Maybe My Soulmate! (GL)

Su Yubing, meanwhile, kept the young cub safe behind a shield of light and spoke in a gentle voice until it stopped trembling. Once the parent understood the truth, its fury melted into wary gratitude. The sea-winged tiger let them approach the cub, and Su Yubing healed a shallow wound along its flank while Mo Yuxin cleared the reef tunnels of trapped debris. The animal eventually lowered its great head and rubbed its whiskers against Su Yubing’s shoulder as if marking her as safe. Su Yubing laughed and patted the tiger’s cheek in return, while Mo Yuxin stood there looking faintly jealous until the tiger also nudged her hand. That made Su Yubing laugh even harder.

The fishing village near the cliff island celebrated their help with lanterns and fresh seafood. Madam He’s caravan rested there for the night too, and everyone ate until they could barely move. Wen Zhu nearly cried from happiness when she realized she had finally seen a living divine beast up close and survived to tell the story. The fisherfolk tried to pay Mo Yuxin and Su Yubing, but the two women refused money and only asked that the coast continue to be kept clean and the cub left in peace. That answer made the villagers like them even more. By then, the whole coast felt like it was starting to know their footsteps.

When the morning finally came bright and wind-heavy, they climbed the last low rise and saw the harbor city waiting ahead with its walls, piers, masts, and endless movement, and only then did the journey truly feel like it had reached the point everyone had been talking about for months.

The coast had one more surprise for them before the harbor city finally came fully into view, and it came in the shape of a cliff temple half hidden above the surf. The local people called it the Wind Bell Shrine, and it sat on a ridge where the waves struck the rocks below with so much force that the whole temple seemed to hum all day long. Travelers used to stop there to pray for safe passage, but lately the place had been nearly abandoned because a strange sea mist had started rolling in every evening and trapping people on the cliff path after sunset. The monks who lived there were not strong enough to clear the mist, and the nearby villagers were too frightened to climb up anymore. Mo Yuxin and Su Yubing could have passed by without a second thought, but the old temple’s bells were so clear and lonely in the wind that Su Yubing kept looking up at them every time they walked the path below.

”Do you want to see it?” Mo Yuxin asked.

Su Yubing nodded at once. ”Yes. It feels like it is asking for help.”

That was enough for Mo Yuxin. They climbed together along a stone path lined with salt-stiff grass and half-broken prayer plaques, and by the time they reached the temple gate, the mist had already started thickening. The shrine’s caretaker, an elderly nun with a face like weathered wood, told them the fog had begun after a storm cracked open a hidden sea cave beneath the cliff. Since then, the temple bells rang on their own at night, and strange wet footsteps were sometimes found on the stairs even when nobody had gone up. Several young monks had tried to investigate and had nearly been dragged into the fog by something with long arms and a shell hard as iron. Now they were all too scared to go near the cave entrance.

Mo Yuxin and Su Yubing went down the cliff path just as the wind changed. The mist was not ordinary mist. It was mixed with a kind of illusion array woven from the breath of a deep sea beast, which made the cliffs look farther apart than they were and the steps seem to shift underfoot. It was the sort of trick meant to make travelers lose their sense of direction and stumble over the edge. The path itself was safe enough for cultivators like them, but ordinary people would have been terrified. Halfway down, they found the source of the problem: a huge shell-backed creature lodged in the sea cave below the temple. It looked like a giant coral crab at first, but when it moved, a long pale body uncurled from beneath the shell, showing that it was a rare deep-coil ocean spirit with translucent fins and a crown of pearl-like eyes. Its body was half trapped in shattered stone, and the mist around the cliff was coming from the spiritual pressure leaking out of its injured shell.

It was not attacking the temple because it was evil. It was trapped and in pain, and in its panic it had started reflexively casting illusion fog over the whole cliff. The monks had mistaken fear for malice. The beast had mistaken people for enemies. That was all.

Because the situation was delicate, Su Yubing handled the first approach. She always had a softer touch when a creature was frightened more than vicious. She stood at the mouth of the cave with her hands open and her spiritual aura low and clean, while Mo Yuxin remained a half step behind her, ready in case the beast lunged. The deep-coil spirit hissed once, then turned one of its many pearl eyes toward Su Yubing and went strangely still. Maybe it sensed that Su Yubing’s power was cold but not harsh, gentle but not weak. Maybe it just recognized someone who would not panic. Either way, the atmosphere changed almost at once. Mo Yuxin moved into the cave by inches, checking the shell damage, while Su Yubing kept the illusion mist from spreading. The shell itself had been cracked by a falling reef stone from the storm. The beast was trying to protect a clutch of soft glowing eggs hidden behind its body, and every time someone approached too fast, it lashed out.

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TO BE CONTINUED.