Chapter 56 Part 1

Because of Jiang Ruan’s forceful intervention, Nan Qingyun and Lu Ning—who had been in the middle of their argument—were compelled to stop.

The two stood obediently, one on each side of Jiang Ruan, as if someone had hit their off switches. They watched her every move without a word.

Jiang Ruan swiftly skewered the last of the ingredients. To keep the two little kittens out of further mischief, she handed each of them ten skewers and flashed a curved smile. “Go on. Grill them yourselves.”

Nan Qingyun and Lu Ning exchanged a glance before silently accepting the skewers. They positioned themselves in front of the barbecue grill with great solemnity and began grilling in earnest.

Jiang Ruan stretched lazily and settled onto a nearby stool, propping her chin in her hand as she watched them.

The scene was undeniably comical, even a touch humorous.

Both were once-in-a-century geniuses, dressed in the Mirror Moon Sect’s disciple uniforms. Though not the ethereal, flowing thin-gauze long sleeves of fairy tales, their plain robes still lent them an air of otherworldly grace—jade-like features and prodigious talent evident at a glance. Yet here they were, grilling skewers with such an earthy, everyday vibe… The contrast was striking.

But Jiang Ruan had no other choice. She needed to calm them down if she wanted to escape that bizarre, tense love-triangle atmosphere hanging in the air.

After a moment’s thought, she decided to “torment” them a little to buy her own peace.

As long as Nan Qingyun and Lu Ning had their hands occupied, they wouldn’t keep fixating on her.

The plan worked like a charm. Both cultivators were locked in a fierce battle with their skewers.

Even the servants who came by to deliver fruit couldn’t help stealing glances at the pair, their eyes brimming with unspoken curiosity.

Jiang Ruan covered her mouth with a light laugh.

But the two paid no mind to the onlookers, showing no trace of embarrassment. They treated the skewers with the same grave seriousness they might devote to cultivation.

Jiang Ruan’s gaze swept across their faces. Though their appearances were utterly distinct, their expressions were unexpectedly similar, leaving her momentarily dazed.

Perhaps it was her imagination, but in that instant… she vaguely felt as though only one person stood before her.

Jiang Ruan frowned and shook her head gently, banishing the fleeting illusion.

It must be the deep impression left by Xuanling Divine Lord. Even now, Jiang Ruan couldn’t fully shake free of her influence.

She let out a soft breath, murmuring to herself in her heart: Nan Qingyun is Nan Qingyun, and Lu Ning is Lu Ning. They were clearly two entirely different people—she shouldn’t confuse them.

Besides, Jiang Ruan was confident she could tell them apart. It was like distinguishing her own little sister from the girl next door; how could she possibly mix them up?

Before long, both Nan Qingyun and Lu Ning had finished grilling their skewers.

It was their first time, and they were far from practiced, but their natural aptitude for learning shone through.

Without a word, Jiang Ruan took one skewer from each of them—ever fair.

She took a bite. “Not bad, not bad at all.”

Nan Qingyun let out a quiet breath of relief, her tense shoulders easing. Lu Ning’s lips curved in a faint, pleased smile.

“You two eat some too,” said Jiang Ruan.

…

After dinner came the real business at hand.

Jiang Ruan and the others kept vigil in City Lord Madam’s room.

The City Lord Madam huddled beneath her covers, trembling. “Immortals, c-can I stay right here? You can just guard the room.”

“Actually,” Jiang Ruan replied, “my original plan was for you to stay here alone while we waited in the next room over.”

At those words, City Lord Madam immediately fell silent.

“From what you’ve described,” Jiang Ruan continued, “the demonic entity only appears after you fall asleep. If we stay here, it might not show itself. And as for your earlier suggestion… I’m afraid the thing is bound to you personally. Do you understand?”

In other words, leaving the room wouldn’t help—the demonic entity had latched onto her, not the location.

City Lord Madam got the point. She didn’t dare suggest departing again, and now she was even more terrified of Jiang Ruan and the others leaving her.

Tears welled in her eyes. “I-I’m so scared all alone. Immortals, please don’t go. I’ll sleep right now—I swear. Just don’t leave.”

Fearing that any further delay might send the three immortals next door as planned, she lay down at once.

But she was far too nervous. Her lashes fluttered, her breaths came quick and shallow—it was impossible to drift off like this.

Seeing this, Jiang Ruan flicked her fingertip. A thread of the Sleeping Curse flowed silently from it.

City Lord Madam didn’t even have time to give last instructions before her eyelids grew heavy, and she slipped into slumber.

Jiang Ruan rubbed the rim of her cup and murmured softly, “We’ll wait a little while.”

Neither of the other two raised any objections.

Summer nights were never truly silent. Even at the deepest hour, faint insect chirps drifted in from outside.

The room held blocks of ice for cooling, so it wasn’t uncomfortably warm.

To avoid alerting the enemy prematurely, they had left the lamps unlit, leaving the room shrouded in darkness with only a faint glimmer of moonlight filtering hazily through the window.

Yet Jiang Ruan didn’t find the quiet night frightening at all.

Instead, she smiled faintly, a nostalgic feeling unexpectedly washing over her.

Many years ago, in the summers of her modern life, she had spent nights just like this.

No air conditioning, just a whirring fan, lit mosquito coils, and the chirping of insects outside. But as technology advanced and they moved from a simple flat to an apartment building, nights filled with the hum of AC units and the glow of phones and computers had made it rare for Jiang Ruan to relive that sensation.

Thinking of her modern life, the smile on Jiang Ruan’s lips faded slightly.

She wasn’t sure if it was the System deliberately influencing and protecting her, or some issue of her own, but she could scarcely recall much about her life back there anymore.

Perhaps in those final moments after death, the mind automatically blurred and erased memories? Jiang Ruan had no idea.

All she knew on instinct was that she was a modern person who had come here to complete her mission, after which she would return to her own world.

As for what awaited her there, she had no clue.

Lu Ning was the first to notice something off about Jiang Ruan’s mood.

Perhaps due to her exceptional senses, she perceived it before even “seeing” it.

Cultivators had sharp ears and keen eyes; even in pitch darkness, channeling spiritual energy into their eyes allowed them to make out rough shapes.

Lu Ning turned her head, her voice soft as a whisper that might scatter on the breeze.

“Jiang Ruan?”

Nan Qingyun looked over as well, spotting the issue without needing anyone to point it out.

Concerned, she reached out tentatively to grasp Jiang Ruan’s hand.

Jiang Ruan snapped back to the present.

She smiled at Lu Ning, then gave Nan Qingyun’s fingers a reassuring squeeze to signal that she was fine.

Soon, sounds stirred from outside.

Jiang Ruan’s brow furrowed slightly as she listened intently.

Something had leaped into the courtyard—and from the sound, it was a four-legged beast.

…Likely a fox.

Jiang Ruan caught the faint scent of a Fox Demon.

Moments later, several long, drawn-out fox cries echoed from outside.

The calls carried a bone-chilling resentment, as if they would haunt her relentlessly even in death.

On the bed, the City Lord Madam shuddered violently and began murmuring in her sleep.

“No, no, stay away, stay away!”

“It wasn’t me, don’t come for me… Please, just let me go…”

“Ah! No! Don’t bite me, don’t—!”

Her voice turned shrill, as if trapped in a nightmare.

Jiang Ruan hurried to her side. “City Lord Madam?”

But the City Lord Madam seemed ensnared in her night terror, unable to wake no matter what.

Nan Qingyun stepped up beside Jiang Ruan and subtly gestured, asking if she should circle around outside to catch those foxes.

Jiang Ruan shook her head.

The moment they made a move, those foxes would surely bolt.

They needed a way to lure the foxes inside.

The City Lord Madam hadn’t been entirely truthful with them earlier that evening.

Before tonight, Jiang Ruan had assumed this was just ordinary harassment by Fox Demons. But after hearing those cries, she no longer believed it was anything so mundane.

From the looks of it, there was deep-seated hatred between those foxes and the City Lord Madam.

The foxes tormented her relentlessly but hadn’t taken her life—perhaps because she’d left them some leeway in her crimes, or maybe because the foxes wanted to savor her suffering slowly.

It was a classic pattern for vengeful Fox Demons.

Regardless of why those Fox Demons were after the City Lord Madam, as the hired experts, Jiang Ruan and the others’ primary task was to exorcise them.

Jiang Ruan lowered her gaze thoughtfully.

Her main problem was the lack of tracking or restraining artifacts, and while Nan Qingyun and Lu Ning were Sword Cultivators, they might not catch up to the foxes.

Foxes were cunning with multiple lairs; if they hid, it would be tricky to root them out.

Tracking spells were an option, but only if she had some token connected to them.

That left just one final method.

Jiang Ruan turned to the City Lord Madam and swiftly, delicately pinched a hand seal with both hands. A thread of spiritual energy slipped into the City Lord Madam’s mind.

The City Lord Madam’s reactions grew even more frantic, her fragmented mutterings spilling out in greater detail.

“I just wanted a few fox pelts…”

“…Set fire to their den… the fox cubs…”

“I’ll never do it again, never again…”

From her broken words, Jiang Ruan pieced together the truth.

Jiang Ruan pressed her lips together. Truth be told, she wasn’t pleased. On the contrary, she despised the City Lord Madam’s actions.

At the same time, a doubt nagged at her.

If Fox Demons weak enough to be bullied by a mere human like the City Lord Madam had driven off those rogue cultivators, how had they managed it?

Or was it that rogue cultivators were fellow cultivators, so the fox demons could attack them without issue, but the City Lord Madam was a mere mortal, so the fox demons held back?

Jiang Ruan’s speculation stemmed from the supernatural novels she had read before. Although there was no explicit rule forbidding foxes from attacking mortals, still…

She just felt there was something off about these fox demons.

Moreover, the City Lord Madam was only suffering nightmares for now, with no real harm coming to her in the waking world. It couldn’t be that these foxes were simply being kindhearted or could only tamper with dreams, could it?

A flurry of thoughts raced through Jiang Ruan’s mind, but her hands never paused in their work.

She deliberately guided the City Lord Madam to recount her own dreams in detail, coaxing her to confess everything she had done, all to lure these foxes into the room for an attack.

Under Jiang Ruan’s intentional indulgence, the City Lord Madam’s words poured out in greater detail, while the fox cries outside grew laced with anger, mingled with a warning “woo-woo” growl.