At this point, Auntie Yimin had gotten to them and seeing Xiaoli in such a state, she furrowed her brows.

She pushed Hei to the side and checked on Xiaoli herself.

When she found that there was nothing wrong, she turned a sharp gaze to Hei.

“What did you do to her?”

“I attempted to synchronise our circulation paths through the mixing of our yin and yang essences.”

Hei bowed.

“I didn’t expect such a thing to occur. Please forgive my negligence.”

At this point, Auntie Yimin’s strength was leaking from her body. She was only a step away from breaking through to the minute realm, so her aura was fearsome.

“You made Xiaoli practice a dual cultivation technique with you?”

If such a thing were to happen, then Xiaoli’s chance of finding a good husband in the future would be ruined. And what’s worse, it would’ve happened while she was taking care of Xiaoli on her parent’s behalf. How would she face them when they returned?

“I did.”

Auntie Yimin gritted her teeth in anger. Even if he had done such a thing, that was one issue. But he was also shameless enough to admit it right in front of her.

She gently laid Xiaoli down and stood up, her hair raising as she glared at Hei.

“Do you have anything to say for yourself.”

“There is no excuse.”

“Then let those be your last words!”

Auntie Yimin dashed forward and launched a heavy fist.

She had already heard about how powerful this boy was from Xiaoli, so she didn’t hold back at all. But truthfully speaking, she knew that she had no chance of defeating him. Still, she couldn’t just let this go.

To her surprise, her fist landed solidly and sent the boy crashing into the window.

As he hit it, the formations protecting the room revealed themselves and prevented the window from breaking.

He then fell to the floor, but Auntie Yimin wasn’t going to give him a moment of rest.

She ran forward and kicked his stomach before he could land, sending him upwards to the ceiling.

She used the rebound to send a fist to his face as he fell back to the ground, sending him back to the window.

While he was there, she pressed him with a barrage of fists, each one landing solidly with a heavy thud.

“Ninety-Nine Impacts, Northern Fist!”

Now that she had him in a state where he couldn’t get away, she unleashed the technique she was most proficient in, aiming for his vitals with ninety-nine vicious blows.

A water-like substance flowed from the mask. This substance radiated a strong aura and caused the natural qi nearby to retreat. It wasn’t a special kind of water, nor was it saliva. No. It was Hei’s blood being spilt as he took the full brunt of Auntie Yimin’s attacks without defending himself at all.

“Skull Crushing Knee!”

After her ninety-nine consecutive hits, Auntie Yimin grabbed the back of his head and brought her knee to the mask, causing more clear blood to flow.

Auntie Yimin wasn’t finished. She was far from it.

“Sky-Fall Dance!”

She let Hei’s body fall to the ground and stamped on his head repeatedly, refusing to let up until he was dead.

As this was happening, Xiaoli was slowly coming to.

She could hear muffled sounds as she regained her senses, and when she looked over to the source, her eyes opened wide in shock.

“STOP!”

It was as if Auntie Yimin couldn’t hear her words at all. She continued her attacks without the slightest pause.

As Xiaoli witnessed the mighty masked one being trampled underfoot, she could imagine what had happened. Auntie Yimin may have been strong, but there was no way she would be any sort of threat to him. He wasn’t resisting. He was accepting a punishment because of her.

She ran up to Auntie Yimin and pulled at her arms, begging her to stop, but she noticed the crazed look in her eyes.

“Asura State!”

There was a legend among the juniors, that the reason Auntie Yimin kept herself locked up in the library was that she was a battle maniac. She would lose herself in the heat of battle, refusing to stop until her opponent was vanquished. It seemed she never expected to raise her hands in the library, but such a situation had occurred today.

Xiaoli tried several times to reason with Auntie Yimin, but she wasn’t receptive to any of it.

As she watched the masked one continue to suffer heavy hits, she could only think of one thing to do.

She jumped in front of Auntie Yimin and caged Hei’s body with her own, protecting him with her back.

Auntie Yimin didn’t seem to recognise Xiaoli as the girl she had a hand in raising, but merely as an obstacle. She raised her foot and sent it down to Xiaoli’s back.

Xiaoli clenched her teeth and braced for the impact with her eyes closed. But even after a while, the pain she was expecting didn’t appear.

“Are you alright, Miss Xiaoli? There aren’t any problems with your body?”

“Problems? Shouldn’t I be asking you that? I’m just fine.”

Hei breathed a sigh of relief internally. What would he have done if Xiaoli had suffered some permanent damage beyond what he was able to detect?

Xiaoli remembered that Auntie Yimin was currently on a rampage, so she looked up to see what had happened.

What she saw, was Auntie Yimin’s foot right above her back, held firmly in place by the masked one’s hand. Auntie Yimin was struggling to free herself.

She turned back to the masked one.

“Why didn’t you stop her earlier?”

“Earlier, I was her target, and I deserved the punishment, but she has now turned her anger on you. I can’t allow you to be hurt for my sake.”

“Why would you deserve punishment? You didn’t do anything wrong. It’s because I-”

“It was my fault for not considering such a possibility.”

Xiaoli smiled, but Hei was in a compromising position right now.

“I’m not able to move freely while you’re on top of me like this.”

“Ah!”

Xiaoli immediately got up and straightened her clothes, Hei got up shortly afterwards.

He released Auntie Yimin’s foot and she resumed her attacks. But this time, Hei defended himself, making sure to minimise the recoil Auntie Yimin suffered.

Since she had attacked Xiaoli, Hei assumed there was something off about Auntie Yimin, and seeing her like this confirmed it.

“Soaring Eagle Claw!”

Auntie Yimin launched another attack, which Hei blocked.

“Swallow Return Reverse Kick!”

She sent a spinning hook kick to Hei’s head, which he also blocked with ease.

“Falcon Punch!”

She launched a fist accompanied by a glowing orange aura at Hei’s abdomen, but similarly, he caught it and the aura dissipated.

Xiaoli watched as all of this happened and noticed that the clear substance that had been flowing from the mask was returning to it.

It was a strange sight.

Hei turned to Xiaoli.

“What’s wrong with your Auntie Yimin? She doesn’t seem to be herself.”

“I’m not too sure, but I heard she has a unique physique which causes her to lose her reason while in battle. They say she won’t stop until the enemy is defeated, or she runs out of qi.”

“I see.”

Hei had just the remedy for this.

He released a large amount of his qi into the study, and since it was null element qi, it drove all the elemental qi out of the area.

It wasn’t long before Auntie Yimin used up all of her reserves and stumbled weakly as she tried to continue her attacks.

Xiaoli ran up to her and supported her.

“Auntie Yimin, it’s me, Xiaoli!”

“Xiaoli? You’re okay?”

“Mm. I’m fine.”

“Ugh. Why is the qi so thin in here? It’s like we’re in a cultivation wasteland.”

Xiaoli hadn’t noticed this as she hadn’t been using her qi, but when she tried to cycle her cultivation technique, she realised just how barren this place had become.

“That’s right, where’s that boy? If I don’t teach him a good lesson today-”

“No, Auntie Yimin. There’s no need to teach any lessons.”

“But your purity. He-”

“Eh?”

Xiaoli inspected her own body and didn’t find any problems with her pure yin core.

“My purity is intact, Auntie Yimin.”

“How is that possible? He already told me that you two practised a dual cultivation technique.”

Auntie Yimin lowered her glasses and looked into Xiaoli’s abdomen where the yin core resided.

After seeing it, she opened her eyes wide and turned her gaze to Hei.

“Didn’t you tell me that the two of you mixed your yin and yang essences?”

“I did.”

“Then…”

Xiaoli’s face turned red.

“It can hardly be called a dual cultivation technique, Auntie Yimin. All we did was hold hands.”

“Oh?”

Auntie Yimin was surprised to hear this. It seemed that she had jumped to conclusions.

Since Xiaoli hadn’t suffered any harm, there was only one thing to do.

She bowed in front of Hei.

“I have acted rashly today. Please accept my apologies.”

Hei helped her up.

“There wasn’t any harm done, so there’s no need to apologise.”

Auntie Yimin and Xiaoli both gave him odd looks.

No harm done? Hadn’t Auntie Yimin beaten him to a pulp just then?

“Come to think of it, why are you up and about so soon after all that?”

Auntie Yimin wasn’t sure what happened, but she remembered the initial moments and was sure she had done some real damage. Yet, here he was, standing there as if none of that had actually happened.

“You aren’t the only one with a unique physique.”

Auntie Yimin sighed and shook her head.

“Yours lets you walk around like you’re invincible, while mine turns me into a crazed maniac. The Heavens really like to play tricks on this lady.”

“Perhaps your curse is a blessing in disguise.”

“If only. I’ve had to struggle to keep my sanity all these years and it’s only becoming more difficult.”

“Is it a problem that has become progressively worse over time or was this worsening triggered by something in particular?”

“It’s always been like this. At first, I was just a bit too violent as a child, but as I grew up, the severity of the outbursts increased. Eventually, it reached a point where I completely lose myself.”

“Are the outbursts something you actively resist or are they triggered by external factors?”

“I actively resist them, but being angered seems to make it harder to resist.”

“Then it may be that you have a high affinity with natural qi.”

“A high affinity?”

“Mm. I’m the same, and I must constantly use my qi to prevent it from building up too much. And if I try to cultivate…”

Hei moved his circulation paths a fraction.

-Boom.

All of the null element qi he had released earlier rushed back into his body.

But that wasn’t the end of it.

All of the fires within the Zhu Clan went out at that moment, the fire element qi rushing madly to the library. The same was true for the water reservoirs, which threatened to overflow as the water tried to escape. Out of nowhere, a cyclone enveloped the library, and the winds rushed in, converging in this one room, blowing Auntie Yimin’s and Xiaoli’s hair all over the place. Even the library itself was creaking as the metal beams reinforcing it tried to get closer to Hei. And last but not least, the earth beneath them was trembling in excitement as the earth element qi was finally able to see it’s friend again.

In one instant, the Zhu Clan was relatively calm, and in the next, it was complete pandemonium.

Hei stopped his cultivation, and the earth was saddened. The water in the reservoirs pouted as it returned to tranquillity, and the winds lingered for a moment before dissipating with a sad sound. The fire was the most upset. It wasn’t as if it could just light itself again. Lastly, was the metal, which seemed to be asking if Hei was sure. Perhaps the entire building would have collapsed if he acquiesced.

When everything returned to normal, Auntie Yimin and Xiaoli looked at Hei with blank expressions. At this point, they couldn’t care less about their dishevelled appearances. They shared the same thoughts.

Was such a thing possible? It wasn’t possible, right?