Chapter 141: It Was Me
Chapter 141: It Was Me
“What’s happened?”
The sudden, chaotic noise cut through the usual chatter in the dining hall. Countless eyes swiveled toward the entrance. The one who had burst in was a low-ranking disciple of Shoushan Sect. His face looked as if he had seen a ghost. Seeing him like this, the senior disciple Zhou Huai grew impatient and roared, “What do you mean ‘Brother Zhou is not good’? You’re the one who’s not good!”
“Flustered and stammering! What is going on?”
The disciple took several rough gasps of air. Seeing so many people inside the dining hall, he hesitated slightly. But Zhou Huai was pressing him urgently, so he blurted out: “It’s… it’s the County Mansion! The Xiaoyin official position in the Demon Capture Bureau… Chief Peng’s spot… somehow… somehow…”
“…Was snatched by Leshui Sect’s Yuan Guaizi!”
“……”
“……”
“What?”
The disciples surrounding them in the dining hall were all shocked by this news.
Senior Brother Zhou Huai paled in anger. He shot to his feet. “How is that possible?”
Instinctively, everyone felt it impossible! Everyone knew that disciples of Shoushan Sect stayed within the mountains, usually just going out seeking official positions. Zhou Huai had invested the most effort in this. He frequently visited the County Mansion, becoming familiar with several Warden Chiefs. He had also secretly paid tremendous sums, finally securing a promise: he would soon join the County Mansion as a Xiaoyin official. He might have received his posting in a matter of days. His lack of regard for the sect Elders and Stewards partly stemmed from this.
Yet who could have imagined that suddenly, without any warning, the Xiaoyin position went instead to that bastard surnamed Yuan? That Yuan Guaizi was always competing against him, yet his cultivation was inferior, and the bribes he could offer in secret were less! Chief Peng himself had personally confirmed the position was reserved for Zhou Huai, definitely not for that Yuan scoundrel…
His mind went utterly blank. It felt absolutely bizarre.
If that Xiaoyin position was stolen… then… then how much more would he have to pay? The bribes had already cost Uncle Liang nearly half his entire fortune…
Before the shock and fury inside him could even fully settle, another commotion erupted outside. Someone was urgently leading a young houseboy up the mountain. This youngster looked terrified as he rushed into the dining hall. Spotting Zhou Huai, he immediately started bawling.
Zhou Huai recognized the boy and cried out in surprise, “Huzi! What are you doing up the mountain?”
“Young Master! It’s terrible!” The boy’s voice was choked with sobs as he urgently called out to Zhou Huai. “Word came yesterday! A Fuyuanhao shipment was swallowed by demons on the Xiaoqing River! Old Scholar Liang’s tens of thousands of taels’ worth of goods… they all turned to ashes! Now… now the creditors are pounding on our door…”
“What?”
Zhou Huai’s eyes snapped wide open. His head swam with dizziness.
The “Old Scholar Liang” the boy referred to was his Uncle Liang. He had originally been his birth mother’s servant. After Zhou Huai left his family, Uncle Liang had followed him out, fiercely loyal. Using silver left behind by Zhou’s mother, Uncle Liang managed a small trading house that funded Zhou Huai’s cultivation expenses. Not long ago, just to prepare and bribe for Zhou’s Xiaoyin position, Uncle Liang had withdrawn most of the capital from that business. To manage this massive withdrawal, Uncle Liang had borrowed money to purchase a large shipment meant for Yuan City via the Xiaoqing River. How could such a vital shipment be swallowed by demons? For years, there hadn’t been any news of demon infestations on the Xiaoqing River! How could their run be the unlucky one?
“Young Master, hurry… hurry back! It’s not just the business disaster…”
The boy’s tear-streaked face held a flicker of hesitation.
A massive sense of foreboding surged in Zhou Huai. Harshly, he demanded, “What else? Speak quickly!”
“When… when Small One came to report,” the boy stammered through tears, “I saw… I saw Miss Zhuer had already climbed onto someone else’s bridal sedan…”
A surge of indescribable heat violently rumbled into Zhou Huai’s skull.
How could this be?
Zhou Huai was swamped, mind utterly blank, the thought nearly causing him to collapse.
Miss Zhuer… Miss Zhuer…
He could not help but recall the sweet, gentle girl, her shy smile. Dull thunder seemed to crash inside his skull. This couldn’t be. Hadn’t he visited Miss Zhuer’s home not long ago? Hadn’t he formally met her father? Hadn’t her father agreed that upon Zhou receiving his official post, he would then consent to their marriage? How could it suddenly…
……
……
The disciples encircling Zhou Huai were stunned.
Some gazed at Zhou Huai with pity. Others looked at him as if he were some kind of cursed object.
One misfortune dropped on a person’s head was bad luck enough. Suddenly having three drop one after another? This… what kind of cosmic misfortune required this?
The sheer strangeness, the claustrophobic way the tragedies piled on one after another left people unsure how to comfort him.
“Things like this… how can things like this happen?” Even Zhou Huai, his face now deathly pale, couldn’t express whether he felt more anger or sorrow in that moment.
How could so many catastrophes strike all at once?
“Heh…”
Amidst the graveyard silence, Fang Cun softly chuckled.
Lin Jiyi truly was a capable man. He hadn’t merely arranged things flawlessly to Fang’s satisfaction, but even timed the delivery of these disastrous announcements perfectly. Indeed, letting all three news items land in rapid succession within the same period was what made this scene truly… fulfilling.
“It was you…”
The dining hall was utterly still. Fang Cun’s light chuckle sliced through the silence like a knife.
In the grip of consecutive devastating blows, Zhou Huai’s mind had become foggy, directionless. Abruptly, he snapped toward the source of the laughter, eyes bloodshot and fixed on Fang Cun. His expression suggested murderous intent as he shrieked hoarsely: “It was you, wasn’t it? You schemed against me! Screwed me over here, didn’t you?”
Instantly, the surrounding disciples tensed. Many began to rise, wanting to intervene. It seemed Zhou Huai, overwhelmed by the catastrophic news, was simply looking for someone to lash out against.
What could Second Young Master Fang possibly do about matters like these? No matter his capabilities…
“That’s right.” Fang Cun’s quiet affirmation hung in the quiet hall.
Every Shoushan Sect disciple froze. The shock registering on their faces might as well have been witnessing a ghost materialize.
“You… you…” Thoroughly enraged, Zhou Huai had aimed his accusation at the smirking Fang Cun purely for an outlet. He hadn’t remotely anticipated Fang Cun would actually admit it. For a moment, he was utterly dumbfounded, mind reeling in chaos, unable to find words.
Meanwhile, Fang Cun had half-turned in his chair. He looked Zhou Huai squarely in the eyes and spoke calmly: “That Xiaoyin official post in the County Mansion? I was the one who helped Leshui Sect’s Yuan Guaizi steal it from you. It was simple. I gave him a ten-thousand taels banknote, plus a few rare treasures he could use to smooth the path with connections. And Fuyuanhao’s lost shipment on the Xiaoqing River… perhaps you don’t know. The Xiaoqing River connects Willow Lake to the north and Yishui to the south. And the entire Willow Lake? Right now, I hold sway there…”
“As for Miss Zhuer from Xunye Huai Lane in Mei County? Ha…” A faint, ironic smile touched Fang Cun’s lips. “Her heart always belonged to the poor scholar in the neighboring lane. She only waited for you under her parents’ orders. I simply ‘reasoned’ with her parents. Once liberated, this heaven-sent match naturally proceeded…”
“……”
“……”
Silence swallowed the hall, broken only by Zhou Huai’s ragged breathing. Eyes wide with terror locked onto Fang Cun, like gazes fixed on a demon who’d stepped from shadow.
It was Second Young Master Fang? He truly did all this?
How could he orchestrate such elaborate affairs within mere days?
For Zhou Huai, the shock washed over him, flooding his mind with disbelief. How could this fiendish series of targeted blows be delivered so casually, so effortlessly, by the man before him? It took long moments before he managed a strangled roar: “WHAT RIGHT DID YOU HAVE?! How dare you plot against me like this?! What mortal grievance lies between us? Why go to such lengths?! Why torment me to this degree?!”
His voice tore at the air, the desperate cry of a cornered beast.
“And what deep, personal vendetta did my brother hold against you… that you would so despicably smear the name of a dead man?” Fang Cun’s stare was frozen steel. His words cut slowly, precisely.
“You…” Raging fury scalded Zhou Huai’s heart, choking back his words.
For this? All these calamities… just because of this minor insult? Over that? This?
Not just Zhou Huai. Even among the spectators, gazes shot toward Fang Cun, weighted with stunned disbelief.
Fang Cun’s icy gaze remained pinned on Zhou Huai, his voice low and even: “You have the freedom to dislike my brother. You reserve the right to slander him… when I cannot overhear it. However…” His eyes swept slowly across the ring of surrounding disciples. “Once my ears hear it… the very justice of it must be addressed. Perhaps you…” His stare swept wider, encompassing the silent throng. “Perhaps even all of you… believe you owe my brother nothing because you didn’t know him? Feel entitled to smear him however you wish?”
“Today, I stand before you to argue this very point of justice!”
As he spoke, his expression turned utterly cold, sharp as ice. “The Xiaoyin posts at the County Mansion? They’ve always been hereditary appointments passed down among local aristocratic families! What claim did sect disciples have? It was only my brother, seven years prior, who pushed back against those powerful clans. With a single stroke of his official pen, he changed it! He created that opportunity! Since you hold my brother was merely chasing fame… then you, hypocrite, have no right to walk into the post he won for you!”
“Willow Lake? The Xiaoqing River? Its conjoined waterways? In the annals you forget… the rivers were hellscapes! Monsters and demons ran rampant! People would vanish trying just to approach the water’s edge! It was my brother, leading allies who shared his belief. Combing upstream and down for three thousand stretches. He cleansed those rivers entirely! His very name forced demons back to the abyss! The safety of the waterways you profit from? His bloody legacy! Since you dare to call his death insignificant… then what RIGHT do you have to send a single coin on that water?!”
“And as for Miss Zhuer…?”
Fang Cun’s lip curled. His eyes were arctic glaciers. “Her roots lie in Lingzhou. She moved to Mei County only a decade ago. Ten years prior… a blight overwhelmed the three thousand li domain surrounding Lingzhou. Children perished at birth. None lived. It was my brother who found the vile source! He shattered the demonic arrays! It was his voice, published across the land, that saved the populace there! For that act… the Path of Heaven assassins hunted him relentlessly for nearly a year…”
“Given you view my brother as a meddling fool whose life wasn’t worth mentioning…”
Fang Cun paused, teeth clenched, his final words explosive: “Then what goddamned right did you ever have to covet a woman HE SAVED?”