"You don’t really hate Lingling... do you?"
Yani averted her gaze from Xuanyan, clearly unwilling to answer his question. "Since when is that any of your business?"
But Xuanyan wasn’t about to back down. "Actually it does," he said. "Lingling is my wife now. Her problems and her family relationships concern too."
He paused for a mont before continuing. "And honestly... it doesn’t look like you truly hate her. To it feels more like so misunderstanding between the two of you."
Yani chuckled lightly, covering her mouth when she heard Xuanyan’s reasoning. "You think I’m your sweet, dumb Lingling who would fall for those smooth words?" she said with faint amusent. "Nice try by the way." It was obvious she was trying to end the conversation there.
But Xuanyan only looked more amused. "You’re right," he said. "Your life decisions have nothing to do with , and neither does your relationship with Lingling."
He shrugged slightly. "I just hope you don’t mind telling her about what happened between us."
Yani’s face darkened instantly. "You—!".
She stopped herself halfway, clearly realizing she had reacted too strongly. She imdiately looked away, clearly irritated, but the faint redness on her cheeks made it obvious she wasn’t as calm as she wanted to appear.
"Nothing happened between us," Yani said quickly, her face still flushed. In truth, nothing improper had happened. Earlier that day, when she finally found Xuanyan inside the outer sect courtyard after searching for him, he had suddenly pulled her into a hug.
At that mont she thought he must have been shaken after everything that had happened with the bounty hunters. Because of that, she hadn’t pushed him away imdiately. But even after that few mont passed, Yani still didn’t create any distance between them.
Instead, almost without thinking, she had returned the hug. Maybe she simply didn’t want Lingling to know about that mont... especially when Lingling had been crying alone in her room because Xuanyan had disappeared.
The worst part was that Yani didn’t regret it. If anything, the mory of that brief hug had stayed in her mind since yesterday, returning again and again no matter how much she tried not to think about it.
Xuanyan chuckled softly when he saw her reaction. "Relax," he said lightly. "I didn’t say anything happened." He leaned back slightly in his chair, watching her with quiet amusent. "If soone heard you just now, they might think we did sothing truly scandalous."
Yani’s face flushed even more, though she tried to keep her expression stern. "I already told you nothing happened," she replied sharply, clearly annoyed that he was still teasing her.
"It’s nothing serious," Yani said after a mont, her voice calr now. "Our relationship simply beca awkward because of my own stupidity."
"When Mother adopted , I was still very young. Around that ti Lingling had just been born. We grew up in the sa courtyard and for many years I never thought about the difference between us. To she was simply my little sister.
When she was small she followed everywhere like a little shadow. If I went to the herb garden, she went to the herb garden. If I went to the alchemy hall, she insisted on sitting beside even though she didn’t understand anything about refining pills."
A faint smile appeared on Yani’s lips as the mory surfaced. "Once she even sneaked into the herb garden behind my back and started pulling out spiritual herbs because she thought they were ordinary flowers. Mother had spent days cultivating those herbs, and Lingling ruined half of them before anyone noticed. She looked so frightened afterward that she hid behind and refused to co out until Mother promised not to punish her."
The smile faded slowly as the mory moved forward.
"For a long ti I didn’t think about it at all. But as we grew older... I started noticing things I hadn’t paid attention to before. Lingling was Mother’s real daughter, the only one she had. I was just the adopted child among many. Mother never treated badly and Lingling never looked down on , but the more I thought about it the more that difference began to bother ."
Xuanyan didn’t interrupt her. But hearing her speak like this, he could finally understand where the distance between the two sisters had begun.
She gave a faint, self-mocking smile. "It wasn’t Mother’s fault and it wasn’t Lingling’s fault either. The problem was simply my own childish jealousy. Every ti I saw Lingling smiling beside Mother or being praised for sothing small, I would start comparing myself to her without realizing it. The more I compared, the more uncomfortable I felt."
"So instead of admitting that jealousy, I started pushing her away. I spent more ti inside the alchemy hall, telling myself I was focusing on cultivation and alchemy so I could impress Mother one day. In reality... I was just avoiding the feeling that I was sohow standing behind Lingling."
"By the ti I grew older and realized how childish that thinking was, the distance between us had already beco normal. Lingling no longer followed around like she did when we were young. When she looked at , it wasn’t with those carefree eyes anymore... and that was when I finally understood what I had thrown away."
Yani’s gaze shifted briefly toward Xuanyan. "But after Lingling t you, sothing changed again. The way she smiles now is the sa as when we were children. She talks to normally again, as if the distance that existed between us for years simply disappeared."
"And that’s why I said it’s my own fault. Lingling didn’t hold onto the past... she simply moved forward."
Her eyes lowered slightly again before she added the last part more quietly. "And the person she chose to move forward with... was you."
For a mont Yani fell silent, her fingers resting lightly on the edge of the table as if she hadn’t ant to say that much. For a brief mont she looked as if she regretted letting those words slip out so easily in front of him.
I used to think Lingling would always keep a little distance from after what happened between us," she continued quietly. "But when I saw her worrying about you yesterday... and smiling again the mont you returned... it felt strangely familiar."
Her lips curved faintly with a mixture of relief and self-mockery. "It reminded of the way she used to smile when we were children." Her voice lowered slightly. "And for the first ti in years... she looked at the sa way again."
"Sotis I wonder... if I hadn’t pushed her away back then..."
"Oh? That sounds like a very interesting story." The voice ca from directly behind her ear.
Yani froze. She turned around instantly and saw i Lingyao standing quietly behind her chair, her black robes flowing gently as if she had been there for so ti already. A faint amused smile rested on the alchemy elder’s face as she looked between Yani and Xuanyan.
"So this is the kind of conversation happening in my hall while I was refining pills?"
Yani’s face flushed imdiately.
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