Meeting You by Cutting Willow Branches

Chi Xun watched as the men stood there, staring at the evidence of time passing, completely forgetting about escaping, and felt a little angry. If it weren't for his heart being tied to this, he wouldn't care whether these two mortal enemies were swallowed or skinned alive.

"Stay right here, waiting to die?! If a hundred years pass, your life span will be over. Even if you finally leave the town one day, you will disappear into thin air the moment you step out of the town gate."

As soon as she finished speaking, everyone noticed that the fat lady had quietly come to Yuanli's side, grabbed her wrist, and ran into the alley.

In just a moment, Qi Heng and Chi Xun took steps almost at the same time and followed closely behind the fat lady. But the strange thing was that although the fat lady looked short and fat, her steps and movements were very agile and flexible.

Neither of them, two adult men who practiced martial arts, could catch up with him. This person must not be an ordinary person.

They gradually found it difficult to run, but they did not dare to slack off at all, for fear that if they slowed down a step, Yuanli would disappear before their eyes.

Although Yuanli was struggling all the time, the fat lady's hand held her tightly like an iron clamp. The back of her hand was red from struggling, but it was not pulled out at all.

"Little girl, stop struggling. Whether you believe it or not, I just want to save you."

"Save me? Weren't you the one who quenched the fire on my shoulder and allowed me to see the monster on the boat by the Qingshui River? How can I trust you?"

"I have my own unspeakable secrets. It's true that I hurt you, but I was forced to do so. However, deep down, I definitely don't want to kill you."

The fat lady turned her head and spoke every word sincerely. Yuanli saw the loneliness in her eyes and a look of self-blame and guilt. She didn't dare to believe it, but she didn't struggle anymore.

She held Yuanli tightly as they walked through the winding alleys of Qingshui Town. People passing by on the streets and alleys were looking at them, but the more people there were, the lower she seemed to bury her head.

The alleys are getting narrower and narrower, the place is getting more and more remote, the alleys are old and simple, and there are few signs of residents.

There's not even a rotting corpse here.

"You seem to be afraid that the people in the town can see your face clearly."

The fat lady turned around and quickly placed her index finger on the center of her lips and said, "They can't see her. She can see everything within their sight."

Because of running for too long, Yuanli's legs felt weak, she was breathing heavily, and the roof of her mouth was dry and painful because she had consumed too much energy.

The fat lady seemed to notice her fatigue, gradually slowed down, and finally stopped in front of a dilapidated house.

"She's already discovered you saw everything, and she'll definitely try to silence you. But don't worry, she won't chase us here. I can't find the town entrance where we're hiding, so I can only try to save my life here and think of a way."

As soon as he finished speaking, they caught up.

Qi Heng casually picked up the sword worn by Xiang Yao at his waist and rushed towards the fat lady. Chi Xun was not to be outdone and pulled out a half-arm-long dagger from his sleeve.

In a blink of an eye, the two men grabbed the fat lady and put the swords in their hands, flashing with cold light, against her neck. Chi Xun was too anxious and the dagger had already sunk into the flesh of her neck.

The liquid that flowed out was not red, but more like rotten juice, emitting a foul smell and a bit sticky.

"Tell me! What is your connection with that willow monster?"

"She...was my master in life."

Hearing this, Chi Xun increased the force of the dagger against her neck. He leaned over to whisper a few words into her ear, so quietly that even Qi Heng beside him didn't hear a single word.

However, the fat lady's eyes widened after hearing this, her eyes were panicked and terrified, and the trembling of her trouser legs showed her fear. "I said, I said..."

"You know you can't hide it from me. If you tell me even a lie..."

Before Chi Xun finished threatening, the fat lady shook her head repeatedly, ignoring the aggravated injury from the friction on her neck, "I dare not."

He retracted the dagger, took out a small white porcelain bottle from somewhere, and poured the liquid inside on the dagger.

When it came into contact, white smoke and bubbles rose from the dirty part of the remaining dagger, and excess liquid dripped onto the ground, instantly corroding into a small pit, bubbling and smoking.

The two of them watched his operation closely, attracted by the unknown liquid.

Chi Xun raised his eyes and noticed, then sneered, "Yellow Hunter, you have poor knowledge."

Qi Heng and Xiang Yao felt a little unhappy after the words were spoken. Although they did not fully understand the meaning, they knew that they were sarcastic and insulting words. However, there was a difference between getting angry at this moment and admitting it themselves.

Chi Xun glanced at the fat lady, and she took several steps back.

"Before I died, I was a maidservant serving Miss Liu. I don't remember my name, but I remember that I was originally a beggar in Qingshui Town. It was thanks to Miss Liu's kindness that I was able to find a place to stay. She was my benefactor. Although she did some wrong things, she was a kind woman at heart..."

She still remembered the pair of delicate white hands that stretched out from the green gauze hat when she first met the young lady.

The young lady spread out six steaming hot meat buns and handed them to her, smiling softly and saying, "Come to my house and do some work. I'm not rich, but at least I won't let you go hungry again."

That was her sixth year as a beggar.

Her husband, who loved visiting flower kilns, abused her because she was unwilling to give him the last silver bracelet of her dowry. He was a gangster who made a living by collecting protection fees, so he did not hold back when he beat her. She was almost beaten to death, but fortunately she escaped.

Although her husband abandoned her, the people in Qingshui Town did not dare to employ her. Without a source of income, she could only become a beggar and survive on the charity of rich people who were not afraid of gangsters.

This was the first noble person who was willing to give her a livelihood.

She wolfed down the meat bun and almost choked because she swallowed it too quickly, but the lady didn't mind and asked someone to buy her noodle soup.

But such a good and kind person was ordered by the owner of the house to have her abdomen cut open just to take out the spine of the baby in her womb.

She remembered that Miss Liu always wore a green gauze hat with three layers of thick gauze that reached her ankles. She never showed her true face in front of others, not even before going to bed.

Miss Liu has hundreds of the same green gauze hats.

The head of the family, Liu Fengjun, is a young man with high spirits and handsome appearance. Many girls in the boudoir fall in love with him and rush to become his wives or concubines, even if they are his mistresses who cannot be seen in public.

The master of the house never looked at any girl much and stayed in the house all year round. No one knew what made him so obsessed.

Two months later, the owner of the house suddenly had to leave Qingshui temporarily. After he came back, he suddenly became nice to the young lady and often gave her various novel little gadgets to please her.

After the two expressed their love to each other, the master of the house slept in the young lady's room every day.

Good things happened one after another, and Miss Liu soon got pregnant.

After she got pregnant, the head of the household sent her all kinds of tonics and medicinal foods, and tried every means to sweet-talk her into eating them all, saying that it was for the fetus in her belly.

The young lady's body became heavier day by day, but the master of the house kept silent about marriage, and his attitude was sometimes hot and sometimes cold.

That early spring, everyone was happy for the young master's upcoming birth, but the child was not born for a long time.

The midwife said that the baby was too big because of the constant supply of tonics and medicinal foods.

The gates of the mansion were tightly shut as everyone was anxiously awaiting the young lady's birth, completely unaware that a strange disease had broken out in Qingshui Town.

People barked like yellow hunters and bit the flesh of passers-by like crazy. Once they bit, they would not let go until they tore off a piece of meat.

Only after the servants reported many times did the master of the house come out of the study room which was kept closed all year round. He went straight into the delivery room, completely ignoring the fact that it was unlucky for a man to enter a woman's delivery room.

Everyone thought that he was too concerned and worried about the young lady, but the fat lady saw with her own eyes that he used a knife to cut open Miss Liu's stomach. Miss Liu died on the spot, her eyes wide open with fear for a long time.

He took out the child who was about to suffocate to death alive. The midwife was about to reach out to take it, but he stabbed the midwife to death on the spot and continued to use the knife to remove the child's spine.

The little spine was still steaming, and he never looked at the mother and daughter again.

Everyone in the town was infected with a strange disease. She hid in Miss Liu's exquisite mahogany box to avoid disaster. Through the gap, she saw Liu Fengjun rushing back in the middle of the night and killing everyone.

At this point, the fat lady was filled with grief and indignation, gritting her teeth and cursing, "I will always remember everything that beast did to my master that day!"

"You're lying. That's irrelevant. Your mistress is a demon. That only means she gave up on living and willingly died. If she's dead, why did she become a demon now?"

"How dare I lie in front of you? It's because three days after my death, I found a jade hairpin in her belly. It gave her a body and brought her back to consciousness, but in the end, she was just a corpse with a spirit..."

"What does a jade hairpin look like?" Yuanli asked anxiously.

The fat lady described it to her in detail, and then squatted down to draw a rough outline for her with a piece of water. Yuanli recognized that it was the one that Emperor Hengjin was looking for.

"After your young lady was resurrected, where is the jade hairpin?"

"The jade hairpin is the foundation of my life, so it is naturally in my master's womb. If you want a jade hairpin, I will find it for you no matter what kind of jade hairpin you want. Please be kind and give me a hand."

"But I absolutely must have that jade hairpin, and I only want that one."

After saying that, Yuanli turned her head and looked away, avoiding the fat lady's expectant and pleading gaze.

Seeing that she refused to give in, and unable to afford to offend Chi Xun beside her, the fat lady knelt down and kowtowed repeatedly, holding on to the last glimmer of hope.

The skull banged against the ground with a dull sound. Yuanli suppressed the pity in her heart. The kowtows continued one after another until her head was broken and bleeding, leaving a small pool of blood on the ground. "Stop kowtow."

"Girl, have you changed your mind?"

"Even if I didn't kill her to get the hairpin, she committed the massacre of the town. God wouldn't have given her a good end. Death in my hands would at least have saved her some pain."

"God is my witness! My mistress didn't kill anyone! She didn't massacre the city! It was Liu Fengjun who did it! It was Liu Fengjun!" The fat lady said excitedly.

"You mean, that Liu Fengjun massacred the town when the strange disease was rampant?"

"Yes, I remember it clearly. In Qingshui Town, as the days and months passed, corpses were scattered randomly in the streets and alleys, blood was flowing everywhere, and unidentified pieces of flesh could be seen everywhere."

Chi Xun stopped her description of the horrific scene, thinking about things in her mind and pondering the messy traces.