“Yes, I’ve met them, many of them,” Ruyi said with a half-smile. “To avoid delaying your cultivation, let’s switch people when we get back. Zhuzui would be quite suitable for you.”

Shen Qiyuan frowned: “How can you tell?”

Ruyi was too lazy to answer. Seeing a village ahead in the distance, she stretched lazily and walked over: “It’s time for the midday meal.”

He fell silent and entered the village with her, finding a farming household to buy food from.

Even simple fare was delicious. Ruyi ate with great relish, but Shen Qiyuan didn’t touch his food.

She glanced at him: “Fasting?”

“Is it that Wei Zijue you mentioned today?” he said. “I can’t see through his spiritual consciousness.”

Since the man had no spiritual consciousness at all, naturally, it couldn’t be seen through.

She swallowed her rice: “I won’t accompany you this afternoon, sir. Please slowly accumulate merit by yourself.”

Shen Qiyuan pressed down her chopsticks, his dark pupils full of confusion: “You want me to travel alone?”

“Everyone in this world travels alone,” she snorted. “Born alone, die alone. Why should you be special?”

He lowered his eyes, his long lashes trembling slightly, but he still restrained himself and slowly, bit by bit, released his grip.

“Alright,” he answered.

Ruyi’s eyelid twitched.

Good heavens, she still thought this person seemed somewhat innocent and pitiful. He remembered nothing, yet was bearing her anger for no reason.

“Eat,” she softened her tone a bit.

Shen Qiyuan picked up his bowl and was just about to open his mouth when his brow furrowed: “Something’s wrong.”

“What?”

“Spit it out quickly!” He frantically patted her back. “There’s something wrong with this food!”

Being patted so hard it hurt, Ruyi was about to dodge when she saw the tables and chairs before them transform into a mass of black mist. The bowls and dishes on the table shook and shattered, and the delicious food inside turned into rotting human flesh.

Shen Qiyuan’s face changed drastically as he pulled her out of the grass hut.

The farm woman who had served them earlier walked over with a smile, asking: “What’s wrong?”

Shen Qiyuan drew his sword and, without a word, slashed toward her. Who would have thought this farm woman’s reaction was extremely quick – she dodged to the side, laughed with a cackling sound, and leaped onto the roof, revealing three fluffy tails.

“It’s a demon from Qingqiu,” he pressed his lips together. “This isn’t good.”

Qingqiu demons had powerful magic. If it were before, he definitely wouldn’t fear them, but now his injuries hadn’t healed and there was someone behind him who couldn’t use divine power. It would probably be very difficult to escape unscathed.

Demonic winds arose all around. Ruyi instinctively stood at Shen Qiyuan’s left side.

When she realized what she’d done, she cursed herself silently. What kind of habit was carved into her bones? She wasn’t even a god cultivator anymore – was she still going to fight alongside him?

That’s what she said, but when the long fox tail swept over, Ruyi still instinctively coordinated with him. The two leaped onto the fox’s tail from left and right – one attacking the demon’s body, the other seizing the opportunity to find its vital point.

Thick demonic energy filled the entire farmyard. Even with another strain of demonic energy mixed in, Shen Qiyuan wouldn’t find it strange.

“Attack three inches from its back to the tail root,” Ruyi found the vital point.

Shen Qiyuan immediately moved, dodging the fox demon’s tail and moving left and right to approach its back.

The fox demon unleashed a sharp purple strike. Ruyi flew up to block it for Shen Qiyuan, and he immediately sacrificed his demon-slaying sword, thrusting it fiercely into the tail root.

Their familiar positioning was off by not even an inch. When she turned back, she could still see Shen Qiyuan’s knife-sharp profile perfectly.

Ruyi had originally wanted to focus on offensive techniques, but since Shen Qiyuan was more skilled in this area, she changed to focus on defense so she could travel with him. Over these thousand years, they had indeed completed many tasks that other god cultivators couldn’t complete.

Unfortunately, now if she wanted to block attacks for him, she could only use demon arts.

Imperceptibly dispersing the demonic energy from her body, Ruyi turned back to see the giant fox demon crash down from the rooftop.

“How are you?” Sheathing his long sword, Shen Qiyuan looked at her with a frown. “That rotting flesh earlier might have damaged your meridians.”

Ruyi paused, then simply went along with it and sat down on the ground: “Yes, it hurts.”

Shen Qiyuan was somewhat anxious and bent down to pick her up: “I’ll take you to find Song Zhenshan. He has medicine.”

This person’s embrace still made her feel secure. Ruyi wanted to struggle, but her will wasn’t very firm.

Forget it, she thought. Since Shen Qiyuan temporarily didn’t remember those things, she could also be magnanimous and temporarily not give him the cold shoulder.

However, seeing how nervous he was about her, did he have no personal feelings for her whatsoever?

The distance from the eastern suburb village to Lin’an City wasn’t as far as from Skeleton Tower to Qidou Mountain, but carrying such a heavy person while walking was still very tiring. Shen Qiyuan still had injuries on his arm, and all the way there, sweat streamed down the sides of his face.

“I can walk by myself,” she lifted her eyelids.

He ignored her and stubbornly held her tight, stepping over stream stones and onto forest paths. Heat steamed from his body – even though the wind was bone-piercingly cold, his embrace was like a steamer.

Ruyi’s anger inexplicably diminished considerably.

This time, even when they reached the city gate, he didn’t let her go. The two of them got into the same carriage under everyone’s watchful eyes.

“You’re finished,” Ruyi shook her head with clicking sounds. “By human customs, this counts as ruining my reputation. You’d have to marry me.”

The person across from her was slightly stunned and indeed frowned: “Why should you and I follow human customs?”

Ruyi teased him: “What if I insist on following them, and if I don’t marry you, I’ll have to marry someone else?”

Shen Qiyuan pressed his lips tightly together, dark currents surging in his ink-black pupils.

Ruyi hadn’t expected to hear an answer – she was used to it after all these years and was just amusing herself.

However, when the carriage stopped in front of the Immortal Meeting Restaurant, he spoke.

“If you really must marry someone,” he said, lifting the carriage curtain and looking down at her with his head lowered, answering seriously—

“Then it would be better to marry me.”

Ruyi’s casual pupils suddenly contracted slightly.

The carriage drove away from before her, her skirt fluttering up, then swaying back to its original position.

He thought marrying her would be more convenient for traveling together, right?

After a long while, Ruyi narrowed her eyes in thought. It must be so. Given Shen Qiyuan’s way of thinking, since two people were going to be together anyway, it didn’t matter whether they married or not. He didn’t know what romantic love was, so it wasn’t the meaning ordinary people would understand.

Taking a long breath, she raised her hand and fanned the heat from her face.

Suddenly, a small head poked out beside her.

“Boss,” Little Heye said in a soft voice, “you look somewhat spring-like.”

Ruyi:?

She narrowed her eyes and looked down, pinching Heye’s little cheeks: “Where did you learn such words?”

Heye’s cheeks were squished flat as she innocently pointed behind her: “The accountant taught me. I just learned to write these characters with him.”

Ruyi turned back to see Zhao Yanning silently raising his account book to cover his face.

“Learning from him would corrupt a good seedling, wouldn’t it?” she said irritably. “I’ll find you another teacher.”

“Lord Shen?” Little Heye’s eyes lit up.