Volume 3, Chapter 307 – Interrogation

It was not only Lu Guan and Chi Zhong. Every person in the courtyard who had heard the commotion and rushed to the doorway had witnessed this staggering scene.

“Isn’t tonight the engagement banquet between the Young Sect Master and the First Young Miss of the Chi family?”

“The Young Sect Master… and the Chi family’s Second Young Miss…”

“What is going on?”

Lu Guan stood with a darkened expression, his eyes fixed on Song Shutao, full of incomprehension.

Song Shutao, at that moment, very much wanted to ask the same question.

How had things come to this?

Now that she had fully come to her senses, she understood exactly how much trouble she was about to be buried under.

The Young Sect Master of Lingxiao Sword Sect, carrying on with the Chi family’s Second Young Miss at the very engagement banquet celebrating his betrothal to the Chi family’s First Young Miss?

This was not a crime she could afford to carry. Not on her name.

“It isn’t what you’re all thinking.” Song Shutao said. “Nothing happened between her and me!”

Setting aside the fact that Song Shutao was not a man to begin with, the body she currently occupied was not even her real flesh and blood. It was a false form conjured from spirit-painting, a fabricated shell.

And because it was only a false body, even with a male form rendered around her, it was not capable of what a real man could do with a woman. Song Shutao was still, at her core, a woman. At most, there had been some closeness, some embracing and pressing together.

This body had no capacity to taint Chi Muxue’s purity.

She and Chi Muxue were innocent. What had happened between them was not what these people were imagining, because she was physically incapable of going that far.

“Senior Brother Lu, believe me. I have not done what you’re all thinking.”

“The Second Young Miss is untouched.”

Skepticism filled every face watching her.

A man and a woman, alone in a locked room, both in disarray. Most of the people present were no strangers to the world. Faced with a scene like this, it was very hard to believe Song Shixuan’s claims.

Song Shutao could see the doubt plainly in their eyes. She felt a helpless frustration well up inside her.

But this was not a crime she could take on. And it was absolutely not one Song Shixuan could take on either.

The honor of the Song family was at stake. She had to make this clear.

“The Second Young Miss and I were both set up!” Song Shutao said. “Someone put poison in the tea! That is why things ended up looking the way they do!”

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“Poison?!” The crowd erupted in alarm.

Who would have the audacity to poison the Young Sect Master of Lingxiao Sword Sect on a night this important, inside the Chi family’s own home?

A brief unease passed across Chi Zhong’s face, quickly suppressed.

The poison was his doing, yes, but he never had the nerve to go after the Young Sect Master of Lingxiao Sword Sect. His only target had been Chi Muxue.

He was more shocked than anyone to find Song Shixuan here at all.

Still, there was one thing to be grateful for. The person who had given him the poison had assured him repeatedly that once the effects wore off, no trace of it would be detectable on the victim’s body. By now, the drug had run its course. Both Chi Muxue and Song Shixuan were clear-headed, and no one could prove they had been poisoned.

Whatever Song Shixuan said, it was only his word without evidence to back it. No one would believe him on his word alone.

As long as he kept that vial from Sin Moon Tower well hidden, nothing could lead back to Chi Zhong.

With that thought, some of the tension in Chi Zhong’s chest eased.

It was then that a small sound drew everyone’s attention.

Lu Zhuxin was leaning against Chi Xiyan, cheeks deeply flushed, pressing herself languidly into her side.

Chi Xiyan’s face was ashen. She had one arm locked firmly around Lu Zhuxin, holding her still.

“Muxue has been poisoned,” Chi Xiyan said, her voice brittle and cold. “An aphrodisiac.”

Chi Zhong stiffened at those words. He looked at Chi Muxue, held securely in Chi Xiyan’s grip, and found he could not believe what he was hearing.

How? After everything that had happened, the drug should have already worn off by now!

“However, Young Master Song.” Chi Xiyan turned her gaze to Song Shutao, sharp as a blade. “There is one thing I cannot understand.”

“You were not poisoned.”

A chill ran down Song Shutao’s spine.

The fury in Chi Xiyan’s eyes was intense enough to be felt from across the room.

“Do you think I was the one who administered the poison?”

Chi Xiyan looked at her in cold silence. She said nothing, but her gaze, laden with frost, said everything.

Song Shutao laughed bitterly. “Xiyan… I’m not lying to you.”

“I truly did nothing.”

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She was full of grievance.

Her identity was a disguise. Her sex was a lie. If she simply told the truth, all of it, she could prove she had no capacity to do anything to Chi Muxue.

But she hesitated. Her true identity was not something outsiders should know.

Think it through: Song Shixuan had come to his own engagement, except the real Song Shixuan had not come at all. He had sent a woman to attend in his place. If that got out, what would the Chi family think?

But if she did not come clean right now, the slander of Song Shixuan having violated the Second Young Miss would become far, far worse.

In the end, she had to speak the truth. Between two evils, choose the lesser.

Song Shutao steadied herself and made up her mind.

“Xiyan, trust me. I can prove it to you.”

“It’s impossible that I could have done anything to the Second Young Miss.”

“Because I am…”

Song Shutao raised her hand and pointed at herself.

Just as she was about to say that she was not actually a man, she noticed it.

A dark red smear on the pad of her finger.

The words on the tip of her tongue crashed to a halt, as if something had short-circuited inside her.

Tonight is the engagement banquet. I bathed and burned incense since morning, keeping myself completely clean. I haven’t touched anything since then.

So where did this mark on my finger come from?

Could it be…

Is this…

No. That shouldn’t be possible. That can’t be right!

How can this be?!

Panic surged through Song Shutao. She yanked her hand back, tucking her fingers deep into her sleeve, not daring to let anyone else see.

Chi Xiyan’s gaze grew colder still.

“What were you going to say, Young Master Song?”

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“Were you going to say you are a eunuch, and therefore incapable?”

“Ha…”

Song Shutao heard the low, humorless scoff.

Her alarm grew with every passing second.

Up until moments ago, she had been absolutely certain of herself. She was a woman. She had no capacity to do anything to the Second Young Miss.

But now, that certainty was gone.

Was that mark on her finger truly what she thought it was?

Then had everything that just happened been real?

Everything she had experienced, that drowning and intoxicating rush, the lingering warmth in its aftermath… was that an illusion conjured by the poison? Or had she, under the poison’s influence, done something that could never be undone?

“Xiyan… it really isn’t what you think it is…” Song Shutao had lost all the confidence she’d had before. “I was poisoned too… the drug was ferocious… it made it difficult to tell what was real…”

Chi Xiyan’s gaze was shadowed. “Were you truly poisoned, Young Master Song?”

“You claim that someone put poison in the tea, that that is how Muxue was drugged. Then how did the poison reach you? Did someone force it down your throat?”

Song Shutao said dully, “It wasn’t like that. It was Muxue’s fingers…”

“Young Master Song is saying that after Muxue was poisoned, she passed it to you through her fingers?”

Song Shutao no longer knew what she was saying. Her entire mind was occupied by those wretched, traitorous fingers of hers. It really was all the fingers’ fault.

She worked her stiff throat. “Xiyan, listen to me. There was another toxin in this room. When I first came in, I caught a strange fragrance… and then I lost my strength… and that was when Muxue’s fingers reached me…”

“So Young Master Song is saying Muxue was the one who poisoned you?” Chi Xiyan’s anger crested into a short, sharp laugh. “Young Master Song, do you want to hear what you sound like right now?”

Song Shutao fell silent. She was finding that the more she explained, the more impossible it became to explain anything at all.

The air in the room grew several degrees colder.

Then Lu Guan of Lingxiao Sword Sect spoke up. “Miss Chi, I think you are being rather hasty in your judgment.”

“The Young Sect Master of Lingxiao Sword Sect has been framed inside the Chi family’s own home. Rather than investigating the truth, the Chi family seems to be rushing to pin the blame on the Young Sect Master. One wonders what that says about how you regard Lingxiao Sword Sect.”

“Lingxiao Sword Sect?” Chi Xiyan turned her cold gaze on Lu Guan. “And what does Lingxiao Sword Sect mean by that? Does the sect truly believe, as Young Master Song claims, that it was Muxue who poisoned him?”

“Miss Chi has misunderstood.” Lu Guan shook his head. He looked past Chi Xiyan to Lu Zhuxin at her side. “What I mean to suggest is simply this. Since the Young Sect Master is confident that nothing occurred between them, why not have the Second Young Miss examined, to determine whether she has truly been dishonored.”

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The moment Chi Xiyan heard those words, fury boiled up through her chest.

An examination. Chi Muxue was already not a virgin. Whether or not Song Shixuan had done anything to her that night, an examination would expose that fact.

This suggestion from Lingxiao Sword Sect would destroy Chi Muxue’s reputation entirely.

“No. Absolutely not!”

To everyone’s surprise, those words did not come from Chi Muxue. They came from Song Shutao.

Lu Guan looked at Song Shutao with a puzzled frown. “Young Sect Master?”

Song Shutao smiled bitterly. “In any case, this matter requires further discussion.”

“I am also opposed.” Chi Xiyan said flatly.

Neither Chi Xiyan nor Song Shutao offered any reason.

The atmosphere locked into an impasse.

And at that moment, the Chi family’s patriarch, Chi Jingwen, finally arrived after being informed of the situation.

He took in the scene of chaos before him, brow drawn tight.

His eyes moved first to the guard lying skewered by a sword, then to Chi Xiyan inside the room, and to Lu Zhuxin held in her arms.

“Xiyan. Take Muxue and have her treated for the poison first.”

“As for Lingxiao Sword Sect’s honored guests, please escort Young Master Song back to rest.”

“Tonight’s events are full of suspicious points.”

“Once we have investigated and clarified everything tomorrow, we will speak with all of you at length.”

“Father!” Chi Xiyan’s voice was sharp.

“Xiyan.” Chi Jingwen shook his head.

Chi Xiyan understood what he meant.

This was not the moment to pick a fight with Lingxiao Sword Sect.

But whatever the case, there was no way tonight’s engagement banquet could continue.