Like a Dream, Like an Illusion

Just at this moment, when even despair had become somewhat numb.

A large, warm hand, without any warning, passed under Lu Qiancha’s armpits and gently lifted her from the cold grass.

“Ngh…?”

Lu Qiancha raised her small face, which was covered in dust and tear stains, in a daze. Her vision struggled to focus through the blurry tears, and she saw a somewhat familiar deep blue figure—the Wolf King Xun Xue, the culprit who had completely crushed her life.

Lu Qiancha’s heart was filled with mixed feelings.

“It’s hard living alone out here, isn’t it?”

Xun Xue’s voice was low and gentle, carrying a penetrating power that seemed able to pierce the soul.

“…”

Lu Qiancha pursed her lips tightly. She wanted to question, to curse, to struggle. But for some reason, her throat felt as if it were firmly blocked by something.

Her body couldn’t even muster a shred of strength to push the other person away…

What terrified Lu Qiancha even more was that in her heart, there was no monstrous anger as she had imagined, but a blank, dead silence, and a weakness that greedily craved that warmth, which she was unwilling to admit even to herself…

“From now on, Mama will take care of you…”

Xun Xue’s arms tightened slightly, gently circling the thin, cold, scratched, and dusty little body into her embrace.

“Mama…?”

Lu Qiancha unconsciously repeated these two unfamiliar syllables, her eyes hollow and bewildered as she looked at Xun Xue like a lost traveler.

‘I should hate her, but why…’

“Mm, from now on, I am your mama.”

Xun Xue nodded, her proud eyes holding only an almost clumsy gentleness.

“Wuu…”

A suppressed whimper, as faint as a mosquito’s buzz, overflowed from the depths of Lu Qiancha’s throat. As if drained of her last bit of strength, her little head rested gently on Xun Xue’s warm shoulder.

“Eh, eh, don’t cry.”

Xun Xue was a little flustered. She had never experienced such a scene before, and her voice carried a hint of panic: “Mama will take you to eat something delicious.”

“Okay… Mama.”

Lu Qiancha responded vaguely, her voice as thin as a thread. The long-tense nerves, the starving body, and the sudden, huge emotional impact instantly drowned her like a tide.

She fell into a deep sleep, curled up in Xun Xue’s warm and unfamiliar embrace.

When she regained consciousness, the first thing Lu Qiancha felt was the warm water wrapping around her body.

And a pair of gentle hands, carefully washing her long hair behind her.

“Be good, don’t move.”

Xun Xue’s voice came from above, with a hint of a helpless smile, “Your hair is all messy…”

Water flowed down her hair strands. Lu Qiancha opened her eyes slightly, and through the misty steam, she saw the dazzling scenery…

“Ngh…”

Lu Qiancha’s face flushed red. Shame made her instinctively want to jump out of this warm bathtub.

“Splash!” Water splashed everywhere. Just as she pushed herself up on the edge of the tub, lifting her wet body…

The next instant.

A firm hand pressed gently on her shoulder, pushing her back into the warm water.

“You have to wash properly to become even cuter.”

Xun Xue’s voice was as soft as a breeze, her fingertips gently rubbing her steamy little head.

“…”

Lu Qiancha’s body stiffened, like a kitten having its fur smoothed.

The strength to resist gradually dissipated in that clumsy yet genuine gentleness.

She slowly relaxed her tense muscles.

She sank back into the warm water that enveloped her.

Feeling the other person following the flow of water, stroking her tail, ears, and body…

Washed clean of dust.

Changed into soft, clean new clothes.

Lu Qiancha sat on a wooden stool covered with animal skin, looking at her trimmed nails.

Her nails were polished round and neat, the pads of her paws glowed pink, and the skin on her arms, after being soaked in hot water, also revealed a long-lost healthy, pink luster.

Compared to her days of wandering, all this was a bit too wonderful.

Like a fragile, easily broken dream.

Lu Qiancha looked up instinctively, her gaze carrying a hint of bewildered inquiry.

“Hm?”

Seeming to sense that gaze filled with unease.

Xun Xue turned slightly, stopping the movements of her hands, and revealed a soft smile, “What’s wrong?”

“…”

Lu Qiancha looked at her quietly for several breaths.

Finally, she just shook her head gently.

She said nothing.

Five years passed peacefully under Xun Xue’s wing. No longer needing to run around just to fill her stomach, Lu Qiancha was able to concentrate on cultivation. Her once-shattered cultivation had now recast the foundation of the Golden Core Dao.

On this day, she finally couldn’t suppress the surging longing in her heart. Clutching a dusty sect token, she quietly passed through the mountain protection array that rippled like water. Her figure like smoke, she sneaked along the familiar yet strange mountain path, finally lying prone on a cliff on Tianquan Peak, holding her breath and gazing.

In the distance, a slender but upright figure was sitting cross-legged in the flying snow, breathing and cultivating.

It was her junior sister, Gan Tang.

In the years Lu Qiancha had been away, Gan Tang seemed to be a different person.

The once naive smile had long faded, her brows were knit with unmelting frost, and the spiritual energy surging around her was as deep as the sea. Her cultivation had actually reached the Void Refining realm.

From Nascent Soul to Void Refining in just five short years.

This progress was truly unbelievably fast.

A complex sense of relief flashed through Lu Qiancha’s heart.

‘In this way, Gan Tang can also stand on her own.’

Then, Lu Qiancha’s gaze swept past that figure.

Finally, it fixed on two glaringly small burial mounds not far away.

Her heart suddenly sank to the icy bottom of a valley.

The complex relief that had just surged up instantly froze, turning into a cold block of lead, falling straight into the abyss.

She walked closer step by step, her fingertips almost trembling as she brushed over the cold carvings on the simple stone tablets:

The slightly larger one on the left—”Tomb of Master Xuan Ya”

The slightly smaller one on the right—”Tomb of Senior Brother Lu Qiancha”

Lu Qiancha was still standing here perfectly fine, but she was no longer the eldest senior brother of the past…

And Master…

“…Master…”

A choke stuck in her throat, and hot tears could no longer be suppressed, bursting from her eyes.

“Boom!”

A clap of thunder tore through the sky without warning.

At the same time, a bone-chilling coldness suddenly erupted from behind her.

Lu Qiancha turned her head abruptly to look—

A figure interwoven with blue and pink stood like a ghost less than three steps behind her. On Gan Tang’s face was a heavy gloom Lu Qiancha had never seen before. Those once clear eyes were now churning with cold killing intent.

“Wolf demon, what are you doing in front of my master and senior brother’s graves?”

Gan Tang’s voice was as if quenched in ice shards. The small sword in her hand, once light and agile, was now condensed with biting frost.

Before her voice had fallen, the sword light had already turned into a life-taking cold star, stabbing straight at Lu Qiancha’s heart.

“Wuu-ah!”

Intense pain instantly pierced through her body. Before Lu Qiancha could even react, the life-saving spirit talisman bestowed by Xun Xue at her waist suddenly lit up with dazzling brilliance.

In the nick of time, her figure instantly turned into a stream of light and dissipated within Tianquan Peak.