In the end, the food still went cold.
Not only because it took time for Sister Lin to bring that little Tu Ba back from the underground shelter, but also because the rules of this era were far more complicated than Han Jie had guessed.
Evil demons were not mountain spirits or wild monsters. When they died, they dissolved into nothingness, leaving behind no treasures like hides, bones, or demon cores. So in the world where Han Jie had once roamed the eight directions, slaying evil and exterminating demons, most cultivators were not nearly as proactive as he was. There were certainly no organizations or factions watching this pile of trouble and stepping forward to manage it. If any sect was willing to gather disciples on training missions and send them down the mountain to clear out passing evil demons, the local commoners would already be thanking the heavens.
Precisely because of that, deep down, Han Jie was still used to killing and leaving, without delaying the pursuit of the next wave of evil demons.
He had never imagined that, over here, after the fight was done, he would still have to give a statement.
He had no patience for this meaningless procedure and withdrew to the side early, watching Meng Qingtong display her practiced skill over there.
They filled several sheets of paper, and by the time the signing and fingerprinting were over, it had taken longer than killing that Jingbei.
Perhaps sensing his displeasure, as soon as the investigator from the Ling’an Bureau left, Meng Qingtong came over with an apologetic smile. “Actually, it normally wouldn’t be this troublesome. It’s my fault too. I didn’t calculate beforehand that you’d be this strong, so just in case, I applied to the Ling’an Bureau for extermination support. They rushed over with helpers, all eager and anxious, only to find everything already over. They had to ask about the situation before going back so they’d have something to report.”
Han Jie looked at the battlefield from earlier. Municipal workers had already arrived to repair the damaged ground. Judging from how skillfully those machines were being operated, attacks of this level were probably nothing unusual to them.
Mortals worked hard to live their own lives, providing assistance to spirit arts practitioners when needed. There was no immense gulf or estrangement between the two sides. They were like soldiers protecting a city and commoners farming grain and fodder… Perhaps everything before his eyes was the world he had once dreamed of, yet had never known how to bring about.
If troublesome rules were the foundation for constructing such a world, then he was willing to endure them.
“You still haven’t told me why the two-headed flying leopard is so much stronger than before.” On the way back, Han Jie picked up the question that had surfaced in his mind before the battle.
“Huh?” Meng Qingtong turned to look at him, undisguised admiration in her eyes. “Strong how? It was still instantly killed by you. If I’d known you were so fast that even the surveillance cameras couldn’t capture you clearly, I might as well have saved the money and treated you to something better.”
“Will the explanation about the spirit-tool specialization be enough to cover it up?”
She hesitated for a moment, then nodded. “Once or twice shouldn’t be a problem. This place is far from the city center, and the spirit arts practitioners stationed here don’t pay that much attention to details. I also took the chance to contact a senior sister nearby and have her first create an official spirit arts practitioner identity for you. She still owes me a favor…”
Han Jie did not let go of his earlier doubt. After taking a few steps, he asked again, “Tell me about the Jingbei.”
“It’s not that I don’t want to tell you. It’s just… the memory fragments I obtained that time were very few, and they’ve already faded away with time. If I just say it with nothing to back it up, I’m afraid you won’t believe me. I’m someone who cares a lot about credibility.”
“Speak. I believe you.” He gave that response very calmly.
He could roughly sense what kind of person Meng Qingtong was. Otherwise, he would have long since left and found a way to establish himself in this world on his own.
This girl might use so-called conversational tactics in order to cooperate with him, but as for the information contained within them, she probably would not conceal or fabricate it.
“When I obtained the Jingbei’s true name, I saw… many parents and children.” Meng Qingtong’s speaking pace slowed greatly, as if she were restraining some emotion within herself. “They made delicious food for the children, gave them fun things to play with. No matter what the children did wrong, they tolerated them without limits, even indulged them…”
“I have absolutely no memory of my parents. From the time I was old enough to understand things, I was living in an orphanage. I had no experience, so at first, I didn’t think there was anything abnormal about those fragments at all. I even… mm… felt a little envious.” She rubbed the tip of her nose with her thumb, hiding the flicker of embarrassment on her face. “Later, I realized that kind of behavior was called spoiling.”
“Spoiling?”
“Mm. The bottomless love that fathers and mothers, grandfathers and grandmothers, maternal grandparents, these elders, have for the children of later generations—under special circumstances and the convergence of spiritual energy, it becomes the Jingbei.” Meng Qingtong’s gaze was somewhat melancholy. “The Jingbei’s danger rating is high not because its hard power is especially strong, but because… it is always born in small families with fertile soil for spoiling. The first people it attacks are everyone except the child. I suppose that’s why it’s called the Kin-slayer in official records.”
Han Jie sighed.
No wonder the two-headed flying leopards of his era were a whole level weaker. In this present world, whether in terms of population base or the proportion of people who spoiled children among them, it was far beyond what his time could compare to.
Before the age of six, the only thing he could recall that came close to being spoiled was his mother secretly hiding half a sugar pancake for him.
For more than a hundred years after that, there seemed to be nothing sweeter than that half sugar pancake…
Han Jie looked toward the entrance of the apartment building. Sister Lin stood there, clearly having just left the shelter. Her arms were wrapped around Xiao Tu, who stood in front of her, and for a moment, Han Jie was actually dazed, unable to tell which of them was the true dodder ghost.
A thought stirred in his mind, and he said softly, “Did the Jingbei change direction earlier because it sensed the existence of that little ghost?”
Meng Qingtong thought for a moment and said, “It’s more likely that it discovered Sister Lin.”
“Mm?”
“Kin-slayer, kin-slayer. The Jingbei’s instinct should be to make it actively attack the source of spoiling.” She sighed softly. “Looking at it this way, my guess was right. The trigger point that formed this Jingbei was Sister Lin. There are fewer residents in the suburbs, and even fewer children. The Jingbei’s source was insufficient, so its strength was below average.”
Han Jie gave a cold snort and said with a hint of mockery, “And she has no flesh-and-blood child of her own. She spoiled to the point of giving birth to an evil demon, yet it was for the sake of another evil demon.”
“That’s why correct emotions don’t necessarily mean no mistakes.” Meng Qingtong lowered her voice so the special mother and daughter pair, already approaching, would not hear. “The problem is, how should a mistake like this be corrected?”
“You really don’t mind trouble.” If it were up to him, such illusory dependence should be severed with one strike of the sword.
Sensing his intention, Meng Qingtong smiled and said, “Aren’t you curious why Xiao Tu is different from ordinary evil demons?”
Han Jie tightened the corners of his lips and did not answer. He did indeed hate trouble, but he was truly curious as well.
She raised her brows smugly. “Besides, someone who helps people solve their troubles can’t be too afraid of trouble.”
“I am afraid.”
“It’s fine. I’ll handle the troublesome parts.” She straightened her chest and walked toward Sister Lin, smiling as she waved. “All right, all right, it’s done. We can eat in peace now.”
During this meal, the one who spoke the most was Meng Qingtong.
Han Jie had a gloomy temperament, and his stomach was hungry besides; his mouth had no desire to be used for anything else. Moreover, he could tell that this girl was probing for information in a roundabout way.
Unfortunately, the target of her probing was also rather introverted and reticent, and her mental state was extremely poor. By the time the deliberately delayed lunch was finished, it was actually that silly little Xiao Tu who had revealed more useful information.
Han Jie did not want to care. After all, there was still a vast amount of information in his sea of consciousness waiting for him to slowly sort through and integrate, so he could free his divine sense and recover his strength. Unfortunately, for a cultivation genius, perfect recall was among the most basic of basics. Once he heard something, he naturally remembered it.
The full name of this woman who had taken the initiative to become a nominal single mother was Lin Sisi. Her hometown was not this small town, but Suiyin City, a satellite city in the southern part of the Dongding Region.
Through hard work, she had tested into a university in Dongding City, where she met the man in the photo, Qiao Mu. Not long after graduating from university, she became Qiao Mu’s girlfriend. Then, for some unknown reason, she left her boyfriend and came to this remote suburb. She did not even go home to look for her parents, simply living here alone.
Until Xiao Tu appeared by her side.
There was not much information revealed through words, but once combined with the memory fragments carried by Tu Ba’s true name, quite a bit could be inferred.
While browsing clothes in a nearby small supermarket, Meng Qingtong compared the price difference between buying on her phone and in the store, and said quietly, “I don’t really understand. Sister Lin clearly still loves that man, loves him so much she even started fantasizing about having a child with him. Then why doesn’t she go back and look for him?”
Han Jie watched her hold clothes against her chest. After a brief moment of thought, he said, “Perhaps she was the one repudiated?”
“Be a little more careful with your wording. A word like ‘repudiated’ has been obsolete for a century or so.” She reminded him softly, then continued, “It probably wasn’t a normal breakup. Tsk, this is a little troublesome. I’ve never been in love, so I don’t have much experience in this area.”
“Lin Sisi has already settled the commission fee. You also said Xiao Tu not only poses no harm to her, but is nourishing and protecting her. Then what need is there to continue?” Han Jie said flatly. “You took two hundred thousand from someone and opened my mountain gate, then did nothing afterward. For this job, you only took five hundred yuan plus a meal, so why are you suddenly doing after-sales service?”
“We’ll talk after I finish bargaining.” Meng Qingtong finally chose the two outfits and one pair of shoes with the best value for money, then rallied her spirits and went to engage the shop assistant in a battle of tongues.
He wore one outfit and carried the other, looking toward the fitting mirror beside him. Reflected within it was, at last, no longer a shadow incompatible with this world.
He could be certain this outfit suited him quite well. Although the main color was black, and when he asked for it, Meng Qingtong had complained that it looked gloomy and lifeless, now that he had put it on, the girls and women passing nearby would all stare at him for a few extra glances. One braver girl even held up her phone at his side, in a spot where she thought he would not notice, and took two pictures.
A faint pleasure arose in his heart.
But it was not because of the boring vanity of being noticed by women. Rather, ever since he had left his sect, left those senior sisters who had been willing to occasionally spare time to look after his daily life, no one had helped manage such matters for him again.
He knew Meng Qingtong had ambitions, but after observing the way she treated people and handled matters, he did not think that was anything worth minding.
At the very least, when the Jingbei had swooped down with murderous intent, that girl had truly been worried that this old senior who could not even handle “Flying” might capsize in a gutter. Otherwise, with her cautious style of setting up a grand Golden Light Barrier formation just to catch a Xiedun, how could she possibly have rushed up in haste for a frontal confrontation?
What was even more interesting was that after personally witnessing the shocking scene of him killing the Jingbei in one strike, this girl could still compare prices at different stores and bargain when bringing him to buy clothes, as if nothing in the world mattered more than saving money.
“All right, let’s go.” Meng Qingtong returned with a beaming smile, stuffed the shopping receipt into her backpack, and said smugly, “Saved another twenty yuan. That’s roughly equal to two cups of milk tea.”
Han Jie was not someone so easily brushed off. After only a couple of steps, he said in a low voice, “You’ve already recorded Tu Ba’s true name. Why continue wasting time on the two of them?”
“Don’t you think Xiao Tu is actually a very worthwhile subject of study?” Meng Qingtong slowed her steps and asked softly in return. “If, and I’m just hypothesizing here, if more and more Tu Ba like Xiao Tu appear in the future, what will happen?”
“You want to find out the reason this Tu Ba is different from the rest?”
“Yes.” Her tone was unusually resolute. “Also, Sister Lin is a good person. Only when good people live better and better will this world become better and better. Her current state is very wrong. Don’t tell me you didn’t see it.”
“She has a knot in her heart.” Han Jie was silent for a moment, then said, “But in this world, people with knots in their hearts are probably too many to count.”
“If it has to do with evil demons, then I’ll help each one I see.” She spoke as if it were nothing. “It’s not as if, just because manpower is limited, I should spread my hands and do nothing at all, right?”
“Then what do you plan to do next?”
Meng Qingtong took out her phone, habitually glanced at her account balance, and muttered, “Aren’t I waiting for you, venerable elder, to speak? If by any chance your golden mouth opens and you agree to cooperate with me, then afterward, I definitely won’t do anything else. I’ll focus wholeheartedly on settling you in first.”
Han Jie stepped out of the mall doors and looked up at the cloudless, washed-blue sky, pondering without a word.
He had seen too many landscapes, yet had never stopped to closely observe even one.
He had encountered too many people, yet had never deeply understood anyone, nor let anyone understand him.
He had tried to use the end of group after group of evil demons to fill the bottomless hole hatred had left in his heart, but those corpses reduced to ash and smoke only made his soul emptier and emptier.
Seeing that he did not answer and had instead sunk into thought, Meng Qingtong tilted her head every so often beside him to sneak a glance. After looking several times, she finally could not help saying, “Han Jie, it’s not like I’m planning to tie you down forever. Just treat it like recruitment and give me a probationary period. Cooperate with me first and see how it goes. If I perform well, then make me official. That should be fine, right? I’ll cover all your food, clothing, housing, and travel. I’ll solve your identity problem. If you like killing evil demons, I’ll find places to dismantle formations and fish for them for you. Once something bites, I’ll take the lead. If I can’t beat it, then you can step in. Look how much trouble that saves you.”
“Why me?”
“First, we have fate. Second, it saves money. Third, you’re good-looking. Also…” She lowered her head slightly, seeming a little sad. “Geniuses are all very busy. If they don’t believe me, how could they be willing to accompany me in my ‘nonsense’?”
Han Jie slowly said, “There are easier roads you can take. Do not forget, you are also a genius. Spirit arts practitioners should cultivate their hearts. Being too obsessive may not be a good thing.”
“I don’t have parents.” Meng Qingtong said very seriously, “It was this world’s goodwill that raised me. People should know gratitude and repay kindness. As long as I can make this world better, no matter how difficult the road is, I’m not afraid.”
Han Jie turned his head to look into her eyes, his gaze gradually growing gentle.
“Then today, help me find a place to stay first.”