Dual Cultivation God Returns - Chapter 1058 - 1058: The game of lights and shadows

They walked slowly on a relatively narrow and winding upward mountain path, beautiful moonlit scenery of mountains and valleys to their side, amid the flowering trees growing resiliently out of barren mountain rocks surrounding the path, and small patches of greenery with wild flowers swaying in the wind on the sides of the pathway itself.

In the silence of this contemplative mood, Wu Long simply enjoyed this stroll with the beauty, not disturbing her reverie despite being quite curious about the reason she suddenly sought him out.

Only after a bit of time passed, did Hong Yue realize that she no longer heard Butler Bang’s and Wu Long’s voices, turning around to see they were walking alone, “Ah… I’m sorry, Daoist Wu…”

“No no, I enjoyed our walk very much. I made you wait despite you coming to talk, so I was more than willing to wait as well. Or rather, why wouldn’t I enjoy a quiet late evening stroll with such a beauty? I am grateful you gave your time to me instead”, he said sincerely with a smile that left her slightly speechless, which in turn made his mood even better since she reacted to the mildly flirty comments he recently started to mix in when meeting her more and more, and then added in a slightly more neutral tone, “So what caused you to wait for me?”

“I…”, she suddenly realized that what she came to ask him was hard for her to put into words, with all the new thoughts she had just now that completely messed up the already barely organized ideas and reasoning she had before. She turned her gaze back to the front and a bit down with a pondering expression, a slight frown furrowing her eyebrows, “I was going to ask for your advice but… I think I haven’t organized my thoughts enough for it yet. If it isn’t too much trouble, I’d like to ask at a later time”

“Of course”, Wu Long nodded with a smile, “Please feel free to have the conversation when you are ready”

“Thank you, Daoist Wu”, she nodded sincerely.

—

That night, as Hong Yue went to bed, she couldn’t sleep properly, tossing and turning in her bed.

‘Theft Dao huh…’, she then turned to lie on her back and opened her crimson eyes to look at the ceiling of a spacious and comfortable room that she got used to without realizing it, despite feeling very foreign to her at first.

The small pond located in the inner courtyard that she shared with Hong Ye’s room was visible through the wide open large window, gently stirred by night wind and the small garden waterfall. Glares of moonlight and watery shadows reflected off the surface of the pond swam around on the ceiling, attracting her gaze.

The conversation that Wu Long and her had in the woods of the Soft Meadow Continent while in search of a Spiritual Land more than a year ago came to her mind.

She knew now that it was a way for Wu Long to open her eyes to the reality of her past existence, but the way he chose to do it, and the wording he used, made her mind stir with thoughts in light of what she heard this evening.

“If you could gain something you seek without hurting or killing…”, she muttered out loud, looking at the sneaking shadows on the ceiling, “… I mean… it’s basically the same set of skills minus the killing… no?”

She thought about the Bahshi Assassins Techniques that she practiced all her life, for the first time seeing them from a different perspective.

Bahshi Ghost Step was basically a godly technique for thieves even in its most simple form.

The higher level forms that Wu Long showed, which allowed one to phase through physical obstacles like a ghost, as long as there was even a small gap or opening where air and thus Spiritual Qi flowed freely, was even more so.

And as she heard from him, there were even higher level techniques that allowed one to phase through into a completely isolated, airtight place, or even through specialized formations and barriers.

She only thought all of that was useful exclusively for assassinations, but that was because she never knew to even try seeing it in a different way.

But now that she saw it, she could not stop thinking about it, and noticing the similarities in the two professions of an assassin and a thief.

‘Then again… what about Ye’er?’, Hong Yue thought as she felt guilty again, turning her gaze to the side of the window leading to the inner courtyard, passing through which, she could reach her little sister’s quarters.

Wouldn’t she be selfish in trying to seek a different, less bloody path alone, and abandon her little twin sister to return to the world they just barely came out of on her own?

After all, someone had to lead those Bahshi Assassins. Of course, Wu Long could do it himself, and just pick out someone to do it from outside.

But she saw that he preferred to leave the highest authority in the hands of his Dao Family, at least that was the trend she saw from the outside.

She did not know the details, thus not realizing that rather than Wu Long placing responsibilities on members of his Dao Family, it was the other way around and his women took up responsibilities to try and help him.

Her conclusion was naturally, that Wu Long planned to hand over the responsibilities of being in charge of the Assassination Group to Hong Ye.

While it seemed that Hong Ye did not mind it, she was perhaps the kinder and more empathetic of the two twins. But knowing about feelings and empathy from a young age, and driven by the desire to protect her older sister, she forced herself to become ruthless, which made her personality slightly twisted. That was a coping mechanism that she used to deal with the dark and bloody world the twins were born into.

Was it not cruel to have her return to that world? While there was another path?

She also knew that Hong Ye was not someone who liked dealing with organizational structures or responsibilities, it was one of the reasons she was sure that she would be heavily involved with organizing Bahshi Assassins even if Hong Ye was there beside Wu Long.

‘Perhaps, it should be the other way around’, she thought. Maybe it was Hong Ye who could take that less bloody path, and if it was necessary for one of them to take the road of contract assassinations again, it should be Hong Yue.

‘Ye’er protected me all that time, it might be my time to protect her’, gradually a resolve appeared in the eyes of the beauty as she watched the shadows on the ceiling gradually prevail over the light, as the moon was covered by clouds.

—

In the morning of the next day, as the twins sat not far from their training grounds, Hong Ye, who was biting into a peach she brought with her from breakfast, noticed her older sister looking at her with a long, intent stare.

“W-what? You want one?”, Hong Ye spoke with a full mouth, offering the peach that had a big bite bark on its side to her sister, “I only have one with me here but you can have this one if you want”

“Ye’er, what do you think of stealing?”, Hong Yue suddenly asked.

“Stealing?”, Hong Ye made round yes, “It’s just a peach Big Sis, it isn’t that big of a deal… I can get another one…”

“No… I mean in general. Aren’t our techniques quite suited for it?”

“Hehehe, you just noticed?”, Hong Ye laid back onto the sunlit wooden flooring, laughing in voice as she held out the peach so it wouldn’t get dirty.

“Ye’er, be careful you’re still eating the peach!”, Hong Yue made a worried expression as Hong Ye was still chewing on the peach while laughing and laying back.

But the latter didn’t mind her warning, still amused by their conversation topic, “Not to mention, why’re you asking me? That’s what I’ve been telling you a bunch of times!”

“You did?”, Hong Yue widened her eyes, but still looking a bit worried about her sister’s precarious behavior as Hong Ye took another big bite of the peach.

“Hahaha! Of course I did! Don’t you remember? I used to get in trouble for stealing extra supplies for our missions when we were kids, hehehe, the Elders were pissed but couldn’t do anything, ahahaha!”, Hong Ye seemed to still savor the pissed off expressions that the Elders made back then, “Though you said we weren’t supposed to use our techniques that way, and that it was cheating to pass missions that were supposed to test our skills by spending high-level talismans like they were paper”

“Ah”, Hong Yue showed a face of recollection and sudden epiphany, which made Hong Ye laugh even harder.

But then she froze as her eyes widened, since she saw Hong Yue make a wide smile. It was a gentle, somehow relieved and joyous smile, also full of reminiscence but seemingly also having confirmed something.

“Khuk-!”, Hong Ye’s eyes then became round for another reason as a piece of peach got into the wrong throat, and she began coughing.

“Ye’er!!! See? That’s why I told you not to laugh, lie back, and eat at the same time!”, Hong Yue instantly began helping her twin by slapping her on the back near the top, shaking her head with a chiding expression.

“Khe-khum~… whose fault… khe-khe~… do you think it is?”

“Gravity, but also human physiology”, Hong Yue replied seriously, rendering her little sister speechless and without a good answer.