Chapter 314 - 300: Any Nascent Soul Stage Experts Online?
"Speak! What in the world happened?!" Mr. An was trembling with rage. "If none of you can give me a straight answer, you can all forget about working for the An Family ever again!"
The atmosphere in the ancestral hall instantly dropped to a freezing point.
The servants kneeling on the floor were scared into silence, burying their heads even lower. They were terrified of their master’s anger turning on them. Fortunately, while Mr. An was wealthy, he wasn’t from a gentry clan or one of the so-called "scholar" families. At least they didn’t have to worry about being buried alive with the young miss over this.
After a moment of silence, the old servant who was usually in charge of cleaning the ancestral hall finally spoke, his voice trembling. "M-Master... This servant... this servant has been guarding the entrance the entire time. Other than... other than people from our own household, I really... I really haven’t seen any outsiders come in..."
The moment he finished speaking, the steward in charge of procurement grew anxious. He threw all decorum about status and seniority to the wind and immediately tried to shift the blame. "Mr. Li! What are you implying?! Are you saying one of our own stole the young miss’s body?! I’ve been out all day running errands for her funeral, buying incense and joss paper! I haven’t set foot back in the mansion!"
"I... I wasn’t saying it was you!" Mr. Li retorted, flustered by the accusation. "But I’m telling the truth! The ancestral hall is a sacred place. I wouldn’t dare leave my post for even a second!"
"Then you were just negligent!" a house guard on night watch couldn’t help but chime in. "Someone probably snuck in while you were dozing off!"
"Bullshit!" Mr. Li’s face flushed with anger. "I didn’t even dare to close my eyes! What about you? In the middle of the night, I clearly saw you sneaking around the young miss’s courtyard! Speak up! Did you see something?!"
"I... I was just getting up to relieve myself! Is that a crime?!" The night guard’s face turned pale. "Don’t you dare slander me!"
In an instant, the entire ancestral hall descended into chaos.
One accused another of being suspicious, while that one called the first dishonest. Every little grudge accumulated over the years was magnified in this moment. Everyone desperately tried to push the blame off themselves and onto someone else.
Watching this scene of mutual blame-shifting, Mr. An felt the world spin around him, a storm of rage and grief churning in his chest.
He pointed toward the door and, with all his might, let out a final roar:
"All of you, shut up!! Now get out and search!! Tear Anhe City apart if you have to, but find my daughter!! If you can’t find her, then you can all get the hell out of the An Family!!"
...
The servants and guards of the An Mansion flooded noisily onto the streets of Anhe City.
They split up, combing through streets and alleys, questioning everyone they saw, desperate to find even the faintest clue about the young miss’s stolen body.
At first, they found nothing. Then, one of the gatekeepers questioned the owner of a tea stall near the Su Mansion.
"A suspicious person?" The owner fanned himself with a cattail fan, thought for a moment, and slapped his thigh. "Oh! Now that you mention it, I do remember something! Just a little while ago when I came back, I think I saw that storyteller, Mu Ling. Yes, that was him! He was acting all furtive, and with a few other people, they carried a huge wooden crate into the Su Mansion!"
Mu Ling?!
The gatekeeper’s mind went BUZZ. He remembered instantly! It was that Mu Ling!
’After the young miss’s accident, he came to the An Mansion’s gate causing a scene, crying and shouting to see the master, begging for one last look at the young miss. He kept muttering things like, "She would never have taken her own life!" I was the one who took a few guards and threw him out because he was bringing bad luck!’
’And he still wanted to see the master? Does he not know how the word "death" is written? It’s a good thing I stopped him. If the master had seen him, he might have been angered to death.’
’And now look! That Mu Ling! The nerve of that kid!’
’The young miss was so precious and pampered, how did she fall for a poor, shabby storyteller like him? The authorities already closed the case, but he couldn’t produce a shred of evidence and just kept making a scene!’
’We wouldn’t let you in to bother the master, so what do you do? You go and steal the young miss’s body?! You’ve really outdone yourself, haven’t you!’
’None of us servants even noticed that the young miss was sick with grief from missing her mother. As her fiancé, could you not tell either? Now that she’s gone, you’re putting on this act of a heartbroken lover!’
The more he thought about it, the more certain he became!
It had to be Mu Ling! He must have thought the authorities were unreliable, and since he couldn’t get into the An Mansion, he decided to go all the way—steal the young miss’s body and find that celestial from the Su Family to perform an autopsy!
The mere thought of the word "autopsy" made the gatekeeper’s legs tremble.
He had heard that the coroners from the magistrate’s office sometimes had to... had to cut open the body for examination! As for the methods of a celestial, who knew if they required the same?
That was the master’s precious daughter, the apple of his eye! She lived a life of luxury and privilege. How could she suffer the indignity of being cut open after death?! That would be more painful for the master than killing him!
’If... if that damned Mu Ling really causes the young miss’s body to be damaged...’
The gatekeeper shivered.
Even if the An Family didn’t have the custom of burying people alive with the dead, he could imagine that the enraged master would absolutely beat Mu Ling to death and make him accompany the young miss in the afterlife!
’Sigh... I just hope... I hope that when the time comes, the master’s fury doesn’t spill over onto us innocent servants!’
His pace couldn’t help but quicken.
...
「Anhe City, the Su Mansion.」
"Alright, Mr. Mu," Su Ling’er took a deep breath, having made her decision. "It’s getting late today, so it’s not convenient for us to disturb anyone further. First thing tomorrow morning, I will go with you to visit each of the people you just mentioned and see if we can find any clues."
She paused, her tone growing serious. "Also, about Miss An’s body... I suggest you return it quickly before the people at the An Mansion find out. Taking her body without permission like this could cause even more trouble, which would be counterproductive..."
Hearing this, Mu Ling knew the celestial’s words were reasonable. He could only suppress his grief and nod.
And just as Su Ling’er was wracking her brain over this murder case, on the other side of things, Lin Qingfeng’s sect chat channel was flashing frantically before his eyes.
He opened it and was immediately drawn to a bold, red message crying for help.
[Ji]: Any Nascent Soul Stage masters online?! Coordinates (XXX, XXX), there’s good stuff here! But I’m not strong enough to get it! Help! We can split the loot!!!
Lin Qingfeng raised an eyebrow. ’Isn’t this a call for me?’
’Hee hee hee hee hee! Looks like Ji has stumbled upon something good that he can’t handle himself. In that case, I’ll just have to *help* him solve his little problem!’