CHAPTER 410: 406

There was a slight chill in the early morning air.

But inside the covers, it was very warm.

Brother Nan, fast asleep, was completely different from her awake self—honest and well-behaved, with her mouth slightly open, looking a bit foolish.

Zhou Li had seen in short videos that girls tend to wrap around their boyfriends and use their legs to trap them while sleeping, and the male protagonists in those videos always seemed annoyed by it. However, Brother Nan rarely behaved like this, leaving Zhou Li feeling somewhat empty, as if he was missing out on some experiences compared to other boyfriends.

There was another difference from the daytime.

Brother Nan, when asleep, only wore shorts. Her legs, which felt cool to the touch during the day, were now burning hot.

The similarity lay in their smoothness.

Zhou Li quietly enjoyed the sensation, saying nothing.

The two were lying very close to each other. Brother Nan’s breath hit his face, carrying the scent of her hair. This made him, who had never been in a relationship before, feel dizzy, sometimes even doubting whether this moment was real.

Something fluffy was moving at their feet, tentatively, without its usual presumptuousness.

Zhou Li paid it no attention.

Until a knocking sound came from the door, followed by Huai Xu’s very low voice—

"Are you up yet?"

"..."

Zhou Li quietly slipped out from under the covers, careful not to wake Brother Nan, and then began to get dressed.

But he still heard a long, drawn-out whine from Brother Nan—a lazy and soft sound, unlike her usual self—and then she opened one eye slightly, peering at Zhou Li.

"You’re awake~~"

"Yeah."

"Check if Master Xuanqing sent me any messages~~"

Each sentence was unusually soft, trailing off, making Zhou Li’s ears buzz, barely able to make out what she was saying.

If Brother Nan always talked like this... he might just explode on the spot.

Coming to his senses quickly, Zhou Li found Brother Nan’s phone by the pillow, pressed it on, and said, "It’s locked with a password..."

A pale arm stretched out from the covers, brandishing an index finger.

Zhou Li then gently took her hand, used her fingerprint to unlock the phone, and couldn’t help but sniff—her movement caused a warm and fragrant scent to waft out from under the covers.

"Nothing."

"Then ask her for me~~"

"Do you always talk like this when you’re not fully awake?"

"Whut~~"

"Nothing."

"Noob~"

"???"

How did it suddenly turn into insults? And what does that word have to do with anything we were just talking about?

Zhou Li was left with a head full of question marks.

He texted in silence.

The whispering at the doorway reached him again. Audible only to Zhou Li, Huai Xu’s voice said, "You’re awake and still lying in bed... is sleeping with your girlfriend that comfortable?"

The voice was as faint as a thief’s. Zhou Li simply couldn’t be bothered with him.

After sending the message, he waited a moment before telling the squinting Brother Nan, "She hasn’t replied to you."

He paused, then added, "You go back to sleep. I’ll pick her up once she texts back, or I’ll call you."

"Call me~~"

"Okay."

So Brother Nan slept on, reassured.

Zhou Li held her phone. He glanced at the WeChat interface inadvertently as he exited the chat window, then checked several more times nonchalantly whenever he returned to the main screen. He then searched the settings and extended the lock screen time to the maximum, as he couldn’t find an option to disable it completely. Afterwards, he put the phone in his pocket and headed out after putting on his shoes.

A small head suddenly popped up at the foot of the bed—

"AWOO~"

Zhou Li was startled at first, then shivered, pretending to be scared.

Tuanzi’s face showed satisfaction. Subconsciously, however, she knew Zhou Li was just humoring her, so she didn’t say much. She merely crawled out from under the covers, stood up, and stretched her front paws toward Zhou Li. "Hold Lord Dumpling~~"

Lord Dumpling was very magnanimous.

「One minute later.」

Zhou Li, holding Tuanzi, pushed the door open.

The Old Monster was already doing calisthenics on the doorstep.

Zhou Li couldn’t help but feel frustrated; he sometimes just couldn’t understand the Old Monster’s thought process.

"Yay, you’re out!"

"..."

"Did you sleep well last night?"

"What about you?"

"Me? I slept like a log!" Huai Xu grinned widely, seemingly in a good mood.

"Where did you sleep?"

"Hmm..."

The Old Demon understood immediately and didn’t try to hide it. He just blinked and said, "I sat out here for a while last night, then went home to sleep. The internet isn’t great here, the blanket is a bit damp, and it’s nowhere near as comfortable as my own little bed, right? Besides, I’m not interested in whatever noises you two kids might make at night. I’ve lived for so many years..."

After he finished, he even asked in return, "What’s up?"

"Nothing much."

"Let me guess..." Huai Xu stopped his calisthenics, touched his chin, and said, "Could it be that you couldn’t sleep last night? Did you realize that compared to your girlfriend, Huai Xu is actually cuter? So you wanted to sneak over and sleep next to me, only to find I wasn’t there. Is that why you went back to your room, disappointed, and slept next to your girlfriend again?"

"Not bad imagination."

"I once wrote an essay, and my teacher also said I had a good imagination," Huai Xu said, nodding seriously.

"Something big happened last night."

"What big thing?"

"It’s just..."

"Hmm?"

Zhou Li walked over to the side, hugging Tuanzi in silence.

Huai Xu immediately followed him.

"What is it?"

"What happened?"

"What’s going on?"

"Is it related to those two humans? Why aren’t they in the temple? Their car has been moved too. Where did you all go last night? Why was Li Daimao interested in news about that little girl? Why did you go to pick them up? Where did you pick them up from?" Huai Xu stuck close to him.

"You do observe quite thoroughly," Zhou Li couldn’t help but praise. "Truly professional."

"Of course... Come on, tell me what happened!"

"Why aren’t you talking again?"

"You’re so annoying!"

Zhou Li ignored everything. Holding Tuanzi, he went to the well to fetch water to wash his face and brush his teeth. Meanwhile, he talked to Tuanzi about how cold the water was, hearing Tuanzi parrot back, "Water so girly!" and then laughed that Lord Dumpling was like a little echo machine. In short, he paid no mind to the Old Monster beside him, who was growing increasingly curious, constantly guessing and theorizing without response, and gradually becoming extremely frustrated.

「It was probably around ten in the morning.」

Master Xuanqing still hadn’t replied to his messages.

Brother Nan had already woken up. She was sitting on a small stool by the door, combing her hair, still dazed from sleep.

Her cowlick looked rather droopy.

Zhou Li noticed that she deliberately combed around her cowlick.

So it really does hurt?

Vehicle sounds emerged from the foot of the mountain.

Brother Nan’s combing paused, and she turned to look at Zhou Li.

Zhou Li shrugged his shoulders and got up to greet the newcomers.

Halfway up the mountain, he saw a van at the end of the small road. A man and Master Xuanqing were together, helping the trembling old Temple Master walk toward the Taoist temple.

Zhou Li quickened his pace.

Soon, they returned to the Taoist temple.

The man appeared to be familiar with Master Xuanqing and the old Temple Master. After some initial refusal, he accepted the cab fare from Master Xuanqing, then went to offer incense before leaving the mountain.

"Why didn’t you send me a message?" Brother Nan followed them, still groggy. "Didn’t we agree that I would come pick you up?"

"The hospital was so boring. I played on my phone all night and the battery died," Master Xuanqing said weakly. "So I found a van on the street to take us back. It was a driver I knew from before; he’d come to pray to the Ginkgo tree for blessings in the past."

"..."

Hearing a somewhat mystical female cultivator softly admit she’d played on her phone all night, Brother Nan felt it was a bit surreal, a sense of incongruity. However, she accepted the explanation and asked, "How is the Temple Master doing?"

"A bit better now."

"He needs to rest well and recover fully," Brother Nan said, then paused. "Oh, right, we’ve decided not to leave today, so we’ll be bothering you for one more day. We’ll just walk around and explore the area. The ginkgo trees here are prettier than those in Ginkgo Village, so we can take more pictures."

"Okay."

Master Xuanqing helped the old Temple Master back to his room to lie down. As they passed by the Hall of the Three Purities, she discovered that the van driver had left the fare she’d given him on a prayer cushion, treating it as an offering. This made her feel somewhat conflicted.

「In the courtyard.」

Brother Nan and Zhou Li gathered around the ancient bell. They gently tapped its surface with their knuckles to test if it truly couldn’t make a sound.

Huai Xu watched them, bored.

It turned out Master Xuanqing wasn’t lying. Their fingers tapping on the ancient bell indeed produced no sound. It was a strange feeling, as if the bell absorbed the energy of their taps and the expected reverberations.

Master Xuanqing came over. After a slight hesitation, she said, "You might not believe this, but last month, it suddenly rang."

"How did it ring?"

"It rang by itself."

Master Xuanqing’s expression was calm. "It was one afternoon when I was livestreaming. No one touched it, and suddenly it rang. The sound was very loud, carried very far, and the echo lasted a long time. It was the first time I’d ever heard it ring. My master, Boss Zhang, and the twenty-something people watching my livestream all heard it."

"That mystical?" Brother Nan was stunned. "Really?"

"What did the old Temple Master say?" Zhou Li’s concern was different. He thought the old Temple Master knew about the bell but hadn’t told Master Xuanqing because she was unwilling to take over the temple.

"Only twenty-something viewers? How pathetic," Huai Xu’s focus was also elsewhere.

"My master was very excited. He kept mumbling, ’It’s real, it’s real!’ and asked me to check if anyone had come. But when I went down to look, there was no one," Master Xuanqing said, her face turning slightly red from Huai Xu’s remark. "Still, my master was so agitated that he had to be sent to the hospital within minutes. Fortunately, Boss Zhang was there, and he got timely medical assistance."

"I see..." Zhou Li fell into thought.

"Yes," Master Xuanqing nodded. She shifted slightly to avoid Huai Xu’s gaze and continued calmly, "Maybe there really are some things in this world that we can’t currently explain."

"You believe in deities, don’t you?"

"Not really."

"Hmm, but aren’t you a Taoist practitioner?" Brother Nan blinked.

"I don’t quite believe in deities, and I haven’t formally become a nun," Master Xuanqing explained, seeing Brother Nan still looked puzzled. She thought for a moment. "Taoist philosophy contains many profound principles. If deities exist in this world, then Taoism must have been established by them, and it’s only natural for believers to join. But if there are no deities, and these teachings all come from humans, then it shouldn’t be a problem for non-believers to follow Taoism, right?"

"Huh!"

Brother Nan found it amusing.