Chapter 20#
Drawing Blood#
…Blood?
The word didn’t register at first. Yin Yuheng stared at Li Guanghan in bewilderment. “Blood? Whose blood?”
Perhaps it was the guilelessness in Yin Yuheng’s gaze. Li Guanghan, unusually, said nothing.
The strange silence was broken by Zhu Anning’s voice — his face bright with eager anticipation. “Shifu, you really found a way? Cough, cough, cough—”
The coughing fit grew severe. Li Guanghan immediately moved to his side, channeling spiritual energy with tender care to soothe his meridians.
Yin Yuheng stood to one side, dazed.
When the coughing passed, Li Guanghan settled Zhu Anning back against the pillows and turned to look at Yin Yuheng. He sighed quietly. “Come outside with me for a moment.”
Yin Yuheng nodded, not quite following, and moved toward the door — then heard Zhu Anning call out behind him. “Shixiong!”
Yin Yuheng paused. He glanced back, his gaze gentle. “Shidi?”
Zhu Anning’s eyes fell on the bowl of ginseng duck soup. Something flickered across his face — a brief, uncertain hesitation. But in the end he closed his eyes and turned away. “Never mind. Go ahead.”
Yin Yuheng smiled faintly.
It was a small smile, and it was gone before it could be caught. He pushed the door open and stepped out. The latch clicked behind him, and the room returned to its dim quiet.
…
Yin Yuheng stood in the courtyard, facing the complicated look in Li Guanghan’s eyes. He felt a prickle of unease. “Shifu?”
Li Guanghan glanced at him, then looked away — almost as if evading something.
Yin Yuheng’s unease deepened.
The afternoon sun fell on Li Guanghan’s face, and still could not melt the quality of him — a snow-plain, a frozen river in winter.
After a long silence, Li Guanghan finally spoke.
“Zhu Anning’s injury is in his spiritual veins. The only possibility of healing is to rebuild them entirely.”
Yin Yuheng listened carefully. “Rebuild spiritual veins? I’ve heard of techniques like that — though I’ve never seen one actually used… Shifu found something in the archive tower?”
Li Guanghan didn’t answer directly. He said, in a measured tone: “Cultivators carry in their bodies a spiritual core, spiritual veins, an inner sea, and a purple mansion. These determine a person’s capacity for cultivation.”
“The spiritual core is located behind the heart, and is also the convergence point of the spiritual veins. That is why a cultivator’s heart’s blood is the most precious.”
Yin Yuheng listened to what felt like a lesson in basics, and felt puzzled.
He already knew all of this. A cultivator’s heart’s blood was the essence of the spiritual core and veins — too much lost, and the very foundation of one’s cultivation would be damaged.
But what did this have to do with what Li Guanghan had said about “drawing blood”?
“Anning’s injury is primarily to the spiritual core and veins.” Li Guanghan lowered his gaze. “To restore them, two things are needed: first, the nourishment of rare spiritual materials; second, someone to use their heart’s blood to replenish his withered spiritual core and veins.”
Yin Yuheng’s brow knitted faintly.
“Furthermore,” Li Guanghan continued, “this heart’s blood must carry pure spiritual energy — true and untainted. Blood from someone with mixed or impure meridians would not only be useless, but actively harmful.”
There he stopped.
Yin Yuheng stood very still.
“…Pure, spiritually concentrated heart’s blood?”
He felt as though he almost understood — and also as though he did not understand at all.
He stood there, blank, while something cold flooded out from his heart and spread through his limbs.
He found himself thinking, unbidden, of what Li Guanghan had said when he took him as a disciple five years ago.
“Forming a Golden Core at sixteen — that is genuinely exceptional.”
“The young Crown Prince’s spiritual bones are innate, his meridians of a purity rarely seen in this world. He is the most naturally suited person for cultivation I have ever encountered.”
In terms of the purity of his spiritual core and veins — who in the world could compare to Yin Yuheng?
Not even Li Guanghan in his youth.
Everyone in the world knew: the young Crown Prince of the Li Dynasty was a genius without equal.
Even with an old wound to his heart meridian, even with that injury clinging to him for years — he had still formed his Golden Core at sixteen and made a name that spread everywhere.
At some point the wind had risen again in the Guoshi Manor.
Fine particles of snow drifted in on the breeze and settled in Yin Yuheng’s hair and on his shoulders, soaking into his thin clothes.
Li Guanghan still had not spoken. He stood watching Yin Yuheng quietly.
Yin Yuheng suddenly bowed his head, unable to stop himself from pressing a hand over his chest.
Cold and aching.
Yin Yuheng was not slow. He understood perfectly well what Li Guanghan meant. He simply couldn’t quite believe it — but Li Guanghan’s silence stripped away the last of any doubt.
“Shifu…”
His voice was very low. His hair fell forward over his eyes, making his expression unreadable. His shoulders trembled, just slightly. Standing in the snow, he looked so pale he might dissolve into the flurry at any moment.
Looking at him like this, Li Guanghan found himself oddly arrested.
This was the first time he had ever seen his eldest disciple show vulnerability like this.
Cold and detached as Li Guanghan was, even he felt something tremble in him for just a moment.
“Shifu — you want to use my heart’s blood to rebuild Shidi’s spiritual veins?”
Yin Yuheng asked, barely audible.
A long pause passed before Li Guanghan’s voice came: “Anning is your Shidi, after all.”
Yin Yuheng finally raised his head. His eyes were blank.
Their gazes met. Li Guanghan hesitated over what he had been about to say, then continued: “…It’s only a small amount of blood. It won’t damage your foundation.”
The blankness in Yin Yuheng’s expression faded. He looked at Li Guanghan directly.
“Only a small amount of blood?” He smiled — a smile that was worse than crying.
Li Guanghan found, inexplicably, that he could not hold Yin Yuheng’s gaze.
“…Only a small amount of blood.”
Yin Yuheng repeated the words back to him.
Li Guanghan finally could not bear to continue in this vein. He made a deliberate effort to soften his voice. “I received your gift. I liked it very much.”
Something shifted in Yin Yuheng’s eyes — as if he couldn’t quite believe those words had come from Li Guanghan’s mouth.
Li Guanghan felt it wasn’t enough. He reached up and gently ruffled Yin Yuheng’s hair. “You have always been my most distinguished disciple. Yuheng — you are different to me. You matter.”
“…”
Li Guanghan’s voice was gentler than Yin Yuheng had ever heard it. It was everything he had spent years yearning to hear. And yet in this moment, it brought him no joy at all.
Blood seeped from his tightly pressed lips. Yin Yuheng closed his eyes. After a long moment, he said: “…All right.”
Li Guanghan, who had been about to say something more, stopped short.
“You’ll do it?”
Yin Yuheng said nothing.
Isn’t this what you wanted, Shifu?
You were willing to show me that much tenderness, just to ensure I would agree. Because you know that no matter how much I suffer, I will never refuse you. You know that the smallest gesture of warmth from you can make me throw myself forward without hesitation.
…You’ve always known.
In that moment, Yin Yuheng felt, for the first time, a wave of nausea.
He looked up at Li Guanghan. Even when deliberately gentle, he still seemed so remote and untouchable — standing there, he was like a solitary mountain wreathed in cold mist.
Yin Yuheng thought suddenly of the first time he had seen Li Guanghan, at sixteen, trailing behind the Emperor. He had stolen a glance up at the white-robed sword cultivator from beneath lowered lashes.
One look. And he had not been able to forget it for years.
The sword cultivator had been magnificent as a god. His voice was even, unhurried: “Your Majesty offers the fortune of the Li Dynasty to aid my breakthrough to the Huashen stage. In exchange, I will take the young Crown Prince as my disciple and pledge ten years of peace to the realm.”
A fair transaction.
Yet Yin Yuheng’s heart, in that moment, had quickened.
Someone like a celestial being… would become his teacher?
A secret joy had bloomed at the core of him. The young boy had smiled quietly, unable to help himself, and called out with perfect obedience: “Shifu.”
That word, called out so many times over so many years.
Feelings he should never have had had taken root and grown — and yet Yin Yuheng had never once spoken of them to Li Guanghan. The gulf between teacher and disciple was like a chasm. In truth, he had never dared to hope for much. Everyone around him thought Li Guanghan treated him carelessly — yet Yin Yuheng had never said a word against him.
To have developed feelings for my teacher is my own failing. He has no obligation to return them.
Yin Yuheng had assumed this would be how things remained for many years to come. And then, without warning, there was a new junior brother. That junior brother had effortlessly obtained everything Yin Yuheng had ever quietly wanted — and now, in this moment, his teacher was willing to deceive him with warmth and coax him into willingly giving up his own heart’s blood, all to save that junior brother.
He didn’t hate Shidi. He only found himself contemptible, and pitiable.
The acknowledgment and warmth he had waited years for had come — in this form.
Yin Yuheng let out a low, private laugh. He turned away from the hand at his hair, stumbling back a half-step. His eyes were red.
He was genuinely in pain, with no heart left to think more deeply.
“When do we begin?” Yin Yuheng asked, his voice rough.
Li Guanghan withdrew his hand. Something empty and hollow settled in him without explanation.
“As soon as possible,” he said, looking away. “…Don’t tell Anning.”
Yin Yuheng let his lips twist in a self-mocking curve.
…
Li Guanghan had said as soon as possible. So Yin Yuheng went with him to the Wentian Platform right then.
In the main hall of the Wentian Platform, Li Guanghan finished drawing the formation for the blood extraction, then turned to look at Yin Yuheng.
Yin Yuheng stepped into the formation with a blank expression. Then, quietly, he said: “Shifu. You know I have an old wound on my heart meridian.”
Li Guanghan’s fingers twitched.
Yin Yuheng smiled without warmth. “Never mind — you know everything.”
The old wound to his heart meridian had lingered for years. Drawing his heart’s blood now would unquestionably aggravate it. Li Guanghan had said it was only a small amount, that it wouldn’t damage his foundation — but Yin Yuheng understood: if the injury went out of control, could he really say with certainty it wouldn’t?
What Li Guanghan was doing, in effect, was ruining his spiritual core. Severing his spiritual veins. Destroying his path of cultivation.
While his Shidi, nourished by his blood, would have his spiritual veins rebuilt — and gain gifts beyond measure.
Yin Yuheng’s handsome face was blank, emptied of expression. He stopped looking at Li Guanghan. He sat down at the center of the formation, took out a small blade, pulled open his collar, and prepared to begin.
His long hair fanned out across the floor. The blade’s edge caught the light with a cold gleam.
The young man sat upright in the center of the great hall, slight and solitary. And Li Guanghan, for no reason he could name, thought suddenly of the small boy trailing behind the Emperor five years ago — sneaking glances at him.
“…Yuheng!”
Li Guanghan stepped forward and caught the blade’s handle.
Yin Yuheng looked up.
“…” A long silence. Then, slowly, Li Guanghan let go.
Something turbulent moved in him. But in the end he did not stop him — he only drew Yin Yuheng gently into his arm. “It’s all right. It will be quick.”
Yin Yuheng’s mouth curved without feeling. The blade, without hesitation, entered his chest.
Crimson blood welled out immediately, pooling and gathering within the formation.
Li Guanghan’s arms, around the young man, tightened.
In a daze, he heard Yin Yuheng’s voice, faint and threadlike: “Shifu. In my heart, you have always been someone who held the world in your care — upright, luminous, incorruptible. A god.”
Li Guanghan went still.
His eldest disciple was dressed in thin layers, leaning against him, the blade still slowly going deeper into his chest. Blood soaked through the cloth, red against pale skin — an alarming red, yet one that somehow only made Yin Yuheng more strikingly, piercingly beautiful.
Yin Yuheng’s voice was very quiet, and still he kept speaking.
“But today, I find myself suddenly thinking — perhaps not.”
In the moment Li Guanghan had shown him that deliberate warmth, Yin Yuheng had understood: his teacher, too, was someone who could use another person’s feelings. Who could coax and deceive to get what he wanted.
…No different from anyone else in the world.
Yin Yuheng closed his eyes.
“…Are you crying?”
Li Guanghan reached out, bewildered and at a loss, and brushed the tears from the corner of the eyes of the person in his arms.
…
It was a strange sensation — blood leaving from the heart.
It hurt. But it was not unbearable.
Yin Yuheng’s tears continued to fall. Inside, he felt nothing at all.
“Not loving me is not Li Guanghan’s fault,” Yin Yuheng said, his tone even as he addressed Xiao Bai. “But deceiving me out of my blood, ruining my spiritual core, severing my path — that is his fault.”
Xiao Bai had been watching with eyes full of tears — or would have been, if it had eyes.
“Heng-ge, you have it so hard!” Xiao Bai couldn’t hold it together. “Wuwuwu.”
Yin Yuheng: “…All right, enough.”
Xiao Bai continued to sob in hiccupping waves.
You’re crying so hard I can’t stay in the scene, Yin Yuheng thought, and said by way of comfort: “What’s destined in the plot can’t be avoided. This was always going to happen.”
“But your spiritual core…” Xiao Bai still couldn’t let it go.
“Consider it a debt he owes me,” Yin Yuheng thought coldly. “I’ll collect it from him eventually.”
A damaged spiritual core could be rebuilt — it would be difficult, but the one who’d regret it in time wouldn’t be him.
He switched subjects, unhurried. “Lighting, composition, setting — look at each posture. Was there not beauty in every single one? Every angle calculated. Blood is not to be wasted.”
Xiao Bai: “…”
“This is art.”
Xiao Bai: …Somehow I’m just… not sad anymore.
Yin Yuheng drawled: “I’m miserable in this scene. No one gets to come out of it feeling fine.”