Rest In A Demon’s Embrace

The Yellow Jasmine Inn was a relatively large place for Ridgeflower City, so a lot of travellers came by and slept a night or two before leaving the region. It wasn’t unexpected that Luo Xiao and Jiang Yao decided on it when choosing where to take shelter in for the evening. They quickly got a room on the second floor of the inn, and then went inside, away from prying eyes.

“That was quite the fruitful trip, Jiang Yao,” Luo Xiao remarked as he looked into his storage bag. While one couldn’t say the space in there was full to the brim, it certainly seemed so - the cave with the dragon heart in it had bore unexpected and plenty of rare herbs and flowers. “Overseer Zhu left me a few different medicinal liquid recipes and there’s a few herbs that I can use from these. Do you think I should go for it? They are excellent quality and,” before Luo Xiao could finish speaking, he was interrupted by Jiang Yao, who was shaking his head, and said, “Just use them, Xiaoxiao. There’s plenty of them for both of us, if you really tried.”

He smiled to himself a second later, deciding not to say that they would also have no effect on him, regardless of the quantity.

After nodding to that, Luo Xiao closed his storage bag up before stretching lightly. “I do think a quick bath is in need before anything else, won’t you agree?”

It had been quite a few days before the two had had the chance to relax fully. Jiang Yao was at the limit of the realm, yet, quite a few encounters and fights had happened in that period of time. Therefore, Luo Xiao felt the need to just get in a warm bath and get a change of clothes. It’s not like the ones he was wearing weren’t practically spotless, but it was good decency to do so.

About fifteen minutes later, he finally walked out of the bathroom, dressed in a set of fresh white clothes. His hair was slightly damp and fully loose on his back, which made Jiang Yao smirk as his eyes went from Luo Xiao’s face to his feet and back up again. The simple gesture made Luo Xiao’s cheeks heat up a little, after which he smiled in return and then went to look at his storage pouch once more.

Sitting down on the floor, he started taking out a bit of the different herbs and grasses after the other, laying them down in front of him. A few moments later, it became clear that the variety of herbs in front of him were quite a lot more than he had noticed initially.

“I can recognise Frostrage Bark, Teal Spark Aster, King’s Barberry and a few others,” Luo Xiao spoke, looking over the various herbs and pointing slightly to the ones he knew. “Do you know anything about the rest?”

To his question, Jiand Yao got up from the bedside, leaning above and over Luo Xiao’s back to take a better look.

“I don’t recognize all of them, but I think for what you need, use only the ones you are familiar with. I can tell you, however, that all of them are absolutely top notch quality and will make great nutrients for your body,” he smiled.

Luo Xiao looked at him from the corner of his eye, clearly expectant. “That’s not the question I asked you to answer, though.”

The prince raised an eyebrow at the remark, smiling. “Every day, you get sharper and sharper. I like it.”

That smug look which Jiang Yao gave him made Luo Xiao’s face heat up even more than from the indirect gaze from before, but he didn’t have any time to react at all before Jiang Yao continued.

“These are Emberleaf Thymes and Mellow Spearmint, and that one with the purple edges should be a Lightning Dream Grass.” He listed a few more, pointing to each one that he knew. The sudden change of topic forced Luo Xiao to focus on the herbs. Regardless, in the back of his mind, he kept thinking about the little compliment from the demon.

It certainly felt nice to be complimented by him.

The important thing was to focus on refining his body with the materials, so Luo Xiao listened carefully as Jiang Yao listed the names of the different herbs they had picked up at the dragon’s cave. Some of them he had heard Overseer Zhu mention once or twice, though only now did he get his chance to see, let alone hold copious amounts of them.

There were a few that even Jiang Yao had no idea of what they were, which Luo Xiao decided to put aside with the rest for now and focus on those he was familiar with. Once the two were done sorting the herbs out, Luo Xiao took out his pill furnace and put it down, after which he sat down cross legged in front of it.

It was time to concoct the various medicinal liquids he had the recipes to.

Just before he began, the thoughts about his adoptive father and his real father and family flashed before him.

Whatever the place the upper realms were, Luo Xiao knew cultivators there were much stronger than even his precious Jiang Yao. And Jiang Yao wasn’t weak at all, either. Then there also was the spell that had been put on him which had saved him from the corpse puppet, which seemed to complicate the situation as well.

No, he thought to himself and took a long breath. He wasn’t going to think about this at the moment. He knew that when time came, him and Jiang Yao would stand together to whatever were to come.

With a resolute spark in his eyes, Luo Xiao’s gaze fell on the pill furnace as he stirred up his soul energy.