Affront

When the pounding on the door and the shouting began, both the woman and Liu Lian immediately showed frightened expressions, each trembling slightly.

Chen Mu frowned faintly at the sight. "What is going on?"

Fear showed on the woman's face. She opened her mouth, just about to speak.

Bang!!!

A huge muffled crash rang out.

The bolted front door was kicked, and the bolt snapped at once.

Then a burly man barged in from outside with two others beside him, carrying a faint smell of alcohol. The moment he entered, he began cursing.

"You dared to bolt the door and leave me outside? You've got some nerve!"

"That slut you gave birth to dared to seduce people in Xuanguo Estate and nearly got me dragged down with her! Hurry up and get the hell out—what are you still doing here?!"

The man cursed all the way from the entrance to the inner room.

Only when he entered the room and spotted Chen Mu standing there did his filthy abuse abruptly halt, his brows knitting together.

Chen Mu looked indifferent as he turned to the woman. "Who is this?"

The woman glanced at the man, hesitated for a moment, then finally replied in a quiet voice, "Lian'er's eldest uncle."

At those words, Chen Mu roughly understood.

The man frowned at Chen Mu and asked, "May I ask who this young master is? Why are you here?"

His younger brother's wife had borne two daughters in a row without giving birth to a son. After his younger brother died, he had originally intended to reclaim this house.

But unexpectedly, Cui'er had sold herself to Xuanguo Estate—and had actually been chosen by the estate. That made things troublesome. Though she had only gone there as a maidservant, he truly did not dare cause any trouble, so he could only watch helplessly.

But a few days ago, Cui'er had died.

Liu Wan had naturally been overjoyed. He had come today intending to take this house and sell it for a little money, so his family could have meat at every meal again.

Chen Mu looked at Liu Wan but did not answer. He merely said flatly, "From now on, this place belongs to this mother and daughter. You are not to lay a finger on any part of it, nor are you to set foot in this courtyard again."

Liu Wan's brows drew tight. Chen Mu's clothes indeed did not look ordinary, but when he looked around, he unexpectedly could not find any servants accompanying Chen Mu. He seemed to be alone.

This left Liu Wan slightly surprised.

What young master went out without servants?

For all he knew, this could be a fake. Even if he was not, perhaps he was merely some ordinary nobody without any real power. Liu Wan had not been scared into submission so easily.

Liu Wan immediately sneered. "Young master, aren't you meddling a little too much? This is my Liu family's business, after all. It is not an outsider's place to speak."

As he spoke, he ignored Chen Mu and strode forward, reaching out a large hand toward Liu Lian beside him. He grabbed for her collar, intending to forcibly drag the mother and daughter out.

Fear appeared on both Liu Lian's and the woman's faces. Liu Lian shrank backward, but how could she evade him? Liu Wan was about to seize her.

But.

At that moment.

Chen Mu gave a soft, indifferent snort.

Spellcasters below Seventh Rank possessed no martial strength, but that was only in comparison to warriors of the same rank. They were still not something ordinary people could resist.

That soft snort sounded unremarkable to Liu Lian and the older woman.

But to Liu Wan and the two men he had brought, it was entirely different.

Boom!

It was like a thunderclap exploding from level ground, detonating inside their minds.

In an instant, it felt as though he had fallen into an ice cellar. A chill surged from his head to the soles of his feet, as if he had been stripped naked and thrown into the snowmelt outside.

Liu Wan's outstretched hand froze in midair, his entire body standing rigid.

With great difficulty, he shifted his eyes toward Chen Mu—and happened to meet Chen Mu's gaze, those deep, unfathomable eyes.

There were no words to describe the terror in that single glance. It was as though the Nine Hells Yellow Springs had suddenly appeared before him; the entire world was collapsing and shattering, even his consciousness about to be smashed into fragments!

What a terrifying gaze!

Even those high officials and fierce military generals did not possess such a dreadful look!

Liu Wan nearly suffocated. He could not make a single sound, cold sweat soaking through the back of his clothes.

The room fell silent, leaving only the sound of breathing.

Just as the atmosphere froze solid.

A loud voice came from outside, breaking the eerie silence.

"Out of the way! Move!"

Ren Yan came jogging over, appearing at precisely the right moment. He rushed straight into the room, kicked the stupefied Liu Wan, and shouted, "You dare offend Second Master? Are you looking to die?!"

"Our Second Master is a young master of Xuanguo Estate! If you anger Second Master, even if you turn to ash and descend to the Eighteen Levels of Hell, it still would not be enough to atone for your sins!"

That kick landed.

And the words "Xuanguo Estate" made Liu Wan's entire body tremble. He was kicked straight to the ground.

That finally jolted him awake, and a little awareness returned. His face was deathly pale as he looked at Chen Mu, his eyes filled with endless terror. The trace of drunkenness had long since vanished without a trace.

"I... I... this lowly one did not mean to offend you... I did not know you were a young master of Xuanguo Estate... Please forgive this lowly one's offense..."

Xuanguo Estate!

As a commoner of the Capital, he understood all too well the weight carried by those three words!

Cui'er's mere sale into Xuanguo Estate as a maidservant had been enough to make him wary, preventing him from forcibly taking these two old rooms. Let alone a young master of Xuanguo Estate arriving in person!

And besides.

That gaze just now was something he had never seen in his life. For an instant, he had even felt as though he were already dead!

Chen Mu looked at him coldly. "Do you remember what I just said?"

"I remember! I remember!"

Liu Wan knelt prostrate on the floor and repeatedly kowtowed, blood appearing on his forehead.

"Then add one more thing. I do not want to see anything happen to this mother and daughter in the future. If something truly does happen, then you will pay along with it."

Chen Mu's tone was calm and casual, without any sharpness or chill. Yet the more he spoke that way, the more terrified Liu Wan became, his heart trembling.

"Yes... yes..."

Liu Wan replied shakily.

"Get out."

Chen Mu waved a hand.

As Chen Mu's words fell, Liu Wan and the others finally felt as though they had been granted a pardon. They fled as if escaping for their lives, not daring to look back even once.

Watching Liu Wan and the others flee in disarray, Ren Yan let out a slight breath of relief. But then his expression turned somewhat bitter as he whispered to Chen Mu, "Second Master, you truly are kindhearted. But Cui'er's family... handling things like this may bring trouble upon you."

He could guess half the reason behind Cui'er's death. At any rate, she certainly had not seduced her master; it was simply that the nature of the matter had already been decided. If Chen Mu had come to smash things in anger and vent his resentment, that would have been fine, but offering comfort like this might well stir up trouble.

He was also afraid of being implicated himself.

That was why he had hidden outside rather than entering at first. Only after hearing that something was wrong, fearing something might happen to Chen Mu, had he helplessly rushed in.

"It is nothing."

Chen Mu did not care.

Perhaps there would be trouble, but it would ultimately be a small matter. He was now more than capable of handling it.

Just as Chen Mu was considering what else needed to be done, a silver-bell-like laugh suddenly drifted in from outside into the bedroom, crisp and pleasant.

"So there are kindhearted people in Xuanguo Estate too?"

"Who is it?!"

Ren Yan's expression changed. He shouted and abruptly looked outside.

But he did not see a single figure.

He only heard a string of laughter coming from different directions, gradually fading away. "This Xia merely happened to pass by. Do not mind me; carry on."

Chen Mu raised his head and looked in one direction, faint ghostly light flickering in his eyes.

Buzz!

The entire world suddenly became transparent and illusory. His gaze passed through the eaves and layer upon layer of walls, landing on a figure rapidly moving away.

The figure was petite and delicate, yet in the image reflected through Chen Mu's Spirit Sight, she was incomparably glaring. Dense bloody radiance intertwined all over her body like a blazing flame, nearly scorching one's eyes!

Her movement technique was nimble as a rabbit's.

In the blink of an eye, she vanished beyond the range of Spirit Sight.

Only a faint, indistinct chuckle remained, gradually fading into the wind.

A hundred zhang away, at the corner of a roof.

The young girl wore only a light yellow blouse as she stood in the snow. Despite the bitter cold, she seemed entirely unaffected. Her exposed wrists and ankles appeared even more crystalline and translucent than the vast white snow between heaven and earth.

"A spellcaster... he should not have entered the Directorate of Celestial Observation yet..."

"What a pity his rank is somewhat weak—and he is from Xuanguo Estate."

Glancing back in the direction she had come from, the girl murmured thoughtfully.

Without a sound.

She had already disappeared.

Specks of white snow drifted down again from the sky, slowly burying the faint footprints at the corner of the roof, as though no one had ever stood there.