“Don’t bother me!” Frost ignored her report and flew off directly.
Hong stood there stunned for a while, thinking to herself that this human was really something special—able to render the secret arts of the Celestial Demon Tribe useless, able to anger the king, and yet somehow always come out of it just fine.
Only this time, it seemed a little different; the king appeared to be very angry.
She was about to go inside and take a look when, unexpectedly, Frost returned at that moment: “Hong, tell me, what were the men you met in our ancestral land like? Were they good-looking but complete jerks?”
Hong: =͟͟͞͞(꒪ᗜ꒪ ‧‧‧)
“Your Majesty, why are you suddenly asking about this…” she asked, a bit confused.
Frost took a deep breath to make herself look more composed: “Oh, nothing really, I was just asking. Since we’ll be going to the ancestral land soon, I thought I’d get a heads-up so I can find a quality man to try out when the time comes.”
Since the Celestial Demon Tribe consisted entirely of women, all their information about men came from books and paintings, so most of them were very curious about men. Only seekers like Hong ever got the chance to encounter them.
That’s why, when she first returned, she instantly became the tribe’s hottest commodity—almost everyone pestered her to describe what men looked like and whether they matched the paintings.
She hadn’t expected the king to be interested in this too, and with such wild talk.
“Actually, there are good men out there…”
She had only gotten halfway through her sentence when Frost abruptly interrupted her: “Would a good man refuse a gift from a woman who likes him?”
This question completely threw Hong off. She hemmed and hawed for ages before finally managing three words: “…I don’t know.”
Even though she had been to the human world, she had already cut off all desires because she had to be a seeker, so she naturally had no interest in experiencing such things.
“But you could ask the queen consort—she’s human, so she definitely—”
“Don’t mention him to me. Just hearing his name annoys me,” Frost said huffily.
Seeing this, Hong said no more. Only when Frost seemed to have calmed down a bit did she cautiously say: “The medicinal bath is ready. You can try again.”
“How many more times can the remaining herbs support the secret art?”
“Once. But the herb-gathering team has sent word that they’ve had some success.”
Frost frowned: “We’ve tried three times already, and still there’s been no progress. His body seems to have some kind of self-protection mechanism that even I can’t break with my strength.”
“You’ve already reached the Demigod realm. Could it be that her physical condition is too weak to withstand your powerful soul?”
Frost shook her head. She knew best what she was feeling: “No, it’s rejection. A force above my soul is rejecting mine. I can only stay inside his body for a short while each time, and that time is getting shorter and shorter.”
“A force above your power…” Hong’s eyes were full of disbelief. “Could it be a deity?”
In her impression, Su Mo was a bit sly and a bit wicked. His strength was decent, but compared to the king, who had reached the Demigod realm, he was far inferior. Yet now the king was saying something like this.
“There must be a deity’s mark inside his body, allowing him to draw on divine power.” Frost sighed. “Hong, you’ve really outdone yourself, picking such a great deity for me.”
Hong was so frightened that she prostrated herself on the ground, repeatedly begging for mercy: “Your Majesty, it was my oversight. Please give me another chance.”
Frost walked over and helped her up: “Don’t be so quick to take all the blame. Your trip was fruitful—you not only killed a traitor but also brought me such a beautiful queen consort. Not only will I not punish you, I will reward you.”
She opened her palm, and a drop of blood slowly floated up.
“This is… Celestial Demon God Blood!”
“That’s right. With this, you’ll have no trouble breaking through to the Heaven-Human realm, and in the future, you might even have a chance to touch the threshold of the Demigod realm.”
Hong felt deeply honored and quickly knelt again to thank her: “Thank you, Your Majesty! Hong would die a thousand deaths to repay you for the grace of this blood!”
“I wouldn’t want you to die; you’re my most capable officer.” Frost helped her up again. “But I’m afraid I’ll have to trouble you to go back to Earth once more to find me a new body.”
Hong’s head shot up: “The… the queen consort won’t try again?”
“No more trying. No matter how many times I try, it’s just a waste of effort.”
Hong blinked, thinking to herself that the king might have actually developed real feelings and couldn’t bear to let go.
Although the Celestial Demon Tribe was made up entirely of women, the tribe’s most powerful secret art, the Celestial Demon Eye, required the power of desire to cultivate. Therefore, within the tribe, it wasn’t uncommon for members to engage in intimate relationships with each other to ease the agony of burning desire.
With such precedents, what was so strange about the Celestial Demon King taking a consort?
“As you command.” Since the king had spoken, she, as a subordinate, would simply follow along.
What, the Celestial Demon Stone was destroyed by him?
How ridiculous—the king hadn’t said a word about it, so it might as well have never happened.
“Take these few days to first fuse with the Celestial Demon God Blood and break through to the Heaven-Human realm. Once you’ve done that, you can leave.”
“We?”
Frost glanced toward the Scripture Pavilion, her expression complicated. “That’s right.”
Just then, from the direction of the Scripture Pavilion came Su Mo’s unrestrained laughter: “Hahahaha, finally found it.”
Frost’s face lit up with delight for a moment, but then, remembering she had just been rejected, she immediately put on a stern face again: “Laughing like some enchantress…”
Hong didn’t dare speak, only thinking to herself: My king matched with an enchantress—what a great couple.
“I’m going back. You go tell the queen consort that I’ve changed my mind. Even if he can find another way to reach the ancestral land, I don’t plan on letting him go.” Frost dropped this statement and left.
Hong muttered to herself: “Just a moment ago, she was talking about leaving together, and now she says this. The king really says one thing but means another. Is this love?”
She smiled helplessly and strode into the Scripture Pavilion.
Inside the dilapidated Scripture Pavilion, Su Mo was still seriously reading, unaffected by his surroundings.
She bowed: “Greetings, Queen Consort.”
“Oh, Sister Hong, no need to stand on ceremony between us. Come, sit.” Su Mo smiled at her and gestured for her to sit.
Hong didn’t sit but said respectfully: “The past is the past, and the present is the present. A subject should bow when meeting the queen consort.”
“Alright, alright, we’ll each address the other however we like.” Su Mo continued reading as he asked, “Is your king doing alright?”
He thought of the look in Frost’s eyes when she left, and for some reason, he felt a strange unease.
It was from that moment on that he realized—Frost seemed to like his soul, not her female body.
But Su Mo didn’t think she truly liked him. Perhaps it was because he was the only man she had ever seen, and that was why she felt that way. This kind of affection was probably just an illusion.
“Please refer to her as ‘my king.’ You are now her queen consort,” Hong corrected, then began mulling over the words Frost had asked her to convey. Finally, she said: “The king seems very sad, but she says… she’s not angry with the queen consort. As long as you’re willing to go and cheer her up, nothing is unforgivable.”
Su Mo’s hand paused as he flipped a page. His gaze fell on a few books he had set aside, and he said lazily: “I’ve found a new way to descend to Earth. She can take it or leave it.”
