◎If you don’t want to die, stay as far away from him as possible.◎
Black iron rings clamped around both his wrists, suspending his arms out to either side. A matching ring encircled his neck, with a chain as thick as a bowl extending from it into the depths of the darkness.
He knelt on the ground, head bowed, his disheveled hair veiling his face so completely that his features were impossible to make out.
A loose white robe hung around him. For some unknown reason, it billowed faintly, creating a hazy, indistinct effect.
The chains continued to clatter and scrape. Nangong Yu realized she had been mistaken. It wasn’t the prisoner shaking the chains—the chains were shaking him.
Nangong Yu approached with the bowl in her hands. “Hello?”
As if startled by her voice, the bowed head slowly lifted. His disheveled hair slid to either side, revealing a breathtakingly beautiful face—light and ethereal as clouds, radiant as the moon, distant as lofty mountains, clear and pure as morning dew.
The face was almost too beautiful, yet the strong bones and sharp contours were distinctly masculine, leaving no room for confusion about his gender.
The man raised his face. There was no blood on it. His eyes were clear and gentle, his expression tranquil, as if he were not a prisoner but a bird soaring freely through the clouds.
“Hello?” When he opened his mouth, his voice was unexpectedly deep, magnetic, and pleasing to the ear.
For one brief moment, something stirred in Nangong Yu’s heart. It was like hearing the most moving melody in the world—so soothing she wanted to lose herself in it, and so touching that she felt like crying.
“I was ordered to bring you food.” She gestured at what she was holding. “Do you want to eat?”
The man’s gaze shifted to the bowl, and he nodded.
Nangong Yu crouched down.
Holding the luminous pearl in one hand to light the way, she brought the bowl to the man’s lips with the other and fed him.
The man lowered his head and drank the porridge. His movements were quiet and composed. Though he was a prisoner, he could not conceal his innate elegance.
Nangong Yu took the opportunity to look him over. She discovered that this prisoner NPC seemed to possess a light of his own. Every inch of him—even the strands of his hair—radiated a hazy glow.
He really was gorgeous!
Before long, the man raised his head.
The porridge was gone.
It had been such a small bowl that Nangong Yu could have finished it in three mouthfuls. To serve such a grown man—who, although kneeling, was clearly large and powerfully built—such a meager meal was downright stingy.
Nangong Yu actually began to feel indignant on his behalf.
“Who are you?” she asked. “Why are you locked up here?”
Behind her lay a wall of darkness. Huang Hu had not followed her in.
Taking advantage of the opportunity, she tried to strike up a conversation with the NPC, but the man only said, “You should leave.”
After speaking, he lowered his head again. It was as though holding it up took too much effort; his neck bent at an unnaturally strange angle, and his disheveled hair fell over his face once more.
Affection level insufficient. Unable to trigger event.
“Oh. Goodbye.” Nangong Yu wasn’t the type to force things. She stood up, holding the luminous pearl in one hand and the empty bowl in the other, and walked out.
After making her way through the deep darkness, she returned to the place where the luminous pearl’s glow spread across the chamber.
Huang Hu was already gone.
Nangong Yu pretended to tidy up for a while before leaving.
As for the bloody mud sticking to the soles of her shoes, it looked like it had been there for years. Clearly, it was part of the background and didn’t need cleaning.
She tossed the luminous pearl into her storage space, walked to the entrance, picked up the two pieces of her former colleague, and headed up the stairs.
The door to the secret chamber opened automatically.
Outside, the sky had already grown dark. Nangong Yu couldn’t help wondering whether she had really been inside for that long.
“Little Yu!”
She had just stepped out of the secret chamber when a figure rushed toward her. Nangong Yu recognized the person and stopped short.
“Brother Ruo Zhu.” She looked at him in surprise. “What brings you here?”
Ruo Zhu looked tense, as if she had just emerged from some deadly den. He rushed forward and grabbed both her arms.
When he saw that she was carrying a corpse in each hand, he forcefully pulled them away and threw them aside.
“Are you all right?” His voice trembled faintly.
Nangong Yu blinked and shook her head. “I’m fine, Brother Ruo Zhu. Butler Huang told me to clean the secret chamber. I finished cleaning and came out.”
“You—you didn’t see anything in there, did you?” Ruo Zhu stared at her without blinking.
“There’s someone locked up inside. Brother Ruo Zhu, who is he?”
When Ruo Zhu heard her question, his eyes slowly closed and his lips began to tremble.
The hands gripping her gradually loosened. “We’ll talk after we get back.”
So he did know something?
Nangong Yu had always felt that he knew far more than he should. She pointed at the ground. “Brother Ruo Zhu, this person is from the Spirit Beast Garden. What should we do with him?”
Ruo Zhu glanced at the gruesome, terrifying chunks of corpse on the ground, but not the slightest trace of emotion crossed his face.
“Leave him.”
With that, he rolled up his sleeves, bent down, and picked up the two pieces of corpse. Just like Nangong Yu, he showed no change in expression, as though he were carrying two pieces of wood.
Dragging the two bodies, he returned to the courtyard, opened a door at random, and tossed them inside.
Before Nangong Yu could get a clear look, he closed the door again, lowered his sleeves, and said quietly, “Let’s go.”
Nangong Yu hurried after him.
All the way there, Ruo Zhu’s face remained tightly drawn, and he walked extremely fast.
He didn’t say a word. Nangong Yu began to understand that something was wrong, so she kept silent as well and stayed close at his side.
The two of them passed through the narrow paths. After walking for roughly half an hour, they finally saw the entrance to the Spirit Beast Garden.
“Brother Ruo Zhu, slow down.” Nangong Yu jogged after him, panting from exhaustion.
Ruo Zhu reached back and seized her wrist. He practically dragged her into a run, charging straight into the Spirit Beast Garden.
“We’re here, Brother Ruo Zhu,” Nangong Yu said breathlessly once they entered.
Only then did Ruo Zhu release her hand.
His hand had been trembling violently as he held hers. He now tucked it behind his back.
The Spirit Beast Garden was quiet beneath the night sky. The only sounds in the small courtyard were the uneven breaths of the two of them.
After a long while, when Ruo Zhu’s breathing had somewhat steadied, he asked, “You saw him?”
“The man chained up in there?” Nangong Yu asked. “Yes, I saw him.”
“Did you speak to him?” Ruo Zhu asked.
Nangong Yu blinked. “I said one sentence.”
In the dim light, Ruo Zhu’s expression turned extremely grim. “Then… did you see his face?”
Nangong Yu looked at him and answered honestly, “Butler Huang had me feed him.”
“Damn that Butler Huang—” Ruo Zhu cursed furiously. He clenched his fists and paced back and forth twice. “You can’t go there again.”
Nangong Yu fixed her eyes on him. “Why not?”
“You can’t go there again.” Ruo Zhu stopped and composed himself. “Next time Butler Huang calls for you, tell him you’re not feeling well. I’ll go in your place.”
Nangong Yu’s curiosity was thoroughly piqued. “What’s going on?”
Ruo Zhu didn’t want to tell her, so she said, “Butler Huang may not agree. He’ll probably say that as long as I can still move and I’m not dead, I have to work.”
That certainly sounded like something Butler Huang would say. Ruo Zhu’s expression darkened. “Why did you run back in earlier?”
He had sent her away to get food from the kitchen. She shouldn’t have returned so quickly.
“I was afraid Brother Ruo Zhu would be hungry.” Nangong Yu put on an innocent expression. “Brother Ruo Zhu, what are you worried about? Why don’t I know anything?”
Why was it so difficult to get information out of this NPC?
He was even harder to extract information from than the old lady NPC in Little Swallow Village.
Nangong Yu wasn’t a particularly patient player. She was preparing to resort to more forceful methods when Ruo Zhu finally said, “Do you know how the person you dragged out died?”
“Butler Huang said he did something unnecessary.”
Ruo Zhu said in a low voice, “Because he wanted to save him.”
“No wonder!” Nangong Yu suddenly understood. They had locked that man up so securely, and he had gone to rescue him. Who else would they kill if not him?
Ruo Zhu: “…”
Her reaction seemed a little off.
But remembering that she was rather thickheaded, Ruo Zhu did not think much of it and continued, “The person locked inside is no ordinary man.”
Nangong Yu knew that already. Why would anyone go to such lengths to lock up an ordinary person?
She tipped her head back to look at him, her gaze serious.
“He can bewitch the people around him.” Ruo Zhu’s expression turned warning. “Once they’ve known him for a long time, they’ll fall under his spell and do anything to save him from his misery.”
Nangong Yu thought of the man’s face, which seemed to carry its own soft glow, and his deep, magnetic voice.
She had even been angry that his prison rations were so meager.
“I understand now.” Nangong Yu nodded, looking obedient.
Ruo Zhu relaxed slightly. “In short, don’t look at him, don’t speak to him, and don’t have any unnecessary contact with him.”
After saying this, he added, “And don’t go there again.”
He led her back to their room, lifted the bamboo basket covering the square table, and revealed the dinner he had left for her.
There was a bowl of spirit-rice porridge and two flatbreads. “Eat first.”
Nangong Yu sat down and picked up a flatbread. Ruo Zhu, distracted, asked her, “Do you know what the person before you was like?”
Nangong Yu shook her head.
All she had seen was him being torn in two and casually discarded on the ground.
“I once took him with me to gather honey,” Ruo Zhu said, the corners of his mouth curling with faint sarcasm. “He stole my scent pouch and went into the enclosure that night.”
Nangong Yu immediately grew indignant. “He deserved it! Good riddance!”
Ruo Zhu choked, looking somewhat helpless. “That’s not what I meant.”
Everything in the Spirit-Beast Garden was a treasure.
They could secretly pocket the items and sell them outside without anyone finding out—the masters of the Lin residence never came to the Spirit-Beast Garden.
They either did not care about such trivial details, or simply did not believe that mortals would dare deceive cultivators.
In any case, before Nangong Yu, many servants had passed through the garden. Some stole its treasures, while others split the spoils with the bandit Huang Hu.
“I know you’re hiding things too.” The man who had stolen the scent pouch had warned Ruo Zhu, “I won’t expose you, so don’t expose me either. Otherwise—”
He had been such a selfish, self-serving person.
Yet after Huang Hu took him away to work, it was not long before he changed. He became a “good person” who put others before himself, willing to sacrifice his life and give everything for their sake.
“He’s dangerous.” That was Ruo Zhu’s true purpose in telling her all this. He warned her, “If you don’t want to die, stay as far away from him as possible.”
Whether she wanted to or not, prolonged contact with him would cause her to fall under his spell.
From then on, that person’s life, freedom, and safety would fill her heart and mind. She would do anything to save him from his misery.
“Brother Ruo Zhu…” Nangong Yu studied him thoughtfully.
Clutching the flatbread, she leaned toward him. “Have you fallen under his spell too?”
Nangong Yu remembered what Huang Hu had said at noon: “What? You’ve fallen under his spell too?”
At the time, Nangong Yu had not paid much attention to the words. But now, in a flash of insight, she connected the pieces.
“Why are you hiding honey and the scales of the dragon-patterned spirit carp?” Nangong Yu asked.
The wooden chest he had given Huang Hu contained only a small portion of what they had collected.
The scales of those dragon-patterned spirit carp covered the entire bottom of the lake. How long had he been hiding them?
“Brother Ruo Zhu, what are you hiding these things for?” She stared into his eyes. “You want to save him, don’t you?”
