A Choice

Tired. Just let the world burn. Right now, Xu Yuan only wanted to stand up, walk over, and give this brat a thrashing. I can't beat the old bastard, but you think I can't beat a little runt like you? The entire matter was honestly simple. If Feng Xianru would just swallow his pride and talk to her, with that little girl's innocent nature, she most likely wouldn't hold a grudge. And even if he couldn't bring himself to drop his dignity, dropping a subtle hint that this place was a secret ancestral hall of legacy rather than some illusion array would have been enough for Feng Fangming to gradually piece things together afterward. With that foundation laid, even if he kept wearing a cold face and acting like a grandstander in the future, she would still know he was merely cold on the outside and warm on the inside. Throwing in an occasional inadvertent act of kindness amid his aloofness would practically seal the deal for this childhood romance. Yet this kid truly wasn't leaving himself a shred of leeway. If he carried on like this, he probably wouldn't know the meaning of true pain until after she ran off with someone else. Xu Yuan was just about to get up and take action, but after a second thought, he let it go. Because it was useless. If getting beaten could reshape a person's character, Xu Yuan would have attained living Buddhahood under Xu Changge's fists long ago. Picking up a skewer of sizzling snake meat, Xu Yuan blew gently on it, took a bite, and chewed slowly before replying in a measured, quiet voice: "How you choose to handle the matters my maternal uncle arranged for you is none of my concern, nor is it my place to meddle." Hearing this, Feng Xianru's expression eased slightly, while the little girl's face beside him grew increasingly tense. To her, the appearance of the Eldest Young Master had undoubtedly been a ray of light piercing into her world. Yet now, that light was about to vanish, just like the warmth that had once shone from her former friends in Qifeng Hall. *Then again, that's only natural...* Feng Fangming's eyelids lowered slightly. There was truly no reason for the Eldest Young Master to offend the Young Master on behalf of someone like her. As the thought crossed her mind, a sigh sounded beside her, followed by the Eldest Young Master's voice once more: "Although your initial intentions aren't evil, I did give this girl my word, and a promise cannot become a shackle." At this, Xu Yuan gave the youth in white a pointed look. "So I will give this girl a medallion. If you pull this again in the future and she runs away, don't you dare regret it." With that, he casually tossed the iron skewer into the campfire, retrieved a Prime Minister's Manor medallion under Feng Fangming's wide eyes, and handed it to her. Afterward, Xu Yuan gave a dismissive wave of his hand, turned around, and walked unhurriedly into the mist-shrouded mountain forest. The hints in his words were practically explicit declarations. He had done all he could; if Feng Xianru remained utterly stubborn and obtuse, Xu Yuan could only respect another's fate and abandon his savior complex. As Xu Yuan departed, Bai Muxi glanced at the dazed boy and girl, sighed with a shake of her head, and vanished from the spot in a flash. Ran Qingmo scrutinized the two with clear eyes, seemingly noticing something. She parted her lips as if to speak, but after glancing toward the depths of the forest, she simply offered a polite "Excuse me" before getting up and leaving. With the three of them gone, only the two remained in the clearing by the campfire. The air was so quiet a falling pin could be heard. A trace of embarrassment broke through Feng Xianru's aloof expression. Clutching the medallion Xu Yuan had given her, Feng Fangming gathered her courage and asked in a timid whisper: "Young Master, what the Eldest Young Master said about regretting..." Midway through her question, she noticed the Young Master's ears were flushed red—she couldn't tell if it was just from the firelight. The next instant, however, her thoughts were cut short by Feng Xianru's reprimand: "Shut up. The Eldest Young Master has already agreed to let you continue breaking the array. Instead of wasting time with nonsense here, get over there and—*cough*—help me break the array." "..." Feng Fangming shrank her neck, stole a glance in the direction Xu Yuan had left, and squeezed the medallion in her hand even tighter. Under the white-robed youth's gaze, however, she slowly pushed herself up from the ground and walked toward the cave with lowered head. Biting her lower lip, she quietly drew her dagger, preparing to activate the array with her blood. But out of the corner of her eye, she caught sight of a beam of bloody light shooting past from behind, striking straight into the formation! "..." Turning her head in confusion, she saw Feng Xianru methodically dabbing medicinal powder onto a fresh, bleeding cut on his hand. Without looking at her, his voice remained frosty: "Even though the Eldest Young Master gave you his word, you'd better not push your luck. But you can rest assured that in the future, I will mind my boundaries. S-So..." At that point, his words suddenly stumbled. Pausing for a few breaths, he blustered fiercely to mask his weakness: "So in short, don't you dare go running off to the Imperial Capital to trouble him!" "..." "..." Having eavesdropped on the young pair's conversation from hiding in the forest, Xu Yuan struggled to suppress his laughter. *What an aloof, stubborn tsundere.* Seeing Feng Xianru act this way, however, he suddenly became curious about how Xu Changge and the Young Celestial Master interacted. Their journey west toward the Great Desert happened to pass right through his sister-in-law's territory; if an opportunity arose along the way, he could drop by for a visit. Stuck with a posturing edgelord like Xu Changge—Grandstander Unit 02—while being forced to keep their relationship hidden from outsiders, his sister-in-law's pent-up resentment was probably enough to kill someone by now. This was the perfect chance to dig up some juicy gossip about Xu Changge, and once he returned to the capital, rub it right in his face. With a soft chuckle, the three vanished into the depths of the mountain forest, leaving their deeds behind unsung. *** Having retrieved the ancient treasure medallion, Xu Yuan and the two women headed to their carriage's hiding spot and set off directly toward the Western Desert. Once they left the metropolitan region surrounding the capital, the journey—which had been so dull it made Xu Yuan question his will to live—suddenly took on far more color. The territories, as it turned out, were far from peaceful. When taking shortcuts along back roads, across a stretch of barely a hundred li, the carriage came upon more than a dozen merchant convoys whose corpses had been left to rot in the wilderness. They even experienced several highway robberies firsthand, with the strongest bandit leader possessing a cultivation at the Soul Condensation realm. Vast expanses of abandoned, fertile farmland were overgrown with weeds. Passing the gates of small towns, one could see crowded refugee camps, and the notice boards before the gates were plastered with bounties recruiting wanderers and errant cultivators to exterminate demons and beasts. The rewards offered were generally not high, but they were likely silver pooled together by villagers scraping together whatever they could. A single glance revealed a landscape steeped in devastation. The festering underbelly of Great Yan was put on full display in these lands. At the Big Ice Block's suggestion, the three deviated from the official highway, doing their best to travel along trouble-ridden back roads to eliminate threats for the common folk as they went. Twenty days flew by in the blink of an eye. Although the trio encountered no formidable foes, they were still left mentally exhausted. All because of several frustrating, conflicting dilemmas. Some highway bandits were chivalrous rogues. They only took wealth without taking lives, maintained local order, helped the people slay beasts, and distributed every bit of stolen grain and silver to the destitute. If they were wiped out, no one would manage the demonic plagues across the entire region, and other, crueler bandit gangs would crop up. When a crowd of commoners knelt around you, pleading on their behalf, in a situation like that, would you kill them or spare them? Only when the carriage crossed into Daying Province, where the Celestial Master Manor resided, did the disasters and human suffering that plagued nearly every corner begin to ease slightly. And as they ventured deeper into the direct jurisdiction of the provincial seat, the entire land gradually regained the prosperous, peaceful aura of the capital region. Evidently, the Celestial Master Manor guarded this land with all its heart and might, just as described in *Cangyuan*. Yet, due to their limited resources at present, they could only extend their protection as far as the provincial seat's surrounding territories. After entering the bustling Kaiyuan Prefecture, Xu Yuan took the two women around to feast, drink, and make merry for several days to lift their dampened spirits, all while staying true to his original mission: finding a way to get in touch with his dear sister-in-law and unearth some gossip about Xu Changge. Unfortunately, without revealing his identity, there was simply no way he could get anywhere near a figure of the Young Celestial Master's standing. He figured he could only wait and see if an opportunity presented itself on their return trip. With that settled, a choice lay right before Xu Yuan. Should he head first to collect the Feng family cache left by his maternal grandfather, or go to Dragon Burial Valley to retrieve the Dragon Transformation Essence from the Dragon Maiden's younger brother? Though both lay near the Great Desert, the latter was situated right against the border between Great Yan and Dachao.