"I suggest you learn some more powerful Dou Techniques. Your performance in that last battle… well, it didn't quite match your status as a Three-Star Dou Zong."
"Alright. I'm done. Goodbye, Grand Elder."
Xiao Tian watched Su Qian's face darken, immediately shut the door, and transformed into a streak of light. Gone.
Su Qian stared at the closed door. His dark expression slowly shifted into something else—amused helplessness. Xiao Tian's words weren't wrong. He really had seemed a bit lacking. It looked like he would have to use his privileges and enter the Scripture Collection Pavilion. This crisis had made Su Qian recognize his own shortcomings clearly.
---
After leaving Su Qian's pavilion, Xiao Tian headed to Boundless Gate's station. Xiao Yu and Hu Jia weren't inside, but he spotted a small white figure.
He asked the guard on duty and learned the two were off handling Boundless Gate affairs. Especially after Xiao Tian had revealed his Dou Huang strength, even more people wanted to join. That meant even more work to deal with.
Xiao Tian walked into the main hall and rubbed the head of the figure meditating with closed eyes. "Little Zi Yan, what are you doing here?"
Zi Yan felt the mischievous hand on her head and opened her eyes, ready to see who had the guts. When she saw it was Xiao Tian, she put away her angry expression and replaced it with a face full of grievance.
"Xiao Tian! You're finally back! I've been waiting for you here all day."
"Little Zi Yan, what do you need? Wait—no one in the Inner Academy could possibly bully you, right?" Xiao Tian asked, amused by her wronged expression.
Half of her grievance was an act. But there was still a good amount of real distress behind it.
"Of course not! In the entire Inner Academy, besides you, who would dare touch me, Zi Yan?"
She struck her signature hands-on-hips stance, full of pride. Then she pulled out her pill bottle, flipped it upside down, and shook it.
"All the pills you refined for me are gone. If you hadn't come back, I'd be chewing on raw medicinal ingredients again."
Xiao Tian dotingly pinched her soft, slightly baby-faced cheek. "Then why didn't you go to the Alchemy Department to help you refine them?"
He asked the question that genuinely puzzled him. It was the same in the original story—she rarely sought out the Alchemy Department even when she ran out.
"Well… that… um…" Zi Yan fidgeted, rubbing her small hands together. "I don't like them. And they ask for way too much compensation. And they secretly deduct my medicinal ingredients. Old Su just waits for me to come to him so he can make me do hard labor, finding medicinal ingredients for free."
"I still prefer you. You don't deduct my ingredients. Your compensation is reasonable. And you never try to use me—unlike everyone else who wants to exploit me. Do they think I don't know? Hmph, hmph."
"Most importantly, I can feel that you genuinely care about me."
She said all this while cheerfully swinging her short legs.
Xiao Tian chuckled softly. He truly had no intention of using her. "That's right. Little Zi Yan is too cute. How could I ever bear to use you?"
He thought about her earlier fidgeting and knew there were other reasons. Connecting it to the medicinal ingredient storeroom, he understood immediately. But he didn't plan on exposing her.
"Hehe. Xiao Tian, you're such a good person." Zi Yan's face broke into a bright smile, revealing her two adorable little canine teeth.
Hmm? Was she giving him the "good person" card?
Xiao Tian studied her. Zi Yan, whose true age was unknown but certainly over a thousand years, still had the personality of a child. According to Magical Beast lifespan classifications, she was still in her infancy—equivalent to a human girl's adolescence. In the original story, her growth period began after breaking through to Dou Huang, then absorbing the Dragon Phoenix Origin Fruit, and she only reached full maturity after breaking through to Dou Sheng.
He cut off that train of thought and looked at her. "Where are your medicinal ingredients?"
"Already prepared."
Zi Yan waved her hand, and a pile of medicinal ingredients appeared on the table. A small portion still had soil clinging to them. Most had been harvested long ago.
Noticing Xiao Tian's gaze, Zi Yan explained, "These were given to me by Old Su."
A flicker of emotion passed through her eyes. Old Su always said they were "discarded ingredients" when he handed them over. But there was no such thing as "discarded" medicinal ingredients.
Xiao Tian saw the look in her eyes but chose to say nothing. Zi Yan was intelligent. She understood many things on her own. There was no need to spell it out.
"Then I'll refine the pills for you now. But there's quite a lot here. I won't refine them in this room."
"Okay! But you have to be quick. I really can't wait any longer."
Zi Yan rubbed her stomach, impatience thick in her voice.
"Alright, alright. It'll be done soon. Just bear with it a little longer."
Xiao Tian gently stroked her twin-pigtailed hair. Joy bloomed on Zi Yan's face. She had long grown used to Xiao Tian touching her head. She'd even grown to like the feeling.
She looked up at him, her eyes holding seven parts anticipation and three parts pleading. "Then you really, really have to be quick. I can't take it anymore. I've been waiting for so, so long."
He gathered the medicinal ingredients from the table and walked toward his room. Zi Yan hopped off her chair and followed right behind him.
When they reached the cultivation area, Xiao Tian brought out his Purple Abyss Cauldron and began refining. Zi Yan, bored, looked around his room. It was simple and tidy.
"Can I lie down for a bit?" She watched him heating the cauldron and suddenly felt sleepy.
"Yes." Xiao Tian answered without turning his head.
Zi Yan immediately ran to Xiao Tian's bed and flopped down onto it. The softness of the mattress and the comfort spreading through her body filled her dark eyes with pure bliss.
Once the cauldron reached the right temperature, Xiao Tian pushed his hand forward. The medicinal ingredients Zi Yan had brought entered the cauldron in orderly succession. Clusters of different flames burned each ingredient separately.
Time passed. Xiao Tian opened the cauldron lid. Pills of various colors—a vibrant rainbow—flew out in a steady stream and into the waiting jade bottles.
Three large bottles, full. Each pill contained powerful medicinal energy. If Zi Yan saw them right now, she'd probably be drooling all over the floor, unable to move her legs.
Xiao Tian walked to his bed and shook his head helplessly. Zi Yan lay there, fast asleep.
He gently removed her shoes, revealing her tiny feet wrapped in socks. He carefully straightened her body. Looking at her peaceful, sleeping face, a soft smile touched his lips.
He took a nearby blanket and covered her carefully, afraid of waking her. Once everything was done, he sat cross-legged in the cultivation area and began to meditate.
The sun slowly set. Twilight's afterglow filtered through the window like a thin veil, bathing the room in a dreamlike, ethereal glow.
Xiao Tian, deep in cultivation, opened his eyes.