Chapter 12: 11. The Little Darling Wife

11. The Little Darling Wife's Perspective

Chen An and the young female cultivator looked at each other across the window, and he began to size her up without any attempt at concealment.

She was in her early twenties, fair-skinned and beautiful, with a tall figure, snow-white hair, and crimson eyes—a look typical of the white-haired, red-eyed heroines often found in the two-dimensional anime of his past life.

All in all, she was a rare beauty.

"Tell me about your father's condition."

Chen An had no intention of making a house call; he stood where he was inside the room and spoke.

The female cultivator wiped the tears from her face and said:

"My father suffered from fire poison when he was young, so his body temperature has always been on the high side. He often feels dizzy, but it was especially severe just now; he fainted from the heat. He is currently lying on the bed unconscious, and the vitality within his body is growing weaker and weaker. Alchemist Chen, I beg you, you must save my father."

After listening, Chen An lowered his head and pondered for a good while before saying, "Wait a moment. I will go get you some pills; they might be able to alleviate your father's condition."

A moment later, he returned holding a small medicine bottle covered in frost.

Inside was a rare pill called a Heat-Relieving Pill, which could rapidly lower body temperature after consumption.

The reason it was rare was that this pill was something he had researched and tinkered with himself in the past, using it only as an air conditioner during the summer.

Other than that, it had no other use.

There was no helping it; the summer in this world of cultivation was simply too hot. The native inhabitants had been used to the heat since childhood, but as an outsider, he could not adapt to it at all.

"Take this bottle of pills back for your father to try. He can take at most one at a time, and the effect of one pill will last for an entire day."

"Thank you, thank you, Alchemist Chen!"

"Don't thank me yet; there is a fee. There are 100 pills in this bottle, and the price is one Low-grade Spirit Stone."

Chen An did not give away the pills he had worked so hard to refine just because the other party was good-looking.

In this world of cultivation where "everyone for themselves or heaven and earth will destroy them," he only recognized money, not people; even a beauty was no exception.

"Alchemist Chen, I don't have any money..."

The female cultivator's voice became much quieter as she spoke.

The high rent over the past few months had long since emptied her family's savings of many years.

Now her family could barely cover their expenses, and they occasionally struggled to make ends meet; she simply could not come up with a single Low-grade Spirit Stone to buy pills.

"Then just take these pills back for your father to take first. We can talk about the money later."

"Thank you, thank you, Alchemist Chen!"

The female cultivator knelt to thank Chen An with deep gratitude, and as soon as she finished, she took the medicine bottle, turned around, and ran toward her home, anxious to return and give them to her fainted father.

Watching the female cultivator's graceful figure disappear into the distance, Chen An was not worried that she would default on her debt.

First, her home was right across the street, so he could go collect the debt at any time.

Second, the Heat-Relieving Pill was not worth much; the cost was only a few taels of silver, so if he lost out, he lost out—it wasn't a significant loss.

The reason he dared to set the price at one Low-grade Spirit Stone was entirely because this thing was something he had tinkered with himself, and it was not sold on the market at all.

Since it was an exclusive pill, he could set whatever price he wanted.

There is no merchant who is not unscrupulous; that is generally how it is.

Returning to the room, his little darling wife had already woken up; she had been awakened by the female cultivator's knocking and shouting earlier.

"Husband, what happened outside just now? I thought I heard a woman crying."

"It was nothing. Just that female cultivator who lives across the street and often comes out to dump her urine; she came to my door crying, saying her father's old illness had flared up and he had fainted, asking me to help her."

"Is it very serious?"

"I'm not sure. I didn't go for a house call; I just asked about the condition and gave her a bottle of pills."

After finishing, Chen An hesitated for a moment and then added, "By the way, Ying, I have something I want to tell you."

"Husband, what is it?"

"That female cultivator has no money to buy the pills, and she said that as long as I can save her father, she will offer herself to me as a concubine."

"..."

Hearing this, Song Huaying fell silent.

What was meant to come had come after all.

She was no naive fool; she knew that her husband would eventually take a concubine one day, and she had long since prepared herself for it.

But preparation was one thing; when that day truly arrived, she still felt very uncomfortable.

After a moment of silence.

Song Huaying bit her thin lips and asked nervously, "Husband, did you agree?"

She was afraid that Chen An had agreed.

Because the female cultivator living across the street was an immortal, and she did not know how she, a mere mortal, would get along with her in the future.

After all, a mortal's youth lasts only a dozen or twenty years, while an immortal's can remain unchanged for decades, or even stay youthful forever.

When the day came that she grew old and withered, while there was a beautiful immortal concubine by his side for comparison, would her husband still look at her?

Song Huaying felt uneasy about this.

Seeing this, Chen An comforted her, "I did not agree to her, and even if I had, Ying, you are my legal wife, and she would be a concubine."

"Husband..."

Song Huaying's eyes were filled with deep affection.

Chen An knew that his little darling wife was lacking a sense of security and wanted to please him in this way to increase her value and consolidate her status.

【You promised to cherish her for the rest of your life; Affection +10, Alchemy Experience +2.】

The next day, the sun was high in the sky.

A burst of noise suddenly came from outside the house.

Song Huaying was curious and pulled her husband, who had just come out of the Alchemy Room, to the window to watch the excitement.

Afterward, she saw a couple arguing in the middle of the street.

"Husband, I have dedicated the prime of my youth to you; how can you be so heartless to me!"

"Are you done yet, you yellow-faced hag? It was already generous enough of me to support a mere mortal like you for so many years; get out of this house now!"

"Husband!"

"If you keep making noise, I'll beat you to death and bury you!"

"..."

Under the male cultivator's intimidation, the woman, whose beauty had long faded, could only leave with a deathly pale face.

Watching this scene outside the window, Song Huaying felt a strong sense of empathy, and her small face instantly turned deathly white.

Meanwhile, Chen An beside her was long since accustomed to such things and felt no ripples in his heart.

Male cultivators despising their aging mortal wives was a common occurrence in the bottom-tier cultivation world.

The reason for this was that female cultivators were only willing to become Dao companions with men whose cultivation was higher than their own, and would not even glance at men with equal or lower cultivation.

Therefore, bottom-tier male cultivators had no choice but to find women from the mortal world to marry.

But mortal women had a fatal flaw: their prime youth lasted only a short ten or twenty years.

Once their beauty faded, they were often heartlessly abandoned by the bottom-tier male cultivators, who would then find a fresh, sixteen-year-old girl to indulge in nightly pleasures.

Heartless?

Very heartless.

But in this bottom-tier cultivation world that worshiped the law of the jungle and lacked any sense of responsibility, this was the most normal thing in the world.

After all, no matter how low-tier a male cultivator was, he was still an immortal in the eyes of mortal women, high and mighty, and arrogant.

And they would only view mortal women as disposable items, to be discarded once used.

A cultivator like Chen An, who was willing to cherish his mortal wife, was the rarest of the rare.

"Husband, if I grow old and lose my beauty in the future, will you still be willing to keep me?"

Song Huaying looked at Chen An pitifully and asked.

Chen An said without hesitation:

"I will."

"Really?"

"Really."

"Husband, let's go take a nap."

【Alchemy Experience +2】

In the blink of an eye, time arrived at night.

The couple had already fallen asleep.

Suddenly, a sound of discussion came from outside the house.

"Sigh, why be so desperate."

"How unlucky, of all places to die, she had to die right next to my house."

"Scatter, scatter, what is there to see? Don't you dare crowd in front of my door again!"

"..."

Song Huaying was a light sleeper and was woken up by the noise.

She sat up from the bed in a daze and curiously walked to the window to look outside, to see what had happened.

As it turned out, this one look almost made her depressed.

The woman who had been driven out of her home during the day was dead.

Taking advantage of the dead of night, she had hanged herself in front of the house of the heartless man who had betrayed her, seemingly as an act of revenge.

After seeing such a miserable scene, the sense of security Song Huaying had finally gained from the intimacy with her husband instantly vanished.

She first fell into deep thought, then quickly returned to the bedside, shook the sleeping Chen An, and said:

"Husband, if that immortal lady who lives across the street says she wants to be your concubine next time, just agree to it."

"Hmm?"

Chen An was stunned, thinking he was dreaming.

Song Huaying had figured it out.

Rather than waiting until she was old and withered, and her husband was no longer infatuated with her, choosing to take a concubine and seek new love, only for her to be unable to fit in and be ostracized.

It would be better to take advantage of the fact that she was still young and beautiful, and her husband was still very infatuated with her, to urge him to take a concubine, making him feel indebted to her, and then she could become sisters with the concubines as the main wife, building a good relationship—killing two birds with one stone.

This way, even if she grew old in the future and her husband was no longer infatuated with her, she would still be a part of the household, a good sister to all of her husband's wives and concubines, and even the guide who had helped them serve her husband in bed in the beginning.

PS: Setting out the bowl, begging for monthly tickets and recommendation tickets!