That mysterious person was a shadow guard sent by her beloved, Gu Li, heir to the Marquis of Dingguo, to protect her. The guard had also brought her the antidote to this extremely potent poison, instructing her to use it to save Wei Qing.
This way, she could win Wei Qing over and turn him into an ally.
As the saying goes, after surviving a great ordeal, good fortune will follow. After this near-death experience, Wei Qing was allowed to stay in the capital, and from then on, his career took off. He rose steadily through the ranks, and within less than three years, he reached the second official rank.
Not only was he deeply grateful to Shao Yutong, but he also had long held a special affection for her. Even though he knew she was already betrothed to Gu Li, he remained determined to stand guard by her side, and willingly supported Gu Li, becoming one of his most trusted right-hand men.
Now that Cheng Yao had swooped in and stolen this whole opportunity right from under her nose, she could not help but wonder how furious Shao Yutong must be.
A smirk tugged at the corner of Cheng Yao's mouth as she spoke. "I was just making an analogy. Rest assured, I will never ask you to do anything illegal or morally wrong."
As she said this, she walked over and squatted down. But the moment her fingertips brushed against Wei Qing's wrist to take his pulse, he grabbed her hand in a tight, sudden grip.
He was still on edge, after all.
"Stay still," Cheng Yao said in a firm, low voice. She quickly pulled out a syringe, lifted his outer garment, tugged down his underclothing, and drove the needle steadily into his hip.
"You —!"
Wei Qing was too weak to resist, and could only let her do as she pleased, his heart burning with shame and humiliation.
The moment the needle pierced his skin, the man let out a muffled groan, and the bluish-purple discoloration on his neck and face faded just a little.
Cheng Yao then took out a porcelain vial filled with detoxifying liquid, pried open his jaws, and poured the contents down his throat. "This medicine will temporarily suppress the poison, and keep you alive long enough for us to get out of here."
Wei Qing seemed to have used up the last of his strength. His body went limp, but he still kept a firm hold on the sleeve of her robe.
Cheng Yao had no choice but to half-support, half-carry his heavy body to hold him up.
"We have to get out of here first," she said.
The secret passage was narrow, so she had to be extra careful with every step she took. She had to avoid hidden traps while also keeping the barely conscious Wei Qing in her arms from hurting himself, making the trek extremely arduous.
When she finally reached the entrance, the sound of rapid, approaching footsteps came from behind them. Without a moment's hesitation, she twisted the mechanism. The blue stone slab slammed shut, sealing the angry shouts of their pursuers behind the dark, solid barrier.
It was only when they stepped out onto the open ground that Cheng Yao finally let out a long, relieved breath.
Wei Qing opened his eyes slightly, his gaze falling on Cheng Yao's dust-streaked face. He pulled a book out from inside his robe and whispered two words, "Thank you."
The second the words left his lips, he slipped into complete unconsciousness.
Cheng Yao dragged him to a side room, quietly pulled out a flashlight, and got a clear look at the object. It was a thread-bound book wrapped in oilcloth, its pages yellowed and fragile with age. The faint, blurry ink characters on the cover read *The Village Chronicle of Sunjia'ao*.
The answers were all here!
Cheng Yao fought to contain her excitement as she carefully flipped the book open.
The pages carried a strong, pungent smell of mildew.
The characters on them were written in neat regular script, recording the village's historical evolution, population, farmland, natural disasters, auspicious omens, and other such details.
She flipped through the pages quickly, and finally, at the very end of the chapter titled "Strange Occurrences", she spotted a few pages that had clearly been added later, written in a completely different handwriting, that caught her eye.
"... In the third year of Shengwu, a severe drought struck. The sun scorched the land until it cracked, rivers ran dry, crops withered to crisp, and the people had no way to survive. All prayers for rain went unanswered, until a shaman said that Lord River God must be appeased, and that to make the rain come, a living human must be sacrificed as a thanks offering..."
"... The village chief led all 108 villagers to kneel by the river, refusing to rise. That very night, heavy rain finally fell, and the drought was broken. The villagers then selected three vagrants from outside the village, tied them to the riverside rocky shoal at midnight, and used sharp blades to cut out their hearts, offering their blood as a sacrifice to Lord River God..."
"... But this method goes against the natural order of heaven, so it was kept a closely guarded secret, passed down only verbally from village chief to village chief, never to be used again unless there was no other choice..."
The icy, sharp words were like awls, stabbing straight into the heart.
A hundred-year drought, and they were offering living sacrifices to the heavens!
This was far from the first time.
The villagers of Sunjia'ao had been using this cruel ritual to thank the River God every time their rain-praying efforts succeeded.
And after the heavy downpour that just fell, they were convinced it was all Lord River God's doing.
Their exiled convoy had become their target.
The so-called "evil spirit claiming lives" was nothing more than a ruse they had forged with special tools, meant to cover up the truth of their human sacrifices!
Just then, from the direction of the manor gate, the faint sound of hushed voices drifted over.
Cheng Yao held her breath, quietly shuffling behind a broken section of wall to peek outside.
Through the curtain of rain, she spotted that hunched figure — Village Chief Sun — standing right at the courtyard gate. He held no umbrella, letting the rain soak through his graying hair.
He tilted his head slightly, gazing up at the pitch-black sky, and stretched out his gnarled fingers to count one by one.
The cold, damp night wind carried his hoarse, greed-laced murmur over, fragmented but feeling like poison-tipped needles, pricking one by one into Cheng Yao's eardrums:
"One, two, three... Hm, six the night before last, one dragged away today, only one left... Round it up... we're still three short... This rain came just in time, Lord River God, we've kept you waiting, these three sacrificial offerings will be brought to you soon..."
For a split second as lightning streaked across the sky, a near-frenzied, cruel grin flickered across Village Chief Sun's face.
Another bolt of lightning tore through the night, briefly illuminating this living hell on earth.
Thunder rolled in right after, sounding like countless wronged souls beating war drums high above the clouds.
They were still three short!
His goal was to use enough human lives to sate the belly of the fictional Lord River God he had made up.
Cheng Yao felt a chill run through her. These ignorant villagers treated human life like grass and dirt, they were dreadful lunatics!
But the people working in the shadows had almost figured out the whole truth of the matter. It was about time for them to make their move.
Whether it was Zhan Haoting's people or Gu Li, neither would stand by and watch more members of the Zhan household die.
Cheng Yao had barely finished that thought when she heard Village Chief Sun let out a scream. A dagger shot through the air and buried itself in his knee. He shrieked and fell to his knees, his whole body trembling.
Right after that, the sound of fighting broke out both inside and outside the house. A man in black led Shao Yutong, who was crouched low, hurrying toward the direction of the firewood shed.
Cheng Yao glanced back at Wei Qing.
The bluish-purple discoloration on his body had completely faded, and his aura was a little stronger now, though there was still residual poison in his system.
Shao Yutong had the antidote that could completely purge the remaining poison out of him. She had to get that antidote — she could never let Shao Yutong earn even the slightest bit of gratitude from him.
Cheng Yao pulled on a mask to cover her nose and mouth, and teleported right in front of Shao Yutong. With one precise, swift strike of her hand blade, she knocked the girl unconscious. Then she teleported behind the man in black, and with a thought, a knife appeared in her hand, stabbing straight for the man's back.
She had fought her way through the end times and drunk plenty of spiritual spring water, so her movements were several times faster than an ordinary person's. But this man in black was a top-tier expert in this world, with extraordinary martial skill, and her speed was still half a beat slower than his.
The man in black twisted to dodge her knife, the cold blade grazing past his body. He flicked his wrist, and three hidden bone-piercing nails flew out in an instant, heading straight for the major acupoints at Cheng Yao's knees and shoulder.
But before he knew it, his eyes blurred, and Cheng Yao had vanished from where she stood.
The man in black was seized by shock. In that split second, completely caught off guard, a searing pain exploded in his back. He muffled a groan, twisted his body, and pushed off the ground to leap backward. The dagger in Cheng Yao's hand sliced through the moonlight in a cold, sharp arc, stabbing straight toward his waist.
Instead of dodging, the man in black suddenly clamped his left hand tight around the blade of the dagger, while his right hand moved swiftly to snap toward Cheng Yao's wrist. The moment his fingertips brushed her wrist, he tensed the bones in his hand to apply force -- only to find that Cheng Yao was nowhere to be seen before him.
Could there really be a ghost?
The man in black had never encountered such an uncanny incident before, and fear completely took over his mind.
