Yu Yi heard the system's announcement and felt a bit displeased.
The favorability was at eighty-five percent. After just sleeping with Xue Chenjing, it had increased again. Was she really a hidden love-struck brain?
Xue Chenjing chose this moment to confirm her favorability with the system. What did that mean? Was he going to decide how to respond to her based on the numerical value?
After reporting the favorability, the system didn't stay silent. It earnestly tried to advise its host, "Master, even the closest people should maintain some mystery between them. The system sincerely suggests you keep some reserve and show more of your good side to the heroine."
Xue Chenjing led Yu Yi upstairs and scoffed inwardly, coldly saying, "Good side? Do you mean Xue Mingyuan?"
The system was speechless. What did that have to do with Xue Mingyuan? It seemed its host would never trust it again, sob.
Even so, the system still tried hard to salvage their precarious trust, explaining, "Host, believe it or not, I'm on your side."
Xue Chenjing responded with a cold laugh, "You didn't used to say that."
The system: "......" That was a previous misjudgment! Couldn't it be given a chance to correct its mistake?
It had guided so many "pursuit of love to the grave" worlds before, never expecting to encounter a "pursuit of host to the grave" itself.
The system took a deep breath and said firmly, "The heroine chose who, I'm on whose side! So, I'm now firmly on your side."
He quite liked that answer.
Xue Chenjing raised an eyebrow, the corner of his mouth couldn't help but lift, his gaze darting from the corner of his eye to glance at Yu Yi.
Yu Yi felt his gaze, her steps paused, and a subtle sense of resistance arose in her heart. Almost instinctively, she pulled her wrist free from his grasp.
She didn't like Xue Chenjing's expression of confidence just now, as if she was completely in his control.
Before, when she didn't care about Xue Chenjing, she didn't mind the system constantly reporting her favorability to him. But now, she started to care and felt uncomfortable.
When they stood face to face, she could only feel his feelings for her through his eyes and expressions. But Xue Chenjing could evaluate her fondness through specific numbers.
Even using these numbers to decide how to respond to her.
As if her feelings were priced and displayed, whether she was willing or not.
This feeling was like a fishbone stuck in her throat.
Xue Chenjing's hand was pulled away, he was slightly stunned, the smile at the corner of his eye turned into doubt, he cautiously asked, "Ah Yi, what's wrong?"
Yu Yi looked up at him, suppressed the discomfort in her heart, and smiled, "No need to hold my hand, I can walk by myself."
With only a few steps to the second floor, Xue Chenjing didn't insist.
The second floor of the wooden building was relatively cleaner, with only a soft couch for living. There was also a balcony at the back, intersecting with the one below, built on different branches.
It had to be said, if this small building was really built by him, he did indeed have some architectural talent.
Xue Chenjing took the opportunity while Yu Yi was surveying the surroundings, reached out to hold her waist, and pulled her into a rattan chair on the balcony. The chair was woven directly from vines hanging from the tree.
This chair was originally designed for one person. The person who wove it probably never dreamed that future self would bring another person here.
The chair was narrow, and sitting two people was a bit cramped. Yu Yi had to lean tightly against Xue Chenjing, almost half her body in his embrace. She wanted to get up, "I'll go get a stool..."
Xue Chenjing naturally wouldn't let her succeed, his arm firmly circled her waist, pulling her back, he teased, "No need, Ah Yi, sitting like this is also very comfortable. This chair can also swing like a swing."
As he said that, he stepped hard with his foot, and the chair swayed gently.
The balcony wasn't big, and when the chair swung, the tips of his toes could directly reach the edge of the balcony, catching a glimpse of the intersecting branches and deep sea below. This was the highest point of the tree island, dozens of feet high, giving a thrilling feeling of swinging on a swing at the edge of a cliff.
Yu Yi liked this feeling, so she no longer insisted, softened her body into the chair.
She kicked her legs to swing her flying skirt, cooperating with Xue Chenjing's movements to push a few more times, making the swing higher and more dangerous.
The tree vines rubbed against the branches, making "creak creak" sounds. This long-lost feeling made her temporarily forget she was a cultivator who could fly and dive. She held the chair tightly with one hand and Xue Chenjing with the other. When she swung up high, her heart felt like it was about to fly out of her throat.
It was like returning to the ordinary past, where after a trip to the amusement park, her legs would go weak.
Before coming to this world, she didn't dare to ride the roller coaster or the drop tower. Some overly stimulating projects, she could only stand below, holding people's clothes and bags, watching them play, a person who would be laughed at for being timid.
Yu Yi gasped and laughed, "Alright, it's really interesting. I haven't swung on a swing for a long time. I used to be scared of the big pendulum."
Xue Chenjing saw her smile for the first time. He stared at her without blinking and asked, "What's a big pendulum?"
"An amusement facility." Knowing that Xue Chenjing knew she wasn't from this world, Yu Yi didn't intend to hide it, and gestured the shape of the big pendulum in the air, "It also swings back and forth, throwing people very high. When it reaches the highest point, it will stop in the air for a moment. The people on it can only be upside down, and then suddenly swing down."
Xue Chenjing's limited cognition couldn't imagine her description, so the system kindly sent him a picture in his mind. Looking at the bright colors, he said, "So that's how it is, it looks fun."
"Only fun for ordinary people."
Cultivators could fly and dive, how could they be scared by such facilities? Yu Yi now rode her crane brother at tens of thousands of meters high, no longer screaming.
If she could go back, she would definitely drag the people who had laughed at her before to play all the extreme projects in the amusement park. Unfortunately, such a wish was too vague, her image of a coward might forever remain in her family and friends' hearts, impossible to wash away.
The swing gradually calmed down.
Xue Chenjing saw the fading smile in her eyes, like the setting sun, irretrievable. He suddenly realized her current mood, gently touched the corner of her eye, and whispered, "Ah Yi, I'm sorry."
Yu Yi looked sideways, smiled again, and asked in confusion, "What are you sorry for? Sudden apologies make me suspect you've done something again."
Xue Chenjing stared at her, in Yu Yi's increasingly puzzled eyes, slowly tightened his grip on her waist, shook his head, "Nothing."
She came to this world for him, and even if he was sorry, he wanted to keep her by his side forever.
Xue Chenjing lowered his head, avoiding her gaze, changing the topic, "You entered the Divine and Demonic Battlefield, saw the Chaos Pool where I was born, right?"
"Were you born from that pond?" Yu Yi pondered, clicked her tongue, and her expression immediately wrinkled, "Doesn't that mean I played in your amniotic fluid?"
Xue Chenjing heard the disgust in her words, turned his gaze in surprise, and complained, "I haven't even started talking, and you're already repulsed?"
Yu Yi kindly patted his hand, encouraging him to continue, "No, no, not very repulsed."
Xue Chenjing emphasized, "Not amniotic fluid! It's the Chaos Pool where the clear and turbid qi merged, we just condensed our bodies in it."
That sounded even more like amniotic fluid. However, their bodies took a hundred years to grow in the Chaos Pool, absorbing the divine and demonic remnants from the battlefield during this period, giving birth to two consciousnesses.
At the beginning, the divine consciousness was stronger, almost completely suppressing the demonic nature.
Xue Chenjing had always been imprisoned within his own body, able to sense only another consciousness controlling the body. They spent many years in the monotonous wasteland of bones, learning to walk, to speak, and to wield divine arts through the occasional ghostly apparitions that emerged from the corpses. They also learned the art of their relentless, life-and-death struggle.
One day, Xue Mingyuan received a prayer from the mortal world. He witnessed the desolation caused by the war between gods and demons—endless barren lands, ceaseless natural disasters, and the suffering of the people. Determined to leave the Return to Void, he stepped into the mortal realm.
He disseminated the divine arts he had mastered, empowering people to survive the natural disasters. This led to the creation of the first great immortal family, the Ji Family, who revered him as their god.
Over time, the ancestors of the Ji Clan of Immortals grew dissatisfied with merely being mortals. They desired ascension, true divinity. Their reverence turned into insatiable demands, eventually imprisoning their god within a mountain.
It was during this period that Xue Chenjing's power began to surge. Despite Xue Mingyuan's attempts to suppress him, he could not stop the ceaseless influx of corrupt demonic energy into the temple.
Xue Chenjing's strength grew with each demonic breath he absorbed, while Xue Mingyuan's power waned under the exploitation of his followers. The balance of power shifted, and Xue Chenjing seized control, imprisoning the other within his own mind.
What followed was recorded in the annals of history.
"During the Battle of Wangye, Xue Mingyuan took advantage of my injury to reclaim control, sacrificing his heart's fire to seal away all the demons who followed me."
Xue Chenjing spoke with deep resentment, his teeth clenched as if he wanted to tear the other apart in his mind.
"Without the heart's fire, I could no longer control the remnants of great demons absorbed from the battlefield. My strength diminished greatly, and he could no longer perform advanced divine arts. We were forced to endlessly reincarnate, tormenting each other in the mortal world."
He, who should have been the ultimate arbiter of life and death, now had to hide and survive in the shadows, even his refuge carefully concealed from the immortals, hidden deep in the sea.
Xue Chenjing leaned against her shoulder, whispering softly, "Yu Yi, I am unwilling. No matter how many lifetimes I live, I am unwilling."
