Chapter 591: Let’s Have a Proper Talk

At 2:35 a.m., Room 306 of Chenyi Inn.

Huá Sāng, lying in bed and fast asleep, tossed and turned restlessly. She was having a strange dream.

The dream was pitch black. Formless tentacles surrounded her, pulling, contracting, enveloping, layer upon layer, gradually steering her soul off course.

In a daze, she felt as if she were transforming into a water cup, a book, a cellphone, all sorts of objects, held by a pair of invisible hands, moved here, then there, drifting with the current, utterly helpless.

Murmurs echoed in her ears, like people whispering, drawing closer, the words gradually becoming clearer.

“He knows all secrets, for He peers…”

The whispers stirred Huá Sāng’s consciousness. She didn’t understand the meaning, yet felt a nameless terror, causing her Spirit Pattern to stir uneasily in response.

The Turtle and Serpent, for once, formed a united front, unleashing deafening roars together.

Thus, in the pitch-black dreamscape, lightning and thunder suddenly clashed, rain pouring down in torrents.

Yet the roars and the booming thunder and rain could not mask that bizarre, abnormal whispering at all.

It was like a specter, clinging to her like a shadow.

“…He peers, from the wind, from the water, from every molecule. Nothing can be concealed, nothing can be veiled, nowhere to hide…”

The whispering continued unceasingly. The roars of the Turtle and Serpent grew progressively louder, reaching unbearable levels.

Finally, Huá Sāng jolted awake from the dream.

She opened her eyes, looking at the somewhat unfamiliar ceiling, gasping heavily, drenched in sweat.

The next moment, something intruded into the range of her psychic sense. A powerful sense of crisis shot through her mind like an electric current, violently stimulating her nerves.

Her muscles tensed instantly. She launched herself off the bed with a kip-up, gripping her ferule in one hand, holding it before her protectively, her eyes warily scanning her surroundings.

The room’s light was off. Shrouded in darkness, the wardrobe, wooden table, air conditioner, television… everything was reduced to shadowy silhouettes.

Huá Sāng felt hidden within these silhouettes were people or hauntings, and more than one.

She sensed it!

She sensed countless deep eyes in the darkness, sweeping over her, silent and still, their intentions unfathomable.

In the darkness, Huá Sāng held her breath, guarding against attacks that could come from any direction, while cautiously shifting her position to lean against the wall near the head of the bed.

“Click!”

She softly pressed the light switch. The light didn’t come on. Huá Sāng’s heart tightened slightly. She tried pressing it a few more times, and a mellow, warm light illuminated the room.

A faint, pond-weed-like stench lingered in the air – the residue of night erosion.

In that instant, the unsettling feeling of being spied on by countless eyes vanished along with the darkness.

“…”

Huá Sāng remained silent, clenching her teeth, enduring the discomfort as she channeled her psychic energy, absorbing the night erosion into her body in one go before it could spread further.

Only after the faint, pond-weed-like stench in the air completely dissipated did she let out a long, silent breath and murmur to herself.

“Was that… an illusion just now?”

She looked around this utterly ordinary single room, her brows tightly knit.

That feeling of being watched reminded her of the haunting stories Aunt Li next door used to tell her when she was little and her grandma wasn’t home, to coax her to sleep.

In those stories, there was a kind of haunting that hid in the dark corners of rooms. Late at night, when someone turned off the light and lay in bed unable to sleep, it would cast its gaze from under the bed, through the cracks of the wardrobe door, or from the gap in half-drawn curtains, biding its time.

But a legend like that, circulating only in the countryside and known by fewer than a few hundred people, was unlikely to birth a haunting, much less one that could make a high-tier psychic like her feel so uneasy.

“……”

But I definitely sensed it just now…

And that murmuring in the dream clearly pointed to some terrifying haunting.

Could it be the Esoteric Society? The true culprits behind senior brother’s death…

This sudden turn of events made it completely impossible for Huá Sāng to fall back asleep.

Although the immense, crushing pressure the Spirit Pattern placed on her body left her exhausted, the dream and the experience of being watched by an unknown presence after waking kept her nerves taut to the breaking point.

It was like the anxiety of having a major exam tomorrow but not having even started reviewing by dawn—so intense it banished any trace of drowsiness.

This feeling was extremely unpleasant for someone so used to being lazy.

This time, the old Headmaster really had pushed her to her limit. Normally, in a few hours, she’d be lying on the rocks by the Cold Pool on the Back Mountain, basking in the morning sun, fishing for turtles.

“……”

If the Esoteric Society has its sights on me, then what about Lu Yibei? She also had contact with senior brother, even personally killed him when he lost control… could she be targeted too?

I’m in a contact point of The Midnight Watchers Society, and they still dare to act so brazenly. If Lu Yibei is out there operating alone, wouldn’t she be in even greater danger?

Perhaps I should tell her about this, warn her to be careful? Huá Sāng thought.

Although Lu Yibei had killed her senior brother, was under close watch by the old Headmaster, had displayed abilities not recorded in The Midnight Watchers Society’s files since leaving the Great Pure Palace, changed identities multiple times, and had deceived Senior Qing Ji in various ways… she seemed deeply suspicious overall.

It would be impossible for her to suddenly drop all hostility towards Lu Yibei and even feel goodwill.

But to stand by and watch helplessly as Lu Yibei was targeted by the Esoteric Society and fell into danger – she couldn’t do that either.

After all, the Esoteric Society was the culprit her senior brother personally named, and after she relayed his last words to her Shifu, her Shifu’s reaction clearly indicated that the Esoteric Society must have major problems.

Lu Yibei, on the other hand, was just suspicious, having done nothing clearly violating laws or rules yet.

After pondering for a long time, Huá Sāng sighed silently and said to herself, “Forget it, I’ll contact her first…”

Now knowing that Lu Yibei also had a marriage contract with Senior Qing Ji’s great-grandson, besides warning her about the Esoteric Society, Huá Sāng really wanted to have a good talk with her.

A face-to-face chat was more reliable than wild guesses, and simpler.

She felt that when she suspected Lu Yibei of marriage fraud earlier, she’d just witnessed Lu Yibei kill her senior brother and was highly emotional. After calming down a bit and thinking carefully, that judgment seemed somewhat rash.

Maybe Lu Yibei and Senior Qing Ji’s great-grandson were truly in love?

It wasn’t impossible! Who’s to say true love couldn’t happen under those circumstances?

If that really was the case… she wondered if Lu Yibei would be willing to introduce her to that unseen betrothed? Huá Sāng thought.

She knew that back then, the older man who arranged her engagement to his son wanted the utterly despairing her to have something, even the tiniest hope, to cling to, so she wouldn’t be consumed by her out-of-control Spirit Pattern before mastering the Ling Seal to suppress it.

But now, besides the engagement, she had many other pillars of support—Shifu, junior sisters, Senior Qing Ji, and the old Headmaster. There was no need to maintain the engagement anymore. After all, she couldn’t possibly actually marry that person; she would be the death of him!

She knew very well that someone like her had the fate of a jinx to husbands. Marriage would mean harming someone. Who knew when her Spirit Pattern would go out of control and kill her, taking her husband and his entire family with her, perishing in violent night erosion.

So she was only suited to be alone…

On the surface, she lived freely and lazily, but in reality, she just wasn’t dead yet.

“Speaking of which, Lu Yibei is also involved with that Operator Jiang… and now with Senior Qing Ji’s great-grandson… is she two-timing?”

Huá Sāng pursed her lips dismissively.

“Forget it, it’s none of my business. Thinking too much is just tiring.”

Although those two always looked cold and aloof, the entire Hua City branch of The Midnight Watchers Society could see something was off between them, except for Li Xuan and the mushroom girl.

Li Xuan only had love for his car; his feelings probably didn’t work like a normal human’s.

Huá Sāng took out her phone and sent a message to Lu Yibei.

Huá Sāng: “Are you free to meet up right now?”

————

Elsewhere.

As Lu Yibei accelerated the progress of changing Song Wei’s dream, flashes of countless scenes swept before her eyes.

Qinghui Hall’s morning classes, the quiet and winding mountain paths, Chili Hall’s metal-scented corridors, hurriedly passing disciples of the Great Pure Palace…

Various people and objects flew past her vision.

Finally, the speed of the changing environment began to slow, and her view settled on the door of a certain workshop on the fourth floor of Chili Hall.

It was a very ordinary metal door, inlaid with semi-circular rivets, just like most workshop doors on the fourth floor of Chili Hall. A metal plaque hung on it, inscribed with the characters “424”.

“Clang, clang, clang—!”

Song Wei knocked the copper ring on the door, and a voice quickly came from inside.

“Come in! It’s not locked.”

Lu Yibei: “……”

So that was Hu Chuan’s voice? The person in contact with Zhang Shuo… The perpetrator who brutalized the headless senior sister… A person connected to the Esoteric Society…

The thought of finally seeing the face of Hu Chuan, whom she’d been searching for over many days, made Lu Yibei inexplicably nervous, her heartbeat quickening slightly.

Song Wei gently turned the doorknob and pushed the door open. The scene before her shifted again.

The room was dimly lit, the curtains tightly shut. On the wooden long table in the center, several alchemy cauldrons bubbled, emitting hazy smoke.

Through the smoke, one could vaguely see a man, bare-chested, sitting on a sofa. His face was hidden in shadow, only a blurry outline visible. The muscles on his exposed chest were impressively defined and laced with numerous, ferocious scars that crisscrossed, outlining the contours of several faces.

As he breathed, his chest rose and fell, and those faces seemed to writhe with it, as if coming alive.

Was that Hu Chuan? Why were there so many scars on him? Scratched by a panda while poaching bamboo shoots?

Lu Yibei struggled to see Hu Chuan’s face clearly but could only make out his profoundly meaningful gaze.

“Oh? Song Wei, I remember telling you to come see me alone, didn’t I? Why did you bring a guest?”

Lu Yibei: “…” A guest? Was there someone following Song Wei here? Why didn’t I notice at all?

Just as she was puzzled, she suddenly realized that while Hu Chuan seemed to be looking at Song Wei, his gaze somehow felt directed at someone behind Song Wei.

Lu Yibei slightly adjusted her perspective, scanning around Song Wei, but found no third person.

Suddenly, a disquieting thought flashed through her mind.

Could it be that the ‘guest’ Hu Chuan was talking about… was me?

How was that possible?

This was clearly just a dream constructed through Meng’s ability…

Lu Yibei thought, looking again at Hu Chuan, at his eyes tinged with a hint of mockery. That unsettling thought grew stronger.

Just then, Hu Chuan spoke, “Guest, stop searching. Since you’re here, let’s have a good chat? Let’s talk… about why you’ve been secretly investigating me…”

Hearing this, Lu Yibei’s heart felt as if it had been brutally squeezed, skipping a beat. Her pupils shook violently in shock.