Chapter 35 The Origin of the Peony Soul

With lightning speed, Shao Yanzhe unleashed a literary character from his jade hairpin brush, striking Leng Zhijie directly in the abdomen and sending him flying.

“Brother Leng, we are all scholars, and your behavior is unbecoming of a scholar.”

Leng Zhijie crashed into the wall and immediately spat out a mouthful of blood, but he didn't care about it at all. Instead, he looked at Shao Yanzhe with a shocked expression.

"You've actually mastered the basics!"

As he spoke, his face was full of resentment and his eyes were filled with hatred.

"Why! Why can a poor scholar like you master this art, but I can't!"

"Why should I!"

"This is not fair!"

Leng Zhijie clutched her stomach and stood up, glaring at Shao Yanzhe with resentment, wishing she could take his place.

"Huh? So Brother Leng hasn't even mastered the basics yet? I thought with Brother Leng's talent, he should have already mastered them long ago!"

Shao Yanzhe looked at Leng Zhijie with surprise, seemingly finding it unbelievable that he hadn't even mastered the basics.

"I think my aptitude is very poor. It took me almost a whole night to learn the basics. I imagine Brother Leng is so talented that he was able to learn the basics in just one hour."

Leng Zhijie's face grew increasingly dark, and his eyes seemed to be spitting fire as he looked at Shao Yanzhe.

Seeing that the atmosphere was getting a bit awkward, Chen Yunhe, who prided himself on being a social expert, spoke up weakly: "Well, Brother Leng has only just passed the imperial examination and become a Xiucai. I'm sure he'll be able to get started soon."

Leng Zhijie, who had already passed the imperial examination three years prior, couldn't hold back any longer and spat out another mouthful of blood. He pointed at them with trembling fingers.

"You! You all! You've gone too far!"

Seeing Leng Zhijie swaying, Shao Yanzhe looked at Xuan Yao.

Xuan Yao received his gaze, stood up from the wall, and pushed off with his feet, kicking Leng Zhijie's back with both legs.

Leng Zhijie was immediately kicked to the ground, falling heavily to the ground with his face making intimate contact with the ground.

Shao Yanzhe quickly ran over, stepped on his back, twisted his hands behind his back, took out Leng Zhijie's belt and tied his hands, then breathed a sigh of relief.

"Brother Shao! Brother Shao, save me!" Liu Mingyuan, who had been too afraid to speak until he saw Leng Zhijie being subdued, finally cried out for help.

Shao Yanzhe gestured to Zhou Jiming with his chin, indicating that he should untie Liu Mingyuan.

Zhou Jiming walked over to Liu Mingyuan and, seeing his disheveled appearance, couldn't help but grin, his eyes full of schadenfreude.

Before this ordeal, Liu Mingyuan would have been angry to see Zhou Jiming's expression, but now that he thought he was going to die but was saved by a twist of fate, he is now filled with the joy of being reborn and doesn't care about Zhou Jiming's mockery at all.

Shao Yanzhe dragged Leng Zhijie to the edge of the well, then asked in a low voice, "What were you trying to do? Why did you use Brother Liu as a sacrifice? Whom did you want to sacrifice?"

Leng Zhijie's face was covered in mud, and blood from his mouth smeared his entire chin, making him look extremely disheveled.

He stiffened his neck, turned his head in another direction, closed his eyes tightly, and looked like he was determined to fight to the death.

Zhou Jiming's eyes darted around, and he said in a voice loud enough for everyone to hear, "He wouldn't be planning to offer sacrifices to Lady Yin, would he?"

Leng Zhijie looked at him suddenly, his eyes filled with disbelief, as if he hadn't expected that he would guess his purpose.

Shao Yanzhe immediately understood: "When your carriage got stuck in a ditch on the road, you weren't fishing on purpose, were you? After you caught the fish, you brought it to this mansion and then offered it as a sacrifice to Madam Yin?"

Seeing that he had already guessed, Leng Zhijie decided not to hide it: "That's right."

Shao Yanzhe felt that Leng Zhijie was still hiding something. He turned to Xuan Yao and said, "I want to see his memories. Do you have a way to do that?"

Everyone stared at him in surprise, wondering why he was talking to a cat.

Zhou Jiming, standing to the side, glanced thoughtfully at Xuan Yao's eyes, which were different from those of the other black cats.

Xuan Yao glanced at Leng Zhijie and nodded slightly.

As it approached, its tail gently touched his temple, a flash of golden light disappearing in an instant, and Leng Zhijie immediately closed his eyes and lost consciousness.

Then, it lay down beside the well curb and looked down into the well.

Seeing this, Shao Yanzhe also went over.

Zhou Jiming and the other two exchanged glances and joined in.

Everyone looked down at the well, and saw that the surface of the still-dry well water, which was originally pitch black, emitted a faint golden light, and then a picture slowly appeared on it.

With a baby's cry, a little baby was born. He was named Leng Wenzhao by a man dressed as a scholar. His mother died after his birth, and he was taken care of by a pair of servants from a young age. The scholar only came to visit occasionally.

Later, he learned from the servants that he was an illegitimate child.

In order to gain the approval of scholarly men, he studied diligently, but unfortunately, he was not good at studying. He only passed the preliminary examination at the age of eighteen, and then passed the county-level examination in the same year. He failed to pass the provincial-level examination before coming of age.

The scholar-man arrived on the day Leng Wenzhao came of age and gave him the courtesy name Zhijie.

The scene depicted in the well water is a reflection of Leng Zhijie's life.

The crowd continued to watch what would happen next.

The scholar-man said, "Zhijie, now that you've come of age, it's time to tell you about your mother."

Leng Zhijie asked in confusion, "Father, what happened to my mother? Didn't she die unexpectedly during childbirth?"

The scholar-man sighed, his face full of sorrow: "No, your mother and I were childhood sweethearts and were originally going to get married, but a wealthy merchant's daughter took a fancy to me and forced me to marry her, otherwise she would kill your mother."

For your mother's sake, your father had no choice but to compromise and marry that wealthy merchant's daughter. But your mother unexpectedly became pregnant with you, and your father was very happy, after all, you are your father's first and only son.

However, the wealthy merchant's daughter discovered this and sent someone to poison your mother. It was only after your father pleaded many times that you were spared.

Later, the wealthy merchant's eldest daughter accidentally fell into a well and died. She harbored deep resentment and became a ghost.

Your grandparents arranged a marriage for your father, and the wealthy merchant's daughter, upon learning of this, began to cause trouble every day.

As a father, I had no choice but to have someone suppress the wealthy merchant's eldest daughter in a well, and we moved away.

But for some unknown reason, the wealthy merchant's eldest daughter possessed a peony and caused chaos in the mansion, showing signs of breaking free from its suppression.

"I imagine that wealthy merchant's daughter harbors a deep grudge against my father and me. Once she breaks free from suppression, she'll come seeking revenge on us immediately."

After he finished speaking, he sighed deeply and looked at Leng Zhijie with unusual kindness.

Leng Zhijie asked anxiously, "Then why didn't Father have someone make that wealthy merchant's eldest daughter's soul disappear?"

The scholar-man said, "That wealthy merchant's daughter is now a spirit, and no one would intentionally kill her. Doing so would only add to their karma, unless..."

Leng Zhijie pressed further: "Unless what?"

The scholar-man remained silent, only shaking his head and sighing, which made Leng Zhijie even more anxious.

"Father, please tell me! Unless what? This is the key to saving our lives!"

Under Leng Zhijie's persistent questioning, the scholar finally spoke and continued.

"Unless that wealthy merchant's daughter is tainted with evil karma, not only will her suppression continue, but even if she manages to break free, a powerful figure will intervene."

"Then how can we get the daughter of a wealthy merchant to become tainted by evil?"

"By getting her hands dirty with murder, she'll be burdened with karmic debts," the scholar-man said with a sinister look.

Upon hearing this, Leng Zhijie hesitated.

But the scholar-man wouldn't let him off the hook: "You hesitated? You don't want to harm others, you want your father to be killed by that wealthy merchant's daughter?"

Leng Zhijie quickly shook his head in denial: "I don't want to! I want my father to live a good life."

The scholar-man patted his shoulder with a look of satisfaction and said, "No poison, no man. For the sake of both of us to live well, we have to let others die. After you finish this task, I will have my wife register your name under her name and raise you to be a good person."

Upon hearing this, Leng Zhijie's eyes lit up with joy, and he nodded, saying, "Alright!"

Later, on his way to the abandoned house, Leng Zhijie met a traveling scholar. After befriending the scholar, he took him to the house to stay. While the scholar was asleep, Leng Zhijie tied him to the well railing and, following the method the scholar had given him, used his blood energy to make the wealthy merchant's daughter go berserk and kill the innocent scholar.

The wealthy merchant's eldest daughter was none other than Madam Yin, whom everyone had seen earlier.

From then on, things spiraled out of control. Perhaps because Leng Zhijie had failed to pass the imperial examinations for many years, he harbored a great deal of malice towards scholars, and all those he brought with him were scholars.

Until this time, Leng Zhijie, as usual, deliberately created an accident on the road and ran into Shao Yanzhe and his group.

After seeing these images, everyone's gaze towards Leng Zhijie changed instantly; he was definitely a murderer!

Just then, Leng Zhijie slowly woke up. Faced with the strange looks from everyone, he looked somewhat puzzled.

"Leng Zhijie, I never imagined you could be so heartless and ruthless as to kill so many people!" Liu Mingyuan was the first to jump out and accuse him.

At the same time, he was filled with lingering fear. If it weren't for Shao Yanzhe and the others, he would probably have become a dead soul under the hands of Madam Yin, just like those scholars.

Leng Zhijie instinctively retorted, "Murder? Murder what? I've never killed anyone!"

Shao Yanzhe sighed and said, "Don't try to deny it. We just saw it all. We saw how you lured those scholars here with you, and how you brought them here to be killed by Madam Yin!"

Leng Zhijie's face immediately turned pale. Recalling Shao Yanzhe's words earlier, he looked terrified, wondering if there really was a way to see his memories.

His lips trembled as he said, "Since you know, then you should also know that I didn't kill those scholars; it was Madam Yin who did it!"

Zhou Jiming said coldly, "If you hadn't brought them here, how could those scholars have died? You killed them!"

Leng Zhijie retorted, "No! It was Madam Yin who killed her!"

Just then, everyone heard the rustling of leaves overhead, and at the same time, a cold voice rang out.

"So that's how it is! It was you, you treacherous villain, who ruined me!"

Everyone looked up and saw that the huge peony tree had bent its branches, and the originally blooming peony flowers had turned into Madam Yin's head, with her red eyes staring coldly at them.