Chapter 9
Chapter 9: Cat-and-Mouse Game (Part 2)
“If you don’t start telling the truth,” Mo Ting Feng said coolly, “I’ll throw you down.”
The memory of being hurled into the Blackwater that night flashed through Song Wei Chen like a knife.
“Don’t, don’t, don’t!” she blurted. “I’ve already been thrown in once! Please don’t ever think that! If you ask me something and I know it, I’ll definitely tell you!”
Mo Ting Feng sneered inwardly.
A thousand years ago, there had been another woman just like this—lying as easily as breathing. The Blackwater of the River of Oblivion wasn’t something a mortal could survive. Even a Great Luo Immortal would die if they fell in.
All that helpless panic, that pretty sincerity—yet not a single honest word.
Disgust cooled his gaze further.
Seeing his expression darken, afraid he might truly do it, Song Wei Chen lunged to grab his arm for balance.
Mo Ting Feng, thinking she had some trick, dodged on instinct.
Song Wei Chen grabbed air.
Her momentum carried her forward, and she pitched off the sword platform in a headlong fall.
Damn it!
Mo Ting Feng steered the sword down, moving to catch her—
But a figure shot upward from below and caught the falling woman in one swift motion.
“Miss,” a man asked, voice amused, “are you all right?”
The sickening drop left Song Wei Chen dizzy. She forced her eyes open and saw a bird’s head looming close—
She jolted so hard she nearly tore free, only to realize it was a bird-beak mask. The man holding her was tall and solid, and his grip was effortless.
“You… are you human or a monster?” she blurted. “You’re not going to eat me, are you?”
In a place like this, anything was possible.
The masked man laughed. “No one has ever dared ask me that before.”
He knew it.
Even without the White Robe, he recognized the aura, the face. He could not mistake her. Delight surged through him.
Song Wei Chen saw the faint curve of his mouth and immediately decided this was another person she could not afford to offend.
“Sorry, sorry,” she said quickly. “I was blind and ignorant. You’re so handsome and extraordinary—you must be an immortal, right?”
“Thank you for saving my life, Great Immortal!”
The flattery was clumsy enough to make her want to bite her tongue, but Gu Cang Yue clearly enjoyed it. His eyes warmed with obvious satisfaction.
Mo Ting Feng watched from above and felt his suspicion harden.
And for reasons he didn’t want to name, the sight of Gu Cang Yue holding her so intimately made irritation flare like a fast, dirty flame.
“Lord Cang Yue arrived at a perfect time,” Mo Ting Feng said, hovering on his sword opposite him. His gaze was far from friendly. “Were you expecting her?”
“A Dust Warden official shows up so often,” Gu Cang Yue replied lazily. “Are you saying you don’t take me seriously?”
“The case is urgent,” Mo Ting Feng said evenly. “Please forgive me, Lord.”
Hearing Mo Ting Feng’s voice—and remembering his hand around her throat, the pressure, the coldness that had felt no different from Nian Niang—fear surged through Song Wei Chen.
Without thinking, she shrank deeper into Gu Cang Yue’s arms.
Mo Ting Feng saw it, and his temper sharpened.
“Well, you two seem close.” His tone turned cutting. “Miss, was it the Lord of the River of Oblivion who brought you into the mist forest?”
His eyes slid over her. “And Miss, you’re quite the actress. That panic and helplessness—hard to believe it’s fake.”
“What are you talking about? I don’t even know him!” Song Wei Chen snapped, but Mo Ting Feng’s face held nothing but disbelief.
Her throat tightened. “Forget it. It doesn’t matter what I say—you won’t believe me!”
She turned her face away, refusing to look at him.
Gu Cang Yue’s mood seemed bright, almost indulgent. “I’m in a good mood today. I won’t argue with you. Go back.”
With that, he swept up through the air with Song Wei Chen in his arms and left.
Mo Ting Feng watched Gu Cang Yue’s retreating back, his emotions knotting into something he couldn’t name.
Was it because the White Robe was missing? Because the chaos wraith had escaped? Or because she’d clung to Gu Cang Yue like he was safety itself?
He forced himself to breathe it down. For now, he would wait.
Let them make their move.
“Do you have somewhere you want to go?” Gu Cang Yue asked the little person in his arms, his voice oddly gentle.
“I do,” Song Wei Chen said, swallowing hard. “I want to see where ordinary people live here.”
If she was going to survive, she needed to understand this world—fast.
Gu Cang Yue brought her to a town near the River of Oblivion called Autumnwater Town. When they landed, he set her down lightly, then took her hand and walked through the market as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
Song Wei Chen tried to pull away, but she couldn’t budge his grip. In a place she didn’t understand, she didn’t dare provoke him. She could only let him lead her.
“I was going to go to the Dust Warden Manor to look for you,” Gu Cang Yue said. “But he brought you back on his own. Good.”
“Look for me?” Song Wei Chen stared at him. “You know me?”
Gu Cang Yue leaned close, his voice dropping into her ear. “That night you fell into the Blackwater—do you remember?”
Song Wei Chen’s eyes widened.
So it hadn’t been a hallucination. Nian Niang really had thrown her into the Blackwater.
“That night… it was you who saved me?”
Gu Cang Yue didn’t answer directly. “If you remember, then remember. But what happened that night—I don’t.”
Song Wei Chen wasn’t stupid. Everyone had secrets. If he didn’t want to speak, he had his reasons. Being alive was already the best outcome.
“Thank you for saving me,” she said, steadying her voice. “But I still don’t know Great Immortal’s name. If I ever have the ability, I’ll repay you.”
“My name is Gu Cang Yue,” he said. “I was once a Nine-Heavens Luan Bird. Now I am the Lord of the River of Oblivion.”
“So you really are an immortal!” Song Wei Chen couldn’t help staring at him. “Too bad you’re wearing a mask, so I can’t see clearly. Lord Cang Yue—my respects.”
Gu Cang Yue’s expression turned unreadable, the amusement in it edged with something else. “What, you want me to remove my mask?”
“Huh?” Song Wei Chen’s mind flashed through every drama trope she’d ever watched. Only the dead see what’s under the mask.
Her head shook so hard it practically rattled. “No, no, no! I don’t! I was just talking! I overstepped, I overstepped!”
She tried to step away.
Gu Cang Yue caught her wrist and tugged her back. With the pull, they nearly pressed together. Song Wei Chen panicked and raised her free hand, planting it between them to keep space.
“You still haven’t told me,” Gu Cang Yue said softly, “what you’re called, or where you’re from.”
“I’m Song Wei Chen,” she said quickly. “Wei Chen as in ‘tiny as dust.’ My family and friends call me Wei Wei.”
Where she was from… how did you explain that to someone like him? She almost blurted out something ridiculous—This humble monk comes from Great Tang of the Eastern Lands—but swallowed it.
“I come from the future,” she said instead. “In our world, we don’t have immortals. But we have airplanes that can take us up like immortals—over ten thousand meters into the sky—and even out into space.”
Gu Cang Yue’s eyes gleamed with interest. “Hearing you speak like that is entertaining. It seems I won’t be lonely anymore.”
Song Wei Chen forced a polite smile. “Lord Cang Yue is joking. With your status and wealth, you must have guests every day. How could you be lonely?”
He didn’t answer. He only studied her, intent and unhurried.
“Wei Wei,” he said at last, “you are different from them, in my eyes.”
What he did not say was that across countless years and countless faces, only she had ever glowed beneath the Blackwater.
He didn’t understand why.
But his instincts told him that light could save him from the endless, desperate loneliness that had hollowed him out.
Still, he needed a test.
“I made an oath,” Gu Cang Yue said, voice low. “My mask can only be removed by my companion.”
“If that person is you… perhaps we can try.”
It was a trap, and he knew it.
So many women had approached him for his status, for the legend of him—each one eager to pry his mask away the moment they met.
He wanted to see if she was the same.
Gu Cang Yue leaned closer and closer, unbearably intimate, as if he meant to guide her hand to his mask.
Far away, Mo Ting Feng watched with a far-sight technique.
For reasons he couldn’t explain, he couldn’t sit still. A nameless anger burned, nowhere to go.
He had also used a thousand-mile voice transmission art, but Gu Cang Yue had clearly prepared. Sound interference swallowed everything within ten feet. Mo Ting Feng could see their lips move—but he couldn’t hear a word.
In that moment, he lost his patience for waiting.
Song Wei Chen’s brain was about to overheat.
What was wrong with this bird-man? One second they were strangers. The next he was talking marriage?
Was this just how birds thought?
Sure, having a powerful boss to rely on in this bizarre world wasn’t the worst thing, but “marriage first, love later” was not her plot.
And humans and birds didn’t even share the same genes. How was marriage supposed to work?
Was she supposed to lay an egg?!
Song Wei Chen felt like she might faint.
As her hand neared his mask, she recoiled like she’d been shocked, resistance flashing through her whole body.
“Big Boss—no, no, no!” she blurted. “How could someone like me be worthy of removing your mask? Even if you gave me ten thousand guts, I wouldn’t dare!”
Her head spun. One big boss was misogynistic. This one was what—marriage-crazed?
While they struggled, a black shadow swept down from above.
“Let go of her!”