Ning Shuang shook her head.

It wasn’t that she didn’t want to talk. It was that she couldn’t.

She reached up with a trembling hand and pointed a single finger directly at her own chest, right over her heart.

Su Bai’s corporate radar instantly pinged. He understood immediately.

’Ah. A biological Non-Disclosure Agreement,’ Su Bai thought as his eyes narrowed slightly.

In the cultivation world, strict sects didn’t rely on paperwork to keep their corporate secrets safe. They used Gu worms. If a disciple tried to leak classified information, the parasitic Gu lodged in their heart would detect the treacherous intent, panic, and instantly devour the host from the inside out.

Su Bai didn’t dare send his Spiritual Sense into her chest to verify it. If a foreign Qi signature poked the Gu, it might trigger the kill-switch like a tripped alarm wire.

He let out a heavy sigh. His shoulders slumped slightly. It was a devastating setback. He had finally secured an insider consultant from a Demonic Sect who was actually willing to cooperate, but her mouth was literally taped shut by her company’s HR department.

Seeing his deflated, disappointed expression, an unexplainable pang of guilt struck Ning Shuang’s chest.

She bit her lip. She realized she really didn’t want to see this handsome, gentle man look so defeated.

"You... you can ask me other things," Ning Shuang offered softly. "If the Gu doesn’t restrict it, I will answer whatever I can."

At those words, Su Bai’s eyes instantly lit up.

"What sect are you from?" Su Bai asked.

It was a safe baseline question. Demonic Sects were notoriously arrogant. They usually wanted their brand names feared and spoken of, so the Gu rarely restricted general affiliations.

"The Abyssal Lotus Sect," Ning Shuang answered smoothly. She felt no pain in her chest.

Su Bai committed the name to memory. He had read about them in the Grand Archives.

The Abyssal Lotus Sect was a massive, highly influential demonic conglomerate in the Northern Region. This meant Ning Shuang was a legitimate, high-tier employee, not just a freelance rogue.

Knowing he couldn’t directly ask for the location of their hidden bases or their operational troop numbers, Su Bai smoothly pivoted his strategy.

He began asking questions that seemed entirely harmless, but to him, they were an absolute goldmine of data.

"Does your sect import a lot of Fire-attribute herbs to stay warm?" Su Bai asked casually.

"No, the Elders actually prefer the natural chill. We only import Earth-attribute materials to reinforce the cavern walls," she replied.

’Intel gained: Their regional headquarters was located deep underground, likely in a natural sub-zero cave system.’

"How long does it take for a standard courier pigeon to reach the nearest mortal city from your posting?"

"I think about half a day’s flight," she answered easily.

’Intel gained: Their operational radius and exact distance from major supply lines.’

Ning Shuang was incredibly cooperative, unaware that her harmless, mundane answers were allowing Su Bai to perfectly reverse-engineer the Abyssal Lotus Sect’s entire supply chain, budget, and geographic footprint.

Having successfully gathered his data, Su Bai finally asked the one personal question that had been bothering him since he woke up.

"Ning Shuang," Su Bai tilted his head. His tone shifted from professional to curious. "Healing me offers you absolutely no benefit. Why exactly did you help me?"

At those words, Ning Shuang stiffened.

She hesitated for a long, agonizing moment. She looked down at her hands. Her face flushed a deep, vibrant crimson.

But through their conversation, she had realized just how considerate and reasonable Su Bai was. She decided to be completely honest.

"Actually..." she mumbled. "I was trying to gather a bit of your Yang Qi. Just to cure my frostbite! Only a little bit, I promise! But... ah... it was my absolute first time trying it, so I don’t know what went wrong. I just felt this massive suction, lost consciousness, and when I woke up, my cultivation was gone and you were healed!"

Su Bai stared at her.

He was completely speechless.

For three seconds, the cave was dead silent. And then, Su Bai threw his head back and burst into a booming, genuine fit of laughter.

It all made perfect sense now! She hadn’t selflessly sacrificed her cultivation to save him. She had tried to run a hostile extraction on his Yang, and his Reversal Body had treated it as a malware attack, violently vacuuming all the excess Yin Qi right out of her Dantian to seal his own wounds!

Seeing him laugh so heartily, completely unoffended by her confession of attempted robbery, Ning Shuang breathed a massive sigh of relief.

A righteous cultivator and a demonic cultivator, sitting by a fire pit, happily laughing about a botched Yang-Plucking attempt. If she told anyone in her sect about this, they would assume she had gone completely insane.

Just then, a sudden flash of inspiration struck Su Bai.

"The Yang-Plucking technique," Su Bai’s laughter faded into a sharp, focused curiosity. "What is the exact mechanism of it?"

"Connecting our meridians," Ning Shuang answered briefly, still slightly embarrassed. "It establishes a direct bridge between our foundations."

Su Bai’s eyes gleamed. ’A bridge. An open network connection bypassing the external firewall.’ 𝘧𝓇ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝘣𝓃ℴ𝓋𝑒𝑙.𝑐𝘰𝑚

"Ning," Su Bai said. His voice turned incredibly serious. "Let’s connect our meridians."

Ning Shuang’s face instantly ignited. She turned brighter than a boiled crab.

"T-That’s... not good!" she stammered as she frantically waved her hands. "We just met! And you’re a righteous cultivator!"

"I want to try something," Su Bai explained calmly. He reached out and gently pointed a finger at her chest.

Ning Shuang breathed heavily, her mind racing. But as she stared into Su Bai’s clear, completely professional eyes, understanding finally dawned on her.

’Oh, heavens, I misunderstood him. I have such a dirty mind!’ she screamed internally.

He wasn’t trying to take advantage of her. He was suggesting that if they connected their meridians, he could peek at the Gu worm from the inside, bypassing the external detection wards that would normally trigger the kill-switch.

It might actually work.

"Then... please lay on the bed," Ning Shuang directed.

Su Bai was stunned for a moment. He suddenly remembered how he had woken up that morning, finding her sprawled directly on top of him.

He coughed into his fist. In his past life, he had only ever engaged in that level of physical contact with his actual girlfriends.

"Is there no other way or... position?" Su Bai asked politely.

Ning Shuang rubbed her head, looking utterly confused and deeply embarrassed. "It’s the only way I know! Like I said, it’s only my second time trying this, so I can only follow the manual!"

Su Bai didn’t argue. If the software required a specific hardware alignment to boot up, you just plugged it in.

He walked over and lay flat on the makeshift fur bed.

"Come," Su Bai invited, wanting to finish this diagnostic procedure as fast as possible.

Ning Shuang swallowed hard. When he was unconscious, it was easy. But now, he was wide awake, staring up at her with those deep, dark eyes.

Mustering her courage, she climbed onto the bed and straddled his waist.

The moment she sat down and met his gaze, she froze. From this close angle, she fully realized just how majestic Su Bai looked. His jade-like skin, his sharp jawline, the quiet, unshakeable confidence radiating from him. She gulped audibly.

Feeling her weight settle on him, Su Bai gave a firm, reassuring nod.

It wasn’t that he was a piece of dead wood who couldn’t feel anything as a man. She was a very pretty girl. But his reason heavily outweighed his biology. To him, Ning Shuang was too young, basically an entry-level intern, and right now, he desperately needed to extract her company’s intel.

Noticing that she had been staring at his face for way too long, Ning Shuang violently snapped out of her daze. Her face burned with shame.

She quickly pressed her palms flat against his chest, closed her eyes, and circulated her Qi.

Click.

Su Bai felt it immediately. It was an indescribable, profound sensation. It felt as though a biological USB cable had just clicked into his body. Her meridians felt like a direct, warm extension of his own body.

It took him only a few seconds to adjust to the shared network.

Once the connection was stable, Su Bai closed his eyes and sent his senses through the meridian bridge, entering Ning Shuang’s body.

He navigated smoothly up toward her heart.

And there it was.

Latched onto the pulsing red muscle of her heart was a grotesque, multi-legged black insect. The Gu worm.

Su Bai smiled internally. His theory was correct.

He opened his eyes. Ning Shuang was looking down at him. Her chest heaved slightly from the intimate exertion.

"I see it," Su Bai whispered. "I want to try something. Don’t resist."

Ning Shuang hesitated. A flicker of worry passed through her dark eyes. "What are you going to do?"

"Don’t worry," Su Bai comforted her. "I won’t be rash and kill it. If the Gu dies, your sect will instantly know you’ve been compromised. That would be terrible for you."

Hearing his assurance, Ning Shuang breathed a sigh of relief. She nodded, trusting him entirely.

Su Bai closed his eyes again.

With a mental command, he summoned a tiny pinch of the [Withered Weeds Ash] from his system inventory directly into his own Dantian.

He didn’t fire it as an attack. Instead, he treated the ash like a localized anesthetic. He smoothly pushed the toxic, gray ash across the meridian bridge and into Ning Shuang’s circulation.

He guided the ash to flow naturally down her internal pathways. It was carried by her own bodily circulation, moving with the rhythm of her heartbeat, straight toward the parasite.

The Gu worm, sensing the incoming energy flow from its host’s normal bloodstream, didn’t detect a foreign attack. It just assumed the host’s body was delivering regular, scheduled nutrients.

The Gu greedily opened its maw and swallowed the Withered Weeds Ash.

The moment the ash entered the Gu’s system, its core properties activated. The ash instantly coated the parasite’s internal pathways, causing the demonic insect to completely lose its ability to absorb Qi or process data.

The multi-legged insect twitched once, went completely limp, and fell into a deep, unresponsive coma. It was still physically alive, so it wouldn’t alert the Abyssal Lotus Sect, but it was entirely offline.

Su Bai opened his eyes. A sharp, triumphant glint shone in the dim cavern light.

"Perfect."