CH 2

The Heart and The Mouth Are Saying Different Things

Rumour has it that there is a thousand-year-old pond beneath Jinghua Mountain in which a mysterious dragon lives.

The rumours are true.

Xuan Long was born ugly, with a broken horn. He was abandoned by his siblings and mother when he was young and was expelled from the dragon clan, so he wandered all the way here, living at the bottom of the pond for years.

Yesterday, on a rare occasion, Xuan Long went out and picked up a badly wounded human from the edge of the pond.

He had no idea that this human would be so noisy. Since waking up, he had been pestering him with questions, annoying the dragon as he asked questions that he could not answer.

"What's your name?"

"……"

"How old are you?"

"……"

"Have you always lived alone in the pond?"

"……"

"Why don't you have any family or friends?"

"……"

The bottom of the pond was dark.

Xuan Long, who had transformed into his human form, was sitting cross-legged on the ground with blank eyes. When he was disturbed, he raised his hand and waved his sleeve to silence him.

Peace and quiet.

The human had been rescued with wounds all over his body, and when he woke up, his bloodstained robes had long since disappeared. He woke up in a white tunic, his peach blossom eyes wide open as he circled around Xuan Long, pointing to his mouth anxiously but unable to make a sound.

Xuan Long opened his eyes and looked at him coldly for a moment, then lifted his sleeve and with a wave of his sleeve, the silencing spell was lifted.

The human breathed heavily before gluing himself to Xuan Long again, and was not afraid to get in his face, "Your pupils are so beautiful, they are turquoise…"

"……”

"You're so pretty, why do you need to wear a mask?"

"……"

"You must look better without the mask, can you take it off and show me…" The human knelt down beside Xuan Long and lifted his white fingers to remove the golden mask with the ancient bronze pattern from the right side of his face.

Xuan Long raised his hand to clamp down on the other man's wrist and stared indifferently at the human, "You're not afraid of me."

"Why should I be afraid of you?" Yan Yuan laughed. His face was extremely beautiful, his eyelashes thick, and when he smiled, it was as if everything had lost its colour, the sky and the earth dimmed, giving people the illusion of gentleness and deep affection, if one ignored the cunning in it, "You saved my life, so naturally you are not an evil dragon like the rumours circulating, I like you."

Xuan Long withdrew his hand and dropped his eyes in silence.

No one had ever said they liked him.

His mother and siblings hated him, saying that he was born ugly and unlucky, which would affect the dragon clan's qi.

It was even rumoured that there was an evil, man-eating dragon in the thousand-year-old pond. There are often Taoist priests who come to the pond to catch him, but they are not good enough to enter the ten-thousand-foot deep pond, so naturally they cannot harm him.

This human, however, said that he liked him.

When Yan Yuan realised that Xuan Long was not as cold and heartless as he appeared to be, he thought of his own dying empress, so he tried again and again to cling to him, hugging his thin waist and speaking coquettishly, "So what's your name?"

"You saved me and I don't even know your name."

"Just tell me…"

Xuan Long had never been this close to another person before. His entire body froze, a trace of shock flashed through his demonic pupils, his thin lips pursed into a line, and he spoke stiffly, “Nameless."

"Nameless?” Yan Yuan straightened up in surprise to look at the other party, "Did your mother not give you a name?"

Xuan Long's eyelashes lowered, creating a faint shadow beneath the deep sockets of his eyes. As if this was a difficult question to answer, he was silent for a long time before answering, "Mhmm.”

In human form, Xuan Long was not much different from an ordinary human, the only difference being the colour of his pupils.

He was dressed in black clothes and his long hair was not tied back. With a waterfall of black hair spreading out around him, he looked cold and lonely. His face was clearly very handsome, but he had to wear a golden mask on the right side of his face, which was a bit odd.

"Why?” Yan Yuan suppressed his inner doubts and asked, "Don't you dragons have names?"

"No." Xuan Long answered.

Because his mother thought he was ugly and did not want to give him a name, she banished him from the dragon clan when he was less than a hundred years old.

A dragon is considered to be an adult when he reaches the age of a thousand years, and at that time he was too young. He wandered around and was nearly caught by a Taoist priest trying to practice making pills, so he couldn't be bothered to give himself a name.

Later, he found this place to live, and since he had been a solitary dragon for thousands of years, he did not need a name.

Yan Yuan didn't know the reason for this, but he inexplicably felt some heartache, "Then let me help you name yourself, okay?..."

Xuan Long turned his head in bewilderment to look at the human, and the pair of unconventional peach blossom eyes were filled with a gentle light, causing his heart, which had been silent for thousands of years, to beat heavily for no reason.

Xuan Long, who had never experienced love before, did not understand what that meant and silently lowered his eyes, "No need, I don't need a name."

He would be alone in the future anyway.

Yan Yuan frowned disapprovingly, "You should have a name if you are alive, how can you not have one?"

He thought for a moment and his eyes suddenly lit up, "You were born so cold and handsome, how about calling yourself Han Po? Han as in ice, and Po as in water. Cold as ice water, coming and going as you please."

Xuan Long wasn't an ordinary person, so he didn't understand the significance of it, but he was moved by the caring eyes of the human.

When others saw him, they were afraid, but this man was not afraid, he even gave him a name.

What a rarity.

Xuan Long did not know that the human race is good at having a disagreement between their heart and mouth… Although the man said he liked him, his heart was thinking about how to pull his scales and kill him.