The old man fled in a panic, scrambling through the darkness until he reached the edge of a gloomy forest.
He wheezed harshly and with great difficulty, his breathing sounding like a broken, leaking bellows. Wisps of black mist vied to spill out from beneath his cloak. He struggled to pull himself up from the ground, only to let out a wet, squelching sound as he spat out a mouthful of filth.
It seemed that the three "Ten-Thousand-Year Kills" Jiang Ying had landed on him earlier had caused significant damage.
He caught his breath, intent on pressing forward, but at that moment, several streaks of golden sword light tore through the night, slicing straight toward him.
The sword energy was so sharp and biting that his cloak was shredded in an instant!
The formless entity beneath the cloak let out a sudden, mournful wail before dissolving into nothingness.
Following the sword light, a young man in black robes wearing a pale gold gourd mask emerged.
He gazed at the dissipating black mist, his brows knitted in contemplation.
"Why would there be a member of the Ghost Clan in this area?"
***
Jiang Ying sped along, holding Xiao Fensi in her arms, until the familiar Cultivator Market finally came into view.
She let out a slow sigh of relief before setting Xiao Fensi down.
Xiao Fensi’s eyes were lowered, staring blankly ahead. Her large, dark eyes were as deep and still as pools of water, reflecting no light at all. Only her mouth twitched slightly; Jiang Ying listened closely and managed to catch a few muffled syllables.
"Candied... candied... haws..."
Jiang Ying couldn’t help but laugh. Even in this state, she was still thinking about candied haws. Xiao Fensi really was a little glutton.
She pinched a seal with her fingers and whispered a soft incantation:
"Ward off evil and bind the spirits, preserve life and protect the body. Clarity of wisdom, peace of the soul! Go!"
A flash of golden light leapt from her fingertip and entered the space between Xiao Fensi’s brows.
Xiao Fensi frowned and squeezed her eyes shut as a wisp of black mist drifted up from the crown of her head. When she opened her eyes and blinked up at Jiang Ying, she finally recognized her.
"Pretty... sister?"
Jiang Ying exhaled. It seemed the girl had finally regained her senses.
Xiao Fensi looked around in a daze. "Sister, where are we?"
Jiang Ying gently rubbed the top of Xiao Fensi’s head. *Could it be?* she wondered. *Was the child addled by that bewitching spell?*
"This is the West District of the Ghost Market. Don’t you recognize it?"
Xiao Fensi shook her head, looking utterly perplexed. "But I was clearly just on the snack street!"
She looked down at her empty hands, her brows drooping. "Where are my candied haws? My two big sticks of candied haws!"
She pouted, looking at Jiang Ying with a sense of grievance. "Sister, someone stole my candied haws!"
Jiang Ying quickly comforted her. "It’s alright. I’ll buy you more later."
"Okay!" Xiao Fensi nodded vigorously. "I knew you were the best to me, Sister!"
"Do you remember what happened on the snack street?"
"Let me think... I had just bought two sticks of candied haws. I wanted to give one to you..." Xiao Fensi tilted her head, trying to recall. "Then I saw the man selling beef skewers. His grilled skewers are so delicious, so I wanted to go buy a few. I was walking toward the fried food stall when a hunchbacked man suddenly walked up and asked me how to get to the South District. I pointed him in the right direction. His voice was horrible—so coarse and raspy. And then..."
She stopped mid-recollection, struggling to think, her brows furrowing. "And then I can't remember anything else..."
She seemed to have a sudden realization, and she huffed indignantly, "It must have been that wretched hunchback! He stole my candied haws!"
Hearing Xiao Fensi’s account, the pieces of the puzzle clicked together in Jiang Ying’s mind.
She patted Xiao Fensi’s head. "That’s right. That wretched hunchback used a bewitching spell on you, trying to abduct you. That’s why you have no memory of what happened afterward."
Xiao Fensi’s eyes widened in shock. "A bewitching spell? Trying to abduct me?"Jiang Ying nodded. "However, I've already taught him a hard lesson."
She was about to offer a few more words of caution—such as not talking to strangers when away from home, and making sure to go out with her older brother—when Xiao Fensi, upon hearing that the man had been heavily disciplined, immediately threw the thrilling incident of almost being abducted to the back of her mind.
Like a happy little sparrow, she threw herself straight into Jiang Ying's arms and rubbed against her. Blinking her large, grape-like dark eyes, she cheered, "Hee hee, I knew Sister is the best to me. With Sister around, I'll definitely be fine!"
Jiang Ying: "???"
This child was way too carefree!
She had almost been abducted just a moment ago! Even Jiang Ying herself had broken out in a cold sweat over it!
On second thought, she couldn't blame Xiao Fensi. After all, the child looked only about six or seven years old. The one at fault was that old man, not Xiao Fensi. She just hoped those three Ten-Thousand-Year Kills had taught that old man a lesson so he wouldn't come out pulling stunts like this again.
Jiang Ying pondered for a moment. "How are you feeling right now? Would you like Sister to check your body again?"
Xiao Fensi lifted her face and obediently nodded.
Jiang Ying gathered her spiritual energy at her fingertips, channeled it into Xiao Fensi's pulse point, and quickly circulated it once throughout her entire body.
This spell was known as the Qi-Observing Technique.
The Qi-Observing Technique allowed one to judge a person's constitution and condition by observing the aura around their body, and it could also be used to check spiritual roots and determine whether one possessed the aptitude for cultivation.
At first glance, all of Xiao Fensi's Five Elements attributes were below one point, making her entirely an ordinary mortal—and a sickly one at that.
However, Jiang Ying had long sensed that Xiao Fensi was different from ordinary people, so naturally, she wasn't about to give up there. Concentrating her mind and gathering her Qi, she probed carefully along Xiao Fensi's aura once more.
With this probe, an abnormality immediately revealed itself.
Hidden within Xiao Fensi's aura was a wisp of strange black Qi. That black Qi was chaotic and profound; the closer Jiang Ying's spiritual energy came to it, the more she could feel the wisps of chilling aura and repulsive force radiating from it.
"Human and Ghost mutually repel each other."
This was a Ghost Spiritual Root!
At this point, Jiang Ying was certain that Xiao Fensi was the very child she had seen in her past life.
——The female child with a "Ghost Spiritual Root," bearing the serial number "197," found in the experimental case files of the Guanghua Sect's Alchemy Department. Her birth year was unknown. Her father had died of usury, and her older brother had died in a brawl.
She had been found and imprisoned by Zhenren Wugao, the Chief Grand Elder of the Alchemy Department. After confirming that she possessed the legendary and extremely rare Ghost Spiritual Root, Zhenren Wugao immediately applied to the Cultivation Alliance for a massive research grant. He renovated the alchemy tower, expanded the personnel of the Alchemy Department, and even hosted numerous academic forums, such as the "Forum on the First Year of the Discovery of the Ghost Spiritual Root" and the "Commemorative Conference on the 132nd Anniversary of the Ghost King's Sealing."
During this period, he used Xiao Fensi as an experimental subject, forcing her to practice various cultivation techniques in an attempt to write an epoch-making treatise on Ghost Spiritual Root cultivation.
Little did Elder Wugao know that the Ghost Spiritual Root could not actually cultivate human techniques at all. By the time Xiao Fensi practiced them to the end, her meridians went awry, and every blood vessel on her face burst.
Thinking of that child's blood-streaked face from her past life, and then looking at Xiao Fensi's current flawless, snow-white little face, Jiang Ying found her emotions truly difficult to settle.
Xiao Fensi had no idea what Jiang Ying was thinking. She stood on tiptoe, tilted her head, and studied Jiang Ying's face, her intuition telling her that Jiang Ying seemed somewhat unhappy.
Her tone inevitably became a bit nervous. "Sister, what's wrong? Is my illness very serious?"
Jiang Ying snapped back to her senses, looked at Xiao Fensi, and furrowed her brow. "Illness? What illness?"