Chapter 24

Chapter 24: The Deity Passed Beside Him

Xu Su’s condition was terrible.

Blood loss had dragged him into unconsciousness. The old doctor had acted quickly with needles and forced a breath to remain with ginseng slices. Tu Hua disinfected her hands, pulled on gloves, and began cleaning Xu Su’s wounds as carefully as she could.

[Host, the contact time you can apply for is only thirty minutes. Please hurry and complete the task.]

“Got it,” Tu Hua muttered—though her hands were already moving.

She tore open a disinfecting wipe, cleaned the wound, then used tweezers to pull out debris. She applied medicine, then covered the area with sterile gauze pads—partly to slow the bleeding, partly to reduce infection risk.

Xu Su twitched faintly from reflex. He was still out cold.

Tu Hua slid a small thermometer under his armpit, then crushed anti-inflammatory pills and mixed them with water. She pinched his jaw and fed the mixture down.

Whether it did anything or not, it was something. Even a placebo felt better than helplessness.

Minor wounds were manageable: rinse, disinfect, medicate, bandage.

But the deeper tears—when she saw them up close, even with mental preparation, her stomach lurched.

“This is beyond me,” she whispered. “What do I do?”

The gash was deep and ragged, edges torn and curled. Ideally, it needed sutures. But she didn’t have the conditions—or the confidence—to do that here.

She dug out butterfly closures and did what she could, pulling the wound edges closer and securing them as tightly as she dared.

She worked fast, but she didn’t work sloppy.

And she used the System shamelessly—its scanning and detection functions became her emergency monitor. If Xu Su died halfway through, she needed to know immediately.

The System seemed to know this mattered. It didn’t complain about being reduced to a medical device; it simply reported Xu Su’s status at steady intervals.

The external wounds were handled as well as she could manage, but Xu Su’s temperature kept climbing.

The anti-inflammatory meds weren’t doing much.

Tu Hua’s hands hovered over her kit.

She had nothing stronger left.

Unless… the System sent her back home. Her living room was full of supplies. Maybe she could dig out something more effective from that pile.

The System’s voice turned syrup-sweet. [You can borrow a certain limit of usage rights in advance. The handling fee is very cheap.]

Tu Hua stared at the empty balance on her screen.

These days, even the System had learned how to lie with a straight face.

She hesitated—because saving a life mattered, but she also had nothing left to spend.

Then a rapid burst of notifications chimed in her ear:

[Collected bloodline points +10!]

[Collected three incense sticks. Merit +20!]

[Received 4 offerings from the ward: one bowl of pure natural mountain spring water, two plates of seasonal fruit, one cup of low-proof wine, and one engraved gold seal.]

Tu Hua’s eyes widened.

Oh. That worked?

Xie Yu Chuan was next door “summoning the god,” and she was actually collecting energy here.

Energy meant points.

Points meant resources.

Which meant: money, but with extra steps and moral pressure.

Xu Su’s external bleeding was mostly controlled. The rest came down to whether he could survive the worst stretch without infection taking him.

Tu Hua opened the System Shop and exchanged her points for the best anti-inflammatory liquid she could afford. She fed it to Xu Su, adjusted his position, and checked his breathing again.

Stable. For now.

Then she turned and slipped into the adjoining room.

No one noticed her presence. No one could.

She saw the offering table Xie Yu Chuan had set up. The incense sticks were nearly burned down, the scent thick in the air, richer with every minute.

It was quiet.

Not normal quiet—ritual quiet.

Tu Hua glanced around. Xiong Jiu Shan and Li Zhou Quan wore very different expressions, while Xie Yu Chuan didn’t even use a cushion. He sat cross-legged on the cold floor, eyes closed, still as stone.

That posture only made him harder to read.

Li Zhou Quan, itchy with curiosity, leaned toward Xiong Jiu Shan and whispered, “Official Xiong… have you ever seen something like this?”

Xie Yu Chuan had performed the offering setup, burned incense, bowed properly—then sat down and stopped. Li Zhou Quan had been waiting to hear special “summoning” incantations, but Xie Yu Chuan simply sat there.

Li Zhou Quan didn’t know whether to sit, stand, or sweat.

“Do the Xie family always… commune with gods like this?” he muttered, half awed, half confused.

Xiong Jiu Shan replied flatly, “This subordinate has never seen it.”

Tu Hua crossed the room quietly. Maybe her world-merging time hadn’t run out yet, because she could move through here without vanishing.

As she passed close by Xie Yu Chuan, his nose seemed to catch a scent that wasn’t sandalwood—balanced, faintly sweet, lingering like something not of this world.

In that instant, his body shifted.

Was it… the Household God?

His heartbeat thundered in his ears—too loud, too fast.

This was the closest he’d ever been. Not across impossible distance, not through messages and silence, but close enough to sense… something.

He hesitated—then opened his eyes.

And saw nothing.

Only the offering table.

Disappointment flickered across his gaze, faint and quick.

Even knowing the deity didn’t casually walk among mortals, he still couldn’t help wanting to see her.

Tu Hua, however, had no clue what kind of emotional storm he was swallowing.

She was staring at the offerings.

Because the System had said: an engraved gold seal.

Her gaze locked onto a small, exquisitely crafted seal to the right of the incense burner.

That counted as an offering?

The System was delighted and immediately tried to tempt her—asking whether she wanted to convert the gold seal into points and helpfully displaying the conversion value.

Tu Hua stared at the number and almost tapped yes.

Where the System got greedy, there was usually a mountain of profit hiding behind it.

Li Zhou Quan saw Xie Yu Chuan open his eyes and immediately perked up. He stepped forward carefully and asked, “Young Master Xie—have you invited the deity?”

He was speaking to a prisoner, and yet the honorific slipped out anyway.

Xie Yu Chuan lifted his gaze and let it drift aside, casual as if he were watching smoke. His voice stayed low and controlled. “Maybe.”

Maybe?

Li Zhou Quan’s face twitched.

Was that a yes? A no? A the deity is standing on your shoulder and you can’t see it?

He scanned the room. No thunder. No glow. No divine wind.

Slow suspicion settled onto his features as he looked back at Xie Yu Chuan.

Could it really be, like the capital gazette said, that the Xie family were masters of theatrics—experts at mysterious tricks and empty spectacle?