Chapter 166: I Hope Liu Chen Won’t Be Like You

Chapter 166: Chapter 166: I Hope Liu Chen Won’t Be Like You

"You’ve always been polite, but you used to be more relaxed around Senior Brother. Why have you seemed so reserved lately?"

While Liu Chen was cooking, Ji Suyao watched with some exasperation as Ye Linglong slowly took a seat. From the very beginning, she’d sensed that Ye Linglong had feelings for their Senior Brother.

In the past, she would only make a few jokes and tease her about it. But ever since Nangong Mu was refined into a Soul Slave, that feeling had intensified. Meanwhile, Ye Linglong—her longtime friend and now fellow sect sister—was acting more and more peculiar.

"That’s not true. Don’t be ridiculous."

Ye Linglong shook her head. ’How could I not have noticed a change in my own attitude toward Senior Brother? Don’t tell me I’ve been affected by something strange?’

"You can fool me, but don’t fool yourself."

Ji Suyao couldn’t help but mutter. ’Any normal person could see something’s off with her, but she’s completely oblivious. What Senior Brother said just now was a dead giveaway. Even *he’s* noticed you’re acting strange, and you’re still stubbornly denying it. I’m speechless.’

"When did I lie to you?"

Ye Linglong couldn’t help but roll her eyes at Ji Suyao. ’That girl eats and lives with me every single day. We even bathe in the same room. What secrets could there possibly be between us? In a situation like this, what would I even have to lie about?’

"Right, right. Nothing’s going on."

Ji Suyao slumped onto the table, not pushing the topic any further. ’Senior Brother is watching from not too far away,’ she thought. ’Am I supposed to just come right out and say she has designs on him?’

"Did you feel any discomfort while absorbing the Spiritual Power from the Spiritual Cuisine?"

Once breakfast was ready, Liu Chen couldn’t resist asking. He didn’t know the exact time, but his two junior sisters hadn’t shown up for dinner last night. He figured they must have finished absorbing the Spiritual Power from the Spiritual Cuisine sometime after dinner was over.

"I didn’t feel any discomfort."

Ye Linglong shook her head. When she woke up yesterday, apart from the feeling of her Cultivation advancing rapidly, she hadn’t noticed anything else.

"Then who was it who told me yesterday that they were exhausted?"

Ji Suyao shot her a look. ’After we woke up yesterday, both of us were completely exhausted. We barely spoke before crashing. So why is it that when Senior Brother asks, suddenly nothing happened?’

"Go take this food to Master and his wife."

Liu Chen looked at Ji Suyao with exasperation and sent her off on an errand.

’That counts as discomfort,’ he thought. ’Fatigue is inevitable when circulating a Cultivation Technique. Besides, I could see that the Bamboo Leaf Spirit Patterns in my junior sisters’ bodies were showing signs of turning from Bronze to Silver. That’s a clear indication they’re about to break through to the Body Tempering Middle Stage. With such significant progress, the body’s adaptation period is bound to cause exhaustion.’

"Wait for me to get back to eat!"

Ji Suyao picked up the food container, shouted the instruction as she was leaving, and then zipped away.

"Suyao... she’s been acting a little strange lately."

Watching this, Ye Linglong couldn’t help but shake her head. ’I don’t know when it started, but Suyao, my once-close friend, has started to develop such a sharp tongue. And the crucial part is, from what I’ve seen, she only seems to direct it at me.’

’You’ve all been pretty strange lately.’

Liu Chen grumbled to himself as he recalled recent events.

’Junior Sister Ye approached me with an agenda at first, but she eventually let go of her hang-ups, and we got along just fine. But ever since the trial at Fire Dragon Valley, it seems something is weighing on her mind again. She’s become more and more reserved, and it feels like we’re back to that awkward, formal stage when we barely knew each other.’

’As for Junior Sister Ji, she seems normal most of the time. But it’s almost as if she’s trying to get Junior Sister Ye to open up—whenever Junior Sister Ye gets all formal with me, Junior Sister Ji jumps in to roast her. I don’t know the exact reason for it.’

How these two junior sisters, who had seemed so close, had ended up this way was a mystery to Liu Chen, and it wasn’t something he could just ask about directly.

"Perhaps she’s just homesick."

Liu Chen gave it a moment’s thought before offering a casual guess. He had no idea if it was true, but he certainly couldn’t say what he was really thinking.

-----------------

"I’m having some trouble making sense of the dynamic between those three."

Elsewhere in the bamboo forest, Mo Xuan watched Ji Suyao’s flustered retreat, then turned his gaze to his Dao companion.

"It’s only natural you don’t understand. If you did, it wouldn’t have taken you nearly fifty years of cultivating together for you to finally confess your feelings."

Bai Qiulan rolled her eyes at Mo Xuan. Back then, the man had been as dense as a block of wood, completely oblivious to all her hints. It had gotten to the point where she suspected he wasn’t just failing to understand, but actively didn’t want to be with her.

After they finally got together, however, Bai Qiulan realized it wasn’t that he didn’t want to be with her—he was just completely incapable of deciphering her carefully crafted hints. All her painstaking efforts had been like casting pearls before swine.

"So, what’s the situation with them now?"

Mo Xuan tried to recall the years before he and his Dao companion were official, but he couldn’t remember a single hint. However, years of experience told him this was certainly not the time to admit that, so he opted to change the subject.

"All you need to know is that there’s no real animosity between the three of them."

Bai Qiulan glanced at Mo Xuan and decided against giving him a detailed analysis. He probably wouldn’t understand it anyway. He would just end up furrowing his brow in thought for ages before giving her a baffled look.

"That’s good to hear."

Mo Xuan was tempted to press further, but he breathed a sigh of relief at Bai Qiulan’s words. His desire to understand the situation more deeply vanished. As long as there was no animosity between the three of them, that was all that mattered.

"I just hope Liu Chen doesn’t turn out like you."

Bai Qiulan shook her head. Liu Chen seemed relatively normal for now, but it was still early. Who knew if he would end up taking after his master, Mo Xuan? If he was cut from the same cloth, things could get complicated.

"Uhh..."

-----------------

After breakfast, Ji Suyao and Ye Linglong returned to their bamboo house to cultivate, while Liu Chen continued his own cultivation as planned.

The morning passed uneventfully.

In the afternoon, as Liu Chen circulated his Cultivation Technique again, the Flood Dragon Spirit Ghost carried a surge of Spiritual Power directly into his Hand Taiyin Lung Meridian. The meridian was widened by the Spiritual Power before merging into his grand circulatory path.

A ripple of Spiritual Power, unique to the Peak Path, emanated from Liu Chen’s body, but it was quickly concealed by his Resting Technique.

’Meridian Passage Peak. I can start Refining the Spirit Ghost now. But to be safe, I should first cultivate the Celestial Thunder Technique to the Perfection realm. If the Soul Slave loses control, the Celestial Thunder Technique can serve as a countermeasure. If I didn’t need it to Refine the Spirit Ghost, I would just purify it on the spot if it lost control.’

Liu Chen shook his head, ultimately deciding not to begin Refining the Spirit Ghost right away. The Celestial Thunder Technique was a crucial safeguard. It suppressed all things yin and evil. In a way, it was an even faster method of purifying Ghostly Creatures than the Soul Crossing Technique—just a lot more brutal.

Before dinner, seven bolts of Celestial Thunder descended from a thundercloud, blasting a deep crater in Liu Chen’s courtyard. The Celestial Thunder Technique had reached the Perfection realm. All preparations were complete.

After dinner, once Liu Chen had completed a full circulation of his Cultivation Technique, he took out three Soul Rings. He opened one of them, and in an instant, a multitude of ghostly shadows converged before him.