Chapter 93: Breather

Ye Chan froze for a moment, then lifted her body slightly, peering past Yang Baibai’s blocking form. Only then did she see it clearly: one corner of the wooden window’s glass pane was already cracked like a spiderweb, and several small shards had been knocked loose right then, revealing holes the size of knuckles. In the blink of an eye, over a dozen Little Bites had squeezed through along the edges.

“Fuck!”

She jumped up immediately, not caring where she landed, snatched a plastic cookie shell from the floor, and slapped it over the corner. But the thing’s curved edges caught perfectly on the window frame, leaving gaps on both sides. The Little Bites quickly crawled through the slits toward her wrist.

“Hiss—” Ye Chan glared wide-eyed and yelped in pain. She watched her wrist swell up instantly from the bites. These bugs were vicious—nothing like mosquitoes. They didn’t care if you noticed them; they just wanted you to hurt. And who knew what strange toxin their mouthparts secreted, but once bitten, the blood platelets’ clotting function was impaired, and the bleeding wouldn’t stop for hours.

“Don’t swat them,” Gu Xianwang said sharply as Ye Chan raised her hand. “The Little Bites here are like blister beetles—they’re poisonous. Touch their body fluids, and you’ll blister up right away.”

“Huh?!” Ye Chan was on the verge of tears. In just those few seconds, at least a dozen bugs had crawled onto her wrist, with three or four spots already bleeding. “What the hell do I do?!”

“Fuck.” Yang Baibai spat, grabbed her wrist, and poured half a bottle of water over it in a rush, washing it clean in an instant. Then he rubbed his foot right there on the floor, grinding the dead and live ones into paste. “Get to the back!”

He yanked her along with one hand, switching positions with her. His left palm slapped a bag of potato chips over the glass. The crinkly packaging didn’t seal perfectly either, so with his right hand he grabbed a hardcover book—from who knows where—and propped his foot in place of his left hand to block the hole. He flipped open the book, ready to tear out pages. “Got any tape?”

“Wait, wait!” Ye Chan waved her hands frantically, eyes bulging. “You can’t tear that book! Th-this is a rare out-of-print translation. This copy of The Red and the Black could trade for two cases of Maotai back in the ’70s!”

Yang Baibai shot her a glare, his eyes bulging with red veins from frustration. “Are you nuts? Money or your life?”

“It’s not about the money! This book is really valuable. I-I’ll block the window, okay? Just look for something else!”

Yang Baibai rolled his eyes and muttered something under his breath. He shoved the book into her arms, kept his awkward pose bent over, and started rummaging again. Ye Chan clutched it like a baby in her jacket. Glancing up, she spotted his ankle riddled with bites, fine trickles of blood streaking everywhere.

Meanwhile, Long Li had finally finished applying medicinal water to the cuts on Gu Xianwang’s face. She sliced open the side of her waterproof backpack tarp with a dagger and draped it entirely over her. “Stay put. Don’t move.”

Don’t move… Gu Xianwang’s eyes widened, but before she could protest, Long Li had vaulted lightly over the pile of clutter, pressed against the wall, one hand pinning the bottom edge of the plastic bag while the other drew a large spray can from her pack.

“Move.”

Yang Baibai: ?

He yanked his foot back sharply, nearly yanking his pants down with it, stumbling two steps to steady himself. His face flushed with irritated embarrassment—this Rat-Walker girl, what was her deal? Didn’t she know men and women should keep their distance? What was with getting that close all of a sudden!

The moment he stepped aside, Long Li whipped up the plastic bag. She jammed the spray nozzle right against the hole, pressing the bag’s sides tight. A continuous hiss sounded from behind as she sprayed for at least half a minute. A choking, acrid stench seeped out from under the bag. When she finished, she pocketed the can and weighed it—about half gone.

“What’s that?” Yang Baibai asked.

“Insecticide,” Long Li added. “Very potent. Too much inhalation is bad for humans too.”

Ye Chan nodded in sudden realization. No wonder they’d waited until they were inside the log cabin to use it.

Yang Baibai tsked twice, stomping to shake the bugs off his legs. He thought to himself that staying out of the city really was asking for trouble. He hadn’t expected the Rat-Walkers to have devolved this far. Was Treasure Spotting the only trade left in the jianghu still clinging to outdated ways, priding themselves on wandering the world with just a bamboo staff and straw sandals?

As he scratched his head, Gu Xianwang suddenly spoke up. “Stitch up your gut. It’s split open a few times already, hasn’t it?”

Yang Baibai glanced down. His sixty-buck T-shirt was soaked with blood, creating an artistic bleed effect. No wonder the metallic tang was so strong.

“It’s fine.” He mumbled awkwardly, figuring it would be too embarrassing to lift his shirt crammed in this log cabin like this. He quickly changed the subject. “You didn’t find those inner-glow fireflies either, did you?”

This round was a draw. He had been about to say as much when Gu Xianwang suddenly pulled a small flower glowing with faint purple light from the nylon bag she’d been clutching tightly the whole time. He couldn’t help but freeze.

Gu Xianwang said, “I found this in a valley between the trees in the forest. Maybe the Fluorescent Candle Fire doesn’t just refer to fireflies—”

“Did you run into a Jade Flute Earth Toad?” Yang Baibai interrupted in a daze. He glanced at the insect corpses on the ground and murmured, “No wonder these bugs ended up like this.”

Ye Chan asked, “What’s a Jade Flute Earth Toad?”

Yang Baibai explained, “It’s a legendary ‘immortal herb’ ranked even above heavenly materials. It’s named that way because when it blooms, it looks like a jade flute from afar. Ancient books say it used to grow in the Kunlun Immortal Pool. It glows during its flowering season, making it quite beautiful. But it’s not actually a plant—it’s an animal. Its roots are a corpse toad buried in the soil that feeds on rotting fluids. They say the more corpses you bury in the soil, the better it grows.”

Ye Chan: …

She stared at the flower in Sister Gu’s hand with an expression too complicated to describe. Her brows furrowed tighter and tighter until she couldn’t help swallowing the sour bile rising in her throat.

Gu Xianwang was stunned too. She was glad she hadn’t handed the flower over right away. “…So why is it called an immortal herb?”

“Probably because it originally grew on Kunlun Immortal Mountain,” Yang Baibai said. He couldn’t explain it any better himself. He only knew that during its growth phase, it was a nourishing tonic. But once it flowered, that meant the earth toad underground had matured. No living creature that stepped into its flower bed ever walked out alive. “You… tch, you’ve got some serious luck.”

Ye Chan grimaced in disgust. She’d thought it had some amazing uses, but it turned out it was just riding on its place of origin. Would Immortal Mountain really cultivate something so ominous? More like Ghost Mountain.

These were all unverified legends, but Gu Xianwang had seen the bones rotting beneath that fluorescent sea with her own eyes. For a moment, she didn’t know whether to put the flower away or toss it.

“Can I take a look?”

Yang Baibai raised an eyebrow. “Don’t tell me you Rat Walkers know how to use it?”

Long Li held out her hand and patiently waited while Gu Xianwang agonized over it for a moment. Then Gu Xianwang walked over and handed her the flower. Long Li examined it closely and smiled faintly. “When it comes to cataloging and sorting heavenly materials and earthly treasures, who would dare claim first place over Treasure Spotting? If the Yang Family doesn’t know, then naturally I don’t either. I just think the flower is beautiful and wanted to look at it a little longer. The ‘jade flute’ description certainly lives up to its name. From another angle, life and death are just part of the natural cycle. Making full use of things is the way of heaven. If I were the divine maiden, I wouldn’t favor one form of life over another. What’s the difference between one that drinks dew and one that drinks blood?”

Hearing this, Ye Chan nodded. “Yeah, that makes sense. They’re immortals, after all.”

Gu Xianwang shot her a glance and grumbled, “But this flower probably can’t be used to dispel the mist, right?”

“No idea.” Long Li smiled. “Someone always has to be the first to try.”

Not you, though, Gu Xianwang thought.

Ye Chan craned her neck to peer out the window. “Hey, looks like the insecticide actually worked.”

No sooner had the words left her mouth than a steady knocking came from the wooden door: thump-thump-thump.

“Damn, no mercy. Banging on the door again?”

Long Li listened for a moment. “Doesn’t sound like the swarm slamming into it. This knocking has a very regular rhythm.”

Something suddenly occurred to Gu Xianwang. She strode to the door, dug out the gum wrapper, and peered outside through the wormhole. Then she yanked the door open in a flash and dragged a massive bulk inside.

Ye Chan stared at the Golden Crow and exclaimed joyfully, “Well, well! Bird Lord, how’d you find your way here?”

The Golden Crow tilted its head and chirped. Who knew what it had scarfed down outside—its belly was perfectly round now, and it felt a lot heavier. Gu Xianwang held it with one arm, and as her fingers accidentally brushed through the fluff under its body, she felt a cord around its neck. She pulled it up and saw a blood-soaked cloth pouch dangling from it.

That was… Long Li’s missing item.

Gu Xianwang hadn’t been able to find it, but the Golden Crow had brought it back.

As Gu Xianwang looked up, she caught Long Li with her brows slightly furrowed—a grave expression that vanished in an instant, quickly returning to normal.

Yang Baibai caught on. “That’s a bird?”

Ye Chan rolled her eyes. “…Didn’t we tell you ages ago?”

In the beam of the flashlight, he finally recognized it. “It’s a Golden Crow.”

“This guy can lead us out.”

Ye Chan: “Huh?”

Yang Baibai went on, “No wonder nothing strange happened when we first entered the Mist Forest. We must have been following the Golden Crow.”

“Birds have a natural sense of direction, and this one’s no ordinary bird. It’s probably unaffected by the Mist Mirage, so it could find its way back.” He turned to Gu Xianwang. “Talk to it. Have it lead the way for us. We can definitely find the car again.”

Gu Xianwang: …What good would her talking do? It wasn’t even her bird.

Whether it was because the overpowering mix of blood and potion on her body was too much, the Golden Crow grew extremely restless nestled in her arms. In short order, it began flapping about. Given its size, even the slightest movement tugged at the wound on her shoulder, sending drills of agony through her. Her grip loosened, and whether by accident or design, her pinky finger hooked the cloth pouch and tugged it free. The Golden Crow then beat its wings and flew down to Long Li’s feet, where it shamelessly rubbed against her legs.

Long Li glanced at it coolly. “If this really is a Golden Crow, it might be worth a shot.”

Fat Bird: Chirp?

Ye Chan happened to have a ball of yarn right at hand. She measured out a length and tied it around the Golden Crow’s neck—it looked for all the world like a dog leash. “So, should we make a break for it and test the theory? Sister Gu, what was going on outside when you opened the door just now?”

“The insecticide must be working. There aren’t many Little Bites left.”

Ye Chan nodded, then suddenly remembered something. “What about this book… Should I give it back to its owner?” She handed the leash to Long Li and pulled the hardcover copy of The Red and the Black from her pocket. She flipped through it reluctantly, the pages rustling softly, until a pink slip of thin paper fluttered out from between them.

Yang Baibai, standing nearby, snatched it up for a look. “A train ticket? Tsk, this book’s probably stolen too. And the ticket’s from two years back—this person came from Guiyang to Xi’an by train.”

“That still doesn’t make it right. Taking without asking is stealing.” Ye Chan pouted. “Maybe I should leave money for the book.”

Yang Baibai snorted. “Such a priss.”

Gu Xianwang stared at the back of the train ticket, an inexplicable chill crawling up her spine. “Let me see that ticket.”

Train tickets from two years ago rarely showed names or ID numbers—just the route details—and checking them was still pretty primitive. The reason it creeped her out was the two symmetrical triangles torn from the corners, visible from the back. That wasn’t the work of any ticket inspector; it was the passenger’s own quirk.

The triangles were perfectly uniform, but they hadn’t been sliced off with a blade in one go. Frayed edges on the paper showed they’d been torn without even folding first, aligned purely by hand and eye, little by little. Two years later, as her fingertip traced the edge of one triangle, she could almost picture the scene: a middle-aged man with glasses and an old-fashioned suit, sitting alone on the train, head bowed as he meticulously tore away at the paper.

If he was satisfied with the tear, he’d leave his unique signature beneath the route arrow: a cursive g.

It was a habit Gu Xianwang had spotted while going through that archaeology folder—Gu Jinnian’s signature quirk.

Her gaze fixed on the penned g scrawled across the ticket, she said coldly, “Take the book with us.”