10. Murdering His Wife (Part Seven)
◎Disgusting! Absolutely disgusting! ◎
Chang Nian had already noticed Lou Tinglan in the corner.
His hair fell down, obscuring his pale face, and the sword wound in his chest was a bloody mess, the flesh torn and rolled back. Even the handkerchief he used to stop the bleeding was soaked in blood, barely better than nothing. Even his spiritual energy was draining away with the blood.
“Young friend Ran, you must really hate him, otherwise why would you let him lose all his spiritual power without caring about it?”
Yuan Yao had been standing by the side ever since the sect leader arrived. Only now, with the sect leader's permission, did he help Lou Tinglan onto the bed, under the gazes of the two men.
He secretly groaned inwardly. This was the chief disciple under Lou Yi, the head of the Discipline Hall. If he were allowed to return to report like this, he wondered how the Discipline Hall would view their Xuan Shui Sect.
Ran Qinghe said without changing her expression, "Although we can't be called enemies, we still have some grudges against each other. And I happen to be a particularly vengeful person."
Lou Tinglan had saved her before, and to repay this favor, she went with him to the Discipline Hall to complete her task, and even received a mission with no benefits whatsoever, which meant she had already paid off her debt.
But in the bamboo forest, he stood by and watched, allowing her to be ambushed by vengeful spirits, and she naturally retaliated in kind. Even if Lou Tinglan bled to death, it would have nothing to do with her.
It was his own fault for being useless and possessed by the vengeful spirit. In order to kill the vengeful spirit, she naturally couldn't take care of him.
Chang Nian seemed to have figured something out and said leisurely, "Young friend Ran, in my opinion, hatred lasts longer than love. Bu Si's hatred for me has even supported him to become a vengeful spirit in his mortal body and have been entrenched in the valley for a thousand years to take revenge on me."
Sometimes, hatred hurts others, and it also hurts yourself.
She left those words behind and went straight back to her sect. However, before leaving, she raised her hand and knocked down the swallow that was perched on the bamboo branch outside the door.
Lou Tinglan on the wedding bed was already delirious due to excessive blood loss. Seeing this, Yuan Yao carefully said to Ran Qinghe, "Fellow Daoist Ran, the sword strike that killed the vengeful spirit just now may have injured Fellow Daoist Lou's heart meridian. That's why his spiritual power is dissipating and he can't take care of himself."
Although a cultivator's lifeblood resides in the dantian, damage to the heart meridian can also lead to sluggish spiritual energy circulation. Moreover, the spiritual energy in this valley is already scarce, and "A-Nian" absorbed a large amount of spiritual energy during his enlightenment. Therefore, the spiritual energy around the bamboo house that can provide Lou Tinglan with healing energy is even more limited.
Ran Qinghe asked expressionlessly, "Will he die?"
Yuan Yao shook her head.
That's good then. She leaned closer and said to the drowsy Lou Tinglan, "Lou Tinglan, I've completed my mission for your Discipline Hall. From now on, we'll go our separate ways, and it would be best if... we never saw each other again."
She got up to leave, but Lou Tinglan grabbed her wrist tightly. In the struggle, half of Lou Tinglan's body fell off the bed, and the wound that had just been barely stopped by the weak spiritual energy reopened. He was actually using his whole body to hold her up.
Ran Qinghe's left arm, which was being pulled, aggravated the wound on her shoulder that had been struck by resentment. She hissed and shoved Lou Tinglan away: "What's wrong with you?"
Lou Tinglan collapsed onto the wedding quilt, but managed to prop himself up on his right arm, sitting up against the headboard with difficulty. His eyes were red, his hair was disheveled, and his collar was wide open, making him look like a groom abandoned by his wife on their wedding night. He covered his mouth with a handkerchief, coughing as he spoke, "Discipline Hall... Hall rules, cough... Article 46, prisoners submitting missions... must be reviewed by the elders before they can be pardoned, and they cannot escape during missions."
He deliberately emphasized the last four words, seemingly to emphasize Ran Qinghe's actions at this moment: privately! escape!
Ran Qinghe chuckled softly, "Fellow Daoist Yuan, may I ask if I have completed the task assigned to the Discipline Hall by the Xuan Shui Sect?"
Yuan Yao nodded slightly and said, "Of course it's done."
She glanced at Lou Tinglan, as if to say, "You heard that, didn't you?"
She swept her sleeve away, flicking Lou Tinglan's hand back. Just as she was about to leave again, Lou Tinglan, disregarding the damage to his heart meridian, stood up and insisted on keeping her there.
His eyes were frosty as he said, word by word, "Ran Qinghe, have you thought this through? If you are out of my sight, you will be a fugitive from the Discipline Hall. I will find you no matter what, even if it means going to heaven or hell! I will never let you go!"
Ran Qinghe was filled with indignation. So, this person was threatening her? She untied the long whip from her waist, but before she could make a move, Lou Tinglan had already clutched his chest and knelt on the ground.
To subdue a madwoman, you obviously have to be madder than her.
Lou Tinglan did it.
Ran Qinghe snorted. It was only a matter of time anyway, so there was no need for her to cause any more trouble. It would be better if she could leave the Discipline Hall smoothly.
She leaned against the bedpost and looked towards the door. Yuan Yao said he was going to the sect to find a doctor and come back, but an hour has passed and there is still no news. Is the Xuan Shui Sect's flying boat so slow?
Ugh, so annoying! She regretted not interfering more, but not because of Lou Tinglan's injuries, but because she herself was held back by his injuries.
Bored, she picked at the longans on the wedding table, not eating them, but just wanting to throw the shells at Lou Tinglan. If they could hurt his wounds, that would be best, she thought mischievously.
After the previous ordeal, Lou Tinglan was now unconscious with her eyes closed.
Bored out of her mind, her gaze swept over his pale lips, and a wicked thought began to form in her mind.
She patiently fed him the longan flesh she had just peeled, one by one, into his mouth, trying to get him to eat it.
I've heard that disciples of cultivation sects are different from those who seek enlightenment in the mortal world. While those who seek enlightenment in the mortal world still indulge in some culinary desires, disciples of cultivation sects have been practicing abstinence from grains and drinking from springs since birth.
She wanted to see if they would swallow these mundane things unconsciously.
The injured man's lips were tightly closed; the fruit pulp fell onto his lips and then slid off. No matter how much Ran Qinghe poked and prodded him, Lou Tinglan did not react.
Ran Qinghe withdrew her hand with some regret, but unexpectedly Lou Tinglan suddenly made a move, sticking out a bit of her tongue, wanting to use the slight sweetness of the fruit to relieve the pain in her heart.
Seeing that there was a chance, Ran Qinghe became interested again and stuffed the fruit pulp onto his lips again, grinding it repeatedly until he opened his mouth again.
Lou Tinglan opened his mouth again and bit into the fruit. He swallowed one, and Ran Qinghe offered him another. He swallowed again, and she offered him another, until every last peeled longan was eaten by Lou Tinglan. She clapped her hands, thinking, "Not a single one was wasted! That's wonderful!"
Satisfied, she was about to withdraw her hand when, unexpectedly, he was lured by the sweet scent that could relieve the pain. He followed the sweet aroma and put her finger in his mouth. Ran Qinghe's breath hitched. In just a moment, his tongue began to circle around her finger, as if he wanted to suck all the sweetness from her fingertip.
The sticky sensation crawled up her arm from her fingertips. She hurriedly pulled away, but Lou Tinglan bit her and wouldn't let go. She was stunned by this utterly lewd act. He seized the opportunity to continue sucking and licking. Ran Qinghe broke free with trembling hands, her face flushed with anger, and immediately slapped him across the face.
Lou Tinglan turned his head away from the slap, and the red marks left by his five fingers gradually appeared on his pale cheek, exceptionally clear. Ran Qinghe angrily cast a cleaning spell, but still seemed not to find it clean enough, so she took out a handkerchief and repeatedly wiped the fingertips that Lou Tinglan had repeatedly sucked, before throwing the handkerchief at him.
Disgusting! Absolutely disgusting!
She took out her long whip, hesitated for a few moments, then suppressed her anger. Forget it, why bother arguing with a dead person? She had no interest in whipping corpses.
She rushed out the door, wondering why Yuan Yao hadn't returned yet. In anger, she drew her long whip and vented her frustration on the bamboo grove in the courtyard.
Shameless! Vulgar!
She lashed out with the whip, and after an unknown amount of time, she managed to cut all the bamboo in the courtyard in half, leaving not a single one behind, even though she hadn't used any spiritual power.
As she waved her bamboo pole, she noticed four people lying in a gap in the fallen bamboo grove. The four had been struck on the head and face by her bamboo, and they had all come to their senses.
It turned out to be Xi Qi, Ling Yu, and the Xuan Shui Sect couple who had previously disappeared. The vengeful spirit had hidden them here. Coincidentally, her actions saved her the trouble of searching for them later.
Seeing Xi Qi stand up first, she recalled their previous grudges and lashed out with her whip. This whip carried no spiritual energy; it was purely for venting her anger. The sound of whipping through the air rang in her ears, and Xi Qi raised his sword to block, saying, "Qing He, are you possessed by that vengeful spirit? Do you still recognize me?"
Ran Qinghe scoffed, "What kind of vengeful spirit possessed me? I've already killed it. As for you, what's this? Came here to sleep?"
While responding to the invitation, Xi Qi replied, "I'm sorry, Qinghe, I really came here to help you."
Without Xi Qilingyu, she indeed wouldn't have been able to deduce so quickly that the vengeful spirit's target was her Daoist partner.
Even so, she still mocked, "I told you long ago, you're a burden, a useless burden. Since you know you're weak, don't come out and drag others down with you."
Xi Qi knew that her inner conflict was unresolved, so he explained, "Back then, in that poisonous forest, I did want to help you block the attack of the ghostly miasma, but I didn't expect to be infected by the miasma myself."
“I never expected that Master would ask you to draw away the miasma for me. If I had known this earlier, I would have rather died from exhaustion of spiritual energy caused by the miasma than have you get hurt because of it.”
Ran Qinghe scoffed: "Hypocritical scoundrels, all of you in Qingxiao are like that."
She smiled and said, her words piercingly cutting: "Since you're so eager to die, then go ahead and die."
From the moment she entered the sect, the old man noticed her innate spiritual body. On the surface, he pretended to appreciate her talent, but in reality, he secretly transferred all the miasma from his most beloved disciple to her body.
Even so, it wasn't enough. He sent her to the land of poisonous miasma to retrieve the heart of the Ghost Miasma, ostensibly to train her, but in reality, to use it as medicine. During the battle with the Ghost Miasma, she was almost covered in wounds from the miasma, but just when she was about to succeed, this man intervened, hypocritically taking a blow for her. In the end, she still had to come to his rescue.
The more she thought about it, the harder it became to suppress the darkness in her heart. Since that old man wanted her to save his precious apprentice so badly, then she might as well send him to his death.
At this moment, her whip was brimming with spiritual power, and in terms of cultivation level, no one here could rival her.
She lashed out with her whip again, each strike aimed at Xi Qi's dantian. The Daoist couple from the Xuan Shui Sect, however, believed that Ran Qinghe had been possessed by a vengeful spirit and was delirious, so they immediately summoned their magical artifacts to assist Xi Qi.
The three of them attacked together, but Ran Qinghe countered each move.
Magical weapons, whips, and swords, all imbued with spiritual energy, were almost all deadly moves, pressing forward relentlessly.
Ling Yu, who had the lowest cultivation level, was the last to regain consciousness. But seeing the three-against-one situation, she instinctively drew her sword and rushed into the air. Ran Qinghe wanted to use the spiritual power of her whip to shake her off, but she saw that Ling Yu directly deflected the magical weapon attacks of the two Xuan Shui Sect disciples for her. "What are you doing? If you want to compete, do it fair and square, one-on-one. What kind of skill is it to fight three against one?"
Ran Qinghe was quite surprised and withdrew the spiritual energy she had unleashed.
While struggling to fend off Ran Qinghe's spiritual blades, the male disciple of the Xuan Shui Sect said, "She's possessed by a vengeful spirit..."
Ling Yu swept her hand across Ran Qinghe's forehead, finding no black aura of vengeful spirits, and explained, "Does your Xuan Shui Sect not even know the most basic resentment recognition? Her mind is clear; where would she get resentment from?"
The two cultivators from the Xuan Shui Sect instantly understood the situation. They stopped and moved aside in perfect unison, looking at Xi Qi with reproachful eyes, as if blaming him for not speaking up sooner.
Xi Qi drew his sword and formed a defensive formation, barely managing to block the spiritual blade swung by Ran Qinghe. His face was pale as he explained, "This is... a personal grudge between me and my junior sister..."
Seeing this, the male cultivator from the Xuan Shui Sect couldn't bear it and once again advised Ran Qinghe, "Sects prohibit cultivators from fighting each other. Fellow Daoist, you should stop."
Ran Qinghe chuckled and lifted her eyelids. Sure enough, her former senior brother always had the ability to get others to willingly risk their lives, no matter the circumstances.
She listlessly put away her whip; some people weren't worth her time.
She abandoned her mask of a faint smile and said listlessly, "In the future, stop clinging to people like a bug. Otherwise, next time we meet, you'd better prepare a coffin for yourself."
After the truce, the five stood in silent confrontation. The bamboo hut was utterly quiet. After a while, a weak soliloquy suddenly came from the wedding bed in the inner room: "Ran... Qinghe..."
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