Chapter 101

Chapter 101: Forcing Someone Against Their Will?
Little Red opened her mouth, wanting to say something, but her head was buzzing so loudly that she could not get a single word out.

At that moment, she felt someone grab her collar and pull her up hard.

She struggled to raise her head. The first thing she saw was a kindly smiling face.

The old man asked with a gentle smile: “You are Little Red, right?”

The old man looked about the same age as Grandpa Tea. Even his smile was very similar.

Little Red unconsciously relaxed her guard and nodded blankly.

“Good child, tell Grandpa,” the old man coaxed. “That young woman who went to Merfolk Pavilion with you that day, where did you go afterward, and who did you meet? As long as you tell Grandpa, Grandpa can give you a mid grade spirit stone. With that mid grade spirit stone, you and your younger brothers can move into a big, warm house.”

The three little boys were also looking at Little Red with faces full of longing.

Little Red was not a seven or eight year old child anymore. She could sense the bad intentions behind the old man’s gentle look.

She lowered her eyes and stammered: “I… I do not know.”

The kindness on the old man’s face vanished in an instant, and a murderous air burst out from his body.

The already shaky house collapsed with a loud crash under the impact of that force, sending up a thick cloud of dust.

The three little boys also fell weakly to the ground, shivering in fear.

Little Red felt as if someone were gripping her throat. She could not breathe, and her small face flushed bright red.

“Child, lying is a bad thing,” the old man threatened. “You do not want to throw away your three younger brothers’ lives for a stranger, do you?”

Little Red suddenly looked up and begged, her voice full of tears: “Lord, please, let my younger brothers go. They are innocent.”

“Innocent or not is not something you or I can decide.”

As he spoke, the old man took a step forward and planted his right foot squarely on Little Fur’s hand.

Little Fur let out a heart piercing cry: “Wah! Sis! Save me! Help!”

Little Red was both heartbroken and anxious. She blurted out: “I will talk! Just let my younger brothers go!”

After she said it, even Little Red herself was stunned.

Was she really going to sell out Senior?

But the situation in front of her did not give her any time to think. All the old man had to do was use her three younger brothers’ lives to threaten her, and she poured everything out like beans spilling from a bamboo tube. She told him everything she should and should not say, not even hiding anything about Floating Fragrance Teahouse and the Tea Master.

The old man waved his hand toward the distance, and someone at once rushed off to check whether Little Red’s words were true.

Little Red did not notice any of this. She was busy helping her three younger brothers up from the ground, carefully patting the dust off their clothes.

Little Xi pouted in annoyance and muttered in a low voice: “If you had talked earlier, it would all be over. Why drag it out? So much trouble.”

Little Red pressed her lips together, her face full of hurt, and said: “I am sorry.”

The three younger brothers only snorted. Not one of them answered her.

Before long, the person the old man had sent out came back and quickly walked up to him to report the results.

The old man nodded, tossed a mid grade spirit stone onto the ground, and left with his men.

The three little boys pounced on it like vicious dogs, beating each other until their heads were bleeding for the sake of that one mid grade spirit stone.

For the first time, Little Red did not move to stop them. She stood stiffly in place like a walking corpse. In her mind, she kept seeing that bright splash of red on the hem of the messenger’s clothes.

It felt like she had done something wrong.

…

On the other side, Yu Zhao followed the mysterious man over mountains and through rivers until they finally stopped before a waterfall.

The man tapped the tip of his foot and shot straight into the waterfall. After that, there was no more movement.

Yu Zhao waited for a while. When no one came back out, she wrapped a Spirit Power Barrier around herself and jumped into the waterfall as well.

Water roared around her as she passed through the curtain of water and landed in a wide, damp tunnel. On the ground, she could still see a row of wet footprints.

She stepped on the spots where the footprints had fallen and walked forward. Her speed was not fast, but each step was very careful.

As she went deeper inside, the tunnel slowly shrank until it was only big enough for one person to pass at a time.

Fortunately, the tunnel was not very long. After Yu Zhao walked for a while more, she heard voices ahead.

A calm male voice said: “Little brother, listen to me. Stop being so stubborn. She is not forcing you right now only because she is in a good mood. If you keep refusing, she will stop letting you have your way. She is not some delicate young woman. She has plenty of strength and tricks.”

Yu Zhao stopped in her tracks.

She wondered if she had heard wrong.

A wild, untamed voice exploded in the cave: “Tell her to give up. Even if I starve to death or smash my head and die, I will never bow to her!”

Even without seeing him, Yu Zhao could already picture the other person with his chin lifted high and his face full of defiance.

The calm voice continued to persuade: “Little brother, why suffer like this? You are a man. Doing this kind of thing does not put you at a loss. And if she had not picked you up, hurt, at the side of the road, you would already be dead. You would not even have the strength to shout here. With your cultivation level at Late Foundation Establishment, how can you fight a Golden Core cultivator? You should just give in.”

“Rubbish! I had already taken a healing pill before I fainted. Even without her, I would not have died! She is the one taking advantage of someone when they are weak. Shameless! Despicable! Filthy! If she dares to come, I will die together with her!”

Yu Zhao listened for a while and more or less understood.

There were two people in the cave. One was the mysterious man who had come in not long before, and the other was the hot tempered man locked up here.

Right now, the mysterious man was trying to talk the angry man into Dual Cultivation with a Golden Core female cultivator. The angry man swore he would rather die and even said he would trade his life for hers.

The mysterious man had come out of Master Zi Wei’s room. Could it be that the Golden Core female cultivator he said wanted to force herself on someone was actually the stern, upright Sect Master of Clear Breeze Sect?

Tsk tsk tsk.

Yu Zhao rubbed her chin.

She had not expected Master Zi Wei to play things this wildly.

In the cultivation world, the weak were eaten by the strong, and the strong were respected. If a female cultivator’s strength was not enough, she could easily become a furnace for a male cultivator. If a male cultivator was not strong enough, he would naturally become the target a female cultivator used to build up her own power.

Yu Zhao was not surprised at all.

She swept the stone cave once more with her divine sense. After making sure there was no third person inside, she stepped into the cave.

The space inside was large, with an open area in the middle and separate small caves carved into the walls around it.

The angry man, or rather, the angry youth, was locked in the cave directly across from the entrance. Right now he was worked up, loudly pouring out his anger at the mysterious man.

The mysterious man had his back to Yu Zhao. He was nodding along off and on, looking as if he agreed, but in truth his attitude was very half hearted.

The angry man, no, the angry youth, looked even younger than Yu Zhao had imagined.

His brows were drawn together. His long, narrow phoenix eyes were full of stubborn fire. His nose was high and straight, and his lips were pressed together in impatience. Because he had not taken care of himself for a long time, his hair hung loosely down his back, yet there was still an air of wild pride about him.

As soon as Yu Zhao saw him, she suddenly understood why Master Zi Wei wanted to claim him for herself.