Chapter 386: Tricked Confession (Happy Birthday, Zhu Moxu Yan)

The man in the withered robe was so frightened that he shut his eyes, not daring to meet Pan Yun's gaze.

Yet a soft laugh reached his ear, and Pan Yun's devilish voice whispered beside him, "I want to try."

The man in the withered robe felt a hand settle gently on his eyelid, and his heart sank deeper and deeper.

"There's another method—drive a needle in through the ear, pierce through the brain marrow, and immerse the consciousness, thereby reading your memories. This is called the Marrow-Sucking Art."

The man in the withered robe sensed something strange by his ear, as though something had slipped into it.

Unable to see, his sense of touch grew sharper.

He was so startled his body went rigid; he flung his eyes open and met a pair of fox eyes head-on. In his terror, he lost himself in an instant.

He seemed to see his own childhood—from a very, very young age—unable to stop himself as memories of the past came flooding back…

From his infancy all the way to the day before his mission was triggered, it was as if he stood in the role of an onlooker, watching "his" life play out from beginning to end…

Blood slowly seeped from his ears and eyes.

Before long, blood streamed from all seven orifices, and his eyes, blood-red, stared fixedly upward.

He did not know when he had shifted from leaning against the wall to lying on the ground; now he did not even have the strength to lift a finger.

He stared up in terror at the two heads above him.

Pan Yun pushed Hong Yan and Wang Cong's heads aside and faced him herself.

The man in the withered robe grew even more terrified.

Pan Yun gave him a faint smile. "Your memories are delicious, and the speed is fast too. Too bad you got nothing."

The man in the withered robe's head throbbed with pain, and his whole body ached. "You stole my memories…"

"How could that be stealing?" Pan Yun said softly. "I read them openly and aboveboard."

The man in the withered robe glared at her with hatred, throwing out a threat: "De Da Ming won't let you off. You've taken what doesn't belong to you, and you'll pay the price in the end."

"Is this what you're talking about?" Pan Yun held up a sheet of paper, waving it before his eyes. He could faintly make out lines and an island on it.

The man in the withered robe's eyes flew wide; he strained to reach out and grab it, but even with every ounce of strength in his body, his fingers barely lifted.

Pan Yun rolled up the map, tucked it into her robe, and smiled at him. "You thought this thing was on Hu Jing?"

The man in the withered robe stared fixedly at her. "Who are you? Why is the treasure map in your hands?"

His whole mind went hazy. "De Da Ming said the thing was in Zhu Zixun's hands. If we couldn't find Zhu Zixun, we'd find Hu Jing. Who are you? I've never heard of anyone like you in our ranks."

Pan Yun said calmly, "It seems De Da Ming trusted neither us nor you."

"What you know is less than what I do. Apart from mine, there's clearly another copy of the map on the Pinghu side. Why travel all this way to snatch this one instead of going to fetch that one?"

The man in the withered robe: "If Songpu Guangzhai hadn't burned the map before he died, and little Songpu hadn't been captured by you, how could we possibly…"

The man in the withered robe suddenly caught himself mid-sentence and stopped at once. The illusory feeling over his body gradually faded. He struggled to raise a hand and felt at his ears and eyes.

Dry and clean—nothing there.

None of the seven orifices bleeding he'd imagined, and no needle stuck in his ear.

The man in the withered robe's hands and feet went cold, and he stared dumbfounded at Pan Yun.

Pan Yun gave him a faint smile, shook a straw in her hand, and said, "Are you looking for this?"

The man in the withered robe struggled to lunge at her. "You tricked me!"

Pan Yun stomped him to the ground with one foot and, looking down from above, said, "Since we're out of the illusion, let's get down to something real. Tell me—how many of you came ashore in total?"

The man in the withered robe said nothing.

Pan Yun snorted, pressed a few acupoints on his body, and he was seized with dull, stabbing pain all over, curling up on the ground in agony.

Pan Yun lifted her foot and stepped aside, watching coldly. "If you talk, I'll let you die quickly and cleanly. If you don't, you won't be able to die even if you want to."

Pan Yun crouched down and tempted him in a low voice: "Anyway, no one here knows what you say. This is the Great Ming, not the land of the Wa."

The man in the withered robe shook his head, refusing to make a sound. Taking advantage of the moment when she rose and relaxed her guard, he bit clean through his tongue, and his mouth filled with blood at once.

Wang Cong immediately went to clamp his jaw shut. After a moment, he frowned and said, "Little Xiao Shishu, he can't speak anymore."

After a pause: "He won't survive."

Too much blood lost—he was already a spent arrow to begin with—and severing his tongue like that meant there was no way to live.

Pan Yun frowned slightly. "That's about enough. As long as we know the treasure map in their hands is destroyed, that's fine."

The man in the withered robe was still in pain, but his struggles grew weaker and weaker. He stared at Pan Yun with round, glaring eyes and said indistinctly, "The General won't let you off."

Pan Yun crouched down to meet his gaze and said, word by word: "That is the wealth of our Great Ming—it belongs to us. If he dares to come again, I don't care which De Da Ming, which General he is, I can shatter him."

"Don't worry. If he comes, I'll definitely make sure you master and servant reunite in the netherworld."

The man in the withered robe's eyes bulged round, and after a moment he did not move again.

Wang Cong glanced at him, recited, "Nine Heavens Responsive Prime Office, Supreme Jade Pure King," and only then said, "Little Xiao Shishu, he died with a grievance."

Pan Yun also wiped the fierce look from her face and, with an expression of compassion, recited, "Blessed be the Boundless Heavenly Lord. May he not be born in the land of the Wa in his next life."

Having said that, she reached out and forcibly closed his eyes, then said to Wang Cong, who was watching her, "He's at peace now. Recite a passage of scripture for his deliverance."

Wang Cong: …

Although the vast majority of living beings in this world cannot form a powerful ghost after death, he still had to guard against it—what if this bandit had been angered too fiercely, his grievance too deep, and thus gained the chance to become a ghost?

So Wang Cong could only sit cross-legged and chant the deliverance scripture toward a corpse. Hong Yan immediately led the golden hairpin away from him, lest little Red be accidentally harmed.

A pile of people huddled by Hu Jing's sickbed, watching him.

Seeing Miao Zhen said, "Little Xiao Shishu, I've tidied Hero Hu's clothes. I didn't find any map on him, only silver notes and some loose coin."

Seeing Miao Zhen showed the money pouch to Pan Yun.

Pan Yun only glanced at it before setting the pouch down by his head, saying gently, "This is Hero Hu's money—leave it here. As for any maps or papers, we'll talk about it when he wakes up."

Hero Hu's eyelashes trembled; he wanted to wake, yet could not.

The wind and rain were heavy; the sound of wind and rain successfully masked the sounds of Pan Yun interrogating the man in the withered robe, and not the slightest disturbance reached the front hall.

So Read Mu Lin had no idea she had already finished interrogating the prisoner.

Seeing that the back courtyard still showed no movement, he was both afraid that Pan Yun and the others would come out and run into Cao Ye's three men, and afraid that if they left shortly, they still wouldn't come out, and the chance would be missed.

Mu Lin sat by the fire, turning his head to glance outside every now and then. Seeing a streak of white appear at the edge of the thick darkness, he knew this rain wouldn't last much longer.

Once that thick darkness drifted over too, the sky would slowly turn white, and the rain would stop.

!. Read

Mu Lin was a little nervous. He lowered his eyes and thought for a moment, then tugged at Jin Shu's sleeve anyway.

The two of them quietly huddled together.

"Jin Shu, help me lure them away. I need the time of one quarter-hour."

Jin Shu looked at him in silence, saying nothing.

Mu Lin explained in a low voice, "I'm not trying to run. I have something I need to do—just one quarter-hour!"

Jin Shu: "Something bad?"

Mu Lin was silent for a moment, then said, "For me and my father, it's a good thing."

Jin Shu nodded. "Even if it's something completely bad, I'd still help you, Young Master. You've always been too well-behaved in the past. Doing something bad isn't so terrible."

Mu Lin: …

Jin Shu patted his behind and rose, humming almost inaudibly, "Wait here."

Jin Shu fished a few flatbreads out of his bundle, handing them out to the soldiers one by one, and even slipped one to each of the three Embroidered Uniform Guards.

Cao Ye's three men didn't really want to eat.

The flatbread was dry and hard. Once the rain stopped and they went on to the next relay station, they could perfectly well eat something hot there.

But with Jin Shu so insistently hospitable, they ate it anyway.

They'd only taken two bites when a burst of neighing rose from where the horses were tied outside. Everyone hurried out to look, and a soldier shouted, "Cao Battalion Commander, your horses have broken free and run off!"

The moment Cao Ye's three men heard this, they immediately dropped their flatbreads and dashed out in pursuit.

These horses belonged to the imperial court.

Losing a horse meant they'd be fined, and in serious cases, they'd have to pay out of their own pocket to replace one.

Earning money as an official in the Great Ming wasn't easy—one horse could cost them a full year's salary.

The three men took off at a run, and the soldiers of the Duke's residence went to help as well.

Jin Shu turned back to look at Mu Lin.

Mu Lin immediately rose and headed toward the back.

Jin Shu was taken aback, falling into thought.

Mu Lin picked up a wooden stick, pushed the door open and went in, immediately turned back to shut the door, re-fastened it with the wooden stick, raised his umbrella, and jogged over.

Wang Cong had already finished reciting the deliverance sutras and was telling Pan Yun about Mu Lin. "He should be someone from the Duke of Qian's residence in Yunnan. He asked me about the method to cure corpse poison—and it's from the inside out. Could someone at the Duke of Qian's residence have been infected with corpse poison?"

Pan Yun then thought of Mo Ru, whom they'd captured at Long Hushan last year, and his Essence-Devouring Worms.

She hadn't taken part in the interrogation at the time, but Mo Ru's Essence-Devouring Worms had carried the smell of corpses on them, and it was said back then that he had ties to the southwest.

Pan Yun frowned tightly, thought for a moment, then said, "If it's only ordinary corpse poison, it can be cured with glutinous rice and Red Cinnabar."

Wang Cong: "But what if the corpse poison is spreading from the inside out?"

"Then there's only a dead end. At most, you can let him live a while longer, or let him pass more peacefully."

The words had barely fallen when Pan Yun heard the sound of the courtyard gate opening and closing. She immediately went to the window and saw Mu Lin running over under his umbrella.

The moment he came in, he said to Pan Yun, "There are three Embroidered Uniform Guards outside…"

Pan Yun: "I saw them."

Mu Lin: "I didn't give you away, and I didn't mention the matter of those two Japanese pirates either."

"Thank you," Pan Yun said. "This is a matter of jianghu feuds, and we really don't want the authorities to know."

Mu Lin: "There's something I'd like to ask you. If a person is infected with corpse poison, spreading from the inside out—is there any way to save him?"

Seeing Pan Yun frown, he hurriedly explained, "I'm not trying to cash in a favor. If you don't know, then…"

"How did he get infected with corpse poison? Normally corpse poison only spreads from the outside in, unless he ate something carrying corpse poison—but corpse poison smells so strong, who would eat it?"

Mu Lin: "It's worms. A kind of worm can burrow into a person's body. The worm feeds on the person's essence to nourish the mother worm, but once the mother worm dies, it dies inside the person's body immediately, and the corpse poison wrapped inside the worm instantly spreads, infecting the person with corpse poison."

(End of this chapter)