"G-good... fine... pretty good..."
Lin Shisan could no longer string a sentence together.
His little heart was about to leap out of his chest.
He felt the urges any boy his age would have.
No normal man could withstand such teasing temptation.
He buried his head low, not daring to steal another glance at that expanse of pale flesh.
"Pretty good..."
Only then did Tiny Waist seem to hear Lin Shisan.
Her expressive eyes gleamed, dark and bright.
Under her gaze, Lin Shisan did not know what to do with himself. His hands clenched, loosened, then clenched again.
"S-senior Sister... I..."
Lin Shisan's wariness surged.
He even tried to stir the true qi in his dantian.
His frightened, uneasy eyes watched Tiny Waist as she leaned in and stared at him.
Was he done for?
Had he just escaped the wolf's den only to fall into the tiger's jaws?
His rotten luck really did come hard on his heels.
He had survived that languid older beauty's lightning, only to have this slender-waisted girl drain him into a dried-out husk through dual cultivation?
"S-senior Sister... I... I only just woke up...
"I've only regained a tiny bit of feeling down below. Maybe... maybe..."
Lin Shisan spoke awkwardly, squirming.
Like a bashful little girl, he could not even get his words out clearly.
"You've regained a tiny bit of feeling?"
Tiny Waist listened as though she were skipping straight to the important part.
She was still leaning forward.
There was practically no space left between them.
Lin Shisan could even hear Tiny Waist's heartbeat.
Her big, dark eyes were practically gleaming green.
It frightened Lin Shisan so badly that his face turned ashen, his brows furrowing into three deep vertical lines.
Were all the female disciples of Jade Maiden Peak this uninhibited?
Were they this blunt about harvesting a man's essence, without the slightest delicacy?
"You can feel it?"
"Fairy Aunt, the dark-skinned boy can feel it! Has he really regained sensation?"
Tiny Waist shouted.
She was positively jubilant.
So jubilant that black lines of exasperation covered Lin Shisan's face.
What was this supposed to mean? Was regaining sensation really worth getting this excited over?
Were you that eager to drain me into a dried-out husk?
Couldn't you show a little mercy? I was still only a half-grown boy!
"Meow, meow..."
This time, all those black lines of exasperation practically burst out across Lin Shisan's face on their own.
A Little Tabby Cat leaped inside.
Following Little Tabby Cat's meows, a fairy aunt came in through the doorway.
It was the very fairy aunt who raised cats.
"Fairy Aunt, the dark-skinned boy says he's regained feeling down below?"
Tiny Waist immediately stood respectfully to one side.
She quietly reported Lin Shisan's condition.
The Cat-Raising Fairy merely glanced at Tiny Waist.
Tiny Waist immediately took the hint and shut her mouth, standing to one side with her hands folded in front of her.
"Meow, meow..."
Little Tabby Cat cried out again.
The cat even leaped onto Lin Shisan's chest.
That little tail curled into the shape of a flower.
The sight nearly made Lin Shisan's heart give out.
He remembered perfectly well that this adorable Little Tabby Cat had eaten Niu Shan alive.
"Fairy Aunt..."
Even Lin Shisan's voice trembled.
He looked miserably at Little Tabby Cat on his chest, not daring to move a muscle.
The fairy aunt remained cold and silent.
She walked straight up to Lin Shisan and studied him for a full minute.
Throughout it all, Lin Shisan held his breath, not even daring to let out a fart.
He feared Little Tabby Cat would transform and attack him, feared the fairy aunt would slap him dead.
Silence.
Deathly silence filled the room.
Tiny Waist stood to one side with her hands lowered, utterly still and quiet as well.
At that moment, time seemed to stop.
"Keep massaging him. Once every two hours, and use a little more pressure."
At last, the Cat-Raising Fairy spoke.
"Yes, Fairy Aunt. I'll do exactly as you say and massage Senior Brother Lin once every two hours."
Tiny Waist answered respectfully.
Her deference astonished Lin Shisan.
He still had to be massaged every two hours.
But... but... why had she even started calling him Senior Brother Lin?
This didn't seem like she was preparing to harvest his essence.
Or was the one who truly wanted to drain him not Tiny Waist, but this Cat-Raising Fairy she treated with such respect?
But why not do it now?
Could harvesting yin and yang really be like raising pigs and sheep in a mountain village-waiting until they were fat and grown before harvesting them?
In any case, Lin Shisan's head was filled with images of himself being drained into a dried-out husk.
Over the next two days, Tiny Waist really did follow the Cat-Raising Fairy's instructions to the letter, massaging Lin Shisan once every two hours.
Not only were Tiny Waist's massages thorough, but the food and drink seemed quite good too.
At least, they were far better than what he had received in the Azure Cloud Lineage. Every meal included meat.
Several times, Lin Shisan wanted to ask about the Cat-Raising Fairy. In truth, he only wanted to know when his essence would be harvested.
But Tiny Waist genuinely seemed terrified of the Cat-Raising Fairy.
Whenever he asked about her, Tiny Waist immediately shut her mouth. She did not even dare mention her name.
She only told him that her own name was Mu Ling.
Just like that, another three days passed, and the stiffness and numbness in Lin Shisan's lower limbs improved noticeably.
The slender-waisted Mu Ling continued to massage his lower limbs every two hours.
Before, the numbness and stiffness had naturally dulled his reactions. Now, however, whenever Tiny Waist massaged him, Lin Shisan reacted immediately.
It left both him and Tiny Waist blushing scarlet.
But the massages continued without a single session being skipped.
Two people with no control over their circumstances were forced to do something neither could help.
To ease that blush-inducing awkwardness, Lin Shisan could only circulate the Nine Heavens True Dragon Art in secret.
In truth, he also wanted to know whether the Jiaolong True Spirit he had seen before passing out had been real.
For the several days since he had awakened, his dantian had been as still and lonely as water.
It was pitch-black inside, without even the shadow of a Flood Dragon.
Naturally, he came to believe that the so-called Jiaolong True Spirit had been a hallucination.
How could he take the Old Madman's words seriously? It had merely been his own wishful thinking.
But by the seventh day, Lin Shisan's lower body had almost recovered.
Inside his pitch-black dan-
-tian, a tiny light actually appeared.
It was accompanied by the faint cry of a dragon.
It sounded just like the dragon's cry he had heard when that languid older beauty nearly toyed him to death during the thunderstorm, only clearer now.
"Roar..."
On the tenth day, by the time Tiny Waist finished her massage, Lin Shisan had also circulated the Nine Heavens True Dragon Art through one greater celestial circuit.
Tiny Waist had barely stepped through the doorway when a tangible change occurred in Lin Shisan's dantian.
With a thunderous boom, the tiny point of light burst apart.
The pitch-black darkness vanished, replaced by swirling spiritual energy and a vaguely familiar presence.
Bang...
The Jiaolong True Spirit, which had remained nowhere to be found for so long, finally tumbled into view again.
Just as before, it had the body of a fish, the tail of a snake, and four legs—the form of a Flood Dragon.
The difference was that shining dragon scales were now visible on the Flood Dragon's forehead.
Its illusory form also looked more real, especially its four legs, which were so lifelike that illusion and reality were indistinguishable.
"Greetings, Fairy Aunt."
On that tenth day, Lin Shisan was savoring the exhilarating power brought by the Jiaolong True Spirit.
Tiny Waist's respectful voice came from outside.
He assumed the Cat-Raising Fairy had come to check his injuries again, but once he saw who had arrived, Lin Shisan went numb once more.
The visitor was not just the fairy aunt who raised cats. With her came the ice-sculpture beauty, seemingly cast from cold itself, who had saved his life at that critical moment.
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