The warm sun rays fell over the woods and shone upon Guan Xi Lin's face. His brows creased up a little and the fingers on his left hand moved slightly as well. After a while, he slowly opened his eyes and stared a little dazed, at the specks of sunlight peeking down through the thick canopy of leaves above his head.
"Awake already?"
The soft and warm sounding voice reached his ears which startled Guan Xi Lin. "Little kid?" He wanted to sit up but it tugged at his wound which was so painful he gasped and fell back.
"Your wounds have not closed properly. Don't move around too much."
Feng Jiu held him down, her eyes a mix of emotions as she looked at him before she asked: "You do not even know by what name I am called, so why would you risk your life so recklessly to protect me?"
"Lit….. Little kid, you….. you're angry?" He was looking at the little beggar kid nervously.
"Answer me."
Seeing that those eyes were sternly serious, he said: "I am older than you, and you are like a kid brother to me. When there is danger, of course I have to protect you."
Feng Jiu was surprised, never expecting the reason to be such a simple and honest one.
"Little kid….."
"My name is Feng Jiu." She opened her mouth to say suddenly, her eyes looking at that face stunned into silence. "Moreover, I am a girl."
"Hah? G….. Gir….. Girl?"
This time the shock was real and he began to stutter incoherently. Because no matter which way you looked at her, where would you ever find a girl that was able to take on a pack of wolves alone?
Moreover, he had always seen him as a him and never for a moment thought that he would turn out to be a she.
Seeing him utterly flabbergasted, her eyes flickered and she said: "Your right shoulder's tendon snapped from that beast's bite."
"Oh." He glanced at her and answered.
"What I mean is. Your right arm is crippled."
This time, he hesitated a moment and lowered his eyes. "Mmm."
"Regret it now?"
Hearing that, Guan Xi Lin looked in her direction and shook his head to say: "I do not regret it. If I had not gone forward to block, it might have bitten you and you might not have lived through it. I am a man, and am much bigger in size. I only crippled an arm. I'm fine. If I cannot hold a sword in my right hand, I will train up my left."
Hearing those words, Feng Jiu was overcome with shock for a long while and when she finally recovered, a smile came onto her face and she said: "As dumb as I thought."
Little kid, no no no, Little Jiu. I am not dumb. I am just too honest." He drew back the sides of his mouth and laughed aloud, seemingly not having fallen into depression with his right arm crippled.
"Would someone who is honest tell people he is honest?" She raised up her brow in askance, deciding secretly in her heart that she must definitely heal his right arm.
"Little Jiu, did you meet with danger when you went to pick the herb? Why were you gone such a long time?"
When he thought back to the fact that he had waited there for a day and a night but still had not seen her come back, he had thought that she had met with a ferocious beast and he had run out intending to find her. Unexpectedly, he had been attacked by the wolves and the tiger.
"Some unexpected things happened and I was chased all over the woods by two bears. Are you hungry? I'll go hunt some wild meat and roast it for us to eat."
She jumped through it without much of an explanation. In regards to the experiences she had gone through in the past one day and night, she did not intend to speak much about it.
"Hungry, but don't go too far." He said in a slightly worried tone.
"I know." She smiled and got up to walk around to survey the surroundings.
A few days later in the Nine Entrapment Woods
The few days of interaction had drawn the two of them closer to each other and knowing that Feng Jiu was alone without anyone else, Guan Xi Lin said he wanted to acknowledge her as his sister.
Unable to convince him otherwise, Feng Jiu felt that it wasn't that bad a idea to have him as an elder brother and hence, the two of them had conducted a very simple ceremony for them to swear to the Heavens, to acknowledge the pair as sworn siblings.
"Little Jiu, let's go to the Rock Forest Town!" As the blood clot in his brain dispersed, he had regained his memory, but he did not feel like going home.