After Death, I Became My Shijie’s Palm-Sized Birdie – Chapter 66
by Little PandaInvitation
Shijie Gets “Candy” Only When She Behaves
A small transmission paper crane flew over Wenshen Sect, its wings fluttering as it circled the sect grounds for a while before heading toward Yunwu Mountain.
Wen Qiwu looked up as if sensing something. She extended her hand and let the transmission paper crane land on her palm. Its wings bore a mark resembling a clan crest — could it be the Gao Clan?
She opened it and, sure enough, it was a letter from Gao Fu.
That day, she had rushed back with her shijie to find the Medical Immortal, managing only to send a brief message saying she was safe and had to leave first. It wasn’t until her shijie’s condition stabilized that she sent a letter to Gao Fu — and this was the reply.
Gao Fu’s letter expressed concern for her safety, asked whether she’d been injured, and inquired if she knew where Yu Hengwei had gone. If their transaction was complete, payment should be due on her end — but strangely, she couldn’t reach Yu Hengwei at all. It was as though the person had simply vanished.
Vanished? She had merely changed identities.
She’d let her shijie explain that herself later.
At the end of the letter, Gao Fu invited her to visit Canghai Domain as a guest, adding that the region boasted beautiful scenery and a pleasant climate — perfect for a patient’s recovery. Wen Qiwu could bring her unwell family member and stay for a good long while.
Gao Fu remembered that Wen Qiwu had mentioned wanting to accompany her sick family member there, so she could use this opportunity to keep them around for an extended stay.
Most of Canghai Domain consisted of endless seas, so its customs and culture differed greatly from those of Dongzhao Domain. If they were simply going out for a change of scenery, that would certainly beat having her shijie cooped up in the sect.
“Something troubling you?” Seeing Wen Qiwu stand motionless for quite a while after receiving the transmission, the Medical Immortal walked over and asked.
“Nothing serious — a friend has invited me to Canghai Domain.” Wen Qiwu tucked the letter away. “I’m planning to take my shijie out for a trip.”
“A change of scenery for recovery isn’t a bad idea. Just remember to have her take her medicine on time.”
Wen Qiwu agreed, though she knew that going out to relax would at most lift her shijie’s spirits — it fell far short of addressing the root problem of her heart demons.
“Senior, about my shijie’s heart demons… have you found a treatment method?”
The Medical Immortal sighed softly. “Heart demons are extremely difficult to eradicate through external means. This thing stems from the knot in the patient’s heart — if she can’t untangle it herself, no amount of effort from others will matter.” And even if the knot were loosened, the series of problems the heart demon had triggered might not be fully eliminated.
“What we can do is stabilize her divine soul, find some mind-calming and spirit-focusing medicines for her, and leave the rest to herself.” The Medical Immortal paused, then added, “I once saw a cultivator who’d been plagued by heart demons for centuries. To eradicate them, that person made a decision I considered extraordinarily bold.”
“That cultivator chose to undergo tribulation. After the tribulation, one faces a trial of the mind — with the aid of the Heavenly Dao’s rules, that person confronted their heart demon head-on, ultimately seeing through the demonic delusion and making the heart demon vanish completely.”
The light that had risen in Wen Qiwu’s eyes dimmed again. “That’s too dangerous.”
Moreover, the higher one’s cultivation, the more severe the backlash after a failure. Her shijie was already at the True Immortal Realm — the next step was the God Realm. If she risked the mental trial during a breakthrough to the God Realm…
Wen Qiwu deliberated again and again, still unwilling to let her shijie take such a risk. This method was out of the question.
The Medical Immortal didn’t say anything more. Though she knew of this approach, she had almost never mentioned it to her patients — after all, the success rate wasn’t merely low in her eyes; it was vanishingly slim.
The reason that cultivator had succeeded was because they had already overcome the hurdle in their heart, so the heart demon would lower its head before them. If the heart demon was deeply rooted, this method was no different from seeking death.
But the Medical Immortal felt that Yun Heng’s situation might be quite similar to that cultivator’s. She had watched Yun Heng develop heart demons step by step — the trigger had been Wen Qiwu’s death. Now that the girl was alive again and at her side day after day, what leverage did the heart demon still have to threaten Yun Heng?
And Yun Heng’s own willpower was resolute. So the Medical Immortal did think she might be able to try — but just as Wen Qiwu worried, her cultivation was too high, which at a time like this actually became a hindrance.
“I’ll go back and research it further. I’ll let you know when there’s good news. Oh, and those two herbs you mentioned are indeed viable — I’ll change the prescription when I get back. Take a fresh batch of medicine back with you.” Though the Medical Immortal didn’t know what punishment Wen Qiwu had in mind, it should work better than bitter medicine.
It was almost time for Yun Heng’s medication, so the Medical Immortal had Wen Qiwu carry a portion back.
On Yunwu Mountain, the flock of bird souls was being terribly restless. After Wen Qiwu left, the little ones refused to stay put — they ran everywhere, and Yun Heng had to use an artifact capable of binding souls to corral them back.
The little ones chirped and twittered, and Yun Heng’s attempts to quiet them were useless. They only listened to Wen Qiwu — they wouldn’t settle without seeing the Little Phoenix.
In the past, Yun Heng would have frozen these little creatures’ beaks shut without hesitation. But now they were all under her shimei’s protection, and she couldn’t very well freeze them.
Yun Heng sighed. Why hadn’t her shimei returned yet?
Was the Medical Immortal badmouthing her again? How much had she said? Would it make her shimei angry?
Wen Qiwu had only been gone a short while, yet Yun Heng found the wait unbearable.
“Chirp chirp!” The bird souls suddenly grew excited, and Yun Heng knew her shimei was back.
“Ah Que…” Yun Heng immediately rose to greet her. Her shimei was still holding a bowl of medicinal concoction — the bitter scent wafted over, though the smell seemed somewhat different from before.
Had the Medical Immortal come up with some new way to torment her? Yun Heng’s expression remained unchanged as she took the medicine from her shimei’s hands.
Wen Qiwu coaxed the bird souls to one side to behave, then lifted her gaze to her shijie.
“Shijie, this is a new formula I worked out with Senior Medical Immortal. Drink it while it’s hot.” Wen Qiwu’s eyes curved into crescents, her smile exceptionally sweet. “It’s not bitter.”
Was it really not bitter? Yun Heng couldn’t help but feel that her shimei’s expression didn’t look quite so simple. She regarded the bowl of medicine with solemn gravity — if drinking a bowl of medicine was all it took to appease her shimei, then so be it.
She obediently cradled the bowl and took a sip. Yun Heng had braced herself for the medicine to be even more bitter than before, but after tasting it, she was mildly surprised.
Though the medicine still carried a hint of bitterness, the taste wasn’t intense. Compared to the previous concoctions, this was practically delicious.
After she finished the medicine, Wen Qiwu produced a small piece of candy and placed it in her shijie’s mouth.
“Not bitter anymore, right?” Her shimei’s beaming smile looked so soft and docile that Yun Heng’s heart melted into water.
“Not bitter anymore,” Yun Heng said without any guard.
“Good.” Wen Qiwu placed the candy pouch she always carried into her shijie’s hands. “Then from now on, Shijie has to take her medicine obediently on her own. If it still tastes a bit bitter, have a piece of candy.”
Yun Heng was a clever person — the moment her shimei’s words fell, she understood exactly what Wen Qiwu meant.
Her expression shifted. This wasn’t medicine that wasn’t bitter — it was even more “bitter”! Before, she had only suffered bitterness on her tongue, but now the medicine was bitter straight to her heart.
“Shimei, I know I was wrong…”
Her shijie’s appearance was endearingly pitiful. The softened tone carried a faint tremor — if her shijie hadn’t frightened her so badly on their last outing, Wen Qiwu might have simply let it go.
“Shijie is such a grown-up, and she still needs me to feed her candy?” Wen Qiwu blinked, asking the question she already knew the answer to.
“I…” Yun Heng stammered, her earlobes faintly reddening.
“Having me feed you isn’t out of the question.” Her shijie’s eyes brightened, and the corners of Wen Qiwu’s lips curved upward involuntarily. “If Shijie is good enough from now on…”
She whispered a few words into her shijie’s ear. For all her appearance of handling matters with aplomb1, the faint blush creeping onto Wen Qiwu’s cheeks betrayed a bashfulness she couldn’t quite conceal.
Yun Heng’s tense expression finally relaxed a little. She promised she would definitely behave — she just didn’t know how long these candy-eating days would last.
Yun Heng’s gaze fell on her shimei’s lips, then silently drifted away. If she had understood her feelings a century earlier, perhaps her shimei would already be her Dao Companion by now.
Unfortunately, there was no pill for regret2 in the world. She gently pulled her shimei into her arms and coaxed her softly, calling her Ah Que, hoping her “sentence” might be shortened.
But Wen Qiwu spoke first: “Shijie, I just received a letter from Gao Fu. The Dragon Gate Grand Ceremony3 in Canghai Domain is about to begin.”
At the name Gao Fu, the warmth in Yun Heng’s eyes vanished in an instant, replaced by a glacial wariness.
“You coaxed her into making a deal before — remember to explain things to her. She thinks you’ve gone missing.” Wen Qiwu felt her shijie’s grip on her hand tighten slightly. She patted it gently and said, “Ah Fu has invited me to attend the Dragon Gate Grand Ceremony. Does Shijie want to come along?”
Yun Heng answered without a second thought: “I’m going!”
How could she not go? Gao Fu was different from these birds — the birds only approached the phoenix out of bloodline instinct, but that Gao Fu likely harbored intentions similar to her own. She just might not have figured it out yet, like Yun Heng herself once hadn’t.
So there was no way Yun Heng would let her shimei go to Canghai Domain alone.
“The Gao Clan of Canghai Domain… is in Longshi City. That’s rather far from the sea, and the scenery is unremarkable. If we’re going for the views, Jiaoyue City is the better choice. Plus, Jiaoyue City is where the Dragon Gate Grand Ceremony begins and ends — Longshi City won’t be nearly as lively.” Yun Heng analyzed the shortcomings of Longshi City with utmost earnestness.
“How does Shijie know so much about Longshi City? I didn’t even know Ah Fu’s family was there.” Wen Qiwu’s eyes brimmed with amusement.
That was, of course, because the moment Yun Heng learned of this person’s existence, she had investigated her background thoroughly. Yun Heng held her shimei close and murmured, “Her background was unclear. I worried she might mean you harm, so I looked into her.”
“Ah Que, let’s go to Jiaoyue City.”
The sight of the usual ice-cold beauty softening her voice to plead with her was enough to erode Wen Qiwu’s already shaky resolve, step by step. And when her shijie finally raised her eyes, that look of tender vulnerability laced with nervousness completely disarmed her.
Jiaoyue City it was, then. She was here to accompany her shijie on a relaxing trip, anyway — whatever her shijie wanted mattered most.
Footnotes
- 游刃有余 | you ren you yu | Literally 'moving the blade freely in an ample space,' from Zhuangzi's parable of Cook Ding, whose knife never dulled because he always carved along the natural gaps between joints; describes handling matters with effortless skill and composure.
- 后悔药 | houhui yao | Literally 'regret medicine' — a colloquial Chinese metaphor for a nonexistent remedy that could undo past mistakes or missed opportunities; commonly used in the saying 'there is no regret medicine in the world,' emphasizing that some things cannot be undone.
- 跃龙门大典 | yue long men dadian | Literally 'leaping the Dragon Gate grand ceremony' — from the ancient Chinese legend of carp that transform into dragons by leaping over the Longmen waterfall on the Yellow River, a metaphor for dramatic advancement through perseverance and overcoming great trials.
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