Chapter 139 - 99: Bai Xiang’s Kill

Chapter 139: Chapter 99: Bai Xiang’s Kill

’There, there, good boy. You must be hungry. Mother will go make you something to eat.’

’Hmph, hmph.’

’That should make him back down, right?’

But to her surprise, Jiang Mu leaned in closer. "Mother, I don’t want to eat a meal."

He paused, and under Bai Xiang’s suddenly wary gaze, he slowly finished his sentence:

"I want to nurse."

"!!!"

Bai Xiang’s beautiful eyes flew wide, and she looked as if she’d been struck by lightning.

’Wait a minute...’

’Can a person really be this shameless?!’

Seeing Jiang Mu actually press his head toward her chest, posturing as if he were "looking for a meal," Bai Xiang finally lost her composure. Her face paled with fright as she stumbled backward, utterly mortified and furious.

’That bastard! That scoundrel!’

Seeing the woman retreat in defeat, Jiang Mu burst out laughing. "Little Xiang’Er," he said smugly, "now you know how formidable your master is, don’t you?"

Bai Xiang gritted her teeth, wishing she could pounce on him and bite him to death.

’Fine, I concede!’

’I have never met such a brazen, shameless person!’

Jiang Mu knew when to quit while he was ahead. He dropped his cheeky grin and opened his arms again.

"Actually... when I was dying, what I really thought was, ’If only I could hold you a little longer.’"

"So from today on, a daily hug is mandatory."

"Come, let your master give you a hug."

Bai Xiang knew he was most likely just teasing again.

But unlike before, she didn’t back away. This time, she stood her ground, neither moving nor dodging.

She let the man walk up and pull her into a tight embrace.

’As for why she didn’t dodge...’

’The reason was simple.’

’He’d already held her during the fireworks, after all.’

’Was there really any difference between being held once and being held a hundred times?’

’Besides, as long as she held her ground and didn’t let this annoying man’s hands wander, it wouldn’t count as a loss.’

The distinctly masculine scent of the man filled her senses, mixed with the faint smell of medicinal herbs and a hint of blood.

Bai Xiang’s heart softened slightly, and she sighed inwardly.

She slowly raised her hands and gently wrapped them around Jiang Mu’s waist.

Using the cover of the embrace, her right hand quietly formed a hand seal.

A vibrant, glowing green speck of light coalesced at her fingertips and, like a gentle spring rain nourishing the earth, silently entered Jiang Mu’s body.

Withered Wood Revives Spring Skill.

This seed, brimming with life force, would help him recover from his injuries more quickly.

While she did this, her left hand was not idle.

Her fingertips lightly brushed over the wound on his abdomen, drawing out a wisp of an aura.

It was a remnant of the murderous aura left behind when Beitang Batian had stabbed Jiang Mu, tinged with traces of karma.

Jiang Mu, for his part, behaved himself. He just held her quietly, his nose taking in the light, elegant fragrance of her hair, before letting go a moment later.

"Alright, we’ve had our hug, and now this master is really hungry."

Jiang Mu patted his stomach. "Hurry up and make some food. I’m going back to my room to sleep for a bit. Call me when it’s ready."

With that, he yawned and turned to head back to his room.

Bai Xiang watched him go and secretly shook her small fist at his back.

...

Arriving in the kitchen, the aura around Bai Xiang changed completely.

She was no longer the gentle Little Chef, but the lofty and majestic Empress.

She pinched her fingers together, concentrating the wisp of murderous aura she had extracted at their tips.

With a flicker of her thoughts, a hazy golden radiance emerged from her palm, enveloping the wisp of killing intent.

The flowing golden light cast shifting shadows across her face.

"Hm? There’s zombie Evil Qi, and the demonic yin energy of the Ghost Sect..."

Bai Xiang’s slender brows arched slightly.

’It wasn’t strange for Jiang Mu, a Demon Slayer Envoy, to be tainted with such things.’

’But what was strange was that, even with the karmic senses of her Emperor and Empress Star Position, she couldn’t directly lock onto the source of this aura.’

She could only vaguely sense that the other party had used some kind of extremely profound Secret Skill to obscure the workings of fate.

"They used a clever possession and grafting technique to conceal their own karma."

"It seems we have a rat with a few tricks up its sleeve."

Bai Xiang snorted coldly.

’Anyone else would have been at a dead end here.’

’But she was Bai Xiang, the Empress of the Star Positions. She had her own methods.’

Bai Xiang raised her hands, her ten slender fingers moving as if plucking flowers or stroking a zither, and began to form profound Dharma Seals.

As the Dharma Seals changed, threads woven from Star Power, like water seeping into every crack, began to peel away the layers of disguise on the wisp of murderous aura...

Revealing a tiny black dot.

"Hm? Beyond my range... It seems they’ve already fled Hu State City."

"Hmph. Even if I can’t kill you, you’ll still have to pay a price."

"Who told you to hurt him!"

Bai Xiang’s gaze turned cold. She suddenly clapped her hands together, trapping the now-unmasked wisp of murderous aura firmly in her palm.

Then, she rubbed her hands together forcefully!

Closing her eyes, she parted her vermilion lips and uttered a single word:

"Break!"

With that soft cry,

a gentle breeze seemed to sweep through the kitchen, and in the sky outside, a star seemed to flicker and die for the briefest of moments.

After all this, Bai Xiang let out a soft breath. Her face was slightly pale, and she subconsciously steadied herself against the nearby countertop, showing a hint of exhaustion.

She raised a hand to rub her chest, murmuring to herself,

"As I thought... my Star Position is growing more unstable. Using a Secret Technique like this to trace a source and break through barriers is actually this taxing..."

"Sigh, I really am in that guy’s debt."

...

...

「In a hidden cave several dozen li outside the city.」

"Hah..."

A voluptuously-figured woman kicked aside the desiccated corpse of a man at her feet, her charming face flushed with a rosy glow.

She picked up a Token from the ground and looked at it.

"A disciple of the Divine Sword Sect... Heh, no wonder he had such pure Sword Intent. A perfect supplement for this venerable one."

Beitang Batian’s mood finally improved a little.

She had thought finding a Cultivation Companion would be difficult, but to her surprise, she had run into a passing Divine Sword Sect disciple not long after fleeing the city.

After using just a little Bewitching Skill, the boy was completely infatuated and took the bait.

"Indeed, in some respects, being a woman does have its natural advantages."

She sneered, her tone complex.

Beitang Batian’s gaze turned toward Hu State City, and a ferocious, cold light suddenly shot from those bewitching eyes.

"You little brat, if you were lucky enough to survive, this venerable one will find you sooner or later! When I do, I’ll make you—"

Before she could finish, Beitang Batian’s expression changed drastically as a massive sense of crisis welled up in her heart.

"Not good!"

She subconsciously tried to form a seal and escape.

However—

It was too late.

"PUH!!"

She spewed a large mouthful of blood, as if struck in the chest by an invisible sledgehammer, and was sent flying backward to slam heavily against the cave wall.

BOOM!

Falling rubble buried the lower half of her body.

"Cough, cough, cough..."

A long while later, she struggled to crawl out, her hair disheveled, her face a mask of terror and confusion.

’What happened?!’

’I clearly grafted all the karma onto that corpse and used a technique to obscure the workings of fate, so how could I still have been tracked?!’

’This power...’

’It strikes the Divine Soul directly, ignoring space!’

’Who was it?!’

’Could it be that woman, Shangguan Luoxue?!’

Feeling the crack reappear in her Divine Soul, which she had only just managed to stabilize, and seeing it now on the verge of collapse,

Beitang Batian, overcome with grief and fury, tilted her head to the sky and roared:

"You monster!"

"I’ve already hidden all the way out here, and you still won’t let me go?!"

She didn’t dare to linger. Scrambling to her feet, she stumbled out of the cave and broke into a frantic sprint, running as far away from Hu State City as she could.

’I have to escape!’

’The farther, the better!’