Volume 3, Chapter 323 – Miss, Are You Injured?

Bu Lianshuang?

Hmph. So that was Chi Jingwen’s angle of attack.

A quiet chill moved through Lu Zhuxin’s eyes.

She was confident she herself had left no openings. No cracks for anyone to find.

But Bu Lianshuang was Bu Lianshuang. She was not Lu Zhuxin.

Lu Zhuxin had no way to guarantee that the little she-wolf would be as careful as she was. That she would leave nothing exposed.

Perhaps… she should trust her.

Trust that the little she-wolf was clever enough. Cautious enough.

Lu Zhuxin still remembered the excuse she had arranged for Bu Lianshuang beforehand. That she had gone to find a remedy for intoxication. Several people had seen it.

She had sent her to stir up trouble with that concealed fighter hiding in the servants’ courtyard. Surely she would not have been foolish enough to do only that one thing?

After running quickly through the current situation in her mind, Lu Zhuxin found that she had very little room to maneuver right now.

In circumstances like these, she could only trust the little she-wolf.

With that thought settled, Lu Zhuxin pressed her lips together and made a show of thinking.

Then she opened her mouth slightly, preparing to repeat the excuse she had woven for Bu Lianshuang before.

“Shuang’er…”

Then Lu Zhuxin’s brow lifted slightly, and she stopped herself.

No. She could not lock herself in too tightly.

Think. When she had sent Bu Lianshuang away, what state was Chi Muxue in?

Chi Muxue had been drugged by Chi Chun. The wine had surged to her head. She was dizzy and disoriented.

That drug would not truly strip a person of all consciousness. But the tide of alcohol it unleashed would scramble one’s awareness.

That was why Chi Muxue had been so docile, so easy to lead away by Chi Chun.

In that state, would Chi Muxue clearly remember what she had said?

Not necessarily.

There would only be a blurry impression.

And leaving a deliberate gap gave her room to maneuver later.

With that thought, Lu Zhuxin raised her head. A faint look of confusion was on her face.

“I… I don’t remember.”

“I only remember… I had too much to drink, and then… my head was so heavy. I felt awful.”

“But I wanted to stay and watch sister Xiyan’s engagement banquet.”

“Shuang’er… she… she went to get something for me, I think.”

Chi Jingwen said, “Was it you who told her to go? Or did she go on her own?”

“I… I don’t remember.” Lu Zhuxin lowered her head, her voice going quiet.

“Father.” Chi Xiyan spoke up. “Shuang’er went to get a remedy for Muxue’s intoxication.”

Chi Jingwen glanced at Chi Xiyan without a word, sighing quietly inside.

“Xiyan. I am asking her.”

Chi Xiyan said, “The wine Muxue drank was from the family’s private stock. Even without any cultivation, she should not have gotten that drunk.”

“Whoever set a trap for Muxue had planned ahead. Her drink was certainly tampered with.”

“They accelerated the effects of the alcohol and brought her down.”

“Muxue likely cannot remember what happened in that state.”

Hearing all of this, Lu Zhuxin silently applauded Chi Xiyan with great enthusiasm.

What a wonderful older sister. She had explained everything away in one breath.

Coming from her mouth, it was far more convincing than anything that could have come from mine.

Chi Jingwen looked at Chi Xiyan’s manner and felt a helpless resignation settle over him.

This girl had answered every question he might have asked before he could ask it. What was left for him to press?

Though in truth, he had never expected a few simple questions to reveal anything. If it were that easy, this young woman would have been exposed long before now.

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Chi Jingwen exhaled quietly and continued. “Muxue. I am not here to suspect you.”

“Only, given what happened last night, that Shuang’er is your personal handmaid, and yet she was not by your side. That is what I need to understand.”

“Do you know where she went last night?”

Lu Zhuxin heard this and understood.

Chi Jingwen suspected that Bu Lianshuang was one of the two powerful fighters who had clashed within the Chi estate last night.

In the world of cultivation, a great house like the Chi family’s estate was protected by formations.

Under the shelter of those formations, slipping inside without detection was no easy feat.

The upheaval at the Chi estate last night had not triggered the formation at all.

And so Chi Jingwen suspected that the powerful fighters who had fought within the estate grounds last night were already among those inside.

Apart from the guests who had come for the banquet, the first person in his sights was Bu Lianshuang. She had only just been brought into the Chi residence by Chi Xiyan.

Even with Chi Xiyan’s elixirs masking her, Chi Jingwen could still sense that Bu Lianshuang’s true cultivation was far beyond the Third Realm she showed on the surface.

Perhaps it was the exchange with Song Shutao at the study hall that had planted the seed of suspicion.

An ordinary Third Realm handmaid could not possibly have held her own against Song clan’s most gifted young master.

Tsk. In the rush to test Song Shutao back then, she had let Bu Lianshuang show a small crack.

Lu Zhuxin pressed her lips together. “Family head… are you suspecting Shuang’er?”

“This is not suspicion.” Chi Jingwen said. “She is your personal handmaid. She should have been at your side at every moment.”

“When something happened to you, she was absent. That is a dereliction of duty.”

Lu Zhuxin’s gaze cooled further.

She could see it now. Chi Jingwen intended to make an example of Bu Lianshuang.

“Family head.” Lu Zhuxin pressed her lips together and said plaintively, “This has nothing to do with Shuang’er. I was the one who told her to go and find the remedy. She cannot be blamed for this. It was my own doing.”

“Muxue.” Chi Jingwen cut her off. “Did you not just say you do not remember what happened before? How is it that you remember now?”

Tsk.

Every word a barb.

“I… I only…” Lu Zhuxin bit her lip and lowered her head slightly. “I only feel that Shuang’er is not a bad person.”

“There is no need to shield her.” Chi Jingwen said. “She made a mistake. She must be punished for it.”

This old fox really holds a grudge. It looks like the little she-wolf is not going to escape her suffering today.

Chi Jingwen gave an order to the guards outside. “Bring her in.”

Not long after, the side hall doors swung open.

Bu Lianshuang was escorted in by several guards.

“Family head. The person has been brought.”

A guard with a long blade at his hip gave Bu Lianshuang a rough shove from behind.

Bu Lianshuang stumbled several steps and nearly fell.

Her face was pale. Her eyes were faintly red. She looked around with an unsteady, lost gaze.

She saw Lu Zhuxin. She also saw Chi Jingwen looking at her with a cold expression.

She was no stranger to this middle-aged man. He was the head of the Chi family.

What had happened here?

Had the matter with Lingxiao Sword Sect already been resolved?

Bu Lianshuang looked toward Lu Zhuxin, and something complicated flickered in those lightly reddened eyes.

This was the first time she had seen the fox lady since last night.

Earlier, in the courtyard, they had been separated by only one room. But Bu Lianshuang had not had the courage to open that door.

The words Chi Xiyan had said to her before were like nails, driven deep into her heart.

Breaking through flesh. Piercing to the bone.

She had long since watched the fox lady and Chi Xiyan together, close and easy with each other. But she had always found reasons to numb herself to it.

The fox lady drew close to Chi Xiyan for the sake of the fox clan. She was sacrificing herself. It was all for the fox clan.

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But when that thing had happened right before her eyes last night, it was the final weight that broke her.

She had spent the entire night on the other side of that door, enduring a torture she could not name.

Bu Lianshuang felt as though the strings of her heart had snapped.

The fox lady’s quickened breathing, the soft sounds she made, had carved themselves into Bu Lianshuang’s mind like a cursed inscription.

Even when she pressed her hands over her ears and shut down every sense she had, those sounds kept rising from somewhere inside her, again and again.

Bu Lianshuang was afraid.

Even on the battlefield of the Far Northern Demon Territory, even when she had fought to the edge of death and been left battered and bleeding from every wound, she had never felt fear like this.

“Shuang’er.”

“I am asking you. Last night, when something happened to Muxue, why were you not at her side?”

Chi Jingwen’s cold, flat voice pulled Bu Lianshuang’s attention back.

But his question dragged at the painful memories of the night before.

What had really happened last night?

The fox lady had barely sent her away before she had ended up in the same bed as that Young Sect Master of Lingxiao Sword Sect.

And what had Bu Lianshuang been doing at that very moment?

She had been fighting a Sixth Realm fighter in hiding, at the risk of her own identity being exposed.

The opponent’s cultivation far exceeded hers. One mistake, and she would have fallen there.

And even if she survived the Sixth Realm fighter’s blows, if her demon energy slipped out of control during the fight and exposed who and what she was, the Chi family’s fighters and the Demon Suppression Bureau would have seized her.

Inside the reach of the Chi estate’s formation, escape would have been nearly impossible.

But it had been the fox lady’s order. She had not wanted to refuse. She had wanted to use every bit of her strength to help.

It was repaying a debt.

It was also an offering of love.

Even now, hidden injuries from last night’s battle with that Sixth Realm fighter still lingered in her body.

But the wounds on her body were nothing compared to the wounds inside.

One night later, here she was again, looking at the fox lady.

Watching her stand beside Chi Xiyan, close and familiar, and the deep pain in her chest surged back up without warning, beyond all control.

Bu Lianshuang felt as though her heart was truly hurting. It hurt so much. So terribly much.

But no matter how much pain she carried inside, Bu Lianshuang knew this was not the time to be reckless.

Bu Lianshuang drew a slow breath.

She pushed the grief back down, moved her dry throat, and said, “Yesterday, I went to fetch a remedy for the young miss. But when I returned, she was already gone.”

“This… First Young Miss can confirm it.”

Chi Jingwen looked at Chi Xiyan.

Chi Xiyan nodded. “I encountered her in the front hall. She had indeed gone to fetch the remedy. After that, I brought her with me to look for Muxue.”

Chi Jingwen said, “You left to fetch the medicine before the disturbance began, yes?”

Bu Lianshuang knew what Chi Jingwen meant by disturbance.

He was referring to her fight with that Sixth Realm fighter.

This human. He was suspicious of her.

Bu Lianshuang raised her hand and drew a small medicine vial from her sleeve. “This is the remedy I found for the young miss. Her own courtyard did not have it, so I went and asked the nanny in the east wing. The nanny told me it could only be found in the medicine stores at the central residence.”

“It took me a long time before I found even this much.”

Lu Zhuxin heard this, and a trace of quiet satisfaction moved through her eyes.

This little she-wolf was sharper than she had imagined.

The Chi estate was large, and the formation within it blocked any escape techniques. At a Third Realm martial artist’s pace, running between that many locations to search for medicine would genuinely have taken a great deal of time.

It also explained why she had been gone so long before returning.

Of course, a Fifth Realm cultivator would not have needed anywhere near that long.

Chi Xiyan stepped forward and took the medicine vial from Bu Lianshuang’s hand.

Bu Lianshuang did not dare look at Chi Xiyan’s face. When Chi Xiyan drew near, she lowered her gaze.

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Chi Xiyan examined the contents and looked up at Chi Jingwen. “Father. The medicine is genuine.”

The medicine was real. Bu Lianshuang had not lied. She truly had gone to retrieve it.

Bu Lianshuang remained silent.

Last night, the Chi estate’s defenses had been thinned considerably.

With her Fifth Realm cultivation and the wolf clan’s acute senses, she had been able to slip past every guard below her level without being noticed.

No one had been able to track her movements.

She had not held the fox lady back.

Wei Qingyu propped her chin in her hand and looked at the tall but unremarkable-looking handmaid before her.

From where she stood, she could only see the girl’s profile.

But for reasons she could not explain, she kept feeling that this handmaid was somehow familiar.

This ordinary, plain face. She had never seen it before.

“Miss.” Wei Qingyu stepped forward. “Would you be willing to look up at me?”

Bu Lianshuang’s posture stiffened almost imperceptibly.

That voice. She knew it well.

The inspector of the Demon Suppression Bureau. Wei Qingyu.

The woman who had set the trap that had nearly caught her.

Stay calm. With the disguise elixir Chi Xiyan had given her changing her appearance, this woman could not possibly recognize her.

Bu Lianshuang tightened her hands into fists.

She slowly raised her head and glanced at Wei Qingyu beside her. “May I ask who this official is?”

Wei Qingyu studied Bu Lianshuang’s face. Her brow furrowed.

She was absolutely certain she had never seen this face before. And yet that feeling of familiarity would not leave her.

Especially those eyes.

This handmaid’s face was plain, but those bright eyes were striking.

Beautiful eyes.

“Miss.” Wei Qingyu said. “You look somewhat familiar to me. Have we perhaps met somewhere before?”

Something in Bu Lianshuang’s chest dropped slightly.

She had completely changed her appearance. How could this woman possibly recognize her?

And the last time she had encountered Wei Qingyu, her face had been covered the entire time.

This inspector of the Demon Suppression Bureau was sharper than she had expected.

Bu Lianshuang steadied herself and said, “You flatter me, official. I am only an ordinary handmaid of this residence. Today is the first time I have laid eyes on you.”

“Is that so?” Wei Qingyu’s brow stayed furrowed. She looked directly into Bu Lianshuang’s eyes and moved closer, slowly.

“Then why do you look away when you speak to me?”

Something jolted in Bu Lianshuang’s chest. She shifted her gaze, slowly bringing it to settle on Wei Qingyu’s face.

That woman’s expression held scrutiny and suspicion.

She has not recognized me. She is only suspicious.

Bu Lianshuang pressed down the unease rising inside her.

Infiltration and disguise were not a wolf clan warrior’s strengths. She was better suited to a battlefield, where she could fight openly.

“I do not understand what the official means.” Bu Lianshuang said. “When I entered the household, First Young Miss instructed me in the rules of the Chi residence.”

As she spoke, she lowered her head again.

“A handmaid must not meet a noble’s gaze directly. To do so is to be without proper deference. It is a great breach of respect.”

The rules of a noble household?

Wei Qingyu’s brow lifted slightly.

That was… a reasonable answer.

But that single glance from before gave Wei Qingyu a feeling she could not shake. This girl was not avoiding her eyes for that reason.

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In that brief moment of eye contact, she had seen nothing of the deference or timidity a noble household’s servant would show when facing someone of authority.

On the contrary, this girl’s eyes were utterly still.

Whether it was Chi Jingwen standing at the head of the room, or Wei Qingyu questioning her directly, they were all no different in those eyes from any ordinary passerby on the street.

That was not the look of a noble household’s handmaid. And it was not the look of a Third Realm martial artist.

This handmaid who called herself Shuang’er was perhaps hiding something more.

“Inspector Wei.” Chi Xiyan frowned. “Is there something wrong with Shuang’er?”

“Ha…” Wei Qingyu laughed lightly. “I only feel that this young lady looks familiar to me. I cannot help wanting to know her a little better.”

“Isn’t that right, Miss Lan?”

As she spoke, Wei Qingyu drifted closer to Bu Lianshuang again, slowly.

A flicker of revulsion moved through Bu Lianshuang’s eyes.

She had not a trace of warmth toward any human.

Wei Qingyu’s breezy, probing closeness triggered a visceral instinct of repulsion in her.

She kept her head down, stepped back carefully by one pace, and said, “Your position is far above mine, official. This servant would not dare.”

Wei Qingyu’s smile remained on her face. But her eyes were entirely cold.

She noticed it now. The qi coming from this girl was subtly off.

“Miss Lan.” Wei Qingyu said. “Your breath feels strange. It seems as though you are…”

“Injured?”

The moment those words left her mouth, the air around Bu Lianshuang seemed to freeze for an instant.

Her pupils contracted.

Chi Jingwen’s gaze lifted slightly, a sharp chill passing through his eyes.

Shuang’er had not been caught up in the chaos at the Chi estate last night. How had she come to be injured?

The words struck Lu Zhuxin as well, sending a quiet shock through her.

Shuang’er is injured?

Was she truly injured? Or was Wei Qingyu bluffing?

Lu Zhuxin’s gaze turned toward Bu Lianshuang, and she caught the faint, involuntary flicker that crossed Bu Lianshuang’s face.

A quiet dread settled in Lu Zhuxin’s chest.

Judging by that reaction. she was truly injured.

Was it from the fight with that Sixth Realm cultivator earlier?

Something this important, and she had not said a word.

Lu Zhuxin’s brow knit.

Then she recalled what had happened last night.

Under the circumstances of last night, Bu Lianshuang had simply never had the chance to say so.

And that little she-wolf, in that moment, had surely been entirely overwhelmed by her emotions.

Lu Zhuxin could well imagine what had been going through Bu Lianshuang’s mind last night.

She let out a quiet inward sigh.

Please do not fall apart on me here, little she-wolf.

This was deep within the Chi family’s estate. The Chi family’s formation enclosed everything.

And there was Chi Jingwen and Wei Qingyu standing right here, neither of them weak. One at the Fifth Realm, one at the Sixth.

On top of that, there were the Chi family’s guards stationed outside.

If Bu Lianshuang’s identity were exposed here, she would find it very difficult to escape the net that surrounded her.

Unless… Lu Zhuxin was willing to pay a price. An Eighth Realm great demon could pull Bu Lianshuang out.

But then Lu Zhuxin’s own identity would be revealed.

And if her identity was revealed here, every scheme she had laid so carefully before this would be wasted. All of it, for nothing.

If things truly came to that, she would have no choice but to grab Bu Lianshuang and Chi Xiyan and run.