The shrine temple of Marquis Zhenbei’s estate was built just outside Wu Jing, constructed against the slope of the hills, and together with the ritual fields it encompassed quite a sizable plot of land. Just as Lang Jiuchuan had begun the gu removal, within a separate room inside the shrine, a small girl with her hair tied in twin buns with red silk ribbons — a face of refined and striking beauty — had suddenly smashed two ceramic urns in a fit of rage. She hurriedly packed up a number of things, stormed out of the room in a fury, ordered the carriage kept in the shrine to be readied, and set off directly for the city.

This was precisely the Spirit Witch that Jiang Che had been keeping watch over — the same sorcerer who had planted gu in Song Yuedie’s body. She appeared to be no more than twelve or thirteen years old, her features delicately beautiful, her manner seeming all innocence and harmless charm.

And yet, in her room, several large urns were filled with rustling, scraping sounds — as if something inside were gnawing away — enough to make any listener’s scalp crawl.

Even many of the male Daoist priests in the shrine gave her room a wide berth, afraid of accidentally being bitten by something and dying without so much as being able to voice a grievance.

Jiang Che watched the Spirit Witch heading toward the city, first relayed the message to Lang Jiuchuan, then doubled back to that isolated room and looked at the several urns. He let out a heavy, disdainful snort.

Things that harm people. What reason was there to let them remain?

He settled in to wait, silently counting off the time. When enough time had passed that the little witch would not be able to make it back before she reached the city gates, he finally released his power. The force tied to slaughter and execution brewed within his spiritual consciousness, then erupted in a single roar — his tiger’s breath became flame, and he breathed it in a blazing torrent at the several pitch-black urns inside the room.

Boom.

Tongues of fire curled and licked out at the urns and the wooden materials stacked along the walls, and the room became a sea of fire in an instant, the blaze shooting skyward.

The people of the shrine were startled by the commotion, shouting about the fire and rushing over with water buckets — yet just as they moved to put out the flames, an invisible force seemed to push back against them, barring their advance, sending them tumbling to the ground one after another.

More strangely still, the fire did not spread at all. It burned only within that room belonging to the young witch.

The head of the shrine rushed over in a panic, tried to push through himself, found himself equally unable to advance, and involuntarily intoned: “Infinite Heavenly Venerable.”

This is divine retribution.

He had warned the young witch time and again not to continue in her wickedness, lest the karmic backlash consume her — and in response she had placed a nightmare gu on him. Truly someone who repaid kindness with hostility, who did not know what was good for her.

Now this room where countless toxic creatures had been stored was burning down — if that was not divine retribution, what was? This was the karmic punishment she herself had summoned!

When the fire ignited, the Spirit Witch naturally sensed it. A tearing, shredding pain ripped through her chest, as if a sharp blade were hacking at it over and over.

It hurt!

The Spirit Witch’s exquisite face twisted in anguish. Her bright, lively eyes had gone bloodshot. Clutching her chest, she said through her teeth: “A ploy to draw the tiger from the mountain — who. Who is ruining my plans!”

She had sensed that someone had moved the Corpse-Decay Gu — which meant the gu king had not yet fully matured, had not yet been marked with her brand, or else the moment the gu king died she would have been hit with tremendous karmic backlash. But the Corpse-Decay Gu had long been something she considered as good as hers. By her calculations it was nearly ready; she had planned to go collect it in the next day or two — only for someone to interfere?

The Spirit Witch was livid. How dare someone move my treasure. She would make them taste the power of the gu she had cultivated.

She had barely entered the city gates when she sensed that the precious things she had stored at the shrine were gone. This was definitely a ploy to lure her away. Who — who knew of her existence?

“AAAAAHHH, hateful — just who is opposing me like this?!” The Spirit Witch clawed at her own hair and screamed inside the carriage, terrifying the driver so badly his whole body wouldn’t stop shaking.

As for Lang Jiuchuan — upon learning that the Spirit Witch was coming, she sent Song Niangzi and Song Yuedie to the Shop of Myriad Matters, while she herself waited here.

She had not yet gone looking for the little witch, and the witch had delivered herself to her door. It saved her the trouble of seeking her out.

Lang Jiuchuan swallowed several more medicinal pellets in rapid succession, then settled into the Small Nine Pagoda to regulate her breathing and recover, waiting for the arrival.

The Spirit Witch’s carriage stopped at the entrance to the alley. By now, most of the lights in the houses along the way had gone out, and the surroundings lay in deep silence. She had gotten into the city by means of Marquis Zhenbei’s estate token.

She stepped down from the carriage and stood at the mouth of the alley, studying the long, dim passage with hardly any lights burning inside. She frowned, struck by an inexplicable unease.

Perhaps she should not have come.

Hissss.

As if sensing her disquiet, a soft, faint hissing reached the Spirit Witch from her wrist. She reached up to stroke it. “Little Scarlet, you’re here with me. I’m not afraid.”

On her wrist, a small snake — red as fresh blood, slender as a chain — was coiled there, flickering its tongue. Its tongue bore sharp barbs that gleamed with a cold light, and it let out another hiss.

The Spirit Witch was coaxed into a smile. She walked into the alley.

She had once watched a woman with a careworn face, someone she had been told was called Mountain Root, walk into that house with the white lantern. She had also slipped by on her own once to look — was it around here?

The Spirit Witch looked at the filth smeared along the walls of this little courtyard and covered her nose in disgust. What a stench.

She pushed open the courtyard gate, mildly surprised to find it unlatched, and frowned. She sniffed the air — a strange smell, and not a single light burning inside.

Had they run?

The Spirit Witch hurried in and went straight for the main room. She had just reached the doorway when — bang — the courtyard gate behind her was caught by the wind and slammed shut, making her jump. The surroundings grew even quieter.

Thump. Thump. Thump.

The Spirit Witch could hear her own heartbeat.

Louder than when she had been digging gu larvae out of a corpse.

The Spirit Witch composed her expression and stepped into the main room. On the bed sat a slender figure. Was that the child?

No.

The Corpse-Decay Gu king had nearly fully matured — even at her most frail and withered, that child would not have been as tall as this dark silhouette. This was not her.

“You’ve come.”

A voice, cold and precise as frost and snow, reached the Spirit Witch’s eardrums, jolting her sharply. A woman.

The Spirit Witch stared wide-eyed. What was this person’s background — what ability had they used to destroy her gu?

The Corpse-Decay Gu’s egg stock had been specially treated with intensely toxic gu techniques, then left to steep inside a corpse’s heart for a period of time. Once the larval insects broke out and ran rampant through a human body, feasting on blood, the host would begin to emit the stench of decomposition. But a Corpse-Decay Gu that did not consume the host’s soul had correspondingly weaker destructive power. If it fully matured, however, mere contact with the body would cause it to emit a corpse stench nearly impossible to remove.

And for the gu king to fully mature, it had to devour a soul before leaving its host — only then would it become a true Corpse-Decay Gu King.

So it was killed before reaching that stage — what a waste.

The Spirit Witch was furious.

She raged: “Who are you? You’re the one who killed my Corpse-Decay Gu — you horrible person, I’ll fight you to the—AHHH!”

Mid-sentence, she suddenly shrieked. A technique launched by the other person struck her in the mouth, sending her face slewing sideways. Enraged, she lunged straight for Lang Jiuchuan — but the moment her foot moved, she went smack flat on the floor, staring down at her own legs in shock. What?!

Two small white paper figures had latched onto her legs, holding them in an iron grip, rendering her completely immobile.

The Spirit Witch: “?!”

Despicable — this horrible woman has no scruples about playing dirty!

“The one with no scruples,” Lang Jiuchuan replied in an icy voice, “is not only me. Are you so different?”

Her hand was pinching the Spirit Witch’s little red snake by its seven-inch point, swinging it up and down idly, as she walked slowly toward her.

The Spirit Witch shrieked: “Let go of my Little Scarlet!”