After Transmigrating into a Book as Cannon Fodder, I Pampered the Villain - Chapter 23

Chapter 23: On the Verge of Death

Yu Yingxia’s face was deathly pale. Yang Xunzhou, assuming her illness had flared up again, wanted nothing more than to lead her away from this wretched place.

Guardian Yu, let us find a different place to receive your reward. The voice continued to chime in her mind like a death knell.

“I… I’m fine, Sister Yang. Don’t worry.” Yingxia pinched her palms to steady herself. Yang Xunzhou clearly had no idea what was happening; no one could help her now. She had to find a way to deal with this on her own.

Making an excuse to part ways with Yang, she walked back home alone. Even while her own life hung by a thread, her thoughts drifted to the house she was worried about Yan Huaixi.

Though Yingxia didn’t have Yang’s insider knowledge regarding the “Ten Thousand Soul Bone,” she had realized from the auctioneer’s description who this trap was set for. The bone would inevitably draw out the survivor of the Yan family. If Yan Huaixi couldn’t resist and came to reclaim it, she would have to face an ambush of world-class combatants while still heavily injured.

Yingxia had no power and couldn’t sense the presence of others, but she could guess that those hiding in the dark were the peak powers of this world—either the Protagonist or Villain No. 1.

How could the current Yan Huaixi deal with them? Moreover, that bone likely wasn’t a normal soul bone but another trap. Yingxia’s heart throbbed with anxiety. She feared the shadow clinging to her, and she feared Yan Huaixi charging into the fray.

Rumble…

The sky suddenly darkened. Thunder groaned within the clouds. Pedestrians, sensing rain, hurried their pace. In the bustling crowd, Yingxia’s frantic steps didn’t seem out of place.

Guardian Yu—oh, I forgot. Silly me, you shouldn’t recognize me right now. Heh, you are acting even calmer than before. It made me forget your memories were sealed.

The shadow spoke again after a long silence. It seemed to enjoy watching her nervousness, its tone mocking. Yingxia clenched her fists. No wonder the voice felt familiar, yet she couldn’t find a trace of it in the original owner’s memories.

“I await your guidance, Excellency.”

To clarify the situation, the shadow projected fragments of the past into her mind. Yingxia learned secrets never mentioned in the system’s texts.

The original owner had been a wavering opportunist, but she wouldn’t have dared to kill Yan Huaixi even if she were down to her last breath. Yan Huaixi was a master of the Void Refinement stage; she could kill a small fry like the original owner with a single look.

What gave her the courage or rather, made her lose her mind was this amorphous shadow, just like the one Yingxia saw in her nightmares. The shadow had latched onto her during a mission at the Yan ruins, in her to assassinate Yan Huaixi. Once her ambition was fully nurtured, it tampered with her memories.

Now that the original owner was dead, the mess and the unknown enemies had all fallen onto Yingxia’s head! She wanted to curse both the original owner and the system. The former left a disaster, and the latter was useless for failing to investigate this before sending her here!

Don’t blame the Master for touching your memories. Yan Huaixi is suspicious and cruel; if she found anything amiss, you wouldn’t escape the fate of a Soul Search. This was for your safety. The shadow spoke grandiosely, but Yingxia didn’t believe a word of its “kindness.”

Safety? This was a fail-safe to prevent Yan Huaixi from tracing them back if the assassination failed!

“I… how could I? The Master acted in my best interest. I cannot thank him enough,” Yingxia replied, feigning submissiveness. Her time spent acting around Yan Huaixi had perfected her skills.

[We know your loyalty. Here is the Master’s reward. Take it.] The shadow condensed into a black bead and shoved it into her hand. The moment she touched it, a wave of nausea surged from the depths of her soul.

This is a newly formed Soul Servant from the Master himself. Ordinary people never get such a chance. You are lucky; only one who achieves the top merit deserves such a reward. With this, there is no need to seal your memories anymore.

Yingxia’s face twitched as she fought the urge to throw the thing away. Something filthy!

The Soul Bead shattered in her hand. The newborn shadow squeezed into her soul, perfectly mimicking her aura and hiding beside her spirit.

The Master trusts you. He knows Yan Huaixi is by your side. A new mission is assigned to you. Don’t worry; as before, the Master will protect you.

If he trusted me, he wouldn’t plant a spy in my soul! Yingxia didn’t believe a single word. But… if this thing knew where Yan Huaixi was, why was Yin Duo still searching for her? Weren’t they on the same side?

Deliver Yan Huaixi’s corpse to the Master, and he will bestow upon you the Yan family’s secret treasure of immortality. Do not doubt it; the reason outsiders haven’t found it is because it has long been in our Master’s hands. The shadow’s voice was seductive. Who in the cultivation world didn’t want to become an immortal?

Yingxia wasn’t uninterested in immortality, but her life was currently on the line! Yan Huaixi was her lifeline if Yan died, Yingxia would at least be scattered to the winds. If she were to stab anyone, her knife would go straight into this lying shadow.

But she knew her place. She was a weakling who could be crushed by any cultivator. She couldn’t afford to offend either side. All she could do was mimic the original owner’s greed to lower their guard.

“I will kill Yan Huaixi and offer her corpse to the Master,” Yingxia whispered. Lacking cultivation, she couldn’t use telepathy. Her voice was masked by the commotion, but to those with cultivation, it was crystal clear.

At that moment, a flash of lightning illuminated her face, followed by an earth-shaking roar.

Rumble!

Yingxia shivered. For some reason, the thunder brought a deep sense of unease.

The Master awaits your good news… The shadow’s laughter faded, and the darkness surrounding her was washed away by the downpour.

Once it was gone, Yingxia slumped against a wall, her legs finally giving out. The rain fell hard, the droplets stinging. She wiped her face, finally daring to show her worry. Ignoring her weakness, she ran toward home.

Yan Huaixi, please don’t be fooled by the auction! Stay inside!

The rain blurred her vision. As she passed a small alley, the memory of being attacked by a corpse flashed in her mind. She glanced toward the alleyway. Beside a lit lantern, she saw a glint of reflected metal.

She instinctively threw herself in the opposite direction. A woodcutter’s cleaver grazed her neck by a hair’s breadth. A drop of red blood flew into the air, blending with the rain.

A hulking figure emerged from the alley, clutching another cleaver. The one he had just thrown nearly decapitated her.

“The Elixir… give me the Elixir…” The man’s speech was slurred, his body swaying as if drugged. “My Elixir! Give it to me!”

Yingxia noticed a crimson glow in his cloudy eyes. He didn’t look human anymore; he looked like a transforming zombie from Resident Evil. She didn’t dare think—she scrambled up and kept running.

The creature was fast. Soon, she heard heavy footsteps closing in. Realizing she’d be caught in a straight line, she veered into another alley. This one was near the apothecary; she knew it well. It was cluttered with junk she could use.

Yingxia dove in. Fortunately, the original owner’s body was fit. The monster followed, crashing through drying poles, broken cabinets, and pickle jars like a wild boar. The clutter slowed it down.

As the monster scanned for her, Yingxia hidden in the dark waited for her moment. When the creature tried to leap over a wall where she had smeared her blood as a decoy, she heaved a massive “pickle-jar stone” from the roof.

The stone smashed into its head with a sickening thud. The monster crashed to the ground, black, foul-smelling blood pooling beneath it. It stopped moving.

Yingxia’s heart nearly leaped out of her chest. She hadn’t missed. She climbed down from the roof, but her strength was spent. Her legs slipped on the wet tiles, and she fell.

She felt her left arm bone scream in pain. Everything hurt. Her neck stung from the cut. She gritted her teeth, tears escaping her eyes. Why is it so hard just to stay alive?

She forced herself up, bypassing the monster. Even though it wasn’t autumn, the rain felt bone-chilling. Her breath was hot—she was running a fever.

When it rains, it pours. She didn’t even have the energy to laugh at her own misfortune. Her steps were hollow, and a familiar stabbing pain returned to her heart.

She reached the alley entrance and looked for help, but there were no normal people only five figures similar to the monster she had just killed.

“Give us the Elixir…” they hissed, their eyes hungry.

Yingxia was truly at her limit. Her vision went black, and she collapsed against the wall. As her strength ebbed away, she recalled the feeling of her death in her previous life. It had been sudden then, but this felt like an agonizingly slow-motion version.

In her blurred vision, the monsters drew closer. She felt she would stop breathing before they even reached her. After all her struggle, she was still dying though not at Yan Huaixi’s hand.

Memories of the difficult villainess flashed through her mind like shards of glass. This was her “life review,” and she realized her thoughts were filled with Yan Huaixi. Despite the mutual suspicion, their time together hadn’t been bad. It had actually been… quite good.

Before her eyes closed, her last worry was still for Yan: Don’t fall for it…

Then, she saw a flash of red.

The storm intensified. On the deserted street, a figure in red held a green paper umbrella. With a slight twist, rain droplets flew out like silver needles.

Five distorted figures were sent flying, their heads pierced. Most were crushed against the walls, but one sturdy monster tried to crawl back. Yan Huaixi didn’t even look; with a wave of her hand, a surge of angry power reduced it to dust.

Once her anger was vented, she walked to the wall and looked at the unconscious girl. Along with her fury, a trace of sorrow surfaced. She knelt and touched Yingxia’s neck. Beneath the fair skin, the temperature was searing. The girl looked like a dying rabbit.

This pitiable state wavered Yan Huaixi’s heart, but then she remembered what she had heard through the hairclip earlier: “I will kill Yan Huaixi and offer her corpse to the Master.”

Yan Huaixi had experienced many betrayals, but none felt this painful. She had given the jade pin to protect her, only to discover a plot. Who was the real Yu Yingxia?

The trust between them, already stained, had become as thin as paper. Her hand suddenly tightened around Yingxia’s throat. She could snap it with a tiny bit of force and end the conspiracy.

She didn’t know why she hesitated. Her grip tightened, making the cut on Yingxia’s neck bleed. The pain woke the girl up.

Yingxia’s consciousness was hazy. She didn’t notice she was being strangled. Seeing Yan Huaixi, she instinctively grabbed the woman’s hand.

“Master… be careful of the Treasure Pavilion… there’s an ambush…” she gasped. Her “grip” was merely a weak resting of her hand on Yan’s wrist.

Yan Huaixi knew. Such petty tricks wouldn’t fool her. But she hadn’t expected these to be Yingxia’s first words upon seeing her. Seeing Yingxia’s dilated pupils, she instinctively let go.

The hairclip could have protected her; the monsters couldn’t have truly hurt her. But Yingxia’s breath was growing weaker, like a candle in the rain.

Yan Huaixi bit her lip until it bled. Which side of you is the mask?

Thunder shook the ground. Yan Huaixi stood up, her cold eyes complex. She wouldn’t throw Yingxia into a corpse pit like other traitors. Instead, she decided: The day you move against me, I will turn you into a Soul Bead that can never betray me, keeping you by my side forever.

She took the girl home but didn’t put her in her own bed this time. She dried her with spiritual energy and tossed her onto the bed in the next room. She even fed her a Spirit-Fixing Pill a tonic for fever. What kind of traitor gets this treatment?

Yan Huaixi went to her own room and smashed half her furniture in a fit of pique. Yin Duo, and whoever is behind Yu Yingxia… I will hunt you all down and turn you into poison corpses.

The next day, the rain had stopped. Yang Xunzhou visited, worried about Yingxia. She was met at the door by a beautiful, sickly woman with starry eyes Yan Huaixi.

“Is A-Sheng okay?” Yang asked.

“She has a fever. She’ll be fine,” Yan replied icily, radiating a “keep away” aura.

Yang felt a bit guilty. Does her sister know I’ve been making her draw ‘those’ kinds of books? Feeling the chill, she didn’t stay long.

After closing the door, Yan Huaixi watched Yingxia’s silent room. She told herself she was only checking to see if the traitor had “burned her brain out” before she could confess everything.

But when she checked Yingxia’s pulse, her heart skipped a beat. It was so weak it was almost non-existent.

“Yu Yingxia, we will settle our scores when you wake up!” She rushed out to find the old physician.

While she was away, a black mist rose from Yingxia’s body, forming a giant maw to swallow her. At that critical moment, the “Yan Family Secret Manual” by her pillow a book Yingxia had dismissed as unreadable—glowed with a faint light. The manual literally “slurped” up the black mist like porridge.

By the time Yan Huaixi returned with the terrified physician, the mist was gone.

The physician’s face turned pale upon seeing Yingxia. “This isn’t a common cold,” he sighed. “Her internal organs are failing, like a person at the end of their life. This looks like the work of an Immortal… She has five days at most, perhaps only three.”

Yan Huaixi was stunned. One night had turned the world upside down.

She sat by the bed and, without realizing it, took Yingxia’s hand. It was as cold as a corpse’s, with only the softness of her skin proving she was still alive.

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