Fu Shanyue chuckled. "I'm not that idle. I came today to ask about what you left unsaid back at Wind Demon Mountain."
"What did I leave unsaid?"
Fu Shanyue spread his hand, revealing the small wooden bottle resting on his palm. "Do you know what is inside this?"
His subordinate looked astonished upon hearing this.
Wasn't this wooden bottle filled with dragon marrow? The young master had gone to such great lengths to seize it himself; why was he turning around to ask an outsider now?
"Who told you that?"
The moment He Lingchuan spoke those words, Fu Shanyue's face darkened. The subordinate couldn't help chiming in, "Young Master, could this man be talking nonsense? Don't believe him."
Fu Shanyue slowly turned his head, fixing him with a stare. "Then whom should I believe? You, Fu Ji? Or Fu Jiu?"
Fu Ji's face changed drastically. He opened his mouth to speak, but Fu Shanyue suddenly struck the crown of his head with a palm, knocking him clean unconscious.
He Lingchuan frowned in displeasure. "Careful. Blood splattered on the wall."
He had seen clearly that as Fu Ji slid down, the corner of his mouth scraped the wall, leaving a streak of blood.
Fu Shanyue was this ruthless even to his own men?
"Ah, sorry about that. Cleaning house," Fu Shanyue said, finding a towel to wipe his hands. "Pardon the unsightly display."
"Not only did I watch the display, I even did the heavy lifting for you." The traps He Lingchuan had set inside the room had all been borne by Fu Ji. "Why bring him here to clean your house?"
Using his efforts to purge his own subordinate—this fellow certainly knew how to take advantage.
"Just convenient, that's all." Fu Shanyue dropped his nonchalance, adopting a serious expression. "What exactly is inside this bottle? Please enlighten me."
He Lingchuan sat steady as a rock. "Information comes at a price. You understand."
"What do you want?"
"Depends on what you have." He Lingchuan spread his hands. "If you're so poor that all you have left is money, I suppose I could make do."
Fu Shanyue looked somewhat surprised. A man like this was short on cash?
He Lingchuan kept smiling. *Short? Why wouldn't I be?*
Back when he was the eldest young master of Dunyu, he had been short on money, and now that he had come to Beijia all alone, all he had at his disposal were unspent savings from before—truly burning through his reserves. He still had the path of cultivation to walk, and every single step cost money.
So talking about money was vulgar, but not talking about money left his pockets tight.
"Understood." Fu Shanyue pulled two banknotes from his robes and laid them on the table. "Here is two hundred taels. That's all I have on me right now."
He was out to kill people—no, negotiate—so why would he carry much cash on him?
"Your life is only worth two hundred taels?" He Lingchuan said. "Don't sell yourself so short."
"Can't you give me a friendship discount?"
He Lingchuan smiled. "Friendship never comes with a discount."
Fu Shanyue felt rather helpless. Concealed weapons he had in abundance, but as for money, where was he supposed to rustle that up on short notice? "Where is your destination?"
"Lingxu City."
Fu Shanyue pondered for a moment. "Add to that a grand residence in Lingxu City covering five mu!"
He Lingchuan laughed. "Covering five mu, and you have the cheek to call it a grand residence?" His old residence in Blackwater City had covered twenty-five mu, five times the size of Fu Shanyue's offer.
Fu Shanyue curled his lip. "In Lingxu City, it is!"
At that, he gave a sly grin. "Actually, I don't need to know precisely what it is. Knowing it isn't dragon marrow is enough!"
Knowing he had indeed been misled was sufficient.
He Lingchuan remained unfazed. "Without knowing the properties of the poison, how do you expect to go back, set a trap, and turn the tables?"
That hit Fu Shanyue right where it hurt. He instinctively bared his teeth. "Two hundred taels, a grand residence in Lingxu City, plus a favor from me."
"Such an opportunity doesn't come often," he warned He Lingchuan. "Don't be in a rush to refuse."
"All right then, but you also have to answer a few questions of mine."
In truth, both men knew those conditions were negligible; they were merely an excuse for both sides to shake hands and make peace. With no blood feud and no tangled web of conflicting interests, why fight to the death? Besides, the person Fu Shanyue wanted to deal with right now wasn't He Lingchuan at all.
"Ask away."
"What is your relationship to the Ruler of Chiyan?" Again, a ba in this world was rarer than Rh-null blood in his previous world; it naturally invited speculation.
"He is my father."
*Just as I thought.* He Lingchuan blinked. "A ba can have children?"
When it came down to it, wasn't a ba just... a corpse?
Did a dead person still possess that kind of vigor?
Still, He Lingchuan had read in *Tales of the Middle Ancient Era*, which Sun Fuling had lent him, that when a ba first came into being, it shunned sunlight, had stiff joints, and bore a pallid complexion. Only as its cultivation grew profound would its complexion become ruddy and its movements natural; at that point, it differed little from a living human and even regained a pulse, though its method of cultivation remained entirely different.
Having a pulse meant bodily functions, so perhaps... hmm?
"He was quite surprised himself," Fu Shanyue said indifferently. "My mother was human."
His father had once been human as well, so there was no reproductive isolation, so to speak.
"Since you are a prince of Chiyan Kingdom, why ambush your own envoy?"
"I heard that the gift the Ruler of Shanyu secretly sent my father would be immensely beneficial to my cultivation," Fu Shanyue said with a smile. "Father would never give it to me, so I came to take it myself."
He Lingchuan expressed sympathy. "Sounds like you don't get along very well with your father."
"It's fine." Fu Shanyue's smile didn't waver. "He just wishes I were dead, that's all."
"A model of filial devotion and paternal affection," He Lingchuan sighed. "And why is that?"
"That's family business, not for sharing." Fu Shanyue tilted his chin at him. "I've answered enough questions. Your turn."
"What is inside that wooden bottle of yours isn't dragon marrow, but a type of venom." He Lingchuan trimmed the wick of the oil lamp on the chest of drawers to brighten it. "I've seen what it does when it strikes someone. Anyone afflicted is beyond cure."
"Venom?" Thinking it was something extraordinary, Fu Shanyue sounded a bit disappointed instead. "I don't fear poisons."
Creatures like ba were naturally immune to all poisons.
"This isn't a poison of the mortal realm, but produced by the spawn of a god." He Lingchuan asked him, "Do you know of the ferry mother?"
Back at Wind Demon Mountain, the moment he smelled the aroma from the bottle, he had recognized it: Wen Xing, the son of Zhong Shengguang's trusted advisor Wen Daolun, had emitted this very same sweet fragrance from his wound after being injured by the ferry mother's ninth child. What was inside the bottle hardly needed further explanation.
Fu Shanyue shook his head blankly. "What is that?"
"Not a 'what,' but a deity." He Lingchuan spread his hands. "We need a living subject for a test."
Fu Shanyue pointed at his subordinate Fu Ji nearby. "What do you think of this one?"
He Lingchuan made an inviting gesture. So this fellow had spared Fu Ji's life just to use him as a guinea pig.
Fu Shanyue casually drew out a silver needle and dipped it into the liquid in the bottle. The tip remained as shiny and silver as ever, turning neither dark nor black. He pricked Fu Ji with the needle, but the man remained unconscious and gave no response.
Fu Shanyue was evidently not very patient. He simply pricked him several more times across his neck, thigh, abdomen, and other spots.
After several dozen breaths, He Lingchuan suddenly said, "There's a change."
Fu Shanyue produced a dagger and scraped at the prick marks. The texture was stiff—or rather, hard. The soft skin had turned into something else.
*Mm, really wood?*
He checked several more needle pricks and found signs of turning into wood appearing everywhere, spreading across the entire body.
Fu Ji also woke from the abnormal sensation, crying out in terror, "What is happening to me?!"
Fu Shanyue gave the wooden bottle in his hand a slight shake. "You tested it for me."
Fu Ji struggled to crawl on the ground. "Young Master, spare my life!"
"Who passed the false intelligence that the gift sent by Shanyu Kingdom was dragon marrow?"
Fu Ji stammered, unable to form words.
Fu Shanyue murmured, "I never treated you boys poorly. Why betray me?"
Fu Ji pleaded desperately for mercy, but by now his limbs could no longer move, and Fu Shanyue remained unmoved. Only when Fu Ji had completely turned into a wooden statue did Fu Shanyue pat his shoulder. "There is no antidote for this venom."
Furthermore, as the blood circulated faster, it took effect even more swiftly.
Now, anyone standing before Fu Ji would only marvel at the craftsman's skill, carving him so lifelike that even the agonized expression on his face appeared genuine.
Fu Shanyue watched, secretly appalled.
He Lingchuan asked him, "Do you think you would have been spared if you drank this?"
A ba's body could resist lethal toxins, but it might not withstand the effect of turning into wood. Fu Shanyue looked grim. "I tested it on mice and a hare too, but I had them ingest it orally back then."
"Snake venom acts upon entering the blood, but swallowing it does little harm. Having the mice and hare ingest it probably meant the effects wouldn't take hold so quickly," He Lingchuan reminded him. "Besides, are you certain the mice and hare you tested weren't swapped out?"
Fu Shanyue couldn't bring himself to say they hadn't.
He pondered, then asked again, "What kind of deity is this ferry mother, anyway?"
He Lingchuan then enlightened him on the traits of the ferry mother and her spawn.
Fu Shanyue kept silent throughout the explanation, exhaling a long breath only after quite a while. "So that's how it is!"
"Why would the Ruler of Shanyu send something like this to your father?" He Lingchuan asked. "Or was the item swapped along the way? I heard the Shanyu envoy was robbed on the road and spent two days recovering the lost property."
"I don't know," Fu Shanyue shook his head. "But I will find out."
He added, "Right now, Shanyu Kingdom's government forces are being routed by the rebel New Army and desperately need Chiyan's help." He had read that letter; according to it, besides this dragon marrow, the Ruler of Shanyu had drawn up a gift list for his father.
He Lingchuan asked curiously, "Can Chiyan send troops to help?"
"Of course not. That is an internal affair of Shanyu Kingdom. Other demon kings can only watch the tigers fight from across the mountain; they cannot step into the arena directly. Otherwise, Lingxu City and the other demon kingdoms would impose severe punishments!"
He Lingchuan caught the word "directly." "Which means they can help indirectly?"
Every rule had loopholes to exploit, and Beijia was no exception.
"Money, grain, supplies—all can be channeled into a friendly nation's war effort under various pretexts such as trade. With proper planning, a few top experts can even be dispatched to offer support. Regarding things like that, Lingxu City finds it hard to police, and sometimes turns a blind eye." Fu Shanyue shrugged. "No matter who wins in the end, as long as they submit as a vassal, pay tribute to Lingxu City, and receive the gods' recognition, they can take the throne."
Chapter 404