"Why don't you go to bed tonight? I'll keep watch."
Unable to sleep, Li Qiuran came into the courtyard, where Zhang Qingyuan sat cross-legged on the ground, practicing the Yin-Yang Limitless Art.
Having read so many scriptures from the Taiyin Dao Palace, his understanding of profound yin had grown deeper and deeper, throwing his Yin-Yang Limitless Art badly out of balance.
The two strands of True Qi entwined in his meridians had originally been equally thick. Now, the black Profound Yin True Qi was clearly two sizes thicker than the white Pure Yang True Qi.
If the Pure Yang True Qi had a mind of its own, it would surely have asked the other strand what fertilizer it had been eating to grow so vigorously.
"Whew..."
He exhaled a breath of stale air, opened his eyes, and said with a smile, "No need. I slept for a good part of the day. I'm not sleepy at all right now."
Li Qiuran paced in front of Zhang Qingyuan, worry showing on her face.
"I can't sleep either. I keep having this feeling that tonight might not be peaceful."
As the days passed, Li Qiuran only grew more worried.
Zhang Qingyuan reassured her, "It's fine. If soldiers come, we'll send a general; if a flood comes, we'll dam it with earth. You might think I'm bragging, but I still have to tell you.
"Back at the Taiyin Dao Palace, studying all those Daoist scriptures deepened my understanding of martial arts by a whole level. I also supplemented the internal cultivation method I practice. Now, under heaven, I'm invincible below Grandmaster, and above Grandmaster, I can trade my life for theirs."
He even winked after saying it.
Li Qiuran was a little surprised. She knew Zhang Qingyuan was usually glib, but he wasn't the sort to brag without bounds.
She couldn't help feeling a pang of bitterness.
She had practiced the Heavenly Yin Mysterious Maiden Art for over a decade, while Zhang Qingyuan had only been practicing martial arts for three and a half years.
In three and a half years, he had become stronger than she had after over a decade...
Was she feeling inferior?
Zhang Qingyuan saw what was weighing on her and hurried to reassure her. "Don't envy me. After all, I'm a Daoist genius seen only once in a century. Even Daoist Master Bright Heart of the Taiyin Dao Palace praised my talent as nearly matching Patriarch Pure Yang's back in his day."
"Pah."
Sure enough, it worked.
Seeing Zhang Qingyuan shamelessly compare himself to Patriarch Pure Yang, she couldn't help spitting in disdain.
Zhang Qingyuan pursed his lips. Sure enough, nobody wanted to believe the truth.
He suddenly stood, walked over to Li Qiuran, and said quietly, "Once I've helped you get your revenge and finished dealing with things in Kaifeng, how about coming to Taihang Mountain with me?"
His warm breath brushed Li Qiuran's ear and stirred against her neck, sending a tingling sensation through her whole body.
He was too close.
The young woman's heartbeat instantly quickened.
"To Taihang Mountain?"
Li Qiuran suddenly remembered that Zhang Qingyuan was currently being mistaken for the murderer who had wiped out Cloud Dust Manor. Come to think of it, that had started because of her too.
But with Zhang Qingyuan leaning so close and speaking so casually, she turned her face aside like a bashful girl and said, "I'm not going."
What's wrong with me?
Why am I acting like this?
She had never behaved this way before. She shot Zhang Qingyuan a fierce glare, then turned away and tried hard to calm herself.
Zhang Qingyuan chuckled. By testing the waters now and then with more intimate gestures, he could clearly sense how the young woman felt about him.
But he couldn't just start by wrapping an arm around her waist and kissing her. Testing the waters meant gradually going further, each gesture a little bolder than the last.
If she didn't refuse, that meant their relationship was drawing closer bit by bit. If a particular gesture upset her, he needed to slow down rather than rush.
Of course, this only applied to Li Qiuran. He was talking about romantic feelings.
Online hookups didn't require this. After some malatang, they could go straight to a hotel room.
Just then, a sudden burst of laughter shattered the lovely moment and interrupted Zhang Qingyuan's hand, which had already reached Li Qiuran's fingers and was just about to take her little hand.
"Hahaha... kekeke..."
The laughter seemed to have reverb added to it, coming from every direction so that its source was impossible to pinpoint.
Li Qiuran felt that tingling sensation vanish instantly, and she became the aloof Bamboo Green Fairy once more.
Zhang Qingyuan hastily withdrew his hand too, as though he'd been caught cheating...
Fuck, I'm pursuing a perfectly legitimate relationship. What the hell am I nervous about!
An unbidden fire rose in his heart. I was just about to hold her hand, damn it!
Having his rhythm broken at such a crucial moment felt terrible.
"Wait down here."
As he spoke, he leaped onto the roof and stood on its gable, surveying the surroundings.
There was a tower in the courtyard across from the Tang Household. Over twenty people stood on its roof, more than a dozen wearing fitted black outfits patterned with dragons, and several others wearing black robes.
The laughter was coming from the shortest of the black-robed figures.
A sonic technique!
The sound kept drilling into his ears, trying to reach straight into his mind.
The Yin-Yang Limitless Art circulated rapidly, and True Qi protected his heart meridians, leaving him feeling only irritated.
Zhang Qingyuan didn't know any sonic techniques, but he knew another way to project his voice.
The simplest was to channel True Qi into his throat while speaking.
He silently recited, Venerable Three Pure Ones above, today your disciple must utter foul language, solely because someone has gone too far.
Seeing that Zhang Qingyuan hadn't taken his sword, Li Qiuran picked up the Questioning Heart Sword from the ground and tossed it to him.
"Hahaha... hahaha..."
The harsh, grating laughter continued. Zhang Qingyuan drew a deep breath and shouted at the black-robed figure, "Laugh at your mother's cunt! Laugh at your mother's cunt! Laugh at your mother's cunt..."
Empowered by True Qi, his voice rang out like a Buddhist chant, waves of sound rushing straight toward the black-robed figure.
"Pfft..."
Down on the ground, Li Qiuran was tickled into laughter by Zhang Qingyuan's actions. He was actually hurling abuse.
Pah.
What a filthy mouth.
Once Zhang Qingyuan's counterattack reached them, the other side abruptly fell silent.
Everyone looked at the black-robed figure, momentarily dumbfounded.
Is he the villain, or am I?
Why does it feel like he's the villain? What righteous person starts swearing the moment he opens his mouth, and so filthily too?
Never mind righteous people-even people of the Evil Dao didn't open their mouths and immediately say "your mother's cunt."
Seeing the other side stop, Zhang Qingyuan stopped too.
Why wouldn't he curse someone who interrupted him while he was wooing a girl?
He might be a civilized man, but civility depended on whom he was dealing with.
When he used to watch television, even when a villain killed the protagonist's entire family and tortured the protagonist with exceptionally cruel methods, the protagonist would at most call them a bastard or say something like, "I'll definitely kill you"...
Did that sort of cursing vent any anger?
Not in the slightest.
If you were going to curse, use the filthiest curses.
If you were going to fight, fight the toughest fights.
Seeing no further movement from the other side, Zhang Qingyuan rested the Questioning Heart Sword on his shoulder, raised his chin toward them, and said, "What the fuck are you laughing about instead of sleeping in the middle of the night!"
The short man in black was stumped by Zhang Qingyuan's question. In the past, when he went to kill people, his sonic attack would already have scared them out of their wits.
Then he could brutally kill his opponents while letting out strange, cackling laughter.
It had always been like that, without exception.
Today, suddenly finding that the initiative was no longer in his hands, the short man in black was indeed a little lost.
It was all because Zhang Qingyuan had started swearing.
The child-sized figure in black cleared his throat. His usual lines clearly wouldn't work anymore, and all his companions were watching. He hurriedly replied, "Y-you are Zhang Qingyuan?"
"What do you want with your daddy?" Zhang Qingyuan still held his head high and chest out, brimming with imposing confidence.
"I..." The black-robed man choked. In all his years roaming the martial world, he had never met anyone who answered like that.
Perhaps it was his companions' first time seeing him at a loss too. The tall man beside him snickered and poked him, reminding him, "Answer him. Your daddy's asking you a question. Kuku-pfft... haha."
The black-robed man instantly felt awkward and gritted his teeth. In his forty-odd years, this was the first time he had suffered such humiliation.
His embarrassment instantly turned to rage.
He raised his head and roared at Zhang Qingyuan, "You brat! You've gone too far!"
"Fuck your mother."
You fucking interrupted me just as I was about to hold her little hand. Who's gone too far here?
Burning with anger, he now had to include someone's mother in every sentence. Without that, he couldn't vent his anger.
"Urgh..." The short man in black nearly suffered internal injuries from holding it in.
"Zhang Qingyuan, today, I'll make you die a horrible death!"
Zhang Qingyuan provocatively extended his hand and crooked a finger at them.
He shouted, "Come get me!"