The crimson serpent came at the call, obedient to Shi Yeshan without any hesitation, docilely releasing the Illusory Image for them to see again.
This beast had no cultivation base to speak of, so it couldn't record things completely—only a few afterimages remained. They could make out the figure of a woman, her features bearing some resemblance to Fifth Young Miss. Her clothes were tattered, her eyes vacant, and someone had beaten her until she spat blood. Slowly, she transformed into a vengeful ghost.
But this ghost didn't harm anyone. She only knelt desperately, kowtowing and repeating her plea: "Don't kill my A'yin…"
Only then did Su Zhai notice that the woman was holding a crying infant in her arms—likely Fifth Young Miss herself. The infant had also turned into a ghost, eerily crawling forward on all fours, pitch-black pupils filling her entire eye sockets, radiating a sinister aura that was far more terrifying than the woman's.
"Oh, so your mother was murdered?" Chu Yi's mind was quick this time, and she said in surprise, "So she set up a labyrinthine array to take revenge?"
This was the Illusory Image of those who had been killed—likely enemies connected to Fifth Young Miss.
Fifth Young Miss floated silently on the water's surface, her face flushed red, clearly out of breath.
The crimson serpent, however, had wound itself around Su Zhai's feet, nuzzling around like a puppy, its body rippling in waves until it nearly became a blur.
Shi Yeshan glanced at it and noticed the beast was quite good at reading people.
"…Since she didn't harm people without reason, then pull her up." Su Zhai stepped forward and nudged Chu Yi's shoulder. "Hurry."
Chu Yi tightened her wrist but didn't act immediately. She only muttered, "Then you can't blame me later if I burn down the house. That's not on me."
With that, she deftly pulled the girl up. This time, she didn't approach but kicked her stomach from a distance. "Hey, are you dead or not?"
The crimson serpent quickly wrapped itself around the little girl's body, pressing its head against her cheek over and over.
"After being kicked into the water that many times, she must have been in real danger." Su Zhai complained. "You went too far just now."
"You're blaming me?" Chu Yi was displeased. "You've only known her for how long, and you're scolding me for her? She tried to burn me to death!"
Shi Yeshan glanced sideways, a hint of disgust showing on his face.
Su Zhai only lowered her eyelashes and said in a calm voice, "I'm timid and weak, a fool. How would I dare scold you."
Chu Yi was stunned. She looked at Su Zhai's indifferent face, opened her mouth dryly, but for a moment didn't know what to say, so she closed it.
A chill crept up her spine.
Su Zhai slowly returned to Shi Yeshan's side. She noticed he was in a good mood, and a hint of hesitation appeared in her eyes.
The man stroked her hair. "Forget it. I'll send this child back to her home."
But Su Zhai shook her head. "She doesn't want to go home. I suspect her mother was killed by her own family."
Inner-court strife was terrifying, after all.
"You pity her?" Chu Yi blurted out without thinking. "Then I'll… take her to my senior brother. He's so powerful, she won't die."
She quickly glanced at Su Zhai, rare for her not to speak in her usual loud, self-righteous voice. She just crouched on the ground, stumbling over her words. "That fool wasn't scolding you. I just said it without thinking."
"If you weren't scolding her, were you scolding me?" Shi Yeshan tilted his head slightly and added, "Words spoken without thought are often a person's true feelings. It seems this is how you see my wife on a daily basis. Cultivator Chu, you put on quite the friendly act on the surface. Hah."
Chu Yi was dumbfounded.
Su Zhai pressed her lips together, and Shi Yeshan comfortingly cupped her face in both hands, speaking softly, "Don't mind her. She's an outsider after all. You're not a fool."
Chu Yi: …
What a scheming man.
She felt deeply uncomfortable. She hoisted Fifth Young Miss onto her back, muttered a single "I'm leaving," and in an instant flew off on her sword, vanishing from sight.
All that remained was a faint breeze. Su Zhai's eyes went wide. "Is that Sword Kinesis?!"
Finally, she felt some real sense of this immortal cultivation world.
She'd heard that only cultivators with extremely high cultivation bases could do this. It seemed Chu Yi was indeed formidable—she must have poured all her talent into her martial arts.
Shi Yeshan, having seen much more, was unimpressed. "She flies terribly. Don't you think she looks like a grasshopper?"
Better she never come back.
The thatched cottage had burned down completely. Su Zhai tried bringing it up after returning, but Shi Yeshan showed little interest in rebuilding it, and she had no real way to push the matter.
While Su Zhai went to bathe, Shi Yeshan stepped out on his own. He grabbed the crimson serpent that was lingering near the house and drove it straight into the mountains. "Don't come back. Your master is on Mount Shu. Go find her yourself."
The serpent, of course, had no idea where Mount Shu was. It only kept rolling around in place, but Shi Yeshan was unmoved, his pupils deep as ink. "Stay away from Su Zhai."
What a nuisance.
After driving off that beast, before heading home, Shi Yeshan also took the time to find Lin Wei and asked him to pass along a message to Chu Yi: there was no need for her to return to Qiling Peak.
Lin Wei naturally agreed, "Grandmaster, this girl that Chu Yi brought back has exceptional Root Bone. Are you planning to have her enter the Immortal Gate?"
"You're quite clever, Lin Wei." Immortal Lord Ziying instead turned the conversation to him, his tone unusually warm. "You do enjoy guessing at others' thoughts, don't you?"
Lin Wei's heart skipped a beat. "I was wrong. Please punish me, Grandmaster."
Shi Yeshan grew impatient. "If there's a next time, the both of you can roll straight into Silent Void Valley."
The Grandmaster had been increasingly moody lately.
First, he had punished Hua Fan to Silent Void Valley, temporarily stripping away his cultivation base, leaving him to toil in gloom day after day without release. Hua Fan was nearly driven mad from the confinement.
And now he was losing his temper for no reason, like a restless youth troubled by matters of the heart.
…The Grandmaster had forbidden him from probing others' thoughts.
Lin Wei let out a sigh and forced himself not to dwell on it any further.
Finally, two days of peace passed. Shi Yeshan hadn't gone to Ziqian Hall at all during this time. The two of them slowly cleaned up the scorched marks on the back wall of the house, and Su Zhai even directed Shi Yeshan to build a stable behind the kitchen, eagerly anticipating the arrival of their first fine horse.
A few days later, Liu Erniang invited Su Zhai to visit the Goddess Temple, and Shi Yeshan finally went out to work as well.
In the carriage, Liu Erniang leaned closer to Su Zhai. "You two are stuck together like glue every day now."
She pointed at Su Zhai's lower abdomen and whispered, "So why is there still no movement in your belly?"
Su Zhai tried to brush it off, but Liu Erniang only gripped her wrist, her face full of worry. "Susu, don't blame Second Aunt for being nosy. Neither you nor your husband had parents to guide you, and your marriage was rather hasty. You two… the matters between husband and wife—do you even understand them?"
…Don't worry, I understand far more than you do.
There was no need to hide anything in the carriage, so Su Zhai spoke plainly. "You mean the pleasures of men and women? Shi Yeshan and I have been together for so long—how could I not understand? Don't worry."
Liu Erniang said nothing more, but a hint of doubt lingered in her gaze. She took Su Zhai to pay respects to the Child-Giving Goddess and even chided her for not being devout enough.
On the way back, Second Aunt was still scolding her for acting like a child, speaking with deep earnestness. "Cultivators may sound impressive, but they deal with demons and monsters day in and day out. Who knows when something might go wrong? If you have a child by then, at least you'll have someone to rely on. You need to get on with it."
Su Zhai was taken aback. "Is that so?"
"Don't panic either. Though things have been unsettled lately, Ziqian Hall is a great Immortal Gate, and your husband is safe enough there. Your priority right now is to bear a child."
Being eager for a child herself, she couldn't help but fuss over Su Zhai as well. She rambled on for a while longer, then sighed and shifted to another topic. "That strange portrait you drew for me last time—it was quite the coincidence. When I went to deliver my embroidery in the city that day, the Prefect's daughter happened to see it. She asked to take it, saying it looked amusing."
But Su Zhai only nodded absently. She felt a little unsettled, thinking only that being a cultivator was a dangerous profession.
She recalled that in the past, when Shi Yeshan occasionally came home, there would be a faint, unidentifiable smell of blood on him, and he always tried to keep it from her—probably because he didn't want her to worry.
Shi Yeshan didn't come home that night either. Having slept alone these past few days, Su Zhai listened to the bleak wind and began to let her thoughts run wild.
Then a faint rustling sound came from the courtyard gate. Su Zhai mustered her courage and went out to take a look, only to unexpectedly find that little red snake, huddled pitifully outside the door, not daring to come in.
"…Are you waiting for your master?" Su Zhai looked at it and said softly, "Don't worry. Chu Yi took her away to be treated."
This little snake was quite well-behaved, at least. It twisted its body with a cautious air, stretching its head to peer into the courtyard. Su Zhai stepped aside to let it see. "Your master isn't here, but once she's healed, she'll definitely come back for you soon."
But the moment her words fell, the snake suddenly darted into Su Zhai's courtyard and vanished from sight in an instant.
Su Zhai was startled. She still harbored some fear of the snake and instinctively stepped back two paces—only to nearly run into two men dressed in robes of blue and purple.
They were both dressed as Immortals, their faces hard to make out in the night. They silently studied Su Zhai, a faint murderous aura lingering around them.
The older one spoke first. "Young miss, have you seen any demons and monsters causing trouble recently?"
"What would a mortal know?" The younger one was still staring intently at Su Zhai. "But I find her a bit strange."
Su Zhai cautiously retreated two steps back to her own doorway. "Are you referring to the disappearance of the Fifth Young Miss from the manor?"
She shook her head. "I wouldn't know. Quite a few people have already gone looking for her."
That matter had stirred up quite a commotion and was practically the biggest news in the village lately.
"You really don't know?" They slowly sized up Su Zhai, their tone faint and elusive. "My junior apprentice brother's Longevity Lamp went out for no clear reason. He was the one following and guarding that Fifth Young Miss. Our master probed and found that his Divine Soul was extinguished somewhere in the mountain behind us."
Guarding.
That must be the cultivator who had been following Fifth Young Miss.
Su Zhai said nothing, only retreating back into the courtyard. "I'm just a mortal. I don't understand such things."
She tried to close the door, but the younger one moved with startling speed, thrusting a leg into the threshold, his gaze drifting with a strange intensity. "Young miss, why would you venture out in the dead of night?"
Su Zhai frowned, and the man strode boldly through the door. Her voice suddenly rose. "Can you get out?!"
A cold snort followed. "Little wench, you don't know respect!"
Without warning, a blow struck her shoulder blade. Su Zhai's vision swam with darkness, and as she staggered two steps, someone caught her arm with remarkable speed.
A faint scent of fresh grass clung to him as he snapped in rebuke: "How are your actions any different from demons and monsters? Laying hands on a weak woman like this—what kind of conduct is that?"
His voice was rather pleasant to the ear.