Backlash

The next morning, just as the sky was beginning to lighten, Yan Wushuang pushed open her door to find that Lian Qiao’s room next door was already open.

Upon entering, she saw Lian Qiao sporting dark circles under her eyes.

She was shocked. “Don’t tell me you secretly pulled an all-nighter reading case files?”

Lian Qiao yawned endlessly. “…No.”

“Then what happened?”

Lian Qiao clutched her head, her intestines turning green with regret.

She didn’t dare mention the foolish things she had said last night, much less tell Yan Wushuang about being infected with the Gu.

Otherwise, the words spoken today would be back at the Wu Xiang Sect by tomorrow.

She thought for a moment. “I was studying this strange demon. Didn’t they say that everyone who laughs will be targeted by it? I’m just sitting here waiting for it to come to my door.”

With that, she took out her treasure pouch, emptied a pile of magical artifacts onto the floor, and set up an Eight Trigrams Qiankun Formation outside her room.

The main feature was that one could enter but not leave.

As long as the demon dared to show up, it would be reduced to nothing but dust.

Yan Wushuang said, “Oh. Then I’ll wait with you.”

But they waited and waited, until the sky was bright, and not even a bird flew by, let alone a demon.

Lian Qiao and Yan Wushuang both started to doze off.

Just as they were about to sneak in a nap, a furtive noise suddenly came from the doorway.

Lian Qiao instantly became fully alert, and Yan Wushuang, brandishing her two large hammers, rushed out.

Who would have thought that as the Qiankun Formation closed, a miserable scream would come from the pitch-black bag.

“Who ambushed me?”

Lian Qiao: “…”

Yan Wushuang: “…”

It turned out to be the just-awakened Zhou Jiannan, who had accidentally stumbled into the formation.

All that effort for nothing. Lian Qiao was angry. “Why is it you?”

Zhou Jiannan was also very aggrieved. “Wasn’t I worried that the demon would come looking for trouble with you, so I came to help? And you, not only are you not grateful, you even stuffed me in a bag. What kind of logic is that?”

Lian Qiao crossed her arms and sneered. “If I had to count on you for help, I’m afraid I wouldn’t even make it to my own funeral.”

The person in the bag clearly felt guilty. “I… I wasn’t that late, was I? Isn’t the sky just getting bright? Besides, His Highness hasn’t even arrived yet…”

Lian Qiao snorted. “Him? He’s probably hoping to show up for my funeral.”

‘Alright,’ Zhou Jiannan thought, ‘although His Highness is very good, it does seem like the two of them don’t get along.’

So he tried to explain himself. “Last night, my bed suddenly shook a few times. I was so scared, I only fell asleep very late. Later, I went to knock on your door to ask you about it. Why didn’t you ever open it?”

This time, it was Lian Qiao’s turn to feel guilty.

Of course she couldn’t open the door, because she wasn’t even there.

At that time, she was trapped on Lu Wu Jiu’s bed.

Lian Qiao coughed into her fist a couple of times. “Was there? I was asleep. I didn’t hear it.”

“You didn’t hear such loud knocking? You must have been sleeping like the dead.” Zhou Jiannan was very surprised inside the bag, then he shifted to the other side. “What about you, Yan Wushuang?”

Yan Wushuang looked perfectly calm. “Me neither. You must have been dreaming, right?”

“No! One of you must have kicked me in the middle of the night. I think I heard someone cursing me for snoring too loudly.” The more Zhou Jiannan thought about it, the more certain he became. “It was you, wasn’t it, Lian Qiao? That’s why you felt guilty later and didn’t dare to open the door for me?”

Before he could finish, his arm was suddenly kicked. “Ouch! Be careful, you kicked me!”

Lian Qiao stepped over him, feigning surprise. “Oh, sorry, I tripped.”

Inside the bag, Zhou Jiannan rubbed his arm and forgave her in a muffled voice. “Forget it, this young master is magnanimous. I won’t hold it against you this time…”

Halfway through his sentence, his fingers were stepped on. He cried out, “What now?”

Yan Wushuang also stepped over him, rubbing her nose. “Sorry, I tripped too.”

Zhou Jiannan: “…You did it on purpose! You must have done it on purpose! I was only a quarter of an hour late, is it necessary to be so inhumanely cruel?”

Lian Qiao put her hands on her hips and laughed heartily. “Alright, alright, I’ll untie it for you.”

But Zhou Jiannan started to throw a tantrum. “Who needs you to untie it? I can do it myself!”

Lian Qiao snorted. “Quite a temper you have. Then I’d like to see if you can get out of it today.”

So she and Yan Wushuang simply ordered a pot of tea and waited leisurely in the pavilion.

In the middle, finding Zhou Jiannan’s muttering too noisy, they even threw a sound-insulating barrier over him.

At this time, looking out from the pavilion, Lian Qiao could just see that Lu Wu Jiu also seemed to be drinking something.

Yan Wushuang’s nose was a bit sharper. She took a light sniff and tutted. “It’s Angelica and Black-boned Chicken Soup. Drinking this so early in the morning, isn’t that a bit too nourishing!”

Lian Qiao nearly spat out her tea.

Yan Wushuang gave a surprised “eh.” “What’s your hurry? Oh, you want some too?”

Lian Qiao quickly waved her hands. “I certainly don’t.”

‘It’s already hard enough to bear when the Gu acts up without supplements. If I take supplements, who knows what will happen.’

However, Lu Wu Jiu had truly surprised her.

He actually did what he said he would do and was taking supplements!

‘Isn’t he afraid of losing control?’

Lian Qiao shot him a fierce glare.

Lu Wu Jiu either didn’t see her or didn’t care if he did. He continued to leisurely sip his soup.

‘Was it really necessary? I just called him impotent. Does he really need to retaliate with such a mutually destructive method?’

Lian Qiao couldn’t figure it out.

She watched with wide eyes as he finished the entire bowl of black-boned chicken soup, and then even ordered Taotie to bring more tomorrow.

Lian Qiao was speechless.

‘Fine, he’s ruthless enough. This kind of damaging tactic that hurts the enemy a thousand while harming oneself eight hundred is something I can’t do. If he loses control and does something, he can only blame himself for being too impulsive!’

Her heart was full of sympathy for her future self as she gulped down cold tea to cool off.

After finishing a bowl, she suddenly remembered there was still someone she had stuffed into a bag.

‘Oh no!’

She quickly jumped up and ran to the corridor to undo the spell on Zhou Jiannan.

Who would have thought that when she removed the sound-insulating barrier and undid the Qiankun bag, she would see Zhou Jiannan lying on the ground, bruised and swollen, with a bloody nose and a black eye, looking as if he had been beaten up.

Lian Qiao was startled. “What happened to you?”

Zhou Jiannan slowly raised his bloodied head.

Seeing Lian Qiao, he was first angry, but his anger was mixed with a hint of grievance.

He pointed at her, snot and tears streaming down his face as he accused her, “I was just a little late, so you stuffed me in a bag. Fine.

But you even kept hitting me. Was that necessary? I… I quit! This is too much bullying!”

Lian Qiao was stunned. “Wait a minute, you’re saying I did this?”

Zhou Jiannan wiped his bloody nose with his sleeve. “Who else could it be but you? How cruel, a full thirty-six kicks, each one aimed to kill! Luckily I put on a Diamond Shield, otherwise sniffle sniffle…”

With a huge accusation thrown at her, Lian Qiao quickly explained, “I didn’t do it!”

Zhou Jiannan was also confused. Although Lian Qiao seemed unreliable, considering how she had stood up for him in their childhood and taught that bully Jiang Li a lesson, she shouldn’t have been so heavy-handed with him.

So Zhou Jiannan trembled as he pointed his finger at Yan Wushuang. “If it wasn’t her, then it must be you! Yan Wushuang, you vicious woman! Last night I dreamt that you were punching and kicking me. Now, I’ve caught you, haven’t I?”

Yan Wushuang: “…”

Although she had really thought about doing just that, she was afraid of seeing a man cry.

Yan Wushuang sneered. “A sneak attack? Do I need to sneak attack a weakling like you?”

Zhou Jiannan was unconvinced. “It’s just the two of you here. If it wasn’t you, who else could it be? I won’t listen to your explanations!”

Yan Wushuang loosened her joints, her knuckles cracking loudly. “Fine. Since you don’t believe me, then I’ll hit you for real once, so you can personally experience whether the force and technique are from the same person.”

Zhou Jiannan instantly shrank back. “Forget it!”

Yan Wushuang’s lips curled slightly. “You say no and it’s no? I think we should still have a fight. If we don’t, you won’t be convinced. Come, come, come…”

With that, she lifted her large hammer to bring it down.

Zhou Jiannan was so scared his face turned pale. “I believe you, I believe you! Is it okay if I believe you?”

Only then did Yan Wushuang put down her large hammer. “You’re lucky!”

But Zhou Jiannan was incredibly aggrieved. “If it wasn’t you, and it wasn’t her, then who was it? Did I see a ghost!”

Lian Qiao scoffed. “There are no ghosts in this world. If there were, with the thousands upon thousands of ghosts from all generations piled up, where would there be room for you to stand?”

Zhou Jiannan was stunned for a moment, but on second thought, it made sense.

‘But what does this have to do with ghosts? Aren’t we supposed to find the real culprit who beat me up?’

Zhou Jiannan arrogantly wiped his bloody nose. “Don’t try to change the subject. I won’t be easily fooled. The two of you had better compare your stories. Who was it that did it, or… did the two of you do it together?”

His eyes were wary, thinking he had cleverly discovered a shocking secret, and he stared fiercely at the two “conspirators” before him.
Lian Qiao’s hands were itching.

She really hadn’t done anything just now, but now she really wanted to.

As her back teeth ground together, she suddenly remembered something.

There were indeed no ghosts in the world, but when Councilor He described this demon, he seemed to have said it “comes and goes like a ghost.”

‘Could it be…’

As her eyes widened, the other two had apparently thought of it as well.

The three of them spoke in unison.

“It was the demon!”

The heart-ripping demon, it was the one who did it!

After waiting for so long, it turned out it wasn’t that it didn’t appear, it just changed its target.

Lian Qiao immediately took out her compass, brought two fingers together, and activated it.

Sure enough, the compass needle began to spin wildly, then stopped, pointing east, toward a garden behind the pavilion—

“Over there!”

Lian Qiao immediately gave chase, with Yan Wushuang close behind.

Zhou Jiannan wiped his bloody nose and also limped after them.

Unfortunately, by the time they passed through the long corridor and chased all the way to the garden, the compass suddenly started to swing erratically, as if it had malfunctioned.

Lian Qiao refused to give up and chased out another gate.

She didn’t catch the demon, but she saw Lu Wu Jiu standing on the corner of the eaves, sword in hand.

It was early morning, the morning mist was lingering, the east was turning white, and the lone star on the distant horizon was slowly fading.

Lu Wu Jiu’s moon-white robes were whipped by the morning wind.

Taotie materialized from his sword, majestically perched behind him.

Man and beast stood against the wind, the golden light of the rising sun pouring down from the tip of his sword, creating a rather breathtaking scene.

Lian Qiao couldn’t help but look once, and then again.

Although Lu Wu Jiu had a bad temper, that face was indeed very captivating. No wonder so many young girls flocked to him.

She pretended to be very nonchalant and looked up. “Hey, what are you doing here?”

“Chasing the demon, naturally.” Lu Wu Jiu looked back, paused for a moment. “You’re so slow.”

Lian Qiao was speechless.

She admitted she had been blind just now. How could she have been dazed by his face again?

She crossed her arms and sneered. “Oh, you’re so amazing. Then where’s the demon? Why don’t I see you catching it?”

Lu Wu Jiu’s lips were slightly pursed.

Taotie cut in from the side. “It’s all your fault! Master was about to lay down an inescapable net just now, but who knew you would suddenly barge in? He had to pull back at the last minute because he was afraid of trapping you along with the demon. For your sake, he forcefully retracted the net and suffered a backlash himself! If you don’t believe me, look at his hand—”

Lian Qiao looked closely and only then did she notice that Lu Wu Jiu was holding one hand behind his back.

There was indeed a red burn mark on his palm.

It was just that he had been holding his hand behind his back the whole time, so Lian Qiao hadn’t noticed.

She was truly stunned for a moment, but she quickly dismissed the sentimental thought.

After all, it wasn’t as if this hadn’t happened before. She would thank him kindly, only to be met with his cold gaze.

After a moment of thought, Lian Qiao finally figured out the reason. “You weren’t doing it for me at all. I guess you were afraid that I would subdue this demon on my own, and the fragment would fall into my hands, right?”

Lu Wu Jiu was silent.

Seeing his silence, Lian Qiao was triumphant. She lifted her chin with a smile. “Not talking? I guessed right, didn’t I? I knew it was like this, hmph!”

Lu Wu Jiu remained silent.

Taotie, on the side, was completely shocked.

In just two short sentences, his young heart had received a huge shock. He had never thought there could be such an interpretation!

Lu Wu Jiu was probably already used to it.

After a moment of silence, he flew down, coldly tossing out a few words.

“Think whatever you want.”

Taotie followed him down, looking at Lian Qiao, hesitant to speak, sighing.

He finally couldn’t help but want to say something, but was coldly rebuked by Lu Wu Jiu and instantly retracted back into the sword, becoming a pattern on the blade.

It was just that this pattern was a little different from usual.

Its eyes were wide like copper bells, and its mouth was wide open, looking quite unwilling to die with its words unspoken.

Being glared at by the pattern, Lian Qiao sneezed three times in a row.

She rubbed her nose and muttered, “I feel like someone is cursing me…”

Yan Wushuang walked over and patted her on the shoulder, comforting her. “This Lu Wu Jiu is going too far, actually being afraid that you would take all the credit for this demon! Don’t bother with him. There will be plenty of opportunities to catch demons on your own in the future. We don’t need this one.”

Lian Qiao rubbed her reddened nose. “Right, next time I’ll definitely be one step ahead and won’t let him steal the credit.”

Zhou Jiannan, who was listening on the side, was dumbfounded. ‘Wait, is that what His Highness meant? The way those two think seems a bit odd.’

After a moment of daze, he tried to remind them from a normal person’s perspective. “Um, is there a possibility that His Highness didn’t trap you in the formation not because he wanted to steal the credit, but because he didn’t want you to face this demon alone and was afraid you would get hurt?”

Lian Qiao’s gaze was one of shock, and then she looked at Zhou Jiannan with the pity of someone looking at a fool, educating him. “Did you get hit in the head? It feels like you’re not just lightly injured, you’re even talking nonsense. Have you forgotten my relationship with him? He would love to see me make a fool of myself. He even threw away the birthday gift I gave him. And he’s always arguing with me. How could he possibly save me!”

Yan Wushuang also looked at him with pity and patted Zhou Jiannan’s shoulder. “If you’re sick, go get treated. I think your external injuries aren’t the only serious ones. Your brain is probably a little damaged too.”

With that, the two of them whispered to each other while looking at Zhou Jiannan’s injuries, then left with sighs.

Leaving the bruised and swollen Zhou Jiannan alone in the wind, disheveled.

So disheveled that he gradually began to doubt his life…

‘Huh? Am I the strange one?’

‘Strange, how come I feel like His Highness’s gaze clearly didn’t mean that?’