Chapter 3

Chapter 3

She was a terribly talkative little phoenix. Sometimes I envied how she could find so much to say.

She spoke about the waters of Mount Fengming, the legends of the Sacred Parasol Grove, and gossip from her clan. Her third sister had fallen in love with a mortal emperor and gone down to marry him, only to discover that his empress was another woman. On the neighboring mountain, a little hedgehog had fallen for a she-wolf at the foot of the peak, and the wolf pack’s leader had pulled out every one of his spines. How pitiful…

She followed He Qiong everywhere. He never showed her a pleasant expression, but I knew he liked her lively chatter.

He was not a man who forced himself to endure what he disliked. Though he appeared to ignore Feng Jue, he never ordered her to be quiet, go away, or disappear from his sight.

When she grew tired of walking, she would turn into a fluffy red bird, perch on his shoulder, hop about, and sing beside his ear.

Whenever Feng Jue was not looking, I could see the curve at the corner of his mouth.

Together, the two of them seemed to carry their own barrier, shutting out everyone and everything irrelevant.

Including me.

One day, Feng Jue pointed at me and asked, “He Qiong, why does she keep following you?”

He did not answer. Feng Jue spent the entire day sullen, head bowed, occasionally glancing from me to him. Secretly, I felt a flicker of delight-until dinner, when He Qiong explained in an almost careless tone, “She is my spirit beast.”

Feng Jue immediately brightened. She wrapped her arms around his neck and pouted sweetly. “Then why didn’t you tell me sooner?”

I lowered my head and quietly withdrew.

He Qiong had given me a new life and a human form. He had shown me the wonders of the Three Realms over centuries. A person should not be too greedy. He had already given me so very much. Just as he had been the first light in my life, I was sincerely happy to see him find his own light.

Feng Jue left on an otherwise ordinary day after receiving a summons from her clan. Before she departed, she repeatedly told He Qiong to wait for her in the parasol grove on Mount Lingxiao in half a month.

He Qiong cast her an indifferent glance. “Why should I wait for you?”

Feng Jue stamped her feet in outrage, and he smiled faintly.

After she left, his mind seemed to leave with her. He often sprawled in a tree and stared into space, a trace of a smile sometimes lingering on his lips. I knew he was thinking of Feng Jue.

A demon could live for millennia; even a hundred years passed in the flick of a finger. Yet through those brief fifteen days, he repeatedly asked, “Du Nan, what day is it?”

I counted the days and told him the appointed time had not come, but he clearly could not wait. On the seventh day, we were already waiting on Mount Lingxiao.

More than a month passed. At last, He Qiong could wait no longer. “Du Nan, I’m going to Mount Fengming.”

Naturally, I went with him.

Nothing had happened to Feng Jue. She had simply told her clan elders that she wanted to marry He Qiong. They called her foolish and confined her to Reflection Cliff.

When we arrived, people were still gathered beneath the cliff, discussing her scandalous defiance.

“She’s so young. Who knows what sort of man deceived her into demanding marriage?”

“Exactly. She’s the Goddess of the Nine Heavens, the sole heir of her line. Her betrothal was settled long ago. How could she make such a decision on her own?”

“What shameless rogue dared seduce our goddess?”

He Qiong climbed the steps at an easy pace. At the foot of Reflection Cliff, he stopped and smiled at the speechless crowd.

“I did.”

The struggle over their marriage lasted a long time. The records of the Three Realms probably preserved everything that followed. At He Qiong and Feng Jue’s wedding, the Celestial Realm launched its assault on the demon realm. He Qiong, still dressed in ceremonial red, had only just drawn his sword when Feng Jue wept and stabbed him from behind.

She struck his one fatal weakness, without the slightest mercy.

Chaos and slaughter erupted. Amid the fighting, I gathered one fragment of He Qiong’s soul and fled to the mortal realm.

There I nourished it every day with my heart’s blood. Five hundred years later, I rebuilt him.