Chapter 162

Chapter 162

As Hu Yulin spoke, he took a small porcelain vial from his robes and walked toward me.

Liu Junyan frowned. His gaze first fell on the hand I was using to hold on to him.

It was my left hand. Though it was smeared with blood and had a few minor cuts, there was nothing seriously wrong with it.

Then he reached out and pulled my right hand from behind my back.

He spread it over his broad palm. The moment he saw the bloody puncture wound running straight through my palm, his slit pupils contracted. His eyes instantly turned bloodshot as he shot Hu Yulin, who had already approached us, a vicious glare.

Then he threw a punch.

Hu Yulin did not dodge. The blow slammed into the corner of his mouth, drawing blood at once.

I hurriedly grabbed the enraged Liu Junyan and cried, “Stop! He… he…”

I wanted to say Hu Yulin hadn’t done it on purpose, but I simply couldn’t get those words out.

After all, he had ambushed me without hesitation to protect Feng Lishu.

If he hadn’t immediately seen me use Fengwu, none of what followed would ever have happened.

Perhaps after skewering the bones of my hand, he would even have mocked me, just as he had outside Qilin Temple.

The next moment, Hui Moqiong pulled me away.

Through gritted teeth, Hui Moqiong said, “Why are you stopping him, Xiao Jiu’er? Let Seventh Master teach this blind, foolish junior a proper lesson. He deserves it!”

I frowned.

Junior?

How could Hu Yulin be a junior?

He and Liu Junyan had grown up together. They had once been close, and Liu Junyan had trusted him deeply.

But I quickly recalled the battle at Zhu Pan River. Feng Lishu had said that Hu Yulin had been ordered to remain at Yin Mountain and was forbidden from leaving.

That meant Hu Yulin did not hold the highest seniority in the Fox Clan.

Then I thought of the statue enshrined in the Pawnshop’s West Room — the statue of a woman with a fox’s head and a human body.

So the highest-ranking member of the Fox Clan, the one who could stand on equal footing with Hui Moqiong, was not Hu Yulin.

It was a certain woman from their clan.

Liu Junyan was not unreasonable. That punch had been to avenge me, but Hu Yulin had just helped us suppress the Qiongqi Evil Formation and must have suffered internal injuries in the process.

After that single punch, Liu Junyan’s anger was temporarily brought under control.

Hu Yulin wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth and pressed the small porcelain vial into my hand. He gave me a defeated smile. “Ah Li, I’ve been searching for you for so many years.”

The moment he said that, Liu Junyan’s expression darkened.

Almost instinctively, he wrapped an arm around me and once again directed a warning glare at Hu Yulin.

Hu Yulin said sorrowfully, “When I couldn’t find you, I searched for your Lifebound Artifact instead.

“But after all those twists and turns, there you were, standing right in front of me, and I… I had clearly already recognized you… I was the one who met you first…”

“No, you weren’t!” Liu Junyan corrected him. “I was the first to find Xiao Jiu! She’d already been raised under my watch since she was six years old!”

Hu Yulin was momentarily speechless, but his eyes were still brimming with sorrow as he looked at me. “Ah Li, I’ve missed you again, haven’t I?”

“I’m not Ah Li. I’m Xiao Jiu of Wufu Town Pawnshop.”

I didn’t know what drove me to emphasize my identity as Xiao Jiu again and again.

In the past, I had done it because I wanted to draw a clean line between myself and the Jiang Family of Tafeng Village.

But now, I emphasized it because I did not want to go back to being Ah Li.

Because I already knew that the Li in Ah Li was not the Li in Feng Lishu. It was… the Li in Linu.

“All right. I’ll remember. You’re not Ah Li. You’re Xiao Jiu.” Hu Yulin’s voice was steeped in an inescapable sorrow. “Xiao Jiu, I’m sorry.”
A sudden burst of flute music came from outside.

Hui Moqiong’s ears twitched. Gloating, he said, “Your family head is calling for you, Little Fox. Off you go. I won’t see you out.”

Hu Yulin glanced at me, then turned and left.

The flute music faded with his departure.

I watched Hu Yulin’s retreating figure, my heart filled with conflicting emotions.

Liu Junyan tightened his arm around me and said softly, “Stop looking. It’s not as though you’ll never see him again. Come here. Let me tend to your wound first.”

He cleaned the wound, applied medicine, and bandaged it. Only after checking it several times did he say, “Fortunately, none of the bones in your hand were damaged. With some time to recover, it should return to normal. Otherwise, I would have broken one of his hands too, just to avenge you.”

I shook my head. “Someone deliberately set him up and deceived him. There was no way to guard against it.”

“Then how come I wasn’t fooled?” Liu Junyan asked. “I recognized you at first glance.”

I pouted but didn’t dare say what I was thinking. I’d arrived at the Pawnshop when I was six, and yet he hadn’t confirmed my identity until our wedding night, when I was eighteen!

“Seventh Master, it’s time to get to work.” Hui Moqiong stood leaning against the doorway with his arms crossed, watching us with a teasing look.

Liu Junyan rose and went into the Main Hall.

He removed the Red Thread binding the paper effigy, then took the Buddha Eyes from its face.

The instant the Buddha Eyes were removed, the entire paper effigy crumbled into ash. A gust of wind swept through and scattered it.

Only then could Guo Zhen’s soul fully return to her body.

Liu Junyan handed me the Buddha Eyes, then began issuing orders. “Moqiong, take some men to the prison and conduct a thorough sweep. Root out every place harboring filth and corruption.”

Hui Moqiong accepted the order and left immediately.

“Qingying,” Liu Junyan continued, “you’re responsible for reassuring the Townsfolk.”

Li Qingying left as well.

In the end, only Yu Nian and I remained in the courtyard to rest.

I held out the Buddha Eyes to Yu Nian. “Senior Sister, you should keep these Buddha Eyes. They were meant for you in the first place.”

“I can’t protect them,” Yu Nian said. “Xiao Jiu, keep them with you for now. If the day ever comes… I’ll ask you for them.”

I seized the opportunity to ask, “Senior Sister, by now, you should understand that we’re all caught up in this. None of us can stay out of it. So can you finally tell me the truth about Huicheng and what three generations of the Yu Clan have been guarding?”

Yu Nian lowered her head and twisted her fingers together, clearly torn.

“It’s Hundun,” I said. “What you’ve been guarding in Huicheng is the Hundun Evil Formation, isn’t it?”

Yu Nian’s head snapped up. Her empty eye sockets somehow conveyed utter shock.

Her lips trembled. After a long while, she finally relaxed and said, “So you already figured it out.”

“Before today, I never could have,” I said. “But after the Qiongqi Evil Formation appeared, and considering what happened to your eyes, I began to connect it to Hundun. Senior Sister, is the Hundun Evil Formation as restless as this Qiongqi Evil Formation?”

“No. It has always lain dormant,” Yu Nian replied. “Hundun likes to attach itself to those steeped in great evil. It is a blade in its master’s hand, and until the most critical moment, that blade will never strike.”

I frowned. “But it killed Granny Yu and your mother. It even gouged out both your eyes…”

“Years ago, Granny Yu discovered the secret of the Hundun Evil Formation and decided to settle in Huicheng,” Yu Nian recalled. “Our repeated attempts to investigate disturbed the dormant Hundun and brought upon us a catastrophe that wiped out our family. After losing my eyes, I hid among ordinary people, and all these years have passed without further incident…”}