Chapter 99

Lin Du could see clearly that for Granny Ma, the distinction between righteous and evil paths was irrelevant. As long as someone could kill Gu masters and Gu insects for her, they were useful and could be cured.

What she could not tolerate the most was that those she had healed would harbor and even nurture Gu masters, allowing them to wreak havoc without restraint.

Granny Ma accepted Lin Du’s promise and, seeing her clear, unwavering eyes, knew that disciples of the Supreme Sect were generally a bunch of foolish sticklers for rules. Even if Lin Du seemed slick and clever, a disciple of that group was likely a fool at heart. Adherence to sect rules and prohibitions was a given; she would not deceive her.

Granny Ma turned to leave. “I will be leaving in the morning. Do what you need to do; it has nothing to do with me. After you remove the vines, give them to me, and I will dispose of them.”

Lin Du thought that the term “vines” probably referred to more than just the ones in the village and acknowledged her.

As Granny Ma took a step away, she suddenly turned back. “The spell marks on you are almost unable to contain the demonic energy.”

She was speaking to Wei Zhi.

During the day, she had deliberately made things difficult for this group of fools, and at night, she ended up encountering a dragon.

A dragon dressed as a monk, no less.

Some offhand remarks turned out to be true prophecies.

The disciples of the Supreme Sect were indeed quite strange.

The last of the four statements might have actually turned out to be true.

Granny Ma was leaving casually when Lin Du called out to her.

A closed iron folding fan suddenly opened, revealing seven or eight flowers, all freshly blasted from the Moonlight Vine.

As Lin Du used her spiritual power to gather the flowers, she also used frost to shape them. Under the moonlight, the fan’s surface shimmered with a spectrum of colors, frost and snow falling like delicate blossoms, the flowers on the fan appearing like fragile, lustrous glass.

“I saw you gather a flower earlier. Do you need these?”

Since these were spiritual vines, the flowers were indeed useful.

Granny Ma paused for a moment, then took the flowers without saying a word and slowly walked away.

Wei Zhi watched Lin Du’s actions and suddenly smiled.

For some reason, Lin Du seemed to have an instinctive compassion for the suffering of others. She might not agree with Granny Ma, but her empathy for women’s suffering always seemed to resonate deeply.

Even though Granny Ma had not spoken about it, and Lin Du had not asked thoroughly, it was likely that such people, carrying so much, would either harm themselves over time or… find an outlet for their frustrations.

Without the Supreme Sect’s regulations and prohibitions, Lin Du’s murderous intent might not be any less than that of evil spirits.

Lin Du turned around and saw a monk with a somewhat… kind smile.

He might not have looked particularly kind, but he was much taller than Lin Du, peering down at her. His bamboo hat concealed the light in his eyes, which were not very monk-like, giving him an air of serene silence.

He indeed carried a bit of the monk’s aura of universal benevolence.

“Why didn’t I detect your demonic aura?” Lin Du frowned, feeling a bit weak.

“You couldn’t detect it because you are a human cultivator,” Wei Zhi replied, shifting his gaze away. “She can detect it because she is also an anomaly.”

Granny Ma was not human; she was a corpse king, existing beyond the Six Paths.

So, she controlled corpses without needing to be physically present, only requiring a spell mark to summon them.

Lin Du was taken aback. “But is it… the spiritual energy and fragrance of the spiritual vine covering it?”

Wei Zhi nodded. “Indeed. The silver bracelet she wears also has a cleansing fragrance, using spiritual energy and floral scents to mask the corpse’s aura.”

Lin Du made an “oh” sound and turned to look at the spiritual vine that had reappeared, now showing some restless killing intent.

Wei Zhi urged, “Leave this to me. You should go find your senior sister.”

Lin Du didn’t move. “My senior sister is probably still on her way in some corner of Yunnan.”

“Then go find your… junior nephews,” Wei Zhi said, “Adults handle things; children shouldn’t stay here.”

After entering the cultivation world, Lin Du had acted recklessly, using her status as a child. She was about to protest that she wasn’t a child, but then she remembered her earlier remark about being young and playful, so she silently closed her mouth, put away her fan, and left without looking back.

Wei Zhi watched as the child left. Originally, she walked very steadily and quietly, but now she was tiptoeing, looking nonchalant and acting like a young dandy.

Suddenly, something was thrown at Wei Zhi from a distance. He instinctively caught it, only to find it was a glass lantern. It illuminated the well with a bright light.

Although high-level cultivators could see well in any light, he still caught it steadily, looked around, and, finding no place to put it, held it in his hand.

Lin Du had initially entered through a window, but for some reason, the window was now closed. Lin Du, holding her breath, went to the front door, pulled on it, and with a bit of force, managed to pull the door off its hinges, causing it to fall outward.

Lin Du reflexively reached out with the other hand, grabbing the door with both hands, and then, smoothly bringing it inside, placed it against the wall. She demonstrated what it truly meant to break into a room.

Inside, the floor tiles were shattered as if someone had decided to farm inside the house. The ground had been plowed, and the stool Lin Du had previously sat on was split in half by sword qi, with scorch marks and fire damage. Clearly, the door had also been affected by the fight between the two people and the spiritual vine.

Tao Xian and Xia Tianwu sat with their swords at the table; one on the bed. The pregnant woman looked as if she had been scared into unconsciousness, her anger nearly depleted.

The two looked at the person who entered. Tao Xian had come to accept the unconventional approach of this ancestor, even thinking that such an entrance was absurd for others but perfectly suited for Lin Du.

Xia Tianwu, who had just been hanging someone’s life by a thread, turned to the little martial uncle and said, “Just now, when I was about to burn it, the spiritual vine retreated on its own.”

“I know.”

The roots had been destroyed by Lin Du’s explosion, and with Wei Zhi’s seemingly ordinary but highly damaging board, the spiritual vine no longer had the strength to affect the room.

“I went out to solve the problem at its source.”

Lin Du spoke lightly, her tone carrying a hint of coldness.

Both Tao Xian and Xia Tianwu were somewhat surprised.

Lin Du was generally warm on the outside but cold on the inside, though her coldness was rarely so explicitly displayed.

She couldn’t be bothered to explain, so she stood by the table and glanced at Tao Xian.

There were only two stools in the room, and Tao Xian was sitting on the only one that was intact. He hesitated and moved to the edge.

The problem with the stool was that it tilted if one end was heavier than the other, making it unstable. A person should sit in the center.

Under Lin Du’s cold gaze, Tao Xian moved to the very edge of the stool, causing it to tip. The person sitting on it was about to fall off.

Lin Du, quick and agile, stepped in and pressed the stool down with her foot, sitting down herself. As her foot fell, a cleansing spell was cast, and as she sat down, even the fabric of her robes settled perfectly. She then turned and gave a nonchalant glance at the others.

Tao Xian thought: …it really makes me look foolish.

Lin Du took out a silver mirror, infused it with spiritual power, and the reflection showed the scene under the moonlight.

She hoped the demonic monk wouldn’t notice anything unusual about the glass lantern.

She didn’t really want to see it, but since he was forcing her to leave, she had no choice but to look.

The essence of life was rebellion.

The lantern seemed to be held in someone’s hand, and the monk’s robe occasionally brushed against the corners, illuminated by the light of the night pearl, appearing like faint frost on the ground.

Then she heard a strange metallic or heavy object rolling sound. At first, Lin Du thought it was a prayer wheel, but she soon realized the sound was harder and sharper.

In the image, a golden vajra, gleaming with a dark metallic sheen similar to the floating life fan in its dull state, was hovering in front of the monk, now emitting a faint golden light.

The monk’s long hands formed a Dharma seal, and the tip of the vajra burst forth with golden light, revealing a hint of golden anger, and then it drove straight into the ground.

A slight tremor was felt below, quickly fading into the quiet of the night.

Lin Du pondered.

That was an object used by the Buddhist sect to set up a legal battlefield barrier.

Then the scene in the mirror slowly moved, revealing a second, then a third…

The monk’s lantern was wandering at night. If it weren’t for the occasional pauses that carried a sense of solemn punishment and sealing, it would have seemed quite leisurely.

Lin Du watched with a dazed expression, but her thoughts were no longer on Wei Zhi.

She was contemplating that once this clone was removed, the other half of the “main body” would likely notice it as well.

Wei Zhi had acted, so he would have to take the blame for it.

She wondered where the Seventh Senior Sister, whom Mo Lin had informed, was now.

At present, in their Supreme Sect, with one being weak and another ill, and no elder around, how could they manage?