Chapter 179
Chapter 179
They say you see a person's true heart when you're cornered. Shen Lang was moved. In this predicament, he had seen the true hearts of two people.
*'But Xu Qianqian, what are you doing? Are you going to disappoint me?'*
Just then, Jin Hui and Jin Zhong rushed in at the same time.
"Young Master, Lady Xu Qianqian has sent a secret letter."
"Young Master, someone from the Heavenly Path Society has arrived!"
Shen Lang was overjoyed.
*'Is this a case of good things coming one after another? Two important pieces of news arriving at the same time!'*
The Heavenly Path Society was a massive and powerful financial organization on par with the Hidden Yuan Society. Whether he could earn eight or nine hundred thousand gold coins, or even more, in an instant depended on Shen Lang's upcoming performance.
Shen Lang first opened the secret letter from Xu Qianqian. In an instant, a wave of resentment seemed to wash over him from the page.
[I've been sweeping floors for a month. Can you imagine over ten beauties all sweeping a tiny little garden? Can you even fathom the infighting that goes on just to sweep a single fallen leaf? Qiu Yao'er is a devil. A devil who doesn't listen to a word anyone says.]
Reading the letter, Shen Lang couldn't help but chuckle. To have frustrated a woman as cunning and vicious as Xu Qianqian, Qiu Yao'er was clearly an extraordinary person. From this, Shen Lang realized one thing: the more talented someone was in the martial arts, the more likely they were to have some strange quirks, unlike ordinary people. Shen Lang continued reading the letter.
[I've been in Raging Tide City for almost two months now. My initial attempt to use my beauty as a honey trap failed. She isn't into women at all. But don't you go celebrating secretly. She doesn't seem to like men either. The number of men she's killed with her own hands must be close to five thousand.]
Shen Lang felt a chill run down his spine, as if his own neck had been slit.
[There are hundreds of beauties in Qiu Yao'er's fortress, all of them pitiful women she rescued. They all have tragic pasts! But as they say, pitiful people have their detestable sides. They're all bitches. Myself included, of course.]
The secret letter from Xu Qianqian was a complaint that pierced the heavens with its resentment.
[You can't even imagine the intense infighting that goes on in this fortress, or how strict the hierarchy is. I've been here for two months, and I'm not even qualified to get close to Qiu Yao'er. I'm a full four ranks below the level required to meet her.
Above me, there's the head maid in charge of sweeping the garden, then the head maid in charge of sweeping all the floors in the fortress, then the head maid in charge of all the maids in the fortress. And finally, there's the maid who personally serves Qiu Yao'er.
I don't know what you want me to do once I've infiltrated her inner circle, but to do it, I need to become her personal attendant. I never imagined it. The proud third-ranked talent and beauty of Nujiang Commandery, striving to attain the position of a serving maid. Life is truly unpredictable.
The name of the maid who attends to Qiu Yao'er is Lüyi. She's a conniving bitch. A real tyrant who borrows the tiger's might to order people around with her chin. Because I tried to seduce Qiu Yao'er, she's constantly hostile towards me, trying to crush me. I want to scheme to kill her and take her place, but the time isn't right yet.
After nearly two months of observation, I've managed to grasp Qiu Yao'er's personality. She's a woman of immense spirit. Her martial arts are unbelievably powerful, but she has no interest in power or wealth, seeking only strength and slaughter. You can't even call it slaughter, really; it seems she has a great sense of chivalry in her heart and wants to sweep away all the injustices in the world.
She is an extremely vicious female devil, yet also a very pure woman. I know you're handsome and good at seducing women, but you will probably never be able to win this one over. I don't even know if there's a man worthy of her.]
*'This is practically worship. Can it be that even a woman like Xu Qianqian sees her as an idol?'*
[I've now found an opportunity to get close to Qiu Yao'er. The woman is taciturn, as cold as ice, rough, and cruel. She has no hobbies to speak of and is incredibly bored within her fortress. She hates reading, too. Her only interest, her only hobby, is listening to others tell stories.]
*'Listening to stories? A female devil likes listening to stories? But I suppose that makes sense. She doesn't like jewels, fame, or fine silks, nor does she enjoy showing off or reading books. She must be bored out of her mind.'*
She wasn't an idiot like Big Dummy or Tang Yan, who could watch ants marching in a line for hours without getting bored. Shen Lang continued reading the letter.
[I had planned to prepare many stories and get promoted from a floor-sweeping maid to her personal attendant in one fell swoop. But the other bitches were better prepared than me; there isn't a story they haven't told Qiu Yao'er, including every novel available on the market. One maid even told her *The Mandarin Duck Dream* and your *Boundless Wind and Moon*. And since we're on the subject, the woman who told her *Boundless Wind and Moon* was sent to clean the latrines.]
*'What a woman with no taste. My *Boundless Wind and Moon* is so well-written. A woman like you, all bust and no brains, failing to recognize a masterpiece is a sign of your lack of culture, not a reflection of my poor writing.'*
[Qiu Yao'er is a deviant who loves novelty and tires of things easily. A woman who tells an interesting story can stay by her side, but only for a few days. The moment she gets bored of the maid's stories, she sends her far away. Qiu Yao'er is magnanimous and tolerant, rescuing all pitiful women, but she is also extremely heartless and will never pity just one.]
One with great love loves the collective, not the individual. They seem heartless, yet are the most affectionate. This is the mark of a leader.
[There's only one chance, so I'm staying undercover and haven't made my move. You need to write a story for me, quickly. It must be grand, thrilling, and most importantly, full of freedom. A story so captivating that one forgets to breathe while listening. You have to make it as long as possible—long enough for me to stay by Qiu Yao'er's side for about a year and a half. That's the only way my position will be secure.
Remember, you must write a good story. Whether I can become her confidante depends on it. Don't forget, the competition is fierce. Every day, dozens of women prepare their own interesting stories and eagerly present them to Qiu Yao'er. Your story must completely crush those bitches and allow me to stand out.
The story must be full of imagination, set in a world completely different from reality, and contain themes of unrestrained freedom and slaughter. Absolutely no love stories. Throw your *Boundless Wind and Moon* into the latrine and write something completely different. My success depends on your story.]
Reading up to that point, Shen Lang was dumbfounded. First, Xu Qianqian's letter was very long. This indicated that she had the freedom to write such a long letter and was extremely bored, which proved that she could easily make contact with the spy Shen Lang had sent into Raging Tide City.
The world was truly full of strange things. Who could have imagined that a vicious and cunning woman like Xu Qianqian would be in a position where she had to tell interesting stories just to infiltrate Qiu Yao'er's circle?
Slaughter, freedom, grandeur, a story that takes your breath away. Should he write *Battle Through the Heavens* or *Journey to the West*? The former was longer. He could tell ten thousand characters a day and it would still last for over a year.
However, *Journey to the West* was a bit more profound and filled with more unusual tales, which would surely appeal to Qiu Yao'er's heroic fantasies. Besides, its content was a little deeper.
Some might ask why not plagiarize *The Tale of Wukong*. No, that wouldn't work. That novel was brilliant for its sharp prose, but it was light on plot. Plus, it was too short. Alright, then. It had to be *Journey to the West*.
*'To think I'd be reduced to plagiarizing a book for just one person. Master Wu Cheng'en, my apologies.'*
And so, the moment had come for the grandmaster of plagiarism, Jin Mucong, to make his reappearance. After finishing Xu Qianqian's letter, Shen Lang noticed a few dots at the very end. An ellipsis? Surprisingly, this world also had punctuation marks. Who invented them? None other than yours truly, Shen Lang himself.
When he printed the special edition of *Boundless Wind and Moon*, he had added them in. Unexpectedly, the punctuation marks caused no stir at all. The people who bought the special edition had never seen them before, but they accepted them naturally, and once they got used to them, it didn't hinder their reading in the slightest.
For Xu Qianqian to use an ellipsis at the end of her secret letter was clearly a hint. Soon, Shen Lang held the letter over a flame, lightly toasting it. And just as he expected, characters appeared on the back of the paper. This was the true secret message.
"Qiu Yao'er is exhibiting strange symptoms. Sudden nosebleeds, frequent dizziness, double vision, and in severe cases, fainting. I've searched through all the medical texts but can't find the cause. She has seen several physicians, but none have been able to find the source of her illness."
Just as expected of the ever-scheming Xu Qianqian, she hadn't even trusted the spy Shen Lang sent, which was why she had written the letter in this manner. She had made good use of what she had learned from Shen Lang in the past. Shen Lang himself had once warned her that Zhang Jin was trying to kill her using this very method.
The symptoms she described for Qiu Yao'er sounded like chronic poisoning. Shen Lang had previously seen a patient with lead poisoning, Princess Ningluo. But Qiu Yao'er's condition seemed more complex and didn't look like lead poisoning, and since Xu Qianqian was a layman in medicine, her description was likely inaccurate. Shen Lang would have to meet Qiu Yao'er in person and examine her condition to be sure what kind of poison it was.
If it was poison, who administered it? The culprit would surely be someone who stood to gain from her death. Could it be Qiu Xiao or Qiu Hu? But in a way, Qiu Yao'er's poisoning was good news for Shen Lang. At least he now had an opening.
*Sigh!* He had set aside his medical duties for so long that he had almost forgotten he was a physician.
Jin Hui asked Shen Lang.
"Young Master, where should we receive the guest from the Heavenly Path Society?"
"We'll receive them in the secret underground chamber!"