Chapter 91: 91: Lips Sure Are Soft

Bow in hand, Lin Songmei stood across the training room from Yan Mingqing. The training room was a decent size, maybe the size of a sports court, but Songmei felt that this was... way too small. 

Songmei had already fought side-by-side with Mingqing, she knew about the monstrous body strengthening technique Mingqing hid up her sleeve. It was like a person bringing a bomb to a knife fight, way overboard and unfair—well Mingqing was using a dull practice sword for this, so maybe it was just bringing a gun to a fist fight. 

Of course, Songmei had some techniques of her own, Songmei had both a movement and a body strengthening technique. To the disappointment of all the meridians in Songmei’s body though, the efficiency and the actual effect of her own body strengthening technique was much worse than Mingqing’s. 

And the movement technique just made her move quicker—no times five strength, times three speed, times six brain power, times a bazillion whatever bs that Mingqing’s did. 

Sword cultivators, why did they have to adopt a “hit first, think later” philosophy?

“You ready?” Songmei called out, patting the quiver of practice arrows slung to her waist. While she herself was certainly not ready, it was now or never. 

Seeing Mingqing shake her head and call out, “one sec” Songmei began to gather Qi in her feet while taking a few deep breaths. 

Gathering Qi in her feet, Songmei motioned towards Mingqing, shouting, “Whenever you want!” 

With her words not even fully out of her mouth, Songmei’s eyes widened as Mingqing leapt forward, her sword outstretched. 

Songmei swore Mingqing had been a lot further not even half a second ago. 

Disappearing from her spot, leaving only a few iridescent butterflies in her place, Songmei watched as the space she was previously in was uh... dismembered by a sword slash. 

Keeping herself moving and leaving Qi butterflies in her wake, Songmei pulled her bow back, creating a crystalline arrow. 

Songmei was going to be honest, she had no idea where to shoot it. 

With monsters, it was easy, it was just shooting the eye or the leg, or something like that. 

But with Mingqing?

Was she supposed to shoot the ground and make Mingqing slip? Was she supposed to try to hit Mingqing? With that monster body enhancement technique that definitely needed a nerf, Songmei was almost one-hundred percent sure that the arrow she let fly would just get cut in half.

Letting the arrow fly as she continued to just run away from Mingqing, Songmei kept herself moving—there was nothing else she could do after all. 

Thwang. Thwang. 

Watching her arrows get eviscerated by Mingqing’s sword into the next dimension, Songmei was at a little bit of a loss. 

How was she supposed to win... 

As of now, the situation was just her leading Mingqing around the room in circles while Mingqing let out a barrage of sword attacks that Songmei wished she could stay far, far away from. 

Having practiced with Mingqing so much, Songmei could tell that Mingqing wasn’t using any of the sword moves from Taurus; instead, she was just cycling through the four stars of Aries. 

Songmei dreaded the day Mingqing got to a cultivation level high enough to have long-ranged attacks as disgusting as her short-ranged ones. Of course, by then, Songmei herself would have some short-ranged attacks too, but the margin of victory would probably be worse than it was now considering the plans Songmei had to learn how to do some healing. 

Their party definitely didn’t need more attack, they had that in the bag. They had Youhong, who was... an assassin? Something like that. Mr. “Descent of the Moon” Youhong who just zipped around like Songmei, but left a trail of headless bodies behind him. 

Then, there was, of course, Mingqing, Miss literal bulldozer that could plow through a crowd of enemies. And now, they had added Mr. “Chosen by the Sun, Sun God’s Descent” or whatever who just pounded the crap out of the enemies with a smile as bright as the sun.  

Really, their party at this point was just a ton of people who could hit other people really hard... 

At least it worked, it was the classic, “if I punch you in the face first, but also do it so hard that I knock you out, I’ll never get hit.” 

Making sure to continue moving (to the sadness of Songmei’s legs), Songmei kept the barrage of arrows flowing. 

The battle at this point had just settled into a struggle of attrition. So, who was going to run out of Qi first? 

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Well, probably Mingqing, that body enhancement technique burnt through Qi about as fast as Youhong burnt through lychee jelly. 

The problem was, Songmei sucked at this whole battle thing. It was going to take Mingqing at least an hour to burn through all her Qi—the girl had that fiendish Kunpeng Clan level Qi reserve after all. 

That meant Songmei was supposed to not make a mistake in running away for an hour???

That already seemed unfeasible, time to buckle for a long run though... 

Interrupting her thoughts, Songmei could only hear a half-laughing half-growling Mingqing yell, “Are you even going to fight? Or just run?” 

“Just run!” Songmei yelled back with a smile. “I’m ready for a long one! Are you?”

It seemed like hunger and the focus it got in the way of was going to be the deciding factor... 

------

Twenty minutes in. 

Songmei’s legs were ON FIRE. 

Damn she was out of shape. Even with the body enhancement technique, running away at full speed for twenty minutes, at this point? Felt like she was stabbing a syringe of literal magma into her thighs. 

She swore, once she was done with this, she’d up her cardio workouts. 

Her arms were tired, her feet were tired, her arrows were off track, and her steps were slower. 

She had been using her technique for so long at this point that more than a hundred iridescent butterflies seemed to fly around in the little training room of theirs—and that with Mingqing chopping as many as she could in half. 

Dodging a sword stab, Songmei let out a long exhale as she pushed herself to move just that little bit faster. Mingqing was close, within sword’s reach, which was... within defeat’s reach for Songmei. 

Just... another... goddamn... FORTY MINUTES! 

Feeling a cramp seize up her leg, Songmei suppressed the urge to let out a stream of expletives as the walls swam and the ground came up to her face. 

Trying to push herself up, Songmei felt the ground next to her split open as a sword appeared beside her and Mingqing appeared above her, propping herself up with one hand against Songmei’s shoulder. 

“You really had to make it that hard didn’t you?” Mingqing asked, gasping for breath as she grinned, smug in her victory. “I feel like I’ve just worked out enough for the next week.” 

“Well...” Songmei pushed out, the out-of-breathness hitting her like one of those freight trains that was carrying goods into Westriver right now. “I had to put up some resistance, I can’t just make it that easy for you.” 

“You did good then,” Mingqing laughed, leaning down and touching her nose with Songmei’s. 

With her breathing quickening because, hot damn was Mingqing close, and hot damn was Mingqing hot, Songmei shifted, embarrassment climbing onto her face as a pink tinge appeared on her cheeks. “I reek of sweat... s-so no need to lean so close.” 

Pushing herself up just a little, Mingqing tilted her head with a grin, a little bit of calculation going on in her head as paused for a second. 

Her shoulder still being used by Mingqing to support herself, Songmei laid there, letting out a little cough as silence fell. “W... What?” 

Leaning down with a smile, Mingqing gave Songmei a small kiss on the lips before pushing herself upright and pulling her sword out of the ground. “I just think that you’re cute and that you smell nice, so no need to say that.” 

W... What?

What?!