Chapter 148: I Will Absolutely Not Follow You in Death
Chapter 148: Chapter 148: I Will Absolutely Not Follow You in Death
Zhiqiu was a hereditary servant of the Pei Family.
Compared to some of the branch family members, those like her, whose ancestors had served the Pei Family for generations, had even deeper ties.
To accompany her master in death was what she was supposed to do.
Cui Lingyao watched from the side, glaring in frustration. There was nothing she could do to stop it.
She knew he was merciless, but she never imagined he wouldn’t even spare a maidservant.
’It would have been as simple as lifting a hand.’
Xie Jinbai set down his bamboo brush, stamped his personal seal on the rice paper, slowly rolled up the letter, placed it in a bamboo tube sealed with wax, and ordered, "Send this back to the Capital City."
Cui Lingyao had just glanced at it and knew it was a private letter for the Emperor.
Liu Rong acknowledged the order. Before leaving, he braced himself and offered a piece of advice, "Your Highness, you should get some rest."
The sky outside had already darkened.
Cui Lingyao suddenly realized the man hadn’t slept for two days and a night.
However, Xie Jinbai said nothing, merely waving his hand dismissively.
Liu Rong didn’t dare to press the matter further and withdrew.
The door closed softly.
Xie Jinbai slumped back, leaning against the back of his chair and rubbing the bridge of his nose.
He had dealt with too many things in a single day.
By tomorrow at the latest, everyone from the Pei Family would be captured.
Once the Pei Family was dealt with, there was still the Empress and the three Princes.
’Only by sending them all to hell can I consider her avenged.’
But he couldn’t wait that long.
He was already desperate to try... to see if he could see her.
The thought consumed his mind, an uncontrollable urge battering against what little rationality he had left.
Cui Lingyao saw the man leaning against the chair slowly stand up, his bloodshot eyes scanning the room.
Finally, his gaze landed on the sword hanging on the wall.
Her heart suddenly lurched. A bad feeling rose within her.
Just then, a familiar buzzing sound echoed in her mind.
The system she’d been cursing for two days finally responded, making a ’BZZT BZZT’ sound in her mind.
Cui Lingyao’s expression lit up. "You’re finally awake!" she exclaimed happily.
"Awake... What happened here? I suddenly couldn’t connect..." Sensing something, the system’s weak voice trailed off before rising in astonishment. "You’re dead?"
Cui Lingyao replied, "Dead. Died yesterday. If you’d woken up any later, my soul would have scattered to the winds."
She had been floating around outside today and could already feel her spiritual form growing uncomfortable.
After explaining everything that had happened, Cui Lingyao added, "In a world like this, where the powerful treat human life as worthless and hold the authority of life and death, I’m bound to Xie Jinbai. The dangers around him are countless. Before you went dormant, didn’t you prepare for the possibility I might get killed along the way?"
"Died yesterday?" The system, in no mood for her banter, asked urgently, "What about the body? The mission isn’t complete, I have to get you back into it."
"I can go back?" Cui Lingyao was overjoyed. Ignoring the mumbling Xie Jinbai nearby, she floated directly into the inner chamber and pointed at the female corpse on the couch. "It’s right here."
Her original plan was to have the system find her another suitable body—it didn’t matter what it looked like or who it belonged to. Worst case, she would come find Xie Jinbai again after she was revived.
Now that she heard she could be directly revived in her own body, nothing could be better.
But the moment the system saw Pei Shuyao’s body, it sputtered to a halt in her mind.
Cui Lingyao urged, "Quick, put me back."
The system was silent for a moment. "How did you manage this? This body’s intestines are perforated and rotting. I’ve been ’starving’ for so long, I don’t have nearly enough energy to repair it."
Cui Lingyao explained that the perforated intestines were due to the Seven-Star Powder.
She had literally died from the pain.
The system expressed its sympathy, then told her it was so ’hungry’ it could pass out at any moment. The bit of energy it could squeeze out wasn’t enough to repair a body that was completely rotten on the inside.
In other words, she couldn’t return to this body.
Cui Lingyao was devastated. The disappointment that followed her brief glimmer of hope left her completely listless.
The system was anxious too. If it had a physical form, it would be tearing its hair out. Seeing its host so devastated, it tried to comfort her: "Let me scan the area. I’ll see if I can find a body that’s intact, just recently deceased, and compatible with your soul."
Cui Lingyao: "..."
’That sounds incredibly difficult.’
Just as she was sighing, wondering how long she would have to wait, a dull CLANG suddenly rang out from the outer room.
It was the sound of metal hitting the floor.
Cui Lingyao froze. Forgetting everything else, she hastily turned and floated back outside.
「In the outer room.」
The longsword that had been hanging on the wall was now unsheathed. It lay gleaming on the floor, its blade stained with a streak of crimson.
The perpetrator had stabbed a hole in his own chest. Fresh blood dripped to the floor. When Cui Lingyao came out, he was still standing ramrod straight, his bloodshot eyes shining with a strange light as he scanned the room from top to bottom.
When he didn’t see the girl he longed for, the light in his eyes gradually dimmed. His face grew paler and paler, until finally, his body staggered, and he propped himself up with a large hand on the desk.
"Not here..."
Xie Jinbai’s head was slightly bowed, an aura of despair surrounding him as he muttered to himself.
His guess had been wrong.
Wrong...
She wasn’t here.
Tears spilled from his eyes, tracing a path down the bridge of his nose.
Cui Lingyao’s mind exploded, leaving only the piercing crimson scene before her.
’That madman!’
She panicked, frantic and helpless, and rushed to his side.
Her spiritual form was weightless and made no sound, but as if by telepathy, the bow-headed Xie Jinbai suddenly looked up in her direction.
They were barely an arm’s length apart.
Their eyes met...
They met!
Xie Jinbai’s pupils trembled violently. His pale lips moved. "Yaoyao?!"
"!!!"
Cui Lingyao’s eyes went wide. ’He can actually see me?’
Her shock lasted only a moment before a colossal wave of fury washed over her. She erupted, "Are you fucking crazy?! What did I tell you? I told you to live well, to live a good life! I said I’d come find you, and you promised you’d wait three years! It’s only been one day!"
Just one day!
The girl before him was furious, shrieking and jumping up and down as she berated him.
Literally jumping up and down.
She could float into mid-air in an instant, her two smooth, pale calves dangling in front of him.
"Yaoyao!"
Xie Jinbai grew flustered. He reached out to pull her into his arms, but his hands passed right through her.
"I’m already dead, you can’t touch me," Cui Lingyao said, her eyes fixed on the bleeding wound on his chest. "Quick, have someone come in and bandage it."
Xie Jinbai refused. "I want to be able to touch you."
He truly intended to just let himself bleed to death.
’Once he was dead, they could be together forever.’
Cui Lingyao was so angry she wanted to cry.
"Hurry up and get that wound bandaged! I can be resurrected any second now. Otherwise, if I come back to life and you’re dead, I absolutely won’t die for you. I’ll turn right around and marry someone else, you believe that?"
Xie Jinbai believed her.
He knew better than anyone how ruthless this girl could be.
He was the one who couldn’t live without her; she had never really cared about him.
How could he not believe her!
Xie Jinbai wiped his face with his hand, his crimson eyes fixed on the strangely dressed girl before him. "You can really be resurrected?"