The Scent of the Orchid in the Forest of Secrets (密林兰香)

Chapter Twenty-Three

The Yu Sect was alive with clamor and noise the day the Yu Sect's party returned. Shu Haoyang, in particular, leaped forward and clung to Shu Haolin the moment she emerged from the crowd. To Shu Haolin's surprise, her little brother didn't cry, instead clinging to her very tightly. A slightly bitter smile spread over her face. "Yang-er, you've really grown up. Come here, it's my fault, I should've told you before I left."

Shu Haoyang hit her big sister with his small fist and sniffled. "I thought you weren't going to come back." He mumbled.

"How could that be? I, your big sister, am such a powerful cultivator. How could I let anyone hurt me?"

But Shu Haoyang was observant. "You're injured? What happened?" He gently lay a hand on Shu Haolin's back and watched as she winced.

"It's nothing. It's almost healed."

Shu Haoyang frowned, his expression nearing a pout.

"Come on, I'm really fine." Shu Haolin tried to coax her little brother, but his stormy expression stayed in place just as firmly. Yu Jielan, who was passing by, stifled a laugh. "Serves you right," she said out of the corner of her mouth.

Shu Haolin rolled her eyes and was given no choice but to follow as her little brother dragged her all the way to the medicine wards to get treatment. As she sat on one a chair, waiting for her little brother to apply a paste to the wound on her back, Chen Linfeng pushed open the door and entered. For a moment, the two of them stared at each other. Shu Haolin turned away her head first.

"Linfeng-gege, you're back too!" Shu Haoyang exclaimed and ran to hug Chen Linfeng, but Shu Haolin caught him by the sleeve, roughly jerking him back.

"Don't talk to him." She muttered darkly.

Shu Haoyang blinked. "What? Why?" But by the time he finished speaking, Chen Linfeng had already stridden back out the way he had come.

Shu Haolin sighed. "There's a lot that happened this trip. I'll tell you all slowly."

By the time Shu Haolin finished speaking, the liquid medicine that her little brother had been brewing had already gone cold. He held it in his hands, staring down at the dark liquid. His expression was unreadable. Shu Haolin felt her heart twist uncomfortably. All this time, she'd never really asked her little brother how he felt, how he had been coping with the death of their parents. She'd always been focused on cultivation, getting more and more powerful, and investigating their deaths, carelessly leaving him behind in the Yu Sect.

"Yang-er, come here." She said softly. Shu Haoyang shuffled forward, not seeming to be aware of his own actions. Shu Haolin gently lay her hand on his cheek. "It's okay... Don't be upset. Tomorrow, I'll find a time to visit Yu Ziyan in prison and think of a way to get him to lift your curse. You'll be all good in no time."

"Mn." Shu Haoyang said, slightly lifelessly.

Shu Haolin sighed. "Come, give me the medicine."

He didn't comply, pulling the bowl out of her reach. "It's cold. I'll go heat it up for you," he said, shuffling away. Shu Haolin couldn't help but smile.

***

It was late when the knock came at her door. Shu Haolin opened it cautiously and found Yu Jielan standing outside in a set of simple robes.

"Hey, what are you doing here? It's so cold outside, quick, come inside." Shu Haolin made way for her to enter, but Yu Jielan didn't budge.

"I missed you." She said very honestly. Shu Haolin was struck dumb. Who knew that Yu Jielan carried around such an icy exterior all day long, but was actually capable of spouting such warm words?

Shu Haolin felt her face growing hot. "You..." She glanced back to where her little brother was already asleep. "He might've heard..."

Yu Jielan furrowed her brows, and for a moment, she looked genuinely upset. "Are you ashamed of me?"

"What? What are you talking about, how could I ever be..." Shu Haolin trailed off, wordless in front of the slight smile on Yu Jielan's lips. Shu Haolin shook her finger in front of her, not knowing what to say.

"Come, take a walk with me." Yu Jielan urged. Shu Haolin nodded in agreement, grabbing two cloaks from inside and draping one over Yu Jielan's shoulders as well.

"Let's go."

The night was cold, and the moonlight of the full moon spilling down on their shoulders didn't help at all. The wind whistled through the tall, dead grass. Now that Shu Haolin could walk shoulder to shoulder with Yu Jielan, even the usually unpleasant and distracting rustling of the grass sounded pleasant to the ear. "Is there something you wanted to talk with me about?"

Yu Jielan shook her head. "Not really." But then, she paused. "There's a lot I want to talk about." She corrected herself.

Shu Haolin laughed lightly. "Okay. Say it."

But Yu Jielan remained silent for a long time. "There's a lot to say, I don't know where to start."

Shu Haolin shook her head, unable to hide the smile at her lips. "Since when did the jade of the Yu Sect, Yu Jielan, become so ineloquent. Fine, if you don't know where to start, I'll start. When did you start to like me?"

Yu Jielan was taken aback. "I... I don't know. I just remember thinking that... wow, my study mate, she's really cool. I can't believe a person like her would be willing to talk with me, to get to know me, especially since my father, he..."

A somber atmosphere fell over the two of them again. "Are you thinking the same thing as me?" Shu Haolin asked.

"That this is just the calm before the storm? Yes, I am."

Shu Haolin nodded. "Now that we've determined there must be a third party behind all this, we still have a long way to go. This third party led us to suspect and investigate Yu Ziyan, using Shao Mingrong and Chen Linfeng to lead us astray. We still don't know who the mastermind is, and whether or not your father might've been wrongfully accused in some aspects."

Yu Jielan pressed her lips tightly together and nodded.

"My parents were the survivors of the Lin Sect. So was Chen Linfeng, and I think my shifu also. Yu Ziyan massacred the Lin Sect under the excuse that they were demonic cultivators, and it made sense that he would also kill my parents to clean up any last evidence. But there's still a problem here."

"What did he do in the thirteen years in between, when he was supposed to be dead?" Yu Jielan followed up effortlessly.

"Exactly. In those thirteen years, did he never need to take the yuan qi of another? How could that be possible? After all, once started, it's addictive, not to mention he took the yuan qi of almost everyone in the Lin Sect. From there on, his appetite would've only gotten bigger—it couldn't have gotten smaller."

"That would mean we've been overlooking the suspicious deaths of many people at once. But how could that be possible? Surely someone would've reported it to us at once. And my father, he's always stayed in the Yu Sect, so these deaths must've happened nearby. It becomes even less possible that the deaths of a large group of people nearby could've gone unnoticed. Also, in the period shortly after the battle, my father had been staying in seclusion to heal his wounds for a couple of months, and he had never left. Where would he have gotten the yuan qi to steal and supplement his growing addiction?"

Shu Haolin frowned. "If this path of demonic cultivation can be described as an addiction, it means that it is still possible to break the addiction and continue on following the right path, right?"

"Of course. But it's very difficult, and at the scale he had achieved, to break the addiction would've meant heart-breaking and bone-crushing pain for a month." Yu Jielan went silent, her brows tightly furrowed, and her mouth unconsciously frowned.

"I can't understand it either. He was perfectly fine, an undefeatable figure in the jianghu. Why would he have suddenly wanted to risk this kind of horrible pain to stop cultivating the demonic path?" Shu Haolin asked. "Unless... did something else happen around this time?"

Yu Jielan's footsteps suddenly stopped. "Yes. My mother died."