Chapter 557: A Few Things Before Zhenwu Mountain

“Name?”

“fang ji… I guess.”

“Age?”

“Twenty… if the ID card is correct.”

“Gender?”

“Male… that I’m sure of, I checked when I went to the bathroom,” fang ji emphasized, as this wasn’t the first time he’d been misunderstood.

“Hmm?”

The police officer looked up at the tall, slender guy sitting across from him, shoulder-length hair, skin as white as snow, a hint of seduction at the corners of his eyes, a touch of red on his lips, his expression shy yet wanting to speak. The officer checked his ID again and again, eyes wide.

You’re telling me this is a guy?

The police officer took a few deep breaths to calm himself, steadied his mind, and said, “Alright, fang ji, can you remember what happened before the car accident?”

fang ji shook his head. “I can’t remember. I was sleeping, then suddenly I heard someone shouting, ‘We’re going to crash, we’re going to crash,’ and then everything spun around.

“When I came to, everyone in the car was injured. I was just sitting by the roadside, called the police and emergency services, and then I was brought here.”

The police officer stared at fang ji for a few seconds, then smiled, stood up, and said, “fang ji, uh… guy, thank you for your cooperation. That’s all for now. Let me walk you out?”

“Alright, thank you.” fang ji replied, getting up and following the police officer out of the room.

As they walked through the corridor, he caught a glimpse of a girl in the next room out of the corner of his eye, frowned slightly, and asked the police officer, “Can I wait for her to come out and leave together?”

The police officer was stunned. “You two know each other?”

fang ji shook his head. “No, but she’s going the same way as me.”

Anyway, that’s what his intuition told him.

That girl could take him where he wanted to go.

“Alright, but you can’t wait here. Go wait in the lobby!”

fang ji nodded and followed the police officer through the corridor, his ears filled with noise.

“Damn! Coffee, you spilled your coffee on my keyboard!”

“Who turned off my computer last night? I didn’t save my file! I worked on it till midnight!”

“Damn it, Old Zhang, my wife just called and said she wants a divorce, says she can’t stand me never being home anymore! What am I supposed to do!”

Looks like every traffic police station is this noisy… fang ji thought, shaking his head.

All the way here, this wasn’t his first traffic accident, but luckily, he hadn’t been hurt any time.

——–

When Lu Yibei realized Hu Chuan might be somewhere in Shizhou City, he was briefly excited, but soon found himself troubled.

Shizhou City’s official population was nearly four million, probably more in reality. Because of the Great Pure Palace, the number of hauntings nearby could be ignored for now, but even so, finding one undocumented person among over four million was no easy task.

Asking the haunting chat group probably wouldn’t help much either, unless he could pay a reward tempting enough.

Those guys were reliable, but never worked for free.

If investigating the whereabouts of an ordinary person in Hua City was a free service, then investigating a psychic or a haunting was a premium service, and in a city with the Great Pure Palace, investigating a psychic’s whereabouts was an extra-charge, pay-per-view project.

Besides, if those guys could have found out where Hu Chuan was in Shizhou City, they would have already done so, then when reporting back, they’d tease a bit of “pay-per-view” content to hook Lu Yibei’s curiosity, then suddenly cut off and start talking about payment.

Just like those cliffhanger trolls–so annoying!

What about asking the local Midnight Watchers Society?

Lu Yibei thought, glancing at Huá Sāng, who was spacing out beside him, and asked, “Um… do you know where the Midnight Watchers Society is in Shizhou City?”

Since the haunting chat group couldn’t investigate in Shizhou City, he could at least ask the local big shots, right?

The Haze Deity and Zhang Shuo, whom Hu Chuan had encountered, were both on the Midnight Watchers Society’s Wanted List. He was suspected of using psychic ability to harm ordinary people, which was enough for the Society to investigate him.

Though letting him fall into the Society’s hands would make things harder later, it was better than not finding him at all.

Huá Sāng glanced at Lu Yibei out of the corner of her eye and said flatly, “There’s no Midnight Watchers Society in Shizhou City.”

“Huh? There isn’t?” Lu Yibei frowned slightly.

Seeing Lu Yibei’s confusion, Huá Sāng explained, “The Midnight Watchers Society in Shizhou City is handled by Zhen Ting Hall of the Great Pure Palace. Haunting incidents are also handled in turn by disciples who need to go down the mountain for training.”

Hearing this, Lu Yibei suddenly understood. He’d seen the name on the map the Ancestors gave him–Zhen Ting Hall was where disciples of the Great Pure Palace practiced swordsmanship, spell formation, body technique, and other skills.

It was like the special task force guys’ gym.

Letting Zhen Ting Hall handle Shizhou City’s haunting incidents basically meant giving those hauntings and Illegal psychics to the disciples as training equipment.

Lu Yibei could almost imagine the scene: several capable disciples of the Great Pure Palace, finally catching an unlucky haunting that had broken the rules, lining up to take turns “milking” the haunting.

Thinking about it this way, the survival environment for hauntings around Shizhou City was truly rather harsh.

Seeing that Lu Yibei hadn’t spoken for a long time after hearing her answer, looking thoughtful, Huá Sāng sized him up and asked in confusion, “Why are you looking for the Shizhou City Midnight Watchers Society?”

Ever since she noticed last time that Lu Yibei hadn’t been affected by the black night corruption from her Spirit Pattern going out of control, she’d been quite curious about this Hua City Midnight Watchers Society reserve operator.

Of course, this level of curiosity wasn’t enough for her to go out of her way to actively investigate Lu Yibei.

However, seeing him now seeking out the Shizhou City Midnight Watchers Society, as if he had some business, she couldn’t help but ask another question.

“It’s nothing much, I’m just interested in where the Midnight Watchers Society is located in different places.” Lu Yibei curled his lips and said, “Look, the Hua City Midnight Watchers Society is in an ancestral hall, the Tang City Midnight Watchers Society is on the top floor of a museum, and Shizhou City is in the Great Pure Palace…”

“For all you know, there could be one in a high school dorm, a small bar by the street, or a public restroom. Isn’t the difference in style quite interesting?”

Lu Yibei still planned to first investigate Hu Chuan’s whereabouts on his own.

Before obtaining the fragments and Visualized Diagram of the Pure Lotus Sword, having too much contact with the disciples of the Great Pure Palace and attracting too much attention might not be a good thing.

If possible, he wanted to be invisible for a while during this period.

Find clues to the Pure Lotus Sword fragments, obtain the fragments as safely as possible, investigate Hu Chuan’s whereabouts, and swipe a few Visualized Diagrams and psychic artifact blueprints… Lu Yibei silently ranked the things he needed to do this trip in his heart by importance.

That’s it? Huá Sāng tilted her head, didn’t ask further, glanced at the time on the nearby LED screen out of the corner of her eye, then changed the subject, “Alright, if there’s nothing else, please don’t talk to me before we reach our destination.”

“I’m a plane sleeper.”

“What the heck is that? Some kind of dark cuisine like the Stargazer Faction?” Lu Yibei asked, puzzled.

“It’s the faction that falls asleep as soon as they get on a plane,” Huá Sāng said flatly.

As she spoke, she bent down and took out slippers, an eye mask, noise-canceling headphones, a U-shaped neck pillow, and a soft rubber stress ball from her suitcase–fully equipped.

“…” Lu Yibei pondered for two seconds, then said seriously, “In that case, I’m actually a plane gossip faction, meaning as soon as I get on a plane, I can’t help but want to gossip with people.”

Huá Sāng, “???” Can’t he tell at all that I find him annoying?

Lu Yibei, “…” Of course I can tell she finds me annoying, but if she’s not annoyed, the one who’s bothered is me!

Honestly, he was quite interested in Huá Sāng too. He really wanted to know why Huá Sāng’s voice came out of the Ancestors’ mouth–maybe that could be a breakthrough in finding the Pure Lotus Sword fragments.

Now that there was no progress in searching for Hu Chuan, he might as well shift his attention to finding the Pure Lotus Sword fragments for now.

However, if he asked her directly about such things, it would definitely arouse suspicion.

But if he mixed the questions he wanted to ask into idle gossip, asking one question for every ten, fifty, or even a hundred bits of gossip, it wouldn’t be so easily noticed.

As for tossing out some trash talk, wasn’t that a piece of cake for Lu Yibei?

So, from boarding the plane to transferring to the bus and heading to the Great Pure Palace, Huá Sāng didn’t manage to close her eyes for even a second, but at the same time, she didn’t answer a single one of Lu Yibei’s questions.

The two supporters of the plane sleeper and plane gossip factions–one kept whispering incessantly in the other’s ear like a devil’s murmur until his mouth was dry, while the other wore an eye mask and headphones, silent as the dead, nearly squeezing the stress ball to pieces.

One maxed out on offense, the other on defense–a true match of equals, torturing each other.

——–

A little after three in the afternoon, near Zhenwu Mountain.

A bus was traveling along the mountain road, weaving through lush greenery and tree canopies that blocked out the sky.

As the vehicle moved forward, the scenery of Zhenwu Mountain slowly unfolded before their eyes, like an ink painting by a master artist.

Looking up into the distance, several peaks of various shapes rose straight into the sky, one after another, ridge after ridge, undulating and stretching on. Some were rugged and imposing, awe-inspiring in their grandeur; others were graceful and picturesque, as if painted. The majestic ones coiled like dragons and snakes across the heavens, while the elegant ones descended like jade maidens to the mortal world.

Amidst the greenery, one could vaguely see buildings scattered among the mountains–stone steps winding up the slopes like a dragon’s spine, ancient structures with blue bricks, white walls, flying eaves, and ornate brackets, or even a massive platform that looked as if it had been sliced out by a single sword.

It was already afternoon, yet the two deepest peaks were still shrouded in mist. A long iron chain suspension bridge connected the mountains, looming in and out of the clouds, swaying in the wind–enough to make anyone with a fear of heights shake their head.

“……”

In a place like this, if you said no immortals lived here, nobody would believe it.

I wonder if the Ancestors’ illegally built, incense-mooching shabby temple is still around.

If I ever get the chance, I really want to see what kind of place could nurture a freak like the Ancestors… uh, such a strangely lovable person.

Lu Yibei was eagerly gazing out the window, his mind wandering.

From Hua City to the area around Zhenwu Mountain, there were no bizarre psychics dropping from the sky, no Miracle Order members launching terrorist attacks with dangerous weapons, not even a single greedy merchant trying to scam him, nor anyone striking up a conversation. The whole journey was so quiet, even he felt it was a bit much.

Lu Yibei could only split his attention to control the Paper Cicada Immortal, while mentally filling in the blanks along the way, just in case he couldn’t restrain himself and ended up making some big news.

Just then, Huá Sāng’s voice drifted over softly.

“Stop looking. What you can see now, aside from a corner of Zhen Ting Hall, is all the front mountain, just a scenic area.” Huá Sāng spoke quietly, so only the two of them could hear.

Lu Yibei paused, turned to look, and saw Huá Sāng’s disdainful gaze.

That look seemed to say, “How could there possibly be immortals in this world? You have to believe in science, silly child!”

But you clearly know ‘spells’… Lu Yibei grumbled inwardly.

However, maybe it was just his imagination, but through Huá Sāng’s messy hair, looking into her eyes, Lu Yibei suddenly noticed her gaze was much clearer, as if a stagnant, lifeless swamp had turned into a bubbling spring.

It was like a thousand-year corpse king suddenly revived by a high-level resurrection spell, bursting with vitality–quite surprising.

But then Lu Yibei thought it over and understood her change.

Because she was almost “home”!

Her change was like some socially anxious people who avoid too much contact outside, but once they’re home, they let loose and become themselves.

“See that iron chain bridge? Once you cross it, you’ll reach Zhen Ting Hall. From there on, it’s the back mountain, which isn’t open to the public. There are solidified spell formations set up, and without a Great Pure Palace disciple leading you, you can’t get through.”

Hearing this, Lu Yibei frowned slightly.

Damn, this doesn’t match what the Ancestors told me!

According to Qing Ji’s map, the front mountain Huá Sāng mentioned did have a lot of buildings, mostly small Daoist temples mooching incense.

But following the wide stone steps at the foot of the mountain up to the peak linked by the iron chain bridge to Zhen Ting Hall, that was already considered entering the Great Pure Palace’s territory.

Yet now Huá Sāng said only the other end of the iron chain bridge was the Great Pure Palace’s domain…

Looks like in the past hundred years, the layout of the Great Pure Palace has changed a lot. The Ancestors’ map probably isn’t reliable anymore!

“Why does your Great Pure Palace act like Taoyuan, running a scenic area? When I searched for pictures online, I clearly saw lots of people in Daoist robes coming and going on the mountain.” Lu Yibei looked at Huá Sāng and asked.

Huá Sāng rolled her eyes at Lu Yibei, “Don’t Great Pure Palace disciples need to eat? Of course they have to make money. All those pictures you found online are of staff hired for eight thousand a month.”

“Do they get social insurance and a housing fund? Is it five days on, one day off? Do they organize trips mid-year?”

If the benefits are good enough, maybe it’s worth considering a job switch from The Midnight Watchers Society. Lu Yibei thought.

“They have all that! But don’t even think about it–you need to be a graduate from a relevant field at least. If it were that easy to work at the front mountain, it wouldn’t be your turn.” Huá Sāng said with a pout.

Lu Yibei immediately caught her subtext–she knew the benefits were good, she wanted to go too, but couldn’t.

Damn, even being a Daoist is competitive now?

But…

Lu Yibei thought, looking at Huá Sāng, “Are you not tired anymore? If you’re not, let’s gossip a bit?”

Finally caught you talking, how could I let you off so easily?

Hearing this, Huá Sāng remembered the torment along the way, her mouth twitching as she silently put on her eye mask and turned away.

“Come on, don’t be shy! Besides you and Fu Xinyi, how many disciples does your Shifu have? I see you and Fu Xinyi are pretty impressive… Is your branch in the Great Pure Palace especially outstanding, like the honors class in a top high school?”

Huá Sāng, “……”

I really shouldn’t have talked to him.

Once we get up the mountain, I’ll immediately hand him over to the junior disciples for hospitality…

Inside the Zhenwu Mountain Scenic Area, at Xuanwu Terrace.

This place used to be the training ground for disciples of the Great Pure Palace, but now it’s the largest viewing platform in the scenic area. Tourists can take the sightseeing cable car or climb thousands of stone steps to get here, where they can watch the spectacular sight of the Zhenwu Mountain waterfalls cascading down the mountainside like silver ribbons, from the closest distance.

All around Xuanwu Terrace are many souvenir shops and vegetarian restaurants. Some locals living nearby often bring their homegrown melons and fruits, or homemade cold drinks and handicrafts to sell here.

At this moment, in one corner of Xuanwu Terrace, an elderly man dressed in coarse cloth and wearing a woven straw hat sat on his own small folding stool, eyes half-closed as if dozing off.

In front of him was a plastic sheet spread out, displaying a dozen or so plump watermelons. Beside him was a large bucket filled with cool well water, with two or three chilled watermelons floating inside. Next to it was a piece of cardboard with the words [Regular melon 2.5 yuan, Chilled melon 3 yuan] written on it.

At first glance, he looked just like an old farmer from some nearby village selling his melons.

A short while later.

A middle-aged man in a dark blue Daoist robe with a long beard walked over quickly, squatted in front of the old farmer, and lowered his voice, “Shifu, a disciple just reported that Huá Sāng has already reached the foot of the mountain, and that young man is with her.”

Yes, the old farmer was none other than the Headmaster of the Great Pure Palace, The Midnight Watchers Society guardian [Dark Emperor], Zhang Huainan.

As the saying goes, a thousand faces for a thousand people. Sitting here on Xuanwu Terrace, watching the endless stream of tourists, was not only his hobby, but also a part of his cultivation of the heart.

For psychics, Spirit Patterns not only grant power, but also carry risks. For catastrophe-class psychics, these risks are even greater.

Sitting among the crowd, constantly reminding himself that he is one of them, was one of Zhang Huainan’s secrets to keeping his Spirit Pattern under control all these years.

“Hm?” After hearing the man’s words, Zhang Huainan opened his eyes a little and said with a start, “Why am I only being told now that they’re at the foot of the mountain? Didn’t I have Fu Xinyi go to the airport to pick them up?”

“She did, but she…” The middle-aged man opened his mouth, just about to explain, when suddenly a discordant voice cut in.

“Uncle, are your melons guaranteed to be ripe?”

He shot a glare out of the corner of his eye at the young man who had appeared behind him at some point, shuffled forward, leaned closer to Zhang Huainan, and was about to say something when that discordant voice sounded again.

“Uncle, I’m asking you, are your melons guaranteed to be ripe?”

Zhang Huainan waved his hand, signaling the middle-aged man to stay calm, then smiled at the young man and said, “I guarantee every single one is a good melon. If it’s not ripe, not only will I pay you two hundred yuan, I’ll even eat the unripe melon in front of you. How’s that?”

“You said it yourself!” The young man nodded. “Alright, pick one for me! I want one of those chilled ones.”

“Alright!” Zhang Huainan replied, deftly scooping a melon from the bucket and patting it onto the scale beside him.

“Three jin and one liang, just give me nine yuan. Want me to cut it open for you?”

“Yes, please cut it for me! Sorry to trouble you.” The young man replied, then scanned the QR code to pay.

After receiving the money, Zhang Huainan picked up the melon from the scale with one hand, took a fruit knife in the other, and with a few swift strokes, left a dozen or so faint lines on the melon. Then, with a gentle tap, the melon split open, each piece almost exactly the same size.

“Uncle, you’ve got some skills! But, are all the people on your mountain like you?” the young man clapped and said.

“Like me? Haha, that’s just from cutting melons so many times, I’m just practiced, nothing mystical about it.” Zhang Huainan laughed heartily. “Young man, you’re still young, you should believe in science!”

“No, what I mean is, are all the people on your mountain as good at tricking tourists as you? You just said the melon was guaranteed to be ripe–look for yourself.” The young man pointed at the melon.

Following his finger, Zhang Huainan saw the flesh of the melon, fading from red to white from the outside in, and the corner of his mouth twitched slightly.

“You said it was guaranteed to be ripe. What if it’s not?” the young man asked expressionlessly, waving his phone. “I recorded you just now, don’t try to weasel out of it, or I’ll call the police!”

“This…” Zhang Huainan was momentarily speechless.

This is the Great Pure Palace, after all. He was just out here selling melons and people-watching, he didn’t even bring any money.

Besides, these melons were being sold on behalf of Old Liu from down the mountain–he was a victim too.

After a few seconds of silence, he suddenly turned to the middle-aged man beside him, giving him a look. “Quick, give him two hundred.”

“I… I left in a hurry, didn’t bring my phone, didn’t bring any money…” The middle-aged man’s face was full of bitterness.

Zhang Huainan glared at him fiercely, then turned back to the young man and smiled, “Young man, how about this: we’ll go get the money and come back to give it to you in a bit.”

The young man narrowed his eyes, sizing up the old man and the middle-aged man. “What if you two run off?”

Young people these days! So suspicious… Zhang Huainan thought to himself, forcing a smile. “We won’t run. My stall is still here, isn’t it?”

The young man pondered expressionlessly for a few seconds, then nodded. “Alright, but you’d better hurry back!”

A moment later, in front of Zhen Ting Hall, on the iron chain bridge.

Zhang Huainan and the middle-aged man walked quickly together, occasionally exchanging words in low voices.

“Hurry up. When we get to Zhen Ting Hall, go grab any disciple, ask him for two hundred, then take it over to that young man from earlier.”

“Why me?” The middle-aged man frowned. Asking disciples for money–something about it just felt off.

Zhang Huainan glared at the middle-aged man. “If you don’t go, do you expect your Shifu to go?”

“…” The middle-aged man opened his mouth, wanting to say something but stopping himself.

“By the way, you just mentioned that girl Fu Xinyi–what happened to her?” Zhang Huainan pressed.

He’d just heard from his own disciple that Fu Xinyi had an accident on her way to pick up Huá Sāng and Lu Yibei. He’d quickly cast a divination, and from the hexagram, Fu Xinyi’s luck today looked good–there shouldn’t have been any Calamity.

The middle-aged man frowned slightly. “I heard from Qingxiazi that Fu Xinyi got into a car accident.”

“Oh? The girl’s all right, isn’t she?” Zhang Huainan asked.

“She’s fine, but the bus that crashed into her went straight into the mountain wall. Out of everyone on board, only one person wasn’t injured,” the middle-aged man said.

Zhang Huainan opened his mouth, about to say something, when suddenly a rush of footsteps sounded ahead.

Looking toward the sound, they saw a woman in a light blue Daoist robe hurrying over. Her hair was done up in a high bun, adorned with a wooden crane hairpin. She had a dignified face, with a tear-shaped mole on her cheek.

Seeing Zhang Huainan and the middle-aged man, she gave a slight bow. “Greetings, Headmaster. Greetings, Senior Brother Lingjizi.”

“Qingxiazi, what’s got you rushing off to the front mountain in such a hurry?” Zhang Huainan asked with a smile.

Qingxiazi frowned, hesitated several times before finally speaking. “Headmaster, the boy who came back with Huá Sāng has gone missing.”

“Hm? How did he go missing?” The smile on Zhang Huainan’s face froze.

“Well… Huá Sāng left the boy at the foot of the mountain, told him to wait there for her senior brother to pick him up. But when her senior brother arrived, the boy was already gone,” Qingxiazi explained.

Zhang Huainan, “…”

He could understand Huá Sāng leaving Lu Yibei at the foot of the mountain–after all, not everyone could endure that kind of torment.

If he had the chance, he’d like to pull something similar on Qing Ji himself.

“Have you searched for him?” Lingjizi asked. “Maybe he’s just wandering nearby?”

“We’ve searched. He’s not around.” As she spoke, Qingxiazi pulled out her phone. “Look, here’s a photo of the boy. I was just about to head to the scenic area to check the surveillance cameras!”

Zhang Huainan and Lingjizi leaned in to look at the photo, and the corners of their mouths twitched in unison.

The boy in the photo had delicate features, a blank expression, and eyes that seemed to say the whole world owed him two hundred yuan. Who else could it be but the watermelon-buying youth from Xuanwu Terrace earlier?

“Shifu, look at this…” Lingjizi probed.

“…” Zhang Huainan took a deep breath and said lightly, “You take the money to him later. I won’t go. I just had a sudden premonition–I need to return to the back mountain and enter seclusion immediately.”

“Shifu, isn’t that a bit much?”

“Hmph, you think it’s just about two hundred yuan? If only it were that simple.” Zhang Huainan snorted coldly, then turned and strode off along the iron chain bridge without looking back.

Those with the surname Lu–I know them all too well.

That kid probably knew I was selling watermelons at Xuanwu Terrace and came looking for trouble on purpose.

Too cunning, just like his ancestors–every word and action is a trap! Zhang Huainan thought.

————

After slicing five watermelons in a row, all of them unripe, Lu Yibei felt that the people of Zhenwu Mountain really weren’t all that honest.

Never mind that Huá Sāng told him to wait at the foot of the mountain for someone to pick him up and no one came for ages. Just the fact that, in this hot weather, he wanted to buy a watermelon to quench his thirst and ended up in this mess was enough.

He’d trusted that old man at first–after all, the old guy looked so kind and amiable.

But Lu Yibei hadn’t expected the old man to betray his trust, leave with the middle-aged man, and never come back.

He waited for over an hour and still saw no sign of them.

“They just abandoned the watermelon stall and ran? It’s only a ten-yuan melon, is that necessary? What about trust between people?”

Lu Yibei grumbled inwardly, picked up the fruit knife, and cut open a watermelon.

With a swift motion–“puchi!”–he saw the familiar gradient-colored flesh.

Lu Yibei froze for a moment, then picked up another melon, sliced it open, then another, and another–the result was the same every time.

Lu Yibei, “???”

Well, looks like he’s a repeat offender?

No wonder he ran so fast after I mentioned calling the police!

Thinking of this, Lu Yibei pulled out his phone and hurriedly paid for three more watermelons.

Although it felt a bit like being scammed out of five hundred online and then transferring another fifteen hundred to make it easier to file a report–a bit dumb–but at this point, it wasn’t just about two hundred, uh…

“Two, four, six, eight, eight hundred… tsk!”

This isn’t just about eight hundred yuan anymore. I mainly want to see how that old man is going to finish off these four unripe melons.

Yeah, he has to eat them all in front of me–no help from anyone else!

Old swindler, just you wait. I’m staying here for a few more days. I’ll come by every day to watch. Don’t let me catch you!

Lu Yibei was fuming when suddenly, a somewhat familiar voice called out from not far away.

“Lu Yibei? Junior Brother Lu!”

Following the voice, Lu Yibei looked over and saw Fu Xinyi standing on tiptoe, waving at him from the crowd. She quickly led a young girl over to him.

The girl was strikingly beautiful; Lu Yibei actually noticed her before he saw Fu Xinyi.

To put it bluntly, the girl’s beauty was second only to Meow Meow-chan, and her boldness far surpassed Meow Meow-chan’s.

So pitiful–her clothes were clinging to her body.

Fu Xinyi came up to the melon stand, her expression excited as she asked, “Lu Yibei, why are you here helping Old Liu watch the stall? Where’s my senior sister?”

So that old man from before was surnamed Liu? Lu Yibei grumbled inwardly, raised an eyebrow, glanced at the sliced watermelon beside him, and said irritably, “I got scammed. I cut open a few melons, and they were all unripe.”

“When I bought them, he promised they were ripe, and if any were unripe, he’d pay me two hundred for each. But when I actually cut open an unripe one, he made excuses about having no money and needing to fetch it, then disappeared without a trace.”

As he spoke, Lu Yibei glanced at the girl beside Fu Xinyi, and their eyes met by chance.

The girl looked at him, as if wanting to speak but hesitating, her gaze rippling like water, emotions seemingly stirred.

The moment their eyes met, Lu Yibei suddenly felt the psychic energy in his body stir, and then, as if it were an illusion, something inside him seemed to be drawn out by the girl’s eyes.

He really felt that the girl’s eyes had drawn something out of him, but the sensation wasn’t unpleasant.

How to put it… it even felt like a sudden burst of clarity and refreshment? Maybe this was the legendary principle that looking at beautiful girls could prolong your life? Lu Yibei thought.

“How could that be? Old Liu’s melons are always good. Maybe it was just a fluke?” Fu Xinyi said doubtfully, interrupting Lu Yibei’s thoughts.

“I’ve cut five already, and you still call it a fluke? That’s way too high a probability for an accident, isn’t it?” Lu Yibei retorted, picking up another melon. With a swift motion, he cut it open–and froze.

He had meant to prove to Fu Xinyi with action that there wasn’t a single good melon at this stall, but this time, the melon he split open was surprisingly perfect.

The rind was paper-thin, the flesh bright red, plump, and juicy. As the knife went through, juice splattered everywhere.

Fu Xinyi looked at Lu Yibei, then at the melon, tilting her head in confusion.

“That can’t be right! Let me cut another one!” Lu Yibei said, carefully picking a melon with a pale, scarred rind, and sliced it open.

This time, not only was the rind thin and the flesh excellent, but there wasn’t a single seed to be seen. At first glance, it looked like the cross-section of a ruby.

This was definitely a top-quality melon!

Lu Yibei, “……”

I’m freaking dumbfounded!

This is way too much of a coincidence. At this level, it’s practically a haunting incident!

Lu Yibei was staring at the bright red melon flesh, completely baffled, when a sudden cry from afar interrupted his thoughts.

“Car, car!”

“Get out of the way, everyone move!”

Looking over, he saw a runaway sightseeing electric car, accompanied by shouts, charging straight toward the melon stand.

Seeing this, Lu Yibei instinctively thought the runaway car was coming for him. He hurriedly jumped up from his small stool and leaped back.

This was the instinct of a lifelong unlucky guy and survivalist when faced with danger.

Before Lu Yibei could react further, he heard a dull thud.

With a “thud,” the beautiful girl beside Fu Xinyi was sent flying, tracing a parabola through the air.

The girl landed on the ground, startling the nearby sightseeing horses. The horses neighed and stampeded, trampling her as they passed.

In the chaos, one frightened horse even kicked over a stall selling boiled peanuts and fried tofu. Boiling water and hot oil, along with scalding peanuts and half-cooked tofu, splashed out, drenching the girl.

It all happened in a flash. By the time Lu Yibei and Fu Xinyi came to their senses, the girl was already lying face-down on the ground, covered in hoofprints, peanuts, and tofu cubes, her body twitching slightly, unable to move.

And in this brief chaos, aside from the girl, not a single person was injured, as if she had absorbed all the harm for everyone.

“Hiss–your friend…” Lu Yibei sucked in a breath and said, “Is she… dead?”

“……” Fu Xinyi was silent for two seconds, then said, “She should be fine, right? On Zhenwu Mountain, as long as there’s still a breath left, she can be saved.”

“Should we go check on her?”

“Mm…”