Chapter 58: When Your Parents Find Out You Slept Out

The moonlight, which had been there for thousands of years, flowed over the glazed tiles of the ancient building in the demon market.
Bai Ling crossed the threshold on tiptoe, shrinking her head.

‘Thank goodness, thank goodness. It seemed Guan Qing hadn’t returned yet.’

“Yo? Isn’t this Miss Bai?”

A female voice, tinged with anger, sounded.
The girl turned her head and saw the jade pipe in Guan Qing’s fingers tapping three sparks on the armrest of the Grand Master’s chair.

The scales on the girl’s body instantly opened and closed in reaction.
A chill shot up from her tailbone to the crown of her head.

This feeling was like sneaking out to an internet cafe all night after your parents fell asleep, only to be caught red-handed when you returned.

Although the girl had never experienced this kind of world-ending event, she felt that this description should be accurate.

“What? Had enough fun and decided to come back? Did you buy the sugar figurine?”

The hidden pattern of Guan Qing’s moon-white cheongsam flowed in the light, and the cyan wings embroidered with gold thread on the hem of her skirt seemed about to break out of the silk.

As soon as Guan Qing had returned and heard the wolf demon and the tiger demon say that this silly girl had run to the south of the city, she knew what she had gone to do.
The Shanhe Group building was in the south of the city.
She could easily guess that this silly girl must have gone to find that foolish boy of hers.

“I was…”
The girl stiffly turned her head, trying to explain.
She could even hear the creaking sound of her cervical vertebrae rubbing together.

“Kneel!”

The green smoke rising from the gilt-gold incense burner suddenly condensed into a chain, heavily pressing her down onto the lapis lazuli bricks.
The hard lapis lazuli bricks hurt the girl’s knees, and the pressure from Guan Qing made fine snake scales shoot up her tailbone.

“You’ve grown some guts, haven’t you? Daring to jump around in the territory of the Demon Suppression Division?”
Guan Qing lightly tapped the table with her fingertip, and three beads of the white jade abacus suddenly burst.
“Why didn’t they make you into snake soup!”

The wolf demon and the tiger demon held their breath and huddled behind the corridor pillar, so scared by the low pressure in the room that they didn’t dare to breathe loudly.

“Did the Mistress take gunpowder today?”
The wolf demon scratched his head.
“Didn’t the young mistress just run out? She’s back now.”

“Why is she so angry?”

“The Mistress was just played by that Daoist priest last night, and she’s still angry.”
A-Qi suddenly drilled out from the shadow of the doorway.
Her cat ears and the copper bell around her neck trembled together.
“I advise you two fools not to seek trouble.”

“Speak.
Why did you come back after running off?”
The tassels hanging from the slit of Guan Qing’s cheongsam lightly swept across the lapis lazuli floor.
She had scolded the kneeling girl for a long time and finally agreed to stop.

“Look at this…”
The girl flipped out the milk tea cup from her heart, and the ice crystals condensed on the cup wall refracted the lights of the demon market.
“Can we track that zombie with this?”

“Hmm?!”
The jade pipe between Guan Qing’s fingers suddenly emitted a few wisps of green smoke.
The green smoke wrapped around the black gas lingering around the rim of the cup.

With a wave of her hand, the milk tea cup in the girl’s hand floated towards her.

“I thought the rain last night had washed away all the corpse qi.”
The smell of disinfectant from the medical hall mixed with the scent of agarwood wafted out from the rim of the cup.
Guan Qing’s cinnabar-red fingernail suddenly pierced through the cup wall.
The brown residue of the bubble milk tea dripped down her wrist, and wisps of black gas floated out in the air.

“This little mouse has even learned to drink bubble milk tea.
Where did you get it?”

“Uh, special channels…”
The girl said awkwardly.
She naturally didn’t dare to tell Guan Qing that she had picked up this thing from Lu Qingyu’s medical hall.

Otherwise, it would lead to the matter of her spending the night at Xu Zhi’s place last night.
If Guan Qing knew that she, a snake demon, had slept right under the nose of the Demon Suppression Division, wouldn’t she be furious?

“Special channels?”
Guan Qing suddenly used her pipe to lift the girl’s chin.
The green fire in the pipe bowl reflected the fine scales on the side of the girl’s neck that were slowly opening and closing.
“Is the bed in the Demon Suppression Division soft?”

“This…”
The girl’s cheeks instantly flushed red, and she couldn’t utter a single word.

With the girl’s sudden surge of demonic energy, the residual cedarwood scent on her neck suddenly mixed with the unique osmanthus scent of the girl’s demonic aura and drilled into Guan Qing’s nasal cavity.

“That old bastard…”
Guan Qing suddenly let out a light laugh, as if she had figured something out.
The laughter startled the stone suanni statues outside the door, and fine cracks appeared on them.
“He’s actually planning this.”

The fate of the girl and Xu Zhi had already been bound by that cup of nuptial wine.
They would prosper or suffer together.
And Xiao Mochen, that old bastard, had previously suggested letting the younger generation handle it, which clearly meant letting the girl and Xu Zhi handle this matter.

This was a test of their state of mind, and also a competition between Guan Qing and Xiao Mochen.

These big and small competitions had been staged countless times during the decades that Xiao Mochen had played a cat-and-mouse game with her.

“Come with me…”
She stopped her light laughter, and her red lips curved into a captivating, charming arc.

As the piping of her cheongsam brushed against the girl’s shoulder, she lightly tapped the armrest of the Grand Master’s chair with her pipe.
The blue luan carved on the back of the chair suddenly flapped its wings and flew towards Bai Ling, dissipating into a sky of starlight half an inch from the girl’s nose.

The girl hurriedly turned her head.
Her graceful figure had already stepped into the full moon at the doorway.

“I’m taking you to see someone.”

The silver-white lunar disk stained the glazed tiles of the densely packed ancient buildings in the demon market.
As the girl’s toes swept across the cracks in the bluestone slabs, she crushed half a maple leaf that had been soaked in medicinal soup.

In the corner, under a plaque that read “Warmth of the Apricot Grove,” a long-burning lamp illuminated the wall full of tadpole-script rubbings of the “Yellow Emperor’s Inner Canon.”

The old woman’s silver hair was adorned with a tortoiseshell comb.
Her fingers, covered in age spots, were holding a sharkskin bandage.
When the last bow was tied, three lotus-shaped phantoms of rebirth suddenly bloomed at the tip of the little raccoon demon’s tail.

“There, little fellow.
Don’t be so careless next time.”
The old woman casually stroked the little raccoon demon’s head.

The fluff on the tip of the little raccoon demon’s ear had a faint golden sheen under the glazed lamp.
Its tail unconsciously swept across a pottery jar labeled “Transformation Powder” on the bottom shelf of the medicine cabinet.

‘This old woman was clearly the same old woman who often sat under the old sophora tree at the entrance of the old alley, enjoying the cool air!’

‘The girl used to greet her often when she passed by! She didn’t expect her to be a demon too?’

‘No, that’s not right!’

‘Even though they were in the demon market, this old woman looked like a human.
Guan Qing had said that any demon would reveal its true form in the demon market.’

‘Then there was only one possibility.
This old woman was a genuine human!’

“What? Curious?”
Guan Qing seemed to have seen the girl’s confusion.
“Curious why a human would be in the demon market?”

“A little.”

“Her name is Su Xuanhu.
She’s a descendant of the apprentice of the ‘Bao An Tang’ medical hall in Lin’an.
Her ancestors and the ancestors of that foolish boy from the Demon Suppression Division you know have a very deep connection.”
Guan Qing glanced behind her without a trace as she said this.
In the bustling crowd of demons, a pair of golden-brown fox ears were twitching with a breath.

“She often comes to the medical hall in the demon market to treat the injuries and illnesses of the little demons for free.”

“Then why are we looking for her…”

“She can follow this scent to find that little mouse.”

As they spoke, the two had already arrived near the medical hall.

“Mistress’s complexion is good today.”
When Su Xuanhu looked up, the amber pendant wrapped in the five-colored silk thread on her wrist jingled.
“What brings you here?”

As she stood up, supported by the Huanghuali wood medicine cabinet, the eight-trigram mirror embedded in the cabinet reflected the thirteen golden needles suspended behind her.

“What are you getting up for, you old bone?”
Guan Qing’s pipe suddenly blocked her waist, and the green smoke condensed into the shape of a Grand Master’s chair to support the old woman.
“Your needling technique is getting better and better.”

“Compared to you, I’m still a young girl at this age.”
Su Xuanhu smiled.
Her coarse linen jacket was stained with the scent of Panax notoginseng and angelica.
The silver needle packet pinned to her lapel, however, exuded a sweet scent.
“Xiao Bai, you’re here too?”

“Grandma, I didn’t expect to see you here…”
The girl scratched her face awkwardly.

“Can you help me find the source of this corpse poison?”
Guan Qing’s jade pipe tapped the table, making the yin-yang fish copper scale in the mortar tilt slightly.

The milk tea cup floated onto the table with the green smoke.
The ice crystals condensed on the rim of the cup refracted a glazed light.

“Hmm… corpse poison? A zombie.
It’s been a few years since I last saw one.”
Su Xuanhu pinched her chin, examining the cup in front of her.