On one side was his martial brother who had lost all his kung fu, on the other was the completely defenseless Bao Zhu. Even though Wei Xun had always been extremely adaptable and calm in crisis, he rarely encountered such a thorny situation.
Pang Liangji had originally been kneeling on the ground performing the ceremony. Hearing the sound of hidden weapons, he had no time to rise and directly threw himself over his bride beside him. In that split second, Wei Xun and Huo Qi Lang flipped and kicked backwards, each breaking a wooden pillar supporting the green pavilion. The entire tent collapsed, thick hemp tent cloth covering the newlyweds performing the ceremony below, blocking most of the hidden weapons.
Delayed by this instant, there was no room for maneuver on Bao Zhu’s side—she could only take the blow with her flesh and blood. Wei Xun flew over and embraced her as they tumbled down.
With sudden catastrophe striking, Bao Zhu didn’t know what was happening. She only heard hissing sounds filling the sky, the green pavilion collapsing, then everything went black as Wei Xun suddenly tackled her to the ground.
This tackle was swift and fierce. Wei Xun’s weight combined with the impact force pressed down at once. Bao Zhu instantly suffocated, all air squeezed from her chest, her mind roaring blankly. Fortunately he realized this and immediately arched his back and lifted his waist, moving his weight off her body. Bao Zhu could breathe again, finding that though the fall was heavy, being held in his iron arms with one hand supporting her neck and the back of her head, the other protecting her waist and back, she wasn’t injured.
Bao Zhu’s heart pounded rapidly. She smelled the cool, refreshing scent from his neck hollow, clear and pure like air in a forest grove after rain. She didn’t make a sound, warmth flowing upward, her cheeks gradually flushing with light red. Having personally witnessed Wei Xun drinking with people all night, though there was slight cold wine vapor in his breath, she felt it forthright and refreshing, very reassuring.
After a moment, the hidden weapons stopped firing. Thick, foul-smelling choking smoke rose in the green pavilion. Wei Xun knew the enemy had released poison fog, immediately stood up and pulled Bao Zhu to her feet, tearing a sleeve from his clothes to cover her mouth and nose, tying a knot tightly behind her head.
Around them came many people’s groans and cries of pain. That yellow poison smoke spread out, growing ever thicker, limiting vision so they couldn’t see how many were injured.
Having spent years in underground activities, Wei Xun’s breath-holding skills were excellent—stopping breathing for two or three incense sticks’ worth of time was easy. But fearing there might be other ambushes in the poison smoke, they couldn’t linger. He grabbed Bao Zhu’s arm and led her toward the upwind direction.
After two steps he realized that in his urgency he had instinctively grasped her elbow’s Quchi and Shaohai acupoints—this was a grappling technique for restraining enemies. Knowing he always used heavy hands and that half her arm must already be numb and soft, Wei Xun quickly released his fingers, slid downward, and naturally grabbed her wrist to continue forward.
Muscle memory was extremely fluid—this time he unconsciously pressed on her pulse point. Though he used no force, martial people pressing pulse points was to absorb and release internal energy to injure the opponent’s heart meridian—a threatening and intimidating action, still inappropriate.
Wei Xun searched for an exit from the poison fog, thinking he had never had gentle physical contact with anyone in his life—either fighting and brawling or restraining and threatening. Under current circumstances, figuring out where to hold her appropriately was quite troubling. After thinking, he slid down another two inches and took her hand.
Only when holding this warm, soft palm did he feel proper and at ease. His natural martial insight told him this was right. If not for this poison fog, he truly wanted to keep holding her hand and walking—unfortunately journeys have ends, and sooner or later he’d have to let go.
Changing positions and grasping here and there like this, Bao Zhu had no reaction at all. Wei Xun found her surprisingly docile at this moment. Looking down, he saw her eyes filled with terror, staring fixedly at his back, knowing she had already discovered it but couldn’t speak with her face covered.
The thick smoke gradually thinned. Walking to the upwind area, they also found the source of the poison fog.
At the wedding ceremony, there was a large stone mortar filled with millet placed in the courtyard—the smoke was spraying out from this mortar. Huo Qi Lang went out alone to find the source, pulled a large piece of tent curtain, soaked it in the pond, and covered the mortar to extinguish the smoldering toxic material inside.
Shisan Lang, who hadn’t been able to enter the green pavilion to observe the ceremony, also found this place, still holding Bao Zhu’s bow and arrows.
As the poison fog gradually dispersed, Bao Zhu pulled off the sleeve wrapped around her face and stammered to Wei Xun: “You, your back is injured! There are, there are seven or eight darts…”
Wei Xun replied gently: “I can feel them—they’re stuck in my back.” He turned to talk with Huo Qi Lang, seeming not to take the hidden weapons embedded throughout his back seriously.
Whatever they said went past her ears like wind. Bao Zhu only felt buzzing in her ears, all her attention focused on Wei Xun’s back.
Bao Zhu realized these were injuries received when he tackled her for protection. Anxious and disturbed, she looked carefully and saw those hidden weapons were swallow-tail shaped, blood seeping from the wounds—but not fresh blood, rather disturbing black blood. She tremblingly reached out trying to help pull them out, but Wei Xun turned and grabbed her hand: “Don’t touch them—they’re poisoned. Be careful not to get your hands swollen.”
Hearing this, Bao Zhu was extremely shocked and cried out: “You know they’re poisoned and you’re just leaving them there?!”
Wei Xun said matter-of-factly: “It’s not some lethal poison that kills on contact—won’t die from it.”
Huo Qi Lang’s hands were covered in fire blisters from the toxic material, her whole body dirty from the smoke, and she didn’t seem to care much either.
The two martial brothers’ magnificent groomsmen outfits were torn and filthy. Wei Xun had torn his sleeves, his back pierced with seven or eight holes from poison darts. Huo Qi wiped the ash from her face, rubbing off the disguise materials and once again revealing that long scar.
No longer were there dashing heroes in fresh clothes on spirited horses, nor androgynously handsome young men—only the harsh reality of the martial world remained.
Huo Qi Lang said puzzlingly: “Really strange. Pang Liangji was afraid of enemies lurking and had already checked the household servants several times. Household guards were patrolling everywhere—where did these assassins spring from?”
Wei Xun pondered silently, thinking that even if ignition materials were hidden in the mortar beforehand, so many hidden weapons required at least two people and mechanical launching devices. Along the way, enemies had always hidden in crowds without showing themselves. This tent scattering attack also relied on poison smoke cover to retreat—clearly they didn’t want to reveal their identities for direct confrontation.
“Tell me when you’ll treat these poison wounds, and I’ll tell you where the assassins are hiding.”
Bao Zhu dropped this statement. The two martial brothers were startled and both looked at her. Bao Zhu took the bow and arrows from Shisan Lang’s hands, tears rolling down her face, but her eyes showed no fear—only anger.
Seeing her expression of such fury, Wei Xun quickly explained: “It’s not that I’m ignoring it. If I remove the darts now, the poison will spread with the blood. I’ve already sealed the acupoints on my back. When this matter is finished and there’s time, I’ll circulate qi to remove the darts.”
Huo Qi Lang also panicked: “Don’t cry—this little injury won’t kill anyone.”
Though this explanation couldn’t be completely reassuring, it was barely acceptable. Bao Zhu nodded and quickly walked to the well, picked up a bamboo pole, and lifted the bamboo mat covering it.
Various customs in folk weddings—stone mortars holding millet, well mouths covered with mats—were most common. No one investigated the reasoning behind them deeply, nor would anyone examine them in detail.
But this was Bao Zhu’s first time seeing this. When she came to Pang Mansion in the early morning and saw a mat over the well mouth, she was curious and reached out to lift it, but the bamboo mat didn’t budge at all, so she assumed the mat was fixed in place. Just now coming out of the poison fog, she glimpsed that the bamboo mat had shifted position, with most of it still over the well mouth but leaving a gap, arousing suspicion.
Wei Xun and Huo Qi looked inside and blocked Bao Zhu from looking closely. They saw two human corpses stuffed in the well, their clothes stripped off, bodies folded into bundles, half-submerged in well water, already soaked white.
Wei Xun thought: It seems the assassins killed two people at night, changed into Pang family servants’ clothes to infiltrate, stuffed the bodies in the well. The assassins could hide here and also step on the corpses to float on the water surface—killing two birds with one stone.
The bamboo mat allowed air through without fear of suffocation, indicating they planned to hide for quite some time. They just waited for the newlyweds to be in position and the ceremony to begin, then jump out of the well to harm people with hidden weapons scattered in the tent. When Bao Zhu tried to lift the mat in the early morning, those two assassins were stepping on corpses hiding in the well—the bamboo mat wasn’t fixed from outside but being held from inside.
Despite external injuries and internal troubles, fighting all night he had never wavered in the slightest. But recalling how close she had been to death, Wei Xun’s neck hair stood on end—truly somewhat frightened in retrospect.
Huo Qi Lang looked into the well and said: “Looking at the corpses, they haven’t swollen much—probably dead less than two days. No need to step on water all night—these two assassins were quite good at conserving energy.” She was about to jump down for a closer look at clues when she suddenly heard Pang Liangji’s furious questioning voice from the green pavilion direction. All three immediately changed color and rushed over.
The green pavilion was in complete chaos, people lying everywhere unconscious or dead—some injured by hidden weapons, some knocked out by poison fog. Fortunately Wei Xun and Huo Qi had reacted quickly, and the newlywed couple was completely unharmed.
The bride stood gracefully, her cold and beautiful face half-hidden behind her round fan.
Pang Liangji sat on the ground, using all his strength with hands and legs to push backward, actually trying to get far away from the bride.
“Who are you?! Where’s A Ran?! Where did you hide A Ran?!”
Pang Liangji’s voice was extremely frightened. The bride smiled without speaking, still gazing gently and refinedly at her husband.
Manager Pang, clutching his bleeding forehead, shouted frantically: “Ancestor! Stop making trouble! Isn’t this the Miss Xiao you’ve been thinking about day and night?”
Pang Liangji said loudly: “I would never mistake my beloved! When I tackled this woman just now, I already discovered something was wrong!”
The Xiao family’s bridesmaids were shocked and furious, crying out: “Are you Pang family deliberately humiliating people? We accompanied our young lady from the Xiao family as she married, watching the wedding carriage with unblinking eyes all along the way. If this isn’t our lady, then who is it?”
Surrounding guests argued loudly. People from both families who had seen Miss Xiao all said this was her, but only Pang Liangji absolutely refused to acknowledge it, insisting the person had been switched. Even if the appearance was identical, the woman before them was definitely not the bride he wanted to marry.
He turned to look at Wei Xun and Huo Qi, calling out desperately: “Senior Brother! Seventh! The enemy has kidnapped my A Ran! This isn’t A Ran at all—it’s a ghost wearing her clothes and having her face!”
Everyone was in uproar. The new wife the Pang family had married with enormous betrothal gifts, brought home through untold hardships and trials by fire, after bowing in ceremony, the groom refused to accept her. Pang Liangji’s father and the Xiao family elders were ready to find weapons and beat him to death on the spot.
Huo Qi Lang stared at the bride for a moment, picked up a small pebble from the ground and flicked it at her face. The bride only blinked her eyes, but the flesh on her face didn’t move—as if her smile was frozen.
She whispered to Wei Xun: “Something seems wrong. Should we expose and kill her?”
Wei Xun shook his head: “The hostage has already been kidnapped. We need to keep this thing alive to see if we can make an exchange.”
No matter how chaotic and noisy the surroundings became, the bride held her round fan and stood smiling quietly, not saying a word to anyone who spoke to her. Observing calmly, it seemed even more mysterious and terrifying.
This chaotic wedding had lasted an entire night. At this time dawn was breaking, and everyone in Pang Mansion was terrified and exhausted. What should have been a great joyous occasion had produced so many horrifying accidents. Many servants had already fled in fear, and many more who had been hit by poisoned hidden weapons and fog needed doctors to extract poison and treat them.
Wei Xun feared there would be frequent battles afterward and needed to deal with the poison darts in his back. He requested a carriage from the Pang family, preparing to take Bao Zhu back to rest at the Lingbao County inn first, leaving his two martial brothers to handle the aftermath. Huo Qi was skilled in disguise—having her arrange this “bride” was most appropriate.
Before leaving, Wei Xun drew a firecracker-like metal tube from his waist and handed it to Shisan Lang.
Seeing this object, Shisan Lang exclaimed: “Is Senior Brother issuing a sect gathering summons?”
Wei Xun said coldly: “This has become too intolerable. Pang Liangji didn’t invite them, yet those who shouldn’t have come all showed up. Since that’s the case, might as well gather them together and have them meet me at Lingbao Inn.”