If she died that easily, she wouldn’t be herself.
“Hey!”
The Fish Demon shook the rope, but there was no struggle from the other end. His previous malicious amusement vanished completely, replaced by panic.
“A Liang!”
With a flick of his wrist, the rope transformed into a red thread coiled around his arm. The fish leaped headfirst into the pond to search for her.
But there was no one there!
The other end of the red thread was tied to a large rock.
She had escaped!
He’d been too soft-hearted and fell for her trick.
“Deceiver!” he roared in fury.
The fish shot out of the water like a white silk ribbon, the red thread in his sleeve transforming into countless red silks that spread in all directions like massive crimson pythons, covering heaven and earth.
Soon enough, Chu Weiliang was wrapped up in red silk like a zongzi, captured once again.
“What do you actually want from me—”
She was being manhandled to the point of wishing for death, having already listed every fish in the world on her death roster.
“Not afraid of water, are you? What about fire? Are you afraid of that?”
The fish had finally recaptured his target, reverting to his previous seductive yet icy expression. He set up a bonfire frame with arm-thick branches and placed Chu Weiliang, still tightly bound in red silk, over the flames, leisurely rotating her as if roasting meat.
“Keep guessing my name. Quickly now. Once the silk burns through, it’ll be your wooden body’s turn to burn.”
Chu Weiliang’s hands, bound within the silk, secretly worked to form a fire-extinguishing seal.
“Don’t try any tricks. I’ll get angry.” The fish seemed to read her mind perfectly, his voice cold.
Chu Weiliang: …
After all this time, there was no hope left in that fool Wen the Blind. She could only play along with this fish.
“Jiang, Shen, Han, Yang, Zhou, Wu, Zheng, Wang…”
She was rotated over the flames again and again.
Her wooden body, separated only by thin silk, was rapidly heating up.
Almost singed her hair off, damn it!
With so many surnames in the world, how long would it take if she had to guess them one by one?
“Can you give me a hint?”
The fish continued roasting her leisurely, gazing toward the nearby waterfall and deep pool. “Fine. My surname is far in the distance, yet right before your eyes. You get three chances.”
Chu Weiliang’s mind raced. “Shui (Water)!”
“Wrong!”
Whoosh! The flames beneath her grew taller, roasting her face until it burned.
“Tan (Pool)!”
“Wrong again!”
Whoosh!
The flames rose higher still. The silk licked by fiery tongues began to break.
If it all burned through, her wooden body would become firewood!
The worst part was if she didn’t burn to death, she’d be left in an utterly embarrassing state.
Chu Weiliang’s eyes rapidly shifted between the fish’s expression and that deep pool. A flash of inspiration struck her, and a single character escaped her lips:
“Chi (Pool)!”
The fish’s eyes snapped open wide, fixed on her.
For a long moment, he remained silent.
But Chu Weiliang couldn’t wait.
The silk binding her continued to burn and break.
Before she could get an answer, she tumbled into the bonfire.
Blazing heat rushed to engulf her.
But in the blink of an eye, the Fish Demon summoned a wave from the pool.
Splash!
She was drenched into a soaked chicken once more.
Chu Weiliang finally escaped with her life, sitting on the still-warm remains of the fire, wiping water from her face.
“Heh, so it’s Young Master Chi. A pleasure.” What she really wanted was to slice him into a thousand pieces and make sashimi out of him!
But this fish surnamed Chi had returned to his cold, indifferent demeanor, speaking slowly and deliberately: “That was just the surname. Now guess the given name.”
Chu Weiliang: …!!!
Her molars ground together audibly.
She now hated all fish in the world!
Damn damn damn!
“Tiezhu, Daqiang, Yingjun, Congming…”
Chu Weiliang no longer cared. She could tell this fish didn’t want her life—he just wanted to torment her to death.
“Zhao Cai, Jin Bao, Wang Quan, Fu Gui…”
The fish remained expressionless, using his rope to bind each of Chu Weiliang’s hands to large rocks beneath the waterfall, half-submerging her body in the water and leaving her suspended.
“Keep guessing. If you can’t figure it out, I’ll hang you here for a thousand years. Don’t expect that blind man surnamed Wen to save you! No one can break the water curtain barrier outside!”
Chu Weiliang’s eyes darted around as she casually tossed out random guesses while racking her brain: Who exactly was this fish? How had she provoked him so badly a thousand years ago?
A thousand years…?
Her eyes suddenly lit up.
The fish had mentioned “a thousand years” twice already—he clearly held a deep grudge about that millennium.
So…
“Your name is related to time!”
The fish stood in the water, his robes and long hair untouched by the moisture, but his eyelashes trembled slightly.
“Chi Shi Nian!” (Ten Years)
The faint light in the fish’s eyes instantly vanished.
How dreadful!
He wanted to beat her to death.
“Chi Bai Nian!” (Hundred Years)
Vulgar! He began to seethe.
The two ropes around Chu Weiliang’s wrists tightened abruptly.
She grew even more certain.
“Chi Qian Nian!” (Thousand Years)
The fish remained silent, his eyes so gloomy they seemed capable of shooting daggers.
Chu Weiliang had figured it out. A confident smile curled her lips as she softly enunciated each word:
“Chi, Qian, Qiu.” (Thousand Autumns)
This time, the fish’s anger did not intensify.
The tension between his brows, strained to the extreme, suddenly eased. The fury and resentment quietly dissipated.
A trace of amusement flickered at the captivating corners of his eyes.
“A Liang…”
He pressed his thin lips together tightly, and when he called her name, there seemed to be a touch of tenderness spanning across time.
But before he could finish his sentence, a thunderous crack echoed through the air behind him. A vast sword intent tore through the sky, splitting the dense water curtain barrier open.
Wen Shubai stepped through the rift, his white robes fluttering as he crossed the void.
“Let. Her. Go.”
The silk gauze tightly bound over his eyes could not conceal the overwhelming pressure he forcibly restrained, making him unfathomable.
Close behind him followed another person.
Fang Jixue.
The moment he appeared, Chi Qianqiu’s expression shifted drastically. With a swift motion, he wrapped the red rope around Chu Weiliang’s neck.
“Stay back!”
His eyes were wary, but he secretly transmitted a voice message to Fang Jixue’s ears:
“Sect Master Fang, if I cannot escape unscathed today, do you think some unsavory rumors about you might spread throughout the Northern Profound Realm by tomorrow?”
Fang Jixue’s expression remained unreadable, his fingers slowly rotating a jade bead within his sleeve.
Chi Qianqiu’s lips curled into a cold, mocking smile as he continued his transmission: “By then, everyone will know that for the past thousand years, the esteemed master of the Thousand Machines Sect has harbored unspeakable, filthy desires for the female disciple he personally executed—even going so far as to… inside the Demon Suppression Tower…”
Fang Jixue’s languid eyelids abruptly lifted, a sharp glint flashing in his eyes as he cut off the threat. He said to Wen Shubai:
“Sword Sovereign, saving her is the priority. He’s merely a demon that escaped from the tower—there’s no need to deal with him immediately.”
Wen Shubai raised an eyebrow. “Since when does this sovereign need instruction?”
He spread the fingers of his left hand and clenched them—retrieve!
Chu Weiliang, who was being strangled by Chi Qianqiu, shrank rapidly with a whoosh— transforming into a small wooden figurine that flew into his palm.
In the next instant, a sweeping sword light cleaved through the cold pond.
Despite Chi Qianqiu’s thousand years of cultivation with mixed demonic and demonic power, he couldn’t withstand such a strike from the supreme ninth-level sword path. Seeing no escape and no one to save him, he was about to be cleaved into a dead fish.
He could only desperately cross his red threads with both hands, making one last stand.
However, when Wen Shubai’s sword light touched the red threads, it was forcibly withdrawn.
But because the force of the strike was too violent, the moment it was retracted, the waterfall reversed its flow, mountains and rivers turned backward, vast and mighty as if capable of reversing time itself.
Fang Jixue’s eyelids flickered imperceptibly.
So, Wen Shubai’s supreme sword path had already reached such a realm.
But why hadn’t he ascended yet?
In that brief moment of release and withdrawal, Chi Qianqiu slipped away effortlessly under the cover of the waterfall and escaped.
Fang Jixue gazed in the direction of his disappearance and smiled faintly, with a hint of mockery. “The Sword Sovereign truly possesses the virtue of sparing lives.”
“In the art of feigned affection, I’m still far inferior to Sect Leader Fang,” Wen Shubai retorted irritably.
He ran his thumb over the wooden figure that Chu Weiliang had become, from head to toe, confirming that she only had superficial injuries before feeling relieved.
Chu Weiliang felt the entire piece of wood grow uncomfortable from his touch.
If her toes could move, they would have curled up tightly.
If her fingers could move, they would have desperately clutched her clothes.
If you’re saving someone, just save them properly! Why touch all over!
The Shape-shifting Demon hidden on her was ignored by Wen Shubai and shrank along with her.
“How strange,” it whispered in a delicate voice.