Perhaps a Heavenly Flame was already waiting for her in the desert?
Besides a Heavenly Flame, she might even stumble across something else...
Xiao Yan shook her head, suppressing the urge stirring within her.
"Fortuitous encounters" hinged on "fate." What was hers would be hers; what wasn't would remain beyond her reach, no matter how high she jumped.
If there really was a Heavenly Flame in the desert, it must have been born or existed countless years ago. Could someone really swoop in and snatch it away in these few days?
So she would take her two brothers back to Wutan City before heading into the desert. It wouldn't take much time anyway.
And then there was Qing Lin...
Xiao Yan went to find Xiao Ding and Xiao Li and asked about Qing Lin's background-
Qing Lin's mother had been human. After being raped by one of the Snake-People, she had given birth to the mixed-blood Qing Lin all alone.
Although such a thing was profoundly humiliating for a human woman, Qing Lin's mother hadn't abandoned her. Instead, she had kept Qing Lin by her side and raised her.
A few years ago, Qing Lin's mother had died a gruesome death in the desert. Xiao Ding and Xiao Li had found Qing Lin and brought her back to raise her in the Desert Iron Mercenary Group.
Hearing this, Xiao Yan fell silent for a while, her heart aching even more for the little girl.
Xiao Yan also deeply admired Qing Lin's mother-humans capturing and selling snake-women, and Snake-People raping human women, were hardly rare occurrences along the border.
Most human-snake children were strangled at birth or abandoned and left to fend for themselves.
To refuse to visit the wrong upon the child, to keep Qing Lin and raise her rather