Just as he was about to laugh at his own thought, Lan WangJi spoke again, “The legs.”
With his reminder, Wei WuXian finally remembered. He overlooked the fact that the Curse Mark didn’t spread any further than his legs. He quickly called, “Take off the pants! Take off the pants!”
Nie HuaiSang was shocked to death, “Why would you say such a shameful thing in front of HanGuang-Jun?”
Wei WuXian responded, “How was it shameful? We’re all men, anyways. Help me take off all of the corpses’ pants. Only the male corpses! This has nothing to do with the female ones.” As he spoke, he started reaching out toward the belt sashes of the corpses on the ground. It really was unfortunate for Nie HuaiSang. He didn’t expect at all that, after confessing everything yesterday, today, he needed to take off the corpses’ pants right inside the Saber Hall of his ancestors. Moreover, they were male corpses. With a face full of tears, he thought that, for sure, after he died, he would be slapped once on the face by every ancestor in the QingheNie Sect and end up injured so badly that he’d be handicapped even after he reincarnated. Luckily, Wei WuXian’s act was stopped by Lan WangJi. Just as Nie HuaiSang was about to praise how worthy of his title HanGuang-Jun was, he heard him speak, “I will do it.”
Wei WuXian, “You’ll do it? You’re really going to do such a thing?”
The corners of Lan WangJi’s brows seemed to be twitching slightly, as if he was holding something back. He repeated, “Do not move. I will do it.”
This was the worst of all the shocks Nie HuaiSang experienced today.
Of course, Lan WangJi wouldn’t actually use his hands to pull on the corpses’ pants. He simply used Bichen and lightly sliced open the clothing on the corpses, revealing the skin inside. This wasn’t needed for some of the corpses, as the clothes were already quite ragged. A few moments later, he spoke up, “I found it.”
Everyone immediately looked toward the ground. On both thighs of the corpse beside Lan WangJi’s white boots, there were two light, circular marks. The stitches of the flesh-colored threads were tightly sewn around. There was a faint difference between the colors of the skin above and below the stitches. Clearly, the legs and upper body of the corpse didn’t belong to the same person.
This pair of legs was sewn on by someone!
Nie HuaiSang was already shocked speechless. Wei WuXian inquired, “Who chooses the corpses that the Nie Sect uses for the Saber Hall?”
Nie HuaiSang replied with a glazed expression, “Usually, the past sect leaders chose and stored them when they were still alive. My brother passed away at an earlier age. He didn’t have enough, so I also helped him choose some… I kept whichever corpses that were complete with all limbs. I don’t know about anything other than this…”
It’d be impossible to get anything out of him as to who exactly sneaked the corpse inside. From the people who provided the corpses to the disciples of the Nie Sect, there were countless suspects. It was likely that the truth would be revealed only if they found all body parts and pieced the corpse and soul together.
Finally having managed to separate the pair of legs and the other half of the male corpse, Wei WuXian put them inside a new Qiankun Pouch as he spoke to Lan WangJi, “Looks like our dear friend here was cut to pieces. And, not only that, the parts were scattered all over the place—one piece here, one piece there. Just how much hatred did the murderer hold for him? We can only hope that the pieces aren’t too tiny.”
Although Nie HuaiSang still said “see you” when they set off, judging from his frightened face, he most likely didn’t want to see them ever again for the rest of his life. The two left the Xinglu Ridge and returned to the inn. Upon arriving at the relatively safe place, they took out the three limbs and started to examine them. As they had expected, the pair of legs were of the same color as the severed arm. And, if they were put close together, they would react strongly, vibrating nonstop as if they wanted to join together. But the efforts were useless, as there was still one part of the body between them that was missing. It was certain that they belonged to the same person.
Aside from the fact that this was a man with a tall physique, long limbs, a muscular body, and a high level of cultivation, they knew nothing else about the mysterious corpse. Fortunately, the ghost hand soon pointed at where the next step would take place—the Southwest.
Following its direction, Wei WuXian and Lan WangJi made their way to Yueyang.
Chapter 28 Dew—Part One
After entering the city, the two walked side-by-side through the bustling crowd. All of a sudden, Lan WangJi asked, “How is the Curse Mark?”
Wei WuXian, “Jin Ling was buried too close to our dear friend and got stained with quite a lot of resentful energy. It faded a bit, but it’s not completely gone. The chances are we can only find a way to remove it after we find the whole corpse or at least the head. It doesn’t really cause much trouble anyways.”
The “dear friend” was none other than the man that had been cut to pieces. Since they didn’t know who he was, Wei WuXian suggested that they referred to him as a “dear friend”. Lan WangJi didn’t say anything after hearing it, but he didn’t object to it either, which could be interpreted as a silent approval. Of course, he himself wouldn’t ever use the word.
Lan WangJi, “How much is ‘a bit’?”
Wei WuXian indicated with his hands, “A bit is just a bit. How do I explain it? Should I take my clothes off and show you?”
Lan WangJi’s brows shifted slightly, as if he was actually worried that Wei WuXian would strip right here and right now. He replied with an indifferent tone, “Take them off after we return.”
Wei WuXian laughed, whirled around, and walked a few steps facing backward. Before, in order to escape as soon as possible, he desperately tried to disgust others, from feigning madness to purposely losing face. Now that his identity was revealed, if he were anyone else, he would’ve felt extremely ashamed remembering all those things he did. Only someone with a face as thick as Wei WuXian would carry on as if he wasn’t involved in anything. Speaking of it, if he were anyone else with at least some face, he would never have done ridiculous things such as climbing into someone’s bed at night, insisting on sharing a bathtub together, and asking if he looked pretty after putting on makeup. Since he pretended that he didn’t remember anything, Lan WangJi naturally refrained from bringing up the subject, the two acting as if nothing had happened. Today was the first time he made such a joke again after his identity was no longer a secret. When he finished laughing, Wei WuXian immediately put on a serious face, “HanGuang-Jun, do you think that the people who set our dear friend’s hand in Mo Village and made it attack your juniors, and the people who sewed his legs on another corpse and buried them in the wall, are the same group of people?”
Both in the past and the present, in his mind, he directly called Lan WangJi by his first name, but he got used to the last few days of calling him by his title. Besides, him calling this name created a tone of exaggerated seriousness, sounding unexplainably funny. Thus, when they were outside, he continued to call him in such a semi-earnest way.
Lan WangJi, “There are two groups.”