Chapter 41: Father, hold on, Xiao Yu needs you

"Thud! Thud! Thud!"

Fist-sized blows rained down on the boy's head and back; he curled into a ball, lying motionless on the ground without a sound.

The child astride him pounded away while shouting: "Dirty barbarian, say 'Grandpa' or I'll beat you to death!"

A distorted voice, muffled from beneath, muttered: "Loyal to Great Qin, the Emperor Eternal!"

"Beat you to death, beat you to death, you ungrateful sand barbarian!"

The boy beating the child looked tall and imposing, but he was only eight or nine years old—and his blows were unusually cruel.

His twisted, ferocious expression and swift, precise motions made it clear he held nothing back, as if he truly meant to kill the boy.

Fortunately, he lacked innate divine strength, only a body slightly more robust than an ordinary child's.

"Loyal to Great Qin, the Emperor Eternal! Loyal to Great Qin, the Emperor Eternal!"

The boy had no lack of grit, nor was he a pushover; even as his bones threatened to shatter, he refused to say "Grandpa," his cries of "Loyal to Great Qin, the Emperor Eternal!" carrying unmistakable emotion.

"Wang Wang Xuan, stop! Someone's coming—a general."

The "Han" boy beside him spotted Xiang General Guan Huchen approaching in the distance and whispered a warning.

Wang Wang Xuan turned, hesitated, then climbed off the boy.

"Loyal to Great Qin, the Emperor Eternal!" the boy still shouted, curled on the ground.

Xiang General Guan Huchen walked straight past the entrance to the Ouyang Qianlong Courtyard, glancing curiously at the boy on the ground.

He hadn't forgotten the boy—but the boy lay face-down, hiding his face, his voice distorted, and he didn't recognize him.

His glance was purely because the boy's chant was so conspicuously odd.

Xiao Yu paused for half a step, her expression flickering with hesitation before she continued walking after Xiang General Guan Huchen toward the inner courtyard.

Unlike Xiang General Guan Huchen, as soon as she entered the corridor, she recognized the boy by his voice—even if his voice were distorted, even if his throat were poisoned silent, that chant was hers to teach!

Then she realized he was being beaten.

The boy's performance was decent—he held the head-down defensive posture perfectly—clearly, he'd been beaten often lately.

The key was, he hadn't forgotten his Aunt Yu's earnest teachings.

As long as he kept chanting, his attackers would suffer dearly—possibly even lose their lives.

The boy kept repeating "Loyal to Great Qin, the Emperor Eternal." A child who dared fight and provoke under such circumstances was surely without cunning, impulsive, quick-tempered, and would eventually snap—shouting something like "To hell with Great Qin, shut up!" or "Fuck the Emperor, I'll kill you!"—and then...

"Boom~~ Crash!"

A child of similar age, two or three years old, fairer and plumper than the boy, with rosy cheeks like a lucky doll, smashed a Taihu stone the size of a table with a single punch, under the gaze of all.

"Hmm, good. Go on."

Everyone else stared in shock—even Xiang General Guan Huchen at the gate. But the Daoist Qingsong Daoist boy showed no expression, merely nodded absentmindedly and ordered the governor's guards to lead the "super-strong lucky doll" to the eaves behind.

Xiao Yu saw only indifference in his eyes—not a trace of delight.

He wasn't showing off—he truly believed that possessing a thousand-jin strength at two and a half years old was utterly unremarkable.

"General General Guan, and... Miss General Guan, have you come to seek me?"

Xiang General Guan Huchen bowed deeply, clasping his hands in salute to Daoist Qingsong.

Xiao Yu followed beside him, kneeling slightly and murmuring "Ten thousand blessings."

"Master, please attend to your matters—I'll wait quietly here and learn from your wisdom," Xiang General Guan Huchen said.

Daoist Qingsong's side wasn't just home to one "super-strong lucky doll."

He seemed to be conducting final tests of their divine talents.

There were thirty or forty children of varying ages—the youngest two or three, the oldest... already growing beards.

From their clothing, complexion, and aura, their backgrounds ranged from poor to rich, lowly to noble.

Now they stared wide-eyed, filled with awe at Daoist Qingsong, and fixed their hopeful gazes on the small porcelain bottle in his hand.

"Speak—what do you seek from me?"

Daoist Qingsong tucked the bottle into his sleeve, turned, and led Xiang General Guan Huchen and Xiao Yu into a quiet, elegant study.

Seeing Daoist Qingsong unwilling to watch the "Western prodigies" awaken their talents, Xiang General Guan Huchen sneered inwardly, his face expressionless.

"Master, yesterday at noon, the Beebird received word: the Fire Crow Captain arrived at Feixian Ferry with the Flame Sun Marquis's token.

By today, all prefectures and relay stations along the route have prepared to receive the Marquis.

I will lead the Iron Cavalry out of Hengsha Pass tomorrow morning and remain by the Flame Sun Marquis's side thereafter.

So I wish to take the Ninefold Bone-Changing Elixir as soon as possible—to better serve Great Qin and the Flame Sun Marquis."

"You're going to meet the Flame Sun Marquis..."

Daoist Qingsong stared at Xiang General Guan Huchen's forehead for a moment; his bright, star-like eyes flickered with something strange. "General General Guan, I have a suggestion—would you care to hear it?"

"To receive your teaching is a blessing beyond my three lifetimes," Xiang General Guan Huchen replied respectfully.

"Forget the Ninefold Bone-Changing Elixir. I'll give you something more suitable."

Daoist Qingsong extended his right hand from his wide sleeve, palm open, revealing a translucent, glass-like tablet.

The tablet was pale gold, paper-thin—no thicker than a fingernail, two fingers wide and one long—its surface inscribed with silver characters glowing faintly like starlight, written in cinnabar.

Xiao Yu strained to read the characters—and went blind.

As if staring too long at the sun.

But without the sun's glare or pain.

"This aura... could it be a divine talisman?" Xiang General Guan Huchen asked uncertainly.

Daoist Qingsong smiled and nodded. "Correct. This is the talisman of the Earth God appointment. You've met its former owner. I've purified it with the Emperor's decree—it will fuse instantly with your soul once implanted.

Once registered on the Investiture of the Gods, you will be the Emperor's appointed, Great Qin's recognized, Heaven and Earth's acknowledged Earth God."

Xiang General Guan Huchen immediately understood, his face darkening: "Is this the Earth God talisman of the 'Xin Mo No. 1' in the Western Desert?"

The Earth God talisman of the Western Desert...

Xiao Yu remembered too.

The day Daoist Qingsong and Xiang General Guan Huchen left the dunes, they'd encountered a pleading "dark shadow" at the crossroads.

Its aura was chilling, radiating ill omen.

Later, it had quarreled with Daoist Qingsong, cursing him for betraying trust and Great Qin for its cold-hearted cruelty.

It even cursed Daoist Qingsong to heavenly retribution and Great Qin and the Emperor to divine punishment.

Now, the Earth God talisman lay before them—clearly, that man had truly been struck dead by Daoist Qingsong's "Drought Thunder."

Daoist Qingsong intended to give it to Xiang General Guan Huchen in exchange for the Ninefold Bone-Changing Elixir...

Daoist Qingsong's eyes weren't blind—he saw Xiang General Guan Huchen's firm refusal and suppressed fury.

He spoke with meaning: "General General Guan, what you most need is the most valuable.

What you don't need—even if worth a thousand gold—is worthless to you."

Xiang General Guan Huchen wanted to draw his blade and slash that smug, childish face.

"Master, you're right—what one needs is treasure. I need the Ninefold Bone-Changing Elixir most of all," he growled through clenched teeth.

Daoist Qingsong's baby face still wore its calm smile. "Forgive me, General—your Yin Tang is dark. You face imminent disaster, and it will be hard to survive.

The Ninefold Bone-Changing Elixir is good—but for the living.

The Earth God talisman is no less valuable—it can bless spirits and ghosts."

Xiang General Guan Huchen was stunned and furious—this damned little Daoist priest claimed he was about to die, that he'd soon need the Earth God talisman.

He wanted to scream: To hell with it, keep the damn talisman for yourself!

But beneath his rage, terror gripped him.

He didn't fully understand Daoist Qingsong's cultivation.

Yet Daoist Qingsong's mastery in dragon-spotting, fortune-telling, and divination was peerless.

Otherwise, the Emperor would never have appointed him "Western Inspector."

If Daoist Qingsong wasn't lying to scare him into surrendering the Ninefold Bone-Changing Elixir, then his warning must have truth.

"Master, save me!"

Xiang General Guan Huchen dropped to his knees before Daoist Qingsong and banged his head three times hard on the ground.

Whether Daoist Qingsong lied or not, he had to kneel and beg.

If Daoist Qingsong lied, he begged for mercy—to spare him, not steal the Ninefold Bone-Changing Elixir he'd sold everything for.

If Daoist Qingsong spoke truth, he begged even harder—for guidance to avert his doom, then the Elixir.

"Please, Ancestors, have mercy!"

Xiang General Guan Huchen had knelt—how could she, the "filial daughter," not show equal devotion?

Yet she genuinely felt some concern for Xiang General Guan Huchen.

Daoist Qingsong said Xiang General Guan Huchen's Yin Tang was dark, disaster near—he was skeptical, leaning toward disbelief.

Xiao Yu, however, believed Xiang General Guan Huchen was almost certainly doomed.

Based on her ten years of adopting foster fathers, those who treated her well—or whom she hadn't yet decided to kill—often didn't last long, dying for all kinds of reasons.

Like her first foster father, Uncle Shazong.

Six months after becoming her father, he was bitten on the ankle by a sand viper and died of poison within half a day.

Uncle Shazong had already lasted longer than most.

Or the Sand Dune King.

Less than three months after becoming her father, he died outside Tianmen Town, his body vanished.

Xiao Yu didn't think she was cursing them—like the Sand Dune King, how could he survive facing the Flame Sun Marquis?

A certain death didn't need her to curse it.

She thought it was purely that they themselves lacked the strength to survive, dragging her down in her youth, repeatedly leaving her fatherless—or that she was simply unlucky, with every adopted father born to die young... Though she thought this, even after forming such suspicions, if she wasn't entirely certain, she no longer took "good men" as her adopted father.

Hu Chen isn't a good man, but he hasn't even taught her the breathing techniques yet!

He can still continue to pass on to her his experience in cultivating the Tiger Soul Seven Kill Scripture.

Her hope that Hu Chen wouldn't die was nearly equal to the sincerity with which she had once hoped the first adopted father, Uncle Shazong, would be saved by the shaman.

——Adopted Father, hold on! Yu'er needs you... the divine arts, the secret manuals, the gold, the spirit pills! Without you helping gather divine arts and secret manuals, without you providing experience, without you tapping into the General Guan family's reserves to freely supply all kinds of miraculous elixirs, how will Yu'er ever achieve great mastery and glimpse the Immortal Path?

Though she thought this, her expression, her gaze, her pleading words all revealed genuine concern and pure hope.

Even the Green Pine acolyte, upon seeing this, showed a flicker of surprise.

In just a few short days, he had completely subdued the wildly untamed Sha Man Yu.

Was it General Guan Hu Chen's exceptional methods—or was Sha Man Yu, though outwardly rugged and ferocious, inwardly starved for love, especially paternal love?

Previously, on the sands, when the nomads told the story of how Sha Man Yu braved danger alone to retrieve her adopted father's remains and enshrine his bones in the shrine, it was clear she was a profoundly filial person...

——If she were truly so easily subdued, then giving her to General Guan Hu Chen back then would have been a loss for him.

"General General Guan, no need for such a grand gesture—this Daoist is saving you even now."

The young Green Pine acolyte cast aside distractions and gently waved the She Ling talisman in his hand before Hu Chen.