System Notification
> [Ding!]
✅ Protagonist's mother fully captured.
▸ Villain Value +5000
▸ Passive Trait Unlocked: "Heaven-Scented Skin"
‣ You now exude an odorless aura that subtly increases the favorability and attraction of women nearby.
‣ Effect scales with target's emotional weakness and cultivation suppression.
▸ Physique Awakening Progress: 30%
Gu Changge opened his eyes.
The bathhouse was dark now. Only the faint glow of lantern coals painted golden patterns across the ceiling.
Beside him, Lin Rou lay curled against his chest, hair trailing over his skin like black silk, her breath soft and contented.
Her body bore the marks of his dominance—his bites, his fingerprints, his seed.
> One flower, wholly mine.
Yet Gu Changge's mind stirred restlessly.
Somewhere beyond the quiet walls of the manor, fate trembled.
He stood, slow as a tide rolling back from shore, and draped a black robe over his body. The faint incense clinging to the hem mixed with a new scent now—a subtle musk, born of his evolving physique.
> Heaven-Scented Skin... curious.
He bent over Lin Rou's sleeping form and brushed a kiss against her bare shoulder. She stirred slightly, murmuring his name in sleep.
> "Yunzhao…"
> Soon, you'll say it even in dreams, he mused silently.
Then he turned, silent as smoke, and stepped into the corridor beyond.
---
The guest wing of the Lin estate was quiet, save for the wind chimes whispering in the breeze.
Gu Changge walked barefoot, his steps soundless. As he approached Lin Xian'er's door, his eyes narrowed.
> She watched. She burned.
Even before he reached the threshold, he could feel the aura inside. Not cultivation—no, it was emotional qi. Shame. Guilt. Arousal. Confusion.
> Like a flower in heat that doesn't yet know the season...
He pushed the door open with a whisper of intent.
The room was dim, lit only by moonlight filtered through paper screens. Peony motifs danced across the walls.
And at the center of the bed, curled beneath silk sheets, was Lin Xian'er.
She thought herself alone.
Her robe had slipped down to her waist, bare shoulders gleaming. Her delicate hands moved between her thighs in trembling rhythm. Her breath hitched.
> "Ah… no… why do I… why do I want him?"
She didn't even notice the door open.
Her lips parted. Her eyes squeezed shut. Her voice—a whisper.
> "Wei Yunzhao…"
Gu Changge stood still.
The sight was… delicious.
> So she does remember my name.
His scent, his energy, still lingered in the bathhouse. She'd inhaled it. Drunk it. And now, even in secret shame, she chased that memory.
His body moved before his mind ordered it.
He stepped into the room—no longer a shadow.
---
> Creak.
Her eyes snapped open.
She froze.
Their gazes locked—her face flushed crimson, mouth parted, caught in the act.
She scrambled, yanking the sheet up to cover herself.
> "Y-You—! You're not supposed to—!"
> "Apologies," he said softly. "The door was ajar. I thought… you were in distress."
He didn't smile.
Didn't leer.
Just stood there, tall, robed in moonlight, eyes unreadable.
Lin Xian'er's hands clutched the sheet tightly. Her legs remained hidden beneath the cover, trembling.
> "Y-You can't be here—Mother would—"
> "Would what?" he said quietly. "Punish you? Or me?"
She bit her lip.
His eyes lowered, just for a breath, to her trembling form beneath the sheets. She noticed—and blushed deeper.
> "You… saw everything last night."
He nodded.
> "You didn't look away."
Her breath caught.
> "I-I didn't mean to…"
> "You watched until the end," he said.
Each word struck like a fingertip brushing along bare skin.
> "Did you… enjoy it?"
She shook her head—but too quickly. The lie was brittle.
He took a step forward.
She shrank back instinctively.
> "Why did you say my name just now?"
Silence.
Then a whisper, barely audible.
> "I don't know."
> "Your body does."
His words wrapped around her like silk bindings—soft but unyielding.
> "I… I don't… I can't feel this… I'm not like her."
He tilted his head.
> "You're not. You're pure. Untouched. Still blooming."
Her breath hitched.
> "But you will bloom."
He sat at the edge of her bed, not touching her. Just close enough that she could smell him—the faint warmth of his skin, that invisible Heaven-Scented pheromone now clinging to his presence like forbidden incense.
Her breath came quicker.
> "Don't tempt me…"
> "Why not?" he asked. "Because you saw your mother with me?"
Her eyes widened.
> "Because it made you feel jealous?"
> "No!" she cried.
Too loudly.
Too quickly.
His hand brushed a strand of hair from her cheek, gently. She didn't flinch.
> "You can pretend to hate me, Xian'er. But your body is honest."
Her lips quivered.
Her heart thundered.
Then—
> Knock. Knock. Knock.
Both of them froze.
A servant's voice, muffled behind the main hall's courtyard gate:
> "Young Master Lin Tian has arrived! Open the gates!"
Gu Changge's smile never reached his lips.
But in his mind, stars began to shift.
---
A New Thread Returns
He rose from the bed.
Lin Xian'er sat frozen, still beneath the sheets, breathing as if she'd run a hundred steps.
He didn't look back as he stepped into the hallway.
But his words hung in the air behind him:
> "I'll return. When your heart stops lying to your body."
The door closed.
And in the dark, Lin Xian'er collapsed onto her pillow, burying her face as tears of guilt and longing flowed.
> "Why… why him?"
> "Why do I want to be held like that… to be devoured like Mother was?"
Her hands trembled. But her thighs pressed together once more.
The first bloom had been witnessed.
And now… another petal began to stir.
---
Meanwhile, Outside the Lin Estate
A young man stood under the moonlight, hands clenched, eyes sharp with suspicion.
Lin Tian.
His robes were dusty from travel, but his spirit burned with fury.
He had felt it—his fate thread had grown dimmer these past days. His cultivation had stalled. His master's teachings faltered.
And every dream he had recently… was full of shadows whispering his name.
> "Something's wrong," he growled. "Mother's qi is unstable. Xian'er's emotions are in turmoil. And that bastard…"
> "I feel him."
His ring pulsed faintly on his finger.
> "Xuan Wutian… speak. Who is interfering with my fate?"
But the old man's voice remained quiet—troubled.
> "…Not yet," it said finally. "Soon. The darkness around you is too deep now. Wait for morning."
But Lin Tian's eyes flashed.
> "I'll tear the shadows apart myself."
---
Back in Gu Changge's Chambers
He returned to Lin Rou's bed as the moon passed its peak.
She stirred, half-awake.
> "Yunzhao…?"
> "Just a nightmare," he whispered, sliding beneath the covers once more, pressing a soft kiss to her collarbone. "Go back to sleep."
She sighed and nestled closer.
And as she slept again, unaware, he smiled.
> The mother is mine. The sister is cracking. And the son… has returned.
> "Time to pull another thread."
He held it against the moonlight.
And in the far distance, the heavens began to shift.
---
End of Chapter 9