I CULTIVATED BY TAKING ADVANTAGE OF THE DEMON LORD

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CHAPTER 13: Guilt

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For one brief instant, Chu Li felt a chill sweep through every inch of her body.

She turned her head, studying the person pressed close beside her, utterly at a loss.

The boy already stood half a head taller than her, and with his soft dark hair falling across the side of his face, she couldn't see his eyes from this angle, had no way of reading whatever expression he wore.

But she could see the faint curve at the corner of his mouth, a smile that seemed to suggest everything was unfolding exactly as he intended.

He was close enough that the warmth of his breath still lingered against the shell of her ear.

And yet, somehow, he also felt impossibly far away, leaving her feeling as though her heart hung suspended over some bottomless drop, as if one careless move might send everything crashing down beyond any hope of recovery.

By the time Chu Li shook herself out of the daze, Little Lian had already released his hold on her, lowering his head slightly the way he usually did, his doe-like eyes looking up at her timidly. "Sister, I knew you'd be all right."

"I told you I'd be fine." Chu Li stroked the top of his soft hair, murmuring the words back to him.

She stared, dazed, as the queen continued her assault on Jin Lan, the attack stretching on for the time it took to finish a full cup of tea, with no sign of slowing.

Time seemed to stretch out endlessly, and the three elders present did nothing but watch from a safe distance, clearly content to leave Jin Lan's fate entirely in the queen's hands.

Just as Chu Li began to believe this was where it would all end, a figure came stumbling into view, and under the shocked stares of everyone present, threw his own body over Jin Lan's barely conscious form as a shield.

"It was me! I set the fire and killed the colony myself, all to gather honey as a gift for my mistress!"

"It was me who framed Miss Chu, because I couldn't stand seeing my mistress upset with her!"

"My mistress knew nothing about any of this. Please, I beg you, spare her. Liu Wu is willing to accept whatever punishment you see fit!"

Even as he screamed himself hoarse, desperately shielding Jin Lan from the queen's fury at the risk of his own life, his efforts only drew even fiercer retaliation from the bee, the scene growing too brutal to watch.

It wasn't until the queen had finally exhausted her rage, retracting her stinger and beating her wings slowly back to Elder Lu's waiting palm, that Liu Wu, utterly spent, finally loosened his protective grip and collapsed to the ground beside Jin Lan, his limbs still twitching uncontrollably from the venom's effects.

"Spare Jin Lan?" Elder Lu closed her fingers gently around the queen and shot Liu Wu an icy glance. "If the queen hadn't shown such awareness today, Chu Li might well have lost her life over Jin Lan's false accusation. Are you only rushing forward now because you're afraid the truth's about to come out, hoping to save Jin Lan out of pure self-interest?"

Liu Wu insisted stubbornly, "My mistress never harmed those bees. She doesn't deserve this!"

"If she never killed the colony, then why would the queen mark her as a mortal enemy?" Elder Wen's gaze turned distant and cold. "I've said all I intend to say on the matter. You'd do well to reflect on your own conduct."

Liu Wu's face went blank with disbelief, his voice carrying more shock than pain. "But I'm the one who burned the colony to death, it was me, it was really me! Why won't any of you believe me!"

But just then, Jin Lan, lying nearby, let out a garbled, mocking laugh.

"Didn't I tell you not to be so clever for your own good? You went and burned the hive, so why didn't you bother burning off the scent that clung to you afterward too? You keep insisting you wanted to help me, and yet look at the state I'm in now, all thanks to you. How exactly do you plan to make up for this?"

"Even now, does my mistress still think I've failed her?" Liu Wu's lips trembled, his voice bordering on despair. "I've already done so much for her. Isn't that proof enough of how I feel? What more could I possibly do to satisfy her?"

"My feelings? What good are your feelings to me!" Jin Lan let out a bitter, ghastly laugh, black blood trickling from her mouth as she spoke, her appearance now genuinely horrifying. She said nothing further to him after that.

Everyone present watched the scene unfold in stunned silence.

"After all this, I suspect both Jin Lan and Liu Wu have lost their cultivation for good." Elder Wen shook her head, sighing at the wreckage before them. "The Bliss Sect cannot keep people like this within its ranks. I'll petition the sect master to have them expelled, and let them fend for themselves from here on."

With Jin Lan and Liu Wu having reaped exactly what they'd sown, and Chu Li's name fully cleared of any wrongdoing, she still couldn't quite shake the lingering unease from the horror she'd witnessed in the rear mountains.

After thanking Qi Ying for so boldly speaking up on her behalf, Chu Li headed home with Little Lian at her side.

Not long after, someone sent by Elder Lu arrived at her quarters as well.

Following Elder Lu's instructions, they confiscated the jar of wild spirit honey from Chu Li's room, to be left for the queen's own sustenance, giving her the strength needed to build a new hive and raise a fresh colony of her own.

Watching them carry off the jar of honey, Chu Li actually felt a measure of relief.

By the end of that exhausting day, worn out in both body and spirit, she told Little Lian she was heading to bed early and went to lie down.

She didn't wake again until well past dinnertime.

Little Lian sat at the head of the bed, holding one of the beeswax candles, and took her hand affectionately the moment she stirred. "Did you sleep well, Sister?"

His eyes were clear, his expression sweet and obedient, no different at all from the version of him she knew so well.

But looking down at her hand in his grip, Chu Li couldn't help but recall how he'd held her hand in much the same way back in the rear mountains.

The words he'd murmured against her shoulder still echoed faintly in her ears, and the same chill she'd felt in that moment crept quietly back over her now.

Chu Li said nothing, gently pulling her hand free, and shook her head, pressing a palm to her temple. "It's nothing. Just a little tired."

Little Lian watched her with bright, careful eyes. "So after dinner, will you still drip wax for me tonight, Sister?"

Chu Li hadn't expected him to bring it up himself. "Didn't you say you didn't like it?"

"That was before." Little Lian seemed genuinely pleased, shifting closer to the head of the bed and holding the candle up right in front of her. "I've had a change of heart. Whatever you do for me, Sister, whether it's the meals or these healing methods, I've realized I like all of it."

Chu Li wondered if she'd somehow misheard him. Barely a day had passed. How could his attitude toward wax-dripping have flipped so completely?

But the slight widening of his doe-like eyes and the faint upward tilt at their corners made his eagerness unmistakably plain.

Hesitantly, Chu Li accepted the candle he offered. Beeswax candles, thanks to the natural pollen carried within the wax, normally gave off an extremely faint, pleasant fragrance.

But perhaps due to some lingering side effect of the bee venom, her sense of smell had grown unusually sharp, and the moment she brought the candle close, the scent struck her as sharply overpowering. She had no choice but to hand it back to him and lie down, facing away.

"What's wrong, Sister?" Little Lian sounded confused.

Chu Li reached for the nearest excuse she could think of. "My head's aching a little. I want to sleep a bit more. I probably won't be able to make you a proper spirit meal tonight. Remember to eat the fruit in the basket, and if that's not enough, there should be more in the storage pouch by the window..."

Little Lian sounded genuinely worried. "Are you sure you don't want to see a healer, Sister?"

Chu Li kept her eyes open and continued the lie. "This headache's something I've had since birth. It'll pass once I've slept a while."

"I see." He sounded downcast. "So does that mean you won't be able to drip wax for me tonight either, Sister?"

"Mm." Chu Li pulled the blanket up over herself, brushing him off. "We'll talk about it tomorrow."

By the time Chu Li woke again, it was already the following day, bright sunlight spilling in through the window.

She fully expected to find Little Lian in the sitting room, eating fruit, but when she rolled over, she found him instead sitting at the edge of his own cot, facing her, still cradling the very same candle, seemingly waiting for her to wake.

Without thinking much of it, she asked, "Have you eaten anything yet?"

"No." He ran a fingertip lightly over the candle, a few fine shavings of wax flaking off beneath his touch. "I've been waiting for you to wake up, Sister."

Only then did Chu Li notice the many fine scratch marks covering the candle's surface. Looking closer, she saw his lips had gone pale, faint dark circles ringing his eyes, and he looked visibly more worn than he had the past two days.

A faint, unpleasant suspicion crossed Chu Li's mind. "When did you get up this morning?"

Little Lian shook his head. "I've been waiting for you to wake up this whole time."

Chu Li threw off the blanket and got out of bed, staring at him in shock. "You skipped a meal, and stayed up the entire night?"

Only then did he finally lift his head, looking up at her with a wounded, wistful expression. "I wanted to wait until you woke up, Sister, so we could eat together..."

Faced with that look, Chu Li couldn't bring herself to say a single word of reproach. Instead, she felt overwhelmed with guilt herself.

When she'd made that excuse and gone to bed the night before, it had never once occurred to her that he'd end up keeping vigil at her bedside for an entire night.

She felt more and more like an utterly terrible person.

A boy this sweet and gentle deserved to be cherished, not doubted, and here she'd spent the last few days tangled up in her own petty misgivings, letting herself hurt his feelings without even meaning to.

A wave of guilt rose sharply in her chest, and in an instant, she pushed aside every lingering, uneasy thought she'd been carrying. "I'm sorry. I don't even know what came over me yesterday..."

Little Lian gently took her hand, giving it a small shake, blinking up at her. "I'm not upset with you, Sister. As long as you're all right, I don't mind anything else."

"Let me make you something delicious to eat." Chu Li steeled herself. "The weather's lovely today. We could go out for a walk."

"You want to take me out, Sister?" Little Lian brightened with delight, before ducking his head, looking a little shy. "Then, tonight, will you still drip wax for me?"

Chu Li found herself utterly incapable of resisting him when he softened like this. "Of course I will! And we'll make up for last night too, on top of tonight's!"

As Chu Li led Little Lian eastward through the sect, the boy kept looking curiously left and right, pausing to admire every unfamiliar flower they passed.

With the weather so pleasant, Chu Li crossed paths with quite a few Bliss Sect disciples out walking with their partners.

Most of the time, the female disciples walked ahead, their partners trailing obediently behind them.

In a few cases, a single disciple even had an entire string of partners following in her wake.

But whenever these groups passed by Chu Li, whether it was the disciple in front or the partners trailing behind, they'd all glance her way with a faint trace of unease, almost fear, as though there were something frightening about her.

Chu Li couldn't quite put her finger on what was so strange about it, and led Little Lian, thoroughly puzzled, to Qi Ying's quarters.

The moment Qi Ying spotted Chu Li, she yanked both her and Little Lian inside at once, smiling as she settled Little Lian down with a cup of tea, then, without any explanation, pulled Chu Li into the inner chamber and shut the door behind them.

Chu Li watched, baffled, as Qi Ying paced the room, rifling through chests and drawers as though searching for something. "What's gotten into you? Why so tense all of a sudden?"

"Shh!" Qi Ying finally dug out a small jar and pressed it into Chu Li's hands, her voice dropping conspiratorially. "Listen, the sect searched Jin Lan's quarters and found a huge stash of spirit honey, enough to feed the queen for an entire year. Elder Lu had to confiscate what you'd gathered too, of course, sect rules required it. But she genuinely felt for what you went through yesterday, and asked me to pass this along to you privately."

Chu Li hadn't expected the outwardly stern, unyielding Elder Lu to have this much genuine warmth hidden underneath.

Touched, she opened the jar, only to be caught off guard by the rich fragrance that wafted out. "Spirit honey?"

Qi Ying pointed at the jar, explaining, "This is aged spirit honey, refined over years by Elder Lu herself from tending the sect's bees. Crystal clear, and far more nourishing than fresh honey. If you feed it to your partner, it'll do wonders for restoring his spiritual energy."

"Elder Lu's very thoughtful." Chu Li held the jar with genuine, flattered gratitude. "I'll be sure to give it to him."

"Don't just give it to him directly," Qi Ying said, giving her a pointed wink, as though hinting at something. "You'll want to have some yourself first."

Chu Li looked a little confused. "We're both supposed to have some? I thought this was meant specifically to nourish him."

"Ugh, how do I put this more clearly?" Qi Ying sighed, exasperated, then mimed scooping a spoonful of the aged honey into her own mouth, before making a gesture toward the empty air as though feeding it to someone else.

The smile froze on Chu Li's face.

She pointed at her own mouth, falling silent for a long moment, before finally asking, hesitant, "Are you saying you want me to... feed him the honey mouth to mouth?"

"Exactly that! Once you've finished dripping wax on him tonight, follow it up with this, and the effect will absolutely be—" Qi Ying's sentence was cut off by a knock at the door, and she glanced up. "Yes? What is it?"

Chu Li blinked, caught off guard, and turned around, only to see Little Lian's head poking through the gap in the doorway, staring at the two of them in utter bewilderment, still holding a cup of steaming tea in his hands.

【Author's Note】

【Bonus scene】

Ji Wuyan: No need for the honey. You can just feed me directly.

Chu Li: If I'm not feeding you honey, what exactly am I supposed to feed you? A sip of water?

Ji Wuyan: ......

Why do you have to make kissing sound so blunt and clinical, it's honestly a little embarrassing.

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