Saving the White Moonlight Chapter 35

“Senior Sister, wait. I will go knock.”
Yan Zhuguang walked to the door of Qiuming Pill Hall in two steps, raised her hand, and knocked. “Is anyone there?”
The sound inside the door was somewhat hollow. It sounded as if no one was there anymore.
Yan Zhuguang knocked twice more, but no one answered.
“Perhaps the owner of the Pill Hall had urgent business and went out,” Yun Mixue said beside Yan Zhuguang.
She had not let Yan Zhuguang go forward alone. Instead, she had silently followed behind her. Yan Zhuguang turned back. “Maybe something happened. When I came, this Pill Hall was still receiving guests normally. They left as soon as I was gone. I think this is unusual.”
Yun Mixue said, “They have already left. We do not know where to look for them.”
If Yun Mixue had met the other person before, she could try searching with spiritual sense. Unfortunately, she only knew that such a person existed and had come to investigate.
Yan Zhuguang thought for a moment. “If Miss Su is still with them, I have a way to find them.”
Yun Mixue asked doubtfully, “Oh? Miss Su?”
Yan Zhuguang explained, “She is the target of the mission that the young master of this Pill Hall gave me.” To be exact, it was the mission the young master’s servant had given her.
Yan Zhuguang told Yun Mixue how she had happened to meet Su Qian’er and the others being chased by a demonic beast on the road, how she had killed the demonic beast, and how the old servant from Qiuming Pill Hall who was escorting Su Qian’er had hired her to protect Su Qian’er on the way to Qiuming Pill Hall.
“So that was what happened.”
“Miss Su wanted to repay me for saving her life. I did not want to accept it, but I could not refuse. So I took one Jade Dew Pill that Senior Sister gave me and handed it to her.”
“There should still be some aura left on that Jade Dew Pill. As long as she did not put the bottle into a storage ring, even if she put it in a storage pouch, I should be able to track it.”
The aura Yan Zhuguang spoke of was not her own aura.
She was careful and cautious. Aura was something unique to a person, so she would not easily leak it. For anything that passed through her hands, she carefully erased her own traces.
The reason she said she could track it was because the small bottle holding the Jade Dew Pill was the system’s bottle.
When Yan Zhuguang divided the pills, she did not have extra bottles on hand, so she had taken the system’s pills out and placed them separately in an inventory slot, then used the bottle.
As long as items produced by the system had not been fully assimilated by this world, the system could track them. It had not been long, so that bottle should not have been assimilated by the world so quickly.
Earlier, the system had once again failed to warn the host about Senior Sister’s movements, causing the host to be caught by Senior Sister and nearly creating a major crisis of trust. In its heart, it felt very, very guilty.
To make up for this mistake, the system was now as eager as if it had been injected with strength. It was especially active and serious, determined to track down that bottle and let Host see its sincerity, proving that it really was useful.
“Senior Sister, should we track it?”
Yun Mixue thought for a moment. “Thank you, Zhuguang. This matter concerns the sect master, so we cannot be careless.”
Yan Zhuguang nodded and quickly used a tracking spell to trace the aura. In truth, the system was running its tracking program.
“Found it, Host. It is not far. It is outside Danye City.”
When the system said outside the city, it did not mean Yan Zhuguang and Su Qian’er had missed each other. Su Qian’er was in the other direction, opposite Tianyu City.
Yan Zhuguang pointed in that direction. “Senior Sister, they are over there. Not far.”
Yun Mixue nodded. She took Yan Zhuguang’s wrist and used a special movement technique underfoot. With only two steps, they had already crossed a great distance. Under Yan Zhuguang’s guidance, they rushed quickly out of the city.
With Yun Mixue’s Nascent Soul strength, reaching the outside of the city did not take much time at all. When they arrived at the destination, the people they were tracking had not moved.
The moment Yun Mixue saw the scene, she could not help acting.
A flowing, lively snow-white ribbon flew out from her wide sleeve. In the blink of an eye, it circled around and returned. When it came back, there was one more person in the ribbon.
It was Su Qian’er, the person Yan Zhuguang had been tracking.
At this moment, blood spilled from the corner of her lips, and her whole condition looked very poor. Her awareness had already fallen into a half-conscious state, but she was still tightly gripping a porcelain bottle. It was the one Yan Zhuguang had given her, though the pill inside was already gone.
Yun Mixue placed a hand on Su Qian’er’s back. Su Qian’er had already taken the Jade Dew Pill, but her own strength was too low. The Jade Dew Pill Yun Mixue had given Yan Zhuguang was too high in quality, and Su Qian’er could not bear its medicinal power. Someone else had to help dissolve it for her.
Yan Zhuguang’s face was like cold frost as she looked in the direction the snow-white ribbon had gone. Her words seemed to carry falling shards of ice. “Young Master Qiu, what are you doing?”
There were four people standing there. The one in the lead was Qiu Qiao, the young master of Qiuming Pill Hall. Behind him stood the manager of Qiuming Pill Hall, and the other two were the old servants who had earlier escorted Su Qian’er.
In front of them lay another person. Yan Zhuguang had seen him before too. He was a servant of Su Qian’er’s family. The servant was covered in blood, staining the ground beneath him red. The source of the blood was his chest, where a bloody hole had exploded open. He no longer had any breath.
Qiu Qiao and the others were clearly surprised to see Yan Zhuguang. He blurted out, “Why are you here?”
Yan Zhuguang’s mind moved, and she raised a brow. “What? Should I not be here?”
“Could it be that the people who ambushed me outside the city earlier were sent by you?”
On the surface, there had not seemed to be anything strange about those Foundation Establishment cultivators. If an ordinary person ran into them, they might only think they were unlucky and had met robbers.
But the fact that they attacked Yan Zhuguang was itself suspicious.
In this kind of road robbery, the target was usually random and uncertain. As said before, Yan Zhuguang had always hidden her aura very well. If ordinary robbers had been lying in ambush there, they would not have sensed Yan Zhuguang’s aura at all.
Real robbers, when Yan Zhuguang suddenly revealed her aura to test them, would definitely have been startled. Then they would have hidden themselves deeper, or even simply given up on attacking Yan Zhuguang.
That was because Yan Zhuguang revealing her aura to test them clearly told the other side that she had already discovered the ambush. Without knowing Yan Zhuguang’s background, robbers would not rashly attack her.
Once they had lost the advantage of ambush, attacking someone whose details were unknown could very likely lead to a failed interception. It would not be worth the loss.
Unless they had absolute confidence in their strength, robbers would rather wait for the next prey to fall into the trap than attack prey that had already become alert.
But it was clear that the people who attacked Yan Zhuguang were not like that. After sensing Yan Zhuguang’s probing aura, they jumped out of their ambush instead. Clearly, they had already made up their minds to attack Yan Zhuguang.
Also, the system’s detection function was very sensitive toward people who held malice toward Yan Zhuguang, while it was not very useful toward those without malice. The system had sensed those people’s ambush even before Yan Zhuguang herself sensed it. If they were ordinary robbers, they had not even sensed Yan Zhuguang’s aura, so where would malice toward Yan Zhuguang have come from?
Clearly, those people had come for Yan Zhuguang.
Yan Zhuguang had known from the start that the ambush was not simple. But since the people were already dead, she had been too lazy to keep investigating.
Now, after hearing Qiu Qiao’s question, she conveniently connected the two matters.
As expected, once Yan Zhuguang brought it up, Qiu Qiao’s expression immediately changed. Even if he tried hard to deny it next, it was useless.
“I do not know what grudge I have with Young Master Qiu, to make you send Foundation Establishment cultivators after me. I truly feel honored.”
Even Yun Mixue, who was treating Su Qian’er, frowned at the people from Qiuming Pill Hall.
She had originally thought Zhuguang had only been unlucky and had met road robbers. She had not expected someone to have specially set an ambush to kill her.
According to Zhuguang, she had earlier even saved Young Master Qiu’s fiancee. Where had Zhuguang offended him, for him to want her dead?
Then Yun Mixue lowered her head to look at Su Qian’er. For what reason had Young Master Qiu attacked his fiancee so viciously?
Qiu Qiao flatly denied it. “Miss Yan, do not speak nonsense. I have no old grudge or recent hatred with you. How could I send people to ambush you? If Miss Yan is unhappy with the payment I gave, you may say so directly. There is truly no need to tell such an absurd lie.”
Yan Zhuguang neither agreed nor disagreed. “I also want to ask why Young Master Qiu wants me dead.” Her gaze landed on Su Qian’er. “Could it be because I meddled in other people’s business and delivered back someone who should not have been delivered?”
Qiu Qiao’s strength was early Foundation Establishment. The two old servants behind him were at the ninth level of Qi Refining, while the manager in front of him was late Foundation Establishment. With this lineup, they originally would not have feared Yan Zhuguang at all. But beside her stood Yun Mixue, whose strength they could not see through.
This white-clothed woman had a restrained aura, but a terrifying presence faintly leaked from her. They did not dare act rashly. For now, they could only try to soothe Yan Zhuguang and hope to fool these two into leaving.
“Miss Yan has misunderstood,” Qiu Qiao said, pointing at the person lying on the ground. “This man wanted to harm Qian’er and took her hostage to escape. We chased them here to save Qian’er. But this man fought back desperately before death and injured Qian’er. We were just about to treat Qian’er when you two arrived.”
Qiu Qiao cupped his hands toward Yun Mixue. “Thank you, Miss, for treating Qian’er. I have pills suitable for Qian’er’s body, so please return Qian’er to me.”
When Yan Zhuguang and Yun Mixue arrived, they had indeed only seen Su Qian’er collapse. They had not seen Qiu Qiao and the others attack her. His words were not completely unreasonable.
However…
Yun Mixue said, “The injuries on Miss Qian’er are the same as those on the dead man. Yet you say she was injured by the dead man?”
With one sweep of spiritual sense, Yun Mixue knew what method had killed the dead person. The aura leaking from the late Foundation Establishment cultivator had not yet fully vanished. How could it be hidden from her?
After hearing this, Yan Zhuguang sneered. “How does Young Master Qiu explain that? Could it be that the man injured Miss Su and then killed himself?”
The late Foundation Establishment manager’s eyes sharpened, and he opened his mouth to say something. But Qiu Qiao raised a hand to stop him. Qiu Qiao said, “Qian’er is my fiancee. This matter is my family affair. Miss Yan insisting on digging to the root of it, is that not overstepping?”
Yun Mixue hesitated slightly.
Yan Zhuguang scoffed. “Since we saved her, how is this unrelated to us? So what if I insist on interfering?”
“Besides, Miss Su paid me a reward in advance. Our hiring relationship has not ended yet. I, Yan, have a duty to protect my employer.”
After saying this, Yan Zhuguang quietly asked Yun Mixue, “Senior Sister, is it all right if I tear all pretense with them?”
She had already said the harsh words, and only now did she ask. Was that not a little late? Yun Mixue shook her head helplessly. “It is fine. Just argue with them as you wish.”
After receiving approval, Yan Zhuguang turned back around and lifted her chin as if borrowing Senior Sister’s authority. “Once Miss Su wakes up, hmph.”