Keeping Her Majesty in Hand: Fortune Comes to the Snake-People Tribe

"Are you really curious?" Lu Yuan stopped and leaned close to Yun Yun, meeting her eyes at close range.

Yun Yun's breath caught. She instinctively wanted to avoid his scorching gaze, but remembering that her cultivation had recovered, she raised her head and straightened her chest. "Yes, I'm curious."

"I can tell you." Lu Yuan brought his face even closer, until he and Yun Yun could feel each other's breath. "But I have one condition."

"What condition?" Yun Yun's hand instinctively tightened beneath her sleeve.

"Fulfill your duties as my Dao companion," Lu Yuan answered.

"What?" Yun Yun didn't understand at first.

But when she saw the faint smile in Lu Yuan's eyes, heat gradually rose through her body. "You-don't even dream of it!"

"Don't dream of what?" Lu Yuan reached out and seized Yun Yun's wrist. "Yun'er, I saved your life. Shouldn't you pledge yourself to me? Besides, you have no secrets from me. Are you going to toy with me and cast me aside?"

Lu Yuan was clearly asking her to acknowledge their relationship, catching Yun Yun off guard.

She still hadn't decided how to handle the relationship between them.

No, she had no intention of rejecting their relationship as Dao companions.

It was just that Lu Yuan was too young, and she hadn't decided how to announce it to the world.

As for the duties Lu Yuan had mentioned, she was even less prepared for those.

"I-I'm not ready yet. We'll talk about it later!" Yun Yun didn't dare ask any more questions. She wrenched her hand free of Lu Yuan's grasp and used a movement Dou Technique to leave.

"The mighty Misty Cloud Sect Master doesn't have a shred of courage." Lu Yuan shook his head lightly.

In her pupil world, Queen Medusa agreed with his assessment and spoke with disdain. "Useless."

"Your Majesty is right." A voice suddenly sounded beside her, making Queen Medusa open her eyes.

At some point, Lu Yuan had appeared before the shed skin of her Purple Nether Flame Snake.

"You knew I was awake?" Queen Medusa asked. Inside the shed skin, her true body was transforming into a Seven-Colored Heaven Swallowing Python.

"Your Majesty, this is my territory." Lu Yuan swept his gaze around and spread his hands. "Your companion snake soul also made a contract with me, so naturally, your condition can't be hidden from me."

"I wasn't trying to hide it," Queen Medusa said. "I merely thought it was better to avoid trouble and quietly finish healing in this world."

"Whatever you say, Your Majesty." Lu Yuan looked perfectly willing to agree.

But his words made Queen Medusa very uncomfortable.

He made it sound as though she were lying. She disdained lying.

"Lu Yuan," Queen Medusa said again, "since you're here, I'll ask you directly. What's the story behind that Seven-Colored Heaven Swallowing Python snake soul of yours?"

If she hadn't been able to sense the Seven-Colored Heaven Swallowing Python snake soul in her newborn body, she would have thought Lu Yuan had used his Purifying Lotus Triple Flower Pupils to steal her companion snake soul.

"That." Lu Yuan certainly couldn't tell the truth, so he brought out the same story he had told Yun Yun. "It has to do with an inheritance I received. I can't tell its grade, but it's definitely no lower than Dou Zun. I even suspect it might have something to do with a Dou Sheng."

"As long as I come into contact with and dual cultivate with a female cultivator of great talent and strength, I can obtain part of the inheritance."

"All the talent and strength I have now are related to these inheritances."

"I probably got the Seven-Colored Heaven Swallowing Python snake soul because I came into contact with you, Your Majesty, a newly transformed Seven-Colored Heaven Swallowing Python."

"To think you had such fortune, receiving the inheritance of a top expert." Envy flashed in Queen Medusa's eyes.

She was the mighty queen of the Snake-People Tribe, bearing the burden of her entire tribe and supported by all of them. Yet even to have a chance at breaking through to Dou Zong, she had to rely on luck to find a Heavenly Flame and stake her life against it.

Lu Yuan, meanwhile, had received an inheritance and had a broad future ahead of him.

"I wouldn't call it fortune. The inheritance was about to dissipate. The senior who left it said I was talented and suited to his inheritance. He also said he had an unfulfilled wish and hoped I would help him realize it in the future. That's why he chose me." Lu Yuan spun a tale.

But his words instead did much to calm Queen Medusa's feelings.

Talent really was unreasonable. She herself had been born into the queen's bloodline, different from the rest of her people.

She, Queen Medusa, would never blame heaven and others. She would rely on her own efforts to contend with heaven.

Just then, Lu Yuan rubbed his hands together. "Your Majesty, you helped me save someone, and I helped you avoid facing the lightning tribulation while gravely injured. That was a fair trade."

"But from now on, you'll be staying in my pupil world and borrowing its power to heal. I think that should save you half a year's work. Don't you think you should pay a little rent?"

In short, Lu Yuan wanted compensation.

Queen Medusa's snake pupils widened, and a flicker of astonishment crossed them.

Then she let out a string of seductive laughter. "You want to talk to me about rent?"

"Yes," Lu Yuan answered decisively.

"Fine." Queen Medusa didn't argue and asked directly, "What do you want?"

"How generous, Your Majesty." Lu Yuan smiled. "That Green Lotus Core Flame doesn't seem to be of any use to you anymore. You don't mind if I take it, do you?"

"What an enormous appetite," Queen Medusa snorted. "You know how valuable Heavenly Flames are. If I offered it in a trade, even a seventh- or eighth-tier alchemist would be tempted."

"That's true, but given your identity, Your Majesty, not only would you be unable to stop an expert like that from forcibly taking the Heavenly Flame, you might even be made into a maid yourself. Don't you agree?" Lu Yuan replied calmly.

No matter how formidable Queen Medusa was, she was only a Dou Zong at present.

If she sought out a seventh- or even eighth-tier alchemist to trade with, they would most likely choose to take both the Heavenly Flame and the woman.

"That's no reason for you to simply take it." Queen Medusa's purple eyes flashed. "You'll have to offer something in return."

"I know a seventh-tier alchemist." Lu Yuan had already given it thought. "If I give him the Heavenly Flame, I'll ask him to refine medicine for me. I can have him refine a pill for you too. How about it?"

Hearing this, Queen Medusa immediately became interested.

On the Dou Qi Continent, alchemists held esteemed identities and lofty status.

When it came to refining medicine for others, the Dou Qi Continent also had an unspoken rule: anyone seeking a pill had to provide the alchemist with three sets of medicinal ingredients, regardless of what pill they wanted refined.

As long as the alchemist refined one pill for the person seeking it, the remaining two sets of ingredients belonged to the alchemist.

If the person couldn't gather three sets of ingredients in time, they could, with the alchemist's agreement, exchange resources of equal value for the remaining two sets.

That was only the normal price. The higher an alchemist's tier, the more demands and conditions they would have. Three sets of ingredients were merely the most basic payment; at the very least, the person would also owe a favor.

To get a sixth-, seventh-, or eighth-tier alchemist to act, one would have to owe them a favor, serve as their hired muscle, and offer cultivation methods, heavenly treasures, and various other forms of payment before the alchemist would agree to refine medicine once for three sets of ingredients.

For an alchemist at Yao Lao's level, no matter how valuable the things one offered were, if they couldn't tempt him, he wouldn't agree to act.

Yet Lu Yuan was now saying that he knew a seventh-tier alchemist and had even promised to have him refine a pill for her, Medusa, once.

"Agreed!" Queen Medusa accepted. "You can take the Heavenly Flame, and you'll get the seventh-tier alchemist to refine medicine for me once."

"A pleasure doing business." Lu Yuan smiled. "But you'll still have to prepare the three sets of ingredients needed to refine the medicine yourself, Your Majesty."

"Naturally. I know the rules," Queen Medusa agreed.

"Good." Lu Yuan smiled. "I have one final request. The Snake-People Tribe can give me a piece of high-grade Spirit Storage, right?"

Queen Medusa: "..."