Chapter 169 - Maybe It’s Fate

Madam Zhong looked at her blushing son and chuckled. Jing Yi only grew more flustered. He searched for anything he could say but found nothing. "Mother, that … I … I also don't know why … I … I mean —"

"It's alright." Madam Zhong patted his hand. "It's obvious that he's very much in love with you."

Jing Yi lowered his head. He had wanted to approach the subject slowly but now that terrible Senior Martial Brother of his had kissed him right in front of his mother! Hadn't he taken extra care and begged him to behave himself? How was this behaving himself?!

Madam Zhong smiled. It seemed her son wasn't ready to tell her about it. Well, he wouldn't get around it now. "So, don't you want to tell your mother what happened? That Senior Martial Brother Qiu of yours, you met him five years ago?"

Jing Yi shook his head. "No. We only met some days ago. It's …" He squirmed on the chair. "It's a little complicated."

"How so?"

"He …" Jing Yi pursed his lips. He didn't want to say it! He had just gotten home. He shouldn't talk about this with his mother. Not now.

"Jing Yi." Madam Zhong's tone of voice was as rebukingly as it was indulgently. Jing Yi instantly felt soothed. "Tell me. Aren't I your mother? Who will you talk about it with if not with me? And shouldn't your mother know what is going on? Or could it be that you aren't my sweet child anymore and are now going to start throwing tantrums? Aren't you too old for this?"

Jing Yi blushed again but this embarrassment was even worse than the one from being kissed in front of his mother. "Mother …" In the end, Jing Yi could only sigh. "Qiu Ling is … He's a little strange. Actually, when we met for the first time he asked me if I … if I wanted to marry him." He turned away, unable to look his mother in the eye. "Then he said he'd give me seven days to consider. I couldn't even get a sound out. But in the next days he …" He shook his head. "He always followed me around, trying to hold my hands and calling me …" Jing Yi suddenly shut up. He definitely wouldn't recount Qiu Ling's shameless behavior in any more detail.

"Haish, what a big child!"

"Ah?" Jing Yi looked up, his eyes wide with confusion. "You really think I'm throwing a tantrum?"

Madam Zhong laughed. "I wasn't talking about you. I was talking about him. Did he really expect you to fall in love with him like that?"

Jing Yi wanted to agree with her but he bit his tongue at the last possible moment. He couldn't really say if it hadn't maybe worked in some way. "Mother …" Jing Yi gripped her sleeve and furrowed his brow. "How do I know if I'm in love with him?"

Madam Zhong blinked. It couldn't be that that direct approach had really worked, could it? On the other hand … If her son asked like that, then his feelings probably weren't too deep yet.

She contemplated a moment and then took her son's hands. "When he asked you if you wanted to marry him were you happy?"

Jing Yi shook his head. "Just stunned. I didn't know how to react. It was so …" He shook his head once more. "It was just too sudden."

"Mn. And now, how do you feel about him?"

"Oh … I also don't know."

"No?" Madam Zhong watched his face, seeing how he fell into deep thought.

Jing Yi couldn't really put into words what he felt. "It's a little strange. At first, I didn't feel good. It was as if … as if I should keep away. The closer he came the worse I felt. But then … I don't know how but that feeling suddenly stopped and I actually liked having him around."

"So you're happy that he came with you."

Jing Yi nodded. He was worried about the journey itself and if he would really be able to cultivate after he hadn't been able to enter the first stage for such a long time already. But he hadn't minded having Qiu Ling with him. In fact, it had felt good not being alone.

Thinking back to the time they flew to the capital and how Qiu Ling had sat behind him, wrapping him in his arms and sharing his warmth with him, he had felt content. More content than he ever had in the last five years. Even learning the sword arts from Shao Hai and Xiao Dong hadn't felt this good, even though he had been immensely happy about this first achievement of his. Being with Qiu Ling unexpectedly had such an effect on him.

Seeing the pensive look on her son's face and the gentle expression in his eyes, Madam Zhong patted his hand. "Do you see a bit clearer now?"

"I … I still don't know. I really am happy when I'm with him. But does that mean I should marry him?"

"The only person who can decide that is you."

"I still feel like it's not such a good idea. We don't even know each other. You and father …" He tried to gauge his mother's expression but she seemed quite normal after he had mentioned his father. "You two knew each other for years and only then he proposed to you. I think Qiu Ling is getting ahead of himself. Shouldn't he have tried to get to know me better first?"

Madam Zhong sighed. That man really was a big child. Wouldn't it have been easier to just tell her son? Why was he making it so hard on himself? "You know, actually, when he proposed to you that wasn't the first time he saw you. He had already seen you here in the teahouse five years ago."

"Hah?" Jing Yi couldn't believe what he had just heard but his mother nodded.

"It's true. When I told him that you had gone to the Yun Zou sect, he followed you there. I don't know why he didn't want to tell you. But you can definitely be sure that he hasn't rushed anything. He was already in love with you a long time ago."

Jing Yi turned around to the door. He could see the counter on the other side and Qiu Ling who stood behind it, seemingly bored. Even like that he still managed to attract the eyes of all the women in the teahouse. This man … he had somehow fallen in love with him not just in the sect but even sooner when he had still been a child?

"How is that even possible?" Jing Yi didn't think of the fact that Qiu Ling was so much older than him but he still felt like it was strange that he would fall in love with him even as a child. He didn't have that kind of charm, did he?

Madam Zhong smiled. "Maybe it's fate."

Jing Yi once again didn't know how to react. Qiu Ling, too, had once said it had to be fate that brought them together. "What kind of fate is this?", he murmured, unable to understand for the time being.

This man and he, were they really connected by the red thread of fate? This kind of love … Had some god read in the stars that it should come true? Was this why all this was happening? Was it just his own fear that had posed an obstacle for them but in the end, that predestined love would win?

Somehow, he really would have liked to get even one tiny glimpse at his fate. He really wanted to know what would happen in the future and if this man that had so persistently followed him in the last days, would stay true to his words and be at his side forever.

But alas, the only one who could look at his fate was the fate's scribe, Shun Tao, who was brooding over a scroll of fate this very moment.