ATAVID CH34

The room was very quiet.
Only the occasional crackling sound of the candlelight bursting open seemed exceptionally clear in the dead of the night.

“So the reason Chen Lin’s legs appear intact is because the legs he has now aren’t even his own to begin with.”

Jiang Qunyu instantly figured out the crux of the matter.

No wonder he felt something was so strange.

Cui Mingjin clearly said he wanted one of his legs, yet Chen Lin stood there with both legs perfectly intact, as if he had never been injured at all.

But what if that leg was taken from someone else’s body and then pieced together onto his?

“Ah? What about Chen Lin’s legs?” Wen Xingyao looked blank.

“Wen Xingyao.”

Afraid of scaring him, Jiang Qunyu didn’t explain further and abruptly changed the subject. “Do you still remember what those maidservants looked like? Can you draw them?”

Wen Xingyao was taken aback for a moment, then immediately shook his head. “This young master only knows how to look, where would I know how to draw?”

Jiang Qunyu felt a bit troubled.

“But,” Wen Xingyao blinked, “This young master can describe them. This young master has a good memory. If you let this young master speak, can you draw them?”

Jiang Qunyu only knew how to play games; making him draw even a stick figure would be a strenuous effort.

He looked at Wen Xingyao expressionlessly.

The two of them looked at each other in dismay, temporarily falling into silence.

Just when Jiang Qunyu was at his wits’ end, his surroundings suddenly turned cold.

Lonely, cold, and empty, as if it had suddenly started snowing.

He subconsciously turned his head to look, only to see that Wei Xun had arrived behind him at some unknown point.

He leaned down, his eyelids half-drooped as he looked at him, his long eyelashes casting a small, pale shadow beneath his eyes.

The green robe draped down, enveloping his entire person in a slightly cool shadow.

The distance between the two was very close.

So close that Jiang Qunyu had an illusion—

He smelled the faint, clear, and cold scent on Wei Xun’s soul.

Like a pine forest after snow, or a cold spring deep in the mountains.

Wei Xun seemed not to mind, speaking in a calm tone: “I’ll do it.”

“Oh.” Jiang Qunyu nodded.

He thought Wei Xun was going to swap back.

But Wei Xun merely stood behind him, looking at Jiang Qunyu and saying: “Take the brush.”

Jiang Qunyu couldn’t react for a moment.

His hand was still resting on the table, and a blank piece of rice paper was spread out before him.

Just as he subconsciously reached out and grasped the writing brush in his hand, that chill descended along with it.

Jiang Qunyu’s mind went completely blank.

He stared at his own hand, over which lay another slender hand with distinct knuckles.

Although it was merely Wei Xun’s soul body.

Although this body even belonged to Wei Xun himself to begin with.

But looking at this scene, Jiang Qunyu still felt an indescribable strangeness.

His mind was completely blank.

Wei Xun chuckled lowly.

The laughter was very light, carrying a bit of teasing.

He applied slight pressure, holding Jiang Qunyu’s hand and pushing it forward as a reminder: “Let him speak.”

Jiang Qunyu was already somewhat dizzy; he even suspected whether he was having a nightmare.

How could such a thing happen?

He heard his own voice, dry, as if it was coming out of someone else’s mouth: “Speak.”

In Wen Xingyao’s eyes, Jiang Qunyu knew how to do everything.

He didn’t doubt it either, took a deep breath, and began describing.

“The first one is the one who stood at the very front in the winding corridor that day. Her face was round, her eyes were also round, her nose was a bit flat, her lips were thin… There was also a birthmark on the back of her neck, shaped like a leaf.”

The words Wen Xingyao spoke seemed to be covered by a hazy veil, floating past his ears without a single word dropping into his mind.

All his attention landed on that hand covering his own.

Slightly cool, very steady.

Wei Xun wielded the brush very quickly.

He could feel that hand guiding his hand to move, the tip of the brush landing on the rice paper, emitting faint rustling sounds.

With just a few strokes, the outline of a face leaped vividly onto the paper.

“Yes, yes, yes! That’s the face!” Wen Xingyao leaned in to look, his eyes lighting up. “You drew it so alike!”

Sensing Wen Xingyao’s approach.

Wei Xun’s hand paused.

He unhurriedly raised his eyes, his gaze ghastly and sinister.

Yet the corners of his mouth curled up, revealing a malicious smile.

Then he lowered his head and leaned close to Jiang Qunyu’s ear.

Lowering his voice, he enticed: “Jiang Qunyu, tell him to get lost.”

Jiang Qunyu froze.

Wei Xun’s undisguised malice, on the contrary, instantly brought him back to his senses.

He lowered his head, his line of sight landing on the two overlapping hands.

He finally couldn’t hold back and said: “Don’t you find it disgusting? Swap back, draw it yourself.”

The curvature at the corners of Wei Xun’s lips froze instantly.

He lowered his eyes, his long eyelashes concealing the emotions in the depths of his eyes.

After quite a while, he coldly tugged his lips: “I do.”

He affirmed Jiang Qunyu’s statement, yet still didn’t swap back. Instead, he sighed and continued the movements of his hand.

He spoke with a smile, his tone carrying a bit of an indescribable meaning: “It’s right for you to find it disgusting. Isn’t it very good this way?”

Jiang Qunyu: “…”

Actually, he didn’t feel disgusted, but the strangeness was intensifying.

“You really are willing to kill a thousand enemies at the cost of losing eight hundred of your own,” he mocked in response.

“Heh,” Wei Xun chuckled softly.

He stabilized his mind.

Disgusting?

He didn’t feel so.

Only he knew how fast his heart was beating.

Thump, thump, thump.

Pounding continuously, stroke after stroke, heavy and fast, as if wanting to break through some restraint.

Even he himself didn’t know why he would do this.

He just wanted to do it, so he did.

At the same time, a voice in his heart said: “Look, under this kind of situation, he could still quickly withdraw himself.”

“How beautiful everything originally was. He didn’t repel your touch, and would even freeze because of your approach. How cute.”

“But just because you brought up that idiot, it shattered everything in an instant.”

“He woke up very quickly, and even got angry because of your malice towards that idiot.”

“What exactly is different between you and that idiot? They are clearly both friends…”

That voice paused, then became even sharper: “No, no, no, it’s different! On what basis is that idiot his friend too?”

“You should kill that idiot.”

“As long as you kill him, there will only be you by Jiang Qunyu’s side again.”

A layer of blood-colored mist slowly veiled Wei Xun’s beautiful, narrow eyes.

The surrounding air began to turn heavy. Black demonic qi spread out from his body, silently intertwining around his fingertips.

Jiang Qunyu was still forcing himself to adapt to this bizarre tactile sensation.

Suddenly, he noticed the demonic qi around him getting thicker and thicker, to the point that a wisp of black mist even intertwined around his own fingertips.

His eyelids twitched, and he turned his head to look.

Sure enough, it was Wei Xun playing tricks.

“Wei Xun,” Jiang Qunyu ground his teeth in anger, lowering his voice to roar, “If you’re going to go crazy, can you wait a bit before doing it!”

Hearing this, Wei Xun froze for a moment.

The black mist around his body instantly and obediently shrank back into his divine sense.

He lowered his eyes, avoiding Jiang Qunyu’s gaze.

It wasn’t until the blood mist in his eyes disappeared that he said: “I’m sorry.”

“Hahaha.”

Jiang Qunyu laughed with schadenfreude, “I told you, if you want to disgust me, there’s really no need to use this kind of method, tsk, on the contrary, it almost disgusted you to death.”

Wei Xun said no more.

Jiang Qunyu couldn’t be bothered to deal with him. He waited until Wen Xingyao finished describing the characteristics of the other few people.

One face after another emerged on the paper.

Jiang Qunyu let go of the writing brush.

Wei Xun also took the opportunity to stand up.

The lines of sight of all three people fell on the few portraits on the table.

“It truly is bizarre.” Jiang Qunyu placed two of the portraits together.

“At first glance, there’s no problem with the facial features on this face, but upon closer inspection, it indeed feels very incongruous. These eyes shouldn’t be on her face, but rather on another person’s face. This nose too—”

He pushed another portrait over: “Look, the nose on this face and the eyes on that face are the original pair.”

Wen Xingyao leaned over to look, finding it more and more terrifying the longer he looked.

He shrank his neck and said with a trembling voice: “So… these faces were really pieced together?”

Jiang Qunyu nodded.

“If they are human puppets, smashing them and piecing them back together sounds much more reasonable.”

He paused, his brow furrowing even tighter. “But it just so happens that they can all speak and can breathe like normal people. That doesn’t make sense.”

Human puppets have no life.

Yet those maidservants were clearly alive.

As his words fell, Wen Xingyao remembered those things he saw in Cui Mingjin’s back courtyard that he thought were puppets.

His face instantly turned deathly pale, his stomach churning violently.

With a trembling voice, he said: “I also saw a lot of people in that City Lord’s back courtyard. At first, I thought they were human puppets, and I even stared at them for a long time. Jiang Qunyu, a-are you saying those are puppets, or are they also people pieced together?”

Jiang Qunyu made a prompt decision: “Where did you see them? Let’s go over there right now.”

Hearing this, Wen Xingyao hurriedly shook his head: “Let’s not, let’s not. It’s already midnight, and anyway, those things won’t get lost staying there. We’ll go again tomorrow morning.”

“No.” Jiang Qunyu had already grabbed the Soul-Devouring Sword and walked outside the door.

The bright moonlight carried a chill. “If we wait until tomorrow to go, those things might no longer be there.”

The draft blowing through the hall passed by, making the silver bell tied to the Soul-Devouring Sword jingle.

Jiang Qunyu added: “Besides, didn’t you say you wanted to cultivate immortality? There are plenty of things scarier than this in the cultivation world. Just consider it an early experience.”

Hearing this, Wen Xingyao felt Jiang Qunyu was right.

He hesitated no more, raised his foot, and followed Jiang Qunyu.

At midnight, the City Lord’s Mansion was very quiet.

Along the way, they didn’t run into anyone else.

The winding corridor was deep and serene, and the paper lanterns on both sides had long been extinguished.

All that was left was the pale moonlight splashing coldly onto the bluestone slabs, stretching the shadows of the two people long and thin.

Over the past few days, after Wen Xingyao had listened to Jiang Qunyu say so much, combined with his inherently decent talent, he could already try to draw qi into his body.

Jiang Qunyu was afraid he would forget, so while walking on the bluestone path, he had Wen Xingyao perform the incantation and movements for drawing qi once again.

Unfortunately, this was the mortal realm, and spiritual power was truly scarce.

Wen Xingyao had only just condensed a bit of spiritual power at his fingertips when that tiny glimmer flickered like a candle in the wind and scattered again.

But no matter what, he had learned how to do it.

So Jiang Qunyu gave him a sound transmission jade pendant.

The jade pendant felt warm and smooth to the touch, glowing with a faint luminescence in the moonlight.

“Take it.” Jiang Qunyu said, “If you have any matters in the future, use this to find me. Even if I’m just a soul body, I can still talk to you.”

Wen Xingyao took the jade pendant and carefully tucked it into his robes.

“Jiang Qunyu, can you teach me something else?” He asked eagerly, “For instance, if I run into a ghost, something I can use to burn its butt or whatever with fire.”

Jiang Qunyu thought for a moment; he actually knew how to do this.

He was just planning to teach him.

Wei Xun, who had been walking behind the two of them all along, suddenly spoke listlessly: “You are a demon. Are you sure it’s fine for you to teach him?”

Wei Xun tugged out a smile, the moonlight landing on his face, making his pale cheeks look even paler.

His tone carried a trace of an almost imperceptible mockery, “Or are you planning to teach and produce a demon?”

Jiang Qunyu: “…”

It had to be said that Wei Xun was right.

Demonic cultivation and orthodox immortal cultivation took different paths.

The things he was teaching Wen Xingyao now might end up harming him in the future.

He looked at Wen Xingyao and decided it was better not to lead a young person astray.

“Hmm,” Jiang Qunyu said, half-truthfully and half-falsely, “You are still at the beginner stage now; you haven’t even learned how to walk yet. Wait until you reach the Qi Refining stage before learning more.”

Wen Xingyao had no choice but to lay his thoughts to rest.

Jiang Qunyu, however, suddenly thought of something. He used his divine sense to ask Wei Xun: “Spiritual power in the mortal realm is scarce. Why are the people of East Mirror Lake City able to cultivate?”

Not to mention those “human puppets,” even in the cultivation world’s Qianji Sect, manipulating human puppets required using top-grade spirit stones.

How did Cui Mingjin manage it?

And those pieced-together things—how did he make them come back to life?

The group happened to arrive at the back courtyard.

It was autumn in the mortal realm.

The night wind was thick with mist, carrying a chill that was somewhat cold.

Wei Xun stood beneath the eaves, his back figure lonely and aloof like a bamboo.

He raised his head, his cold eyes looking toward Cui Mingjin, who was standing not far away inside the more than half-open courtyard gate.

Curving his lips, his voice was chilling and dead silent: “Who knows. Perhaps it isn’t spiritual power.”

Jiang Qunyu also saw Cui Mingjin.

He seemed to have expected they would come long ago, and was even carrying a green paper lantern in his hand.

The candlelight inside the lantern burned faintly.

With a smile on his lips, he looked at them from a distance.