“Cackle cackle cackle cackle—no matter how clever you are, you still have to drink this old lady’s foot-washing water!”
A pair of black-stockinged feet stood upright in the air, bright red toes twitching neurotically, expressing infinite smugness. The owner of these feet happily kicked at the air several times and clutched her belly in silent laughter.
“Search all you want!” Jing Hengbo rolled over and got up, looking through the window at the activity in the forest.
She was now in that small house in the woods, leisurely watching from behind the window as that group of fools in the forest studied where she could have possibly vanished to around that tree. Like a bunch of stupid dogs circling a tree looking for a place to pee.
Jing Hengbo wound her gold nail-polished fingers through her big wavy light golden curls, chuckling.
The four-person group from Tianding Fenghua Research Institute: Jun Ke had X-ray vision, Taishi Lan possessed strange regenerative abilities, Wen Zhen’s eyes could see the tiniest bacteria. And Jing Hengbo could teleport instantly and move objects through space.
However, her teleportation distance wasn’t far before—she couldn’t even get out of the research institute that covered several acres. Sometimes when she was in poor condition, she could only teleport from her own bed to Yaoji’s dog house. She had been somewhat worried earlier, afraid she couldn’t teleport to the forest cottage as desired. Unexpectedly, after transmigrating, her movement ability seemed to have grown stronger than before. In just a flash, her wish was fulfilled.
However, moving from behind the tree to inside the house was only the first step. If she hadn’t guessed wrong, the Wild Donkey beauty wouldn’t give up so easily.
Sure enough, the next moment she saw that black-clothed beauty turn his head. His hair was very long, illuminated hazily by dappled moonlight, covering half his face and revealing only a delicate profile. Jing Hengbo stared mesmerized at his jade-like chin, wondering if it would be smooth to touch with her fingers.
That beautiful State Preceptor seemed to have telepathy and suddenly turned toward the house, his gaze falling on the dust-covered window.
After a pause, the corners of his lips slowly curved up, half mysterious, half smiling, like a flower blooming halfway in the wind.
Jing Hengbo quickly ducked her head with a whoosh, quite surprised—from this distance, with only her eyes showing and the window completely covered in dust and cobwebs, it was absolutely impossible to be seen. What made him suspicious? Intuition?
People with strong intuition were scary. She believed such people must have been beasts in their previous lives, like Taishi Lan.
The next instant, she slowly moved to the window edge and peeked out.
The beauty in the forest had disappeared.
Jing Hengbo’s heart jumped, and her second reaction was to quickly check the door.
Sure enough, by the window, there was already a silver-black robe hem!
This guy moved like a ghost!
Jing Hengbo was greatly alarmed, her heart pounding like drums. She ducked her head—I’m flashing away!
“Bang.” The forest cottage door was knocked open.
Left State Preceptor Yelu Qi stood in the doorway.
With a glance, he had already seen the room was empty.
He frowned slightly, even more puzzled. His gaze then fell on the bed.
Though this house had been uninhabited for a long time, it was quite enclosed. The door lock had been securely locked just now, so there wasn’t much dust inside. He lifted the bedsheet and saw there were indeed traces of someone having slept on the bed—the bedding was wrinkled in a large area.
Looking at this mess, it didn’t seem like sleeping but rather like the person on the bed had rolled around vigorously many times.
Rolling around from gleeful belly-clutching laughter, perhaps?
He bent down and picked up a golden curly long hair from the pillow. After examining it carefully for a while, he flicked his finger.
The golden hair strand instantly vanished at his fingertip, like a gorgeous dream annihilated to ash in spatial transformation.
“Interesting,” he said.
…
“Cackle cackle chase me—if you can find me, that’s your skill!” Jing Hengbo stood at the edge of the other side of the forest, looking at the forest cottage and laughing mischievously with hands on her hips.
She waited for an angry roar, but the house remained quiet. This guy seemed to have good patience.
“One, two, three…” Counting to three, she immediately turned and disappeared.
As she vanished, a silver-black robe hem swept out from the house.
…
The next instant, Jing Hengbo was by the river at the bottom of a slope fifty zhang away, gazing at her reflection with fascination, gracefully smoothing her hair: “Sister is so beautiful… one, two, three…”
Just as her figure disappeared, a silver-black robe hem flashed and landed by the river. The black-clothed State Preceptor looked down at two spike-like footprints in the mud by the riverbank.
…
A horse was grazing in the grassland below the slope.
A figure flashed, and Jing Hengbo landed, nearly bumping head-first into the horse’s rear.
“So smelly…” she muttered, looked up to see the fine horse, and her eyes lit up. She circled the horse several times, considering whether to ride it to escape.
“No good.” After thinking, she shook her head. “I can’t ride. What if I fall off? Besides, the saddle is so hard—what if it chafes my delicate skin and leaves scars? This horse is really beautiful. Come here, mwah mwah, hey don’t kick me… hey… he’s coming! One, two, three!”
A silver-black robe hem flashed and landed on the horse. The restless horse snorted hot air and stamped its hooves. The black-clothed figure patted the horse’s head and chuckled softly: “Nearly suffocated by the scent? Stay away from her next time.”
He raised his head, looking toward a certain direction in the thick night.
…（。Y。）…
“Shh. Don’t call out.” Jing Hengbo raised her finger and hushed the heavily made-up, panic-eyed bride before her.
The sedan chair swayed back and forth as Jing Hengbo smiled and examined the little bride across from her.
This was a wedding procession passing by the hillside below. There was a local custom of fetching brides at dawn. This bride had been dozing in the sedan chair when she suddenly felt weight on her legs. Opening her eyes, she saw a mud-covered monkey face before her.
The bride was about to scream but was quickly silenced by Jing Hengbo.
Jing Hengbo touched her face, somewhat regretting she couldn’t show her true appearance. Otherwise, she could have let this country girl witness what real beauty looked like with her devastatingly gorgeous face.
She could only blame the rushed timing—she hadn’t had time to wash her face. Of course, she could have simply washed with the water the guards had brought, but how could she wash her face so simply? Her face-washing routine required four basins of water—one cold, three warm. First, cold water to pat and tighten the skin, then warm water to wash, exfoliating scrub to remove dead skin, then moisturizing cleanser for skincare, and only then a final clean rinse. With just one basin of clear water, could the dirt in her pores be properly cleaned? Just thinking about her pores full of black mud… she’d go crazy!
People with severe cleanliness obsessions take cleaning very seriously…
“Little sister, getting married today?” Jing Hengbo familiarly put her arm around the bride’s shoulder. “Your makeup isn’t done well—you’ve applied too much rouge. It’s like a monkey’s bottom and actually covers up your natural beauty, dear…”
“Ah, is that so…” The bride immediately forgot about this person’s mysterious origins. “Sister, please teach me…”
“Here, make a soft little brush and sweep lightly from your cheeks toward your temples. Mm, lift and hook, like the Nike swoosh…” Jing Hengbo earnestly instructed, conducting on-site makeup technique education.
Outside, the sedan bearers muttered: “Huh, why did the sedan chair suddenly get heavier?”
“We just passed a mass grave—could it be…” someone suspiciously guessed, then suddenly looked up to see a silver-black robe hem floating leisurely on the hilltop behind them.
“Ghost…”
“Hurry, hurry!” The sedan bearers tremblingly quickened their pace.
“…Also sweep the concave areas on both sides of your chin with dark powder to create three-dimensional contours…” Jing Hengbo suddenly stopped, her eyes rolling. “Oh my, he’s coming. One, two, three! Goodbye, little sister!”
The bride, who had been stroking her chin, looked up and stared bewildered at the empty sedan chair. After a moment, she screamed.
“Ah—”
“Ah!” The sedan bearers outside also cried out. “Who are you! Stop! This is a wedding sedan that cannot be disturbed—”
“Swoosh!” The sedan curtain was lifted.
The screaming bride looked up and saw an indescribable face.
Her scream caught in her throat, her gaze instantly mesmerized. She subconsciously tilted her chin up, wanting to show him her most beautiful angle.
The black-clothed man half-bent down, his gaze sweeping through the sedan chair, showing an expression of unsurprised yet slightly annoyed.
The bride in the sedan stared at him fixedly.
As the black-clothed man put down the curtain to leave, the bride dreamily reached out her hand, not knowing what she wanted to do herself. “Hey, you…”
The black-clothed man stopped, half-turned, and looked at the hand extending from behind the deep red curtain. The hand was white and plump—her peasant status made it somewhat callused, but the nails were clean, dyed with light red balsam flower juice, though not very well done, somewhat uneven.
He suddenly thought of another pair of hands—pristine white and slender with pale golden nails. Such dazzling pale gold, crystal clear, smooth, trimmed neat and round like exquisite little tiles reflecting sunlight.
Strange feelings suddenly arose in his heart. He suddenly turned and grasped the bride’s fingertip.
The bride was flattered and overjoyed, looking up at him with expectant red lips parted.
“An ugly woman like you,” he said, gently holding her hand and speaking tenderly, “shouldn’t paint your nails next time. They look like they’ve been gnawed by dogs.”
…