There wasn’t even a single serving attendant in the palace. At the end of autumn and the beginning of winter, the wind blew in from outside. The young boy, who normally didn’t feel cold or heat, felt for the first time that Taiyan Sect’s gauze robes couldn’t ward off the cold. Otherwise, why would he be shivering so?

After a long while, Mendong knelt with a “clang,” hanging his head and saying quietly, “These past few days, I’ve searched through all the classics related to Qin Chong. I learned that although Qin Chong seeds are grass, they’re like insects. Once they parasitize within a human body, one can only wait for them to sprout and germinate.”

“But Qin Chong also favors the strong. If two people dual cultivate and their spiritual meridians merge, the Qin Chong will naturally choose to parasitize the one with stronger cultivation between them. Yang Zanxing only has Foundation Establishment cultivation, so… if Master Uncle dual cultivates with her, the Qin Chong will naturally transfer to Master Uncle’s body.”

Gu Baiying listened and laughed coldly.

Mendong boldly glanced at him and suggested, “Master Uncle should feel fortunate. After all, Yang Zanxing is a woman. If it were a man…”

The youth laughed instead of getting angry. His pair of beautiful eyes seemed to burn with raging fire, bright enough to be captivating. He spoke coldly, his tone full of mockery, “You mean I should thank her?”

“This disciple never said that.” Mendong argued righteously, “But compared to chastity, isn’t life more important? Master Uncle, you shouldn’t be so old-fashioned. Male-female dual cultivation is very normal. Chastity sitting there won’t increase in value—it’s just one night…”

The next moment, his mouth was stuffed with the spiritual fruit that had been bitten once, and he could only make futile “ah ah” sounds.

Gu Baiying’s face flushed red with anger as he gritted his teeth, “Shut up!”

Mendong didn’t dare speak anymore.

After a while, Gu Baiying asked irritably, “What about other methods?”

Mendong pulled the spiritual fruit from his mouth and asked, “What methods?”

The youth stared at him, holding back his temper again and again, saying word by word, “Besides this, other methods.”

“I haven’t found any yet.” Mendong’s words were particularly infuriating: “Moreover, Yang Zanxing was just recently parasitized by the seed. If taken by force, the seed would immediately wither. Even if we want to think of other separation methods, we’d have to wait until after the seed sprouts and germinates.”

Seeing Gu Baiying’s tightly furrowed brows, Mendong took the opportunity to say, “Master Uncle, if you ask me, you might as well just dual cultivate with her. Dual cultivation would benefit both of you. Though you’d suffer a bit of loss, as a man…”

Gu Baiying could bear it no longer. He angrily clenched his fists, and the next moment, Mendong was wrapped in Yuanli and rolled out the door, disappearing into the autumn scenery outside Xiaoyao Palace.

The youth stood up and walked to the window. The hair ends hanging over his shoulders swayed in the wind, but his posture remained upright, like a spear flowing with radiance, displaying undisguised sharpness.

Outside the window, Gufeng Mountain’s peaks were hidden under shrouding mist, as if covered by a layer of hazy gauze.

He watched for a while, then gritted his teeth and muttered to himself, “How could I possibly dual cultivate with her?”

…

Zanxing had no idea that after only a few months at Taiyan Sect, even dual cultivation had been arranged for her.

These days, she had been wholeheartedly immersed in cultivation.

By Chuhong Terrace, in winter, there were no longer the beautiful rainbow bridges of sunny days. A thin layer of frost had formed under the flying waterfall. According to senior sisters at Taiyan Sect, when deep winter arrived, the entire waterfall would freeze. The ice waterfall would be like a silver mirror, preserving its surging posture until the following spring when ice and snow melted, and it would resume its flowing, rosy colors.

A muffled sound seemed to come from the forest, accompanied by the sound of the earth trembling. A line of fallen leaves was stirred up by this tremor and flew into mid-air, then accurately froze in the air.

Under the tree, a woman in light green gauze robes stood up. She looked at the fallen leaves frozen in mid-air. After a moment, she extended her finger, and the leaves frozen in the air suddenly disappeared in an instant.

Seeing this, Zanxing’s face bloomed with a smile.

She had finally broken through to the second level of Foundation Establishment.

When she first transmigrated into this book, being suppressed by demon beasts underwater had perhaps triggered her potential, or maybe the Xiaoyuan Pearl had been fully charged then—she had risen three levels consecutively, from Refining Qi to Foundation Establishment. But after that, the Xiaoyuan Pearl’s power grew increasingly weak. After spending the night on Gufeng Mountain, it simply went dormant and stopped working. For a modern person to start cultivating from scratch wasn’t easy.

These days of studying while forgetting to eat and sleep had finally yielded some results.

But… Zanxing looked at the rust-covered iron staff in her hand. She couldn’t execute the second level of “Qing E Nian Hua Gun” no matter what.

She had hit a bottleneck in her studies, and the textbook’s author was currently missing. Zanxing wondered if she should find an uncle to ask for guidance.

Just as she was thinking this, she saw many young disciples cultivating near Chuhong Terrace running hastily in one direction. Zanxing was curious and grabbed a disciple to ask, “Senior Brother, where are you all rushing to?”

“You don’t know yet?” the new disciple said, “I heard that Senior Sister Meng Ying from Taiyan Sect has come out of seclusion, and everyone wants to go see!” After saying this, he pulled the sleeve Zanxing had grabbed away from her hand and said while running, “That’s Senior Sister Meng Ying!”

Zanxing watched his departing figure and muttered, “Meng Ying?”

The name sounded somewhat familiar.

Suddenly, inspiration struck, and Zanxing looked ahead sharply. Right, Meng Ying!

Meng Ying was one of the male protagonist’s eight wives in “Nine Heaven Summit.” In this book, the male protagonist’s eight wives each had their own merits. There was the gentle and obedient pure childhood sweetheart, the cold and proud daughter of heaven, the arrogant and seductive spicy beauty, and the mischievous and clever medical woman. From mature women to lolis, from married women to goddesses—the author had probably arranged every style he could think of.

And Meng Ying was that cold and proud daughter of heaven.

Among the male protagonist Mu Cengxiao’s eight wives, the ones with the most complete character development and the most screen time were the childhood sweetheart Liu Yunxin and the cold Meng Ying. Liu Yunxin was gentle and considerate, with shared hardships and affection, suitable as a wife. While Meng Ying was devastatingly beautiful with supreme cultivation, cold as a mountain peak, making people want to conquer her at first sight. Between these two wives, the male protagonist wavered back and forth, either breaking this one’s heart or owing that one a debt.

Zanxing wanted to say: crazy, even with a peanut, one wouldn’t get this drunk.

She followed the crowd forward, feeling somewhat curious.

She had already seen Liu Yunxin, who was indeed a lovely and pitifully beautiful girl. She wondered just how stunning Meng Ying, famous for her beauty in the original work, would be in person.

Just as she was thinking this, someone ahead shouted, “Look quickly, Senior Sister Meng Ying is coming!”

Zanxing looked up.

Two women walked out of Miaokong Palace.

The woman on the left wore gray-blue gauze robes and appeared to be about forty years old, with fair skin and beautiful features, and a red mark between her brows. Her eyes were somewhat elongated, and her lip color deep, adding several points of stern severity to her beauty. Her gauze robe didn’t have a single extra wrinkle, her collar was perfectly neat, and when she walked, her spine was straight, as if even the length of each step was calculated precisely.

Standing beside this rigid woman was a young lady in snow-white gauze robes. The robes flowed elegantly, gathered only at the waist with a moon-white belt. Her blue-black hair was pinned up in towering cloud-like coils. Just her silhouette alone was already graceful and refined.

Zanxing was stunned.

This woman… was remarkably similar to the white-robed woman’s figure in her spiritual platform when she practiced staff techniques.