Translator: Transn Editor: Transn
Shangguan Ru carried Maid Lotus into the tent and healed her using Wayless Qigong. Old Man Mu’s words were not to be trusted, but she had no other choice.
Old Man Mu hid in the luggage and did not dare to move again. He waited for Shangguan Ru to help him reattach his broken tendons, but his mouth simply refused to be idle, not caring if his incessant talking would bother the two people in the tent.
“This old fellow is so lucky! All the deities and buddhas in the heavens who bless the wicked will never let me die, haha.”
“How did I even come up with the Seven Circles seven apertures Heart Stopping Finger? I really admire you, you old fellow!”
“Be it Jueyin Touch or Peripheral Force, compared to me, everyone else are fireflies vying with the sun and moon for light. I bet Han Wuxian didn’t expect me to be so clever when she revealed the secret techniques of the New Moon Hall and asked me to fix their flaws. Not only did I manage to fix the flaws, I even created a new manual! The Manual of Seven Secret Techniques has one more unique skill because of me.”
“New Moon Hall likes to plant things into people’s bodies so as to coerce them to obey. Hehe, I will give them a taste of their own medicine by inventing the Heart Stopping Finger, specially made to counteract against New Moon Hall. Plus, it’s easy and simple, just a little force from the fingers will cause them to suffer from qigong deviation. Maid Lotus will be your minion from now on, good girl!”
“I wanted that old crazy woman, Han Wuxian, to experience this for the very first time, but who knew that this little crazy woman robbed her of that opportunity.”
“Old fellow here really is quite lucky, isn’t it? Good girl, how did you learn Heart Stopping Finger so quickly if you do not have prior knowledge of Wayless Qigong? I, myself took three months to master it. You had no idea, right? Actually, the Manual of Seven Secret Techniques was based on Wayless Qigong as well. All of the occult sciences of New Moon Hall are based on it. That is why they had to steal the divine kung fu by all means necessary. The two sects were originally one family, do you understand?”
“The most interesting thing was that I had just reached the Fire Level of Five Hole Punch for the heart, and my heart pulse was as solid as a massive rock. Even if the New Moon Hall disciplines attacked me with the Seven Circles seven apertures Heart Stopping Finger, it would have had no effect on me. Haha, good girl, you’ve been fooled. But you scared me as well! Last night, I almost died when you attacked me with it, you know? Especially since my Internal Strength has not fully recovered yet.”
“Look, stop helping the little crazy woman and help me attach my tendons back. There are a total of seven moves for the Heart Stopping Finger and you’ve only learned two moves. There are still five more moves, you know…”
The luggage was removed from his body as Shangguan Ru stared down at him coldly.
The sunlight shone directly on him, and in an instant, his gleeful gloating evaporated into a wisp of smoke. Old Man Mu immediately shriveled and raised his arms to cover his face. He let out a series of strange groans and then pleaded, “Cover me, cover me.”
However, Shangguan Ru hardened her heart and threw the luggage to one side, letting Old Man Mu writhe painfully in the sun.
“Good girl… spare… please spare me.”
Old Man Mu had no principles: he would terrorize others when he was formidable but was not ashamed to plead for mercy when he was weak.
Shangguan Ru squatted down and reattached his three broken tendons, then get up and left. She did not stop until she no longer heard his wailing.
Plants in the marsh had started to bud.
Spring was arriving, but Shangguan Ru’s heart was as heavy as a rock and as brittle as the cold winter.
Just because she was born in the Stone Castle, did that mean she would never be able to run away from deception and betrayal? Even in the wilderness and surrounded by only two people, the scheming and plotting never stopped, even she was forced to scheme and plot as well. It used to be something she took pride in, but now it sickened her.
The spring breeze blew past and Shangguan Ru gradually calmed down. She even felt a hint of joy.
From now on, her life would be used to repay all the evil things that she had done in the past. The thought that the hardships she was suffering now were compensation for her previous sins fueled her.
Old Man Mu was still writhing around on the ground when Shangguan Ru returned to place the luggage over him again.
“You… you…” Old Man Mu was so weak that he almost could not speak.
“You promised me that you would never kill again.” Shangguan Ru’s tone was calm and she no longer felt remorse for what she was about to do.
“I… I didn’t kill anybody.”
“You almost made me kill Maid Lotus.”
“Is it also counted? You didn’t say so earlier. I thought that as long as I did not do it with my own hands, it wouldn’t count as breaking the promise. Old fellow won’t dare to do so again, please don’t torture me anymore.”
“You also mentioned that you would accept my supervision from now on.” Shangguan Ru continued on her own train of thought.
“Yes. If the good girl doesn’t want me to kill, I won’t even kill a rabbit.”
“But Maid Lotus was right. Your Kung Fu is too powerful. Once you restore your skills, no one will be able to control you.”
“I can teach you the best Kung Fu, then you will be a hundred times stronger than me.”
“I don’t want to learn your Kung Fu.”
“Then… what do you want to do?” Old Man Mu asked. He had a bad feeling about what was going to come next. His voice was no longer haughty but became suspicious and rigid.
“Very simple. As long as your Kung Fu is not restored, I will be able to supervise you and prevent you from killing innocent people.”
No sound came from the luggage. Old Man Mu seemed to have turned into a block of wood.
“From now on, I will need you to bask in the sun every 15 days. This way, your Kung Fu will only partially recover. Since you don’t want to kill people anymore, there’s no use having such good Kung Fu skills.”
Shangguan Ru finally finished telling Old Man Mu about her plan. Ever since bringing Old Man Mu along with her, she had been thinking about this problem. It was not all empty talk when she told Maid Lotus that she had a way to control this devil. She had actually been coming up with this plan for a long time.
But she saw how much he suffered under the sun and was still somewhat reluctant. It was only after being deceived by him and almost killing Maid Lotus with the Seven Circles seven apertures Heart Stopping Finger that she made up her mind to do so.
To Shangguan Ru, it was a difficult decision. To Old Man Mu, the news was like a thunderbolt out of a clear sky.
He was still in cloud nine after having successfully deceived Shangguan Ru, but in a twinkling of an eye, he became the one who was fooled. Even Old Man Mu. who had experienced countless storms and waves, was dizzy from it.
“You… you…” Old Man Mu was full of indignation; he felt that he was the most unfortunate person in the world. “How could you do this? This old man here was dead set on believing that you will not do evils. You are a good person, you should be the female Buddha, you know. Why did you learn from evil people like me?”
Shangguan Ru’s face flushed, and her conviction was swayed once again. But she knew that her decision was final and unwavering, so she said apologetically: “I never wanted to be a Buddha. But I saved your life. So from now on, every person that you kill is akin to me killing as well. Therefore I could only come up with this plan. But rest assured that I will always take you with me, and will not let you suffer from hunger and cold.”
“Damn you, do you think I am some kitten or puppy? How about I’ll give you a chain, you might as well chain me up or something.” Old Man Mu was furious and no longer in the mood to please Shangguan Ru.
“Uh…” Shangguan Ru had thought of that idea as well, just that she was too shy to voice it out.
Old Man Mu was in despair and started hurling verbal abuse at her. His language was as colorful as his words of flattery and full of patterns. Suddenly, the “good girl” Shangguan Ru became a “bad woman” with many unflattering occupations.
Shangguan Ru could understand his pain, not to mention that she also could not fully understand most of the swear words, so she said, “Have a good rest, don’t let your wounds split open again.” Then she went into the tent and let Old Man Mu vent his anger alone.
In the tent, Maid Lotus was still in a coma, but her condition seemed better given that her complexion had returned to normal.
If Old Man Mu was right, the lurking danger of qigong deviation had already been planted in Maid Lotus’ body even though her conditioned had stabilized.
Shangguan Ru did not wish to control people using such evil means, she wanted to wait for Old Man Mu to calm down before asking him for a solution. She wanted to set Maid Lotus free and then find a way to evade her tracking.
Doing good was always much more difficult than doing evil. Shangguan Ru recalled the times when both Kun and Qiu society fought against each other and felt it quite comparable to today’s situation.
Maid Lotus was also a killing devil herself, but Dragon King needed her. Shangguan Ru agonized over her thoughts and turned a deaf ear to the curses outside the tent.
Maid Lotus’s sword was still lying on the ground, Shangguan Ru picked it up and put it back into the scabbard. She noticed that there was a small “Yun” word carved into the sword shaft. Maid Lotus still owned another sword which was broken. She had not discarded it and that sword had the word “Huan” carved on it.
Seeing this, Shangguan Ru was even more determined to save her. She would return Maid Lotus in good condition back to Dragon King.
Maid Lotus woke up in that evening. Even comatose, she had a general idea of what had happened and that familiar yet unfamiliar force planted by the finger explained everything: Once again, she was being controlled.
“You won.” There was not a trace of emotion in Maid Lotus’ voice. “I will carry out all your orders, and will not pretend to be happy. I won’t waste time to make excuses.”
“You don’t have to do anything.” Shangguan Ru suddenly had a thought, even though she felt it ridiculous. “What if I ask you to leave him?”
“Whatever the master says.”
Maid Lotus was still indifferent. However, Shangguan Ru was panicked and ashamed. “You don’t have to follow my orders. I will try my best to remove the Heart Stopping Finger.”
The indifference shown by Maid Lotus made her seem inhuman; she was neither thankful nor doubtful towards Shangguan Ru.
It sent chills down her spine. Shangguan Ru would rather sleep in the wilderness than stay in the same tent as the female killer.
Outside the tent, there was no noise for a while after Old Man Mu got tired of cursing.
The night was getting darker, so Shangguan Ru helped him take off the luggage. She was shocked to see two lines of tears running down his wrinkled face.
“You…” Shangguan Ru tried to recall the victims whose hearts were dug out by Old Man Mu so that she could remember that he was really the devil who terrified the Western Region.
“Do I not have feelings? Can’t I cry?” Old Man Mu seemed not the least bit embarrassed as more tears flowed down his face. “I trusted you so much and really thought that you are a good girl, a living Buddha even! But you lied to me!”
“Since you now know that being cheated doesn’t feel good, then you should not have deceived so many people.”
“How can that be the same? Everybody knows that being defeated is not a good feeling, but everybody wants to defeat others. It’s because I’ve deceived too many people, therefore, I cannot accept being lied to by you.”
Old Man Mu’s words often sounded both logical and ridiculous. Shangguan Ru knew that it was wrong but she could not argue with him, so she dropped the whole subject altogether, “The Heart Stopping Finger in Maid Lotus’ body, how can it be removed?”
“Remove? Why do you want to remove it? Even if you have no ambitions, you can also make her carry your luggage or something. If you don’t like her, give her to me then.”
“Don’t you worry about what I do. Tell me the method.”
“I won’t say, even if you kill me, I won’t say a thing.”
“At first, I said I will tan you in the sun every 15 days…”
“Haha, you really don’t know how to take a joke. It’s simple. If you want to remove the Heart Stopping Finger entirely, you will need to learn all of the seven moves of Heart Stopping Finger, then you will have the power to claim life or death.”
The thought of learning Kung Fu from Old Man Mu again made Shangguan Ru very uneasy.
