That faint, almost imperceptible voice seemed to explode right at his ear. The horns were already the most sensitive part of a dragon’s body, and Long Yin, in over ten thousand years, had never endured such a trial.
Feng Qingyun not only bit and licked them, but also deliberately leaned close to whisper, his breath scattering hot and damp against his body, in a gesture that was sheer torment.
He even blurred his words on purpose, like someone draped loosely in robes that barely covered his body, fabric sliding off his shoulders, yet still feigning innocence and ignorance.
Long Yin truly could not take it anymore, gripping the chin of the person in his arms and kissing him, unable to restrain himself.
The kiss came like a sudden downpour. Feng Qingyun instinctively tried to dodge, but Long Yin held his jaw and demanded lowly: “Say it clearly, what is hard?”
Feng Qingyun didn’t answer, only smiling as he tried to evade. But seeing that smile, Long Yin narrowed his eyes, as if he could read his thoughts like an open book, faintly guessing the truth.
Still, knowing Feng Qingyun would never admit it, he pinched his chin again and pressed another kiss onto his lips.
In the empty jade tower, the sound of lips colliding echoed. Feng Qingyun reached up, seizing the man’s horn like a handle, meaning to make a teasing remark, but after only a few kisses, he suddenly realized something was wrong.
It felt as though he were being crushed completely into the man’s arms. With a muffled whimper, Feng Qingyun hastily released his grip on the horn, only letting his hand rest weakly against it. After a few more breaths, he didn’t even dare touch it anymore, as he could only press his palm against Long Yin’s shoulder instead.
And even as he yielded like this, he was still being kissed until he couldn’t breathe, forced to push weakly at Long Yin’s shoulders.
When Long Yin finally released him, Feng Qingyun could only glare at him through ragged breaths. Yet since he had been the one to bite the horn earlier, he could hardly say anything. Instead, he licked his lips and muttered: “…Just biting your horn once makes you go this crazy. No wonder you’ve always hidden them and never let me touch.”
Long Yin had only just withdrawn his horns when he heard his lover’s complaint. In the end, he couldn’t help but chuckle as he asked, “Why does the Little Palace Master accuse this Lord instead? You never said you wanted to touch them before, wasn’t I afraid you’d think them ugly?”
Feng Qingyun gave him a sidelong glance, speaking as if casually: “Horns that hard… does touching them truly make you feel anything?”
The implication was clear, as he didn’t believe the horns were really that sensitive, suspecting Long Yin was exaggerating. And it wasn’t an unreasonable suspicion. After all, Long Yin had a long history of trickery.
At his words, the Long Yin arched a brow and asked instead: “And when this Lord touched your flowers earlier, what did you feel?”
Feng Qingyun’s breath caught as he turned his head, evasive. “…Whatever I felt,” he answered, “didn’t you still touch me even when I said stop?” Then, his voice turned faintly aggrieved as he continued: “I let you touch hundreds of flowers before, but now I’m not even allowed to touch one horn, and you react like this.”
Clearly, he was about to steer the topic toward how Long Yin had never shown him the horns before, hiding them away. Between the lines, he was confessing how much he liked them, while protesting how many times his own flowers had been touched, yet he had never once been allowed to see Long Yin’s true body.
But he never admitted he liked them. He thought he had concealed it well.
Yet the next words whispered into his ear made his scalp prickle, as if his most secret desire had been laid bare: “Alright, alright, it’s my fault. Since the Little Palace Master likes touching them so much, when we leave this ruin, this Lord would let you grind your flowers against them.”
Feng Qingyun froze, his face instantly burning and scalp tingling, like he’d been caught in his deepest secret. He blurted, flustered: “You! What nonsense are you spouting?!”
“Don’t you like it?” Long Yin’s lips curved, his arm circling his waist as he murmured, exposing him mercilessly. “You like grinding your flowers against hard things. Too soft, you don’t enjoy it. Like my tongue, you dislike it, first because it’s too soft, second because it’s too nimble, and you can’t control it. Fingers are acceptable, but sometimes you complain they aren’t hard enough. Before the horns, your favorite was my…”
He hadn’t even finished when Feng Qingyun’s face turned as crimson as if he were fully on fire. Overcome with shame and outrage, he smacked Long Yin across the face and shoved him aside.
“Utter nonsense!”
Not long ago, even when he had been tormented to tears on the bed, he hadn’t been truly angry, chalking it up to indulging his lover. But now that his most private thoughts had been exposed, it was as if someone had stomped right on his tail. Enraged, he turned his face away, refusing to acknowledge the Demon Lord, and went straight to the nearby table covered with more carved markings.
Long Yin, struck across the face, only smiled more broadly. Knowing when to stop, he followed quietly to Feng Qingyun’s side.
But Feng Qingyun kept his face cold, ignoring him as he lowered his gaze to study the inscriptions on the table. However, language itself was a vast and profound field of study. Even cultivators who had lived for tens of thousands of years, if they hadn’t delved deeply into it, might not know as much as a mortal scholar.
Having lived not even a thousand years across two lifetimes, Feng Qingyun naturally couldn’t understand much. Therefore, he withdrew his gaze from the inscriptions and studied the unusually floating tables instead. Though he said nothing, his brows knit faintly with puzzlement.
Why would a table be suspended in the air?!
Long Yin caught his confusion at a glance and suddenly said, “The people of this world never needed chairs.”
His words sounded strange. Feng Qingyun, setting aside their little spat from moments ago, turned and asked, “What do you mean?”
But Long Yin only said, “…One matter is one matter.” Then, his tone turned faintly menacing as he continued: “Let’s say… In your memory, can you think of an environment where there are floating tables, but no chairs? And no stairs or bridges, either?”
The absence of stairs had already suggested to both of them that the jade city hadn’t been built for mortals. Now, combined with the lack of chairs, Feng Qingyun suddenly realized something.
“…The seabed?!”
Long Yin nodded, glancing out the doorway at the landscape beyond. “Perhaps this isn’t a jade city touching the heavens, but a city built under the sea.”
But what kind of beings would build a city beneath the sea?
Feng Qingyun abruptly looked back at the wave-like patterns carved into the table, and a sudden thought struck him.
“Merfolk…”
Merfolk were said to be a branch of the ancient demon clans. According to legend, they were gentle in nature, their tears turned to pearls, and their hair could be woven into silken gauze. Even today, a single piece of what was rumored to be merfolk silk could fetch a staggering price on the black market.
But in the past ten thousand years, no one had ever seen a true merfolk. Their entire race seemed to have vanished without a trace, as if extinct.
Unlike the heavenly fox clan, whose demise was confirmed during the ancient war, no ruins ever bore signs of merfolk. It was as though they had only ever existed in legend, disappearing quietly from history. But if one thought about it another way, most tales of merfolk had come from mortal settlements on land. And aside from the Northern Sea, no other expanse of water in the realm had ever held even a rumor of them.
As for the Northern Sea, that was where the Kunpeng1 once dwelled. But since the Kunpeng’s disappearance, that sea had become a forbidden abyss. No merfolk could possibly live there now.
So, how had the stories of merfolk been passed down?
By now, an answer was almost obvious: merfolk were not natives of this world at all, and the legends about them were likely the result of contact with another realm.
Perhaps once, merfolk from outside had crossed over, traded their woven silk, and then returned. But when the realm was later sealed off, they could no longer come back. The legends remained, but no ruins were ever left behind.
And those same legends all described merfolk as having human bodies with fish tails, with beauty beyond compare, which suggested that even if they had cultivated to the point of traversing the void, they had deliberately retained their tails, whether as a mark of their species or simply out of habit.
Taken altogether, the possibility of the jade city being one belonging to the merfolk race grew stronger.
After all, they had no legs and lived naturally in the water. Of course, there would be no need for stairs or bridges.
“There truly are worlds beyond this one…” Long Yin murmured, then frowned as he continued: “Your Master may indeed have used the Qilin’s power to shatter the void and step into such a world. But if she had already crossed, why come back? With the Heavenly Dao intact in that other realm, ascension might have been just a single thought away.”
Feng Qingyun shook his head softly, answering: “If she had truly cast aside everything and ascended in that other world, then she would no longer be the Sword Sovereign Zhong Yulan I know.”
It wasn’t strange that she had returned.
But why would she have returned with an entire city belonging to merfolk?!
Furthermore, Ming Jingtai’s divinations had revealed the ruin before it opened, claiming it was the Qilin’s legacy. But aside from Feng Qingyun’s sword resonating with the jade towers, they had seen not a single trace of the Qilin.
So, where was it?
Feng Qingyun brushed his fingers over the inscriptions on the table, lost in thought. Finding no other clues in the jade tower, the two were about to leave when Feng Qingyun suddenly felt a faint pull. He turned sharply, gazing upward toward what seemed to be the second floor.
Of course, there were no stairs. And from what could be seen below, the upper level looked almost identical to the first, with nothing remarkable about it.
Even so, Feng Qingyun kept staring unblinkingly.
Long Yin arched a brow, asking: “What is it?”
“I can’t shake the feeling there’s something up there,” Feng Qingyun answered. “Though perhaps it’s just my imagination.”
“Then let’s take a look.”
Without waiting, Long Yin leapt upward first. When he found no danger, he paused briefly at the sight before him, then raised his hand with a smirk.
“Tsk. Our Little Rose truly is favored by heaven. Even the hidden corners yield their treasures to you.”
At once, Feng Qingyun followed him and saw, upon the empty jade floor, a brocade chest lying open. Scattered around it like spilled silk were pearls, agates, and countless jewels. But what caught the eye most was a round, lustrous white object lying apart from the rest.
Feng Qingyun approached, picked it up, and at once sensed the life-force within. He froze as realization dawned, then turned to Long Yin.
“This seems to be… an egg.”
Long Yin stilled, placing his own hand upon it to confirm. Instantly, he felt it too.
“It is an egg.”
Upon retrieving the chest, they found it filled with even more jewels, along with a jade tablet inscribed with flowing characters that resembled water ripples. Unfortunately, neither of them could read a single word, and yet, as Feng Qingyun traced the lines, he was suddenly struck with a wave of inexplicable sorrow.
The silken gauze scattered on the ground was not much, but when spread open, it could wrap the egg entirely, soft as a drifting cloud. It must have been what cushioned the egg inside the chest, a piece of the famed merfolk silk.
The egg had clearly been treasured, carefully placed within the chest.
But then… where were its parents? Why had they abandoned a lone egg here?
As thoughts spun endlessly in his mind, Feng Qingyun couldn’t help but lift the egg closer to his chest. But he hadn’t even spoken yet when Long Yin instantly read his intentions. His brow twitched as he said, “Little Palace Master, think back to those wolves you tried to raise… This Lord’s advice would be to think twice.”
“Isn’t there still Ruolin?” But Feng Qingyun’s instincts were already flaring, unstoppable. “And you said yourself, those juniors’ paths were influenced by Mu Hanyang. It wasn’t all my fault. Besides, I’ve learned plenty of lessons from past failures. This time I will do better.”
Cradling the egg, he continued, “And besides, it has no father or mother. The merfolk, according to legend, are such fragile spirits. If we abandon it here, how could it possibly survive?”
“Hold on. How do you even know this is a merfolk egg?!” Long Yin cut bluntly. “What if it’s a turtle egg?!” Then, he pressed on mercilessly, “Think about it, just because it’s a merfolk city doesn’t mean there are only merfolk here, right? Even my Demon Palace has skeleton soldiers and beast generals, doesn’t it? And frankly, I’d rather not, though my beloved wife calls me a bastard every day, I don’t actually want a bastard turtle child!”
Feng Qingyun: “…”
His face iced over as he declared firmly: “If you don’t want it, then I’ll just find another father for it.”
Long Yin: “…”
This time around, it was Long Yin’s turn to fall silent. After a long pause, he reached out and brushed the egg with his hand, smoothly changing his stance as he coaxed: “Father said nothing just now.”
At that, Feng Qingyun nearly broke composure, glancing at him with a flicker of laughter in his eyes. Then he lowered his head and sent a thread of spiritual power into the egg. But the energy sank like a stone into the sea, without the slightest reaction.
Long Yin arched a brow and pressed his palm to it, sending in a wisp of demonic Qi.
Still, nothing.
Hesitating briefly, Feng Qingyun then infused it with a breath of his own demonic Qi, not expecting much. However, the next moment, the egg gave the faintest tremor.
Both men froze. The egg shifted in Feng Qingyun’s hands, rolling slightly until it pointed unmistakably northward, almost as if trying to guide them.
Long Yin let out a low laugh.
“Some people have compasses… and you’ve picked up a pointer egg.”
Feng Qingyun: “…”
“…Do you think that sounds good?”
“I never said it had to be its name. But if it truly hatches, then… Like the Polar Star, fixed in its place while all others turn around it2.”Long Yin tapped the shell. “Why not call it Beichen then? Feng Beichen.”
“Too common. Why not have it take your surname and call it Long Beichen…”
Halfway through, Feng Qingyun fell silent.
Long Beichen sounded even more vulgar than Feng Beichen!
So much for the auspicious pairing of dragon and phoenix! Who knew their surnames would make naming an offspring so difficult?!
Unbidden, Feng Qingyun thought of the day his own name was carved into stone the moment he took form, bestowed, as Zhong Yulan had said, by the heavens themselves.
But whoever that immortal who named him had been, he owed them thanks for not giving him a ridiculous name!
Finally, Feng Qingyun decided, “…Beichen, it is. Let it choose its own surname when it hatches. Even taking Ruolin’s surname, Bai, would be better than Feng or Long.”
Then he glanced toward the ornate chest they had set upon the jade table, saying: “We’ll take the chest too. It’s what its parents left for it. If it really does hatch someday, perhaps it could use this box to find its way back home.”
As he spoke, he stroked the egg gently, his words flowing with such natural tenderness. But it was, after all, just an egg. An egg that might never even hatch. But he was already envisioning its entire future.
Long Yin lowered his gaze to him, a strange pang stirring in his chest, leaving behind an indescribable itch. That feeling was hard to define: tenderness and compassion entwined, touching the deepest chords of the heart.
But only Long Yin knew the other side of Feng Qingyun. How the same man had once cleaved the waters of the Yellow Springs with only his sword, how he had stood alone against a collapsing sky. Only he knew that the one who now cradled the fragile egg so gently was also the one who, trembling, had once bared his blossoms and yielded his most hidden beauty.
After Feng Qingyun tucked the chest away, he turned, only to catch Long Yin staring at him. Startled, he didn’t look away. Instead, he met Long Yin’s gaze and, without warning, asked, “Dragons… lay eggs too, don’t they?”
Long Yin paused, puzzled, but still answered, “Of course.”
Feng Qingyun touched the egg again, then whispered, “Then the Dragon God himself… was once nothing more than an egg too?”
At that, Long Yin froze, then realized suddenly: through that random egg they found, Feng Qingyun was trying to glimpse the past he had never known, the years he had never seen.
Just as Long Yin regretted not having been there when his rose was still but a seed, so too did Feng Qingyun mourn the endless years of the dragon God’s life he had not shared.
And in that instant, Long Yin finally realized.
Feng Qingyun favored him.
All those pangs of insecurity, that gnawing jealousy, they dissipated like smoke. And what replaced them was something else entirely: a joy so sharp it shuddered through his soul, a bliss that no physical pleasure could rival.
It left him tingling to his scalp, for once a man knew he was favored, he could act without fear.
“…Maybe,” Long Yin’s throat bobbed, his voice low as he pressed down the trembling delight in his heart. “But does the Little Palace Master… intend to hatch me himself, then coax me into calling you Elder Brother?”
Feng Qingyun flushed at once, exposed, and shot him a glare. Hugging the egg, he turned away in silence, following the direction it pointed. Outside the jade tower, the place was empty. At the doorway, the egg hesitated, turning in a circle as if searching for the right path.
The two stood quietly, waiting.
Long Yin picked up the thread of conversation again.
“In truth, it wouldn’t be impossible. Just as the phoenix is reborn from fire, if a dragon were to start anew, perhaps it too could return to…”
But before he could finish, Feng Qingyun reacted as though struck, spinning in place with eyes ablaze. He seemed inordinately sensitive to words like “reborn” or “begin again.” Meeting those luminous eyes, Long Yin stopped short, then lowered his voice.
“…I misspoke. Little Palace Master, don’t be angry.”
He leaned in to kiss him, but Feng Qingyun shoved his face away with an icy expression. And at that precise moment, by sheer coincidence alone, Mu Hanyang and Lian Ziqing, having cloaked their presence with that strange spiritual pearl, arrived and stumbled upon the scene.
Mu Hanyang’s heart jolted violently in his chest.
The person he had longed for so desperately was right there, holding an egg, lips pressed in a cold line, and clearly displeased. But the next instant, “she” seemed to hear something that made her lose control of her expression. The corners of her lips lifted in a smile, and in that moment her beauty shone like light breaking through the clouds.
Almost immediately, “she” remembered herself and forced her face to turn cold again.
Still, that vivid, unguarded glimpse left Mu Hanyang utterly stunned.
Some people choose to beautify the path they never had the chance to walk. Others, by contrast, in order to justify the path they did choose, will go so far as to slander the road they turned away from.
Mu Hanyang belonged to the latter.
Along the way, he had ceaselessly whispered to himself: How could that possibly be his Miss Yu? If it were truly her, how could she have abandoned me to marry a demonic cultivator?
Perhaps it was nothing more than a mirage, a bubble in an illusion. Or perhaps, it was another demonic cultivator who had peered into his restless heart and taken on her guise to deceive him.
But in this moment, when he saw her bow her head, gently cradling that egg in her hands, Mu Hanyang was struck as if by lightning. All his self-soothing shattered into ash and, in the rubble of his own denial, the truth rang out crystalline and undeniable.
That was Miss Yu.
That was the one he had pined for, body and soul, for centuries.
But before he could savor even a shred of reunion, his eyes caught another figure at her side, familiar.
All too familiar.
The Demon Lord, Long Yin?!
His eyes flew wide, his mind cleaved apart as if by a blade.
Three long heartbeats passed before realization dawned: the demonic cultivator who had shared Miss Yu’s bed last night had been none other than Long Yin himself!
At once, fury surged through him, scalding hot.
And yet, even with the truth brimming before his eyes, Mu Hanyang still clung stubbornly to his blindness. He would rather fester in resentment, convinced that Long Yin had stolen his beloved not once, but twice, than dare to glance in another direction.
For what could be more absurd, more intolerable, than the possibility that the person he had yearned for all these years had been standing before him all along, and that he had failed to recognize them over and over again?!
Such folly could never befall the ever-perfect, ever-righteous Lord Mu!
And so, he convinced himself instead: both of his lovers had been stolen by Long Yin. Old grief and fresh hatred mingled, steeped in poisonous jealousy, until they filled his chest to bursting.
After all, the hatred of having one’s wife stolen was irreconcilable, but to have it happen twice? Mu Hanyang ground his teeth, seething as he remembered that the devil in front of him also happened to harbor designs on Qingyun as well!
Never mind that he himself was grasping at one while coveting another; in his own mind, that was no sin. But if someone else did the same, it was nothing short of betrayal!
But just as his rage boiled over, he heard the Demon Lord chuckle softly.
“I’ve heard,” Long Yin said, “that in mortal families who cannot bear children, they sometimes adopt a girl to ease their loneliness. Though young, if that child is destined for siblings, she may yet bring sons into the house.” Reaching this point, he let the words hang, then added with mock gravity: “If this egg truly hatches one day, and you should bear a fruit of your own… then I suppose this Lord will need to figure out how to keep things fair.”
Such careless talk, yet Miss Yu seemed accustomed to it. Stroking the egg, “she” scoffed coldly: “Even if I did bear fruit, fairness would be my affair. What does it have to do with you?”
“Why not?” Long Yin arched a brow. “Can you say I didn’t serve you well last night? Better than that so-called Senior Brother of yours, who looks proper but is useless where it counts?”
Senior Brother?!
The words struck Mu Hanyang like a bolt. He staggered, his eyes widening as if to burst.
Some obvious truth, one he had long buried, loomed up, undeniable.
Meanwhile, the gentle “maiden” who had never once raised her voice to him flushed scarlet, then snapped in flustered fury: “You! You’re the dignified Demon Lord! Can’t you have a shred of shame, instead of spewing such shameless filth…”
But Long Yin answered at once: “What’s shameless about it? You weren’t saying that when you were biting my horn just now, insisting I let you grind your blossoms against it.”
Feng Qingyun finally exploded, mortified and furious: “Shut up! When did I ever! You… you’re slandering me out of thin air!”
“Struck too close to the truth, and now you bite back?” Long Yin’s lips curled in a smirk. But catching sight of the blaze in those eyes, he deftly changed tack: “Fine, fine. Call me ‘husband,’ and I’ll hold my tongue.”
Feng Qingyun glared at him. At that exact moment, the merfolk egg in his arms shifted, turning to one side. With a snap of his sleeve, he declared, “Say what you like.” And strode off.
Long Yin followed immediately, slipping an arm around his waist and murmuring coaxingly in his ear. Feng Qingyun’s face remained cold, lips pressed shut.
Until Long Yin murmured something more, and Feng Qingyun halted, his steps caught.
From Mu Hanyang’s vantage, and with his cultivation, he could only just catch the Demon Lord’s honeyed murmur, words dripping with enticement:
“…Next time, I’ll let you grind a hundred blossoms on my horns…”
And the very same Feng Qingyun, who had just cried “slander,” froze mid-step. His ears flushed red, his lips pressed tight, and he swept his gaze about, probing the surroundings with his spirit sense.
Only when he was sure no one else was near did he mutter, grudgingly, under his breath:
“…husband.”
- Kun-pengs are a species of mythical magical beasts that originated from China. They are massive beasts that look like hybrids of fish and birds. They tend to have fish-like bodies, but their pectoral fins have been replaced by bird-like wings, their mouths are bird-like beaks, and their caudal fins basically look like fish fins, but placed horizontally, like whale flukes, and look like bird tail feathers. ↩︎
- Confucius said: 為政以德 譬如北辰，居其所，而眾星拱之, – Wéizhèng yǐ dé. Pìrú běichén, jū qí suǒ, ér zhòng xīng gǒng zhī translates to: Governing with virtue is like the Polar Star, which stays in its place and is surrounded by other stars. The joke around the child’s surname is that both Long Beichen (as in Dragon Polar Star) and Feng Beichen (Phoenix Polar Star) sound ridiculous, so it would potentially be better to go with Bai Ruolin’s surname, since Bai Beichen (White Polar Star) sounds slightly more reasonable. ↩︎
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