chapter 72.1

Murong Yunshu had lived in the Liang Palace for three days. During these three days, Hua Yeli had never come again, but Wang Chao ran here for three days. He didn’t speak when he came. He just looked at her, and then silently left. It was like the special purpose of his visits was to confirm whether she was still alive. On the fourth day, Wang Chao came over again.

When Wang Chao entered the guest yard, he found that there was no one inside, but there was a tea set on the stone table. While he was being puzzled, he suddenly heard an unsavoury voice coming from behind him, asking him in a calm way but with a bit of an eerie tone, “Would you like some tea?” He immediately jumped a few metres away in fright. Then, he turned around and cried out, “If you scare people to death, you have to pay back with your own life!”

Murong Yunshu couldn’t make head or tail of[+]Chinese idiom : baffled his reaction, “Did you just do something shameful?”

“No!”

“In that case, are you here to do something shameful?”

The corners of Wang Chao’s mouth trembled slightly as he said with a dark expression on his face, “I just came to see you, so how can that be considered as something shameful!”

“You didn’t do anything shameful, and you didn’t want to do anything shameful. Then, what are you afraid of?” Murong Yunshu raised her eyebrows and leisurely continued, “If you don’t do anything shameful during the day, you won’t be afraid of ghosts knocking at the door at night[+]Chinese phrase : a quiet conscience sleeps in thunder.”

“I…” Wang Chao was at a loss for words. He originally wanted to say, ‘I’m not afraid of ghosts, I’m afraid of you, because you’re more frightful than ghosts’, but when he thought of her behind-the-scenes backer and semi behind-the-scenes backer, he swallowed those words back. Chu Changge and His Highness, both of whom he could not afford to offend![+]This noob translation was translated by a noob translator, きつね. Please read this chapter at xin-shou.blogspot.com.

Murong Yunshu glanced at him indifferently. Then she walked over to the stone table, sat down, and leisurely drank the tea.

Wang Chao didn’t understand. He had been observing her for so many days and discovered that she had done nothing except for drinking tea and eating. She was extremely leisurely and carefree as she simply sat there and ate till she died. However, all these acts must have been her facade. She must be thinking about something in her mind, but what was she thinking about?

Feeling confused, Wang Chao scratched his head and said, “When I see you, I will hate my parents.”

Murong Yunshu raised her eyebrows, “Therefore, you come here every day just to hate on your parents?”

“…” Did he look like such a jerk? Wang Chao’s whole face was full of black lines as he responded, “I came here to see when you’re going to die.”

Murong Yunshu smiled softly and reacted, “You are really good at joking. Since you are still alive, how can I die?”

“Are you so sure I’ll die before you?”

“I’m not sure. So in order to make sure that you die before me, you can go die now.” Murong Yunshu smiled pleasantly.

The corners of Wang Chao’s mouth twitched wildly. When someone told him to die, he should have been angry, but her cloudy tone and smiling expression actually made him lose his anger. “Do you know why I hate my parents when I see you?” Wang Chao asked.

“Of course I don’t know. We don’t know each other that well at all.”

Will you die if you don’t add the latter sentence? Wang Chao secretly rolled his eyes and explained, “Because I found myself to be so stupid when I saw you, so I hate them for not making me smarter.”

Murong Yunshu felt that this person’s logic was really strange. Even she could not really understand. She hesitated for a long time before saying, “Maybe you have wrongly blamed your father.”

“How do you know?”

Murong Yunshu told him, “Your father must not know about the person who put the hat on him, was even more stupid than him. If he had known, he would not have let you be born, and there would have been one less imbecile in the world. Even the Daye Dynasty would not have an average intelligence level to be this low.”

Wang Chao stared dumbfounded at her. What did she mean by him being a burden to so many people? No, no, what with this putting on a hat? Suddenly, Wang Chao eventually realised what had happened, followed by him becoming as fierce as thunder[+]Chinese idiom : fly into a rage, “How dare you accuse my father of being a cuckold!”

“Six seconds.” Murong Yunshu completely ignored Wang Chao being expressive. She was just like an old god was here[+]South Fujian proverb : calm / unperturbed as she said, “Although the reaction is a little slow, in the end, you will still understand it.”

So? Then what? No more words to say? Still want to say that his understanding was not insufficient enough to understand what she was saying? Suddenly, Wang Chao fell into a dilemma whether he should be furious or laugh in this awkward situation and his expression froze. After a long while, when his facial muscles finally regained consciousness, Wang Chao found that his body was starting to lose its consciousness. “You…” Before the sound of the word ‘you’ could be fully pronounced, he fell to the ground.

Murong Yunshu took a sip of tea from the teacup, slowly swallowed it, and then instructed, “Dig a hole and bury him.”

“Ah!” Lu-er jumped up in shock and reminded, “Miss, treating human life as if it is not worth a straw[+]Chinese idiom : kill in cold blood is against the law!”

“Who’s treating human life as if it is not worth a straw[+]Chinese idiom : kill in cold blood?” Murong Yunshu put the tea cup on the stone table and stated, “He is not dead yet.”

“…he’s not dead…in that case, no need to bury him, right?” Lu-er forced out a laugh.

“Just bury him alive.”

“Ah!” Lu-er screamed once more, “After all had been said, you still want to treat human life as if it is not worth a straw[+]Chinese idiom : kill in cold blood!”

The corner of Murong Yunshu’s mouth trembled slightly, “Are you going to bury him or not?”

“I…”

“I remember someone had pledged in all sincerity by saying that she would help me dig a hole to bury the body.”

“I…” Lu-er was afraid. She…she was just saying it casually. Bury alive…bury alive…suddenly, Lu-er’s spirit turned excited as she happily stated, “I am talking about digging holes to bury corpses, not digging holes to bury people alive!”

“Since you said so…” Murong Yunshu’s tone was very careless, but in Lu-er’s ears, they sounded unusually eerie, almost like a prelude to a murder in the dark of the night, “then turn him into a corpse first before burying him.”

Sure…sure enough. Lu-er looked horrified as she started to plead, “Miss, you, you just don’t joke with me…”

“Just forget it. You can plant grass in the yard.”

Yay? From burying a person alive to planting a grass…Miss’ thinking jumped too fast, right? Although Lu-er was puzzled by her Miss’ action, she also didn’t dare to ask more. For fear that her Master would turn back on her word, she quickly said, “Okay, I’m going to plant grass.” When she turned around, Lu-er was dumbfounded. Where was Wang Chao? Didn’t he fall here just now? Lu-er looked back at her Master and saw that she was still calm while drinking tea and thinking about things. “Mi, Miss?”

“It’s Missy.” Murong Yunshu corrected.

Lu-er sweated and she continued to ask, “Where did Wang Chao go?”

“Have you finished planting your grass?” Murong Yunshu asked instead of answering.

Lu-er tactfully shut her mouth while she sighed in her heart. Since Miss met Guye[+]son-in-law [used by wife’s family], she had really become even more amazing!

Her Miss just took a sip of tea, and Wang Chao fell down.

With another sip of tea, Wang Chao disappeared.

Was…was this what the jianghu[+]lit. rivers and lakes—people wandering from place to place and living by their wits, e.g. fortune-tellers, quack doctors, itinerant entertainers, etc. , considered as a social group people often said by killing people invisibly, then destroyed the bodies to make the evidence of one’s wrongdoing disappear? Lu-er immediately shuddered and she started to float in her steps.

*

After Wang Chao’s disappearance, Zhang Yu also began to ‘drop in’.

Murong Yunshu still didn’t go beyond the front gate nor did she step out through the inner gate and she did nothing other than continued to drink tea and eat. When Zhang Yu came, she drank tea. After Zhang Yu left, she continued to drink tea.[+]This noob translation was translated by a noob translator, きつね. Please read this chapter at xin-shou.blogspot.com.

On the fifth day of his visit, Zhang Yu finally lost his cool. “What did you do to Wang Chao?”

You finally know how to open your mouth to speak? The corner of Murong Yunshu’s mouth twitched. She put down her tea cup, then raised her eyes to look at him, and asked, “Do you want to see him?”

“I just want to know where he is.” Zhang Yu replied sullenly.

“Inside Gossip House on the outskirts of the city, in Yun Si Niang[+]form of address for an elderly married woman’s inn,” answered Murong Yunshu.

Zhang Yu’s face changed drastically when he heard this, “You gave him to Yun Si Niang[+]form of address for an elderly married woman?!”

Lu-er blinked. Was Yun Si Niang[+]form of address for an elderly married woman that terrible? More terrible than her Miss? Why was this ice rock becoming so scared like this?

Murong Yunshu smiled without saying a word, which could be regarded as her tacit approval.

Zhang Yu’s face became even more ugly. While he was still standing in place, he glared at Murong Yunshu for a long time, before he sullenly turned around.

“Are you going to find Wang Chao?” Murong Yunshu asked leisurely.

Zhang Yu stopped but said nothing.

Murong Yunshu went on to say, “Although Gossip House is not a big place, there are many nooks and crannies to hide people. If you look for him, you may not find him. Why don’t I give you a favour by letting someone lead you there?”

When he heard what she said, Zhang Yu’s two thick and black eyebrows knitted high. Although he was not smart, but, he also knew that pie would not just fall from the sky. “No need.” He decisively refused.

“But I have to give you this favour.” Murong Yunshu’s voice was as flat as water. If one listened carefully, maybe one could still hear some smiles in them, as if she was cracking a joke.

However, Zhang Yu knew that she was definitely not joking. Not only was she not joking, but she was also serious. “What do you want?” he asked very vigilantly.

Murong Yunshu slightly bent her lips. She said nothing, just silently drinking tea.

Zhang Yu was about to repeat his question, when he all of a sudden felt a burst of discomfort. It was an unspeakable discomfort, because he didn’t know where exactly his discomfort was at all, but felt that his body seemed to be different from usual…he was losing his consciousness! Zhang Yu took two steps backwards abruptly, “You…what did you do to me…” The word ‘me’ had not yet been spoken, and his body had toppled over.

“Ah!” Even though this was not the first time she had seen someone fall down inexplicably in front of her, Lu-er still screamed out, “He…he…Miss, how on earth did you do that?”

Murong Yunshu did not answer, but said indifferently, “Go plant another grass.”

“But…” Lu-er still wanted to ask, but she knew she wouldn’t get an answer for it. Thus, she held back her mouth and she said instead, “Okay. I’ll go plant grass.”

Lu-er just took two steps forward, when she suddenly remembered that Zhang Yu’s ‘corpse’ had not been dealt with. Hence, when she turned back, she was dumbfounded again.

Zhang Yu…had disappeared.

She then looked at her Master once more. Her Master was still drinking tea in a leisurely manner, as if she did not see anything.

Really evil!

Lu-er was full of doubts but she did not dare to ask. Thus her small face wrinkled just like a dumpling.

At the same time, Murong Yunshu slowly put down the cup in her hand. With a hint of coldness in her eyes, she looked at Wang Chao’s grass, and she was startled in shock.