The Frost Beneath Her Veil - Chapter 1

Chapter 1: How Could I Bear to Let You Die

The mist from the snow beneath the thatched eaves rose, carrying a cool and refreshing scent.

Yin Jiuruo loved this bone-chilling sensation. Especially after being confined in this pitch-dark thatched hut for who knows how long.

At the far end of the hut, a group of similarly ragged and terrified people huddled together on filthy reed mats, swaying like pigs penned for slaughter.

The sound of footsteps mixed with the scraping of sharp weapons against the ground grew closer, and the people inside instinctively shrank further into the corner.

Only Yin Jiuruo stubbornly leaned out, eager to taste the icy sweetness of the snowmelt.

Two armored demon soldiers, while deferentially ushering in their alluring yet deadly demon lord, groveled and said:

“Your Majesty, this batch of mortals is of the poorest quality either missing limbs or hideously ugly. They are utterly unworthy of being Your Majesty’s dual cultivation partners.” As they spoke, one of the soldiers glared viciously at Yin Jiuruo, catching only a glimpse of her disheveled hair and the spiderweb-like crimson scars marring her face.

“Is that so?” The demon lord chuckled seductively, her bewitching crimson eyes sweeping over each person in the room, making them tremble in fear terrified of being dragged out to be drained of blood or devoured whole.

This demon had kept them captive for months, indulging in every cruelty from blood-drinking to flesh-eating. That no cultivators had come to vanquish her spoke volumes of her formidable power.

“Then clean them all up and reward them to you…” The demon lord’s rosy tongue flicked over her lips, her voice dripping with allure as she addressed the soldiers, “Steamed or braised.”

Instantly, the hut filled with desperate pleas and wails, which only seemed to amuse the demon lord further. Her laughter, though enchanting, was laced with bloodlust.

Yin Jiuruo turned her head just in time to meet the demon lord’s gaze, cruelty and delight shimmering behind the veil.

She watched as the demon lord pointed at her and commanded, “Bring her to my chambers.”

Forced into a room heavy with the scent of musk and perfume, Yin Jiuruo found the demon lord reclining on a divan, clad in a sheer red gauze robe.

Her jade-like legs peeked through the fabric, and her soft, starry eyes held none of the terror expected of a flesh-eating monster.

“Your blood smells sweet,” Yin Jiuruo heard the demon lord whisper in her ear.

As the veil slipped away, it revealed a face both cold and tender strikingly beautiful, with skin like polished jade. Yet, like a serpent or a seductress, she coiled closer.

This is it. I’m really going to be eaten by a demon, Yin Jiuruo thought bitterly.

After her soul transmigrated to this world, she had suffered frequent memory loss, retaining only her name and nothing else.

Worse still, this body held too many secrets. Even in death, she wanted to understand them.

“Am I going to die?” Yin Jiuruo murmured softly, closing her eyes.

To her surprise, the demon lord exhaled a fragrant breath and laughed, her voice dripping with honeyed charm, “How could I bear to let you die?”

Startled, Yin Jiuruo opened her eyes just as the demon lord pressed closer her snow-white, delicate body barely concealed by the gauze, her intoxicating scent beckoning like a forbidden fruit.

Furnace Cauldron.

The term flashed through Yin Jiuruo’s mind. To lose her purity before death.

Truly, worse than amnesia was being powerless in a world of cultivation unable to resist, unable to fight back.

“Quite the stubborn one, willing to die rather than submit?” The demon lord’s jade-white fingers lifted Yin Jiuruo’s chin, caressing her pale lips before slipping a crimson pill into her mouth when she least expected it. “To dual cultivate with me is a blessing you’ve earned over a hundred lifetimes. Whether you’re willing or not, you shall comply.” The slick, cold-scented pill dissolved within her, its coolness turning to scorching heat, forcing a low moan from Yin Jiuruo’s lips.

The demon lord’s hair was elegantly coiled high, her eyes tinged with crimson as she leaned in to bite Yin Jiuruo’s frost-nipped fingertips.

A thunderous crash shattered the moment, the sandalwood door exploded into splinters under a blade-like gale of wind and snow. The icy moon hung high, its radiant glow casting an ethereal shimmer over the scene, the sheer force of immortal energy nearly turning the snowflakes crimson in Yin Jiuruo’s dazed vision.

A figure of breathtaking grace descended from the sky, a woman holding a cyan jade paper umbrella, her white robes fluttering like a celestial being. Her beauty was unparalleled, her gaze upon the mortal world both compassionate and transcendent, as if untouched by earthly concerns.

Her arrival was impeccably timed. Yin Jiuruo stared, mesmerized, her heart pounding like a drum.

“Fu Qing, my Daoist Venerable Chang Fan, what took you so long?” The demon lord maintained her indecent proximity to Yin Jiuruo, her tone eerily familiar, as if greeting an old friend.

Fu Qing, the Daoist Venerable known as Chang Fan, remained silent, her expression unreadable. A jade-green twin-fish pendant rested in her palm, while the surrounding snowstorm coalesced into icy swords, all aimed at the demon lord.

“Ah, a thousand years apart, and you’re still colder than I, more demonic than I could ever be,” the demon lord sighed theatrically before turning to Yin Jiuruo with a blood-red smile dripping with false tenderness. “Someone’s come to save you. Aren’t you happy?”

Desire slithered through Yin Jiuruo’s veins like ants gnawing at her bones. Beads of sweat formed on her forehead as awe and terror warred within her for the Daoist Venerable Chang Fan, whose presence was as pure as the moonlit snow, and the demon lord, whose beauty was as lethal as her cruelty, shared the exact same face.

Noticing Yin Jiuruo’s horrified expression, the demon lord grinned wider. With a flick of her wrist, a fiery serpent whip materialized, and she called out to Fu Qing:

“This mortal’s blood is intoxicating. Why not join me in savoring it? Imagine the three of us sharing a bed, what a sight that would be.”

“Nonsense.”

The snowstorm intensified as Fu Qing uttered those two detached words, her voice as cool and dispassionate as her demeanor. Yet Yin Jiuruo couldn’t fathom how a revered Daoist and a malevolent demon could bear identical faces.

“So you refuse to partake in earthly pleasures with me,” the demon lord mused, her vermilion-tipped fingers tracing the dark red patterns on Yin Jiuruo’s face. Under the icy moon, the strange, cloying fragrance grew stronger.

Fu Qing stood unmoved beneath her umbrella, only the faintest glimmer of light visible at its jade tip.

“Pity, Fu Qing. Since you remain obstinate, let me witness how you forsake all passion to attain the heartless Dao.”

With that flippant remark, the demon lord swallowed a crimson aphrodisiac pill of her own and lunged toward Fu Qing, meeting the razor-sharp intent of her snow-forged blades.

Scarlet clashed with blinding white, their collision birthing a suffocating aura of malice and pressure. Yin Jiuruo, a mere mortal caught in the crossfire, coughed up blood at the slightest movement.

The demon lord unleashed her serpent whip, a mist of blood-tinged spiritual energy swirling around her. After a few exchanges with the white-robed Daoist, she wiped blood from her lips and sneered,

“If you had come a little later, you could have allowed me a few more days of bliss with that mortal. At least she wouldn’t have to die without ever experiencing a shred of genuine affection.”

“This venerable one will ensure her safety,” Fu Qing replied, her frosty gaze unwavering as she closed her umbrella with a light flick. The blood mist scattered like three thousand falling petals, dissipating into the air.

Without even drawing her sword, the demon lord who had wreaked havoc in the mortal realm was effortlessly crushed beneath Daoist Venerable Fu Qing’s hand.

Between heaven and earth, the wind was silent, and the snow was still. Yin Jiu weakly crawled toward the courtyard’s edge.

Yet, in this profound silence, her blood churned violently. The scabbed wounds on her hands split open again, her body burning as if consumed by fire as though death was near.

She had never known the poison of desire could be so agonizing and unbearable.

Realizing she was no match, the demon lord only laughed more brilliantly and seductively, watching the overwhelming sword aura surge toward her.

“Fu Qing, the higher your cultivation, the fiercer the poison of desire. Since I cannot taste its pleasures, you shall experience them in my stead.”

Pausing briefly, the demon lord ignored Fu Qing’s hesitant frown and sent a secret message to Yin Jiu:

“Her name is Fu Qing, and she’s here to kill you.”

At this moment, Yin Jiu was utterly weak. Though her will to survive was strong, the demon lord’s voice, infused with demonic power, scorched her insides. A deafening “buzz” filled her ears, blood trickled from her nose, and she nearly lost consciousness.

With the demon lord’s soul obliterated, Fu Qing reopened her pristine umbrella, her immaculate robes untouched by a single snowflake.

She had intended to summon disciples from the Canglan Sect to handle the aftermath, but then she noticed a crimson mist seeping into her palm, a sign that the poison of desire had entered her body.

Yin Jiu remembered collapsing in the muddy winter grass, her body wrapped in icy water yet burning as if aflame.

Now, that fire raged even fiercer.

Because she was half-submerged in a warm pool, her skin pressed against another’s body heat.

The woman, cold as frost, had shed her cloud-like white robes. Their bare skin touched like drifting clouds against the horizon.

The hot spring’s ripples shimmered. The Daoist Venerable, usually clear-minded and detached, now had a faint blush at the corners of her eyes. Her gaze remained cool and distant as she reached for a white veil by the pool, attempting to cover the marks scattered across her body.

But the poison of desire had taken deep root. Clarity was fleeting; surrender was eternal.

Yin Jiu’s slender eyes were clouded with thick desire. She saw the woman in her arms her phoenix-like eyes, dark as ink, captivating the world’s splendor yet they were veiled in unmelting ice and snow.

As their cheeks brushed, waves of emotion rippled through her heart. But then, hazily, she remembered, she didn’t even know this woman.

This person’s Daoist name was Chang Fan, her given name Fu Qing. Fu Qing was…

Here to kill her.

The demon lord’s final teasing words struck Yin Jiu’s mind like thunder, jolting her back to clarity.

Yet at that very moment, the woman in her arms suddenly lifted a hand, gripping Yin Jiu’s tattered collar, and pressed her lips against hers.

Her fingers brushed against the twin-fish jade pendant in the other’s hand, cold as ice.

Instantly, an electric current crackled between their lips, sending shivers of pleasure through both their bodies.

This sensation surpassed even the tender intimacy of moments before.

Yin Jiu suddenly realized, she and Fu Qing were in the spiritual sea. The demon lord’s poison targeted the soul, forcing poisoned souls to intertwine.

In other words, she was engaging in spiritual communion with someone who might kill her.

The ecstasy of spiritual communion far surpassed that of the flesh by hundreds, even thousands of times.

Fu Qing sensed the other’s distraction. Her ink-dark eyes, tinged with desire, fluttered lightly. She had always been indifferent to emotions, devoid of passion. Yet now, the friction of their souls merging for the first time sent tremors through her heart uncontrollable and overwhelming.

The fusion within the spiritual sea of consciousness knew no day or night, an inseparable entanglement.

Once the intoxicating passion had dissipated, Yin Jiuruo regained clarity, only to find the aloof and noble woman beside her still deep in slumber.

Fu Qing’s palm still tightly clutched the jade pendant, her alabaster skin marred with traces of their fervor undeniable evidence of the days lost in delirium.

Suppressing the soreness that wracked her body, Yin Jiuruo crawled up from the edge of the mermaid-silk-draped hot spring pool, staggering as she fled into the distance.

Fu Qing’s resemblance to the Demon Lord and the fact that she had slept with her either of these alone was enough to ensure a mere mortal like her would meet a gruesome end.

Despite knowing the danger, Yin Jiuruo hesitated. Gazing at the sleeping woman, her heart wavered, dark eyes flickering with unnameable emotions.

It felt as though leaving like this would mean losing something precious.

After much deliberation, she steeled herself and walked away unaware that the woman’s tear-stained lashes trembled faintly, as if on the verge of awakening.