DLOBML CHAPTER 11

Chapter 11 — Infuriate the Demonic Master to Death (2) | What Do I Do If the Heroine’s Dad Really Likes Me?

Three months later, a band of purple clouds shrouded Dan-Cloud Ravine.

Xing Ge’s breakthrough came almost effortlessly. Her mind was already calm and round; the tiny heart-demon that formed at birth was flicked away in an instant. She formed her core without a hitch and stepped into the ranks of Golden Core cultivators.

Rich spiritual energy coursed through her meridians, like spring surging into a dead tree. Vitality poured forth, strengthening her at a frightening pace.

Seizing the chance, Xing Ge adjusted her outward appearance a little. She was not obsessed with looks, but even she had limits to how long she could endure that orange-peel face. More importantly, every time she saw it she wanted to sing, “Chrysanthemum Withers, Wounds All Over the Ground.”

Not that she planned to turn into a pretty young lord. She already had children and grandchildren. What bees or butterflies did she need to attract?

Besides, her heart was very much a woman’s.

So she became a handsome, middle-aged gentleman.

As the saying goes, appearance follows the heart. She stood a full seven feet tall, broad-shouldered and elegant, her bearing dignified with every step. She was a world apart from the shriveled, greasy old Luo Geng.

Ahem. Do not fall in love with me. I am but a legend.

When Xing Ge strode out of Dan-Cloud Ravine, the waiting wives and concubines were struck dumb.

Madam Jin was in front. She flushed scarlet before managing, “S-sir, you…?”

How had this cultured, refined man walked out of the ravine? The only one inside was the master. Could it be that something had happened to him at this man’s hands—

Her thoughts spun, her face turning ugly. Then the gentleman laughed brightly. “Madam, after only a few months you cannot recognize your own husband?”

It was the master?

Light leapt into Madam Jin’s lovely eyes. The other women blushed to their ears. They had not expected that upon regaining his youth, the master would look like this, graceful and scholarly, the very picture of a refined gentleman.

Hearts began to stir.

Xing Ge felt a chill under that pack-of-wolves gaze and hurried to change the subject. “Madam, where is Ye Zhenzhen?”

Madam Jin’s smile thinned, he had barely stepped out and was already asking for his eighteenth concubine, but she still called sweetly, “Bring Lady Ye to the master.”

Ye Zhenzhen stepped out from the women. After a few months living in the Bamboo of Clear Winds, her color had improved. She looked bright and spirited.

“Pack your things. Tomorrow, I will take you home.”

Ye Zhenzhen’s eyes flew wide. She had thought he was joking. She searched his face for a hint of mockery, but Xing Ge only descended the mountain with the wives and concubines, saying to Madam Jin as they walked, “I have missed your flower cakes these past months.”

A warm smile curved Madam Jin’s lips. “You flatter me, my lord. I will cook them myself today. You must have extra.”

Ye Zhenzhen dropped her gaze and followed the grand procession back, thoughts tangled.

On the road to her hometown, her feelings grew more complicated. She had died and been reborn, and despite all her efforts to avoid the old path, Luo Geng had still found her in the back mountain and taken her as his eighteenth concubine.

Yet things were different this time. Luo Geng had not touched a single hair on her head, nor sold her to that other beast in human clothing, the Foundation cultivator who would have fed her to demons.

“Eighteenth Madam, we have arrived,” said a little maid, lifting the swaying carriage curtain. They had reached the Prosperity Inn in Clearwater Town, her hometown.

“The master said you must be tired and hungry after traveling,” the quick-tongued maid chirped. “We will rest and freshen up here so that when we call upon your honored parents, we will do so in style. They will be delighted.”

Her words were smooth enough to coax a smile from Ye Zhenzhen.

As she helped Ye Zhenzhen alight, the little maid settled a conical hat over her. With looks like the eighteenth lady’s, they could not let lowlifes ogle her.

Xing Ge booked several private rooms upstairs. On the way up, Ye Zhenzhen clearly heard the gossip below, “What a pity about that Ye girl, wasted by some withered old goat,” and “Her poor parents, I saw them yesterday, crying themselves half-blind,” and the like.

Ye Zhenzhen trembled, a thread of hatred curling up from her heart.

If not for Luo Geng, her parents would never have suffered such slander.

But just as that hatred unfurled, the man ahead of her let out a cold snort. “A pack of bumpkins nattering like housewives all day. Pathetic.”

Silence fell over the inn in an instant. Everyone felt, instinctively, that one more word and their tongues would be forfeit.

Who on earth was that man?

“Serve the lady well. There will be rewards when we return.”

He tossed the sentence behind him and strode to his own room.

“Yes, my lord.” The maid beamed. Of course she understood: the master wanted her to cheer the eighteenth lady up and draw out a smile. The rewards would be generous.

After half a day’s rest, they set out again.

Madam Jin had arranged this “third-day homecoming” from start to finish. Knowing the master doted on his new favorite, she made it lavish, even supplying a proper dowry after the fact, pearls and jade, silks and satins, everything complete. The gilded soft sedan alone made Clearwater’s residents gape and speculate about which family’s daughter was so blessed.

Father and Mother Ye, out shopping for vegetables, were swept up by the crowd. When the sedan passed, Mother Ye’s eyes filled at the sight. “My poor Zhen girl. Why is her fate so bitter…”

Father Ye sighed, bitter and weary. “Perhaps this is what they call fate.”

They were ordinary folk. Who would have expected to bear a daughter so beautiful she drew envy and trouble?

What they did not expect was that the girl in the sedan heard their familiar voices. Ye Zhenzhen lifted the curtain. Seeing her parents, aged by grief, she burst into tears. “Father, Mother!”

The couple froze for a long moment. Mother Ye, startled into certainty, looked up. In the little lattice window was her daughter’s charming face.

“Zhen girl…”

Well then, reunion on the roadside it was.

In less than half a day, word had spread through Clearwater Town: Ye Zhenzhen had returned in splendor. Rumor had it her husband was tall and handsome, nothing like the gossip of an old, lecherous wreck.

Ye Zhenzhen abandoned the sedan and walked home with her parents.

Meeting the legendary son-in-law, Father and Mother Ye were torn, furious that he had stolen their daughter without a word, yet relieved to see he was handsome, wealthy, and noble. Conflicted, they left the returning son-in-law to cool his heels.

Xing Ge thought, Please, speak up. If you object, the marriage will be null and void!

The stalemate did not last.

Ye Zhenzhen had a little brother, seven or eight, at the perfect age for mischief. Seeing his “brother-in-law,” who was patient, generous, and ready to buy him anything, the boy latched on like glue.

Watching the man outside spinning bamboo dragonflies with the little brother, Mother Ye chopped vegetables and whispered to her daughter, “So… how is he with you?”

Ye Zhenzhen flushed. She knew exactly what her mother wanted to ask. “Mother! Why are you asking that!”

Father Ye, who had been pretending to be furniture, could not help chiming in. “Daughter, this concerns your whole life…”

Unable to fend them off, Ye Zhenzhen finally snapped and shouted toward the courtyard, “Little Leaf! Come carry the dishes!”

The boy muttered under his breath. Since when was his sister this cranky?

Then half a year slipped by.

Ye Zhenzhen turned fifteen. This was the year she would ascend the mountain to take a master. From then on, the sky would be wide and the sea open, her life brilliant.

By the power of the heroine’s fate, she did indeed find the Sumeru Ring. For a moment she wanted to tell Luo Geng, but reason won. Had she not suffered enough at men’s hands in her past life? No matter how well he treated her now, she would not be a fool. She would carve her place in the cultivation world with the ring.

After the New Year came the once-in-a-decade disciple intake for the Xiaoyao Sect. Xing Ge could only accompany Ye Zhenzhen to bid her parents farewell.

She was still a young girl. At the moment of parting, Ye Zhenzhen wept like rain.

“Xiao Geng, I’m entrusting my daughter to you,” Father Ye said hoarsely, holding back tears. “Treat her well. If you don’t, these old bones will haunt you from the coffin.”

The weight of those words, entrusting a life, settled on Xing Ge’s shoulders like a mountain.

Is it just me, or does the heroine’s dad actually like me?

And, um, would the male lead kill her for this someday? Orz…

“I will. Don’t worry.”

Xing Ge held the sobbing girl stiffly. Fortunately, her face had long practiced being a blank mask. No one could see the panic underneath.

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