It wasn’t until Nan Shan lost control of the car and crashed into the snowbank beside him that Ling Ye realized everything wasn’t just a hallucination.
He was silent for a long while, then finally found his voice:
“Why did you come back?”
Nan Shan suddenly looked up, her face covered in snow and filled with a trace of resentment:
“What else was I supposed to do? Let you die without saving you?”
“You can’t save me by coming back,” Ling Ye replied calmly, not wanting to mention that he had lost all feeling in his body.
Nan Shan grimaced and stepped forward, forcefully closing his collar, then reached out with her hands, already red and swollen from the cold, to hold him.
She pressed close to him and rubbed him with her hands, trying to generate some heat through friction.
“Just hang on a little longer. When the sun comes up, it won’t be so cold,” Nan Shan’s lips were frozen, making it hard for her to speak, but she still tried to sound calm.
Ling Ye made a faint sound of acknowledgment and closed his eyes again.
“Hey, hey!” Nan Shan forced him awake, her pale face full of unspoken emotions.
“I gave up an almost certain escape just to come back for you. At least try a little harder.”
Ling Ye gathered his strength:
“I told you, you shouldn’t have come back.”
“I already regret it, so stop saying things that will make me regret it even more.”
Nan Shan turned her head and saw that the faint light had completely disappeared.
The regret in her heart nearly drowned her.
Why had she come back?
Why?
Her parents were still waiting for her in the mortal world, their only wish in life was for her to grow up healthy and strong, to live out a long life.
So why had she run back here?
Why, when she knew she couldn’t do anything, did she throw herself into danger with Ling Ye?
Nan Shan regretted it so much she wanted to cry to the heavens.
But then, when she thought about how Ling Ye’s eyes had appeared in her mind again and again while she ran toward the faint light, she had to sadly admit that, if given another chance, she would probably make the same choice.
A life was in front of her, and humans really struggled to weigh the pros and cons.
Ling Ye didn’t know the emotional turmoil Nan Shan was going through, but he could see her expression changing repeatedly.
Finally, she sighed as if accepting fate:
“Who told me I have good luck?”
Ling Ye’s eyelashes fluttered slightly.
After a long moment, he weakly raised his hand and gently placed it on her wrist.
Her hand, also cold and losing warmth, felt icy to him.
As soon as his hand touched hers, Nan Shan shivered lightly, lowered her head to look at their hands intertwined, then looked back up into Ling Ye’s eyes.
“Are you afraid too?” Nan Shan asked.
Ling Ye stared at her for a while, then nodded, complying with her unspoken wish.
Nan Shan laughed softly and held him tighter.
“See? Even gods are afraid of dying.”
Ling Ye looked up at the sky.
Under the cover of night, not a single star could be seen.
A wave of drowsiness hit him again and again.
He wanted to sleep, but every time he closed his eyes, he would hear Nan Shan’s sorrowful words:
“I gave up an almost certain escape just to come back for you. At least try a little harder.”
“Hey.”
Nan Shan suddenly called out to him again.
Ling Ye struggled to stay awake:
“You used to call me ‘Immortal.’ Now you’re calling me ‘hey.'”
Nan Shan hadn’t expected him to still care about formalities at this time.
She barely managed a smile: “Oh, Immortal, I apologize.”
“You can just call me by my name,” the prince said generously.
Nan Shan pretended to forget that she had already called him by his name long ago:
“Well, thank you very much.”
Ling Ye, also too frozen to think clearly, didn’t catch her sarcastic tone.
After a moment of silence, he said, “Say something.”
“What do you want me to say?” Nan Shan snuggled closer to him, trying to warm him up like she did the night before, but it wasn’t working.
Not only was he still cold, but she was getting colder too.
The toll of traveling through the snow all night was beginning to show, and both of them were gradually losing their body heat.
“Anything.” Ling Ye whispered.
Nan Shan thought for a moment, then asked, “Why don’t you want to tell your Immortal Uncle about how powerful you are now?”
Ling Ye: “………… You really are persistent.”
“We’re about to freeze into corpses, and you still won’t tell me?” Nan Shan asked, more confidently now.
Ling Ye’s eyes moved slightly, and after a while, he slowly spoke:
“The Ling family’s foundation is damaged. If I continue to cultivate, it will only become harder. If I develop a new inner demon, I’ll die without a doubt.”
Nan Shan was taken aback.
“So it’s really because you’re afraid of making him worried?”
Ling Ye closed his eyes:
“You don’t understand.”
The position of the King of the Underworld was traditionally passed down by bloodline, but if the heir was too weak, anyone capable could take the throne.
Once replaced by a new King of the Underworld, the old bloodline would be slaughtered.
Long ago, his life had been tied to his cultivation.
“I don’t understand,” Nan Shan clicked her tongue.
“I don’t have your strong will. In this life, I don’t ask for anything else, just for my parents to stay healthy, and for me to live long enough to take care of them in their old age, then the three of us will be buried together in one grave and live out the next life together.”
“Even if you’re buried together, the road of reincarnation must be walked alone. The chances of becoming a family again are very low.” Ling Ye said, despite the cold.
Nan Shan wanted to roll her eyes at him, but since her body had lost all feeling, she just kept lying on him:
“What good does saying this do now? We’re both going to freeze to death together.”
Ling Ye fell silent for a moment and said:
“Sorry.”
To his surprise, Nan Shan raised a corner of her mouth and said with a reluctant smile, “Forget it. I chose to come back, so I can’t blame you.”
Ling Ye slowly closed his eyes.
“Ling Ye.”
“Mm?”
“I’ll tell you a secret.”
Nan Shan’s voice suddenly became blurry.
Ling Ye lay still for a moment before understanding her words.
“What?”
Nan Shan yawned uncontrollably and closed her eyes:
“Before I was seven, I wasn’t called Nan Shan.”
“What was your name?”
“Sui Sui,” Nan Shan’s voice was growing fainter.
“My father said ‘Sui Sui Ping An’ was a lucky phrase, and every time someone said it, it was like they were making a wish for me. Then, when I was seven, a pompous scholar came to our village, heard my name, and praised my father for choosing such a good name. He said it had noble connotations, like ‘rather be a shattered jade than an intact tile.’ It sounded so righteous, it made my father so angry that he changed my name overnight…”
Her voice grew softer, and Ling Ye didn’t hear the last two sentences clearly.
After replaying them in his mind, he asked sluggishly, “What’s so secret about that?”
“Of course it’s a secret! My father said the old name was unlucky, and if I ever mentioned it again, he would cut ties with me. Now that I’m telling you, if you tell my father, I’ll become an orphan…”
Ling Ye’s lips curved into a faint smile.
He wanted to say something else, but no more words escaped his lips.
The wind howled relentlessly, and snowflakes were blowing all over the place.
The two of them huddled together in the storm, and the world fell silent.
Nan Shan felt as if she was constantly falling, descending into an even darker place.
Where would she go?
Would Ling Ye come with her?
Would that place be as cold as here?
Suddenly, countless questions arose in her mind, and just as she was about to ask someone, a strand of hair gently brushed against her cheek.
It was a bit itchy.
Nan Shan’s eyelashes fluttered, and a teasing voice suddenly came into her ear:
“My little fiancée, how did you become this miserable after half a month?”
Who?
Nan Shan struggled to open her eyes. Warm fingers suddenly lifted her chin, pulling her away from Ling Ye’s chest.
She paused, her vision still blurred.
Before it could clear, the man had already bent down and pressed a kiss on her lips.
Her lips met and parted, a thread of silver light fell on Nan Shan’s lips, and warmth rushed from her throat, quickly spreading to her limbs.
On her previously smooth and fair neck, a silver butterfly trembled its wings before disappearing in an instant.
Nan Shan couldn’t see the butterfly, only a pair of alluring, yet not feminine, eyes, and a few strands of fiery red and silver-gray long hair.
Then, she knew nothing.
“Why is she still not awake?”
“The frostbite has healed, and there is no major harm to her body. She probably just overexerted herself and hasn’t woken up yet.”
The murmurs came repeatedly, accompanied by the sound of footsteps and sighs.
Nan Shan wanted to continue sleeping, but she had no choice but to reluctantly open her eyes.
As soon as she did, she found herself face to face with a girl who had three eyes.
She gasped, fully awake.
The three-eyed girl looked at her in surprise:
“Miss Nan Shan, you’re awake!”
Before she could finish speaking, the sound of hurried footsteps came, and Yan Yue appeared in the room.
He wanted to help her but hesitated to approach, only gazing at her repeatedly.
Nan Shan blinked and tested, “Is this my deathbed illusion, or have I already been saved?”
Yan Yue was about to answer when the three-eyed girl suddenly pinched her.
It hurt so much that she cried out, her face filled with disbelief.
“What are you doing?”
“Isn’t it common for mortals to use this method to verify whether they’re dreaming?”
The three-eyed girl said innocently.
Nan Shan’s mouth twitched.
Before she could speak, Yan Yue had already asked someone to remove the girl.
The room was left with just the two of them.
Nan Shan rubbed her brow, feeling like she had forgotten something important, but no matter how hard she tried to recall, nothing came to mind.
Snowfields, near death, and maybe seeing someone…
She was trying to remember when Yan Yue suddenly bowed to her seriously. Nan Shan was startled and quickly helped him up.
“Master Xian, what are you doing?!”
“Naturally, I am thanking my benefactor,” Yan Yue said, his eyes reddening.
“Child, if you hadn’t killed the Seven-Legged Serpent, my only son would have…”
Nan Shan: “Oh, so it was her who killed it.”
Yan Yue continued to express his gratitude, but Nan Shan was more concerned about another matter.
“Master Xian, when exactly did you find me?”
“According to the time inside the barrier, it was probably after the sealing of the wandering Qian position was reversed again.”
Yan Yue carefully responded.
Nan Shan paused, trying to understand his words.
“So, that means if we had just stayed still, we would have been naturally rescued after five hours?”
“What?” Yan Yue didn’t understand her meaning.
Nan Shan suddenly beat her chest and howled to the sky.
Yan Yue was startled and quickly asked her what was wrong. Nan Shan, looking at the kind elder, suddenly felt sorrowful. “Master Xian, Ling Ye and I almost died!”
“What exactly happened?” Yan Yue asked urgently.
Nan Shan suppressed the part about Ling Ye battling the Seven-Legged Serpent and detailed how she and Ling Ye were almost killed while chasing the seal.
Although Yan Yue had heard a rough version from Ling Ye, it was the first time he heard such a vivid and dramatic version.
Even though he knew they had been saved, he was still shocked.
After Nan Shan finished speaking, she took a sip of tea to quench her dry mouth.
Just as she set the cup down, she heard Yan Yue say, “Nan Shan, I have a question for you.”
“You may ask,” Nan Shan raised her head.
Yan Yue pondered for a moment and then asked, “At that time, you could have walked out of the seal on your own, so why did you go back to find Ling Ye?”
“Because she is fond of me,” Nan Shan replied after a long silence.
Zhi Can, holding a chicken leg, froze, looking like a dumb goose:
“Really? When did that happen? How come I didn’t know?”