Chapter 784: Believe It or Not

He widened his dark‑green eyes to the limit, his whole body frozen in place.

His lips moved, and a few incoherent sounds came from his throat; he wanted to say something, but his tongue and vocal cords seemed temporarily uncooperative.

He raised his hand, pointed at Sai Fei Er's phone, lowered it, raised it again, and finally his hand hung in mid‑air like a robotic arm paused on a button.

His mind was a scorched‑earth landscape after a bombardment.

Jing Yuan's voice—the voice he had heard for hundreds of years, the voice that commanded on the battlefield and joked in the court—just now coming from the phone was that same voice.

He recognized it.

It was too familiar.

But precisely because he recognized it, his worldview began to collapse from the top down like a building demolition.

Huo Huo stood beside him.

In her white claw‑shaped pupils flashed a streak of light so fast it seemed an illusion; the corner of her mouth lifted less than a millimeter, then she suppressed it at lightning speed, using all the will of the Extinction Great Lord to manage her expression.

Couldn't keep it together, sorry......

She could only quickly lower her head, cross her ten fingers in front of her chest, lift her shoulders slightly, and mimic a perfectly timed shocked pose.

Those drooping matcha‑green floppy ears also twitched twice, as if frightened.

But the frequency and amplitude of the tremor were too precise; her acting still needs improvement.

"This… this…" Huo Huo stammered, the trailing syllable trembling.

The Lingering Aftertaste of the half‑shout "ah—" in the recording still echoed in the three people's ears.

Sai Fei Er lowered her head to look at her phone; her smug face reflected on the screen, and her Tail behind her swung a full arc.

She glanced at Dan Heng, then at Huo Huo, her mouth corner lifted almost to her ear.

"Ah~" Sai Fei Er mimicked the tone of that half‑shout from the recording, flipped her phone to show the screen, "It's over."

She opened the payment code; the Two‑Dimensional code glowed faintly on the screen, making her cat face especially radiant.

Sai Fei Er extended the phone forward with one hand, gave her wrist a light shake, and the Two‑Dimensional code on the screen swayed left and right like a little victory flag.

"Fifty thousand Credit Points," her voice was sweet enough to pull silk, "one per person, scan or cash?"

Dan Heng lowered his head to stare at the Two‑Dimensional code, his expression as if tallying his remaining life choices.

Huo Huo turned her head, gave him a glance, then looked at Sai Fei Er's "no‑money‑no‑leaving" expression; the light in her green eyes flickered, then she reached out, pulled a phone from her sleeve, and quietly scanned the code.

The payment‑success chime rang especially crisp on the quiet dock.

A "ding" sounded, as if stamping a seal on this absurd farce.

Dan Heng also took out his phone, tapped the screen three times before opening the scan interface, his movements stiff like an elderly person just learning a smart device.

He scanned, entered the amount, confirmed payment, each action bearing a resigned, self‑destructive acceptance.

Another fifty thousand Credit Points went into Sai Fei Er's account.

Sai Fei Er watched the account balance jump up a digit; her cat ears twitched satisfyingly.

She slipped the phone back into her pocket, clasped both hands to her chest, her Tail swayed back and forth, and the whole being—no, the whole cat—exuded a "I earned this money by my own skill" thrill.

Dan Heng took a deep breath and put the phone away.

His rationality was making a final resistance, like a lone city besieged for three months; the walls were mostly torn down, yet the defending general still raised a tattered flag refusing to surrender.

"Even so,"

Dan Heng spoke, his voice a little hoarse, as if cotton were stuffed in his throat, "The recording can only prove you indeed stayed at Shen Ce Fu, but I know something about the general's character and methods. A single audio clip can't prove much, and the basic principle of recordings—"

"Believe it or not."

Sai Fei Er shrugged, her cat ears cocked casually to one side, and in a completely indifferent tone cut off his second half, "Anyway you heard it, why hasn't the general attended court these two days? Overindulged, fell into a coma, taken for treatment. Didn't you notice the recent Luofu administration has been handled by others acting as proxies?"

Dan Heng frowned.

Regarding Jing Yuan's slumber, he could be sure Sai Fei Er was fabricating; Jing Yuan is a Patrol Hunt envoy, seasoned over centuries, how could he fall into a coma for such an indescribable reason?

That would be the greatest insult to the Imperial Bow Director of Destiny.

He thought this, his brows furrowing tighter.

Then he heard a tiny voice beside him.

"The general indeed… fell asleep."

Dan Heng's head snapped toward Huo Huo, moving as fast as if someone had yanked his hair from the side.

He looked down at the petite Fox People girl, her ink‑green pupils swirling with incredulous light: "What?"

Huo Huo lifted her head, her green eyes meeting Dan Heng's gaze, round pupils filled with a crystal‑clear innocence.

She timidly nodded, her voice as light as a feather landing on water: "Just these two days. The general fell into sudden sleep for unknown reasons. Now Grand Diviner Fu Xuan is Acting General."

Every word she spoke landed squarely on the facts.

Jing Yuan indeed fell asleep.

Fu Xuan indeed is Acting.

All of that is true.

But she deliberately left a half‑sentence unfinished—between "the general indeed fell asleep" and "I don't know the other parts Sister Sai Fei Er said," the gap was just enough for Dan Heng's complexion to slide from shock to deeper shock.

Sai Fei Er's eyes lit up, her cat ears perked up with a snap, her Tail arched high.

She stepped onto Huo Huo's side, wrapped an arm around the latter's shoulder, pressed her face against it, and brushed Huo Huo's hair: "Look! Look! As expected of Sister Huo! Much better than that stuffy gourd‑like…!"

She jabbed her mouth toward Dan Heng, "Dan bro, I didn't say anything wrong, right?"

Dan Heng's mouth corner twitched.

He forced himself to refocus, putting Sai Fei Er's nonsense aside, now the key was to verify the real situation in Luofu.

He crouched, aligning his sight with Huo Huo's, his tone softened yet tinged with unmistakable tension: "When did this happen? What are the specifics? Is the general injured? Is it an external enemy or internal—"

Huo Huo shook her head, her ears flicked twice: "I don't know either. It was announced suddenly these two days, the officials gave no reason."

She spoke fragmentarily, but the core message was clear: Luofu's highest commander—indeed fell.

Dan Heng stood up, his hand unconsciously clenched.