IS Chapter 54
by VolareIn the end, Dragon Li Yuan couldn’t control himself.
Or perhaps, he never intended to control himself in the first place.
Even with his eyes covered and unable to see, he still managed to get close, reach out, and accurately lean over to embrace him.
“Don’t move, let me smell,” Li Yuan said. “That piece of dragon brain was too bitter, it makes you smell fragrant.”
—So?
Because he smells fragrant, he has to smell him? Besides, he doesn’t smell fragrant at all.
Li Yuan eventually pressed close to Ye Zhuo’s neck.
Closer to the skin, the fragrance was indeed clearer than from the sleeves.
That aura was light and faint, particularly ethereal against the backdrop of the bitter cold, like a diluted sweetness soaked in water.
It reminded Li Yuan of that slender sword, “Late Clearing.” It was also like this, a limpid, flowing cyan color, imbued with a faint, light red, like a lotus in water.
He now knew many human allusions, and naturally understood that the two characters “Late Clearing” inherently contained a metaphor for the lotus flower.
Lotuses are born in water, hence they possess both the moisture of water and the spiritual essence of vegetation.
Just as he thought of this, he was interrupted by the other person’s impatient question: “Have you smelled enough?”
Not enough.
The black dragon was also born in water.
Holding such a person in his arms made Li Yuan feel instinctively pleased.
So he wanted to kiss this person’s cheek before he would be satisfied and let him go.
Thinking this, he did just that.
A cool, soft sensation brushed past the corner of his lips, like a dragonfly skimming the surface of water. He couldn’t see, but the place he touched didn’t seem to be entirely the cheek.
Like lightly sipping a drop of cool dew from the edge of a lotus leaf.
The next moment, the other person turned his head to avoid his touch, withdrew his fingers, placed them on his shoulder, and tried to push him away.
Li Yuan thought he must have been stunned for a moment.
After a brief daze, light suddenly appeared before his eyes, abruptly revealing the other person’s face in the candlelight.
His brows were slightly furrowed, as if displeased. In the close gaze, his eyes reflected his own image, yet still remained a pool of shimmering, empty light.
Li Yuan’s eyes, however, involuntarily looked at the place he had unintentionally touched just now.
His fingertip gently brushed over the thin, graceful corner of his lips, pressing against the other person’s lips.
“You don’t want me to touch here?”
Ye Zhuo slowly thought about it.
Actually, there was no particular reason for avoiding it.
It was just too close, making him feel uncomfortable.
So he nodded.
With the movement, his ink-like black hair scattered a little more.
“Then forget it.” Li Yuan moved his finger away.
The light touch vanished in an instant.
——It seemed he really hadn’t touched this place much.
If he really touched it, like that, with his breath so close, it would feel inexplicably offensive.
More often, he preferred those places that would elicit a reaction when touched.
His fingers threaded through the flowing hair.
“Are you really not a lotus demon?” Li Yuan asked.
Otherwise, why would he have such an aura, and why would he have such a beautiful face?
Even his robes and long hair spread out in his arms, resembling half-open lotus petals.
Moreover, he grew in a deserted world, in a freezing, snowy cold pool, the heavens and earth were clear and empty, and there was also silence in the bottom of his eyes and heart. He swam across the East Sea to come here, and saw the appearance of a red lotus half-bloomed in the snow, but if he approached it, he would instead feel that he was disturbing his cultivation.
Ye Zhuo didn’t seem to understand his words: “What are you saying?”
So Li Yuan earnestly asked again.
Ye Zhuo quietly looked at him: “Do you really want to die?”
Li Yuan laughed and couldn’t help but bite the other person’s neck.
Ye Zhuo’s shoulders and back were pressed against the bookcase beside him, a corner filled with Buddhist scriptures.
In the narrow space, wisps of dragon scent lingered.
Following that wisp of scent, he sniffed, and it seemed that, as Li Yuan said, the dragon brain fragrance left a trace of cold, bitter aftertaste, which instead highlighted Dragon Li Yuan’s dragon scent, like the bright moon in the vast sea, which was still quite pleasant.
But if it were just the fragrance, that would be even better.
Li Yuan naturally felt that the other person was lost in thought, lightly sniffing his dragon scent near his neck.
Immediately, he pressed the person into his arms.
“…!” Ye Zhuo was forced to inhale several mouthfuls of the scent before bracing himself and struggling away from Li Yuan, glaring at him coldly.
Usually, when he was angry, Li Yuan would have to be wary, but at times like this, there was absolutely no deterrent.
As if to appease him, Li Yuan picked him up again and glanced at the desk laden with Buddhist scriptures.
——He placed Ye Zhuo on it, then swept the remaining scriptures away.
Hearing the sound of the Buddhist scriptures falling to the ground, Ye Zhuo chuckled softly: “Revering the gods and Buddhas?”
This person. Looking up at him, his voice was aloof and condescending, how disdainful.
Li Yuan looked down at his face, and that gaze made Ye Zhuo want to cover his eyes again.
But Li Yuan reached out first, caressing the corner of Ye Zhuo’s eye and chuckling: “Your Excellency is a Buddhist disciple, are you yourself abiding by the precepts and rules? And now you’re blaming me.”
——Such sophistry, he didn’t know who he learned it from.
Ye Zhuo frankly replied: “I cultivate emptiness, I have no taboos.”
Li Yuan: “What is emptiness?”
“Everything is emptiness.”
The shape of his lips was truly beautiful, a pity they could speak.
Li Yuan’s finger brushed across the other person’s lips again, lightly pressing and lingering on them.
He gazed deeply into Ye Zhuo’s eyes, as if trying to see into the deepest depths of this person’s eyes.
“What about the swordplay then?” Li Yuan said, “Sword heart, sword path, and your Life-Bound Sword, are they also emptiness?”
Ye Zhuo quietly looked at him.
Swordplay classics and Buddhist and Daoist secrets were stacked layer upon layer in the bookcase, surrounding them.
The candlelight flickered, illuminating the dust, the embroidered patterns on Li Yuan’s clothes, and also illuminating his face.
Ye Zhuo reached out his hand.
His warm fingers slowly stopped on Li Yuan’s cheek.
Li Yuan knew that the warmth of that skin was not from this person’s heart, but from the effect of the scent.
But he didn’t know if Ye Zhuo was looking at him at this moment, or at his Life-Bound Sword.
Finally, he heard that person speak.
Ye Zhuo’s voice was soft: “The sword is attachment.”
“Then what do you ultimately want to cultivate, emptiness or attachment?”
Ye Zhuo looked at him blankly, the confusion in his eyes like a vast white mist rising between heaven and earth, with everything looming indistinctly within.
From the Integration Stage to the Tribulation Transcendence Stage, it was originally meant to unite swordplay and Buddhism, but under this question, the sword path and the Buddhist path were like two towering mountains, standing apart at opposite ends of the world.
Li Yuan could feel the changes in the aura around Ye Zhuo, but Ye Zhuo didn’t seem to care about these changes, his fingers groping upwards, threading through his hair.
This person wanted to touch the place where his dragon horns were.
He didn’t want him to be like this when he spoke.
So Li Yuan also leaned down, gently nibbling his soft lips, then moving downwards, sucking on his neck.
He heard the undulating breath beneath the scent.
That was the red lotus swaying in the mist, lotus petals falling on the water surface. You could feel everything about it, but you couldn’t see its true face.
“If you cultivate emptiness, you shouldn’t have attachments,” he heard Ye Zhuo’s slightly hoarse voice in his ear, “if you cultivate attachment, you shouldn’t look at emptiness.”
Like a soft sigh.
“But, my heart inherently has two sides.”
The subtle, profound aura realm stirred and then settled, eventually stopping at the mid-stage of Tribulation Transcendence.
But no one cared about this point anymore, only letting the tidal wave of scent sweep them up and take them to the deeper depths of the ocean.
Interlocked fingers pressed against the tabletop. In the flickering candlelight, the Buddhist beads collided with the tabletop, making a crisp, ambiguous sound. Ye Zhuo was still conscious. He saw the scattered Buddhist scriptures on the floor out of the corner of his eye, then looked up to meet those dark, turbulent dragon eyes that were like an abyss.
Actually, by now, his bones and constitution were extremely clear and transparent, and the effects of dual cultivation had gradually become negligible.
He should think of a way to get rid of Dragon Li Yuan, Ye Zhuo thought.