Chapter Sixty-One: The Bitter Truth and the Bitter Brew

The cottage, once a symbol of Lin Wan’s independence and hard work, now felt like a high-stakes arena.

The air was thick with the scent of pine wood smoke and the sharp, medicinal tang of herbs being steeped in boiling water.

Lin Wan lay tucked under a mountain of soft furs, her body still humming with the aftershocks of the Whispering Woods.

Every time she closed her eyes, she could feel the phantom sensation of vines crawling up her ankles, but when she opened them, she was met with the suffocatingly intense gaze of two powerful males who refused to leave her side for even a second.

"You need to eat," Qin Mo said, his voice as smooth as silk but carrying the weight of an imperial decree.

He was crouched by the hearth, moving with a practiced ease that suggested he had done this a thousand times.

He had already gathered the necessary supplies from her kitchen—supplies the Dragon warriors hadn’t even thought to touch.

With a flick of his wrist, he produced a small, silver-handled knife, precisely slicing through a piece of dried meat and dropping it into a clay pot of bubbling broth.

Long Zhan stood by the window, his large frame blocking out much of the fading evening light. He watched Qin Mo’s efficient movements with a deepening scowl. In the Dragon Tribe, high-ranking males were served; they did not serve.

Seeing the King of the beast city—a man whose reputation for cruelty was legendary, meticulously skimming the fat off a soup for a female made Long Zhan feel a strange, burning prickle of inadequacy.

He was a Sovereign, a warrior who could level mountains, but he realized with a jolt of irritation that he didn’t even know where Lin Wan kept her wooden spoons.

"I can have the warriors bring fresh prey," Long Zhan offered, his voice a low rumble. "A pregnant female needs the blood-essence of a fresh kill, not dried scraps."

Qin Mo didn’t even look up, though a smug, knowing smirk played at the corners of his lips. "She needs something her stomach can actually hold down, Dragon. Her spirit is fragile. If you give her heavy, raw meat now, she’ll be sick by midnight.

But I suppose a beast who spends all his time in the sky wouldn’t understand the delicate needs of a female on the ground."

Long Zhan’s jaw tightened so hard his facial scales shimmered. He looked at Lin Wan, hoping she would side with him, but she was staring at the fire, her eyes distant.

"Qin Mo," she whispered, her voice cracking. "Tell me the rest. You said Wang... you said he was alive. But where is he? Why didn’t he come with you? He promised... he promised he would never let me go again."

The steady rhythm of Qin Mo’s stirring slowed. The smugness vanished from his face, replaced by a grim, heavy shadows. He poured the broth into a bowl, the steam rising in white plumes, and walked over to the bed. He sat on the edge, ignoring the way Long Zhan took a threatening step forward.

"Wanwan, listen to me," Qin Mo said, his voice dropping to a somber register. "When the disaster us after we left the coldera, it wasn’t just a storm. It was chaos. Wang... he lost his mind when he couldn’t reach you. The anger in him was like a wildfire."

He began to describe the scene, his words painting a vivid, terrifying picture of the battle at the caldera. He told her how Wang had charged the Phantom Beast—a creature of pure nightmare that shouldn’t have been in those lands.

"He fought like a demon," Qin Mo continued, his eyes reflecting the flickering orange light of the hearth. "But the Phantom Beast... it was as if it had lost its senses. It didn’t just fight; it hammered us into the earth. It was mindless violence. I was knocked aside, my ribs shattered, and for a moment, the world went black."

Lin Wan’s breath hitched. She could almost see it—the golden-furred leopard she loved, bruised and broken, refusing to back down.

"When I regained a sliver of consciousness," Qin Mo said, his voice trembling slightly, "the air was screaming. There was a sound... a roar like a mountain splitting open.

A massive explosion of energy that killed the Phantom Beast and the feral beasts instantly. I couldn’t move, I could only listen. Through the ringing in my ears, I heard an older voice. It sounded ancient, cold, and possessed of a power I couldn’t measure."

"What did the voice say?" Long Zhan asked, leaning in, his interest as a Sovereign piqued by the mention of such power.

"The voice said, ’You are lucky to be next to the Young Master,’" Qin Mo repeated, his gaze fixed on Lin Wan. "I saw a figure through the dust—someone tall, cloaked in shadows. They fed Wang a pill. I could smell it from where I lay; the scent was so potent it made my own blood sing. It was a Grade-9 Life-Restoration Pill, something that shouldn’t exist in the lower realms. And then... they were gone. They took Wang with them."

Lin Wan felt as if the bed had dropped out from under her. "They took him? Who? Where?"

"I don’t know," Qin Mo admitted, the frustration evident in his tone. "But whoever they are, they are not from the four known territories. They treated him not as a slave, but as someone of value. Wang is alive, Wanwan. But he is far from here, being healed by people with power we don’t understand."

The silence that followed was suffocating. Lin Wan leaned her head back against the furs, a single tear tracking through the dust on her cheek.

Wang was alive, but he was gone. She was safe, but she was trapped between two other males who were already marking their territory in her home.

"He’ll come back," she whispered, more to herself than to them. "He has to."

"Until he does," Long Zhan said, stepping closer and placing a heavy, warm hand on the foot of her bed, "you are under the protection of the Dragon Tribe. And my protection."

Qin Mo let out a soft, mocking huff. He stood up, the bowl of broth in his hand. "Enough talk. The soup is the right temperature now."

He proceeded to feed her, one careful spoonful at a time. Long Zhan watched, his eyes burning with envy as he realized he was being completely shut out of the intimate moment.

Qin Mo acted as if the Dragon Sovereign didn’t even exist, blowing gently on each spoonful and wiping a stray drop from Lin Wan’s lip with his thumb.

It was a silent war of "service." Qin Mo was showing Lin Wan—and Long Zhan, that while the Dragon could provide an army and a village, the Snake understood her soul

He remembered her favorite temperature; he remembered the way she liked her pillows fluffed.

As the night deepened, the atmosphere in the cottage grew even more strained. The fire had burned down to glowing embers, and the temperature outside had plummeted.

"I need to bathe," Lin Wan said suddenly, the memory of the "scented soap" Weiwei had denied her making her feel even more grimy.

"I’ll fetch the water," Long Zhan said quickly, eager to finally do something useful. He grabbed the large wooden tub from the corner and disappeared into the night before Qin Mo could stop him.

A few minutes later, Long Zhan returned, lugging the heavy tub filled with cold well water. He set it down with a heavy thud, looking proud of his strength. "There. It’s ready."

Qin Mo looked at the tub of freezing water, then at Long Zhan, and let out a short, sharp laugh. "You really are a lizard, aren’t you? You think she wants to bathe in ice?"

Without waiting for a response, Qin Mo went to the hearth. He had already kept two large stones heating in the coals. He used a pair of iron tongs to drop the glowing stones into the tub. The water hissed and groaned, steam erupting in a thick, warm cloud that filled the room.

He then pulled a small pouch from his belt—dried lavender and mint he had scavenged on the journey. He crushed them and sprinkled them into the water.

"There," Qin Mo said, casting a smug, sidelong glance at Long Zhan, whose face had turned a deep, embarrassed shade of purple. "Now it is a bath fit for a female. Not a cold pond for a beast."

Long Zhan looked like he wanted to breathe fire. He was a Sovereign! He was the Lord of the Peaks! And yet, he was being made to look like a clueless hatchling by a snake who knew too much about domesticity.

"I will stand guard outside," Long Zhan growled, his pride stung. He couldn’t stay in the room while she bathed anyway—not with Qin Mo there. He needed to clear his head.