Harem Link Cultivation System-Chapter 70: Su Lan’s Intervention

The tunnel silence was alive, thick and cold. Lin Tian listened to his own breathing, held the Core in his left hand, its chill a reminder of the prize that had nearly killed him. His right arm throbbed against his chest. He didn’t need to look; he could feel the black veins spreading.

He Lian’s gone. The System map glowed in his mind: the labyrinth, the red dot of the wyrm in its chamber, and one blue dot. No other disciples nearby. The exit was a winding route away, with at least three of hostile life signs between here and there. Cave ghouls, probably.

He pushed off the wall. A sharp ache bloomed in his shoulder, the old frost-venom wound protesting. He ignored it. The curse was the greater threat. A timer counting down in his flesh. The geothermal vents Liang Shu had mentioned were somewhere beneath the North Peak, not here. He needed to get out first.

One step at a time. Get to the exit.

The Frost Core’s energy signature was a beacon. His qi-masking technique was weak, like a blanket over a lantern. He navigated by the system map, skirting the ghouls, but the cold in his arm was worsening, as if his marrow was turning to ice. He clenched his jaw against chattering teeth.

A wrong turn led him into a dead-end chamber. As he turned back, dizziness hit him. He stumbled, right hand shooting out to brace against the wall. The moment his palm touched stone, intense cold shot up his arm. Where his hand had been, an imprint of his fingers remained in the rock.

It’s leaching out. I’m losing control.

Panic, tried to rise in his chest. He crushed it down. Panic would wake the trace on his wrist and paint a target on his back for every elder watching. He focused on his breathing, the way his grandfather had taught him.

He made it another hundred paces before his legs gave out.

He slid down a rough wall into a crouch. The Frost Core was like a block of winter in his hand. The curse was a storm raging inside his arm. He could feel the two cold energies, one external and one internal, starting to feed each other. A visible mist began to coil from the sleeve of his right robe.

No. Not here.

He fumbled with his belt, trying to shove the Core into his pouch to insulate it. His fingers were clumsy, like wood.

"Well," a voice said from the tunnel entrance ahead. "This is a predicament."

Lin Tian’s head snapped up. She stood ten feet away. Su Lan. The sect’s medical disciple. She wasn’t in trial gear, just her simple, pale-blue outer disciple robes. She looked utterly out of place, like a surgical instrument dropped in a mud pit. Her arms were crossed, her head tilted as she studied him.

"Medical oversight," she said, answering his unspoken question. Her voice was calm. "The elders are paranoid about losses in the preliminaries. They station a few of us at key points in the cave. In case someone needs... patching up." Her eyes scanned him. "You look like you need more than a patch."

Lin Tian forced himself to stand. His knees trembled, but he locked them. "I’m fine. Just catching my breath."

"You’re shaking," Su Lan noted. She took a step forward. "Your qi is erratic. And you’re emitting a frost field strong enough to mist the air." She took another step. "That’s not catching your breath. That’s your cultivation imploding. Let me see your right arm."

Every instinct screamed to run, but his body wouldn’t obey. The cold had sunk too deep. "It’s nothing. A side effect of the environment. The cold down here..."

"Is pervasive, yes," Su Lan cut in, closing the distance. "But it doesn’t make spiritual energy curdle around one limb. I gave you seventy-two hours. It hasn’t been twenty-four. Whatever you’re hiding is progressing exponentially. Show me the arm, or I’ll invoke authority and forcibly examine you. The commotion will draw every disciple within half a mile. How would you like that?"

Her words were ice needles. Lin Tian’s mind raced. He couldn’t show the black veins. The moment she saw that curse, she’d report to the elders. They’d separate him from Xueya.

Think! The System... the Link it mentioned...

A silent query flashed in his mind.

[Condition: Black-Veined Curse (Yin Imbalance) at Critical Stage.]

[Available High-Compatibility Partner Detected: Su Lan.]

[Proposed Solution: Establish Preliminary Spiritual Link. Fire Resonance may mask Yin Imbalance symptoms, providing temporary stabilization.]

[Warning: Forced elemental convergence will cause severe meridian conflict. Proceed?]

It wasn’t a choice. It was the only door left in a burning room.

Do it.

"You want to see what’s wrong?" Lin Tian’s voice was a rough scrape. He met her gaze. "Then you’ll have to feel it."

Before she could react, he reached out with his left hand and grabbed her wrist.

Su Lan’s eyes widened in offense. "Unhand me!"

But it was too late. The System had already activated. It wasn’t like with Xueya, a gentle warmth blooming from mutual connection. This was a violent, forced bridge. Lin Tian channeled a thread of his own chaotic qi toward her, using the System.

Su Lan gasped. A wave of heat erupted from her core. It shot up her arm and met his incoming energy at the point where their skin touched.

For Lin Tian, the world dissolved into agony.

Molten lead flooded his veins while glacier water dunked him. Su Lan’s fire roared through his meridians, colliding with the curse’s ice. In his right arm, black veins sizzled.

He cried out, grip tightening on her wrist. She didn’t pull away, staring at their hands, shocked. She felt it too.

"What... what are you?" she whispered, her clinical detachment gone.

Burning. Freezing. Burning. Freezing.

His right arm cycled through torment until, slowly, a balance formed. The mist from his sleeve vanished. The black veins on his forearm didn’t disappear, but faded from black to dull grey. The chill left his skin, replaced by normal warmth.

The System notification was brief.

[Preliminary Spiritual Link Established. Partner: Su Lan. Compatibility: High.]

[Status: Yin Imbalance symptoms externally masked. Internal meridian conflict active. Stability: Temporary.]

[Warning: Link is unstable. Prolonged conflict may cause permanent meridian damage.]

Lin Tian sank to the floor, releasing Su Lan’s wrist. The Burning vs Freezing sensation had finish.

Su Lan stumbled back a step. She looked at her own wrist, then at him. Her usual composure was shattered. "That was... a forced connection. That’s forbidden technique. It’s..."

"It’s what you felt," Lin Tian finished, his voice exhausted. "That’s the ’nothing’ I was hiding. You have a fire-aligned body. It... help me. For now."

"Help you?" Su Lan’s voice rose. "You forced connection between us. If our compatibility had been fractionally off, your spirit root would have shattered."

"It was that or let you see the curse and report me," Lin Tian said flatly, looking up at her. "This was the better option."

"Curse?" Su Lan’s eyes narrowed. "So it is a curse." Her gaze dropped to his right arm. "Show me. Now. The truth."

This time, Lin Tian didn’t resist. He pushed up the sleeve of his robe. The gray, vein-like patterns were still there, visible against his skin, but they no longer looked actively poisonous. They looked old, healed, like scars from a long-ago injury.

Su Lan reached out, her fingers hovering just above his skin. She didn’t touch him. "The energy signature is... It’s like looking at a painting that’s been left in the sun."

She looked at him, her expression unreadable. "My fire is acting as a filter. It’s masking the curse’s true nature by overlaying it with its own chaotic signature. That’s why you’re in conflict. Your body is trying to process two fundamentally incompatible energies."

"Will it hold?" Lin Tian asked. It was the only question that mattered.

"For a while. Hours, maybe a day. It wear down both energies, the curse and my fire qi. Eventually, one will give up. If my fire fades first, the curse returns, probably worse than before. If the curse breaks first..." She trailed off, frowning.

"I don’t know. This isn’t in any medical text. What is this curse? Where did you get it?"

"A parting gift from Elder Shen," Lin Tian muttered, pulling his sleeve down. He wasn’t ready to tell the whole truth.

Su Lan sat back on her heels. The sounds of the caves seemed loud in the silence. "You’re a mess, Lin Tian. A political mess, a medical mess." She shook her head. "And now, thanks to your little stunt, I’m linked to you. I can feel your... distress."

"Can you break it?"

"Not without potentially causing a backlash in both of us. You initiated a forced link. Severing it carelessly could leave a scar."

She stood up, brushing off her robes. Her demeanor shifted back toward the clinical, but it was frayed at the edges. "The immediate problem is getting you out of this cave before your condition worsen. Can you walk?"

Lin Tian pushed himself up. "I can walk."

"Good. Follow me. I know a direct route to the exit. It’s for medical emergencies only."

She turned and started walking. Lin Tian fell in step behind her. He focused on putting one foot in front of the other.

After a few minutes of silent travel through a narrow, upward-sloping tunnel, Su Lan spoke without turning around. "This link. It’s not just to take care the curse for you. It’s giving me... data."

"Data?"

"Echoes. Sensations. I can feel the edges of your control, the precision you use to keep your aura in check. I can also feel a... a second presence. Faint, like moonlight on ice. That’s her, isn’t it? Bai Xueya."

Lin Tian didn’t answer.

"I thought it was just political rumor," Su Lan continued, her voice low. "The bond between you two. But it’s real. It’s a tangible spiritual link, and it’s strong. And now there’s this... this hot wire connecting you to me." She finally glanced back at him.

"What are you, Lin Tian? A hub for spiritual connections?"

"I’m just trying to survive," he said, the truth in his voice.

Su Lan held his gaze for a long moment, then nodded, facing forward again. "Aren’t we all."

The tunnel opened into a small chamber. In the center was a glowing formation circle in the floor. A teleportation array.

"Step on it," Su Lan instructed. "It will take you to the medical pavilion. You’ll be recorded as withdrawing due to injury. It will hurt your standing, but you’ll be alive."

Lin Tian moved toward the circle, then stopped. "What about you?"

"I have to stay. My duty isn’t over. And I need to... process this. Figure out what it means." She crossed her arms, a defensive gesture. "Seventy-two hours. The clock is still ticking. When this masking effect fails, the curse will be back. And I’ll be able to see it again."

Lin Tian stepped onto the glowing lines. The world began to blur at the edges. "Thank you," he said.

Su Lan’s expression was complex, a mix of professional duty, personal curiosity, and deep unease. "Don’t thank me. You’ve dragged me into your mess. Just... don’t die before I figure out what to do with you."

The light swallowing the chamber. The last thing Lin Tian felt was the violent, pain in his meridians as the teleportation ripped him away.

End of Chapter 70