Chapter 89

Chapter 89

Was there any daughter in this world who didn’t love her mother?

There had been a brief time when my mother loved me, too.

But I still remembered with painful clarity the look of loathing in her eyes when I was nine.

I had also never forgotten the rules Granny laid down when my grandmother pawned me to her as a Dead Pawn.

The mistake I made at nine was not one I would make again at eighteen.

My strictly businesslike, emotionless question made her freeze for a moment.

Then she lowered her head, rubbed her hands together, and said, “Tongtong, we’ve moved. We’re in the town right next to Wufu Town now. Xinxin and Ah Bao will be transferring to a school in town soon too. They’ve both been talking about their big sister. Your father also said that moving into a new house is a happy occasion, and our family should be together, so I came today to take you home. There’s a room for you in the new house.”

As she spoke, she reached out to take my hand, but I dodged her.

I repeated the same words. “I am Xiao Jiu, the manager of the Pawnshop. The Pawnshop mainly handles redemption and pawn transactions. We also run a Funeral Supplies Shop, with a full range of funeral goods available. Do you need anything?”

Her face paled. She glanced toward the Funeral Supplies Shop, then instinctively shifted a little closer to me, as if deeply wary of it.

On the front porch of the Funeral Supplies Shop stood two paper horses. They were snow-white from head to hoof, with only a piece of red paper pasted on each forehead. Seeing them unexpectedly really could give someone a fright.

I had made them a few days ago.

Orders for paper effigies and paper horses at the Funeral Supplies Shop were usually urgent. Some customers needed them on the spot, so whenever I had nothing to do, I would make a couple in advance and leave them there, just in case.

After steadying herself, she said again, “Tongtong, I know you blame Mom for not protecting you back then, but your fate truly was too fierce. I… I had no choice.”

I really wanted to say that Master Hui Quan had read my fate for me, and it wasn’t nearly that fierce.

I also wanted to ask her: back then, you all couldn’t avoid me fast enough, so why aren’t you afraid of me now?

But in the end, I said nothing.

Since I had no intention of having anything more to do with the Jiang Family, what was the point of dwelling on all that?

It would only trouble me for nothing.

“Since you have no business with us, I won’t keep you company.” After saying that, I went to the back to eat breakfast.

Li Qingying saw her out for me.

I didn’t know when she left. By the time I finished breakfast and came back, the fruit and the princess dress on the coffee table were gone.

Li Qingying looked at me cautiously. “Xiao Jiu, are you all right?”

“I’m fine.” I smiled at her, then sat behind the counter and started scrolling on my phone.

I was distracted the whole time, though. At first, I was just irritated, but the more I thought about it, the more something felt off.

So many years had passed, and they had avoided me like a Snake or scorpion.

Now that my life had finally gotten a little better, why had they suddenly remembered me?

If they had only come to see me, that would have been one thing. But they even planned to take me back and had prepared a separate room for me?

I couldn’t help feeling uneasy.

But after another thought, I let it go.

If they truly still cared about me and wanted to acknowledge me, they wouldn’t have come without doing any homework first. Even if they had secretly come to Wufu Town and watched me from afar, they never would have bought me a princess dress like that.

I shook my head, forced myself to stop overthinking, and scrolled on my phone for a while. Then I saw a news article about Huicheng. Recently, the two major families of Huicheng, the Song Family and the Tang Family, seemed to be at each other’s throats. Tang Ao had made Yin-Yang digs at the Song Family several times on treasure appraisal shows, and the Song Family had also caused no small amount of trouble for the Tang Family behind the scenes.

I quickly took a screenshot and sent it to Tang Tang.

Tang Tang replied very soon. “It’s fine. Small stuff. It’s just one little Song Family. My dad can handle it.”

Then she immediately started a video call.

As soon as I picked up, Tang Tang said, “Hey, Junior Sister, I actually have something I wanted to tell you.”
I asked, “What is it?”

Tang Tang waved her phone toward the area behind her.

Behind her, Song Ruoqing was sitting in front of a huge floor-to-ceiling window, a drawing board set before her as she painted with complete focus.

Tang Tang straightened the phone and turned the camera back on herself.

She said, “Something seems to have happened over at the Song Family. Yesterday, they invited Uncle Huo over, and that Annoying Person went with him.”

“Annoying Person?” I was puzzled for a second, then immediately realized who she meant. “Bai Jingmo?”

Tang Tang nodded. “Yes, him.”

“Why would the Song Family suddenly invite both of them over for no reason?” I asked. “Could they be asking about Song Ruoqing?”

“Uncle Huo keeps his mouth shut tight. Don’t worry,” Tang Tang said. “I’m more inclined to think someone in the Song Family has fallen ill, and not with any ordinary illness. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have invited Uncle Huo so easily.”

I thought about it, then suddenly understood. “The Song Family wanted to offer Song Ruoqing to Wangting Mountain as a Sacrifice, but we interfered. The Sacrifice failed, so now they’re facing retribution?”

“See? This is why our Xiao Jiu is so smart,” Tang Tang said with a laugh. “That’s what I think too. If nothing unexpected happens, the Song Family is probably in for a world of bad luck.”

I quickly blinked at her and pointed behind her.

Seriously, she had no sense of caution. If Song Ruoqing heard that, she would inevitably feel awful.

Tang Tang giggled twice and lowered her voice. “It’s fine. After going through life and death, what is there left to be hung up on? Hey, Xiao Jiu, why don’t I bring Qingqing over to your place for a few days? Let your man treat us to dinner and karaoke.”

“Doesn’t Miss Song still need her medicinal baths?” I asked.

Tang Tang slapped her forehead in frustration. “Oh, right. She still has four or five more days to soak. We really can’t go for now.”

I smiled. “There will be plenty of chances later.”

After chatting with Tang Tang for a while longer, even my mood improved considerably.

Once I hung up the video call, I was just about to exit the page when I saw that Jin Wuya had also sent me a message.

“Emergency rescue needed from the martial world, Shopkeeper Xiao Jiu. Help me take a look at what this is.”

Below the message was a photo.

The photo showed a piece of bone. It looked like the raised bony tumor section in the middle of a spine, but it wasn’t human. It should have belonged to some kind of animal.

I zoomed in and looked it over several times before realizing that something seemed to be hidden inside the bony growth.

I immediately replied to Jin Wuya: What is stuffed inside the bone tumor?

He answered very quickly: It looks like a piece of paper with writing on it, but it’s been too long, and it’s stuck inside the bone. I can’t get it out, and I can’t see it clearly either.

I turned my phone screen brightness all the way up, enlarged the picture to the maximum, and carefully examined it several more times.

Before I could make anything of it, a voice suddenly sounded behind me. “If I’m not mistaken, this is Cat Bone. The writing inside… is scripture?”

I was startled.

When I turned around, I found myself looking straight at Liu Junyan’s face.

I had no idea when he had arrived. At that moment, he was bent over, his cheek almost pressed against mine, though his eyes were fixed very seriously on the phone screen.

Today, he was wearing a set of white casual clothes, the collar slightly open. I saw a fresh blood mark on his neck, about half a finger long.

Without thinking, I tugged his collar open and leaned in to take a closer look. Only then did I realize there wasn’t just one.

I counted them. There were six in total, evenly distributed from right to left. But perhaps because of the angle from which the other party had struck, the wounds varied from deep to shallow and were not uniform.

These marks clearly weren’t scratches or anything of the sort. They looked more like they had been made by some kind of special weapon.

What could it be?

I opened my mouth, just about to ask, when I saw the corners of Liu Junyan’s lips curve upward. He was looking at me with smiling eyes.

In that gaze, amid the joy, there seemed to be a trace of… smugness?