A minute passed, the rustling of willow leaves, the soft fall of distant water, everything seemed to return to stillness. And yet, the air between the two did not settle.
Lao Xie stood a few steps away, half-turned toward the pond, white robes gently stirred by the breeze.
While Ling Ruxin remained beneath the tree, unmoving. Her guqin still rested across her lap, though her fingers had long stopped playing. She stared at his back in silence.
"…You're not going to say anything?" she asked at last.
Her voice was calm, but it carried a faint edge half tension, half curiosity.
Lao Xie finally moved.
Not toward her.
Just a slow glance to the side, eyes catching the last of the evening light.
"I already did," he said, tone quiet but deliberate. "To the one who needed to hear it."
Ling Ruxin lowered her gaze.
"…Thank you," she said after a pause.
"Didn't I tell you we'd meet again?" Lao Xie replied lightly.
She blinked once beneath the veil. "Did you?"
A faint frown crept onto his face.
"Ugh… I don't really remember…" he thought. "I might've said it. Sounds like something I'd say…"
He brushed the thought aside.
He walked forward, hands still folded behind his back, stopping just at the pond's edge. His reflection trembled in the water white robes, golden eyes, expression unreadable.
"Why?" she asked.
A beat passed before she clarified. "Why help me?"
Lao Xie didn't turn. His voice was casual, almost bored.
"Because I wanted to."
She frowned faintly beneath the veil. "Just like that?"
"Do you need a better reason?"
"Mhm." She studied his silhouette in silence, her gaze lingering on the edges of his robe where the fading light touched like liquid gold.
"I have so many questions," she said softly, almost as if to herself.
Lao Xie's response was calm, steady. "Then ask."
She hesitated. Her fingers gently brushed the surface of her guqin, as if grounding her thoughts.
"…Are you really from the Outer Court?" she finally asked.
For a moment, he said nothing. The breeze stirred the pond again, and a lone leaf fell, its reflection trembling across the water.
"I am," he answered at last, his voice quiet but firm.
Ling Ruxin's brows knit slightly beneath her veil.
"Then why… why has no one ever heard of you?"
"They have," Lao Xie replied, still not turning to face her. "Everyone knows me."
Her eyes narrowed faintly. "You mean the rumors," she said. "That you couldn't cultivate. That you were the 'Little Mortal.'"
She paused, then asked more pointedly, "That was you?"
At that, Lao Xie gave a low chuckle, just under his breath.
"Well, who knows," he murmured, his tone deliberately vague. "Sometimes, rumors serve better than reputation."
There was a pause between them again, but it wasn't heavy. Just filled with unspoken thoughts.
"…What realm are you in now?" she asked next, her voice quieter than before.
Lao Xie finally turned, his golden eyes meeting hers across the soft distance. There was something in his gaze.
Calm, unfathomable, but not hostile.
"I don't know," he said lightly, as if the answer hardly mattered to him.
She tilted her head slightly. "You're stronger than me," she said, not quite a question. "I can feel it."
He offered no denial.
"Perhaps."
As he stood there, his mind flicked to the panel without breaking his expression.
[AFFINITY ]
Ling Ruxin
Interest: 1 Star
Relationship: Fellow Disciple
Age: 17
Cultivation Stage: Qi Refinement, 2nd Stage
Affiliation: Silver Crescent Mountain Peak, Inner Disciple.
"Second stage…" he murmured without realizing.
Ling Ruxin caught it. "Hm? What did you say?"
Lao Xie blinked once, then turned away as if brushing off dust from his sleeve. "Nothing important."
He took a slow breath, casting one last glance at the darkening sky. "In any case, it's getting late."
Just as he was about to step away, he paused, as though remembering something.
Turning slightly, his gaze met hers once more not sharp, not soft, but something in between. A calm curve formed at the corner of his lips, unreadable yet oddly familiar.
"If you're still curious…" he said, voice light but clear, "you should come watch the tournament."
Ling Ruxin tilted her head faintly, caught off guard by the sudden shift.
"The tournament?" she echoed.
He nodded slowly, as if it were a matter of casual suggestion. "You might find the answers you're looking for… or at the very least, see something interesting."
The breeze tugged at his robes again as he turned fully this time, walking toward the edge of the garden.
Ling Ruxin watched his back as it receded, the words lingering in her ears like a faint chord struck on a guqin string.
She wasn't sure if it was an invitation, or simply a passing remark.
She sat quietly beneath the willow, her guqin resting across her lap, untouched. The sound of Lao Xie's footsteps had long faded into the evening mist, but his presence still lingered like the echo of a song that refused to end.
Her eyes drifted toward the garden path, half-hooded beneath her veil. The ripples on the pond had begun to settle, but her thoughts had not.
"The outer disciple tournament…"
The words clung to her mind.
"You should come watch."
It had sounded casual. A passing remark. But the look in his eyes, unbothered had left a mark far too precise to be accidental.
Her fingers pressed lightly against the guqin strings, not to play, but to ground herself.
"That nickname… 'Little Mortal.'"
She remembered hearing about it from a few senior sisters months ago. Some bizarre story about a nameless outer disciple who couldn't even cultivate. It had been a joke, at first how could someone like that survive in the sect?
But the rumors refused to die. Whispers of it grew louder, persistent enough to creep into the inner court.
She had never cared to investigate them before.
And yet… if what she saw today was real-
"That pressure he released… That control…"
Ling Ruxin's gaze lowered to the surface of the pond, where the moon had begun to rise in reflection. Her veil shifted gently as the breeze passed.
"No outer disciple should be capable of that."
Even many inner disciples struggled to control their Qi with such stability. Not just brute strength, but finesse, the kind that came from understanding the flow of energy as intimately as one understood breath and thought.
And yet, he wore it like a second skin.
"He's… hard to understand."
Unlike Hai Mu, who couldn't hide his emotions… or Young Master Li, who always tried to impress her with arrogance polished into confidence, Lao Xie had done nothing of the sort.
He hadn't shown off.
He hadn't pleaded for attention.
But somehow, every word, every movement, had drawn her deeper into curiosity.
Even now, she couldn't say what his intentions were.
"But if he really is the 'Little Mortal'…"
"Then that nickname might be the last thing people will remember him as." She closed her eyes briefly, exhaling into the stillness.
This tournament wasn't just some promotion test or chance for outer disciples to shine.
At least, not for him.
"For him, it might be a stage."
She opened her eyes again, their light calm yet focused. "…I'll watch," she whispered.
It wasn't a decision made out of politeness.
But curiousity.