Crush's Cold Senior Sister is Actually Childhood Sweetheart - Chapter 21

Chapter 21: She Felt That She Was Qualified to Love The Person in Front Of Her.

Only then did she feel she had the right to love the person in front of her.

Ling Qi watched as the other person’s eyelashes trembled slightly. Her eyes were veiled with a mist, and there was a deep sadness in them. Ling Qi smiled again, thinking she must be truly drunk.

“Yang Chongguang and I don’t actually have such a deep conflict…”

She sighed lightly. “She just thinks I’m very hostile toward her daughter, but I simply don’t agree with her… way of raising a child. The divine power and cultivation to truly ascend to godhood cannot be built up with elixirs and spiritual herbs.”

Ling Qi herself had started with an inferior immortal bone and cultivated little by little. When she was very young, the divine Fuling had told her:

You can use everything in Jiu Yang Palace, but I want you to know that I will proactively give you anything that is beneficial to your cultivation. As for the things I don’t give you, it’s best if you don’t touch them.

She had grown up in an orphanage and had long learned to exercise restraint and endurance. She could swallow bitterness and pain like candy, let alone learn to progress step by step.

Ling Qi had never taken a shortcut.

Every step she took was solid, and every hurdle she crossed was steady. Bl00d and tears paved the road in front of her, leaving behind crimson footprints.

By the time Ling Qi had made it through the thorns and stood at the peak, looking back, she had long become Senior Sister Ling of Chongguang Palace, and a Senior Ling whom all the immortals in the Upper Realm respectfully called.

So she never thought that taking a shortcut was a viable path.

Unfortunately, the divine Chongguang did not think so. And it was clear that Yang Anping thought even less so.

“Does Yang Anping know… your relationship with the divine Chongguang?” An Jin asked in a low voice.

Even though she deliberately lowered her voice, it still trembled uncontrollably. Her hands were clenched tightly at her sides, her nails already digging deep into the flesh of her palms, but she had no intention of letting go, as if she couldn’t feel any pain.

“She probably doesn’t know,” Ling Qi mused, following An Jin’s train of thought without noticing her unusual state.

She thought for a moment and said, “There aren’t many people who know. Besides Yang Chongguang and me, there’s only Senior Sister Cen… Now, with you, that’s only four. None of us would tell her on purpose.”

“But she… isn’t too stupid after all. Even if she didn’t know at first, over time, she would notice that something was off.”

“Otherwise, why would she find fault with me every day, right?”

Ling Qi chuckled and shook her head, as if she were telling an irrelevant joke.

But An Jin felt only a boiling rage in her veins and couldn’t smile at all.

Her lips trembled a few times, and finally, she squeezed out a choked sentence, “How could she do that… How could she treat you like that…”

Ling Qi was surprised by An Jin’s reaction and was stunned for a few seconds. She still tried to tease her. “Didn’t you think she was a good person after she saved you in the Void of Wu Xu and even went over to comfort her?”

She said this, but Ling Qi didn’t actually mind.

Although she had felt a little sour because of the handkerchief An Jin had given her in the Void of Wu Xu, Ling Qi didn’t consider herself a petty person and was far from holding a grudge.

She also understood An Jin well. Let alone that Yang Anping had helped her, even if the girl crying on the ground that day was just a stranger from the same sect whom she didn’t know well, she probably wouldn’t have been able to stand by and do nothing.

In the next second, An Jin’s eyes instantly turned red, and tears welled up, but she held them back, not wanting them to fall.

Seeing this, Ling Qi panicked. She no longer dared to tease her and quickly explained, “I truly don’t care. The things she holds so tightly and is so afraid of losing have always been worthless to me.”

She was not just referring to the spiritual elixirs and artifacts but also the so-called motherly love and the identity of a god’s daughter.

Yang Anping had always held a strange hostility towards her. This was something that not just she herself, but even people who had just joined Chongguang Palace, could see. Of course, Ling Qi knew this. Although no one dared to say it to her face, the quiet whispers behind her back were unstoppable.

What made her most exasperated was that many people thought they were fighting for the position of the third-in-command of Chongguang Palace. Every time she heard this, Ling Qi felt a sense of utter frustration.

It made Chongguang Palace sound like some bandit’s lair. Yang Chongguang was the leader, Cen Xiyao was the second-in-command who plotted strategies, and she and Yang Anping were just the small-time lackeys fighting for the third position.

Even more absurdly, some people rumored that they were competing for favor. At the thought of the subject of this competition being Yang Chongguang, Ling Qi felt goosebumps all over her body.

To these people, Ling Qi’s response was always the same: go to the mortal realm less, browse the internet less, attend more classes, and cultivate more.

In such an environment, it was completely normal for An Jin to have heard or misunderstood something.

Unexpectedly, An Jin sniffled and forced her tears back. Her brows were still furrowed, but she said to Ling Qi in a low voice, “I know.”

“I know… those things have no meaning in your eyes, and you’ve never felt that she truly stole anything from you. She might not even know your relationship with the divine Chongguang, but every time… every time she probes, every time she targets you, it’s just bringing up old wounds.”

An Jin’s voice suddenly rose. “But it was Yang Chongguang who left you first! What right does Yang Anping have, what资格- what right does she have to target you here!”

Her chest rose and fell violently, and her hands at her sides were trembling so much that she could barely control them.

After she said this, the pavilion was silent for a long time. No one spoke again. But Ling Qi did not look away. She continued to look at An Jin, very seriously, with so many emotions in her eyes that others couldn’t read.

Perhaps it was because of the intensity of her tone, or because she had hit upon something that was on Ling Qi’s mind. For the first time, An Jin saw the other person’s eyelashes blink rapidly, and a glint of moisture flashed in her eyes.

But it was gone in an instant.

An Jin couldn’t sit still any longer. She stood up and quickly walked over to Ling Qi. As she got closer, the other person’s shoulders clearly flinched, instinctively wanting to shrink back. But before she could hide, An Jin had wrapped her entire body in a hug.

The moment she was embraced, Ling Qi’s body stiffened for a moment, then gradually relaxed. She didn’t look up. Instead, she wrapped her arms around the other person’s waist, and tilted her head slightly, pressing her ear to An Jin’s chest.

She felt the familiar body temperature and scent, and even their heartbeats intertwined. The heartbeats were very fast, a little unnaturally so.

But if they couldn’t tell whose thumping heartbeat it was, they hadn’t exposed themselves.

In this way, the two of them remained in this posture in silence for a long time. Until the daylight gradually faded, until the sky was so dark they could no longer see the emotions in each other’s eyes, neither of them let go.

After a long time, Ling Qi buried her whole face in An Jin’s chest and said in a muffled voice, “So I have hated Yang Chongguang… I don’t hate her for abandoning me. She said she had no other choice, and I don’t care if that’s true or not. I also don’t hate that she later had another daughter. That’s her own freedom.”

“I just hate why she had to tell me all this. Why, at that time… when I was already in so much pain, did she have to drive a knife into my heart again?”

Ling Qi looked up at An Jin, saying each word with great difficulty.

She said she hated her, but in her eyes, there was only pain and confusion.

She didn’t explain what “that painful time” was. She also knew that An Jin wouldn’t ask.

There was a very slight nasal sound in Ling Qi’s voice. If you didn’t listen carefully, it was almost the same as usual. Two tears that were about to fall hung on her eyelashes and then quickly disappeared. Even her breathing frequency hadn’t changed.

But An Jin felt as if her heart was being squeezed by an invisible hand. The pain started in her heart and slowly spread to her limbs. A sharp ache rose in her chest, and every breath felt like torture.

She had seen her senior sister in many different ways.

The gentle and caring way she looked when they first met; the cold, emotionless way she spoke during the Grand Selection; the firm attitude but slightly weary voice she used with the divine Chongguang; and all the ways since then… how she had protected her and cared for her so meticulously.

The violent and uncontrolled heartbeat she felt when they first met had frightened An Jin back then. She was afraid that it was just infatuation, that she was uncontrollably attracted because the other person was so beautiful. She was even more afraid that she didn’t know what love was and that her heart was fickle.

After they had been together for a while, she became even more afraid. Afraid that she was just taking advantage of Ling Qi’s kindness, just infatuated with how such a remarkable person was so different with her. That she was just too young, and it was her vanity at play.

But it wasn’t until this moment, until the other person shed tears in front of her, until her heart ached so much that the intense burning sensation almost crushed her, that An Jin realized—

She truly loved the person in front of her.

And only in this moment, did An Jin feel she had the qualification- the right to love the person in front of her.

She hugged Ling Qi even tighter, bending down slightly to rest her chin on the top of her head. As she bent down, the tip of her nose brushed against Ling Qi’s hair, and the familiar scent of hibiscus flowers filled her lungs.

Neither of them spoke for a while.

Suddenly, Ling Qi felt a chill on her hair. An Jin’s tears were silently seeping into her hair. The warm tears brushed against her forehead, making her body tremble.

“Don’t look at me.”

An Jin somewhat forcefully pressed her head into her chest, not allowing her to look up. Ling Qi couldn’t move for a moment. She only struggled to pull her arm out of their tight embrace.

When her palm touched the liquid on An Jin’s cheek, An Jin suddenly turned her head away, trying to hide.

“You’re so concerned about your pride,” Ling Qi said, a little exasperated.

Feeling the heartache and sadness conveyed by the tears, Ling Qi’s internal conflict grew even stronger. “What about you? If knowing the truth would inevitably lead to pain, if blissful ignorance would make you happier… would you still want to recover your memories?”

“…I don’t know what you’re talking about. I remember everything,” An Jin insisted, stubbornly turning her head away, refusing to admit it.

Her memory loss was actually an open secret in Chongguang Palace. Her lack of common knowledge about the Upper Realm could be attributed to having stayed in the mortal realm for too long, but she always looked confused when talking about her past. When asked too many questions, she would start making things up. When asked about her age, she would blurt out, “Over two thousand years old, I’ve lived too long to remember clearly.” After a while, everyone could tell something was off.

Despite this, Ling Qi still played along with her. “I’m saying, hypothetically, if you were to lose your memories.”

“I think I would,” An Jin said, sniffing. “The joy of ignorance is not true joy. The clarity of pain is still clarity. I want to be clear.”

Seeing that Ling Qi wasn’t speaking, she was afraid the other person had misunderstood, so she quickly added, “But you and I are different! Since you were already left in the mortal realm, what’s the point of knowing who the other person is? If I were you, I would hope I never had to see Yang Chongguang again.”

Ling Qi struggled to lift her head from An Jin’s embrace and looked into her clear eyes, but her thoughts drifted far away.

The person in front of her clearly couldn’t remember anything, yet she was still trying to comfort her. She still said the exact same words as before and still used the word “left” when talking about Ling Qi being abandoned.

For a moment, Ling Qi felt as if she had returned to eight hundred years ago.

If Xiao Jin hadn’t lost her memory and hadn’t been missing for so many years, then after Yang Chongguang had come to her and revealed everything, their conversation would have been like this.

Or maybe it would have started with, “I’m sorry, Ling Qiqi, for hiding it from you for so long, but even if I had to do it all over again, I still wouldn’t have told you.”

She also remembered that before the last Grand Selection, Ying Baizang had visited her at Chongguang Palace. At that time, Ying Baizang was determined to have Xiao Jin return to the Cold Palace with her. Her reason was—

Can you truly continue to love her?

When all her past memories are gone, and even the people around her and her environment have changed, how can you be so certain that her personality won’t change completely, that she won’t become a completely different person?

When that happens, can you truly still love her? Do you really not mind at all?

At the time, Ling Qi had said without a second thought that she didn’t care at all. As long as Xiao Jin returned to her safe and sound, she could be anything, and Ling Qi would accept it all.

And at this moment, with Ling Qi’s arms still wrapped around An Jin’s waist, those words echoed in her ears, lingering for a long time. If Ying Baizang were standing next to her right now, Ling Qi would tell her without hesitation—

Even if the environment changed, even if the memories were lost, I am still so certain that the underlying essence of her soul is the person I have loved for thousands of years.

It has never changed.

…

Ling Qi didn’t remember how she got back to her chamber.

She only remembered several wine pots lying askew and the mellow fragrance of the “Fishing Song” wine still in the air. In her fragmented memories, all the tears and words became blurry. She had even forgotten what she had said herself.

When she woke up again, Ling Qi was lying on her bed in her chamber. The sky outside was just starting to get light. The sound of rustling conversations could be heard outside the hall, but she didn’t have the splitting headache of a hangover.

Was the drinking part a fake memory?

Just as she was wondering, her gaze suddenly fell on an empty bowl on the stool next to the bed. Inside the white porcelain bowl, there was a small spoon, and a little bit of the hangover soup was left at the bottom, not fully consumed.

Ling Qi was stunned for a moment, then smiled knowingly.

She could almost picture someone fumbling to make hangover soup and trying every possible way to get the sleeping her to drink it.

“Why is she still so unwilling to wash dishes…”

She shook her head helplessly, threw back the covers, and got out of bed. But as she passed the desk, she inadvertently glanced at the painting she had left unfinished and then froze.

On the unfinished painting, next to the two small trees standing side by side, there was now a line of somewhat childish handwriting. The ink was still fresh.

It was connected to the half-line of poetry she had hastily written after leaving the Su You flower illusion, completing a couplet:

If life were only like our first meeting, we’d add wine and light the lamps to start the banquet anew.

Add wine and light the lamps to start the banquet anew.

Ling Qi closed her eyes. She could still feel the violent rise and fall of her chest and the uncontrollable trembling of her eyelashes.

It was as if a person had walked through a fog for a very, very long time, barely making it to today by relying on the sweetness of the past, not knowing how much further the road ahead was.

And someone, like a gust of wind, had forcefully intruded on her territory when she was a child, and after many years apart, suddenly returned to blow away the mist in front of her without a word.

And so the clouds parted, and the world became clear.

Ling Qi couldn’t help but laugh softly.

She suddenly realized that the number of times she had laughed in just these two days was more than all the times combined in the past eight hundred years.

Carefully lifting the painting with both hands, Ling Qi examined it for a moment, and finally hung it on the wall above the divan. The divan was next to the desk, and faced the foot of the bed.

The communicator on the desk flashed several times. A familiar name lit up over and over, but Ling Qi’s eyes were fixed on the painting she had just hung on the wall, and she didn’t see it at all.

Ling Qi stared at the painting on the wall for a long time. When she finally made it to An Jin’s chamber, she was surprised to learn that she had already left.

“An Jin seemed to have mentioned before she left… that she was going to Jiu Yang Palace with Liao Huan,” Fu Xin said, holding a thick stack of documents at the entrance of the hall, trying hard to remember.