"Who's there?!"
The women cultivating beneath the tree were startled awake and looked toward the outside of Bai Yujing, visibly displeased.
But when they saw that the other party was a woman—and a married woman with her hair pinned up, at that—their expressions turned strange as they looked at Qin Feng, as if asking whether he'd gotten himself tangled up in another love affair.
"This has nothing to do with me!!"
Qin Feng hurriedly pulled Murong Jing over, urging her to clear his name.
"It's Lingxiao Saintess!"
Murong Jing immediately fumed, "I've never seen anyone so shameless! She's a guest, yet she's acting even more domineering than the host. Who does she think she is? Why should Senior Brother Qin return the Twelve Star Beads to her?!"
"She's Lingxiao Saintess!?"
The women's eyes instantly cleared.
While Qin Feng had been busy helping Tian Tian plug holes and pay off debts, they'd heard Yourong talk about Lingxiao Saintess and learned that she and Qin Feng had some history between them.
"Wait, that doesn't add up!"
Qin Feng looked puzzled. "The Twelve Star Beads may have come from Lingxiao Palace, but isn't Lingxiao Saintess overreacting a little?"
"Hmm!?"
Murong Jing froze for a moment, then knitted her willow brows.
"That's perfectly normal!"
Tian Tian, the hopeless romantic, spoke up first. "The Twelve Star Beads were her late husband's keepsake. Isn't it perfectly normal for her to want them back so she can remember him?"
"If you were talking about anyone else, that would be perfectly normal!"
Murong Jing shot her an exasperated look. "But she's Lingxiao Saintess, the first-generation Saintess of Mount Taibai Immortal. After the previous Palace Master of Lingxiao Palace died, she held the whole place together on her own and raised an Immortal Emperor. She's a formidable woman."
"I