Chapter 59 Part 2

Mu Qian Tan replied, “Do I need a reason to scold you?”

“Of course!” Shang Shan pressed against the door. “I’m not like you said at all. Apologize to me.”

Mu Qian Tan said, “You’re really relentless.”

Requests for apologies weren’t new, but normal people would’ve given up long ago. A simple sorry couldn’t undo the hurt anyway, and meaningless. Only this one-track-minded fool persisted.

Mu Qian Tan ignored her.

After a while, Shang Shan said, “But besides the serious stuff, I have other things too. I want to prove I’m not incompetent! Or dumb!”

Mu Qian Tan leaned back more comfortably and scoffed. “Needing to prove it already shows you’re dumb.”

Pressing her mouth to the door crack, Shang Shan unleashed her demonic sound technique. “Master, Master, Master…”

Mu Qian Tan gripped the page tighter, annoyed. “Fine, you’re not dumb. Stop bothering me.”

Silence fell outside. After a long pause, thinking she’d left, Mu Qian Tan prepared to resume reading. Then the girl at the door said, “Then let me prove it to you—I’m actually pretty dumb.”

“…”

Mu Qian Tan pinched her nose bridge, utterly speechless at this Rubber Dragon. Wondering how she’d cling on, she spotted something in the book, hesitated, then waved spiritual power to unlock the door. “Get in here.”

The door swung open. Shang Shan, mask perched on her head, grinned as she slipped inside. She shut the door behind her, reached out with both hands, rolled on the floor a few times, and plopped down by the bed, chin on the edge. “Master.”

Mu Qian Tan glanced at her from over the book. “Say it quick and leave.”

A faint Tan fragrance wafted from the woman. Shang Shan licked her lips, eyes sparkling, nodding like a chick pecking rice.

“Oh, oh, right. That Sister Wen during the day said it might be a human culprit, but we fought her and even tore off her veil. I can say for sure—she’s definitely not human. Her skin was so white!”

She poked the back of the woman’s hand with one finger. “Whiter than you—no, you’re different. Hers is like… wall-white, and her eyes have no black pupils, just scary whites full of red bloodshot veins. Hitting her is like hitting nothing—steel and iron bones. This absolutely isn’t human, right, Master?”

Her gaze moved between the pages, and Mu Qian Tan hummed in acknowledgment.

Shang Shan said, “So, it’s still the fierce corpse. That waiter and the coffin shop owner were right! But we chased for so long and never heard any opera singing. New Year’s Money didn’t hear it either. So strange. Did you hear it, Master?”

“No,” Mu Qian Tan turned a page, her gaze drifting casually, her eyelashes fluttering slightly under the candlelight. “She didn’t want to sing for you all.”

Shang Shan huffed. “Impossible. You’re lying to me again.”

Mu Qian Tan lifted her chin. “Get me the water from the table.”

“Oh, are you thirsty?” Shang Shan stood up, went to the table, felt the teapot to confirm the water was still hot, then poured a cup and brought it back to the bedside. “Here.”

Mu Qian Tan leaned half-sideways against the headboard, her left hand pressing the book flat on the bed surface, two fingers holding the pages on either side. Her right hand took the teacup, tilted her head back, and drank more than half, leaving a shallow layer at the bottom. Then she set the cup on one corner of the book.

“Give me your hand.” She had just drunk the water, her pale pink lips glistening moistly as they parted. “I’ll try something.”

As if compelled by some ghostly force, Shang Shan said oh and sat cross-legged by the bed again, extending her right hand.

That hand had rounded finger joints, slender fingers naturally curled, and a palm uniquely thin like a young girl’s, set against the dark bed surface that made it appear even fairer and pinker. Palm down, back up—no, hand back down, palm up—the clearly etched palm lines like veins of life. “Here.”

Mu Qian Tan still held the book down. She dipped her right index finger in the water at the bottom of the cup, studied the talisman illustration on the page, and began drawing stroke by stroke on the girl’s palm. “Keep talking about what you were saying.”

“What I was saying… um, we… well, cough cough, tomorrow we’re going to find that coffin shop owner.”

A constant fine tingle came from her palm. Shang Shan’s words were thrown into chaos by the itch. It took a good while before she gathered her thoughts. “We need to find the owner and ask if he heard what opera it was. It feels like that’ll be important!”

“Mm.” Using the girl’s palm as talisman paper and the tea water as ink, Mu Qian Tan tried to replicate the talisman drawn in the book, responding offhandedly. “And then?”

“And then… and then…”

That finger didn’t seem to be moving on her palm—it was like it was on her scalp. The tingling made Shang Shan almost tremble, and she subconsciously wanted to pull her hand back. The woman in front of her breathed lightly. “Don’t move.”

She didn’t dare move and said in a low, aggrieved voice, “It itches…”

She wasn’t afraid of being hit— it didn’t hurt much anyway—but she was uniquely afraid of itching, that scratching sensation on the skin’s surface that was so hard to pin down. It always made her scalp tingle, her limbs curl up, wishing she could ball herself up and swat it away.

She pitifully said it itched two more times, but the woman didn’t budge. Shang Shan couldn’t help curling her fingers and squirming. “What are you doing?”

The curved finger accidentally pressed the inside of the woman’s wrist, the fingertip touching a faint, steady pulse. She said as if discovering some delightful surprise, “Your heart is beating. So amazing.”

“…” Mu Qian Tan pulled her wrist away from the finger and lifted her eyes from the book, saying coldly, “Yours isn’t beating, huh.”

This distracted her, and Shang Shan stopped focusing on the itch, shaking her head instead. “That’s not what I meant. I just look at you and always feel like you’re an ice cube. Like, how could an ice cube have a heartbeat? It doesn’t, right?”

The talisman was nearly complete. Mu Qian Tan drew the tail stroke. “How could an idiot have a brain?”

“Right, you can curse too. Mm.” Shang Shan organized her words. “She’s an opera-singing fierce corpse, and you’re a cursing ice cube.”

“Then what are you? An extra forgetful little dragon who always wants to get beaten…” Without thinking, she almost said something she shouldn’t. Mu Qian Tan bit back the words, the final stroke sliding to the base of the girl’s palm.

Shang Shan pressed. “What am I?”

Carefully checking the talisman for errors, Mu Qian Tan said, “Aren’t you the Cat Official?”

Shang Shan broke into a grin. “Yeah, yeah! You still remember?”

“Am I as dumb as you?” The talisman checked out fine. Without giving her time to prepare, Mu Qian Tan smacked her right on the head. “A cursing ice cube, huh?”

Facing this kind of attack, Shang Shan had already trained her muscle memory. Seeing the initial arm-raising motion, she wanted to dodge, but the hand on the bed felt like a mountain was pressing it down—it wouldn’t budge an inch!

Before she could even let out a huh, she got hit squarely because she couldn’t move. Her head buzzed, and only after half a day did she say, “What did you do to me?”

Mu Qian Tan grabbed one of her ears and tugged it upward, saying indifferently, “Mount Tai Overwhelming Talisman. How does it feel?”

Her head tilted to one side. Shang Shan was like she was nailed in place, unable to move, grimacing from the ear tug. “I can’t lift my hand. My ear hurts!”

Mu Qian Tan twisted it harder before letting go. “Then it worked.”

She had flipped open this talisman book wanting to learn some life-saving or escape talismans for critical moments, so next time she encountered someone like You Lianmeng, she could avoid her. But these were all advanced talismans, as difficult as higher math, and with her pure novice level who couldn’t even understand the text, it was hopeless.

Still, she wasn’t one to give up easily, so she flipped to the front to look at simple ones and practice first. She spotted this Mount Tai Pressing Down incantation—no restrictions on materials, lenient conditions, simple content. It seemed easy to pick up, and right then Shang Shan barged in—perfect to test it on her.

The talisman succeeded on the first try. This meant she had some talent, right?

Even if it took a long time to draw—long enough for anyone to run away.

A faint smile curved Mu Qian Tan’s lips, gone in a flash. But Shang Shan was like an eagle spotting prey, accurately capturing the moment it emerged. She leaned in. “You smiled.”

A finger poked her forehead to push her away. “Done talking? Go back.”

Shang Shan rubbed her ear in retaliation. “But I can’t move.” She tilted her head and flopped onto the bed. “It’s your talisman’s fault. I have to sleep here.”

Her words were reluctant, but her face showed none of it. Mu Qian Tan picked up the teacup and splashed the last bit of water onto her palm, ruining the entire talisman. “Get lost quick.”

Shang Shan clutched her palm, cupping both hands to her chest. “Can’t I sleep here?”

Mu Qian Tan closed the book. “Didn’t I get you a room? Don’t mooch off mine. Want another beating?”

Perhaps because the night was too quiet, the woman’s voice was much softer too. Though the tone was still fierce, it lacked much bite, coming off gentle. Shang Shan felt like that Mount Tai Overwhelming Talisman had been written on her heart—heavy—but she also wanted to fly. In the end, it turned into her stomach rumbling.

“Fine, fine.” Seeing the woman wouldn’t agree no matter what, Shang Shan clutched her belly and headed out. “I’m off then. Good night. Don’t have nightmares.”

The corridor was a bit cold. As she walked back to her room, rubbing her belly, she couldn’t figure it out no matter what—why did Master always stir up her weird appetite? She always felt hungry just seeing her.

Looked like she needed to eat more tomorrow morning.

In the room, Mu Qian Tan got out of bed to lock the door, blew out the candle, and returned to lie down.

Silence spread through the night. She could hear little insects chirping outside the window. Mu Qian Tan recalled the talisman-drawing method, then thought of the evening conversation and said, ‘And she says her brain doesn’t work well. When she comes to settle old scores with me, her head’s plenty clear.’

What she’d cursed her over, how many hits she’d taken—she probably remembered it all crystal clear, then came pitifully to apologize, not forgetting a thing.

Li Biyuan said, ‘This… hahahaha.’

Mu Qian Tan said, ‘And she says it’s all instinct. Her coming to bug me every day is instinct too?’

Li Biyuan tried to find a fitting description. ‘Mm… maybe she just really likes you, wants to get close to you? Yeah, that counts.’

She said this with particular difficulty. After all, given how much the female protagonist put up with abuse, for her to still like and want to get close to this woman—who knew what she was after.

Mu Qian Tan heard this, closed her eyes, pulled the thin quilt over herself, and only after a moment said, “She’s got issues.”