Faced with these two people who appeared out of nowhere, the old lady was startled, then furious: “Someone come quickly and throw these two people out!”

The monk had a bald scabby head and bare feet, while the Taoist had a lame foot and disheveled hair. They both looked somewhat mad and deranged. How had such people managed to get into the inner courtyard?

Before the guards could reach the inner courtyard, the women servants and maids nearby surged forward, forming a human wall in front of their masters.

But this was just bizarrely strange.

No one knew how they did it, but this monk and Taoist were able to part the crowd. First they scrutinized Daiyu carefully, then came before Ying Yu, Luo Yu, and Chen Yu, even reaching out to pinch each of their arms one by one, as if confirming whether they were real or fake. Finally, looking at the old lady, the monk shook his head: “How strange and peculiar! Why are you here?”

The old lady didn’t react at first, but now she suddenly remembered and realized who these two people were.

She couldn’t see every single detail clearly in the dream world. For instance, she had never seen these two people in the dream world, but she had heard about them from others.

When Daiyu was three years old, a monk had come to the Lin family, saying he wanted to take Daiyu away to become a nun.

He said something about not allowing her to hear crying sounds or see relatives with different surnames, otherwise her illness would never be cured for her entire life.

Then this monk went to the Xue family and gave the Xue family daughter a prescription. In the end, the Xue family daughter and that Baoyu talked about some gold and jade marriage match, the golden locket matching the jade, which directly caused Daiyu to die from exhausted tears!

These two people were definitely not good people!

The guards, whom she suspected were useless, rushed in at this moment and all pounced on these two people.

The space was only so large, yet this monk and Taoist were still able to dodge and weave here, managing to say their words about taking Daiyu away to become a nun and not seeing relatives with different surnames.

After feeling frightened in hindsight, anger surged into Jia Min’s heart. Was there anyone who cursed her daughter like this?

She flatly refused: “This is impossible!”

She would absolutely not agree to let her daughter live such a hard and utterly boring life!

Hearing Jia Min’s answer, the Taoist looked at Jia Min’s complexion, then looked at the old lady, and calculated with his fingers: “It’s you. Your life should have ended long ago, how can you still be alive?”

Jia Min was furious.

These two mad and deranged people first cursed her Daiyu, and now said such inauspicious words to the old lady!

The old lady, meanwhile, felt her heart pounding with alarm. While protecting the children and retreating, she ordered people to quickly capture these two.

The guards answered in unison, and more and more guards arrived.

By all rights, they should absolutely be able to capture these two people.

But the two people kept flashing and dodging, forcibly crashing through the crowd and disappearing.

Leaving behind a scene of chaos.

The two people came inexplicably and left inexplicably.

They came, said some strange words, then ran away.

Jia Min’s face was full of frost. They ran away?

The monk may run, but the temple cannot!

Jia Min hurriedly looked at her daughter. Sure enough, Daiyu was terrified, her lips pressed tightly together, her eyes full of tears.

Jia Min was heartbroken: “Daiyu, don’t be afraid. Mother is here.” Where did these evil Taoists come from? Her daughter would never be like that.

When had Daiyu ever seen such people? Now seeing they were gone and her mother was comforting her, she finally began to cry.

Ying Yu was also somewhat frightened, but she considered herself already grown up and couldn’t cry, so tears swirled in her eyes, but she still bravely held them back.

She looked at her second sister. Sure enough, second sister’s face showed no fear, only some curiosity.

Luo Yu’s curiosity wasn’t about anything else. Just now when that person reached out to grab her arm, she had wanted to dodge, and she thought she could dodge, but just like when her concubine mother grabbed her, she couldn’t dodge.

The twins exchanged a glance, tacitly confirming that their situations were the same.

This monk and Taoist didn’t actually run away—they went to see Lin Ruhai again.

Lin Ruhai was in the government office when these two people suddenly appeared before him. The Taoist even calculated with his fingers and said: “Strange, strange. It’s not you, only your mother. Do you know which divine immortal changed your mother’s fate? By rights her life should have already ended.”

Lin Ruhai was furious: “Utter nonsense!”

The Taoist shook his head and sighed: “How strange and peculiar, how strange and peculiar!”

Just as Lin Ruhai was about to have someone come in and capture them, they disappeared again.

He couldn’t sit still anymore.

He rushed home at full gallop.

The guard captain shamefully begged his forgiveness—he had failed to stop those two people.

The old lady spoke up to get him off the hook: “This matter isn’t their fault. Those two people’s origins are somewhat unusual.”

Knowing that she should have died, they couldn’t be ordinary people.

After her anger passed, she also began to feel frightened. Should she do something? For instance, since they said not to see outsiders—no, that won’t work, but weren’t there other alternative methods?

Moreover, her fate had already changed, and the Lin family’s fate had changed too. Even if Daiyu’s fate was originally like that, it wasn’t anymore.

Besides, there were loopholes to exploit, such as requesting a substitute with compatible attributes to replace Daiyu in becoming a nun.

It would just cost some silver.

Her granddaughter’s experiences in her previous life really couldn’t be considered good, making her afraid not to take the words of that monk and Taoist seriously.

The more she spoke, the more determined she became. Even if her son didn’t approve, she would still do it.

Seeing her like this, Lin Ruhai, who had been angry, fell silent.

His mother’s attitude reminded him of when he was unwilling to take concubines, but his mother insisted he agree.

Thinking of this, he readily agreed: “Let your son handle this matter.”

Finding a substitute wasn’t difficult. Many poor families worried about three meals a day and were willing to become lay Buddhists in place of Daiyu—just burning incense and worshipping Buddha without having to work, with food and drink guaranteed. Many people were willing.

“Mother, that monk and Taoist…”

The old lady shook her head: “Just nonsense talk. Don’t take it all seriously. I’m just taking precautions.”

She had already lived until now. Even if she died now, she would be worthy of the Lin family’s ancestors.

It was just that she hadn’t personally seen her grandsons grow up and continue the family line, so she was still uneasy.

Yun Shuyao was in her small courtyard at the time. Except for special circumstances, concubines generally weren’t brought along to pay respects to the old lady.

So she only found out afterward.

In her memory, “Dream of the Red Chamber” did indeed have these two characters, but Yun Shuyao didn’t know what exactly these two people did. After hearing Luo Yu’s retelling, her brow twitched, and she examined both children from top to bottom, only feeling relieved after confirming they were fine.

As for their ability to appear and disappear mysteriously, Yun Shuyao immediately heightened her vigilance.

Could those two people be the legendary cultivators?

She had thought her self-defense methods wouldn’t be needed—there were no zombies to kill here, and under normal circumstances, as a concubine, she wouldn’t have assassins coming after her.

Now it seemed she still couldn’t be careless.

High-level ability users naturally had means of self-protection. For instance, the sixth-level ability user she had seen could control vines for both offense and defense—very powerful.

She was currently fifth-level, so of course not that strong.

But her current body was in no way inferior to those old seniors who had cultivated for a lifetime.

Her recovery speed also exceeded normal people.

Being called a little superman in the modern world would be no problem.

Her offensive methods were somewhat limited, but with her strength, even a tree leaf could be a darkly powerful hidden weapon.

As for vines and other weapons suited to wood-element ability users, they had very high requirements for seeds.

Yun Shuyao hadn’t encountered any that satisfied her.

If one were to rank spiritual energy density, the post-apocalyptic world was the most chaotic, but its spiritual energy density was also the highest, then came the Red Chamber world, and finally the modern world.

The Red Chamber world wouldn’t differ too much from the modern world, but there were definitely still many blessed lands and cave heavens here.

If these two people had real skills, might they have some good things in their hands? Or even things like cultivation methods?

Yun Shuyao took a deep breath.

Undeniably, she was tempted.

…

This time Yun Shuyao proposed strengthening the children’s martial arts training, and Lin Ruhai agreed without a word.

Previously, he only had tutors give them basic training, especially for his daughter—just learning some decorative fist and embroidered leg techniques. Now even if Yun Shuyao didn’t bring it up, Lin Ruhai had this plan.

While having the children strengthen their own abilities, he began seeking more skilled fighters for their residence.

If the other party hadn’t just come to look but also wanted to do something, what would happen to the Lin family?

If it were an assassination, the Lin family might be completely wiped out.

Just thinking of this possibility made Lin Ruhai restless.

The residence of a third-rank official was infiltrated by two assassins who then left unharmed—this undoubtedly caused an uproar.

Lin Ruhai had just taken up this post.

As the saying goes, a new official lights three fires upon taking office. Even if there’s nothing to do, you must do something to establish authority, let alone when it was equivalent to being directly slapped in the face.

Soon, wanted posters were hung at the city gates.

High rewards for information on their whereabouts.

Looking at the amount, many people were tempted. Moreover, these two people’s characteristics were very obvious. But these two people seemed able to fly through heaven and burrow through earth—so many people searching everywhere, yet no one saw any trace of them.

What everyone didn’t know was that those two people were secretly lamenting their misfortune in a broken mountain temple.

They had some abilities, but they couldn’t travel a thousand miles in one step.

Initially, it was the scabby-headed monk who discovered something was wrong, but didn’t know the reason. Why was the Lin family’s situation so different from the calculated results?

So he found the lame-footed Taoist, and the two went to their door together.

The lame-footed Taoist found the reason.

The problem was with the Lin family’s old lady.

One move affected the whole situation.

Her life should have ended long ago, but when the lame-footed Taoist visited this time, this old lady’s fate had already changed.

Forget about passing away—if there were no accidents, she still had many years to live!

Then their plan would be very difficult to implement.

So what if Jia Min’s fate didn’t change much from the divination results? With the old lady around, how could they make her meet that stone and repay tears?

As for taking action themselves to make corrections and take away the Lin family old lady’s life, that would really be courting death.

They had cultivated with difficulty and didn’t want to seek death.

Now they had found the problem, but how to solve it?

Before they could figure it out, they were wanted. They could only hide and evade all the way.

Scabby-headed monk: “Report this information upward?”

Lame-footed Taoist: “Report it like this, and you want to be punished?”

The scabby-headed monk said nothing more, shaking his head and sighing.

They were controlled by others and had no choice.

These tasks were already done unwillingly, and now there was an error.

Scabby-headed monk: “How about we first go see if everything is normal with the others?”

The lame-footed Taoist nodded: “Let’s go!”

These two people were lamenting their misfortune, and those searching for them were also lamenting their misfortune.

This time it was the top officials who ordered the capture, so they didn’t dare not take it seriously.

If they caught them, they could even show their faces.

But they had already worked very hard, yet still couldn’t find those two people. Their characteristics were clearly very obvious. They were scolded as incompetent every day—how could they be happy?

After a long time, with no way to find them, they suspected these two people perhaps knew they were too conspicuous, so they changed their appearance.

If they removed their conspicuous features and changed clothes, it would be very difficult to recognize them again.

Lin Ruhai naturally wasn’t pleased with this result.

He had even set up an inescapable net at the Lin residence, but unfortunately, those two people never came again.

Someone with well-informed sources somehow knew Lin Ruhai had once sent people to inquire about pandas and sent one over.

When Lin Ruhai saw it, he had it sent back to the Lin residence and settled in the small courtyard next to Yun Shuyao’s.

He specially arranged personnel to watch over it.

When it grew up, it would be quite large and could injure people—better to prepare early.

This panda was still in its juvenile period and extremely adorable.

As soon as it arrived, it captured the hearts of Luo Yu and Chen Yu. Soon Ying Yu also became a regular visitor, often coming during spare time.

Especially when it was washed clean, sitting on the ground eating bamboo, looking at everyone innocently and naively—its lethality multiplied.

After Daiyu came to see it once, she immediately didn’t want to leave.

Daiyu had always been kept by Jia Min’s side, rarely coming out to play with her older sisters and brothers.

Now she came out on her own initiative and became more familiar with her brothers and sisters. This brought Lin Ruhai a trace of comfort.

Jia Min also didn’t stop her.

She knew her own physical condition.

She was ill again.

These years, mother and daughter drank medicine together.

As her daughter grew older, her condition gradually improved, but she herself became increasingly powerless.

The master had been finding physicians for her, wanting to cure her.

She also wanted to see Daiyu grow up.

But in her heart she already had a premonition—she wouldn’t be able to see it.

Even without this panda, she would have the children proactively build good relationships with their brothers and sisters.

And also…

On this day, Yun Shuyao received a message to come to the main courtyard.

Jia Min sat there, lightly lowering her eyes toward the window.

If time froze, this would be a standard ancient lady painting.

Jia Min turned her head: “You’ve come. Sit.”

Yun Shuyao sat down. “Madam.”

She didn’t know what Jia Min wanted to tell her.

Jia Min waved her hand. Someone served tea, then everyone left the room and closed the door.

It looked like she wanted to discuss some important matter.

Indeed it was an important matter.

As soon as Jia Min spoke, it was earth-shattering: “My days are numbered.”

Yun Shuyao’s vigilance immediately shot to maximum: “Madam, don’t say such inauspicious words.”

Jia Min looked at Yun Shuyao, her gaze calm. “There’s no need to say these things anymore. I haven’t lived this life in vain. The only one I can’t rest easy about is Daiyu. You know, once I’m gone, the possibility of the master remarrying is considerable. I want to make a deal with you…”