215: Chapter 213 Curse Killing

The Second Prince sat in the main hall, with a pile of newly delivered secret reports in front of him.

He read them one by one, tearing each one up after finishing and throwing them onto the floor.

The floor was already covered with a thick layer of shredded paper, as if it had snowed.

His expression was terrifyingly gloomy, so much so that the attendants by his side didn't even dare to breathe loudly.

He hadn't closed his eyes for several days; his eyes were bloodshot, his eye sockets were sunken, his cheekbones protruded, and he looked as if he had aged ten years.

News from Qingyao City had arrived.

The Fox Clan Chief, Nascent Soul Perfection, captured.

Hundreds of the Fox Race, arrested.

Xue Ji, defected.

His face looked even worse; he gripped the secret report, his knuckles turning white, and the paper slowly deformed between his fingers, crumpling into a ball.

He stood up abruptly and slammed the secret report onto the ground.

"Useless!" he roared. "A bunch of useless trash!"

He had known long ago that the Yao Race was unreliable.

Those foxes were respectful to him on the surface, but secretly harbored their own agendas.

They helped him not because of who he was, but because he could give them what they wanted: territory, resources, and power. If he gave them those things, they helped him. If he didn't, they would go to someone else. It was a transaction, not loyalty. He had never trusted them, but he hadn't expected them to be so useless.

A Clan Chief at Nascent Soul Perfection and an Early Nascent Soul Stage Xue Ji—two Nascent Souls, gone just like that.

They were snatched away like little chicks without even making a splash.

"Someone, come!" he shouted.

A guard entered the door and knelt on one knee, head lowered, not daring to look at him.

"Pass down the order," the Second Prince's voice was as cold as ice. "Execute every member of the Fox Race in the Prince's Mansion. Leave none alive."

The guard's body trembled.

He opened his mouth as if to say something, but swallowed it back down.

He stood up and turned to walk out.

"Wait."

A voice came from outside the door.

A middle-aged man walked in, wearing a grey Daoist robe. He had a lean face and a long beard in three strands, giving him a somewhat transcendent, immortal air.

He was the Sect Master of the Xuanzhou Sect, surnamed Li, given name Shan.

The Xuanzhou Sect was a small Sect known for its curse techniques; it didn't have many disciples, but it held a special status in the Second Prince's camp.

Curse techniques were of little use on a direct battlefield, but they could achieve unexpected results in the shadows.

Li Shan walked up to the Second Prince and cupped his hands in a salute.

"Your Highness, please calm your anger," he said, his voice neither fast nor slow. "It would be a pity to kill these Fox Race members. Why not leave them to me to make the best use of them?"

The Second Prince looked at him with a cold gaze. "How do you intend to use them?"

Li Shan smiled. "My Sect has a curse technique called the 'Thousand-Mile Soul-Chasing Curse'. It can curse and kill an enemy from ten thousand miles away. The caster must sacrifice Lifespan; the more that is sacrificed, the better the effect of the curse. The higher the cultivation level, the higher the success rate of the curse kill. A Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator using the Lifespan of another Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator as a sacrifice is enough to curse and kill someone of the same rank. However, there is one condition—the essence blood of the target is required. The most ideal is Heart's Blood, followed by fingertip blood, and then hair, nails, skin flakes, and the like. In short, there must be biological tissue from the target for the curse to take effect."

The Second Prince was silent for a moment.

He didn't have even a single drop of Yun Ming's essence blood. That Alchemist lived in seclusion and never left Qingyao City; the several groups he had sent hadn't even been able to get close. Hair? Nails? Skin flakes? Even more impossible. That person lived as if inside an iron barrel; he couldn't even get a single strand of hair.

His gaze fell on the pile of secret reports on the table, on the words 'Qingyao City', and on the report stating 'Xue Ji defected'.

His gaze grew even colder.

"Xue Ji," he spoke in a very low voice. "I wounded her a few days ago, so her blood should still be around. Can you use her blood to curse and kill her?"

Li Shan was stunned for a moment, then smiled. "Your Highness is brilliant. A blood-kin curse kill is more effective than a distant relative curse kill. The blood of the same race is more effective than the blood of a different race. One's own blood is the most effective. Using Xue Ji's blood to curse and kill Xue Ji has an extremely high success rate. As long as Your Highness can provide her blood, I am ninety percent certain."

The Second Prince signaled to a maid. She turned and went into the inner chamber, and after a moment, she came out holding an outer robe.

The robe was black, with a large patch of dark red bloodstains on it that had already dried and turned blackish.

"Is this enough?"

Li Shan took the robe, examined the bloodstains carefully, and nodded. "It's enough. This blood is sufficient to cast the technique." He put the robe into his Storage Pouch and cupped his hands toward the Second Prince. "Please wait, Your Highness. I will go back and prepare immediately. There will surely be a result within three days."

The Second Prince nodded.

Li Shan turned and quickly walked out of the main hall.

The Second Prince stood in the empty hall, looking at the shredded paper on the floor and the indentation left by the robe for a long time.

In the following days, Yun Ming's small courtyard was as quiet as usual.

Xue Ji no longer went out; she locked herself in her room, reading Storybooks, writing things, occasionally coming out to pour a cup of water before returning.

Her desk was piled with all sorts of Storybooks—some bought, some borrowed, and some dug out from the City Lord's Mansion's library.

She read them one by one, very quickly, but forgot them as soon as she finished, remembering nothing.

She felt bored and didn't know what to do.

She tried writing her own story, but couldn't continue after writing a few lines.

She found that her writing style was too poor; the things she wrote were dry, like dried salted fish, without any flavor.

She went to find Yun Ming.

Yun Ming was reading the newspaper in the courtyard. She pulled up a small stool and sat beside him, her hands propping up her chin as she tilted her head to look at him.

"Tell me a story," she said.

Yun Ming put down the newspaper and glanced at her. "Haven't I already told you so many? Go read your Storybooks."

"Storybooks aren't good," Xue Ji pouted. "None of them are as good as your stories."

Yun Ming sighed, put down the newspaper, and took a sip from his teacup. He thought for a moment and decided to tell a long one.

Dream of the Red Chamber.

He told it very slowly, only one chapter a day.

It wasn't that he didn't want to tell more, but he felt that this work needed to be savored slowly; if told too quickly, it would lose its flavor.

Xue Ji started listening very seriously, but later she became restless.

She complained that Yun Ming was telling it too slowly, only one chapter a day, which left her heart itching with curiosity.

She began pestering Yun Ming to tell more chapters.

Yun Ming ignored her, so she made a fuss. But fussing was useless; Yun Ming still only told one chapter a day.

Xue Ji got anxious.

She began to find ways to please Yun Ming.

She served Yun Ming tea and water, brewing the tea to just the right strength and temperature. She cracked melon seeds for him, picking out the kernels and arranging them neatly on a small plate. She cleaned the courtyard for him, wiping the stone table until it could reflect a person's image and sweeping away every single fallen leaf. She even learned to look after the medicine garden, watering, loosening the soil, and removing pests from the Spirit Medicine, doing it all quite skillfully.

Yun Ming found her changes amusing but didn't show it on his face.

"Only if you're obedient will there be stories to hear," he said. And Xue Ji really did become obedient.

Yun Ming told her about Lin Daiyu entering the Jia Mansion, Jia Baoyu's dream journey to the Land of Illusion, Granny Liu entering the Grand View Garden, Daiyu burying flowers, Baochai chasing butterflies, Qingwen tearing fans, and Baoyu being beaten.

Xue Ji was mesmerized; sometimes she forgot to drink her tea or eat her melon seeds, just sitting there blankly, her eyes fixed on Yun Ming without blinking.

One day, Yun Ming asked her to go buy groceries.

She went out alone.

She thought she would be fine by herself; it wasn't like she hadn't been out before. Moreover, she wasn't wearing that cicada-wing-thin gauze dress now, nor was she wearing heavy makeup, and she wasn't using the Lianxiang Cup or Qingluo Ruanyan. She wore plain green clothes, her hair was tied up casually, and she wore no makeup, showing her natural face.

She thought this way she wouldn't attract attention.

But as she walked on the street, men still looked at her.

It wasn't just because she was beautiful, but because there was something indescribable about her.

That thing wasn't a Charm Technique or mere beauty; it was a natural attraction belonging to the Fox Race that emanated from her very bones.

As she walked, people followed her the whole way.

Some watched from a distance, some approached to strike up a conversation, and some even reached out to pull at her. She shook one off, and another came. She cursed one away, and another came. By the time she reached the vegetable market, over a dozen people were following her. After she finished buying groceries and headed back, even more people were behind her. She quickened her pace, and the people behind her did the same. She began to run, and they ran too.

By the time she ran back to the small courtyard, dozens of people were following her.

Those people stood at the courtyard gate; some knocked on the door, some shouted, and some even tried to climb over the wall.

Shen Yizhi happened to be at the City Lord's Mansion. Hearing that Yun Ming's small courtyard was being surrounded, he rushed over and was caught between laughter and tears at the sight.

He had the soldiers of the Patrol Camp disperse the crowd and posted a notice on the courtyard gate that read 'Private Residence, No Unauthorized Entry'.

Xue Ji hid in the house, not daring to come out.

Yun Ming looked at Shen Yizhi, and Shen Yizhi looked at Yun Ming; the two exchanged a glance and both laughed.

From then on, Yun Ming never dared to let Xue Ji go out alone again.

The days passed one by one like this.

This evening, Yun Ming sat on a bamboo chair in the courtyard. Xue Ji pulled up a small stool and sat beside him, her hands propping up her chin as she tilted her head to look at him. On the stone table sat a pot of tea and a small plate of melon seeds; the tea was ordinary, but the seeds were mystic pattern jade seed sunflowers. Yun Ming picked up his teacup, took a sip, set it down, and cleared his throat.

"Today I'll tell the twenty-third chapter," he said. "The Romance of the Western Chamber's clever words convey playful banter, and the Peony Pavilion's beautiful songs alert the fragrant heart."

Xue Ji's eyes lit up.

Just as Yun Ming was about to speak, Xue Ji's body suddenly stiffened.

Her eyes widened, her pupils contracted violently, and her face instantly turned deathly pale.

Her body began to tremble as if being torn apart from the inside.

Her hands clutched her chest, her nails digging into her flesh until blood seeped out.

Her mouth opened as if to scream, but no sound came out. A rasping sound came from her throat, as if she were being strangled. Her body slid off the stool and collapsed onto the ground, curling into a ball.

Yun Ming stood up abruptly.

He threw down the teacup in his hand and crouched down to support Xue Ji. Her body was icy, as cold as a block of ice.

Her breathing was rapid and weak, her pulse was erratic, and her spiritual energy was racing wildly through her Meridians as if being chased by something with nowhere to escape. Her eyes were half-open, her pupils dilated, and her consciousness had already begun to blur.