The Silly Alchemist

“If you’re his sister, I can be his sister too! After all, I am the eldest here!” said Xuan Yuanbing with a smile.

“Judging your appearance, I think you’ll fit the little sister role better. We have a vacancy for that,” offered Ye Lanyu bluntly. She was confident the Lady would have no objections being the little sister of the bunch.

As long as Ye Lanyu gets to remain as the big sister, she would rest her case.

“Little sister? That sounds nice. It’ll fit me well because I’m only seventeen years old!”

“That’s your physical age. Your mental age would be about thirty-eight years old at this point- no, maybe its ancient…” Ye Lang interrupted the two.

“I don’t care, I’m only seventeen! But… Ye Lang, I need you to call me Sister Bing.” suggested Xuan Yuanbing with a sweet smile. Age was such a taboo topic for females, ladies would generally prefer to be younger but Xuan Yuanbing wasn’t keen on having Ye Lang as her older brother. After all, it was Xuan Yuanbing who watched him grow.

The first time Ye Lang entered her dreams, he was just thirteen years old…

“Xuan Yuanbing! The Pope is summoning you home for dinner…” Ye Lang quickly switched the topic, looking elsewhere but her.

“…”

“Hey, Ye Lang, seal this place up!” requested Xuan Yuanbing as she took in the beautiful garden.

“Seal it up?” Ye Lang was puzzled.

“I like this place a lot and I want it to stay this way forever!” another sweet smile from the Lady.

“Oh, sure!” Ye Lang went into action, walking towards the outer rim of the previous circular formation. He made a few hand gestures to retract the floating circle console and created a new formation.

Six rays of light appeared on the ground, significantly less intense than when the square was empty as it was muted by the new landscape.

“I’m warning you, stop using telepathy in front of us! That’s disrespectful!” the seventh princess and Ye Lanyu’s frustration was reaching its peak. They were upset at how they were excluded from their conversation.

The two were off in their own world and the girls felt left out as they didn’t understand the context behind their conversation. It was frustrating!

“I wasn’t using telepathy! It’s not something I can control!” Ye Lang defended himself but the indication of his words had added to their annoyance.

“What do you mean?! Are you against us? I don’t care if you’re unable to control it, anything you conversed in telepathy must be repeated out loud to us!” raged Ye Lanyu as she pulled one of Ye Lang’s ears.

“Ow! I said I wasn’t using telepathy!” Ye Lang gave her the puppy eye.

“Then what were you two talking about just now?” Ye Lanyu released his ear from her grasp, rubbing his ear gently as an apology.

“I was just trying to understand what she had meant by sealing this area. I left it unsealed to give her some flexibility to make some changes to the landscape. The landscape will be finalized and unchangeable after we seal it up… Hey, Xuan Yuanbing, you better not regret your decision. I won’t make another garden like this ever again, it’s exhausting!”

The formation of the garden had drained him badly so Ye Lang was unwilling to repeat the action unless necessary in the future.

“I know, I think it’s perfect the way it is now. This is enough!” Xuan Yuanbing was absolutely pleased with her garden.

Ye Lanyu paid no mind to Xuan Yuanbing’s reply. She stared blankly at her brother, “You mean the formation allows repeated changes to the landscape?”

“Yeah, that’s right,” Ye Lang nodded.

Ye Lanyu went silent, a second passed before she responded, “That’s amazing! You should’ve said something about it earlier, I’d love to play with it!”

“…” the seventh princess had no words. She couldn’t believe Ye Lanyu would want to ‘play’ with it. What if more people found out this was possible?

The seventh princess shuddered at the thought. Ye Lang would definitely face constant harassment…

Thankfully, Xuan Yuanbing’s decision would turn the manipulability of the garden a secret. A potential storm was evaded!

There wasn’t much any of them could do with the information for now.

“Long live the prince, long live the Sacred Lady!”

“Eh? Why are they screaming?” Ye Lang finally noticed the loud cheers and screams.

Ye Lang’s delayed response wasn’t due to his usual cluelessness, the formation had created a barrier between the outer world and the garden so it was relatively silent within it.

The formation was sound-proof for the sake of confidentiality but the sudden transition from a peaceful silence to passionated screams made him yelp. They were so loud!

“What’s going on? Why are they screaming for us?” Xuan Yuanbing couldn’t hide the glee in her heart, she loved the sound of her name and Ye Lang’s together.

“Hmm, nevermind, I’m leaving now, my battle is happening soon,” Ye Lang patted the dirt off his clothes as he announced his departure.

“Battle? Aren’t you done with your round?” Xuan Yuanbing tilted her head, unaware that Ye Lang was just an extra that morning.

“The mixed-gender rounds were this morning, alchemy division rounds take place this afternoon. The timing would be just right when I reach the arena,” explained Ye Lang as he started to leave the square.

“Why were you in the mixed-gender round?” Xuan Yuanbing trailed behind Ye Lang.

Ye Lang shrugged: “You’d have to ask my sister for that, she registered my name and I had to go through so much hassle! But it was fine since I had nothing to do in Sheng City anyway.”

“I can bring you out for a day trip if you’d like! I know a lot of fun things you can do here,” offered Xuan Yuanbing. She knew this city like the back of her hand.

However, her type of fun might not be Ye Lang’s definition of fun…

Ye Lanyu was about to stop Xuan Yuanbing from pestering her brother, but the sister’s concern was not needed for Ye Lang blurted out a rejection.

“No thank you, I’d rather sleep!” Ye Lang shook his head, he hated strolling around with females other than Tigress.

“Oh! I get it now, you’ll meet me in my dreams…” Xuan Yuanbing flashed a cunning grin.

“…” Ye Lang fought the urge to tell her off.