"S-sorry," Ju Xian squeaked and fell silent, not daring to ask any further even though there were many things he wanted to know.

.

​​

.

.

"This is a dress from Fu Xie Lan. If you feel better, change your clothes." Xue Ning who was still lying with her eyelids closed heard Wan Lie's voice so close to her.

"Dress? For me?" There was no response from him again.

Xue Ning tried to open her eyes, but her vision was blurry and slightly dim.

'What happened to me?' she thought closing her eyes again, she also felt a bitter sensation at the base of her throat.

***

Fu Xie Lan walked closer to Qian Cheng's house, with such agile movements she managed to enter the house without anyone noticing.

She then walked down the corridor in the house, towards where Hao was. Fu Xie Lan did not expect that the house she was currently stepping on had an area that she never expected. Along the corridor, there were so many rooms facing each other.

If Fu Xie Lan's guess was correct, that room was the Qian Cheng members' room.

Walking for about three minutes, she finally arrived in front of the room where Hao was.

Fu Xie Lan turned her head in all directions to look for Qian Cheng's whereabouts.

After feeling that she was safe, then the girl entered the room. It was so dark inside, there was no light at all, only light escaped from the gaps in the closed windows, and it couldn't help Fu Xie Lan at all to see where Hao was.

She then activated her eye power, and at the same time, her eyes caught Hao's presence in the corner of the room, precisely on a table, the creature curled up with his eyes closed as if he didn't realize that his neck was being in chains.

A sigh of relief sounded from Fu Xie Lan's lips, the girl then approached Hao. She didn't make any lighting using her mana because she didn't want to steal attention if someone was around her.

The girl's tiny hand rose slowly to touch the chain and tried to untie it. Gathered mana in her palms and with her magic, she tried to break the chains around Hao's neck.

One second...

Two seconds...

The chains were not broken, and instead, Fu Xie Lan felt that the chains were getting stronger.

'why is this?'

She again tried to break the chain using her magic but the result was the same.

'What chain exactly is this?'

'Why isn't it working at all?'

At this rate, she would have to change her plans.

***

Two male figures came out of the Zu royal forest with sour faces. The reason is that not a single animal has been successfully brought by them, only a few broken arrows can be seen in the hand of one of them.

The two men were members of Qian Cheng who just moments ago had been ordered to inspect the traps they had set yesterday. They continued to walk towards the hunter village where they lived while contemplating what kind of answer would give Qian Cheng.

"Why are you so scared?" one of them asked the other.

"Is that clear?"

"Just look, your forehead has been wrinkled since earlier, your hands are shaking too. It bothers me a lot."

"Qiao, aren't you really afraid? We came home with absolutely nothing. It's just a piece of the arrow from the corpse earlier, the chief definitely won't accept this and maybe we will both receive punishment."

"The chairman will understand. This is beyond our control, we only were to receive punishment from him, I'm sure he wouldn't kill us both."

The two members of Qian Cheng's hunting group were Qiao and Lim.

"Hopefully what you said is true," Lim replied with a rough sigh.

***

It didn't feel like it was getting dark, Fu Xie Lan didn't move an inch from her place

Footsteps leading to the room she was in made the girl put on an alert attitude. Fu Xie Lan could immediately tell who that figure was. It was Qian Cheng, with a black robe in his body.

When the middle-aged man's figure entered the room, Fu Xie Lan minimized the sound of her breathing, even her eyelids were reluctant to blink and watched Qian Cheng's every move, afraid of missing something.

He lit a lantern hanging near the entrance of the room then approached Hao, and lifted the little creature with a smile on his face.

"I didn't expect to get many preys at once, Hahaha." he laughed and then lowered Hao back into position.

"I also didn't expect that getting rid of them would be so easy."

"Wait a minute, I'll hand you over to that person," he added, stroking the creature's fur slowly.

Fu Xie Lan who was in hiding heard everything Qian Cheng said without missing a beat.

'That person?'

'Who was the person Qian Cheng was talking about?'

Fu Xie Lan wasn't so stupid as to digest it all. If her guess was correct, Qian Cheng's hunter group had indeed targeted them from the start.

'But why? Did I miss something?' her mind continued to observe Qian Cheng's every move.

Seeing that the middle-aged man had no intention of releasing Hao from the chains around his neck, Fu Xie Lan got into position.

When Qian Cheng turned around, Fu Xie Lan's figure was suddenly standing right in front of him with her eyes glaring at him, and it makes the middle-aged man startle and take a few steps back.

Fu Xie Lan didn't let the man take the chance to attack her, with a swift movement she aimed the dagger at Qian Cheng's neck and with such a nimble movement the girl twisted around and managed to grab the man's hands and bring it behind his back.

It didn't stop there, Fu Xie Lan again kicked the man's leg very hard and managed to make him kneel on the floor with his arms crossed behind his back, using fairy mana combined with her magic, she took out the plant vines and tied the middle-aged man's hand. Everything Fu Xie Lan did so quickly. It wasn't even a second, and Qian Cheng was already kneeling in front of her helplessly.

However, he didn't accept Fu Xie Lan's treatment. He is trying to scream for help but was immediately stopped by the girl.

"If you are trying to scream, this dagger will pierce your neck," said Fu Xie Lan, bringing her lips closer to Qian Cheng's ear, a sentence that was more like a death whisper and it was immediately silenced him.

The man hadn't realized who was threatening him, Fu Xie Lan's movements were so fast that Qian Cheng couldn't see clearly, coupled with the dim light coming from the lantern in the room.