Right now.
Faced with this sudden turn.
Li Yue plainly lost her composure for an instant.
Pink lips parted; she began to speak and stopped. Her look was first puzzlement and curiosity, then turned cold and grave.
In her heart she had a faint guess at an identity close to the truth.
Feigning calm, she spoke slowly: "Keep away from my friend, Circuit Envoy of the Myriad-Fiend Empire."
The words landed.
"Heh-heh."
"Feng Rui" laughed aloud, the deep-green cat eyes turning in an instant to deep violet, bewitching pupils, and said in an amused tone: "My, my. Was my attendant's fiend core good to use? You who haven't yet worked out where you stand, little princess—"
Put like that.
The guess in her heart was confirmed.
Li Yue understood the true identity of the one before her.
The Myriad-Fiend Empire's highest authority in the Dongshen Region, its Circuit Envoy, the Half-Fiend "Thousand-Faced Poison Maiden": the one who had planned and directed the Blade Demon night attack from behind the scenes.
"Aren't you afraid I'll expose you? Half-Fiend."
Li Yue said it with a very cold glance.
"Your Highness, do you still not understand? Right now, it is I who have captured you, not you who have seen through me. Let me think, the poison I gave your friend just now was......"
The Half-Fiend put in the reminder in a tone of doing it all for your own good, and thought back seriously to what kind of toxin she had slipped in when she patted Bai Wuxie's right shoulder a moment ago.
A few seconds later.
Only then, with a look of thorough enjoyment, did she meet Li Yue's ice-cold, near-murderous glare and smile impishly:
"It's Sheath-Breaker Powder, among the sword-poisons. A toxin designed specially for Sheath-Tier Sword Maidens. At best the victim's sword sheath collapses and all her cultivation is gone; at worst it reaches the soul and her life hangs by a thread! It usually takes effect within an hour."
"But the Sheath-Breaker Powder I make myself is a little different. It only takes effect on a command from my own sword-force. So if you want the antidote, please cooperate nicely. You don't want to lose your dear friend, do you? Your Highness~"
She finished.
Very boldly, the Half-Fiend reached out her right hand, tipped up Li Yue's chin with a fingertip, and met her eyes.
If looks could kill, Li Yue would already have killed this Half-Fiend thousands, tens of thousands of times over.
But for Bai Wuxie's sake, she would most likely have no choice but to yield to the other's tyranny.
Her clenched fists suddenly loosened.
"Fine. What do you want?"
Li Yue asked it through gritted teeth.
Abruptly.
"It's simple. Let's play a game."
Withdrawing her right hand, the Half-Fiend looked at her, all smiles.
"Today, after noon. Right here at the door of this flower shop, come and find me alone. You may not tell anyone else, your friend included, and still less bring anyone with you, or your friend's life is forfeit."
"Then I'll play a game of chase with you: you run, I hunt. The winner may make of the loser one demand that must be carried out and can be, and ask one question that must be answered and can be. The antidote to the sword-poison in your friend, say."
"The exact rules and procedure can wait till then. I look forward to Your Highness keeping the appointment. Goodbye."
She finished.
The last note stopped.
The smile vanished, and the Half-Fiend turned without hesitation and left, disappearing into the vast sea of people.
She did not go into the flower shop to buy ziling flowers, or rather, she had put that errand off for later.
"That woman......"
Li Yue's face was frost.
Holding down the fire in her heart, she closed her eyes gently.
The Sword Art "Meteor Night-Cleaving" closed, and the flow of time around her returned to normal.
"Safe for now. Let's go."
Li Yue, calm again, said to Bai Wuxie.
Rather than gamble on the Half-Fiend not finding out, better to be honest and not tell; at the least there was no added risk.
"She's gone? Then let's go to the clothes shop!" Bai Wuxie let out a breath and laughed brightly, as if nothing were the matter.
Luckily.
She did not yet know that she carried a deadly poison, and had one foot through the gate of the underworld.
***
After a short walk.
The two walked into the clothes shop Bai Wuxie often came to.
Li Yue, sightless, kept close at Bai Wuxie's side, small hand in big.
For a while she failed to notice that the several garments the other picked out and liked were all being chosen for her.
In a muddle, Li Yue was led and tricked by Bai Wuxie, now transformed into a self-propelled human clothes rack, into a fitting room built for one and now holding two.
"Click."
The crisp sound of the door locking.
Bai Wuxie leaned her back against the door without a word.
Sealing off Li Yue's escape route.
"Mm?"
Sensing the atmosphere was not quite right.
Li Yue, thinking the Half-Fiend had come again, let go of Xiao Bai's hand of her own accord and felt around her with both small hands.
Touching the fitting room's smooth mirrored wall, she could confirm she was in a small enclosed space.
"Big Sis. Where is this?"
"The clothes shop's fitting room."
"Should I step out?"
Thinking Bai Wuxie meant to try on clothes, Li Yue moved by reflex to leave the fitting room, turning and stepping out with a small foot.
"Thump."
Straight into Bai Wuxie.
She could faintly guess what the other meant.
It seemed she was the one to be tried on.
"Heh-heh, no need! Little sis. Your big sister has picked out several new outfits for you, outerwear and underwear both. Now please try them on properly, one by one?"
Bai Wuxie, eyes doting, wore her auntie face like a silly grin, and slowly stretched her claws toward Li Yue.
"Big Sis. Don't."
Li Yue tried to refuse in stern and righteous terms.
She knew very well how sensitive this body of hers was, and did not dare imagine what being Xiao Bai's dress-up doll would look like.
"No! I finally have a little sister as cute as you. Please, my number-one princess in all the world~"
Bai Wuxie was pulling out every trick she had.
"Wheedling doesn't work on Mr. Ke Jie, Xiao Bai."
Li Yue was still trying to talk Bai Wuxie round.
"What Mr. Ke Jie? All I see is my little A-Li!"
Bai Wuxie shot back, blushing.
"......"
Li Yue had no answer.
Xiao Bai was past saving. She could only blame the way she looked now for being too charming.
She was just about to open her eyes and use her Sword Art to slip quietly out of this.
"Mm?"
Only for Bai Wuxie, who had seen it coming, to clamp one hand over her eyelids so she could not open them.
"Why?"
Holding a question that was fated never to be answered.
Li Yue surrendered without a fight and obediently began her fitting session as a dress-up doll.
Before today she had assumed a Sword Maiden's clothes, inner and outer alike, were condensed from sword-force, and in theory could not leave the body far or long.
Under the excited, eager Bai Wuxie's hands-on practice, that notion was corrected. A Sword Maiden's clothes could all be changed.
What tormented her most was that the loss of sight magnified her other senses, making the changing of each new garment, and the underwear next to the skin above all, a torture.
Fabric rubbed over every inch of skin, and Bai Wuxie's commentary came now and then at her ear.
"Heavens! This figure, these proportions, it's like a little princess out of a manga."
"Here! Try this sky-blue two-piece swimsuit. It'll come in handy later."
"......Little sis, even your big sister is a bit jealous of you there. Lucky kid."
Now and then she could not help opening her eyes to sneak a look, only to be frightened into shutting them again by what was in the mirror.
In the end Li Yue gave up struggling and went along with Bai Wuxie's movements of her own accord.
She did not know how long it went on; time blurred.
Li Yue, very nearly played to pieces, finally found release when Bai Wuxie finished trying the last new outfit on her.
"All done! Little sis, please open your eyes."
At Bai Wuxie's eager invitation.
"......Okay."
Li Yue, with nothing left to live for, opened her eyes.
The moment she made out the figure the mirror ahead gave back.
At once.
"That's... me?"
A wonder and admiration from the heart were written all over her face and eyes, reflecting the turmoil within......