A powerful suction force dragged the two rapidly downward. Jian Xingzhi caught Qin Wanwan in midair, and they landed on the ground together.

With his spell interrupted midway, Jian Xingzhi had no time to say anything. He quickly sat cross-legged to channel his spiritual power. Qin Wanwan steadied herself and surveyed the surroundings, discovering this was a sealed stone chamber. The floor was smooth, the four sides were square, and the ceiling formed an arch. In the center was a stone platform. On the platform sat a stand, and on the stand rested a sword that gleamed pure white throughout.

Complex formations were carved into the floor, and the walls were covered with paintings—all depicting sword techniques.

This type of structure in the cultivation world was typically a tomb. The paintings in tombs either showed the tomb owner’s life story or their legacy.

Qin Wanwan roughly scanned the sword techniques and began examining the walls. This sealed chamber had no door—completely sealed. Logically there should be some mechanism, but after looking carefully all around, the walls were smooth and flat with no suspicious areas.

After a while, Jian Xingzhi’s voice sounded behind her: “I’m done.”

Qin Wanwan was pulled back by Jian Xingzhi’s voice. She glanced at him coldly and responded indifferently: “Mm.”

Seeing Qin Wanwan’s attitude, Jian Xingzhi inexplicably felt a bit panicked. He had ten thousand questions in his mind but didn’t know how to ask them.

He instinctively felt he’d done something wrong, but thinking about it, nothing was wrong. He picked out what he considered the most critical question from countless questions and explained: “Just now Ning Wenxu really wanted to kill us. No matter how you explained, it would have been useless.”

“How would you know?”

Qin Wanwan couldn’t even be bothered to look at him. Jian Xingzhi nodded stiffly: “A sword cultivator’s killing intent can’t hide from me. Ning Wenxu wanted to kill us.”

“Kill you, or kill us?”

Qin Wanwan turned to look at him, emphasizing: “If what you said is true, just now was a frame-up. They staged all that to kill someone—so tell me, what was their motive?”

“I don’t know.” Jian Xingzhi admitted candidly.

“Think about it. We have no grievances with Ning Wenxu. The only connection we have with him is one thing—you look like Lin Yanzhi. If he really had killing intent, what’s the most likely reason?”

“He… wants to kill someone who looks like Lin Yanzhi?”

Jian Xingzhi thought and responded. Qin Wanwan spread her hands: “Exactly. Lin Yanzhi died at the Ning clan back then, and his death was unclear. If the Ning clan wronged Lin Yanzhi, and one day they encountered someone who looked so much like someone who died a hundred years ago, wanting to kill him would be quite normal. So tell me—they want to kill you because of your face. What does that have to do with me?”

Jian Xingzhi said nothing. Hearing Qin Wanwan draw such a clear line, he gripped his sword tightly and only said: “I came to Desolate City for you.”

“Don’t make it sound so noble,” Qin Wanwan raised her hand to stop him. “You didn’t come for me. You came for yourself—to ascend back to the Immortal Realm.”

“But don’t you need to ascend too?” Jian Xingzhi couldn’t help but retort. “I’m helping you too.”

“Haven’t I been helping you?” Qin Wanwan countered. “If we’re helping each other, we should cooperate. Look at what you’ve done—you drugged me, which gave people leverage against us and got us dragged before Ning Wenxu. This is a trap! The person who set it up knew Ning Wenxu would want to kill you the moment he saw you, so they deliberately designed it to send you there. You dragged me into the pit with you and you still think you did nothing wrong?!”

“But you can’t purely blame me for this!” Being blamed made Jian Xingzhi somewhat frustrated. “You’re holding my Paired Hearts Talisman and won’t return it. I already know you’re the Jishan Female Sovereign—don’t you know I’m uneasy? But you absolutely refused to return it!”

“I know you don’t trust me, but I don’t trust you either!” Qin Wanwan spoke directly. “Think about all the wonderful things you’ve done—you’ve hit me, scolded me, stabbed me, slashed me. What’s wrong with me keeping a Paired Hearts Talisman for self-protection?!”

“That was all for your own good!” Jian Xingzhi quickly argued. “Have I ever hit you without reason? I hit you to improve your cultivation. I scold you to urge you to work hard. I stabbed you…” Jian Xingzhi paused, finally recalling the reason he’d stabbed her back then, “to earn you some backbone!”

“I’m so very grateful to you.”

Hearing this, Qin Wanwan was so angry her chest hurt. She waved her hand and stood up: “Fine, let’s just leave it at that. We’ll go our separate ways. Everyone knows each other’s identity now anyway. You take your sunny path, I’ll cross my single-plank bridge. Goodbye!”

With that, Qin Wanwan randomly picked a direction and started feeling the stones on the wall.

She needed to get out quickly and get away from this idiot.

Hearing her harsh words, Jian Xingzhi stood to the side without moving. He’d never felt this uncomfortable before. After recovering for a moment, he finally spoke in a low voice, reminding her: “Stop looking. This is a sealed stone chamber. Only Divine Transformation stage cultivators and above can open it.”

Divine Transformation stage!

Hearing this, Qin Wanwan’s heart skipped a beat.

They were only at Nascent Soul now. Cultivating to Divine Transformation stage was still far away.

She only had four days now before she had to participate in the finals. Only by going to the finals and becoming Gentleman’s Sword could she find Young Master Wuyou and learn her parents’ whereabouts.

But now she was trapped here, and she could only leave after cultivating to Divine Transformation stage…

By the time she got out, Young Master Wuyou might have died of old age.

But anxiety was useless now. Qin Wanwan steadied her mind and turned around, wanting to swallow her pride and ask Jian Xingzhi if he had any other solutions. But just as she turned, she saw Jian Xingzhi turn his back to her and sit down cross-legged.

Seeing this seemingly rejecting back, the question stuck in Qin Wanwan’s mouth. She bit her teeth and simply sat down with her back to Jian Xingzhi as well.

“38,” Qin Wanwan meditated while asking 38, “Is there any way to leave here?”

“There is!”

38 seemed somewhat excited: “I have a manual here, 1000 points. Do you want it?”

“What is it?”

Hearing there was a way out, Qin Wanwan got excited for a moment. A book instantly appeared in her mind with “Dual Cultivation Manual” written on the cover.

“This makes progress very fast! Combined with the sword techniques in the stone chamber, want to try?”

Qin Wanwan froze, then calmed down.

“You may withdraw.”

“Oh.” 38 was somewhat disappointed, but after thinking, he still reminded her, “If you don’t want to dual cultivate, kissing works too.”

Qin Wanwan said nothing. She understood 38’s meaning. The fastest advancement method in the Immortal Realm was to directly transfer one’s cultivation to another person.

They were both at Nascent Soul. If she transferred her cultivation to Jian Xingzhi, Jian Xingzhi could quickly enter Divine Transformation stage and then take her out.

And during this cultivation transfer process, dual cultivation was optimal, because ordinary spiritual power transmission would encounter rejection when directly entering someone’s body, whereas dual cultivation could deliver the purest spiritual power into the other’s body, and the other person would accept it as their own spiritual power.

If dual cultivation wasn’t possible, at least intimate contact was needed.

At minimum, they could directly transmit cultivation, but that would result in great loss.

But right now she didn’t want to use this method at all.

She felt a strange resistance. Jian Xingzhi didn’t trust her. Even after spending so much time together, his first thought upon learning she was the Jishan Female Sovereign was to get back the Paired Hearts Talisman, thinking she must be a bad person.

But she had long ago thought he was wonderful. No matter what he did, she unconditionally thought he was good.

This inequality made her feel like her trust was one-sided wishful thinking.

Originally she thought she’d just accept it as his personality, but now that things had reached this point, he still wanted to argue with her, not yielding an inch.

She hated him, hated him so much!

She’d rather find her own solution than get close to Jian Xingzhi again, much less have this kind of entanglement with him.

“No way, I absolutely won’t acknowledge him!”

Qin Wanwan rarely lost her temper as she snapped at 38. After speaking, she couldn’t help but turn to glance at Jian Xingzhi.

Jian Xingzhi was meditating with closed eyes, his expression calm and indifferent, as if they hadn’t just had that fight.

She felt a bit upset for a moment. She organized her emotions, not wanting to think about other things. Since there was no other method now, if she had to cultivate to Divine Transformation stage, then she’d cultivate to Divine Transformation stage. If she worked hard, maybe it would be faster. If she couldn’t catch Young Master Wuyou when she got out, there would be other clues.

Qin Wanwan comforted herself, closed her eyes and began meditating. But just as she closed her eyes, she heard Jian Xingzhi speak: “The sword techniques on this stone chamber are excellent. There’s a formation in the chamber that can create a small illusion. After you enter the illusion, you can use this sword technique set to duel with the people inside. One hour outside is one month inside. If you train your sword intent more inside, I’ll break through as quickly as possible.”

Qin Wanwan froze, then heard Jian Xingzhi speak steadily: “I’ll try to get you out within four days.”

“You…” Qin Wanwan hadn’t expected him to say this. Unable to swallow her pride, she spoke stubbornly: “Aren’t you still angry, saying I was wrong? Why care about these things again?”

Jian Xingzhi was silent for a moment, then spoke in a low voice.

“I’m angry at myself.” Jian Xingzhi thought for a moment and added, “I’ve never been angry at you.”

First angry at himself for being moved.

Then angry at himself for doing wrong.

Hearing this, that grievance from before suddenly dissipated quite a bit.

“Aren’t you blaming me for not giving you the Paired Hearts Talisman?” Qin Wanwan spoke with her back to him, feeling this happiness came too easily, and pressed him with difficulty.

“I thought you were the Jishan Female Sovereign and should have extraordinary strength, thinking you had the ability to protect yourself. I also suspected you were hiding things from me, afraid you were deceiving me. It was me who didn’t trust you enough—I shouldn’t blame you.”

Having calmed down, Jian Xingzhi patiently explained to her.

“So do you trust me now?”

Qin Wanwan turned to look at him. Jian Xingzhi paused, then nodded: “Mm.”

“It’s just…”

Jian Xingzhi hesitated, still not understanding: “How can you be so weak?”

That bit of forgiveness just now vanished completely. Qin Wanwan clenched her fist, but for the sake of peaceful cooperation between them, she gritted her teeth and explained: “I was born this way.”

“Born this way? Aren’t you born with an immortal body?”

Jian Xingzhi was stunned. Qin Wanwan pretended to be relaxed: “I am born with an immortal body, but I have no golden core and can’t cultivate. So my parents went everywhere searching for medicine for me. But as you know, the Immortal Realm also bullies the weak. Jishan has ten thousand years of inheritance—if people knew I couldn’t cultivate at all, once my parents left, they’d find all kinds of reasons to divide up our treasures. So my parents bought me the title of the Immortal Realm’s strongest female immortal.”

“Bought… bought it?!”

Jian Xingzhi couldn’t believe this. It exceeded his range of understanding.

Qin Wanwan nodded, candidly admitting: “That’s right. Those uncles and aunties who lost—they were all my parents’ good friends. They were bribed to deliberately lose to me. Once my reputation rose, everyone feared me.”

With that, Qin Wanwan smiled with some bitterness: “I stayed peacefully at Jishan for two hundred years. If not for you, I could have continued living safely. Eating hotpot and singing songs, hunting some wild chickens and catching some fish.”

Jian Xingzhi said nothing. A long time later, Qin Wanwan heard a low voice from behind: “I’m sorry.”

This sudden apology actually made Qin Wanwan somewhat embarrassed.

“It’s nothing,” Qin Wanwan smoothed things over, not wanting Jian Xingzhi to blame himself too much. She spoke carelessly: “Coming to the small world has been pretty good too. I’d never held a sword before—you taught me to. I’d never won a single match before—you let me win. At first I really hated you, but now I think you’re not bad. Now I even know news of my parents. I don’t regret coming here.”

“Back then,” Jian Xingzhi spoke with some difficulty, “I didn’t understand many things. My sect practiced dao through battle. I’d never interacted with ordinary people. I always thought that if I challenged you and you accepted the fight, as cultivators, it was natural. But now I understand I was wrong.”

“It’s not really wrong.”

“I shouldn’t have disturbed your original life trajectory. I shouldn’t have forced you to accept fights. I shouldn’t have stepped on your face. I shouldn’t have forced you to do things you didn’t want to do.”

“When teaching you, there were actually many methods. But I chose the most painful one. I should have treated you better.”

Jian Xingzhi recalled the past, apologizing repeatedly.

Qin Wanwan couldn’t help but laugh: “How did you come to have these insights?”

Jian Xingzhi was silent. After a long while, he spoke softly: “Because I learned what it feels like to be upset, and I understand what heartache is.”

Fighting with her taught him sadness; seeing her injured taught him heartache.

Life’s sorrows, joys, and delights—he learned most of them from her.

Understanding human emotions and worldly affairs, he finally knew where he’d been wrong.

Qin Wanwan froze. This belated apology came candidly, after she’d already let go and forgiven him, yet somehow stirred an indescribable feeling of affection.

Like a seed gently placed in her heart, then watered, taking root and sprouting.

She didn’t dare turn to look at Jian Xingzhi, nor did she speak.

After Jian Xingzhi finished speaking, he also felt somewhat embarrassed and only said: “Let’s not talk about this anymore. Cultivate well.”

With that, he raised his hand wanting to weave an illusion for her.

Knowing he was going to do other things, Qin Wanwan finally gathered courage to slowly turn around, and saw the young man’s back sitting cross-legged.

He sat straight, light gathering at his fingertips as his hands drew talismans in the air, as if starlight had fallen on his fingertips.

Her eyes fell on this person. After gazing for a moment, she smiled gently.

“Jian Xingzhi.”

“What is it?”

“Turn around.”

Hearing this, Jian Xingzhi turned in puzzlement. In that instant, he saw Qin Wanwan suddenly lean forward and press her lips against his.

Jian Xingzhi’s eyes flew wide open. His body went rigid, then he felt spiritual power transmitting from her lips along with sweetness.

He immediately realized what was happening and pushed Qin Wanwan away, looking at her in panic.

Being pushed away, Qin Wanwan froze, then became flustered.

She hadn’t expected Jian Xingzhi to push her away. She could only explain awkwardly: “I just wanted you to reach Divine Transformation stage sooner so we could get out. I didn’t mean…”

“I know.”

Jian Xingzhi knew she misunderstood and quickly interrupted her. He wanted to explain but didn’t know how to start. After holding it in for a long time, he finally just gritted his teeth and said: “Wrong way.”

“Wha…”

Before Qin Wanwan could react, Jian Xingzhi pulled her into his embrace. One hand around her waist, the other pressed against the back of her head, he lowered his head and kissed her.

He clumsily kissed the girl in his arms while continuously sending spiritual power to her.

The fragrance of the Charm Bone Worm emanated from Jian Xingzhi’s body, the scent filling the sealed chamber.

This was his human desire, a pool of spring water in his heart.

And only at this moment did he have the courage to admit that his desire for Qin Wanwan had nothing to do with external factors.

The Charm Bone Worm was just an excuse he used to cover this desire. From beginning to end, he wanted this person.

Becoming master and disciple was not wanting to separate from her;

Keeping the Charm Bone Worm was wanting to go further with her.

He liked her, wanted to touch her—it wasn’t due to any influence. It was just a young man using a pretense to cover what he thought was an indecent desire.

Now Qin Wanwan kissed him to get out, but he wasn’t.

He kissed her because he liked her.

This was the first person he’d liked. He was willing to give her everything.

As Jian Xingzhi kissed her, cultivation flowed continuously through their breath into Qin Wanwan’s body.

Qin Wanwan also took the opportunity to merge her divine sense with his, using Jishan techniques to repair his divine sense.

Bitten lips brought blood, the taste of blood mingling between lips and teeth.

It seemed there were rustling leaves, a gentle breeze—everything tender and intoxicating.

Jian Xingzhi felt that though he hadn’t created an illusion, all this was already like an illusion.

Just in that moment of passion and confusion, there came a thunderous boom. Spiritual energy exploded through the wall, surging powerfully. Jian Xingzhi instinctively protected Qin Wanwan, rolling to the side. Then through the rising dust and smoke, he saw Nanfeng, Cuilu, and Xie Gutang standing together.

Nanfeng’s excited voice rang out: “Master! Daojun Jian! We’ve come to rescue you!”

—

**Author’s Notes:**

[Mini Theater]

Nanfeng: “Master! Daojun Jian! We’ve come to rescue you!”

Jian Xingzhi: “Get lost!! It’s Long Aotian – Chapter 69—do you know how hard this was for me?!”