A Life Thinner Than Paper, a Tongue-Cutting Slave

"Second Uncle."

Fang Shu came back to his senses and spoke.

So the other man had noticed him long ago.

Yu the Second nodded. After patting Fang Shu on the shoulder, he pointed at the bowl of milk food, signaling him to eat it.

Fang Shu was still hesitating when a mature woman's teasing voice suddenly drifted out from inside the milk shop:

"Oh? Is this young master worried that the milk in my shop isn't fresh?"

He looked up and saw that the milk shop beauty, a woman in her thirties, was casting a flirtatious smile at the uncle and nephew.

"Don't worry, it was all freshly milked." After teasing him, the milk shop beauty seemed to know Second Uncle. Her red lips curved toward Fang Shu as she asked:

"Your nephew?"

Second Uncle nodded, a reserved smile on his face.

"No wonder you're being so generous today. You actually brought money to do business with this old lady." The milk shop beauty rolled her eyes and said irritably, "So it's because you two uncle and nephew are so close—you came especially to build up your nephew's health and put on a show. Here I thought this bastard had finally grown a conscience."

Clearly, the milk shop beauty had seen that, among the four who came ashore, Fang Shu alone had lacked the money to buy milk food.

Second Uncle did not respond. He only smiled, then tugged Fang Shu over to squat beside the milk shop and urged him to hurry up and eat.

Fang Shu said softly, "I haven't sold blood yet. I don't need to eat it."

Second Uncle showed no surprise and still told him to hurry and eat.

Fang Shu had no choice. Unable to refuse him, he asked the milk shop beauty for another bowl and split the bowl of milk food into two portions.

Second Uncle could not refuse him either. The uncle and nephew squatted by the roadside, each taking half, and happily began to eat.

The moment the milk food entered his stomach, Fang Shu's expression shifted slightly. He immediately sensed that it was different.

He slowly ate half a bowl and found that although the milk food was icy cold, his body warmed up—not with the heat of agitation.

Moreover, threads of something cool slowly dissolved within him, lifting his spirits.

Fang Shu seemed to realize something.

He silently summoned his Dao Register and immediately discovered that the [Lifespan] column had gained another three years in lifespan limit, showing that his physical body had been nourished.

"You get what you pay for. Milk food that costs fifty Greenfly Blood Coins a serving really has something to it."

He suspected that the faint coolness inside his body was very likely the spiritual energy spoken of in rumors.

Second Uncle's change in complexion was even more obvious. After half a bowl went down, his paper-white face immediately gained a little color and vigor.

After finishing, the two good-for-nothings licked their milk bowls clean.

In the end, Second Uncle even shamelessly managed to beg the milk shop beauty for two bowls of the dregs water left over from making the milk food.

Half a bowl of milk food and one bowl of dregs water went down.

Fang Shu immediately understood why Lü Daoist and the others had looked so blissfully drunk while eating it.

As the uncle and nephew finished eating and returned the bowls, the milk shop beauty suddenly said:

"Oh, right. That bastard Cheng the Jar is collecting rent.

"If you have any spare money, don't spend it here, and don't go drawing those chance lots either. Otherwise, you'll fall behind on rent, and Cheng the Jar will set your house on fire."

Hearing this, Second Uncle's brows visibly furrowed. Yet he quickly returned to his cheerful smile, cupped his hands toward her, and led Fang Shu away with swaying steps.

Besides eating milk food, Second Uncle took Fang Shu around the market and simply bought a whole pile of necessities. He even purchased two sets of clothes on the spot.

By the time they finished shopping, the sky had already darkened. Yet the market remained lively, even livelier than during the day, having transformed into a night market.

Only, all the lanterns in the night market glowed crimson, as though bloodlight covered the ground, giving it a rather eerie air.

As night was about to fall, the two made do with a meal before leaving the market district for home.

Along the way, Fang Shu had already mentally prepared himself for a crude dwelling. Even if the two of them had been sheltering beneath a bridge, he would not have been surprised.

Yet when the house appeared before him, he still froze for a moment.

Before him stood rows upon rows of thin-skinned houses arranged along a ditch.

Each house was no more than a zhang wide and only four or five chi high. Their doorframes were low, forcing anyone entering to lower their head and bend at the waist.

They stood in neat rows, pallid and white, all resembling the paper houses burned in graveyards, only a little larger...

It was not merely similar. They were exactly that!

With a scraping sound.

Second Uncle opened one of the houses. After squeezing inside, he immediately invited Fang Shu in.

The door was made of paper offerings. The bed was made of paper offerings. The short table and short chairs were made of paper offerings. The window lattices, walls, and everything else went without saying.

The only saving grace was that it was half underground. Once inside, the ceiling was high enough, and there was no need to worry about the whole place being blown away by a gust of wind.

A conversation soon took place between the uncle and nephew.

Fang Shu chose his words carefully, but still asked in confusion:

"Second Uncle, didn't you say that you were living a rich and flavorful life in Guling Town?"

At those words, Second Uncle gave a clack and took out a smoking pipe.

He lay sideways on the single paper bed and smoked with great relish, looking exactly like a crippled invalid ghost sprawled in bed.

Fang Shu's brows knitted tightly as he asked again:

"You also said that you ate fine food and drank spicy liquor here..."

Before he could finish, Second Uncle took a fierce drag from the pipe and slowly exhaled smoke at Fang Shu.

"Cough!" Fang Shu hurriedly dodged, but he still caught a strange fragrance mixed with a pungent spice that rushed straight into his nose and mouth, making him cough repeatedly.

What burned in the pipe did not seem to be tobacco, but incense candles and chili powder!

Seeing Fang Shu cough, Second Uncle looked embarrassed and apologetic. He quickly reached into the pipe and snuffed out the "tobacco."

Once Fang Shu recovered, his brows had twisted into a knot.

With his last shred of hope—or perhaps bafflement—he asked:

"Didn't you also say that you had become an entry disciple at some Daoist hall in the market district, and were preparing to enter a sect?"

At that moment, Second Uncle sat upright.

With meticulous seriousness, he rubbed the smoking pipe in his hand and used its charred tip to write a large character on the yellowing paper-offering wall: "Once."

As if afraid Fang Shu would not understand, Second Uncle added another character: "Before." He tapped the words "once before," his face full of melancholy.

In an instant.

Fang Shu understood completely.

His Second Uncle had... suffered a calamity and fallen on hard times!

While Fang Shu worried for his uncle, he looked at the thin paper house. The cursing and rent-collecting outside came clearly through the walls.

For a moment, he too felt desolate.

This rich and flavorful life of fine food and spicy drink was truly nothing like what he had imagined.

Still, Fang Shu found one point of comfort: at least Second Uncle did not seem to be the rotten person outsiders described. Clearly, he had merely lost his drive and was muddling through each day as it came.

With a thought, Fang Shu cautiously took out the original copy of the Mouth-and-Stomach Secret Sword Technique that he kept close to his body and began asking Second Uncle for guidance.

To his relief, Second Uncle gave him only a few pointers, yet Fang Shu's understanding of the spell deepened by several degrees.

Clearly, Second Uncle had also cultivated this spell into himself and had immersed himself in it for a long time.

Yet this only left Fang Shu more puzzled. Though the Mouth-and-Stomach Secret Sword Technique was low-grade, it was a complete first-tribulation entry-level spell.

According to the spell's description, the Long-Tongue Sword it cultivated could, after a little nurturing and once its needs for essence blood were met, enter the ranks as a first-tribulation magical artifact!

With such a spell at his side, how had Second Uncle fallen so low as to become a "blood ghost" who survived by selling blood?

At this moment, Fang Shu wiped his lips and removed his Long-Tongue Sword, intending to have Second Uncle appraise it.

The moment his Second Uncle saw the object, his expression changed drastically, his face filled with uncertainty and shock.

Fang Shu looked carefully and realized that Second Uncle did not seem shocked or gratified because Fang Shu had successfully refined the sword and nurtured it more than halfway. Instead, he looked furious—enraged!

Bang!

Second Uncle slammed his fist hard against the table. He rummaged through the cramped paper house, then clenched something tightly in his hand and charged out of the paper house.

After rushing outside, Second Uncle suddenly turned back. He smiled at the stunned Fang Shu and signaled for him to rest easy.

The commotion left Fang Shu utterly bewildered.

Within only a few breaths.

He heard shoving and angry curses coming from the ditch outside the paper house:

"Well, well, Yu the Second. I haven't even come to collect your rent, and you dare come looking for trouble with me, Cheng the Jar!"

Fang Shu sprang to his feet with sword in hand, intending to go outside, only to discover that the paper house door had been locked from the outside.

Though this paper-offering door was thin and offered no soundproofing, it was surprisingly tough.

Faintly realizing something, he stood inside the door with his sword raised, his expression shifting between light and dark as he restrained himself.

Just then, laughter and angry shouting erupted outside, footsteps became chaotic, and there seemed to be the sound of slaps.

Smack! Smack!

"Pah!" The man calling himself Cheng the Jar laughed as he cursed, "You tongue-cutting slave, you can't even speak clearly, and you dare falsely accuse me? Hahaha!"

That curse crashed into Fang Shu's ears, making his pupils constrict sharply.

He thought of something. Staring at the Long-Tongue Sword in his hand, he was incredulous and alarmed...