Watching Zhai Bairong depart with his own eyes, Nie Shiyun returned to the inner room. He calculated that it was time to find an opportunity to refine a handy magic treasure for himself. What he lacked least were Grade Two Treasure Tools, but as for Spiritual Tools, he possessed only the Nine Dragons Divine Fire Cover. There was still a long way to go from the mid-stage of the Golden Core realm to the Nascent Soul realm, and the quality of the magic treasures he carried was currently in a state of awkward transition.
Setting aside the fact that the Divine Fire Cover could not exert its maximum efficacy before the Nascent Soul stage, Nie Shiyun was even less inclined to reveal it now that he knew Xu Yehua had reacted to him seizing things that originally belonged to him in the book. He didn't feel it was a pity; regardless, the item was currently serving as a heater for Meiqiu, so it wasn't exactly gathering dust. He only wondered what the master of that cave dwelling, who had passed away thousands of years ago, would think if he knew in the underworld that his most beloved magic treasure was now being used as a nest for a fledgling bird.
As he thought of Meiqiu, the bird appeared as if they shared a telepathic connection.
"Why have you come out?" Although Nie Shiyun knew that demonic beasts had no concept of nudity—especially before they could transform, as these beasts spent every day bare—he still pulled his clothes on properly when he saw Meiqiu hop out of the jade pendant.
"The fire's gone!" Meiqiu chirped, sounding as anxious as a tenant whose landlord had cut off the internet and electricity. "And it’s been gone for ages! I saw you rolling around with that other human all night, so I waited until now!"
He certainly had a sense of timing. Nie Shiyun said helplessly, "That fire is only to assist your cultivation; it’s not as if you can't survive without it." Although he spoke to Meiqiu with a hint of exasperation, he still went over and activated the Divine Fire Cover.
After several days of cultivation, Meiqiu had grown a size larger. His body, which could previously be held in one's palms, had expanded rapidly, and he could now only perch on Nie Shiyun’s shoulder. His wings had also become full and powerful; he fluttered them now, flying to Nie Shiyun’s ear to twitter away. "So you have a Dao companion? And a male one at that. You won't be able to produce any eggs that way!"
Nie Shiyun rolled his eyes at him. "Human cultivators moved past the stage of hoping to produce offspring every day a long time ago."
"Is that so?" Meiqiu asked in surprise.
Cultivators walked a path against the heavens, gaining longevity and abilities far beyond those of mortals, yet the higher their cultivation, the more difficult it became to conceive. Cultivators who wished to carry on their lineage usually found a way for their Dao companion to conceive a child before reaching the Nascent Soul stage; otherwise, they were almost certainly destined to leave no descendants. However, most cultivators were single-mindedly devoted to the Dao in pursuit of ascension, and they had long since ceased to care for the mortal notions of spreading one's branches or having a house full of grandchildren. Thus, in the cultivation world, same-sex Dao companions—and even opposite-sex companions who did not seek offspring—were very common.
The demonic race, however, was different, especially those demonic beasts who had cultivated from animals; they still retained their instinctive desire to reproduce.
"Is there no relevant knowledge in your inheritance?"
"Among phoenixes, there are naturally Feng birds mating with Feng birds, and Huang birds with Huang birds! But that doesn't stop everyone from finding other birds to lay eggs with." Meiqiu flapped his wings. The inheritance he received originated from the Upper Realm and the current demonic race; although he had never interacted with other phoenixes, this information existed naturally in his mind. Conversely, his understanding of human cultivators was simply not very deep.
Meiqiu’s terminology as a demonic beast was blunt. Nie Shiyun cleared his throat. "Cough, I see. So it's just blatant promiscuity."
However, crows were strictly monogamous.
Thinking of Meiqiu’s origins, even Nie Shiyun couldn't help but marvel at what a scoundrel that never-before-seen father must have been. He had unexpectedly come to the Lower Realm and didn't forget to have a fleeting affair, only to pat his backside and leave. Meiqiu’s mother must have been furious; otherwise, she wouldn't have discarded the egg she had worked so hard to lay just to keep it out of sight and mind.
After asking more about the habits of the phoenix race, Nie Shiyun gained quite a bit of insight. At the same time, he learned from Meiqiu’s words that although the conditions for ascension in the cultivation world were harsh and nearly impossible to fulfill given the current state of affairs, opening a passage from the Upper Realm was not nearly as difficult. It was just that the denizens of the Upper Realm naturally looked down on those from the cultivation world, and those cultivators who had ascended thousands of years ago had likewise taken no action. Perhaps they were too busy looking after themselves, or perhaps they felt it wasn't worth the time and effort for their successors; Nie Shiyun had no way of knowing at this time.
Afterward, Nie Shiyun did not rush to leave the jade pendant. Instead, he sat down at the refinement table. Although Meiqiu had sensed it before, it had been through a layer of eggshell; this was the first time he had seen Nie Shiyun work with his own eyes, and he stared curiously from the side. Since leaving Yunqing Pavilion, Nie Shiyun had paused his smithing for a while. Right now, he was just casually hammering at some materials to get a feel for it, leaving him with the spare energy to chat with Meiqiu.
"Whether human or demon, when out and about, one usually has to rent a geothermic fire room or an alchemy room for smithing and pill-making, right? This setup of yours is convenient; you can come in and refine anytime, anywhere. I've never even heard of such a blessed land that allows living beings to enter and exit in the Upper Realm! What did you use to refine this?" Meiqiu clicked his tongue.
"It was originally just an ordinary jade pendant. By the time I noticed it, the space had already appeared on my person; I didn't refine it myself," Nie Shiyun said. "Setting that aside, I've heard that Phoenix Essence Fire is comparable to top-tier exotic fires in its assistance to smithing. Why don't we give it a try?"
Meiqiu grumbled, "You said there would be plenty of spirit herbs, but you haven't given me anything good to eat and you're already putting me to work," but he still flew to the side to help.
The cooperation between Nie Shiyun and Meiqiu was stumbling. Meiqiu was still young, and his control over his abilities was poor; he would frequently extinguish the fire or fail to rein it in. Forget being comparable to an exotic fire; he was somewhat lacking even compared to the ordinary flames Nie Shiyun usually used.
"I can't do this! I'm not a purebred phoenix anyway..." Meiqiu had burned through five of Nie Shiyun’s sword blanks in a row. His originally proud expression vanished completely, and he sat on the ground, moping.
Seeing him dejected, Nie Shiyun stroked his fluffy head. "When I first started smithing, I burned through far more things than this. The whole room was filled with scrap metal."
Meiqiu still had the temperament of a child; his moods came and went quickly. Hearing Nie Shiyun, whom he subconsciously viewed as his guardian, comfort him like this, he instinctively felt much better. He didn't stop to think whether it was true or false, thinking that perhaps everyone really did start out this way, and regained his vitality before long.
The man and the bird spent a long time in the space before they managed to forge a usable Grade Three magic tool. Although it was only suitable for a Qi Condensation cultivator, Meiqiu was very excited and flew in circles around the small space for quite a while. Not wanting to dampen his enthusiasm, Nie Shiyun praised him unreservedly.
Having consumed a significant amount of spiritual energy, Meiqiu still felt tired after eating a few of Nie Shiyun’s pills. Nie Shiyun left him to recover inside the Divine Fire Cover while he buried his head back into focused refining.
It is said that to do a good job, one must first sharpen one's tools. Not long ago, Nie Shiyun had received a refinement cauldron gifted by Nie Lian. The items Nie Lian gave him were naturally high-quality; it had a body cast from gold-purple copper, and the decorations on its belly were fire-gathering arrays integrated into the patterns, allowing a smith to draw and control fire with greater precision. However, after thinking about it for a few days, Nie Shiyun felt that this cauldron could be taken a step further on its current foundation, so he had decided earlier to melt and remodel it.
Phoenix-patterned copper cauldrons were quite popular among smiths. Dragon and phoenix patterns naturally carried auspicious meanings, but ordinary cauldrons obviously had nothing to do with divine beasts; they were just for good luck. At most, they might have the beast cores or essence blood of other avian demonic beasts melted into them, which would already be considered precious.
But now he had a real little divine beast by his side. It wouldn't be hard to ask for something from him. In the future, by utilizing his Essence Fire in coordination with the same lineage of spiritual energy within the cauldron, the refining results would be twice the effect for half the effort.
Thinking of this, Nie Shiyun lifted the Divine Fire Cover and called Meiqiu over, telling him his plan.
"What? You want my feathers?" Meiqiu’s face paled with shock. "Are you joking! Impossible!"
Nie Shiyun said awkwardly, "Just a few will do. It's not like I'm going to pluck you bald..."
"Not even a few! Every one of my feathers is very important." Meiqiu cautiously retreated a foot.
Seeing Meiqiu so resistant, Nie Shiyun did not press him. Perhaps to him, bird feathers were like hair—it wouldn't matter if a tuft was shaved off—but to a demonic beast, they might be precious things where "the ten fingers are connected to the heart."
"Fine. I didn't want to take your flesh or blood, but if I can't even have a feather, it seems this concept won't work."
"Oh, I can give you blood. You should have said so earlier," Meiqiu suddenly let out a long sigh of relief. "Not essence blood, but just ordinary blood is fine. I'll just drip a few drops for you."
"...?"
Nie Shiyun was dumbfounded. Was blood something even less important than feathers to a bird?
He didn't ask more at the time, only gradually coming to understand later that it wasn't that all birds valued their feathers so highly. Rather, although Meiqiu looked like a crow—pitch black all over—in terms of vanity, he had unfortunately inherited the pretentious, beauty-loving traits of the phoenix race. He would rather shed ten drops of blood than suffer the slightest loss to his appearance.
Nie Shiyun confirmed several times that Meiqiu really wasn't afraid of bleeding. After receiving an impatient answer from the latter, he finalized the plan. Blood was naturally more precious than surface feathers; thus, the finished refinement cauldron would certainly be even more superior than expected. However, bleeding was still taxing on the body, and the Great Cultivation Meet was the very next day. Even though Meiqiu might not even have a chance to appear, Nie Shiyun weighed his options and decided to wait until after the competition.
Although he didn't think much of it himself, seeing Nie Shiyun’s grateful expression, Meiqiu quickly became pushy. He clamored that he needed to nourish himself first, wanting to eat this and that, and ordered Nie Shiyun to go buy spirit eggs for him.
In terms of diet, Meiqiu didn't have a shred of the divine beast's ethereal air of absorbing the essence of heaven and earth or drinking dew. He was very realistic and ate everything, though his favorites were meat and eggs.
Even though time flowed more slowly within the jade pendant, more than half a day had passed in reality. Nie Shiyun temporarily shut down the furnace and resigned himself to making a trip to the spirit food shop at the foot of the mountain to satisfy Meiqiu’s appetite. Hearing that there was good food, Meiqiu lost the desire to cultivate in the Divine Fire Cover and began to frolic excitedly within the jade pendant.
Nie Shiyun donned a heavy cloak and walked out of his residence. Leaving the formation, the mountain of Pinyin Pavilion was as cold as ever. Nie Shiyun circulated his spiritual power to keep warm. Looking at the vast, empty expanse of silver-white and snow-covered pines across the mountains, he couldn't help but sigh. No wonder someone as restless as Qi Miaohan ran outside every day; unless one was a cultivator with extreme mental fortitude, living here for long would inevitably feel lonely and desolate.
He did not take out his flying sword, instead choosing to walk toward the Yunqing Pavilion residences halfway down the mountain. If Nie Xing'an or Qi Xuan'er happened to need something, they could go together or he could bring some things back for them.
Halfway there, Nie Shiyun’s shoulder suddenly felt heavy. He quickly turned his head and found that Meiqiu had come out on his own.
"Hey, why did you come out? Have you been cooped up too long these past few days?"
Nie Shiyun hurried to a stop. Although there was no one around right now, the further down the mountain he went, the more people there would be. Moreover, looking at the time, it was already past noon; the open auditions for rogue cultivators should have ended, and it was exactly the time when cultivators who had gone to watch the excitement would be returning to their lodgings.
"How strange. There's the aura of a demon cultivator... faint and flickering."
Nie Shiyun’s heart jolted. Meiqiu said "demon cultivator," not simply "demonic beast." If it were a demonic beast, that would be commonplace; perhaps some cultivator had let their contracted spirit beast out for some air. But a demon cultivator participating in the human race's Great Cultivation Meet—there hadn't been one in hundreds of years.
And as it happened, Nie Shiyun knew there was one in this assembly.
"How can you tell?"
Meiqiu replied, "Because his concealment is terrible. As a fellow member of the demon race, in my eyes, it's basically no different from walking around naked."
Nie Shiyun: "..." Fine, then there was no doubt. When the last member of that harem first appeared, the original book described him as a fellow who "possessed cultivation and talent but was completely ignorant of all techniques and moves."
Being sensed by Meiqiu meant the other party definitely wasn't far away. Nie Shiyun guessed whether the person had gone to the consignment shop at the foot of the mountain after the auditions, seen the message he left, and was now coming up the mountain to find Yunqing Pavilion. If so, he might just happen to run straight into them at the gate.
Nie Shiyun wasn't in a hurry; he had already told Nie Xing'an that if someone came looking for Yunqing Pavilion, he should be contacted immediately.
He praised Meiqiu, saying his senses were very sharp and he should keep up the good work. Meiqiu was bewildered, not knowing what merit he had achieved, and returned to the jade pendant in a daze.
As he walked, before reaching Yunqing Pavilion, Nie Shiyun heard a familiar voice—one he didn't particularly want to hear.
"This is the area where disciples of the four major sects reside; you've likely taken the wrong path. The place you're looking for is not far from the foot of the mountain. If you go any further up, you'll reach the summit."
It was Duan Mingyu. Separated by a wall, Nie Shiyun hastily checked his steps and concealed his aura. Although he could probably catch a glimpse of Zhai Bairong if he went out now, the price was too high; Nie Shiyun chose to take a detour.
Just as he was cautiously attempting to leave, he heard another voice he had never heard before say, "Oh, so that's how it is... thank you so much. My, this mountain is so full of twists and turns, and there are no signs; it's really hard to find the way! I thought walking through the woods would be a shortcut."
Duan Mingyu let out a bell-like laugh. "You're such an interesting person, insisting on trekking through the woods when there's a main road! Since we've happened to meet and we're heading down the mountain anyway, why don't we walk you to your destination?"
"Really? That's great! What did I say? Hah, there really are more good people out here!" the other party cried out joyfully.
Duan Mingyu let out a puzzled "Hmm?"
Nie Shiyun suddenly sensed something, and alarm bells rang in his mind.
Unaware of Duan Mingyu’s confusion, the voice on the other side continued cheerfully, "Then I'll have to trouble you. My name is Du Zhi, what's yours?"
They still ended up meeting first!
Nie Shiyun let out a long sigh in his heart, but he didn't give up completely; they had only just introduced themselves. He immediately turned around, feigning a chance encounter, and stepped out from behind the wall, walking toward the direction of the voices.
Duan Mingyu was just about to introduce himself when he saw someone approaching. It was Nie Shiyun, who had caused him to lose face the day before. Before he could say anything, another loud voice drowned him out.
"Ah!"
Nie Shiyun was startled. He felt his entrance was perfectly natural and smooth; why was this harem member named Du Zhi reacting with such shock?
The man named Du Zhi froze for a moment, then said with a mix of joy and urgency, "Boss! So this is where you ran off to!"
"...?" Boss?
Nie Shiyun, along with everyone else present, fell into a state of utter confusion.
| Chinese | English | Notes/Explanation |
| :--- | :--- | :--- |
| 凤 | Feng | Specifically refers to the male phoenix in Chinese mythology. |
| 凰 | Huang | Specifically refers to the female phoenix in Chinese mythology. |
| 精火 | Essence Fire | A concentrated, high-grade flame produced by certain powerful beings or beasts. |
| 器鼎 | Refinement Cauldron | A specialized cauldron used by smiths to forge magic tools and weapons. |
| 杜执 | Du Zhi | A new character; the final member of the original protagonist's harem. |
| 老板 | Boss | A term used for a shopkeeper or business owner. |
