nose;

She had survived five years in a secluded manor filled with feuding concubines and eyes and ears everywhere, and had even woven a web of intelligence;

And she knew to offer her trump card in a desperate situation rather than weep and beg for pity...

This woman had brains, resilience, and a measure of rare good fortune.

Perhaps she truly was qualified to become a "Blood-Congealing Five-Element Pill" in his hands.

Like Mo Juren, she could one day contribute another brick to his grand undertaking of attaining a golden core.

"Get up." Jing Wen's tone softened slightly, but held not a trace of warmth.

Enchantress silently breathed a sigh of relief and carefully rose to her feet.

Today, she had deliberately worn a plain white gauze dress, with only a single silver hairpin in her hair and no cosmetics. She looked slender and delicate, like a secluded orchid beneath the moon-

This was the conclusion she had reached after years of observation: truly powerful figures disdained flattery buried beneath layers of powder and rouge.

Jing Wen's gaze passed over her understated attire. Such unobtrusive care was indeed far more skillful than the efforts of those painted, vulgar beauties.

"Remain by Venerable Golden Light's side for now." His voice was calm and unruffled, yet it sent a jolt through Enchantress's heart.

She immediately grasped the deeper meaning-he wanted her to become a hidden piece planted beside Venerable Golden Light's pillow.

She promptly offered a solemn bow. "I will faithfully fulfill my duties and never betray your trust, Senior."

Only when she left the cave abode and the mountain breeze brushed her face did she realize that her legs were still trembling slightly.

She glanced back at Jing Wen's residence, where clouds and mist swirled, making it seem like an immortal realm.

Venerable Golden Light's manor, for all its apparent golden splendor, was merely an ornate cage in the mortal world.

"At last... I can see a thread of hope." Enchantress clenched her fists, the pain of her nails digging into her palms keeping her clearheaded.