Urbaner Blumentraum - Kapitel 200
Zhu Huihui swung her arm, turned her head to wipe the tears on her shoulder, and asked, "What?"
"The bottle of medicine in the Valley of Sorrow."
"It's gone."
"What? Where did it go?"
"Pour the medicine powder into your fish tank, and we'll trade the bottle for sugar."
"..."
Feng Xuese was speechless at this greedy spendthrift. The healing medicine from Beikong Valley was not only good for healing bones and muscles, but it could even bring the dead back to life and make flesh grow back. Its effects were miraculous and it was hard to buy even with a thousand pieces of gold in the martial arts world. This spendthrift actually fed the medicine powder to the fish just to exchange the bottle for a few candies!
"Very well! In that case, you can keep this bump on your head," Feng Xuese said calmly.
Zhu Huihui raised her hand and carefully pressed it against her forehead. The bump was the size of an egg, burning hot to the touch, and throbbing numbly. She frowned, enduring the pain, and said, "This isn't much of an injury; it'll heal in a few days! When I was little, I broke my hand, and that really hurt. I went home and cried to my mother, and she beat me. My mother said, either you learn to become thick-skinned so you don't feel pain when you get hurt, or you just have to bear the pain yourself, because no one will pity you!"
The Sky Over the Martial World is Clear, Part Three: Chapter Fourteen (3)
Feng Xuese paused for a moment, then decided there was no need to get angry with this wild girl who lacked proper education. She gently pulled down the hand that was covering her head, glanced at the purplish-blue bump, and thankfully, it wasn't broken. She would apply some ointment later and wait for the bruise to subside.
Young Master Liu Yue gently waved his folding fan, watching Feng Xue Se finish dealing with Zhu Hui Hui, and then asked with a smile, "May I ask, Brother Feng, did you come to this desolate mountain temple to find a granddaughter so you can go back and see your mother one last time before she passed away?"
Feng Xuese, not understanding his meaning, avoided answering and instead asked, "Brother Liuyue, what brings you to Luomei Hermitage?"
Zhu Huihui tiptoed and whispered into Feng Xuese's ear, "Hero, he's having an affair with the nun in this temple!" Although she lowered her voice, she did it on purpose so that the other person could hear her.
Such vulgar and offensive slander left Young Master Liuyue speechless with rage. He paused for a moment, looked away, pretending not to have heard, but his face darkened slightly. With a "snap," he closed his folding fan, then opened it again, fanning himself faster as if he were terribly hot.
Feng Xuese glared at her, then looked at Liu Yue with an apologetic smile: "This girl has had little guidance since childhood, so she is naturally rude. Brother Liu Yue, please don't take offense!"
Liu Yue, being very cultured, simply smiled and said, "Brother Feng, you're overreacting. How could I possibly lower myself to the level of a little girl!" Her gaze, however, lingered on Zhu Huihui's face. She'd never seen such a sharp-tongued girl before; she had to teach her a lesson!
The moment Zhu Huihui met his gaze, her little heart skipped a beat. Suddenly remembering something, sweat beaded on her forehead. She was such a fool; she'd been rambling on like this, and was afraid she'd ruined something important…
She tugged at the snow-white hem of her robe in a panic: "Great hero, something's not right. This temple... seems to be deserted..." She'd been searching here for so long and hadn't seen a single nun!
Feng Xuese nodded slightly: "Even if there are any, they're all dead!"
Zhu Huihui was taken aback: "What?"
Young Master Liu Yue pointed with his folding fan: "Go see for yourself the side halls, the rear bedroom, and the dining hall!"
Zhu Huihui glanced at Feng Xuese and, seeing that he had no intention of stopping her, immediately ran to the east side hall. Pushing open the hall door, she saw two nuns sitting upright on the prayer mat in front of the Buddha altar.
The two nuns hung their heads and remained motionless, holding prayer beads in their right hands and wooden mallets in their left, seemingly having fallen asleep while chanting sutras and striking the wooden fish.
Zhu Huihui paused for a moment, held her breath, and carefully placed her hand on the shoulder of one of the nuns, giving her a gentle push: "Hey!"
The nun swayed, collapsing under the force of her movement. A bizarre face was revealed beneath her cap: pale skin, bulging eyes, an open mouth, and a tongue slightly protruding from its lips…
Despite being mentally prepared, Zhu Huihui still couldn't help but scream. She had seen many dead bodies before, each more gruesome and bloody than this one, but this was the first time she had ever touched a corpse with her own hands!
A white robe flashed beside her, and Maple Snow appeared in her presence. She bent down to examine the body's temperature, marks, and stiffness, and said, "The throat was crushed; the time of death could not have exceeded an hour."
Zhu Huihui touched another nun with trepidation, and sure enough, she fell to the ground. The nun's distorted face made her body tremble uncontrollably.
Feng Xuese looked at her: "How is it?"
"I...I'll go look somewhere else!" Despite being terrified, Zhu Huihui did not forget her mission—the old man had brought her here to find someone, the nun who had been on the same boat as her and had given her a red bean paste bun.
Feng Xuese accompanied her into the west wing hall. There were four corpses in this hall. She then went to the bedroom and dining hall behind the main hall. There were several corpses in each room, all with broken throats, and all in the same position they were in before they died. Obviously, the murderer was very efficient, killing them with one blow. The nuns died instantly, without even having time to change their positions.
Finally, they arrived at the kitchen, where a nun was holding a cleaver and lying it on the cutting board, which was covered with half-cut vegetables.
On one side, another nun was lying on the ground with a wooden shovel, surrounded by loose firewood. In the iron pot on the stove, tofu and radishes were stewing, the soup was bubbling slightly and was almost boiled dry, and there were still embers in the stove.
The Sky Over the Martial World is Clear, Part Three: Chapter Fourteen (4)
From the moment he saw the smoke rising from the chimney, about half an hour had passed. The old man deduced that the nuns had been dead for no more than an hour, meaning that as he walked towards them, the nuns were being killed one by one…
Zhu Huihui suddenly burst into tears.
Feng Xuese gazed at her, a surge of tenderness welling up within him. Though this child was mischievous and infuriating, that was only due to a lack of proper upbringing from a young age; ultimately, she was kind-hearted. He patted her shoulder, his voice gentle: "Huihui, don't be sad. We'll avenge these people's deaths sooner or later!"
Zhu Huihui wiped away her tears and sobbed, "I'm not sad, I'm just glad! Luckily I arrived late. If I had come any earlier, I might be dead here by now!"
Maple Snow Color: "..." He wasted his feelings! What a useless piece of trash!
Zhu Huihui bent down, turned the nun who was lying on the ground over, glanced at her face, straightened up, let out a long sigh, and shook her head at Feng Xuese.
Feng Xuese understood: No! Among these corpses, there was no nun who had crossed the river with Zhu Huihui.
This proves that either the nun escaped unharmed, or—she was taken away by the murderer. Don't forget, Zhu Huihui wasn't the only one on the boat at the time; there were other people who knew this nun.
If the nun isn't dead, where is she now? He's anxious to find her, hoping she can provide clues from another angle so he can definitively determine whether those killed on the riverbank were indeed family members of the two generals.
Feng Xuese pondered silently, "If I were one of those black-clad assassins, and someone on the opposite ferry saw me committing the massacre, how would I silence them?"
Killing people isn't difficult; the difficulty lies in finding them—a group of complete strangers from all corners of the world who just happened to be on the same ship. Once they disembark, they will disperse and disappear into the crowd, perhaps never to meet again in this lifetime…
If I were the assassin, even though the distance was great and the ferry could escape quickly, it would have been enough time to memorize the key characteristics of the passengers. The one who left the deepest impression was the middle-aged man who rowed the boat away after the captain was killed. Because he carried a knife and was skilled in martial arts, people in the martial arts world always pay more attention to their own kind. Even if they didn't recognize him, in the eyes of an expert, even a single movement could reveal a lot of personal information about a person, such as their martial arts skills and background. Therefore, with a little investigation, it wouldn't have been difficult for the man in black to find the Donglin Escort Agency.
Therefore, the first to perish was the Donglin Escort Agency.
Next, you need to interrogate the people you find about the origins of the others. Even if you don't know each other well, you've traveled together on the same boat, so you'll remember some things, even just a few words. You can use this as a clue to find the next person—just like me, didn't I find Luomei Temple from the only sentence that Zhu Huihui, that muddle-headed idiot, remembered?
Zhu Huihui is probably the easiest and the hardest person to find.