Achieving A Happy Ending With The Tragic Female Lead [Quick Transmigration] - Chapter 17

The pitter-patter of rain fell continuously along the cave entrance, gathering into puddles that flowed toward the lower ground.

Occasional fine mists of spray splashed up, landing on Su Mi, who was positioned near the outer edge.

Su Mi extended a finger to steady the head that kept rubbing against her. Unlike her own cold and damp state, Wanqi Yue, being a natural fire element cultivator, possessed a higher body temperature, and her clothes were drying faster.

Logically, Wanqi Yue shouldn’t be cold, but… if she had a high fever, she might still feel a chill. Su Mi wasn’t certain yet whether she had fallen ill.

So, she shifted her two fingers from Wanqi Yue’s head down slightly, pressing them against her warm forehead.

Su Mi’s icy fingertips made her flinch, but she didn’t pull away.

Her temperature felt normal to the touch.

“You don’t have a fever. It’ll be fine once the rain passes,” Su Mi thought, using her sleeve to shield the girl from the wind and rain drifting inside.

But Wanqi Yue relentlessly tightened her arms around Su Mi, tilting her head back to meet Su Mi’s eyes: “But I’m so cold. There’s too much water, I’m going to d…” die.

The rest of her sentence was muffled back into her mouth by a cold faced Su Mi.

“Mmph, mmph..” With her mouth covered, Wanqi Yue only showed a pair of slightly misty eyes, her long eyelashes fluttering like cicada wings.

With her palm pressed against those soft lips, the sensation was impossible to ignore.

Su Mi’s gaze lingered on her face for a moment, her expression shifting slightly. She tightened her hand behind the other’s waist; the embrace made the cold clothes against her body feel as if they had gained some warmth.

No one can resist a hint of warmth in the midst of a chill.

“Don’t speak, and don’t move around,” Su Mi instructed softly.

Wanqi Yue, though confused, blinked to show her agreement.

Su Mi slowly released the hand covering the girl’s mouth, moving it instead to Wanqi Yue’s back, holding her in a full embrace.

A faint blue spiritual energy gradually enveloped their bodies to dry their clothes.

She had originally intended to conserve this bit of spiritual power, but now she had no choice. Otherwise, she didn’t know what Wanqi Yue might do next, it was better to pacify her first.

Having gained what she wanted, Wanqi Yue finally stopped crying out that she was cold. Instead, she closed her eyes and leaned obediently in her Senior Sister’s arms.

Su Mi rested her gaze on the damp stone walls. With every breath, the cold air mingled with a soft, delicate scent, allowing her mind to relax slightly.

After a long while, she looked down at Wanqi Yue, who had already closed her eyes. A few strands of half-damp hair curled against her cheek, her ink-black eyebrows were arched like the stroke of a brush, quiet and elegant.

When she wasn’t making a sound, she was quite easy to deal with, she even looked well-behaved.

Perhaps because the spiritual energy consumption was a bit high, Su Mi felt a wave of exhaustion leaning against the cold stone. The person she was forced to hold felt like a warm hand-warmer, making her feel drowsy.

She forced herself to check the sky outside. The rain showed no signs of stopping, and the world outside seemed shrouded in a soft grey veil, turning everything in the distance into a blur.

Her thoughts followed suit, becoming as hazy as the rainy scenery.

But it wasn’t long before this brief respite was shattered.

In her slumber, Su Mi felt something constantly brushing against her chin. The feeling of having her rest interrupted when she was already sleep-deprived made her quite irritable.

“Stop it.” She firmly pressed down on the restless head, her tone slightly sharp.

Sure enough, the restless head stayed quiet for a moment after she spoke.

But a moment later, the commotion started again, though this time the movements were laced with a cautious prudence, yet they remained impossible to ignore.

Su Mi suppressed a sigh and opened her eyes to see what the girl actually wanted.

Below her, Wanqi Yue carefully looked up and saw Su Mi watching her. Her body stiffened slightly, looking like someone caught red-handed doing something bad.

“What is it now?” Su Mi’s voice was slightly raspy.

Wanqi Yue pursed her lips and stated her request: “Senior Sister, I want to bask in the sun.”

Su Mi’s eyelids twitched uncontrollably. “…Bask in what?”

Wanqi Yue pointed outside at the stopped rain: “Bask in the sun.”

“Your clothes are already dry, there’s no need to bask,” Su Mi told her, trying her best to remain calm.

Wanqi Yue’s brow furrowed slightly, a hint of confusion in her eyes: “But I’m a little flower. I have to bask in the sun to grow up quickly.”

Su Mi fell silent for a long moment until Wanqi Yue spoke up: “Senior Sister, you’re hurting me.”

Her Senior Sister was holding her too tightly. Although she liked being held this way, it was very uncomfortable.

Coming back to her senses, Su Mi asked with a skeptical tone: “You are… a flower?”

Wanqi Yue’s eyes sparkled as she nodded vigorously.

“………”

So, during this period of time, she truly considered herself a flower.

Su Mi shot a direct glare at the “Coal Ball” in the corner.

The Coal Ball, caught off guard by the “eye-knife,” rolled further away and spoke in a voice only the two of them could hear.

【I’m so sorry, Master, I don’t know why the female lead is like this either, wahhh!】

The Coal Ball didn’t know, but Su Mi could probably guess.

Undoubtedly, Wanqi Yue’s current state was caused by the mist sprayed by that flower earlier.

Su Mi didn’t know whether to be relieved that she hadn’t ended up like this herself. She pressed her fingers to her brow with a headache, wondering how long this condition would last.

She could no longer distinguish whether she was also under the influence of the flower mist. After all, during this period, monitoring Wanqi Yue’s behavior had become almost instinctive to her.

Thus, Su Mi asked the “Coal Ball” once more if her own actions were as abnormal as Wanqi Yue’s.

The Coal Ball told her categorically that this was not the case, everything she did was reasonable and consistent with common sense.

Su Mi reflected for a moment. Aside from a few instances where she felt slightly out of character, she truly hadn’t done anything too outrageous.

On the other side, Wanqi Yue didn’t give her much time to think. Turning her head toward the outside, she clamored to go out and “bask in the sun.” When Su Mi refused, she leaned against Su Mi’s shoulder and began to sob softly, sounding like a quiet accusation.

Though the sound wasn’t loud, in this narrow cave, it felt amplified.

Listening to it gave Su Mi a headache, so she relented and took the girl out to “bask in the sun.”

But outside, besides a vast stretch of grey sky, there was no sun to be found; in fact, the sky showed signs of darkening again.

Su Mi had expected Wanqi Yue to throw a fit upon finding no sun, but she didn’t. Instead, she stood obediently by Su Mi’s side, tilting her head up to watch the sky.

Seeing that she had quieted down, Su Mi began to survey their surroundings.

They were positioned on ground slightly higher than the surrounding terrain. Looking ahead, she could see the stream in the distance. After such a heavy rain, not only had the water level failed to rise, but the flow actually seemed to be shrinking.

Su Mi looked at the ground beneath her feet. There was no post-rain mud. The water permeability here seemed a bit too efficient.

Just as she was thinking of taking advantage of the light to walk a bit further and investigate, she turned around to find that Wanqi Yue whom she had lost sight of for just a moment was now squatting on the ground with her back turned, scattering clumps of loose soil everywhere.

Su Mi’s temple throbbed. She strode over quickly: “What are you doing?”

Unaware of any looming danger, Wanqi Yue was enthusiastically digging a hole: “Senior Sister, I’m digging a pit for us. We can bury ourselves inside when night falls.”

Even as she spoke, her hands never stopped moving for a second.

Su Mi moved her gaze from the girl’s earnest face to her mud-covered hands. For a split second, she really didn’t want to deal with this person.

After a long silence, Su Mi let out a wordless sigh. She couldn’t let her keep digging.

“Stop digging.”

“Why?” Wanqi Yue was puzzled and even tried to continue.

A talisman flashed between Su Mi’s fingers. As it drifted onto Wanqi Yue’s wrists, it instantly transformed into a blue rope, binding them together so she could no longer move.

Su Mi pressed her fingers together and lifted them slightly, Wanqi Yue was immediately pulled up by an invisible force and brought to her side.

Wanqi Yue looked back reluctantly at the half-finished hole. “Then where are we going to sleep tonight?”

Su Mi didn’t answer her. Instead, she stared at those mud-stained hands as if facing a great enemy. Finally, as if making a grim resolution, she cut a piece of fabric from her own robe and used it to wipe the girl’s hands.

Ultimately, she couldn’t get them clean enough, so she decided to take her to the stream to wash up.

Upon reaching the stream, Su Mi told Wanqi Yue to stand still while she went to fetch some water.

However, when she saw the state of the stream, her expression froze. She even looked left and right to make sure she wasn’t looking in the wrong direction.

After the rain, the stream was actually flowing backward.

At the same time, a clear and distinct tremor vibrated through the ground beneath her feet.

The Mountain Peak.

Inside a cave filled with biting cold, a Divine Physician her eyes covered by a white silk ribbon, leaned halfway over an ice coffin. she looked down at the woman lying inside, her eyes devoid of both sorrow and joy.

Crack…

The strange sound made her look up toward the side.

The Mountain Master, covered entirely in black robes, appeared before her eyes with an air of urgency. With a flick of her long sleeve, the woman surnamed Xu who had escaped was suddenly dropped beside the ice coffin, her faint breathing indicating she was still alive.

“Why did you unseal it early!”

A stone mirror manifested in mid-air. The Mountain Master’s hand, currently channeling spiritual energy, was already trembling slightly. Clearly, she had tried before and failed.

The Divine Physician frowned: “The Twin Mirrors are spiritual artifacts that wax and wane together. Once the Yin side has absorbed enough spiritual energy, it will open naturally. If you force it open now, not only will you suffer a backlash, but the people inside might suffer various degrees of harm due to the instability of the illusion.”

The Twin Mirrors continuously absorbed the spiritual energy of those who entered the Yin side to nourish the person on the Yang side and sustain the illusion, continuing until the intruders died of spiritual exhaustion.

“We got the wrong person,” the Mountain Master’s voice was laced with resentment and fury.

The Divine Physician turned her gaze back to the woman in the coffin: “She was the one who created the artifact. I only have a superficial understanding of it. I cannot guarantee it will be completely error-free.”

The Mountain Master wiped the blood from the corner of her mouth: “In this world today, I don’t care who dies but she cannot.”