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“Young Master Lan." Jiang Cheng could feel the heat of her cheeks, she was absolutely blushing at that moment and, embarrassed, she hated it. She wanted it to stop, but now that she was in front of the beautiful, peerless First Jade of Lan, she had no choice but to press on. "I am here to....apologize."

Lan Xichen turned toward her, the smooth streams of black that were his raven hair swaying in the wind like immaculate slips of silk. Even in movement, he did not have a single hair out of place. "Jiang-er-guniang?" He inquired, warm brown eyes blinking. "What is the matter?" His tone was curious, expectant, but not judgmental in the least. It put her immediately at ease, like she could offer him all her secrets - and indeed, she would trust him to keep them in his honest heart.

"Yesterday, after Wei Wuxi-my shixiong received his punishment, I followed him to the Cold Springs to check on his condition while he recuperated. I was not aware that you were also present, and-" she swallowed, "intruded upon your privacy."

According to the Gusu Lan rules, male and female cultivators were kept separate in the Cloud Recesses, and she had crossed a line. However, she was but a maiden peeking (accidentally or not) upon a man in undress - it was hardly as scandalous compared to the opposite. If a boy had peeped upon a naked girl, his punishment would be severe.

"It was an accident and no harm was done." Lan Xichen smiled, but Jiang Cheng shook her head, "N-No, when I was there, I saw...your soulmark."

The final few words said by her were quieter, fearing reproach for having seen something so private, and Lan Xichen's expression shifted, looking at her pensively.

"It was...a lotus covered in clouds on your chest, wasn't it?" She continued, blushing slightly from the image of his defined left pec - balling her hands into fists. "I recognized it immediately, because....because-!"

Brown eyes widened as Lan Xichen's lips parted, was it what he thought this was -

"-because I have the same soulmark!"

Every person had a soulmate. They were led to the other half of their soul by the marks imprinted on their skin ever since they were born, an identical symbol shared by each pair. To find another with the same mark was to find their companion for life.

"You...You do?" Lan Xichen exclaimed, and it was the first time Jiang Cheng had ever witnessed the First Jade of Lan be so unsettled in his breathy stammer. Jiang Cheng nodded tightly, eyes watching him in fear and hope.

"Can I see it?" He asked, and she turned redder than a hawthorn berry.

He was her soulmate, he was going to be her husband, Jiang Cheng tried to tell herself, as she glanced at the ground nervously.

"...it...it's in a...private place." She muttered, and clarity sparked in his brown eyes.

"I understand." The tips of his ears had already begun to flush red, wondering if she had her mark in the same place he had. Maybe it was on her breasts? The glimpse of her shapely round breasts, if her figure was anything to go by, in his mind made him feel hot.

"But if...we were to move to somewhere more private?" He suggested, driven by a heart-pumping curiosity.

She nodded, nervously biting her lip, and Xichen led Jiang Wanyin to an empty classroom. The anxious look on her face did not change, clearly afraid to be exposing herself in a relatively public place where others could still enter or see, so he reassured her that locking and binding spells would be used to secure the place, performing them as he spoke.

Slowly, her nerves eased, but was still shy and jumpy, eyeing the shimmering barriers erected around the classroom. Undoing his sash and showing her their soulmark on his chest, vividly rendered, made her slap her hands onto her red cheeks, but it gave her the courage she needed.  "O-Okay. L-Let me show you," She murmured.

He had been expecting her to take off her belt and slowly undo her layers, not abruptly sit down on the floor, stretch her legs out and pull her skirts up, all the way to her waist - exposing miles and miles of the honey tanned skin of her long, trim legs.

It was all happening faster than he could react. "It's...between my legs...." she whispered, barely audible, and to the detriment of his restraint, she spread her legs so he could see inbetween them and then lay back on the floor.

Jiang Cheng gritted her teeth and forced herself to endure, burning in embarrassment. "C-Can you see it, Young Master Lan?"

He barely stopped himself from bodily jerking. Before him, Jiang Cheng was the image of a virginal bride ready on her wedding night. He had never seen - a woman - like this, in person, only ever read about them and caught vague allusions. The ink-painted illustrations in the yellow books he had peeked into were nothing compared to it in the flesh - and oh, he could see the folds of her flesh indeed...

A lotus flower surrounded by white, swirling clouds. The small purple bloom was indeed on her skin,  but on the dusky spot between her - between her chrysanthemum and her- her womanly parts - a small, pink slit between two slim, tinged petals that hid a small pearl beneath a hood at the top - the blushing entrance of a virgin ready to welcome a man's length. It was all fully exposed to him.

She whimpered, face blazing red with her eyes scrunched shut, and his cock stirred shamefully in his pants. "Young Master Lan-"

"I - I see it-" Xichen stammered, face red, and averted his eyes, the image burned into his brain. "M-Maiden Jiang, we are soulmates," he gasped.

He turned his face away, fastening his robes over his bare chest as she scrambled to cover herself, pulling her skirts down and sitting up. Once she was presentable, he promptly came to her side, and he noticed the way she blushed even more at his approach. "T-Thank you for showing that to me, it was very courageous of you." He murmured, feeling lightheaded, his focus narrowing on her pink plump lips and cheekbones and pale, pretty eyes. When they had first met, he had inwardly acknowledged her arresting beauty, but never to this extent.

She shot to her feet, and in his effort to ease her, he ended up grasping her hand.

They were soulmates, they would be married inevitably, and one day they would find themselves in that same position they were in underneath red bridal curtains. Jiang Cheng knew that Xichen would see her entire bared body, and her cunt would be split open by his manhood, where she would welcome him into her deepest, most intimate parts.

They stared at each other for a single, exhilarating moment, before remembering themselves, and reluctantly letting go of the other's warmth, gazes averted and faces flushed.