At this moment, Jing Hengbo had pulled Cui Jie to appear half a zhang away from their target.

The marketplace was bustling with people coming and going, most minding their own business, with no one noticing that someone had suddenly disappeared or appeared beside them.

Jing Hengbo first took a deep breath, checking if she felt any discomfort—she was very worried that after leaving the Dahuang guards’ sight, she might suffer some kind of poisoning.

Strange, nothing happened. Was it because she wasn’t far enough away yet?

“Do you have any weapons?” Jing Hengbo put her mind at ease and asked Cui Jie.

If they were going to act, they needed to hurry. The guards would find them soon.

Cui Jie shook her head. Two women out shopping—where would they get weapons? Even if they had any, they would have been searched and confiscated first.

Jing Hengbo looked around in all directions, finally picking up a solid blue brick. “Then this will have to do.”

“Yes!” Cui Jie gripped the blue brick tightly, her eyes shining as if she had grasped the Heaven-Reliant Sword.

Jing Hengbo pulled Cui Jie closer to their target. The young master was still watching the street performance with great interest, chin propped on his hand, discussing with a scholar-like companion beside him.

“Look at that rope-walking girl, what do you think?” He pointed with his little finger at the young woman walking on a rope in the center of the performance area. “Look at that face—like a lotus bud in June; look at those hips—like peach petals in May; look at those legs… those legs… those legs…”

His breathing suddenly became rapid, his gaze fixating directly on a pair of legs that had appeared before him.

The legs had just suddenly appeared in front of him.

As soon as the legs appeared, they pulled his gaze away from the performing girl’s long legs, completely captivating him.

The owner of the legs was walking past him with a peculiar gait, toes touching the ground, heels slightly raised, her entire being carrying a heart-racing rhythm like she was dancing. As she passed in front of him, her fingers intentionally or unintentionally lifted her skirt…

Whoosh—

This group of men’s eyes all went straight.

This beauty wasn’t wearing long pants under her skirt!

This beauty’s skirt actually had slits! The slits went up to her thighs—normally invisible when walking, but with this lift…

With this lift, they saw dazzling snow-white skin with a strange pearl-like luminescence…

The beauty held her skirt slit, one hand on her hip, slightly turning her body with her leg extended forward at a right angle, revealing her rounded thigh, slender calf, delicate ankle—exquisite curves extending straight up to her slender waist…

What she was lifting wasn’t just her skirt—she was clearly seducing people…

For a moment, silence fell all around. Even if the rope-walking girl had fallen, no one would have noticed.

On the wall opposite, someone seemed to have drawn a sharp breath…

Jing Hengbo smiled with flowing, enchanting charm, her fingers holding the skirt hem slowly moving upward…

Everyone held their breath, their eyes burning with anticipation. The richly dressed young master couldn’t help but leave his heavy guard protection and step forward two paces.

Jing Hengbo smiled even more happily.

“Crack!”

A crisp sound, like a fresh watermelon being split, sounding clear and sharp.

“Puff!” A spray of fresh blood flew out, bright red mixed with some white things, looking like splattered unripe white watermelon seeds.

“Ah!” A miserable scream, like the desperate howl of a cornered wolf.

This cry awakened everyone, and they turned around abruptly to see that somehow a woman had appeared beside the young master. The woman looked terrified, holding half a blood-soaked blue brick in her hand, while the other half lay on the ground, splattering the blood pool.

This solid blue brick had obviously been smashed hard against the young master’s head, breaking cleanly in two.

“Murder—!”

With a shocked cry, everyone crowded around. Jing Hengbo grabbed Cui Jie, who was still in a daze after getting her revenge, “Let’s go!”

The crowd all surged in this direction. At this moment, she didn’t dare use teleportation—vanishing with a whoosh under everyone’s watchful eyes would certainly get her burned as a demon.

She could only drag Cui Jie and run outward. Behind them came shouts of “Stop! Don’t run!” Some of the bodyguards had already reacted and were giving chase.

“There are fewer people that way!” The panicked Cui Jie wanted to run toward the less crowded area.

“No! This way!” Jing Hengbo gripped Cui Jie tightly and dove into the most crowded area.

The pursuing enemies saw her panic-stricken and drilling into the crowd, and they all sneered coldly, immediately relaxing—Jing Hengbo was such an obvious target that even in the crowd she would be easy to identify. On the contrary, she would be hindered by the crowd and unable to move, and would soon be caught.

“Block those people! They’re in there!” The bodyguards caught up and blocked that group of people. But when they controlled the crowd and pushed through to look for them, where was that beautiful woman with the slit skirt?

…

“Huff, huff…” Jing Hengbo crashed into an alley with a bang, leaning against the wall to catch her breath while quickly taking off her high heels to rub her feet. “Damn, it was too crowded. I almost couldn’t use my ability and nearly sprained my ankle.”

Cui Jie looked at her stockings and high heels with admiration. She had never understood why Jing Hengbo wore those strange stockings and high heels under her long skirt instead of long pants. Now she finally understood—these were essential tools for seduction, murder, and mayhem.

Only now did she feel weak, slumping against the wall corner, staring blankly at her raised hands with their blood stains.

That blow just now… was really vicious.

She had used all her strength, channeling three years of hatred, pain, loneliness, and despair from her family’s destruction into one clean, decisive strike. If she couldn’t crack her enemy’s skull, she couldn’t shatter the suffering and nightmares of her lifetime.

Not far away, the faint sounds of pursuing soldiers could be heard again. Cui Jie glanced at Jing Hengbo, who was leaning against the wall panting heavily, looking like she didn’t have the strength to teleport again.

Cui Jie got up without wiping her hands, supporting herself against the wall and looking at Jing Hengbo before suddenly saying, “Let’s split up.”

Jing Hengbo froze.

When helping Cui Jie get revenge just now, she had been the one to show herself, drawing everyone’s attention. And being tall and beautiful, she was an obvious target. Speaking of it, once walking among the crowd, she was more dangerous than Cui Jie, the actual murderer.

Was Cui Jie wanting to split up because she was afraid of being implicated?

Jing Hengbo suddenly felt somewhat disheartened and listlessly propped her chin, saying, “Fine, you go out through the west alley entrance, I’ll go east. Let’s try to meet back at the inn.”

Cui Jie said nothing, just gave her a deep look before walking toward the exit.

Jing Hengbo suddenly spoke up: “You’re not planning to return to the inn, are you?”

Cui Jie stopped in her tracks.

“You don’t like shopping, but today you acted completely out of character and dragged me out. You knew you’d encounter your enemy here, didn’t you?” Jing Hengbo didn’t raise her head, her tone light as her fingers slowly picked at her nails.

The nail polish was already peeling, looking patchy. She didn’t have any nail polish to touch it up, and it looked ugly no matter what. She peeled it off piece by piece, her movements somewhat vicious.

Cui Jie remained silent.

“You and I usually aren’t that close, yet you followed me out of Fenglai Qi. You were originally planning to use this opportunity to come out for revenge, weren’t you?” Jing Hengbo irritably scraped her nails against the wall. “You knew I had teleportation abilities and thought I could be useful to you sooner or later? So you followed me all along, but later had bad luck getting watched over. Who knew that today we’d actually enter the city and really encounter your enemy—speaking of it, your luck isn’t bad after all.”

Her heart stirred, suddenly feeling something was wrong. Some things were too coincidental, and they shouldn’t be coincidences that Cui Jie alone could arrange.

But feeling depressed at the moment, she was too lazy to think about it further.

She drooped her eyelids, thinking that if it were Jing Jun, she might be weak and faint, but she would probably stay with her, right?

Cui Jie still didn’t speak, standing with her back to her. Blood drops slowly accumulated on her fingers into droplets, then fell roundly to the ground with sizzling sounds that irritated the ears.

After a long while, she said woodenly, “I’ll go first.”

Jing Hengbo made an acknowledging sound, lazily turning over like a frustrated cat that just wanted to sun its belly.

At this moment, she especially missed the research institute trio.

Cui Jie’s footsteps had already left the alley entrance. Jing Hengbo was about to get up and leave from the other direction when she suddenly heard an exclamation—Cui Jie had already retreated back with quick steps.

Her eyes looked toward the ground as she said in a trembling voice, “You… you…”

Only then did Jing Hengbo see that somehow a blood-covered arm had extended from around the alley corner, groping around on the ground, tremblingly trying to grab her ankle.

At the same time, a rather pleasant voice wailed miserably, “Don’t… leave… I… died… so… miserably… ah…”

…

A shabby alley, cold wind, shadows, a severed arm moving on the ground, bloody fingers, the shock of having just killed someone still lingering.

Enough to capture anyone’s soul with horror.

Cui Jie lifted her foot as if wanting to stomp down, but those blood-soaked fingers suddenly spread upward. She let out an “Ah!” and rolled her eyes back, fainting.

Jing Hengbo also screamed “Ah!”

In an instant, Sadako, Kayako, Chu Renmei, and Nie Xiaoqian all came back to life in her mind, crawling out from TVs, books, cassette tapes, elevators, walls, and everywhere else, writhing…

Jing Hengbo ran to escape, but suddenly her foot tightened. Her scalp exploded as she slowly looked down.

Those bloody hands had already grabbed her ankle.

Ghostly, mournful weeping echoed beside her ear.

“You… seduced… me… ah… you… tricked… me… even as a ghost…”

Her ankle felt ice-cold and sticky, like a dead snake tightly coiling around her. Jing Hengbo suppressed her nausea and desperately shook her foot, “Get away! Get away!”

The hand was limply shaken off by her, taking her high heel with it. Jing Hengbo couldn’t be bothered to pick it up and ran away with long strides.

After running a few steps, she suddenly remembered that her suitcase had been taken by the black-clad beauty, and these high heels were her only remaining pair. Thinking of this, her heart felt like it was being cut by knives—how could she abandon her only beloved high heels!

“Give it back!” She ran back barefoot, snatched her high heel from that hand, and without bothering to put it on, hung it on her waist and turned to run.

The ghostly hand that had its shoe snatched seemed not to have expected someone would come back to “snatch shoes from ghosts.” Its five fingers spread and froze.

“Pfft.” An involuntary light laugh echoed in the alley.

Jing Hengbo’s forward-charging body stiffened.

This laugh… familiar!

Where had she heard it?

Would a ghost laugh like this?

She slowly turned around. The alley was empty, Cui Jie was unconscious on the ground, and beside her was still that arm, with a section of deep red brocade sleeve visible from around the wall corner—the dandy’s clothing. At the end of the sleeve was a slender hand, whose fingertip suddenly beckoned to her.