His kidney was healing so slowly—did he need some sort of medicine to strengthen it a bit?!
The Mobei clan needed the cold. If they didn’t have cold temperatures, they just had to make their own. Shang Qinghua muttered a, “His sleeping posture is really so fucking bad,” then accepted his fate and went out. Unhindered by the annoyance he earned for knocking on doors in the middle of the night, he asked for two leaf fans, a basin of water, and two clean towels. He returned and wiped Mobei-Jun down, then placed a wet towel on his forehead. Taking up one leaf fan in his left hand and the other in his right, he fanned like his life depended on it.
He fanned and yawned incessantly, fanning until his eyes were bleary. Half-dreaming and half-awake, he seemed to see Mobei-Jun’s eyes open. Icy-blue pupils were bright and cold under the moonlight, like a pair of magnificent and eerie chrysoberyls.
This scene was profoundly frightening. Shang Qinghua shuddered and opened his eyes wide to take a better look, but Mobei-Jun’s were clearly shut tight.
Once Shang Qinghua awakened, he realized there was a major problem.
During the night, he had become dizzy from the heat. As he waved and waved those leaf fans, he had managed to topple over on the bed and fallen asleep.
Too close, too close!
Thankfully, Mobei-Jun was still asleep—if he’d woken, he might well have kicked Shang Qinghua’s brains clear out of his head.
Shang Qinghua hurriedly jumped off the bed and lay down in the corner of territory he had claimed for himself on the floor by the headboard.
After a while, the bedframe began to creak lightly, and Mobei-Jun finally sat up. Shang Qinghua hissed to himself; that had been too close. If he had woken up even a little later, he’d have been turned into a blood splatter on the spot.
The next day, having obtained King Mobei’s gracious permission, Shang Qinghua was finally able to see the light again, and he went out on the street for a stroll.
Well, actually, he had clung to Mobei-Jun’s thighs and wailed, “My king, I’m out of rations. My cultivation level isn’t so high that I can eat when I want and abstain when I don’t like you can. If you don’t let me go out to buy food, I’ll starve to death and my corpse will stink up your room…”
He bought a bowl of thin congee to drink from a shop on a street corner. The congee was clear as water. When he looked down and glimpsed his own reflection, he beheld a chrysanthemum battered by the rain—a trampled mien, wan and sallow.
Just as Shang Qinghua was wallowing in his wretched misery, he suddenly heard someone call him “shidi” from behind. He turned to see some five young men exuding immortal auras, their sleeves and hems fluttering in the breeze as they shouldered longswords and walked solemnly toward him.
Comrades! His comrades from Cang Qiong Mountain Sect!
Right, seven days had passed, so they had organized a group to come find him!
Shang Qinghua was moved to tears. Reaching out a trembling hand, he called, “Shixiong—Wei-shixiong!”
A reserved smile graced the face of the leading youth. Two swords hung at his waist, one long, one short, and his sleeves billowed as if filled with a cool breeze. It was Wan Jian Peak’s Wei Qingwei. When he saw Shang Qinghua rush out to greet him, he raised a hand to meet him, moved. “X-shidi, you… What happened to you? How have you so completely transformed as to reach such a state in the few days since we last met—you don’t even look human!”
Shang Qinghua choked down a wave of hot tears, then awkwardly said, “That’s probably because I’m not X-shixiong.”
Sure, he had become a bit skinnier because he wasn’t eating well, but what was with that “don’t even look human” remark? Moreover, Shang Qinghua had been to Wan Jian Peak’s sword trials terrace at least three times to polish swords for Wei-shixiong and his buddies, and every time they’d wanted him to sweep their rooms while he was at it, and to make them food, and to also feed their pangolins—how could they have already forgotten his face?!
“Can’t you see I’m making a joke?” Wei Qingwei asked. “What, is it not funny? Oh, right, Shang-shidi, why are you all alone? Where are the others? Why did you delay your return? Did something happen?”
“Uh, Wei-shixiong, you really need to work on your jokes. As for the others… The others…”
This attack had been too sudden, and Shang Qinghua couldn’t make up a seamless alibi on such short notice. So he just swayed a couple of times, his face deathly pale, then fell to the ground with a plop.
As he looked like he couldn’t hold up much longer, no one would be suspicious if he pretended to faint.
While he was playing dead, he felt Wei Qingwei crouch down and poke his face a couple of times.
The others said, “Shixiong, he fainted. What should we do?”
“What else can we do?” Wei Qingwei asked, still poking. “Let’s drag him back first and figure it out after.”
At Qiong Ding Peak, rows and rows of dead bodies were arranged outside the main hall. Other than Shang Qinghua, every An Ding Peak outer disciple who had been sent to retrieve goods that day lay in repose, down to the last.
Shang Qinghua knelt in front of the bodies, tears falling to the ground. There was no way around it; it was hard to get by in this cultivation world. Someone like him, with mediocre innate ability, really couldn’t make it without well-developed tear glands. If he hadn’t had those, he wouldn’t be able to put on this act of “a sorrow so heartbroken, it stilled the tongue” in front of the peak lords.
After the peak lords finished questioning him, they went into the hall to discuss, the atmosphere serious and solemn. Shang Qinghua suddenly heard the tinkling of sword tassel pendants, and a youth wearing Qing Jing Peak’s uniform slowly approached him.
This youth had snowy-fair skin, slender brows and eyes, pale lips, and a somewhat harsh appearance. His black hair was neatly tied behind his head with a light-green ribbon, and a sword was held in his arms. It was precisely that inauspicious star, that heartless ghoul, that certain, uh, eccentric fellow from Qing Jing Peak, Proud Immortal Demon Way’s scum villain par excellence of the next generation: Shen Qingqiu.
Once Shen Qingqiu finished examining the bodies, he asked carelessly, “Did that demon ask you to bring back some message, or perhaps some object?”
Shang Qinghua started, shocked that Shen Qingqiu had actually chosen to grace him with unsolicited words. “No?”
Shen Qingqiu had a habit of raising his chin, so he was often looking down his nose at others. Every time they spoke, Shang Qinghua felt like Shen Qingqiu was sneering at him. Granted, the sneering didn’t really matter; he was pretty used to it…
“Then that’s strange,” Shen Qingqiu said, his expression like a smile, yet not. “All the others died. If you don’t have some message to bring to us, why would you of all people be the only survivor?”
Shang Qinghua blinked his eyes, tears once again streaming down his face. “This… That is…”
This time, Shen Qingqiu smiled for real. “Shang-shidi. Exactly how did you escape unscathed to return to Cang Qiong Mountain?”
Shang Qinghua absolutely could not afford to give a careless response to this question.
The Shen Qingqiu of this world functioned in accordance with his original settings. He wasn’t like those low-IQ, paper-thin cannon fodder villains, and he was under no circumstances easy to deceive. If Shang Qinghua blew his cover and got reported, his clandestine second career would be over before it even began.
So, he played dumb and laughed awkwardly for thirty seconds. Suddenly, the lightbulb in his head lit up and he instantly began to stammer, “That is… It might be because…”
Because he hadn’t for a second hesitated to kneel?
Because he’d yelled “My king!” with volume and sincerity?
Because he’d brazenly abandoned all dignity?
Shen Qingqiu waited patiently and, for his trouble, received a fit of gut-wrenching coughs from his target. Shang Qinghua coughed until tears poured from his eyes. Shen Qingqiu backed up a step, a shade of disgust on his face.
Everyone has a weakness—just you see who I’ll summon to deal with you!
Sure enough, after five seconds of this, Yue Qingyuan’s voice came from behind them.