Volume 4: Immeasurable
Liking someone, is it supposed to be like this?
Yi Qiu didn’t know why she’d asked such a question, but the moment the words left her mouth, it was already too late for regrets.
It seems I’ve always cared about the answer to this question.
It’s just that before, I only cared about whether I was just a little pet in You Yan’s heart. But now, I’m a bit unsure of what I’m actually bothered by.
The instant she asked, her heart was already tangled like hemp1. She couldn’t for the life of her figure out what kind of answer she even wanted to hear.
All she knew was that she’d asked the question, and You Yan would give her an answer one way or another.
So she gazed at You Yan quietly, trying her best to suppress the anxiety in her heart as she waited for that unknown response.
However, after a long silence, You Yan only offered a question in return.
“What do you think?”
“I… I think?” Yi Qiu couldn’t help but blink.
“Liking someone… does it come in many different kinds?” You Yan asked softly, a hint of confusion in her eyes.
“I guess so,” Yi Qiu said in a small voice. After lowering her head in thought for a moment, she looked up and said earnestly, “Different kinds of ‘like’ aren’t quite the same. I like my family and friends, I like little pets, and I also like characters from stories that leave a deep impression on me. Because the degree of liking is different, the emotions I invest when facing them are also different…”
“I’ve only ever liked you,” You Yan said with a frown. “You’re the only one. I don’t know how to compare you to others.”
“I’m… the only one?”
“Mhm.”
Gazing at You Yan’s serious expression, Yi Qiu couldn’t help but stare, dumbfounded.
It was as if a voice was clamoring by her ear, surging up from the depths of her heart inch by inch, smashing through layers of prisons, on the verge of breaking out2.
In this entire world, in You Yan’s heart, she was the only one…
No one else could even begin to compare.
Is that it? Is that what You Yan is trying to tell me!
Just like that one thing the Huodou3 said to the Fuzhu4 in its moment of despair—it came from the heart, without a single trace of falsehood?
As her heart fluttered, Yi Qiu subconsciously pressed her lips together, trying to hide the joy that was becoming impossible to conceal.
She instinctively lowered her gaze, but she couldn’t hide the light shining in her eyes at all.
After another long silence, she suppressed the turbulent waves in her heart, trying her best to calm herself as she replied softly, “I understand now…”
If I haven’t guessed wrong, if I haven’t overthought it, then I should understand.
I think I actually… fell in love with You Yan long ago.
Even though such a conclusion seems absurd to me, I really can’t keep lying to myself anymore.
In fact, I’ve been this way since a long, long time ago.
Ever since meeting You Yan, it’s like my emotions no longer belong to me; they’re so easily swayed by her.
That bird woman5, it’s like she’s burrowed right into my heart. A single cold sentence from her can make me angry, but the slightest bit of kindness can also make me happy.
I’ve always thought I’m not the type of person who can’t live without someone else. Even if I’m destined to be just an alpaca6 for the rest of my life, if I really left You Yan, I could always find a way to get the male and female protagonists to take me in.
But I just don’t know when it started… whenever I’m away from her, my heart can’t find peace.
Just like that night You Yan got angry and left me at that eatery in Moshui. I couldn’t eat well, couldn’t sleep well, and when I finally managed to fall asleep, my dreams were filled with You Yan abandoning me, with me chasing after her but never being able to catch up.
Thinking day and night, perhaps this is what it feels like.
Honestly, I should’ve understood a long time ago.
From the first moment I was dashing ahead without a care for myself7 for You Yan’s sake, I should’ve understood that my heart no longer belonged to me.
But I’m just slow. Not only did I fail to realize it sooner, but I also fell deeper and deeper without even knowing.
At the Xianlu Sect, You Yan exhausted her spiritual power8 for me. Inside the Floating Dream Pearl, You Yan held me in the palm of her hand.
I could always feel You Yan treating me better and better, and I could always feel that for every bit of kindness she showed me, I’d sink another inch deeper.
I just thought this kind of feeling was merely the bond between sworn friends who had gone through life and death together.
I thought, I’m a woman, and You Yan is also a woman. Even if there wasn’t the difference between clouds and mud9 separating us, it shouldn’t have led to mutual devotion.
But in the end, if fire and water can embrace, what’s impossible about me and You Yan?
I’ve misunderstood all along. If it weren’t for the change in You Yan caused by that dream, I might have kept misunderstanding forever.
Misunderstanding myself, thinking I never loved the person who accompanied me through life and death.
“You Yan, I really like you too. A very, very special kind of like…” Yi Qiu said, her little head already bowed as low as it could go.
“I know.”
“You know?” Yi Qiu couldn’t help but raise her eyes.
In that instant, she met You Yan’s incredibly earnest gaze and saw a scorching heat that was being forcefully suppressed beneath a calm surface.
She subconsciously opened her mouth, but before she could voice the question in her heart, she’d already received her answer.
“I’ve told you before, your eyes don’t lie,” You Yan said softly, her expression gentle yet resolute. “The way you look at me tells me this fact at every single moment.”
That gaze enveloped Yi Qiu inch by inch like a rising tide, as if You Yan desperately wished she could carve the sight into her very heart.
“I told you, in that dream, every word I said was from the heart,” You Yan said, her grip on Yi Qiu’s hands tightening. “You too, right?”
“Right!” Yi Qiu nodded solemnly.
There are some things they had, in fact, already said to each other a thousand times over.
It’s just that neither the speaker nor the listener dared to believe any of it was real.
“Then what are you doubting? What are you worried about?” You Yan pressed. “And what are you trying to prove?”
“I… I just feel…” Yi Qiu bit her lip, hesitating. “Right now, this feeling between us… it feels too unreal.”
“What would count as real?”
“Huh?”
That question really stumped her.
Honestly, even at this very moment, I’m still somewhat lost. Is the relationship between me and You Yan really what I think it is?
You Yan keeps bringing it up, saying every word in the dream was true. Does that mean, as I suspect, that her words about getting married10 were also true?
If they were, then You Yan’s feelings for me should be the same as my feelings for her… that kind of feeling.
Then… then what can be used to prove all of this?
Yi Qiu looked at You Yan blankly, as if searching for an answer in her eyes.
However, the next second, the hands You Yan held her with tightened for some reason.
Those palms, which had always seemed perpetually cold, now felt as if they had a warmth of their own.
She saw You Yan slowly lean in. Flustered, she instinctively tried to back away, only to bump into the rough trunk of the tree behind her.
The autumn wind was most unwelcome, shaking a few withered leaves from the branches overhead and blowing them onto Yi Qiu’s shoulder, startling her into a slight shiver.
She watched as You Yan gently blew the fallen leaf from her shoulder. That exquisite face was now right in front of hers, so close she could clearly feel their breathing quicken.
She stared, transfixed, at the flawless face before her, so nervous she couldn’t stop blinking.
I think, aside from life-or-death situations, there’s no other time my heart has beaten faster than it is right now.
This distance made her feel completely at a loss.
“You Yan, you…”
Before she could finish, her words were sealed by a sudden, soft warmth.
In that instant, the last shred of rationality in her mind snapped like a string. Peng!11
She subconsciously tried to pull back her hands, which had nowhere to go, only to find she was pinned tight by the person before her.
She froze on the spot, her slowly widening eyes filled with shock.
Be it lies or deep affection, as long as You Yan takes one step closer to me, I’ll always collapse into a disorderly retreat12 like this.
But this is also what I wanted. I’ve received the “proof” I was looking for.
This was You Yan’s way of dispelling all her doubts—so sudden it caught her off guard, yet it made it impossible for her to resist in the slightest.
Her legs instinctively recoiled a little, and her fingers couldn’t help but curl.
After a brief moment of astonishment, she couldn’t help but relax her tense nerves and lean forward clumsily, as if wanting to respond to that kiss, which was so full of possessiveness.
But in the next second, You Yan had already pulled back, raising her eyes to meet hers.
Those eyes were so gentle, so gentle that a single glance could make one unable to stop themselves from falling in.
In the long silence, they stared at each other, as if even the sound of the wind could no longer reach their ears.
In this mortal world, there was nothing but silence, leaving only the two of them.
Yi Qiu opened her mouth as if to say something, but she found that all her words were stuck in her throat by some nameless emotion, rendering her unable to speak a single word.
After staring for more than ten seconds, she subconsciously pursed her lips and swallowed, her face flushing red to the ears with nervousness.
Only then did You Yan release her hands, gently brushing her own cool fingertips against the side of Yi Qiu’s scorching ear.
She curved her beautiful eyes into a smile and asked softly beside her ear, “Like this?”
“…Huh.”
“Liking someone, is it supposed to be like this?” she asked again, her tone so careful, as if she were terrified of doing something wrong that might scare the person on her heart13.
Yi Qiu saw it then. You Yan’s eyes, just like hers, were filled with confusion and helplessness.
So, neither of us has ever understood.
“Why aren’t you answering me again?” A trace of panic appeared in You Yan’s eyes.
But a moment later, she saw Yi Qiu reach up and hook a hand around the back of her neck. Just as she had taken the initiative before, Yi Qiu leaned forward, pressing her lips against hers once more.
In that instant, it felt as if even the air they breathed had become scorching hot.
She seemed to lose her ability to think, subconsciously closing her eyes and pulling Yi Qiu into her embrace.
They kissed, clumsy and inexperienced, deep in the mountains of an uninhabited island. The chirping of insects, the calls of birds, and the rustling of the wind could no longer compete with the drumming of their hearts.
After lingering for several moments, they finally parted.
Yi Qiu came back to her senses and quickly retreated, her back and shoulders once again pressing against the tree behind her.
Her face was crimson, the tips of her ears long since burning hot, yet her eyes were unwilling to move even an inch from You Yan’s own blushing face.
In the few seconds they stared at each other in silence, she felt her heart beating so fast, so fast it felt like if she didn’t press down on it, it would escape from her chest.
“Are we… considered together now?” Yi Qiu asked, not very confident.
“If you’re willing,” You Yan’s tone didn’t seem very confident either.
“I thought your tone would be a little more certain…”
“When we return to the Demon Realm, I’ll marry you14.” This time, You Yan’s tone was much more resolute.
Yi Qiu’s eyes widened, the complex look on her face slowly giving way to a heart full of joy.
【Ding—】
【Warning, Warning—】
She backhanded the System, muting it, and leaned against You Yan. “You’re the one who said that,” she whispered.
“Mhm, I said it.”
The author has something to say:
System: Ying?!
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