Faced with Xinyun’s fury, Xuanyuan Lige remained utterly unmoved, saying only flatly, “If you didn’t like it, why did a young lady like yourself throw herself into my arms like that?”

These words from Xuanyuan Lige were no longer merely a joke — said lightly, it was mockery; said more harshly, it was an outright insult!

Ziqing, hiding behind Jun Beiyue watching all this unfold, found herself unconsciously dropping her earlier spectator’s amusement, only now realizing that Xuanyuan Lige had never once been the type to show tenderness or gallantry toward women.

“You!” Xinyun cried out furiously, immediately protesting. “Master Xuanyuan, as a man, I’d ask that you show some respect when you speak. How exactly did I throw myself into your arms!”

“Then why were you standing so close?” Xuanyuan Lige asked again. This man was, quite clearly, deliberately provoking and humiliating a woman — and yet, strangely enough, whether one looked at his calm, cool bearing or listened to his cold, detached voice, none of it felt ungracious at all. It merely radiated a kind of frosty aloofness that kept everyone at arm’s length — and it was precisely this aloofness that made people all the more drawn to get closer to him, to understand him.

If Xinyun could be called a piece of work, then the way Xuanyuan Lige was treating her right now could just as well be called a piece of work of its own!

Faced with such an affected, put-on woman, some principles were simply optional.

Xinyun took a deep, heavy breath, her fists clenched tightly within her long sleeves. If she weren’t so wary of the trouble it would cause, she would have killed this man long ago!

She endured it. She wanted to see, in the end, who would be laughing and who would be crying!

She chose to avoid Xuanyuan Lige entirely, turning instead toward Baili Weisheng. “Master Baili, do you feel the same way?”

To her surprise, Baili Weisheng, hiding behind Xuanyuan Lige, waved his hands frantically. “No, no, no — why would I think that?”

Xinyun’s anger eased somewhat at this. In her understanding of things, a woman could carry a joke too far, but a man was never allowed to — a man needed to maintain his grace, his composure.

Baili Weisheng, worthy descendant of the Jiao clan, truly was a man worth admiring, or so she’d thought. But then, to her surprise, Baili Weisheng’s next words took an entirely different turn. “Honestly, I think a young lady like you isn’t just careless with her own dignity — you’re far too dramatic. Just the other day you were dressing up as a ghost to scare people, and today you’re suddenly this terrified of the dark? Putting on such an act — does your beloved even know?”

Xinyun hadn’t expected this at all — Baili Weisheng’s tone had suddenly turned this sharp, this venomous. Her chest tightened, and for a moment she found herself utterly speechless.

Jun Beiyue and Ziqing watched from a distance behind them. They had never fully trusted this woman to begin with — and even if everything she said turned out to be true, they still had no interest in someone like her, no desire to associate with her, to befriend her.

A woman like this ought to be shown, once and for all, that a man’s grace was never unconditional — it depended entirely on who he was dealing with.

Fury burned within Xinyun’s heart, her phoenix eyes widening in outrage as she glared at Xuanyuan Lige and Baili Weisheng, and yet, for all her anger, she never once made a move — she simply glared furiously at the two men before her!

But neither Baili Weisheng nor Xuanyuan Lige felt the slightest pressure from it. These two were, after all, no ordinary men — heaven only knew how many times they’d each been glared at by women in their lives.

Letting Xinyun stare all she liked, the two of them simply went about their own business, one continuing to observe the shifting patterns of the surrounding seawater, the other sitting there in silence, looking upon the world with utter indifference.

Ignored by both of them, Xinyun instead found herself in an increasingly awkward position — pressing the matter further would only invite more humiliation upon herself, and yet backing down without a word left her no graceful exit either.

In the end, she had no choice but to find her own way out, lowering her head sullenly, adopting a pitiful, wronged expression, and quietly slipping back toward the bow of the boat.

Xuanyuan Lige carried on as though nothing at all had happened, his expression unchanged from beginning to end, while Baili Weisheng, delighted, threw an arm around Xuanyuan Lige’s shoulder like the closest of brothers, laughing. “Little Lili, I had no idea you had such a sharp tongue!”

Xuanyuan Lige said nothing, simply reaching over to grip Baili Weisheng’s wrist and pry his hand away.

The moment that hand was removed, it immediately draped itself back over his shoulder again, the very picture of brotherly camaraderie — though what came out of Baili Weisheng’s mouth was, “Little Lili, you weren’t jealous just now, were you!”

At these words, both Ziqing and Jun Beiyue’s expressions froze, while Xuanyuan Lige remained just as expressionless as ever — but in that very expressionlessness, his elbow suddenly shot backward, driving hard into Baili Weisheng’s chest, the pain leaving him utterly unable to speak another word, unable even to move his hand.

Only then did Xuanyuan Lige, taking his time, with an air of calm elegance, gently pry Baili Weisheng’s hand away.

That blow had genuinely been no light matter — Baili Weisheng took a long moment to recover from the pain, and was just about to say something, when suddenly, the boat, which had been gliding smoothly along parallel to the water’s surface, lurched to a sudden halt!

It was like an abrupt emergency stop, instantly sending Ziqing and the others at the stern pitching forward — and even more disorienting still, after that initial jolt, the bow of the boat suddenly plunged straight down into the deep sea!

Heavens, what was happening? None of them had even had time to collect themselves before the entire canoe tipped perfectly perpendicular to the water’s surface, plunging downward. Though none of them were thrown from the boat, they all found themselves crushed together in a heap!

Xuanyuan Lige slammed hard into Xinyun, Baili Weisheng slammed into Xuanyuan Lige, Jun Beiyue slammed into Baili Weisheng, and Ziqing landed squarely in Jun Beiyue’s arms.

There was no question — Ziqing was, without doubt, the luckiest of them all, while Xinyun was, without doubt, the most unfortunate.

For a moment, everyone was hopelessly dizzy, utterly beyond their own control, and amid the chaos, Baili Weisheng’s voice rang out in alarm, “We’ve left the vortex!”

Amid the confusion, they weren’t merely dizzy — they’d lost all ability to control their own bodies as well, as though weightless, unable to exert any strength at all, only feeling themselves plunging further and further down along with the boat, the darkness deepening the further they fell, until, before long, everything went entirely black before their eyes!

They had no idea how much time passed before everything finally settled back into stillness, and one by one, everyone came back to their senses, finding that they were all still aboard the boat.

And, what’s more, everyone was now upside down — the canoe itself was resting upside down on the ground!

Xinyun was crushed at the very bottom, her face pressed against the boat’s planking, her expression hidden from view. Above her, in order, were Xuanyuan Lige, Baili Weisheng, Jun Beiyue, and Ziqing.

Though crushed together in a heap, everyone found themselves still holding onto one another’s hands, each grip locked tightly, one after another in an unbroken chain.

None of them could quite recall when exactly they’d taken hold of one another’s hands, or whether they had reached out first, or whether the other had reached for them.

None of that mattered anymore, really. What mattered was that, in a moment of crisis, no one had been selfish — everyone had still thought of the person beside them.

Once they’d recovered, Ziqing quickly hopped down, and the others followed suit, scattering apart and naturally releasing one another’s hands.

In the end, only Xinyun remained pinned at the very bottom, her face pressed flat against the boat, her body genuinely looking rather flattened, an image none too pleasant to look at!

Precisely because it was so unpleasant to look at, Ziqing and the others all chose, without a word, to simply look away. At this point, they turned instead to survey their surroundings, taking stock of their environment.

They had, quite clearly, been heading down toward the ocean floor — so how had they ended up in the middle of a forested mountain range instead?

This… where exactly was this?