Red-Clad Ghost, the Burning of the Martial and Civil Temples

ON THE FACE OF THE BOY, as Xie Lian had first suspected, there was a field of serious burn scars. Except, beneath the bloody scars, there were

traces of three or four tiny faces.

Those faces were no bigger than the palms of a baby, and they were scattered crookedly across his cheeks and forehead. After being burned, the features on each tiny face were shriveled in pain, as if screaming in agony. The sight of these weird, screaming faces squeezing and squirming on a regular human face was indeed more horrifying than any demon!

Xie Lian felt as though he were plunged into a nightmare the instant he saw this boy’s face. A fear so immense paralyzed him until he couldn’t recall standing up, nor tell what the expression on his face was, but it

must’ve been intimidating. The boy was already on tenterhooks when he removed his bandages at that hesitant, slow pace. After seeing Xie Lian’s reaction, he took a couple of steps back, as if aware of Xie Lian’s inability to accept that face of his. He suddenly covered his horrifying face and leapt up from the ground, then let out a shout and fled into the deep woods.

Xie Lian finally came around and shouted, “Wait!” He called out as he chased after him, “Wait! Come back!”

But Xie Lian had been dumbstruck for a good moment before he

came around. The boy was obviously familiar with the mountain paths and used to escaping in the dark, so it took him no time to vanish completely.

No matter how Xie Lian yelled for him, he wouldn’t show himself. There was no one around to help Xie Lian search and his powers had to be exhausted by now, so there was no way he could contact the others through the array. He ran all over the mountain, searching for a good part of an hour to no avail.

A cold breeze blew past and cleared his mind a little. Knowing that running around aimlessly like a headless fly served no purpose, Xie Lian forced himself to calm down. Maybe he’ll go back to take Xiao-Ying’s body, Xie Lian thought as he returned to the Ming Guang temple. But then, he stopped in his tracks.

Many men dressed in black with grave expressions had gathered in

the woods at the back of the temple, and they were in the midst of carefully unloading those forty-something upside-down corpses. A tall man with folded arms was standing before the woods, overseeing the operation. When he turned his head around, it was the exquisite-yet-cold face of a youth. It

was Fu Yao. It looked like he had made a trip back and brought a number of helping hands along from the Palace of Xuan Zhen.

Xie Lian was about to speak but was interrupted by the sound of footfalls behind him. Nan Feng had returned from sending the villagers

away. Upon seeing the situation at hand, Nan Feng glanced at Fu Yao and said, “Didn’t you run away?”

The comment was not pleasant to the ears, and Fu Yao raised his eyebrows in displeasure. Xie Lian didn’t want them to start another argument at a time like this, so he said, “I asked him to find

reinforcements.”

Nan Feng sneered. “Well, where are they? I thought you could at least ask your general to come personally?”

Fu Yao replied coolly, “When I went back, I heard General Pei Junior had already come to the scene, so I didn’t bother our general. Even if I had, he’s probably too busy to come anyway.”

Actually, based on Xie Lian’s understanding of Mu Qing, Xie Lian was pretty sure that he wouldn’t come even if he had the time. But under the present circumstances, there wasn’t time to dwell on that. He said tiredly, “Stop your fighting for a moment and help me find the bandaged boy.”

Nan Feng frowned. “Wasn’t he guarding that girl’s body with you earlier?”

“I scared him off after asking him to remove his bandages,” Xie Lian replied.

Fu Yao smirked. “Please, your cross-dressing isn’t that terrifying.” Xie Lian sighed. “It’s my fault for being in a stupor. Miss Xiao-

Ying’s death was already a big shock to him. He probably couldn’t take the

blow of thinking that I was scared of his face, so he ran off.” Fu Yao wrinkled his nose. “Is he really that ugly?”

“It’s not a matter of ugliness,” Xie Lian replied. “He…has the Human Face Disease.”

Hearing those three words, both Nan Feng and Fu Yao froze. They finally understood why Xie Lian was shocked.

Eight hundred years ago, a plague swept through the Kingdom of Xianle, and it wiped out the nation. Those who caught the plague would first develop small warts all over their bodies, then as the warts swelled, the skin would grow rough. The swollen parts would slowly grow more uneven, with three indentations and one protrusion, just like…eyes, mouths, noses. The facial features would then metamorphize until the warts

eventually took on the shape of a human face. If they were left alone, more and more human faces would grow on their bodies. It was said that some of these human faces, once fully formed, could speak and even scream.

They called this the Human Face Disease!

Fu Yao’s expression went through a myriad of changes as he dropped his folded arms. “That’s impossible! It was exterminated hundreds of years ago! There’s no way it could reappear!”

“I’m not mistaken,” Xie Lian only said.

Nan Feng and Fu Yao couldn’t refute him. No one could refute this if it came from Xie Lian.

Xie Lian continued, “There are many burn scars on his face, probably from self-inflicted burning to get rid of the faces.”

The first reaction of those who contracted the disease was usually to slice off the faces with knives or burn them away with fire; they would use any means possible to rid themselves of those lesions.

Nan Feng’s voice turned solemn. “The boy is probably not a normal human being, then. He has to be at least a few hundred years old. All else aside, is he contagious?”

Even though this was a severe headache, it was a question Xie Lian considered calmly and logically, so he replied with conviction, “No, the Human Face Disease is highly contagious. If he were still contagious, then the entire mountain would’ve been infected by now, considering how long he has been hiding here. His condition should already be…cured. Only the scars remain.”

They couldn’t afford to be careless. Fu Yao seemed to have some real influence in the Palace of Xuan Zhen and was able to call forth capable

hands to help with the search. But no matter how deep they dug or how far they looked, they could not find any traces of the bandaged boy. Perhaps he had already fled Mount Yujun and vanished into the sea of people. The best they could do now was to return to the heavens, request that the Palace of Ling Wen conduct a search, and wait for news. Fortunately, the boy was not contagious, but Xie Lian thought of how horrifying he looked. If he was discovered after he left the mountains, he might end up hunted as a monster. It was best that they find him soon.

Without further delay, Xie Lian picked up Xiao-Ying’s body and descended the mountain. Since he was slightly out of it, he didn’t realize he brought the body into the tea shop until the tea master yelled at him. Xie Lian immediately apologized and went back out to entrust Xiao-Ying’s burial to someone else before reentering the tea shop. After settling everything, he sat down and heaved a soundless sigh.

This case was finally over, but Xie Lian thought that the few days

since he ascended felt longer than an entire year of collecting scraps in the Mortal Realm. Climbing, jumping, flying, screaming, tumbling, disguising, and performing…his bones were going to collapse. Even then, there were still many mysteries and aftermaths left for him to deal with. Maybe he’d

raise a bard banner and roam the world telling tales of how collecting scraps was better than ascension.

Fu Yao lifted the hem of his robe and sat down next to him. Alas, he could no longer keep it in and rolled his eyes. “How much longer are you gonna wear that thing?”

It felt incredibly endearing, somehow, to see his eyes roll. Xie Lian finally took off the wedding dress, wiped away his makeup, and then realized dejectedly, “Was I talking to General Pei Junior in this dress the whole time? Nan Feng, why didn’t you remind me?”

“Probably because you looked so obviously happy in it,” Fu Yao replied.

After running errands all day, Nan Feng finally sat down for a rest too. “Don’t worry about it. General Pei Junior won’t care. You can dress ten times weirder and he won’t tell anyone when he goes back.”

Xie Lian was grateful for all the errands this junior official had run and poured him some tea. He thought about how coolheaded General Pei Junior was in the face of Xuan Ji’s madness and commented, “General Pei Junior is certainly calm and collected, very composed.”

Nan Feng took a sip of the tea and said, “He may look well mannered, but he’s like his ancestor, difficult to deal with.”

That was something Xie Lian could of course see. Unbelievably enough, Fu Yao agreed too. “General Pei Junior is a nouveau ascendent of the last couple hundred years, but he’s got a strong tailwind and climbs the

ladder pretty fast. When he was appointed Deputy General by General Pei, he was barely twenty years old. Do you know what he did?”

“What?” Xie Lian asked.

“He slaughtered an entire city,” Fu Yao replied coldly.

Xie Lian looked thoughtful on hearing this, but he wasn’t surprised. In the Upper Court, kings and generals roamed. Regarding fighting for and protecting of one’s land, it was said that the success of a general is built on the bones of millions. To reach godhood, one must first become a hero, but the path a hero walked was always bloody.

Fu Yao concluded, “In the Upper Court, there aren’t many who are trustworthy and worth meeting.”

Xie Lian thought it funny that Fu Yao sounded like he was speaking from experience and cautioning a newcomer. He wondered if Fu Yao only spoke because he had been bullied in the Heavenly Realm himself, and the experience had affected him deeply. But then again, even though Xie Lian had ascended three times, he never stuck around for long. So when it came to understanding the gods, he might actually know less than these two junior officials.

Nan Feng, on the other hand, seemed to strongly disagree. “Don’t listen to such inflammatory statements, there’s good and bad everywhere. There are still a number of trustworthy officials in the heavens.”

“Hah! Trustworthy officials? Do you mean your general?” Fu Yao sneered.

Nan Feng responded, “I don’t know about my general, but definitely not yours!”

Xie Lian was long used to this kind of situation. And with other things on his mind, he didn’t have the energy to pull them apart.

The case in the north had concluded. The first thing Xie Lian did upon returning to the heavens was to report the bandaged boy to the Palace of Ling Wen and place a request to search for him.

Ling Wen took the request with a grave expression. “I will do my utmost to find him. Truly, I did not think this journey to the north would

open such a giant can of worms. Thank you for your hard work, Your Highness.”

Xie Lian replied, “I have the two junior officials who volunteered to help to thank, and General Pei Junior as well. I am sincerely grateful.”

“This all came from relationship trouble caused by Ol’ Pei himself, so of course Junior has to take care of it. He’s used to it, so there’s no need to thank him,” Ling Wen said. “If Your Highness is not busy, please enter the communication array. We are to have a meeting regarding what has

transpired.”

Xie Lian also had many questions he’d like answers to. After leaving the Palace of Ling Wen, he wandered about and found a small stone bridge. The stone bridge crossed a small gurgling stream with crystal clear waters. He could see the clouds drifting under the water, and through the flowing waters and clouds, there stood the rising and falling mountain ranges as well as the vast, squarely erected cities of the Mortal Realm.

This is a good place, Xie Lian thought. And so he sat on the head of the bridge, mouthed the password, and entered the communication array.

It was one of those rare times when the communication array was bursting with liveliness, with voices echoing and reverberating from all directions. The first thing he heard was Feng Xin swearing.

“Holy fuck! Have you all picked a mountain for the sealing yet?!

That Xuan Ji is a madwoman; no matter what we ask, she only screams to see General Pei and tells us nothing useful about the location of the Green Ghost Qi Rong!”

General Pei Junior responded, “General Xuan Ji has always been stubborn and intense.”

Feng Xin yelled angrily, “General Pei Junior, is your General Pei back yet? Let her meet him. Then get the Green Ghost Qi Rong’s location out of her and get rid of her!”

Feng Xin had never been good with women, and Xie Lian felt sorry that he was the one given the task of interrogation. General Pei Junior replied, “It doesn’t matter even if they meet. She’ll just become more

insane.”

A voice came through, “Another round of upside-down corpses… Qi Rong really is too crass. Disgusting.”

“Even the Ghost Realm thinks he’s vulgar; that means he truly is very much so!”

Words between the officials flew seamlessly around in the array, and it was clear that they were all on familiar terms with one another. As a newcomer who’d only just ascended again after an eight-hundred-year absence, Xie Lian should have laid low and remained silent, but after a while, he couldn’t resist and asked, “Everyone, what was with the upside- down corpses? Was Green Ghost Qi Rong in the area too?”

Xie Lian rarely spoke in the communication array, so his voice was foreign to many, and the officials did not know whether to respond.

Surprisingly enough, the first to answer him was Feng Xin.

“Green Ghost Qi Rong wasn’t at Mount Yujun. However, the upside- down corpses were offerings Xuan Ji presented to him, as per his order.”

“Xuan Ji is a subordinate of the Green Ghost?” Xie Lian asked.

“Correct,” General Pei Junior replied. “Xuan Ji passed away many hundreds of years ago. She held a grudge but was too powerless to stir up

havoc until just over a hundred years ago, when Green Ghost Qi Rong took a liking to her and took her under his wing. Only then did her spiritual

powers improve by leaps and bounds.”

What he really meant was that the chaos Xuan Ji caused was not General Pei’s fault, because she wasn’t originally this strong. All blame should go to Green Ghost Qi Rong instead, since he was the one who took her under his command and gave her the power to cause harm. Everyone

was already of the opinion that this sin was all General Pei’s to bear, though no one said it out loud. Yet he noticed, and spoke of it so openly in this reminder that it shut everyone up and made them hide their real thoughts deeper within.

Xie Lian then spoke up again. “Has Mount Yujun been thoroughly inspected? What about the child spirit?”

This time, Mu Qing’s voice rang out. He said in an inscrutable tone, “Child spirit? What child spirit?”

Xie Lian realized Fu Yao must not have reported every detail— maybe his volunteering to help was even done in secret. So, without mentioning Fu Yao to spare him any unnecessary problems, Xie Lian

explained. “When I was in the wedding sedan, I heard the giggles of a child who sang nursery rhymes as a word of caution. The two junior officials next to me didn’t notice, which means that this child spirit must have remarkable powers.”

“There were no child spirits found on Mount Yujun,” Mu Qing stated.

Xie Lian was confused. Perhaps the child spirit had come specially just to warn him? Thinking of this, Xie Lian was suddenly reminded of another matter that had been on his mind all this time. He asked, “Speaking of which, I met a young man who can control silver butterflies at Mount Yujun. Does anyone know who he is?”

The noisy communication array suddenly fell completely silent. Xie Lian was expecting this reaction, so he simply waited patiently.

A moment later, Ling Wen asked, “Your Highness, what did you say just now?”

Mu Qing said coldly, “He just said that he met Hua Cheng.”

Upon finally learning the name of that young man in red, Xie Lian felt his spirits lift inexplicably. He smiled. “So he’s called Hua Cheng? Hm, it’s a fitting name for him.”

The tone of Xie Lian’s voice rendered all the officials even more speechless. Another moment passed before Ling Wen cleared her throat. “Um… Your Highness, have you ever heard of the Four Calamities?”

Much ashamed, I only know of the Four Famous Tales, Xie Lian thought to himself.

The so-called Four Famous Tales referred to the extravagant stories of the deeds of four gods prior to their ascension: The Young Lord Who Poured Wine, The Prince Who Pleased God, The General Who Snapped His Sword, and The Princess Who Slit Her Throat. Of course, “The Prince Who Pleased God” alluded to the awe-inspiring display of the crown prince of

Xianle upon the Grand Avenue of Divine Might.

Having one’s name among the Four Famous Tales did not necessarily indicate that those four were the strongest of the gods; the Four Famous

Tales were as such simply because they were the most well known and most spoken of. Xie Lian had always been slow on the uptake when it came to

news from the outside world; he could even be said to be out of touch with the outside world and ignorant of its affairs. He only knew about the Four Famous Tales because he was one of the four. The Four Calamities was

probably something that grew popular later, but Xie Lian had never heard of the term before. Since it included the word “Calamity,” it couldn’t be anything good.

“Much ashamed, but I’ve never heard of them,” Xie Lian said. “Who are the Four Calamities?”

Mu Qing responded coolly, “Your Highness walked the Mortal Realm for hundreds of years, and yet you are still so ill-informed. I’m really curious to know what you’ve been doing all this time.”

Eating, sleeping, busking, collecting junk, duh?

Xie Lian smiled. “It’s not easy being mortal. There are plenty of

things to busy myself with, and they’re all complicated. It’s not easier than being a heavenly official.”

“Please remember well, Your Highness,” Ling Wen said. “The Four Calamities are: Ship-Sinking Black Water, Night-Touring Green Lantern, White-Clothed Calamity, and Crimson Rain Sought Flower. They are the four Ghost Kings of the Ghost Realm, who cause endless headaches for all in the Heavenly Realm.”

Humans become gods when they ascend, ghosts when they fall.

The gods created heaven to reside in, drawing a clear boundary between themselves and mortals. They watched from above and ruled from beyond reach. The Ghost Realm, on the other hand, was not separated from the Mortal Realm. Monsters, demons, ghosts, and mortals all shared one earth. Some ghosts hid in the darkness, and some pretended to be humans as they walked among the people and roamed the Mortal Realm in disguise.

Ling Wen continued, “Ship-Sinking Black Water refers to a water ghost. Although he has reached supreme status, he’s fairly low-key and

rarely starts trouble. Not many have seen him before, so we won’t mind him for now.

“Night-Touring Green Lantern refers to that vulgar, corpse-hanging Green Ghost Qi Rong. He’s the only one in the four not yet a supreme. He is likely included because he’s always causing trouble and is really quite annoying. Or maybe because four names are easier to remember, so he’s just there to pad the numbers. We’ll skip him too.

“White-Clothed Calamity should be someone Your Highness is familiar with. He’s also known as White No-Face.”

Hearing the name, Xie Lian, who was sitting on the stone bridge, suddenly felt a stab of pain in his heart that spread all over his body. His hands began to shake, and he unconsciously clenched them into fists.

Of course he was familiar.

They say that when a supreme is born, it can destroy an entire nation and throw the world into chaos. The first country White No-Face destroyed was Xianle.

Xie Lian remained silent, and Ling Wen continued.

“In any case, White No-Face is already defeated. Even if he still exists somewhere in this world, it’s now past his time in the limelight.

“Your Highness, the silver butterflies you saw at Mount Yujun are also called wraith butterflies. Their master is the last of the four, and one the world does not want to incur the wrath of: Crimson Rain Sought Flower,

Hua Cheng.”

In the heavens, “notorious” was the word to describe the Heavenly Emperor, and the crown prince of Xianle. Although the meaning of

“notoriety” was completely different between the two, the word still resonated equally. However, in the Ghost Realm, there was only one worthy of being called “notorious,” and that was Hua Cheng.

If you wanted to learn about a god, simply walk into his temple and take a look at the way he was dressed and the weapons he wielded, and you’d more or less understand him. If you wanted to know more, simply listen to folktales, plays, and stories passed down by word of mouth. A god’s mortal past and deeds were well documented. Ghosts, on the other

hand, not so much. The kind of person they were while still alive, and their appearance at present, were all a mystery.

The name Hua Cheng5 was very obviously fake, and his appearance was most likely fake too. In the rumors, he was sometimes a twisted boy given to capricious mood changes, sometimes a gentle and mannered

handsome young man, sometimes a gorgeous seductress with a venomous heart, anything goes! As for his true self, the only thing that one could be

sure of was that he dressed in red and often appeared alongside a bloodbath with silver butterflies flitting between his sleeves. And when it came to Hua Cheng’s backstory, there were endless different versions. Some say he was born without a right eye and was bullied and humiliated for it since birth, so he was filled with hatred for the world. Some say he was a young soldier who died in a lost battle for his country and later came to walk the earth in resentment. Some say he was a fool who was tormented by the death of his love; some even say he was a monster. In the most outrageous version, supposedly—only supposedly!—Hua Cheng ascended and became a god but immediately jumped back down on his own and became a ghost. But that version wasn’t widespread. No one knew if it was true or false, and not many believed it. It had to be false, though; even if it were true, it’d be a

complete embarrassment for the heavens if someone ditched a heavenly official role to become a ghost. Either way, the more diverse the stories were, the more mystery he was shrouded in.

There were also many reasons for the gods to fear Hua Cheng. For example, his behavior was unpredictable: sometimes he would carry out a massacre in cold blood, and sometimes he would do odd acts of kindness.

He also wielded a great deal of influence in the Mortal Realm and had legions of followers.

That’s right. Mortals worshipped gods to ask for blessings and protection so that they could escape the evils from the Ghost Realm, and that was how the gods came to gain so many followers. Yet, Hua Cheng, a ghost, had such a large following on earth that he could influence the world single-handedly.

Here is a story that must be told. When Hua Cheng first appeared, he did something notorious.

He openly challenged thirty-five heavenly officials. The challenge was to spar with the martial gods and to debate with the civil gods.

Thirty-three of the thirty-five thought it hilarious but were also infuriated enough to take up his challenge, thinking they could join forces to teach this little devil a thing or two.

The first to step up to the plate were the martial gods.

The martial gods were the strongest of the heavenly officials; each had plenty of believers, and they were all-powerful. In the face of a newborn ghost, it was a sure win. Yet unexpectedly, it turned out to be a

complete annihilation after one battle. Even their weapons were completely smashed to pieces by Hua Cheng’s freakish scimitar.

It was only after the battle that they found out Hua Cheng was born of Mount Tonglu.

Mount Tonglu was a volcano, and within its mountainous domain there was a city called Gu. The City of Gu wasn’t a place where people cultivated poison, but rather the city itself was a great venom.

Every few hundred years, tens of thousands of ghosts descended upon the City of Gu to butcher one another until at last only one remained, and thus was the venom brewed. It usually ended in complete elimination, but those few who were capable enough to make it out alive would emerge as the devil incarnate. Only two such ghosts had ever made it out of the City of Gu in the past several centuries, and as expected, those two both

became well-known Ghost Kings.

Hua Cheng was one.

After the defeat of the martial gods, it came time for the civil gods to rise to the challenge. Surely Hua Cheng could fight, but not debate?

Unfortunately for the civil gods, they could not defeat him. Hua Cheng could recite the classics and debate the contemporaries. He was sometimes polite, sometimes vicious, sometimes unyielding, sometimes incisive, and sometimes quibbling. He was impenetrably sharp, his

arguments flawless. He verbally abused the civil gods from top to bottom, past to present, and infuriated them so much that they puked blood and washed the skies red.

Hua Cheng gained fame overnight.

However, that alone wasn’t enough to call him scary. What was scary was that after the challenge, Hua Cheng demanded all thirty-three officials make good on their word.

Before the challenge, it was decided that if Hua Cheng were to lose, he would offer up his own ashes. If the officials were to lose, they must descend from the heavens and return to being mortals. If it weren’t for his arrogant attitude and his decisive stake, and the conviction of the thirty-

three officials that they would not lose, they never would have accepted such terms.

However, not a single heavenly official voluntarily honored the terms. It was humiliating to renege on their bet, but when they thought about it, if only one of them was defeated it’d be an embarrassment, but if all of them were defeated and humiliated, then no one would lose face.

They could even turn around and mock the other party! So they all came to a tacit understanding that they’d pretend nothing had happened. Mortals

were forgetful anyway. They would forget all about this in fifty years or so.

They were not wrong about the mortals, but they were wrong about Hua Cheng.

The gods refused to fulfill their promise? That was fine, he would give them a hand.

Thus, Hua Cheng burned every single temple and shrine of all thirty- three gods.

This was the stuff of nightmares for all the gods in the heavens: the red-clad ghost’s burning of the thirty-three martial and civil gods’ temples.

Temples and followers were the main source of power for heavenly officials. Where would followers go to pray if there were no temples? If they didn’t pray, there wouldn’t be merits. The massive loss of temples and merits greatly injured the heavens. To rebuild would take at least a hundred years, and even then, they wouldn’t be the same as before. This was a

catastrophe greater than failing in transcending Tribulations. The number of temples and shrines of these heavenly officials combined was at least in the tens of thousands, but Hua Cheng managed to burn them all in a single night. How? No one knew, but he did it. Pure madness.

The gods cried foul to the Heavenly Emperor, but there was nothing he could do. The heavenly officials themselves accepted the challenge and the terms, and Hua Cheng was cunning enough to only destroy temples without hurting anyone. It was as if he dug a hole and asked the gods to jump, and the gods themselves dug the hole bigger and dove in. With the way things were, what more could they have done?

At first, the thirty-three heavenly officials had wanted to show the world the defeat of this crazed little devil, so they broadcast the challenge into the dreams of many royals and nobles to display their strength and might before their most devout believers. But all the royals and nobles saw was their miserable defeat. When the mortals woke up, they switched from worshipping heavenly officials to worshipping that ghost. The heavenly officials who lost both their temples and believers soon grew weaker and

weaker, until they were erased from existence. It wasn’t until a new wave of ascensions that those empty positions were filled again.

Ever since then, the name Hua Cheng was feared in the heavens.

Even just hearing a mention of red robes or silver butterflies brought cold sweat to many. Some feared he would challenge them and burn their

temples if they were to incur his displeasure, some were blackmailed into

silence and inaction because he had them by the balls, and some even oddly respected him because of how wide his reach was in the Mortal Realm.

Sometimes, they even had to ask him for help paving the way for them

while they carried out their duties. This went on for a long time, and many heavenly officials developed a peculiar sort of admiration for him.

Thus, the heavens feared, hated, and respected this Ghost King.

Among the thirty-five gods who were challenged, the two who declined were General Xuan Zhen, Mu Qing, and General Nan Yang, Feng Xin.

They thought the challenge was beneath them and didn’t care to take it. Turned out, that was the right decision to make. But even then, Hua Cheng hadn’t forgotten about those two. Many Zhongyuan Festival patrols ended in fists and blood when both parties crossed paths with each other, and those crazy, maniacal silver butterflies left an everlasting impression on both men. Hearing this, Xie Lian thought of that fluttering silver butterfly

that sparkled and danced adorably around him in delight. He couldn’t picture it as described in the rumors.

Was that little silver butterfly really that scary? Xie Lian wondered. It wasn’t that bad… It was kind of cute.