Chapter 145 — Not My Business, Not Yours

She had Ning Xun’s body-control talisman in hand, so she could fly without needing any magic tools, but there were demonic beasts in the sky too. So she dove down first and targeted the low-grade demonic beasts.

Low-grade demonic beasts were easy to handle. After finishing off the first wave, Lian Mu set her sights on the frenzied high-grade ones.

Ning Xun wasn’t idle either; while maintaining the array, he manipulated the golden chains to assist her.

The scale-hoofed two-headed deer’s vine form was entwined with many demonic beasts, but it had only one main vine, anchored in the ground, oozing a strong stench of carrion from its split wound.

Breaking through layer after layer, Lian Mu found that beside the gash on the main vine, a branch had sprouted but broken off — probably where the corpse-flower had once grown.

Wood beasts live symbiotically with spirit plants. The mother beast merges the young beast’s crystal core into a chosen spirit plant, so the young beast and the plant grow together, absorbing the world’s spiritual energy. If the symbiotic plant is destroyed, it’s like losing an arm or a leg.

Though the scale-hoofed two-headed deer was high-grade, its symbiotic plant was partially destroyed, weakening it significantly. By rights, it should have been easy to kill, but the fact that no one in Star-Plucking Tower dared take this bounty meant it must have an extra troublesome trait.

Lian Mu couldn’t get near the main vine for now, so she first killed the demonic beasts entwined in the vines. When she slew a nearby earth beast, she seized the vine before it could retract.

The vine writhed in her hand; when it failed to escape, spikes suddenly sprouted and pierced through Lian Mu’s palm.

“Miss, are you alright?”

Ning Xun sent out a golden chain to bind the vine, but its spikes were lodged in her flesh — pulling would only tear her hand apart.

Lian Mu felt the spikes bore through bone, yet no blood spilled out — it was all being sucked away by the vine.

Ning Xun shouted, “Cut it off! Miss, it feeds on human flesh and blood!”

Lian Mu clenched the vine tight. She saw red liquid coursing under its skin toward the main vine.

“Dare to drink my blood? Perfect.”

She channeled her spiritual power — the vine instantly ignited and crumbled to ash in her grasp. The blood-fire raced along it back to the main vine.

Agitated, the main vine twisted violently and severed this branch on its own, cutting off the fire just before it reached.

The drops of blood on the ground caught fire too, forcing other demonic beasts to keep their distance.

Ning Xun stared, stunned. “You’re… a spirit-blood fusion body?”

Lian Mu rose into the air again. A demonic beast in the sky seized the chance to attack — a red-feathered stone-claw hawk dove at her, its hooked beak aiming for her eye.

Without thinking, Lian Mu caught its neck barehanded. Her palm still gushed blood, soaking its feathers red — in the next instant, the hawk combusted into charred bones.

Looking down, she saw the scale-hoofed two-headed deer’s main vine burrow into the soil, while the parts coiled around other demonic beasts did not retract; instead, they bound tighter. The beasts went berserk — wooden antlers sprouted on their heads, and their limbs began to mutate.

“…”

So this was why no one dared claim the bounty.

The deer itself wasn’t fearsome — but it could parasitically control other demonic beasts and assimilate them.

Any beast of lower grade became its puppet.

They weren’t facing one deer, but a horde of “scale-hoofed two-headed deer.”

“Three-Eyes, can your array force that thing up from underground?” Lian Mu called from mid-air.

Destroying the main vine was the key. But with it buried, digging while fighting alone would be a hassle.

Ning Xun loosened the golden chains, exposing a gap in his protective chain-ball. The golden eye on his forehead scanned the spot she pointed at and frowned.

“It’s doable, but it’ll take time. Once my golden net nears the main vine, all the beasts will charge me — the chain-ball might not hold.”

“How do you use these chains? I want a go.” Lian Mu said. “I can hold off the beasts for you.”

“You?” Ning Xun looked at her. “Do you have a metal spirit root?”

Lian Mu nodded. “I do.”

“Fine.” Ning Xun flicked his finger, withdrew half the spiritual power he’d poured underground, turned it into a half-formed golden talisman, and sent it to her.

“With this, you can resonate with the Heaven-Earth Net.”

Lian Mu tried it — with a slight hook of her finger, golden chains erupted from the ground.

“Got it. Thanks.”

Ning Xun: “?”

Ning Xun: “You’ve used this array before? How can you resonate with so many chains your first time…”

“Nope,” Lian Mu said. “Not the time to fuss. Focus on the beasts.”

With that, she drove the golden chains down — they locked the beasts from all directions. She gripped her sword and cut through them like a whirlwind.

Her wounded palm gave her an edge — she smeared her blood on the blade; once she struck a beast, she unleashed her power to burn it alive.

Ning Xun entered his own rhythm — drawing blood runes and embedding them into the ground. Soon, the deer’s main vine burst from the soil.

It was far more complex than they imagined — like a nest of writhing serpents, vaguely forming a deer’s shape.

Having cleared the beast horde, Lian Mu dashed over the blood-soaked earth. The deer sensed her spirit-blood aura and tried to retreat, but the golden chains bound it fast.

“Three-Eyes, lend me your chains too.”

Before Ning Xun could respond, his protective chain-ball unraveled and lunged at the deer’s main vine.

Ning Xun: “…Miss, why’d you take my shield? I don’t fight beasts.”

He only then noticed — all the other beasts were dead.

All the golden chains snapped at the main vine, binding its thrashing tendrils. The thickest chains coiled around its two pairs of antlers.

Lian Mu dove at its head and cleaved off a pair of antlers with a single stroke. When they hit the ground, they turned into scattered vines, lifeless.

The deer struggled to push a tendril into the soil, trying to bury its crystal core in another spirit plant — but Lian Mu caught it instantly.

“Like drinking blood? I’ll let you gorge on it.”

She pinned its head down, tore off the remaining antlers by force, and let her blood soak the wounds — igniting it from top to bottom.

This time, the main vine couldn’t escape. In an instant, it burned to ash, letting out a few hoarse deer cries before death.

“Congratulations, ‘Cultivation Is Just a Money Grab,’ for slaying a Tier-2 Wood Beast, the Scale-Hoofed Two-Headed Deer. Please return to Star-Plucking Tower to claim your bounty…”

The forest gradually fell silent.

It was finally over.

Ning Xun muttered an incantation, recalling the golden chains that spanned the woods. The glow faded, the chains vanished.

“Miss, are you alright?”

Lian Mu sheathed her sword calmly. “I’m fine.”

“Your hand…” Ning Xun glanced at her palm. “You’d best treat it quickly.”

Lian Mu: “Five hundred thousand.”

“What?” Ning Xun blinked.

She raised five fingers. “Your array’s good. I was going to charge you a million — but I’ll give you half off. Pay me five hundred thousand and I’ll share the corpse-flower’s leaves with you.”

Ning Xun gasped. “You— you’re extorting me! The corpse-flower leaves aren’t worth that much!”

“Can’t help it. That’s just how I am.” Lian Mu said. “But you can trade me something else. For instance, that array you just cast is pretty interesting. Teach me, and I’ll knock off another half.”

Ning Xun was slightly stunned. “You want to learn the Heaven’s Net Formation? But… aren’t you a sword cultivator? This formation is very hard to master.”

“I’m giving you a chance to haggle. If you don’t want it, forget it.” Lian Mu pulled out her demonic crystal blade, ready to dig out the inner cores.

Ning Xun said, “Wait, I can teach you, but whether you can master it depends on your own ability.”

Lian Mu quietly stared at him, waiting for his next move. Ning Xun, with the mindset of a broke man, decided to go all in to bargain. Ignoring the circumstances, he began teaching on the spot.

From laying the formation to drawing talismans, he explained each step in detail to Lian Mu.

Lian Mu silently memorized all the steps and said, “Once we’re out, just give me two hundred fifty thousand.”

With that, she squatted down and began extracting demonic beast inner cores.

This pack of demonic beasts varied greatly in rank, but Lian Mu didn’t intend to spare a single one, moving from beast to beast to dig them all out.

Seeing she wasn’t planning to leave yet, Ning Xun also squatted down to watch her work.

“What are you doing with these inner cores? They’re not exactly clean,” Ning Xun said.

Lian Mu kept digging as she answered, “I have my uses.”

Ning Xun sat cross-legged, completely indifferent to the demonic beast blood on the ground. “Miss, judging by your skills, you’re no ordinary person. Earlier you said you were taught by one of the best masters in the world. I suppose that wasn’t a lie, was it?”

“You already figured out which sect I belong to. Do you really need to ask me?” Lian Mu said. “You’re a talisman cultivator who can’t fight, yet you insisted on coming here. You must have foreseen you’d run into me, so you had nothing to fear. Everything that happened today was within your calculations, wasn’t it?”

Ning Xun smiled faintly. “So you finally believe I’m not a fraud. Yesterday, before I left home, I cast a divination. Because of that Remnant Corpse Flower, I was bound to face danger today, but a benefactor would appear to help me overcome it. The moment you claimed the bounty, I knew you were my benefactor.”

“We’re quite fated, you and I. Aren’t you curious who I really am?”

Lian Mu thought for a moment and said, “Who you are has nothing to do with me.”

“I’ve told you my name. Can you tell me yours too?”

Lian Mu said, “Who I am has nothing to do with you.”

Ning Xun wasn’t embarrassed at all. Brazenly, he said, “No problem. I’ve calculated that we’ll meet again, so there’s no rush.”

Lian Mu didn’t respond, quickening her movements. She had already filled an entire bag with demonic beast inner cores.

“By the way, I promised you before: if you’d give me the leaves of the Remnant Corpse Flower, I’d do a reading for you.” Ning Xun leaned closer. “Miss, give me your hand.”

Lian Mu said, “My fate is already miserably poor.”

Ning Xun grabbed her hand and smiled. “I’m really accurate. Trust me just once.”

Lian Mu was about to pull her hand back when he suddenly applied a cool ointment to her palm. The wound immediately began to heal.

Lian Mu froze for a moment. The pain vanished from her hand.

“Miss, your fate…” Ning Xun smiled, about to speak, then suddenly stopped.

Lian Mu asked, “What’s wrong?”

Could it be that her future would be even poorer than now?

Ning Xun withdrew his hand. “It’s nothing. My skills aren’t refined enough—I couldn’t see clearly. Forgive my clumsiness.”

Lian Mu said, “Oh.”

She instantly lost interest. After digging out the last of the inner cores, she got ready to head back to Star-Plucking Tower.

Ning Xun still sat motionless on the ground. Seeing him in a daze, Lian Mu called out, “Three Eyes, we’re leaving.”

Ning Xun said, “…You’d better keep calling me a fraud.”

Lian Mu couldn’t be bothered to argue over titles. They were mere strangers crossing paths. After today, they’d go their separate ways—there was no such thing as a ‘next time.’

Ning Xun stood up, brushed off his clothes, and followed her.

“Miss, has anyone ever told you that you’re a bit… blunt when you talk?”

“Annoying, right? I know. I won’t change.” Lian Mu replied expressionlessly.

“But in the martial world, a temperament like yours is bound to stir up trouble. I used to be the same—people praised me to my face for being straightforward, fought to befriend me, but deep down, they couldn’t stand me at all.”

Lian Mu said, “Is that so? Then your judgment of people is off. My friends and teachers have always treated me very well.”

“That’s not a given,” Ning Xun said. “Even the most amiable person, no matter how noble their status, may not be trustworthy. A genius talisman cultivator as brilliant and handsome as myself—even with a thousand precautions, I still get targeted.”

Lian Mu said, “…Stop bragging. No matter how much you talk, I won’t tell you my name.”

She stepped into the transmission mirror without looking back.

Ning Xun had no choice but to give up. “Alright then. May we meet again someday.”