After a Fake Death, the Emotionless Dao Senior Sister Became Obsessed - Chapter 17

Tanhu was stunned in the water vat.

She quietly glanced at the long-ailing Liniang, and her breathing grew frantic. Her voice was broken: “…Li-niang.”

The demon, whose spiritual intelligence was only half-formed, still didn’t understand why this was happening, but she heard warning and reproach in the immortal cultivator’s words.

She blamed herself severely, and large tears rolled down her seductive eyes.

She didn’t want Liniang to be sick; she wanted the woman to still be able to smile warmly at her, read books, and coax her to sleep.

The immortal cultivator stood up and slowly approached. She cast an unknown magic spell, and Tanhu felt a searing, unbearable pain all over.

She cried out in agony, and looking at her reflection in the rocking water beside her, she realized she had reverted to her true form: the ugly, repulsive, wriggling, wet, soft worm body. It was the form she had in the Immersed Silence Sea.

Tanhu was terrified and ashamed, shrinking to the bottom of the water vat.

Liniang certainly wouldn’t like her like this.

“You are from that region plagued by demons, aren’t you? Born a demon, yet tainted with demonic energy,” the cultivator’s tone was dismissive.

“Do you know that all your current cultivation was gained by devouring the lifespan of the human you lived with?”

Tanhu was bewildered, not understanding what the woman was saying.

So that was why, every time she kissed Liniang, the other woman would sleep for a long time.

This spring, Liniang was clearly still strong enough to push the stone mill alone, but by winter, she couldn’t even lift the light muslin cloth.

She coiled at the bottom of the vat, curled up, and thought blankly for an entire night.

It wasn’t until the next day, remembering she had to feed Liniang her medicine, that she quietly crept out.

The high-ranking immortal cultivator, who seemed to hold a lofty position, had left at some unknown time. Only a mermaid lamp with a static halo was left on the table.

Tanhu then recalled that last night she vaguely heard the woman say this magical artifact had the effect of condensing the soul and was intentionally left for her as a gift.

She grabbed the lamp like a drowning person clutches a straw, anxious and eager, letting the halo envelop Liniang on the couch.

She kept watch like this for an entire day, until Tanhu woke from her exhaustion.

Liniang’s complexion had already improved, and her eyelashes fluttered, just about to wake up.

Tanhu was overjoyed and could not contain herself. She rushed over and called out softly and stammeringly: “Ah-jie…”

But in the woman’s misty, damp eyes, she saw her own ugly, wriggling reflection.

She had exhausted the cultivation she had accumulated in just one short year, and now she had reverted to her true form.

The immortal cultivator had said it: the mermaid lamp relied on siphoning the cultivation and soul of the worshipper to solidify the person they wished to revive.

Tanhu desperately tried to activate her demon power, but she could no longer transform.

She was utterly panicked; she didn’t want Liniang to see her in this state.

The Winter Passes, Spring Arrives

And so, winter passed and spring arrived.

Tanhu never returned to the tofu shop.

Even though she secretly watched Liniang desperately searching for her from a dark, hidden spot, and even though she had promised Liniang they would go together to see the spring opera this year.

The outside world was too dangerous, so Tanhu could only hide in a pond north of Yingchuan City.

She used the mermaid oil lamp to store the scattered soul wisps of people who had accidentally fallen into the water, and then, in the dead of night, she would sneak into the tofu shop.

By the light of a candle, she would regulate Liniang’s body and, while she was at it, blankly steal glances at the sleeping woman all night.

The intimate touches, however, were something she could no longer do.

Tanhu thought that she and Liniang would continue on like this.

Her lifespan was long. If she could watch the woman grow old, even if she couldn’t show her face, she would be content.

But there were very few solitary souls wandering around the pond. Yingchuan City was peaceful all year round, so where would there be so many souls to supply the mermaid lamp?

Tanhu’s visits to Liniang became increasingly infrequent.

She had tried to restrain herself, thinking that if she just secretly snuck into the city and killed a few ordinary, defenceless people, she could see Liniang sooner.

But then she would remember Liniang’s soft “Good demon, good demon” whispered into her ear when coaxing her to sleep.

Liniang wanted her to be a demon who did no evil.

She certainly had to be obedient.

Tanhu restrained her demonic nature, even allowing the small shrimp and fish that mistook her for a rock to run rampant and play on her.

The Bridal Sedan and The Reunion

Until that day.

She saw a familiar figure at the pond where she lived and quickly hid.

Huan Liu, dressed luxuriously, had somehow found her hiding place.

He was arrogantly directing a few people to lift a crimson sedan chair to toss into the water, while saying self-righteously,

“That’s right, this is where I dreamed it was. That coral demon must be hiding in the pond.”

“Father had a Diviner calculate the hexagrams. If I can solve this rumour of the water demon taking a wife and personally eliminate the demon, a Xuanmen sect will take me in as a disciple.”

Tanhu tremblingly released a thread of demon power, so frightened she wanted to flee immediately.

It was unintentional, but she suddenly realized there was someone in the sedan chair.

A particularly familiar, lingering scent.

Only now, that scent was extremely faint and dead, nearly dissipating.

Using her demon power, Tanhu was able to see Liniang inside the bridal sedan.

The woman was dressed in splendid robes, leaning against the interior of the sedan. Her hair, like a cloud, was styled for a bride, and the jade ornaments on it clinked softly as the sedan swayed.

Her eyes were as gentle and moving as usual, but she had already fallen into a deep slumber.

Her body was already cold, and she would never open her eyes again to smile softly and whisper anything to the person who came for her.

Outside the sedan by the water, Huan Liu was still smug and self-satisfied, intoxicated by his impending smooth and unimpeded path to cultivation.

He spoke of “sacrificing”, and then “drowning” and “luring the water demon to show itself.”

Tanhu understood nothing.

She just stood there blankly, repeating the only human words she knew with an empty voice, “Li-niang.”

“…Li-niang.”

She didn’t understand.

It had only been half a month since they last met. Why had Ah-jie suddenly fallen asleep again?

Had she done something wrong?

Was it… that she was too slow in collecting residual souls, so slow that the woman had lost patience and was unwilling to wait for her?

She had planned to go to Yingchuan City tonight to see Liniang.

The next day was precisely when the spring opera started. She was greedily thinking that this time she wouldn’t be timid and run away; she would just hide in a corner and watch the opera with the woman.

The Tragedy and the Turning

The crimson bridal sedan was tossed down. In the murky water, Tanhu glimpsed Liniang’s heavily made-up, cold, pale face.

She remembered a day in the past winter when Liniang briefly woke up on her sickbed and softly held the wrist of her clumsy hand feeding the medicine.

Her voice was as pleasant as the melting of fresh snow: “Xiao Hu also wants new clothes, doesn’t she? When spring comes next year, Ah-jie will tailor a set for you at the tailor’s shop. How about crimson?”

“…Okay, Ah-jie knows,” the woman saw her expression, coughed weakly, but still smiled at her.

“And we must buy two strings of sugar-coated hawthorns for the spring opera.”

Blood tears overflowed from Tanhu’s eyes.

She wiped them away blankly, experiencing such a bitter taste for the first time.

She was clearly no longer human. She was a demon, a monster, a dirty, sticky thing. Could a coral weep?

She tried so hard to be the “good demon” in Ah-jie’s words, so why didn’t she receive the good reward she was supposed to get in the storybooks?

The mermaid oil lamp was like rain after a long drought; in an instant, it devoured Liniang’s soul.

All that was left for Tanhu was a serene-faced, empty shell of a body.

Tanhu held Liniang and gradually surfaced from the deep pond.

Demonic energy surged, and she transformed back into her human form. Her appearance was beautiful and bewitching, with tears hanging from the corners of her eyes, making the people by the water look on in dazed fascination.

“I…” Tanhu spoke human words, her seductive eyes wide, her voice innocent.

“Can I kill you all?”

Not just these few people.

She wanted the entire Yingchuan City to pave the way for Liniang to return to her side.

Ah-jie had left, so she would simply reshape her using the mermaid lamp.

A few times, a hundred times, even a thousand times, she would continue.

In this way, she could always see Liniang.

Black water overflowed from the deep pond. The sedan bearers who touched it screamed and fell to the ground. They bled from their seven orifices, their faces turned ashen, and their souls were rapidly drained.

Huan Liu was utterly terrified. Relying on the self-defence magical artifact he carried, he fled in a panic.

Tanhu paid him no mind.

She placed the person, who was already cold, on the water’s edge, bent down, and pecked at the woman’s moist, chilled lips.

Just like the first time she transformed, when she bravely crawled onto Liniang’s couch and clumsily and helplessly pressed her lips to hers.

But this time, Ah-jie did not open her eyes.

Tanhu raised her head, looking up at the sky in a daze.

At some point, her vision was filled with the thin, solidified white mist that appeared after she succumbed to the demonic path.

Water vapour surged; a new rain had just fallen.

But it was no longer like that season of early clear skies when she first opened her eyes and happened to meet Liniang’s gentle gaze.

The Execution of Justice

Inside the jade chamber, the mirage slowly dispersed with the mist. The blurry images of the past rippled away into nothingness.

The mist that had long hovered over Yingchuan City had completely cleared this evening.

“Following the words you attached to that pearl,” Si Jing finally spoke from a distance.

“I have brought Huan Liu.”

Huan Liu was huddled, hugging himself, looking timid and mentally unstable.

Although the demonic energy in his body had dispersed, he had become a foolish, idiotic shell, unable to care for himself.

“As you wished.” The woman in the snow-white clothes took out a discipline whip and walked step by step toward Huan Liu.

“I, as the foremost disciple under the Snow Seat of Cloud Water Stream in Yulu Peak, will act on behalf of the sect’s internal discipline.”

Her hand rose, and the long whip struck down.

Huan Liu’s torn clothes and skin instantly split open, the wounds deep enough to expose bone.

“Expel him from the peak, sever his root bone. And by the Master’s command, leave him to fend for himself.” Si Jing lowered her eyes, showing no sadness or joy.

Shen Susu was holding Yuan Ling.

Perhaps because she had joined the sect later, she had never seen her senior sister in such a cold, unfeeling state.

The woman’s slender figure brushed past her and Yuan Ling without stopping, walking slowly forward.

Saving the Soul

Chu Zhao’s eyelids were faintly red, and she was still kneeling blankly in her original spot. The condensed water droplets in the air landed on her soft eyelashes and slid down her cheeks with a rustle.

As if suddenly waking up, she lunged at the mermaid lamp.

Stubbornly shaking it, trying to extinguish the unceasing light, “…Give her back, give my Tanhu Niangzi back!”

Why… why could this evil mermaid lamp arbitrarily seize the souls of the deceased?

A bone-structured hand suddenly reached into her view.

Chu Zhao vigilantly hugged the lamp to her chest. She looked up and saw Si Jing’s calm, snow-like appearance. She showed neither sadness nor joy, only looking down at her.

“I have a method,” she said.

With that, the woman took out a familiar small white porcelain bowl that Chu Zhao had seen before.

She held a pale-yellow talisman between her fingers and quietly closed her eyes.

Her lips moved slightly. The obscure brushstrokes of cinnabar on the talisman instantly came alive, escaping like smoke, injecting themselves into the mermaid lamp, and firmly binding a wisp of the soul that was about to dissipate.

Chu Zhao, forgetting any past grudges, held the white porcelain bowl and looked eagerly at Si Jing.

In just a few breaths, a wisp of soul, shaped like a mist, entered the bowl.

She held her breath and concentrated, sensing the familiar aura belonging to Tanhu solidifying little by little.

She pressed her face against the porcelain bowl, rubbing it in delight, “Niangzi? Niangzi!”

“She cannot hear you right now,” Si Jing scattered the burned-out talisman. “It will take some more time.”

The Soul-Locking Talisman and the porcelain bowl magical artifact were originally intended to capture demons who escaped in soul form, and unexpectedly came in handy at this time.

Chu Zhao mumbled an “Oh,” staring at Si Jing for a long time, her almond eyes shining.

The woman was about to take a few steps back to look for Liniang’s soul in the mermaid lamp but was suddenly wrapped around the waist by a soft body that rushed into her arms, making her unable to move.

Looking down, Chu Zhao was snuggling lightly against her neck, her voice sweet and soft, mixed with a nasal tone.

“Beauty, Beauty, you are so amazing!”

She opened her eyes wide, very serious. “You saved Tanhu Niangzi, which means you saved me! To repay you…”

“I’ll marry you today! How about that?”

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