Who Exactly Falls for Their Own Master, Eldest Senior Brother, or Junior Brothers and Sisters?

Mingzhu nodded. "I see. Then is there anyone you like?"

Jiang Tingxue gave it serious thought, then shook her head.

"No."

Mingzhu looked at her with some disbelief, then glanced at Shen Ji.

"Really? I thought you would like your senior brother. He's so wonderful-good-looking, good-tempered, and so gentle when he speaks."

Jiang Tingxue froze, then glanced sideways at Shen Ji.

Shen Ji had no idea why, but still gave his little junior sister a gentle smile.

Jiang Tingxue turned back to Mingzhu, her tone exaggerated.

"But that's Eldest Senior Brother! The eldest senior brother of our entire sect! How could I like Eldest Senior Brother?"

"Oh," Mingzhu said.

"That's how all the storybooks I read go. Hmm... there are rebellious disciples who fall for their masters, little junior sisters secretly in love with their eldest senior brothers, and senior brothers and junior sisters who grow up as childhood sweethearts and fall for each other."

Jiang Tingxue thought it sounded absurd.

She secretly rolled her eyes.

Who exactly falls for their own master, eldest senior brother, or junior brothers and sisters?

"Those storybooks you read really know how to make things up."

Mingzhu was visibly disappointed. "So you don't actually do that. Some storybooks I've read even claimed they were adapted from the personal experiences of some Dao Lord."

Jiang Tingxue shook her head repeatedly. "Don't listen to that nonsense. Just the part about disciples falling for their masters couldn't possibly be true. No normal person would fall for their own master. That's betraying your master and defying your ancestors."

Mingzhu hadn't expected it to be so serious. She covered her mouth in surprise. "All right, then. It looks like storybooks really are very different from reality."

"Of course."

The two girls, close in age, found more and more to talk about, putting everything else out of their minds.

Until Jiang Tingxue suddenly heard someone calling her.

"Junior Sister Jiang, are you finished chatting? If you are, come to the front courtyard."

Jiang Tingxue looked up and discovered that it was actually Senior Brother Xie calling her. She instantly felt a mountain of pressure.

She immediately stood and ran over.

"S-Senior Brother Xie... is something the matter?"

Xie Lingchuan looked at her and said slowly, "If you aren't discussing anything important, come with me to the front courtyard. He Chongsan's remains are laid out there. Your eldest senior brother is going to estimate that demon's strength from the aura left on the bones. Go watch and learn."

Jiang Tingxue had been a little nervous at being singled out so suddenly, but after hearing Xie Lingchuan's words, she realized that Senior Brother Xie meant well, too, and happily headed to the front courtyard.

In the front courtyard, Shen Ji was crouching beside the remains, collecting the lingering demonic qi.

Xie Lingchuan also felt the bones.

Zhu Lianqing looked at her youngest disciple and said leisurely, "Well? There's no trace of my aura on them, is there? That's why I said this corpse really had nothing to do with me."

Xie Lingchuan neither agreed nor disagreed. He stood and cleaned his hands with a spell.

Jiang Tingxue looked at him curiously. "Senior Brother Xie, how strong is that demon?"

Xie Lingchuan did not answer her.

Still curious, Jiang Tingxue turned to Shen Ji. "Eldest Senior Brother, what did you find?"

Shen Ji withdrew his hand. "The spirit creature He Chongsan encountered didn't have a high cultivation level and should be fairly easy to deal with. But that doesn't rule out the presence of other, more powerful demons deep in the forest. In any case, be careful in everything you do when we go up the mountain tomorrow."

Jiang Tingxue, Song Wensheng, and Yan Qing knew their eldest senior brother was addressing the three of them, and all nodded obediently.

After examining the remains, they returned to the hall. Only once they had some free time did they notice that Master Liu's family truly revered cultivators.

There were no bodhisattvas or Buddha statues enshrined inside. Instead, the room was hung with portraits of cultivators, large and small.

Most of those in the center were prominent figures from the major immortal sects of the Northern Territory and Western Region.

The younger ones could recognize a few by their Daoist titles.

There were the current sect master of the Moon-Gazing Sect, the founding patriarch of Calming Waves Mountain Manor, and, rather unusually, even the sect leader of Seven Splendors Mountain.

They had to identify them by their Daoist titles because the cultivators' appearances in these portraits came from the popular imagination. The painters had never seen the actual people.

As a result, the portraits looked very different from their subjects.

As Zhu Lianqing looked around, she actually spotted herself.

Her portrait depicted a woman performing a sword dance, clad in magnificent skirts, her sashes fluttering, with a spot of cinnabar between her brows.

The lower-left corner bore the name Perfected Lord Nanhua, with a line of small writing beside it-even having known the vastness of heaven and earth, she still cherished the green of grass and trees.

Although Zhu Lianqing herself bore no resemblance whatsoever to that portrait with its bodhisattva's lowered gaze, she thought nothing of it.

Folk portrayals were painted from the common people's beautiful imaginings, after all.

But then Zhu Lianqing shifted her gaze and saw that the Luoyu Sword Sect's third sect leader had been painted as a balding old man.

She nearly failed to hold back a laugh.

Beside her, Jiang Tingxue had clearly spotted her own master's portrait as well, and burst out laughing without the slightest restraint.

She poked Song Wensheng and Yan Qing with a fingertip, beside herself with amusement.

"Quick, look over there!"

Following Jiang Tingxue's pointing finger, the two initially failed to react.

Then they saw their master's Daoist title and their eyes widened-that person in the painting is my master?

Huh?

And so, in an instant, all three were helpless with laughter.

"Master is acknowledged as one of the beautiful masters in our sect! If he saw this portrait, wouldn't he be heartbroken?"

Shen Ji smiled faintly. "Master has always been gentle and generous. This portrait carries the hopes of ordinary people and receives their offerings. Master would probably only say that this, too, is a good thing."

Zhu Lianqing thought Shen Ji was right. Who in the sect didn't know that the third sect leader, Weisheng Yi, was the most easygoing of them all?

Now his eldest disciple had inherited that same easygoing nature.

Zhu Lianqing saw a portrait of the Luoyu Sword Sect's founding patriarch, Perfected One Dongtian, and silently bowed to it.

She genuinely had no idea what this founding patriarch looked like.

After all, even the second sect leader, who had joined eight hundred years before her, had never seen him.

When she joined the Luoyu Sword Sect, she had not taken any of its sect leaders as her master. Instead, she had bowed directly to the founding patriarch's portrait, established a branch of her own, and taken over as peak lord of Evergreen Peak.

As Zhu Lianqing reminisced, a figure moved at the edge of her vision.

She came back to herself and realized that Xie Lingchuan had walked past her to stand beneath her portrait.

Her portrait hung in a corner on the right. Perhaps because its subject had been dead for two years and the owner no longer paid respects to it, it was not as clean as the portraits in the center and had gathered a layer of dust.

Just as Zhu Lianqing was wondering what her disciple intended to do, she actually saw Xie Lingchuan reach out and brush the dust from the portrait.

Zhu Lianqing could not help going still.

After wiping away the dust, Xie Lingchuan remained beneath the portrait rather than leaving.

He still gazed up at the woman dancing with her sword, her skirts flying, his gaze so intent it bordered on reverence.

In that instant, an indescribable feeling suddenly welled up from the depths of Zhu Lianqing's heart.

What exactly did this disciple of hers feel toward her?

He, who had always loved cleanliness, was willing to wipe the dust from her portrait with his own hands and then pay his respects so devoutly, yet he hadn't been willing to let his eyes redden or shed a single tear at her burial?

Could it be that her youngest disciple disliked how wildly she behaved as his master, so at odds with the bearing of a distinguished figure, but now that she hung on a wall, he felt she truly was an expert worthy of admiration?

Zhu Lianqing felt that she had experienced something deeply contradictory through her disciple.

Until she saw Xie Lingchuan do this today, she had always thought he harbored no particular feelings for her as his master.