Jing Yi and Qiu Ling stared in silence at the scene in front of them before turning to each other only to see the same doubt in the other’s eyes. Could it be they were hallucinating?

Jing Yi couldn’t help but clear his throat and lean closer to Qiu Ling. “She doesn’t look much like her. Maybe it’s somebody else?” He had lowered his voice so nobody else would hear but still felt awkward bringing it up. This wasn’t very likely, was it?

Qiu Ling shook his head as well. “No, she doesn’t look the same but … she looks a lot like her older sister. Unless they have a third sibling running around somewhere, it’s unlikely not to be Hong Bao.”

Even though Qiu Ling said so, his lips twitched while he watched her. Shen An De and Ai Hua really hadn’t exaggerated. She looked like a completely different person.

Originally, when he had seen Hong Bao for the first time in the Zhongs’ teahouse, she had looked like a fifteen-year-old girl with nothing but air in her head that was used to fuel her pipe dreams. Then later, when they had met again in the human realm after she had been expelled from the Nine Heavens, it had been in the Hei Dian Sect. She had looked a few years older, about twenty, at the time but that air of immaturity hadn’t lessened much.

Now though, things were different. That girl who had run around rating guys on handsomeness and revising her list of good-looking men whenever she met a new one, talking left and right about that charming Fate’s Scribe or her awesome senior martial brother that she wanted to marry one day, didn’t exist anymore. In front of them was now a woman that looked to be in her late twenties or maybe even her early thirties. She had an air of seriousness about her, with her brows tightly furrowed, her lips for once not holding a silly smile — or any smile at all for that matter —, and there was an almost scary determination in the way she carried herself. The biggest surprise was the guandao she was wielding though.

Qiu Ling watched her with a complicated expression. Honestly, women fighting wasn’t strange to see among immortals, especially among the dragon race. Hell, one of his best generals next to Fu Heng was a woman! Still, things were different in the mortal realm. He was also aware of that. And when it came to Hong Bao, this picture in front of him just seemed somewhat inharmonious.

Maybe it was because he had originally gotten to know her while getting drunk over feeling lovelorn or maybe because each time after that, as soon as she opened her mouth, nothing good would come out of it, but he just couldn’t think of her as any type of warrior. While she had clearly matured, it was just so … wrong to think that this could be Hong Bao. He simply didn’t want to believe it.

Jing Yi wasn’t doing much better. His mind told him that she had to be that Hong Bao because that simply fit with everything they knew from Hong Bao changing a lot to her being at the Ye Zhong Order. But even seeing her now and noticing the similarity between her and Ai Hua, he had trouble wrapping his mind around this. Just how had she changed so much?

No matter how they felt about it, they quietly waited until the fight Hong Bao was currently involved in was over before stepping closer. Anyway, they could just make sure whether it was her or not by talking to her. No matter their feelings on the topic, if it was really her, then they should go ahead as planned.

They waited for her to exchange a few words with the person she had just fought about.

When Hong Bao turned around, Jing Yi gave her a faint smile in greeting. “Hong Bao?”

Hong Bao looked at him and her eyes widened. “Jing Yi?!” Then, she put away her weapon and grabbed his hands. “It’s so awesome to see you again! Have the two of you finally gotten married?!”

Jing Yi looked at her, somewhat shocked. The difference between her looks now and then was really too big but … just as Grandmaster Shen had said, as soon as she opened her mouth, there was really no way to mistake her for somebody else. That was still exactly the same Hong Bao he had known back then.

Strangely enough, this calmed Jing Yi down. This person was somebody he knew and somebody that he knew how to deal with. It didn’t matter that she looked and also behaved differently now, at her core, she was still the same girl who had wanted to help him set up his wedding.

With her direct inquiry, he naturally couldn’t just talk about other things so he first shook his head. “No, some things happened and we had to push the matter back. Although we will be getting married shortly. Before that though … would you have a moment?” He didn’t want to talk about everything out here so he’d prefer to go inside and talk about this without anyone else.

He couldn’t help but glance at the man who had just fought with Hong Bao, wondering if he was also somebody who had switched over to another demon-hunting sect after the Chun Feng Sect’s demise.

Qiu Ling also looked over there and then, his brows twitched. What was this guy doing here?!

The person in question finally looked at them as well when he noticed their gazes. Looking at Jing Yi, his reaction wasn’t too big, but seeing Qiu Ling, his eyes naturally lit up. “Qiu Ling! What are you doing here? It’s so nice to see you again!”

He looked as if he wanted to rush over and pull him into a bear hug but Qiu Ling’s gaze made him stop in his tracks. Oh, well, he and his friend’s child really hadn’t started off on a good foot back then …

« ToC »