Chapter 142

Chapter 142: A Dragon Trapped in the Shallows 1

After Xia You spoke, she waved her hand in full view of everyone. A earth-element spell shot out, and the entire stronghold was instantly flattened to the ground.

The bandits were stunned by what they saw. Some of them had legs so weak they sat down on the ground. The second-in-command was driving the carriage himself, so he did not lose face that badly.

He knew very well that anyone with such heaven-shaking power could not be an ordinary person. The two beauties in front of him had to be the “immortals” of legend.

“Im… immortals…”

His tongue got tied.

Xia You was satisfied with her little display. She had done it on purpose. Most of the people in that corpse pit had died because the bandit chief drained them of essence, but these men had helped him do evil too. They were not good people. If they were not mortals, she would have acted long ago.

Yun Xi smiled and said, “We’re leaving.”

“Y-yes!”

The second-in-command calmed his pounding heart, then cracked the whip and drove the horses onto the main road.

Inside the carriage, Xia You and Yun Xi communicated with spiritual sense.

“These people are all rotten. We’re just letting them go like this?”

“We won’t. Once we find Daoist Yu and Daoist Liu, we’ll make them turn themselves in at the county office.”

“Will the officials here enforce the law fairly?”

“We’ll see. If not, they can keep being our laborers. Daoist Yu and Daoist Liu will need carriage drivers too.”

“That makes sense.”

Meanwhile, Yu Qing Cheng and Liu Hao Tian, the two being talked about, were not as lucky as Yun Xi. When they were thrown out of the teleportation passage, they were crushed by spatial force. Both suffered severe internal injuries. Their meridians cracked. To resist the tearing force, all the spiritual energy in their dantian was drained. Even opening a storage pouch was difficult.

To make things worse, they landed inside Qi Xia Pavilion, the largest brothel in Jin Shan County.

The owner was shocked by the beauty that fell from the sky, and then he was overjoyed. With such stunning beauties, he would have no trouble making Qi Xia Pavilion famous.

The huge profit made him deliberately ignore the fact that they fell from the sky. He ordered his men to confiscate their belongings and had martial servants keep them under guard.

When Yu Qing Cheng woke up, she almost exploded. Since stepping onto the path of cultivation, she had never been this miserable. She was actually being kept like livestock as “goods.” She swore she would tear down Qi Xia Pavilion, and that ugly man had to die.

Liu Hao Tian was much calmer. He soothed her. “Junior Sister, mortals say revenge can wait ten years. We’re already Foundation Establishment cultivators, with a lifespan of two hundred years. We have plenty of time for revenge. The urgent thing is to repair our injuries, get our storage pouches back, and go meet up with Fellow Cultivator Wei and the others.”

Yu Qing Cheng took deep breaths again and again before her anger finally settled. Then she frowned. “Thank goodness for Yun Xi’s guiding red cord. If the two of us had been separated, it would be even worse. But the spiritual energy here is too thin. This is obviously the mortal world. If we want to repair our meridians, won’t we have to wait until the end of time?”

Liu Hao Tian also frowned. “The spirit stones are all in our storage pouches. First we find a way to get them back.”

“Alright.”

From that point on, the two of them became very obedient. They did not argue with the owner’s arrangements, acting like they were resigned to their fate.

The owner of Qi Xia Pavilion also tried to probe into their background. Liu Hao Tian wore an expression that said, “I’m hiding something,” and only said that something happened to their family, so they ended up here. He did not say anything more.

The owner filled in the rest himself. With how sensitive they were about their origins, he decided they must be the descendants of disgraced officials.

He found no identity documents on them, but their clothes and accessories were exquisite, clearly from a wealthy household. That only made him more certain of his guess, and it made him feel he could control them easily.

When he hinted at these ideas, Yu Qing Cheng and Liu Hao Tian both tacitly accepted them. This made Boss Shen of Qi Xia Pavilion even more pleased with himself. He believed he had their weakness in hand, and his words became more and more brazen.

“You’ve already fallen to the point of running for your lives. Whatever happened to your family must be serious. As the owner of Qi Xia Pavilion, I can give you a way to live, and I can shelter you. You should be satisfied.”

Yu Qing Cheng was desperate for the storage pouch, so she put on a frightened look. Then, with reddened eyes, she said, “Sir Shen, for you to help us siblings like this, we are truly grateful. As long as you don’t reveal our whereabouts, we will obey you in everything.”

Boss Shen was even happier. He waved his folding fan and said, “Don’t worry. As long as you help me win over the magistrate’s heart, I won’t treat you badly. Not only will you never worry about food or clothing, you’ll have gold and silver on you and servants at your call. I’ll make sure you live the way you used to.”

Liu Hao Tian looked at the greasy man in front of him and had to talk himself down again and again before suppressing the urge to kill. “Sir Shen, we understand what you mean. Before that, we only have one small request. We hope you can grant it.”

Boss Shen said warily, “Let’s hear it. If it’s not difficult, I’ll grant it.”

What he meant was that they’d better not ask for anything outrageous.

Yu Qing Cheng immediately spoke up. “Sir Shen, when we were unconscious, you ordered someone to change our clothes, but you never returned our personal pouches afterward. That pouch was sewn by our mother’s own hands, and we cherish it deeply. Now our mother is gone forever. It’s the only thing we have to hold our grief. Could you return it to us?

“Of course, you can have someone check it before giving it back. It’s just an ordinary pouch. There was nothing inside. It’s only more delicate in style.”

As she spoke, her phoenix eyes showed pleading, which was very pleasing to Boss Shen.

Boss Shen had taken their things to cut off their escape routes and to investigate their background. He had indeed seen the two delicate pouches. One was embroidered with orchids, and the other with roses. The fabric was also high-quality.

“Fine. I’ll go back and see where I put them. If I find them, I’ll send them over.”

“Thank you, Sir Shen.”

Yu Qing Cheng immediately changed into a bright smile, making Boss Shen lose himself for a moment.

“Good. Rest well, nurture your bodies, and there’ll be plenty of good days waiting for you. Hahaha!”

With that, he left the loft where the two were locked up.

After the owner left, the martial servants at the door locked it again and kept patrolling near the windows to block any possible escape route.

Once Boss Shen was gone, Liu Hao Tian’s face darkened. He regretted his earlier decision a little.

Yu Qing Cheng instead comforted him. “Senior Brother Liu, just endure it. This place is comfortable to live in, and it doesn’t delay our recovery. No one dares to bother us either. Once we get our storage pouches back and repair the injuries in our meridians, that’s when we settle accounts.”

“Alright. Endure it for now.”

Boss Shen had never seen a Cultivation World storage pouch before. In his eyes, they were just two ordinary pouches stuffed with cotton, nothing special. So two days later, he sent them over.

But Boss Shen was crafty. He kept a backup plan. He only returned Yu Qing Cheng’s storage pouch, claiming that Liu Hao Tian’s pouch was damaged and he had someone repairing it. He said he would send it back once it was fixed.