“Are you all right?”
After completely dispelling the demonic melody, this was what Mo Xi asked him.
Gu Mang smiled and caught his breath. His lips, which had just been wrapped around the mouthpiece, were moist and flushed. The color made Mo Xi’s gaze linger for a moment before, as though he had suddenly thought of something, he abruptly looked away.
“What could possibly be wrong?” Gu Mang said. “That little trick is still showing off in front of me?”
He wiped his mouth. His solid, taut chest rose and fell.
“If she kept blowing for a while longer, I’d have had her vomiting blood.”
Mo Xi looked at the suona hanging from his hand, its plain white gauze ribbon fluttering in the wind.
Seeing Mo Xi looking at it, Gu Mang said, “My divine weapon.”
“I’ve seen you fight before,” Mo Xi added. “At the training grounds.”
“Oh.” Gu Mang remembered and smiled. “That doesn’t really count as a fight. I was helping one of my buddies out of a jam.”
“You were using a saber then.”
“That was one I bought at a weapons shop. It wasn’t the divine weapon the Academy requested for me.”
As he spoke, Gu Mang gave the suona in his hand a rueful wave.
“My actual weapon is this. But I don’t use it very often. Every time I play, the other musical cultivators at the Academy say they can’t practice and get mad at me, so I…”
He paused and sighed.
“I usually go practice alone in the back mountains. I don’t use it much otherwise.”
Mo Xi nodded.
He thought the other musical cultivators’ complaints were not entirely unreasonable. Just look at the unlucky fellow who had been playing the Qiang flute earlier.
As he watched Gu Mang disperse the suona into points of spiritual light and draw it back into his palm, Mo Xi said, “The flute player was a cultivator from Liao. We need to report this to the Military and Administrative Bureau.”
“Oh, no need, no need.”
Gu Mang patted him on the shoulder.
“You’re still too young. After hearing a demonic flute melody, you’ll assume the person must be from Liao. That’s not necessarily true.”
As he spoke, Gu Mang’s expression became solemn.
“A cultivator from Liao wouldn’t have only that level of power when playing it. If they were really attacking, an inexperienced low-level cultivator would lose their sanity in the blink of an eye.”
“Of course,” he added quickly. “You might be an exception.”
As he said this, he glanced at Mo Xi’s hand, the one whose bandage he had torn open in order to form the seal.
“Who was the flute player?”
“It was the embroiderer, Su Qiao.”
Gu Mang sighed.
“I saw some things in Lin Yun’s memories at the end. I think that no matter what Su Qiao intends to do right now, we should go back to the Lin family embroidery shop. Miss Bai’s body, as well as the secret of why Su Qiao knows Liao’s demonic spells, should both be hidden there.”
Gu Mang said, “We shouldn’t waste any time. I’ll explain on the way.”
They soon reached the Lin family embroidery shop.
Gu Mang first set up several layers of transparent barriers around the shop, cutting it off from the neighboring houses. Then he placed a hand against the door and sensed the aura inside—
“There aren’t any ghosts hiding here.”
Gu Mang continued sensing carefully for a while before closing his eyes.
“But the spiritual flow in this building is definitely strange. It feels like some kind of unfamiliar power is surging inside.”
“Liao’s Black Magic Arts,” Mo Xi said.
“It should be.”
Gu Mang nodded and opened his eyes.
“There may be something sinister inside. We’ll split up. Don’t stay together. You go through the front door, and I’ll climb over the wall from the back courtyard and sneak in. Be careful once you’re inside.”
They split up.
Gu Mang crouched low as he made his way onto the roof and soon disappeared behind the eaves.
Mo Xi pushed open the door with a soft creak.
The interior was still the same as when they had taken shelter from the rain before—silks and embroidered fabrics piled everywhere, curtains hanging low.
Only the woman who had greeted them and offered them dry clothes was gone.
The embroidery shop was frighteningly quiet.
Mo Xi slowly walked through the mist-like layers of silk, a concealed weapon case held in his sleeve.
After making a complete circuit, he found nothing hidden on the first floor.
But Mo Xi could not shake the feeling that something was wrong.
Something seemed different from the first time they had come here.
For a moment, he could not remember what it was.
He decided to check the second floor first.
The wooden stairs gave a faint creak beneath his feet.
The light upstairs was extremely dim, but the moment Mo Xi stepped onto the second floor, he noticed something strange—
The smell.
A pungent, bloody odor drifted through the crack beneath a door.
Along with it came the sound of dripping water.
Drip.
Drip.
Mo Xi’s long, slender, pale fingers pressed against the door.
It had not been fully closed.
With a slight push, the door slowly swung open.
At a glance, Mo Xi saw a star-shaped talisman formation drawn in blood across the floor.
A completely black hunting dog lay in the center of the formation.
Its abdomen had been cut open, and its heart, liver, spleen, stomach, and lungs had been removed and placed at the five points of the formation.
The dripping sound came from black dog blood slowly seeping downward.
The dog looked as though it had only just been killed.
And in the corner of the room lay dozens of dried dog corpses.
The leg of the one lying on top still bore an injury…
Was that the black hunting dog Gu Mang had chased after on the rainy night?!
Mo Xi suppressed his nausea and bent down to examine the blood talisman carefully.
The writing twisted into complicated patterns. It was ancient Liao script.
He could recognize some of it, but he could not immediately decipher the hidden meaning.
However, one thing could be confirmed.
It seemed that when he and Gu Mang had encountered Su Qiao in the rain that night, she had indeed been using that hunting dog to perform some kind of evil ritual.
But she had accidentally been bitten on the leg by the black dog and escaped.
That was why she had limped after them into the rain.
Mo Xi searched the other rooms as well.
He found no further abnormalities.
So he went downstairs, intending to meet Gu Mang in the back courtyard.
But as he passed the place where he and Gu Mang had sat and rested that night, his eyes accidentally caught something in one corner of the room.
At first, he paid no attention.
But a moment later, he suddenly remembered something.
His footsteps stopped instantly.
Gu Mang’s words from that night flashed through his mind—
“This Miss Su really is amazing. Her embroidered landscapes and birds look lifelike, but even her figures are beautifully done. Look at that silhouette on the gauze—isn’t it just like a slender young woman?”
He knew what was wrong!!
That night, when they had sat here warming themselves by the fire, they had admired a piece of bright-yellow gauze.
A life-sized silhouette of a woman had been embroidered onto it.
At the time, Gu Mang had even laughed and said:
“Although this woman isn’t embroidered as delicately as the crane beside her, she’s pretty interesting. I just wonder what you could possibly use an embroidery this big for.”
But that embroidery was gone now.
No.
It would be more accurate to say that the embroidery itself had not disappeared.
The bright-yellow gauze was still hanging perfectly intact from the beam.
But the life-sized “woman” was nowhere to be seen.
Because…
What they had seen that night had never been an embroidered woman at all.
There had actually been a real person standing behind the yellow gauze!
Mo Xi’s expression changed drastically.
He abruptly turned and hurried outside.
“Gu Mang—!”
.
At that very moment, in the back courtyard—
Gu Mang was walking back and forth among the dye vats filling the entire courtyard, inspecting them one by one.
The little wooden man sat on his shoulder and shouted,
“Ah! Yes! That’s right! This is the smell! The person who moved me beneath the old peach tree and recited spells over my grave smelled exactly like this!”
It was perfectly normal for Su Qiao to carry the smell of dye.
The scent coming from the dozen or so dye vats was extremely pungent. An embroiderer who worked among them day after day would naturally have the smell seep into her skin and bones.
But Gu Mang was not wandering around here to investigate the smell.
He was searching for something.
He kept turning things over throughout the courtyard, clearly looking for something specific.
“What are you looking for?”
“A person.”
“The Miss Su you were talking about?”
“No. Someone else.”
After saying this, Gu Mang abruptly flipped aside a pile of cloth in a shaded corner of the courtyard.
There were only withered branches and dead leaves underneath.
He turned and began searching beneath other coverings.
There were far too many miscellaneous objects piled up in the back courtyard. Some had rusted from years of exposure.
Every time Gu Mang moved something, copper rust fell everywhere and clouds of dust rose.
But Gu Mang did not seem to care about getting dirty at all.
If anything, the more he searched, the more energetic he became.
Because he had just seen the final—and most crucial—part of Lin Yun’s memories.
Before Lin Yun died, he had once received a letter.
In the letter, Su Qiao did not mention that Lin Yun’s parents had died of illness.
Instead, she wrote in a gentle, warm tone, telling Lin Yun that his parents were doing fine. They missed him terribly, and they were also worried that Miss Bai had remained childless all these years.
His parents were getting old and desperately wanted a grandchild.
They hoped the couple would return to the town for a visit.
“There’s that big tree behind the Earth God Temple—the one you used to climb to pick peaches when you were little. It’s probably been cultivating for several thousand years and become a tree spirit by now. It’s supposed to be very effective for asking for children and blessings. Bring your sister-in-law back and take a look.”
Those were the exact words in the letter.
By the time Lin Yun received it, he and Su Qiao had not been in contact for a very long time.
Lin Yun knew Su Qiao was still angry with him for turning her away from the Bai residence back then.
He had written to explain afterward, but whether the Bai household servants had simply never delivered the letter or Su Qiao could not let go of her anger, the two of them had never seen each other again after that day.
Lin Yun had originally wanted to go home and visit as well.
Unfortunately, Bai Rouxia had always been physically frail.
After her miscarriage, her health had never recovered properly. Her mood was poor, and even taking a walk by the lake could make her sick, let alone traveling a long distance.
And so, one thing led to another, and the trip was delayed.
Then, one day, Lin Yun suddenly received Su Qiao’s letter.
Her tone was calm.
Clearly, Qiao-mei was no longer angry.
Lin Yun was delighted.
He went to his wife’s bedside and told her about it.
At that time, Bai Rouxia was sitting beside the window, reading the family’s master ledger.
The master ledger contained many secrets, so Bai’s eldest brother generally allowed only his own sister to handle it.
When Bai Rouxia was young, she had flipped through the account books without understanding what any of the entries meant. She simply followed whatever her brother told her to do.
But as she grew older and developed opinions of her own, the more she looked at those accounts, the more disgusted she became.
Throughout the ledger were entries such as:
“Evil qi and plague-related disturbances increasing. Evil-dispelling bells in short supply. Raise the price of Yellow-Sky Copper and Soul-Returning Grass.”
“The Yue residence recently requires a large quantity of Snowflame Wood for ornamental use. This is the primary material for the ‘Peaceful Guardian Pillar.’ The Yue residence must not be offended. Immediately raise the price of the Peaceful Guardian Pillar. Turn away low-paying customers.”
Bai Rouxia had always been kindhearted.
After losing her child, seeing these cold and ruthless words covering page after page only made her conscience weigh more heavily upon her.
The fact that she had remained bedridden and ill for so many years was, to a large extent, because she could never resolve the knot in her heart.
The Bai family has done so many wrong things. We were born from the same roots as ordinary people, yet we exploit their suffering to charge exorbitant prices.
I lost my child and have been sick for so long. Perhaps this is Heaven punishing me.
Lin Yun brought Su Qiao’s letter to her and showed it to her.
After reading it, she sighed.
“It’s wonderful that Qiao-mei doesn’t blame us anymore. Then let’s go back to Liansheng Town and visit Father and Mother. How many years has it been since you last went home?”
“Go pack your things. Don’t bring anything unnecessary. Take more of the herbs the Jiang Alchemist gave us from the storehouse. The Benevolent Hall in town can use them.”
“But your brother absolutely won’t agree…”
“Just tell him we’re going to Liansheng Town to pray for a child and do some good deeds, so that we can build up some merit.”
Bai Rouxia closed the ledger.
“Also, whatever treasures and magical artifacts we take, record all of them at market price. We’ll pay for everything ourselves. That way, even if he’s unhappy, he won’t have anything more to say.”
Lin Yun agreed and then awkwardly thanked Bai Rouxia again.
Before the small lattice window, Bai Rouxia wore a goose-yellow outer robe and her hair in a young wife’s coiffure.
Her expression was solemn.
Only when she smiled could one still see traces of the carefree young heiress she had once been.
“Why are you thanking me? Look at the pearls and jade I wear, the silk and brocade on my body. Which of them wasn’t squeezed out of someone else by the Bai family?”
She sighed softly.
“My voice carries little weight, and I don’t have the ability to change my brother’s heart. But I’m not at peace with this…”
“Brother Lin, I’m suffering.”
Lin Yun awkwardly had no idea how to comfort her.
“It’s all right. You… you’re a good person. We’ll go to the temple and pray, and you’ll have another child.”
Bai Rouxia smiled and shook her head.
“That’s not what I’m talking about. Besides, you can’t force something like this. Compared with praying for a child, I actually want to talk to Qiao-mei more.”
“You’re such a simple-minded person. You don’t understand how hard she’s worked all these years.”
“I understand…”
“You only understand a tiny little bit.”
Bai Rouxia held out her fair hand and showed him a gap no wider than her fingernail.
“She and I are both women. She was born into poverty, yet she has done so much more good than I have. That tiny body of hers contains ambitions that a person like my brother has never possessed.”
“Those ambitions are simply so grand that she’s afraid people will laugh at her, so she never talks about them.”
“Qiao-mei has ambitions? What are they?”
Bai Rouxia shook her head and did not answer.
“I haven’t seen her many times, but I can tell that she has great ambitions, a heavy heart, and a lot of pride.”
“Every time she asks me for something, I can actually see how embarrassed she is. She always pretends not to care, but she doesn’t even dare look at me.”
“She’s afraid I’ll get angry. She’s afraid I’ll think she’s asking for too much. She’s afraid we’ll drive her away.”
Lin Yun murmured,
“So that’s how it was…”
“Mm.”
“And then you really did drive her away. You basically confirmed the fear she had carried inside her heart.”
“She didn’t understand what kind of person I was. She only thought that after you came to the Bai family, I had influenced you and made your heart harder and harder, until finally you abandoned her and her parents as though they were worthless.”
“That’s why she resented you and me for all these years.”
“But… but I wrote her a letter explaining everything…”
Bai Rouxia smiled bitterly.
“You really did grow up with her, didn’t you?”
“Don’t you know how proud she is?”
“Do you really think that before her anger had faded, she would be willing to read a letter from you? That she would be willing to see you?”
“…”
“Now she’s finally sent us a letter.”
“So tell her thank you for the fertility remedy she recommended. We’ll set a date soon and go back to Liansheng Town to visit her and Father and Mother.”
And so it was decided.
They packed spiritual medicines into seven or eight Qiankun brocade pouches, chose an auspicious day, and returned to Liansheng Town.
Su Qiao acted as though nothing had ever happened.
She welcomed them with a bright smile.
That night, the married couple walked straight into a trap she had spent several years carefully preparing.
Su Qiao prepared a table full of fine food and wine.
She lied that their parents had gone into town to buy meat, then coaxed the two of them into drinking a cup of poisoned wine each…
Lin Yun’s memory ended there.
The last thing he remembered was the agonizing pain in his abdomen, Bai Rouxia collapsed over the table, and Su Qiao’s blurred face beneath the candlelight.
Tenderness.
Hatred.
Pain.
Satisfaction.
All of it surged across that beautiful, delicate face at that moment.
“Little Lin, Sister-in-law, what’s wrong?”
She asked tentatively.
Her voice was eerie and chilling, with a faint tremor.
“Can you hear me?”
Until the moment Lin Yun died, he still had not fully understood what had happened.
In this final fragment of memory, there was confusion, bewilderment, fear, and incomprehension.
But there was one thing missing—
Suspicion toward Su Qiao.
He had even wanted to foolishly remind her:
It’s nothing. The wine just seems to have gone bad. It feels terrible after drinking it.
Qiao-mei, whatever you do, don’t drink it.
You and Father and Mother shouldn’t be so frugal. Why are you still keeping spoiled wine around…
But those words became nothing more than a blood-choked gurgle caught in his throat.
Everything ended.
“I found it!”
After searching countless places and trying several different spirit-sensing artifacts, Gu Mang suddenly shouted.
The Black Magic Compass in his hand was spinning wildly.
A beam of red light shot toward one of the dye vats in the courtyard.
Gu Mang hurried over and leaned over the vat to look inside.
The dye inside was cloudy and oily, its color bizarre.
Its contents were even harder to make out.
Gu Mang stared for a long while.
All he could see was his own dusty, disheveled reflection.
He was just about to find a pole and poke around inside when suddenly—
He felt an icy hand settle onto his shoulder.
“…”
Gu Mang stood perfectly still.
After a moment, he saw another face slowly appear behind him in his reflection.
A woman’s face.
Deathly pale.
She leaned out from behind him and looked into the vat with him.
Their eyes met in the reflection.
Bai Rouxia!!!
Gu Mang felt ice run through his entire body.
He recognized that face instantly.
It was the same face that had appeared in Lin Yun’s memories!
He abruptly spun around and summoned his thin curved saber, slashing toward the seemingly half-dead Bai Rouxia.
But the woman was faster than he had expected.
She suddenly opened her mouth.
A massive cloud of black smoke spewed from inside.
Gu Mang quickly ducked beneath it, keeping his saber raised protectively across his chest.
Normally, there was no flaw in this defense.
Unless Bai Rouxia could somehow grow another hand behind him—
Wait.
Behind him!
Gu Mang tensed.
He realized what was happening almost instantly.
But even that flash of insight was too late.
Behind him, something suddenly burst out of the dye vat with a great splash.
It was cold and slick as a snake.
It wrapped around his neck and yanked him backward, dragging him headfirst into the dye vat.
Water exploded everywhere!
As Gu Mang choked and coughed, he saw the cold-faced Bai Rouxia standing before the vat.
Then he turned his head.
And what he saw behind him was even more horrifying—
The monster that had wrapped itself around him and dragged him into the dye vat for a little lovers’ bath…
Had a face exactly identical to Bai Rouxia’s!!!