Chapter 38 No Need to Run
She doesn't know any medical skills. If the city lord wants souls, she can release all the souls in the pennant, but she can't guarantee that the souls will return to their places...
In other words, it is impossible to return to its original position.
Ruan Xing scratched her head. Forget it. She would simulate it again and just ask him directly what he wanted. If it was really a soul, she would just run away with Hu Sanjian. She had already got 40,000 taels of silver anyway, so it was not a loss. Although it was a pity for the Red Head Gang to gain some benefits later, she couldn't hand over what the city lord wanted, and she wouldn't have the life to spend the money.
This time, after Ruan Xing chose to check his memory, he felt it was both unexpected and very reasonable.
It turned out to be like this...
She entered the City Lord's Mansion under the pretext of giving gifts to the City Lord, and when she arrived in front of the City Lord, she asked him directly, "What exactly do you want to be explained?"
The city lord was an old man with gray hair and beard, but his hair was combed meticulously. He looked like a scholar with a scholarly temperament. He looked at Ruan Xing with a kind smile on his face, "Sit down and talk."
Ruan Xing had tried this before. No matter how she scolded him, he would not get angry. If she tried to take action, she would be restrained and thrown out of the gate of the City Lord's Mansion by the dozen or so Thousand Feather Guards hiding around her. So she simply sat down and listened to what the old man had to say.
"Are you the disciple of the Red-Headed Taoist?" asked the city lord.
Knowing that the Red-Headed Taoist and the City Lord were likely to have a grudge, Ruan Xing would certainly not get involved with him. She denied it, "Of course not."
Although she learned everything from the Red-Headed Taoist Priest, she did not become his disciple.
"Haha." The city lord seemed not to believe it and laughed twice, "How did that Taoist treat you?"
She had only met the Red-Headed Taoist once in real life...the time she killed him.
"I'm not familiar with him."
"Where do you usually live? What do you eat?"
Ruan Xing was speechless. Anyway, the old man wouldn't be angry. She couldn't help but get angry: "Are you the leader who went to the countryside to visit the grassroots? We are talking about the Red Head Gang now! I have already answered several of your questions. Can you answer mine too?"
The city lord looked at her like an old man looking at a naughty child. He smiled and said, "I just want to know what kind of environment you lived in before."
Seeing that Ruan Xing didn't speak, the city lord shook his head and continued: "Since you don't want to answer, then listen to me. I'll tell you a story."
He changed into a comfortable position and leaned back in the chair, his eyes passing through Ruan Xing and drifting into the distance.
"Four years ago, I was appointed by His Majesty as the Lord of Jiangning City. When I was taking my family to take up the post, it rained heavily on the way, delaying our journey. So we stayed overnight at the foot of a mountain ten miles outside the city. That day was my birthday, and my six-year-old granddaughter secretly went to the forest to pick flowers to celebrate my birthday. However, she encountered a poisonous snake in the forest. A Taoist priest who came down the mountain saved her. I offered him gold and silver as a reward, but he refused. He said that my granddaughter had the potential to practice Taoism, and he wanted to turn her into a Taoist child.
I was over 60 years old when I had this little granddaughter. How could I bear to let her go to Taoism and suffer? I declined the Taoist's kindness, and the Taoist left. Unexpectedly, a quarter of an hour later, my little granddaughter suddenly fainted and could not be awakened no matter how I called her. I was about to rush to the city to find a doctor for her at night, but the Taoist appeared again and said that my little granddaughter was scared out of her wits and needed a ritual to calm her down. After he finished the ritual, my little girl woke up and lay in my arms crying and making a fuss. I was so distressed.
The Taoist said that Nannan's soul was unstable and she would suffer from soul loss in the future. It would be better for her to worship him as her master and practice Taoism. He would always be able to calm her soul. I was so anxious at that time that I didn't see the Taoist's sinister trick. Instead, I thanked him profusely and let him take Nannan away...
Later, I learned that he was the Red Head Taoist of the Red Head Gang, and Nannan was just a tool he used to threaten me. Sometimes I asked to see Nannan, but he would never agree. I haven't seen my Nannan for four years. I know in my heart that she is probably in danger. Seeing you today makes me more certain of this idea. He is dead, and it is you, a little kid, who took over his place. Nannan should be your senior sister, right? Have you seen her? Can you tell me if she... passed away peacefully?"
The sixty-year-old man had tears in his eyes. In the past few years, he had dreamed of his granddaughter's innocent smile. He felt guilty towards his son and daughter-in-law. He wanted to bring his daughter to his side and love her, but he ended up killing her...
Ruan Xing knew this was the reason, but it was even harder for him to speak. With the Red Head Taoist's character, he would not keep a crying, noisy, eating, drinking, defecating and urinating child around to affect his research. The child was most likely one of his experimental subjects for making puppets...
Ruan Xing's throat was hoarse as he spoke, "So, what you want to be told is... her body?"
"No!" The city lord shook his head. "I want to massacre the Red Head Gang to comfort her soul in heaven, but I don't want to kill them all. The lower-class people are just drifting with the tide. In these three days, the small leaders of the Red Head Gang who have a little status will gather at the Red Head Gang headquarters. If there are those who change their allegiance and escape, I will just assume that they are not destined to die. Three days later will be the auspicious day to massacre the Red Head Gang headquarters. Little girl, seeing that you are still young, I advise you not to stay in the Red Head Gang and be buried with them."
Perhaps it was because the conversation about his little granddaughter opened the city lord's heart, and the city lord actually revealed his true purpose and advised Ruan Xing to escape.
When her thoughts came back to her mind, Ruan Xing bit her lower lip lightly, her face full of worry. It seemed that she had no chance of stopping the city lord, and she could only give up the Red Head Gang... Damn it, she had only been the gang leader for half a day!
I thought I was going to live an upper-class life with food and clothes provided for me, but now I have to run for my life again.
Is it possible that she will never have a good life? Ruan Xing was unwilling to accept this. She stood up and put on the clothes she had taken off during the simulation. She was not going to sleep tonight. She wanted to go to the old man's cave to take a look!
If the child was really refined into a puppet, there might be a chance of turning around. In that case, her soul would be stored in the puppet's essence, unlike the soul in the pennant, which would become confused and only left with negative energy and resentment after more than three days.
Just like Jianlai, there will be residual memories and instinctive behaviors. Jianlai can recognize his brother's voice, and maybe the little girl can also recognize her grandfather.
Anyway, she has tried it many times in simulation, and the city lord will not kill her within three days no matter what. So she might as well go and see. If she can't find the little girl's puppet, it won't be too late for her to escape.
She has to bear all the consequences of the evil done by the Red-Headed Taoist priest. She is so unlucky.
Ruan Xing sighed and walked out.
All the gang leaders have their own private houses, except for Ruan Xing and Hu San. One of them used to live in Qi Ye's hall, and the other lived in an alley in the civilian area. Therefore, except for the scattered guards, they were the only two living people in the entire headquarters. She ran to Hu San's temporary room and called him, "Get up, drive the carriage, we are leaving the city now."
Hu San had just fallen asleep and rubbed his eyes sleepily. He suddenly woke up after hearing Ruan Xing's words and asked solemnly, "Miss, are we going to run away?"
Hu San didn't care about the position of deputy gang leader he had just taken. Now that he had found his younger brother, he would follow the lady wherever she went.
How could he accept the idea of running away so easily? Did Hu San think that she was just going to cheat him out of money and run away? She had just told him in the afternoon that he should study hard and work hard!
Ruan Xing looked at him suspiciously and said, "That's not necessarily true... Take the banknotes first. If it doesn't work, we won't come back." The banknotes are worth 80,000 taels! Although she can't withdraw them after the city lord destroys the Red Head Gang and takes over the property and reports all the banknotes lost in three days, she can still withdraw 10,000 or 20,000 from the bank in the next city, which is enough for her living expenses.
Hu San responded with a "yes", and the two of them quietly packed up the banknotes and left the headquarters. Because of the Red Head Taoist's stingy behavior and the Red Head Gang's lack of guards who had practiced internal energy, no one noticed that the two of them had taken advantage of the night to drive the carriage out of the city.
It takes an hour and a half to drive the carriage to the dense forest maze, and she didn't prepare a replacement horse in advance, so it would take longer. Ruan Xing couldn't help but wonder if she should learn how to ride a horse...
She staggered all the way and finally reached the dense forest maze when it was almost dawn. There were still countless memories of deaths in this place in her mind, and she felt a little emotional for a moment.
While riding in the carriage on the road, Ruan Xing had already summoned Jian Lai, who was staying with Hong Xi, through the mind connection. Jian Lai's ghost escape was much faster than the carriage, and he caught up with them in a short time.
After communicating with Jianlai through the puppet's essence, she realized that the maze was not the only way up the mountain. She left Hu San to look after the carriage and a large bundle of silver bills in the carriage, and asked Jianlai to lead the way. They passed through an underground secret passage near the maze and finally reached the old man's cave.
In Ruan Xing's memory, she only knew the cave where the old man lived for research, but she didn't expect that in addition to the road leading to the cave, other places were more complicated, and only with a sword to lead the way could one navigate correctly.
It’s just that Jianlai’s intelligence is not very high, and sometimes Ruan Xing can’t clearly understand what he means by his expressions. She doesn’t know where the other puppets are, so she follows Jianlai to walk through all the territories before she finds the locations of the old man’s other puppets.
The old man needs his heart's blood to refine medicine, he needs his soul to raise the flag, and he needs treasures containing spiritual energy or yin energy to make puppets. Therefore, he didn't make many puppets. Most of the children he deceived or abducted are now sleeping in the medicinal field he cultivated.
The puppets whose strength was not as good as Jianlai were doing the chores of watering, planting medicine, washing clothes and cooking. A few little idiots stood there in a daze. Having lost their master, they were like machines in a factory without power, and they didn't know what to do.
There were four children in total, three boys and one girl. The girl looked about six years old, a little taller than Ruan Xing, and a little dirty, but her pale little face was still as tender and cute as when she was alive. They were not as white as Jianlai. Except for the lack of blood color on their skin, their appearance was not much different from normal children.
This is probably because the puppet brought by Jian Lai is essentially a white jade bead.
Ruan Xing asked Jianlai, and in Jianlai's memory, this girl did exist earlier than him.
She found the puppet essences of several people. The three little boys had a bronze wine cup, a small brass sword, and an iron and wooden ruler. They were all filled with yin energy, and it was obvious that they came out of the tomb. She refined them with blood and let them continue to take care of the medicine field according to their previous actions.
The little girl had a wooden plaque hanging around her neck, with her own birth date engraved on it.
Although Ruan Xing intuitively felt that this was the child, she was not 100% sure. She simulated it again and only felt relieved after she was sure, and she smiled with relief.
"That's good. We don't have to run away." Ruan Xing ordered Jian Lai to go down the mountain and take out half of the silver bills in the carriage and hide them in the cave.
Whenever the Red Head Gang delivered something or someone, they would deliver it to the entrance of the maze. No one had ever come up to the cave. The only living person who knew the location of the cave was Ruan Xing herself. The others were puppets who had lost their own will. This place was relatively safe and could be used as her warehouse and safe house in the future.
Although the old man was not a very good person, the medicinal fields he cultivated and the several prescriptions he experimented with were quite useful, so Ruan Xing accepted them with a smile.
Let Jianlai become invisible again, Ruan Xing took the little girl down the mountain to meet Hu San and prepare to return to the city.
"The leader is missing!"
"Oh no, the leader is missing!"
"The gang leader has run away!"
Several servants cried and hurried to report to the steward.
Zhang Chenghui, who had brought more than a dozen coffins to Ruan Xing early in the morning to show his courtesy, became the first person to know the news. He said with a sullen face, "Hurry up and inform Gang Leader Hong and the others. Explain to me what is going on!"
The two trusted men beside him ran off to deliver the letter. The servants kneeling on the ground gathered their minds. The old servant in the lead said, "This morning we went to deliver hot water for the gang leader to wash and eat breakfast. We knocked on the door for a long time but no one answered. So we bravely opened the door to see that there was no sign that anyone had lived in the room. We went to look for Deputy Gang Leader Hu, but he was not in the room either..."
Another servant nearby continued, "I went to clean the Gang Master's study and saw the large boxes scattered in front of the door. I knew they were the property sent by Deputy Gang Master Hong. I didn't dare to move them rashly, so I wanted to ask the Gang Master. I bumped into them and found out that the Gang Master was missing. When I went back to the study, I opened the box and found that all the gold, silver and banknotes inside were gone!"
At this time, Hong Xi and several other managers also hurried over. The gang had encountered this disaster and Ruan Xing had many changes. They dared not sleep well and woke up early. They were afraid of coming too early and disturbing the little devil's rest, so they did not dare to enter. They were able to come in time after hearing the news and catch up with the second half of the servant's words.
"Damn it, I thought that even though this little devil was cruel, I would be willing to obey her as the leader if she could help our gang get through the difficult times. I didn't expect that she was just taking advantage of the situation and ran away after stealing our money!" A manager spat indignantly.
A steward who almost died in the lottery yesterday immediately retorted, "Oh, you knelt so quickly yesterday. With her skills and strength, would you dare to resist even if she robbed you openly? You are a fence-sitter and a hindsighter!"
"Okay, stop arguing!" Hong Xi shouted softly, interrupting the verbal battle between the managers, and frowned, "How can you make a conclusion so early when the matter is not clear yet?"
"How could it be that she ran away with all the gang's cash?"
"That's great. Even if we survive this crisis, how can the gang operate without money in the account?"
"Ha, why not just hand over the property and disband the gang! There's no need to worry about how to deal with the city lord!"
Thanks to Honghuayiduo for the monthly ticket~
Thanks to book friend 160329153720453 for the monthly ticket~
(End of this chapter)
