Chapter 87: Cold

The next day, the moment he opened his eyes, he found Si Nuo Sang staring at him.

Well, so it was not a dream after all.

“Xuan Yuan Juesi, you’re awake!” Si Nuo Sang flashed her white teeth and smiled at him.

Xuan Yuan Juesi said nothing. He simply sat up and left her there.

Si Nuo Sang had been nothing but warm-faced kindness thrown against his cold indifference. Even after she had gone this far, Xuan Yuan Juesi was still angry. Did he really have that much anger to give? Honestly, he did not understand her at all. There could never be anything between her and Ye Xuan. And yet he kept targeting Ye Xuan. Ye Xuan was a good man; no matter how she explained it, he would not listen. Compared with Qin Li and him, those were two entirely different matters.

A person only believes what he wants to believe, and cannot see the truth.

Women could judge women best of all. That Qin Li, even if she were not the culprit, even if she had been framed, even if she were of Thousand Gates, was still not a good woman. Of that, she was absolutely certain.

“Where are you going?” Si Nuo Sang did not want things to stay this stiff, so she hurriedly got out of bed, barefoot, and ran after him, catching his hand.

“Training the troops.”

Xuan Yuan Juesi answered in two icy words. He should never have stayed here yesterday. Then today he would not have been caught red-handed.

Anyway, he was indeed still angry. She kept thinking about him and Qin Li, so why could he not think about her and Ye Xuan? Si Nuo Sang knew nothing at all, yet acted as if she understood everything. Even when he tried to explain, she could not fully hear it. Sigh. There was truly nothing he could do about her. The problem was that she and Ye Xuan, and her misunderstanding of him, had created trouble between them over and over again.

“I’m going with you,” Si Nuo Sang said thick-skinnedly.

“No need. I can go by myself. It’s inconvenient for you to be there.” With that, he did not even wait for her reply and left on his own. He looked rather lonely.

But the one who felt lonely was not Xuan Yuan Juesi. It was Si Nuo Sang.

“I’ve already been shameless to this extent, Xuan Yuan Juesi, can’t you at least show me a little face? You’re such a miser. The most miserly person in the whole world. I hate you.”

She sat in a chair and cursed him loudly, nearly driven mad.

Just what did Xuan Yuan Juesi want? If he did not care about her, why had he brought her back that day? If he did not care about her, why had he come yesterday? He clearly wanted to look after her, yet also wanted to act as though he did not care. What a contradictory man.

People always said women were contradictory, but men were even more so.

So this was how miserable she had become. It was almost laughable. She, Si Nuo Sang, had started to be reduced to this state.

She could not keep sinking like this. She was Si Nuo Sang, not some frail little girl. Getting back on her feet was only a matter of minutes.

So she washed her face, then chose a beautiful outfit. She arranged her hair and looked at herself with satisfaction in the bronze mirror. Even so, she could not see herself very clearly.

The mirror was too yellowed. But it was good enough, so long as her hair was not a mess. There was no makeup here for her to cover her face with anyway.

After coming back to the past, her skin had improved. It was the most natural kind of care.

Si Nuo Sang went on thinking, asking around among many people to see whether she could find any clues about Thousand Gates. But if Thousand Gates was targeting Bright Tower, then Qin Li had to be connected to Bright Tower in some way.

Two major assassin organizations appearing in the same place at the same time, and not fearing retaliation from each other—why would that be?

For one goal. And in the end, their goal was money.

Perhaps a client had hired both of them to come here at once. And it seemed to have happened only after Xuan Yuan Juesi arrived, because before that, nothing at all had happened.

Good heavens, if her imagination really ran wild like that, then it would mean Xuan Yuan Juesi was the target.

Unthinkable. Xuan Yuan Juesi, the target, with the two greatest assassin organizations in the martial world joining forces to deal with him. But they did not seem to want his life, otherwise they would have already made a move.

She thought of many possibilities, but still could not determine which one was most accurate.

“Si Nuo Sang, I’m here.”

A voice came from far away and shattered her calm.

“Ye Xuan.”

It was Ye Xuan.

She hurried toward the sound, and Ye Xuan ran over as well.

“You were fine yesterday, right?”

“I’m fine, don’t worry. And you? How are you?” She teased him on purpose.

“Si Nuo Sang, your smile is giving me gooseflesh. What is it?”

“I’m asking how you are. Why are you looking at me like that?” She did not understand the look in Ye Xuan’s eyes.

“That Ruan Qingnong is pretty good! She seems like a good girl, only she’s sadly fallen into the dust. I’ve asked around about her. She’s a proper woman who performs only her art and does not sell her body. She can play the zither, and most importantly, she’s beautiful.”

Si Nuo Sang sounded like she was arranging a match, talking nonstop, completely failing to notice the darkening of Ye Xuan’s face.

He really wanted to seal her mouth shut. Wasn’t she supposed to be clever? Why could she not understand his heart? Or was he hiding it too deeply, making it impossible for her to see?

Ye Xuan truly had no way with her. Suddenly, he lowered his head very slightly, as if he wanted to kiss her.

He stopped with only a sliver of a breath between them.

“What are you doing?”

“If you keep talking, I won’t be polite to you anymore.”

Ye Xuan said this while looking at her without the slightest courtesy.

“All right, all right, I won’t say anything. Is that good enough? Did you find any clues about Thousand Gates?”

As she spoke, Ye Xuan remembered Xuan Yuan Juesi’s warning: he must not take her to dangerous places. Besides, he had truly not found any news about Thousand Gates.

“No.”

“No? I thought you had found something!” Si Nuo Sang was disappointed.

“Do you think it’s so easy to find? I haven’t even found Qin Li, let alone Thousand Gates. These are all things without a shadow, impossible to get a grip on.” He put on a helpless look, as though he had the heart but not the strength.

Si Nuo Sang walked ahead of him, and only then did Ye Xuan notice the clothes she wore.

It was the very outfit she had chosen that day.

It suited her quite well, letting her blend right into the crowd of Cold City without the slightest hint that she was from elsewhere.

As for him, he could never blend in as easily.

“If you can’t make sense of it, then stop making sense of it. But Qin Li is a dangerous woman. You’d better not go looking for her. What if she sees how handsome you are and does something improper to you?”

Si Nuo Sang always liked to joke. Ye Xuan could only shake his head helplessly.

“Would she? Am I really that handsome?”

Clearly, Ye Xuan’s focus was very different from Si Nuo Sang’s.

“Pretty much.”