43: Two hearts burning in the same furnace, who can endure it?

The air was filled with a scorched smell similar to a short circuit, the aftermath of two high-level energies forcibly clashing.

Su Chen felt as if scalding mercury had been poured into his spine; that was the resonance triggered by Qin Ya in the back of the bus.

Meanwhile, Lin Mengyao, whom he was supporting, was as limp as a puddle of mud, yet her body temperature was terrifyingly hot.

After only a few steps, Su Chen's arm was soaked by her cold sweat.

"Don't play dead. This is just the beginning."

Su Chen spoke harshly, but his hand steadily supported her waist, as a gentle stream of true qi protected Lin Mengyao's nearly collapsing heart vessels.

After struggling to get this "Hot Potato Guanyin" onto the bus, Su Chen was about to toss her into the passenger seat when his peripheral vision suddenly froze.

On the dashboard of the driver's console, which was originally cluttered with junk, a neatly folded paper boat had appeared at some point.

It was a piece of paper torn from a lesson plan; the hull of the boat held a pool of crystal-clear liquid that shimmered under the dim overhead light.

It wasn't ordinary water; Su Chen's nostrils flared as he caught an extremely faint, elegant metallic scent of rust.

It was Rootless Water mixed with essence blood from the heart.

"That's the dew Teacher Qin collected by the window last night..."

Zhao Wanting's spectral image flickered in the rearview mirror, her voice as rapid as a machine gun.

"She used her Natal Essence Blood as a catalyst, trying to use this clumsy method to 'wash' away the driver's seat's rejection of her. She doesn't want to seize power; she just wants to help you share the driving load!"

"Stupid."

Su Chen snorted coldly, but his gaze lingered on the paper boat for an extra second.

This woman, a teacher of the people, actually believed in such "shamanic" folk remedies?

It seemed she had been driven to a dead end.

Just then, the entire bus suddenly let out a tooth-aching sound of twisting metal.

"Creeeak—Bang!"

A few rivets securing the windows shot out like bullets, embedding themselves deeply into the iron roof.

The fuel gauge needle was like it was having an epileptic seizure, swinging wildly between "Full" and "Empty."

"It's over! Two hearts in one furnace, the furnace is bound to explode!"

Zhao Wanting screamed, her features contorted with fear.

"The core logic of this bus has been scrambled! It can't distinguish who the mistress is now. Both wills are fighting for control. If they don't merge or if one isn't removed, the souls of you three will be torn apart by this bus to be used as fuel!"

Lin Mengyao slumped in her seat, her originally dilated pupils suddenly contracting.

She was weak but not stupid; she immediately understood the current death trap.

One mountain cannot accommodate two tigers, unless one is male and the other female.

But now there were two tigresses plus a driver; it would be a miracle if this bus didn't flip.

The floor of the bus began to vibrate violently, like some living creature twitching in pain.

"Who should be removed? Kick her off, or should I get lost myself?"

Lin Mengyao bit her pale lip, her nails digging into the leather seat.

"Neither."

A wild laugh rang out abruptly, drowning out the bus's wails.

Su Chen suddenly straightened up and grabbed the heavily worn leather seat cover of the driver's seat, tearing it open with a violent "rip."

Amidst the flying dust, a Bronze Pedestal covered in complex runes was exposed to the air.

The pedestal was dark in color, with a dark red halo flowing over it, looking like a dormant Taotie's Eye.

"When did I ever say this bus was driven by women?"

Su Chen's eyes were wild; his right hand, with fingers held like a blade, sliced ruthlessly across his left palm without hesitation.

Blood gushed out instantly.

With a backhanded strike carrying the weight of a thousand catties, he slammed his bloody palm onto the runic eye of the Bronze Pedestal!

"You've all got the logic wrong. This damn bus doesn't care about sincerity; it only recognizes the 'Yang Master'! I, Su Chen, have the Sacred Yang Divine Body; I am the only furnace core! At most, you're just the ones adding firewood!"

"Buzz—!"

As the blood seeped in, the Bronze Pedestal emitted a hum like a giant bell.

An extremely overbearing suction force suddenly erupted.

The two pinkish auras that had been darting around and attacking each other throughout the bus...

Lin Mengyao's coldness and Qin Ya's gentleness were suddenly pulled away by the pedestal as if they had encountered a black hole, converging into a violent torrent of energy that poured frantically into Su Chen's body through his arm.

"Ugh!"

Su Chen let out a muffled groan, his face instantly turning flush as if he had downed an entire bottle of strong vodka.

It felt like forcing two types of lava with completely different properties into the same blood vessel.

"Are... are you absorbing our lives?"

Lin Mengyao watched this scene in horror; she felt the power within her rapidly draining away, and the sense of weakness made her instinctively want to resist.

"Su Chen! Have you been lying to us all along? What loyalty, what bonds? You're just using us as batteries!"

She struggled to rush forward and push Su Chen away, but she was held tight by a pair of soft yet powerful hands.

"Don't move! Look at his hand!"

Qin Ya had rushed to the driver's console at some point; she didn't care about the pedestal that might drain her dry, but instead stared fixedly at Su Chen's left arm hidden in his sleeve.

There, blue veins bulged like earthworms, and the vessels beneath the skin had turned a terrifying purplish-black, with fine beads of blood even seeping out from his pores.

"He's reversing his meridians..."

Qin Ya's voice was trembling, and tears instantly fell.

"He's bearing the backlash for us. The two energies are fighting inside him; he's using his own body as the battlefield to forcibly suppress this collision!"

Lin Mengyao was stunned.

She looked at the man who usually talked nonsense and seemed selfish; right now, his teeth were clenched tight, and the main artery in his neck was throbbing violently.

He was clearly enduring immense pain, yet he maintained the formation's operation without a word.

An egoist?

What kind of egoist would shatter their own meridians for the sake of two "batteries"?

Su Chen heard the commotion behind him, but he had no time to explain, nor did he intend to.

A misunderstanding was for the best; making people fear him was much easier than making them love him.

Until the restless energy completely calmed down and the needle on the dashboard finally stabilized at a green mark, Su Chen only then released his hand as if exhausted.

The wound on his palm was already charred black, a trace of being scorched by high-concentration energy.

Su Chen swayed and slowly withdrew his hand; the wound on his palm healed in a flash of golden light, but he was drenched as if he had just been pulled out of water.

"What are you looking at? Haven't you seen a handsome guy practicing cultivation before?"

Su Chen panted heavily, casually wiping the cold sweat from his face to hide the exhaustion in his eyes that had almost caused him to faint from pain.

"All of you, get to the back and sleep. Don't get in the way; I'm going to drive."

Late at night, the rain in the wilderness always came without warning.

Su Chen leaned back in the driver's seat, his breathing long and steady, appearing to have fallen into a deep sleep.

But his hand gripping the steering wheel remained in a tense state, ready to strike at any moment.

A martial artist's five senses are infinitely magnified in the dark.

He heard a deliberately lightened footstep, accompanied by a familiar scent of chalk dust mixed with a faint jasmine fragrance.

It was Qin Ya.

She moved cautiously to the driver's area like a startled kitten.

Su Chen didn't open his eyes; he was "listening" to her movements.

A faint sound of ceramic friction rang out.

Immediately after, Su Chen felt a cool aura spreading from the Bronze Pedestal; the smoldering heat that had been aching within him was instantly smoothed over quite a bit.

It was the Pearl Hairpin that Qin Ya never took off.

It was an heirloom left by her mother on her deathbed, said to be an old item that had been offered before Buddha; he hadn't expected it could actually serve to "suppress" the Yang Fire.

"I only know half of this 'Heart Calming Incantation'..."

Qin Ya's voice was extremely low, carrying a hint of humble entreaty, as if she were speaking to the air or confiding in the cold pedestal.

"I don't have as good a bloodline as the Eldest Miss Lin, nor do I have much ability, but this thing is cool. If it's placed here, you should be able to get a good night's sleep."

After doing all this, she didn't approach Su Chen, but curled up on the cold iron partition behind the driver's seat like a dutiful night watchman.

"This time, it's my turn to protect you."

Her murmur was as light as a feather landing.

Su Chen's eyelashes flickered slightly, but in the end, he didn't open his eyes.

If he woke up now, this woman would probably die of shame and indignation.

Meanwhile, Su Chen's keen hearing caught a slight noise outside the window.

Through the refraction of the rain curtain, the cold campus belle Lin Mengyao was standing barefoot in the muddy rain, staring fixedly through the glass at the warm yet eerie scene inside the bus.

She tightly clutched the silver needle she had originally intended to use for one final test of Su Chen.

For a long time.

Lin Mengyao's fingers slowly loosened.

"Ding."

A very soft sound, as the silver needle representing doubt and defensiveness fell into the dark mud, instantly swallowed by the darkness.

She turned around, letting the cold rain soak her expensive blazer, but a complex look of self-mockery curled at the corners of her mouth.

Su Chen sighed in his heart.

Is this... a halftime break before the Harem catches fire?

Just then, a drop of cold liquid landed on Su Chen's brow without warning.

It wasn't sweat, nor was it a tear.

Su Chen snapped his eyes open and looked up at the dark roof of the bus.

"Drip."

Another drop.

Accompanied by the increasingly frequent thunder outside, a fine, almost invisible line of water was slowly seeping through the seams of the bus's roof, making a heart-pounding dripping sound in the quiet cabin.