The next life

"No, no, no..."

Even a man of his lofty rank and power could weep, feel fear, and scream in agony at this moment.

Zhao Jianchen had never imagined...

Never imagined that dealing with a mere subordinate, Shen Xintang, would cost his entire family their lives and rob the Xiao Clan of a genius of his generation!

A hundred Shen Xintangs wouldn't have been enough to make up for such a loss...

"Fu... Fu Yun..."

Zhao Jianchen's eyes widened as he stared at the madman before him.

"Don't kill me yet! Have you forgotten? We were classmates! When you first came to the Divine Strategy Manor, you didn't have a single friend. I was the one who took you out to play. Have you forgotten?"

Zhao Jianchen's voice trembled, and his throat bobbed.

"I haven't forgotten. Thank you for teaching me what it means to suffer endless humiliation, to face a class divide that can't be broken, and to live in a world that can't be changed."

Master Fu came to his side, blade in hand.

"What do you mean, a class divide that can't be broken? Didn't you rise above your class? If you had this kind of strength, you should've shown it sooner! Couldn't you have joined the Demon-Slaying Headquarters, even become its Sage, and enjoyed a lifetime of glory and riches?" Zhao Jianchen said urgently.

"Join you in consorting with devils, slaughtering our own people and sucking the lifeblood from the masses?" Fu Yunzi's voice trembled. "Zhao Jianchen, I'm not a man like you. I couldn't do it, so I chose silence! And even now, you still don't understand why you deserve to die?"

"I deserve to die?" Zhao Jianchen hurriedly shook his head. "I'm not the one who deserves to die. You're the one who hasn't understood, Fu Yun! Look at this world. What's wrong with us wanting promotions and riches? Yes! A lot of people have miserable lives these days, but they're all commoners. What do they have to do with me? What's a human life worth? A woman spends a few months eating some steamed buns and rice, and doesn't she give birth to another one? Can you stop them from having children? No, right?"

"Besides, what's so bad about devils? Devils are great. They're reasonable. As long as we deliver the goods on time, they don't cause trouble. They don't take our territory, and they trade resources with us. Compared to them, humans are harder to please, all right? Every one of them wants this and that, without even looking at what they are!"

"Brother! What's the essence of this world? Survival of the strong! As long as someone's strong enough, they're all friends. Who cares what clan or race they belong to? None of that matters. What matters is that we all feast and drink together, right? Give me a chance today, and this time I'll make sure you rise above everyone else..."

Crack!

Before Zhao Jianchen could finish, his head had already flown off.

"I couldn't hear what he was saying clearly. I just thought he was noisy."

Master Fu spoke to Xiao Qian.

"Husband..."

Xiao Qian looked at the headless, legless corpse beside her. Her whole body went stiff, and she rolled on the ground, convulsing.

Her eyes, ears, mouth, and nose were all twitching.

Her son was dead.

Her husband was dead.

They were all dead.

This was the price of everything she had done at the Hall of Law Enforcement that morning.

Now, it was her turn.

"Shen... Shen... Xin..."

Bloody tears streamed down Xiao Qian's face, but her torn throat could make no sound.

"Stop calling her name..."

As Master Fu spoke, tears poured down his face.

"Xiao Tang..."

He slowly raised the Demon-Slaying Blade in his hand and laid its sharp bone spikes and the savage power of the devil against Xiao Qian's neck.

The one weeping was still Fu Yun himself.

"In this life, I've let you down far, far too much."

"I didn't even have the courage to take that final step."

"I finally gathered my courage, only to take that step too late!"

"In this life... I've truly become a prisoner of regret, a slave to my own unwillingness to accept it..."

"In the next life, I'll cherish and protect you for the rest of my life!"

"I promise..."

"Alas..."

In his pain, his tears mingled with the rain, and his shoulders began to shake.

"Shen... Shen..."

But the dying Xiao Qian was staring behind Master Fu with a look of unspeakable horror.

"I said, stop calling her name!"

Master Fu said in annoyance.

"She... she!"

Trembling violently, Xiao Qian laboriously raised a finger and pointed behind Master Fu.

Master Fu's whole body suddenly shuddered.

"Hey, god of begonia flowers."

A familiar voice rang out right behind him.

So close,

So close...

Master Fu's eyes flew wide. He could barely breathe, and his whole body trembled.

He didn't dare turn around.

He was afraid he had misheard!

Impossible...

But that voice continued to sound behind him.

She said, "I have a pot of evening breeze. May I plant it in your courtyard?"

Closer still.

Master Fu felt as if he had been struck by lightning.

Trembling, he turned his head and then his body.

His Demon-Slaying Blade fell to the ground, and his eyes were already engulfed in tears.

He saw her.

Beneath the curtain of rain that filled the sky...

A radiant woman in a long, pale yellow dress was holding a pot of pale yellow begonias in her arms.

She was soaked through, but her face was radiant as she smiled at him.

Master Fu felt as though he had fallen into a dream.

He stood motionless.

Just looking at her in the rain.

"Shen Xintang!!"

In her torn voice, Xiao Qian let out a cry of utmost agony. "You... why aren't you dead... why aren't you dead?!"

She saw her too.

"Xiao Qian."

Only when the woman in the pale yellow dress saw that hideous woman did the tenderness vanish from her eyes.

"Hold this."

She shoved the pot of Evening Breeze Begonia into Master Fu's hands.

As if his acupoints had been sealed, Master Fu held the Evening Breeze Begonia and remained motionless.

The fragrance of the flowers...

And her fragrance...

So real...

The woman in the pale yellow dress passed him and came before Xiao Qian.

"Why..."

Xiao Qian reached out and grabbed the hem of her dress... It was real.

"Taking someone else for a fool again, weren't you?"

Shen Xintang pulled her filthy hand away and looked at her coldly. "Your Xiao Clan has been trying to kill me for more than a day or two. Did you think my uncle wouldn't take precautions against you when I lectured at the Divine Strategy Manor?"

"How... did you do it..."

Xiao Qian wailed.

She had already repaid Master Fu and Qi Lin tenfold for this debt.

And now she was being told that Shen Xintang hadn't died?

"It wasn't hard. My uncle hid his identity as a puppet refiner for years. He made a human puppet that looked like me, and I controlled it while it gave the lecture."

Shen Xintang gave Xiao Qian a cold smile. "Otherwise, given my temperament, if I'd really been on that platform, wouldn't at least half those Yang Devils have died? Do you think I'm an idiot, that I'd just obediently let them kill me?"

"Uh..."

This was the heaviest blow Xiao Qian had suffered that day.

"Xiao Qian, your son was outstanding, your husband held great power, and you had a happy, perfect life?"

Shen Xintang pinched her face and gave a faint smile.

"What a pity it's all gone."

Pfft!

Before Shen Xintang could even make a move, Xiao Qian spat out a huge mouthful of blood and died of rage on the spot in the Cloud-Watching Tower.

Thud!

Her corpse collapsed limply.

Her eyes remained open in death.

In fact, she died with her eyes wider than they could possibly be.

Only then did everything fall deathly silent.

The rain abruptly stopped.

The thunder also faded.

The first glimmer of light appeared between heaven and earth.

The wind began to blow.

It stirred the Evening Breeze Begonia and the hem of her dress.

In the Cloud-Watching Tower.

They stood with their backs to each other.

"An evening breeze isn't late. There's still a long, long night ahead."

"That shopkeeper really knew what to say. I didn't want to buy it at first, but after she said that, tell me, how could I not?"

She faced the gentle breeze, talking to herself.

As she spoke, she slowly turned around and looked, her eyes brimming with tears, at the man holding the begonias.

"Fu Yun."

"Can you marry me now?"