Chapter 41: Goddamn Him

As dawn approached and the sky began to lighten, Bian Chunzhou finished his usual night of cultivation.

The instant he opened his eyes, he still could not understand which utterly shameless bastard had run into his restaurant and stolen three whole barrels of fish.

He could not figure it out. He truly could not figure it out at all!

Bian Chunzhou scratched his head furiously. If a cultivator had done it, then why? Surely he had never offended a cultivator childish enough to pull something like this.

The fish were perfectly ordinary snakeheads. They had merely been raised in diluted spirit spring water for the past few days, which made their flesh plumper and more tender. They contained no spiritual energy, so why would a cultivator want to eat them?

But if it had not been a cultivator and really was the work of those people engaging in dirty commercial warfare, plenty of people had come and gone from the Shared Cup Tavern yesterday. Yet for ordinary people to carry away three enormous barrels of fish without anyone noticing—and without alerting those sleeping upstairs—would have been...

Harder than ascending to the heavens.

Wen Xu was exceptionally sensitive to scents and could also perceive information carried on the wind. He had said at the time that no one had entered or left the Shared Cup Tavern carrying a large quantity of fish.

This was truly...

Unbelievably strange!

A supernatural incident had occurred just as the restaurant opened. Although they had urgently transported another batch of snakeheads over and resolved the immediate crisis, there was no way Bian Chunzhou would simply write off the loss!

“No. I’m going to catch that fish thief!”

After finishing his morning cultivation assignments, Bian Chunzhou was preparing to descend the mountain and play “the great detective Sherlock Bian” when he received a message from Shopkeeper Rong.

“What? They were stolen again! Is there no law left in this world?”

The thief was really determined to fleece his restaurant alone. Wasn’t the East Market of Langyuan City famous for being peaceful and safe for business? Why did everything become so...

Disaster-ridden when it came to him?

Was it easy for him to earn a little money?

Bian Chunzhou stood in place and thought for a full minute. Then he turned around, returned to Kaiyuan Peak, and exchanged sect contribution points for two shadow-recording stones.

He refused to believe that the thief would remain so brazen after he installed surveillance cameras!

When Wen Xu arrived carrying the copper hot pot from last night’s delivery, he immediately sensed that his friend’s temper was especially fiery today.

“What happened?”

Had the restaurant’s opening gone badly?

Naturally, Bian Chunzhou could not keep his complaints bottled up. But when he saw the spotless copper pot in Wen Xu’s hands, he could not help feeling a little hopeful.

“Um... did you really give it to your master?”

Wen Xu set down the copper pot. “Yes. Master said it tasted quite good.”

Bian Chunzhou’s mood instantly improved. “Really?”

“Really.”

Not only that, his master had even dug out spirit wine that had been stored in the cellar for years. When Wen Xu left Spring-Crossing Peak that morning, his master was still drunk inside the main hall.

He had no idea whether the drunkenness was genuine or feigned. Last night, his master had grabbed him and spent nearly half an hour telling him sect gossip.

Some of it was surprisingly scandalous.

Wen Xu certainly had never guessed that the Sect Master used to enjoy making dolls by hand.

Bian Chunzhou cupped his face and began to grin.

The divine dragon had said he liked it!

Rounding that up, didn’t that mean Bian Chunzhou had gained some favorability points?

No. He could not allow the rotten mood caused by the fish thief to affect the joy he felt while preparing offerings and cooking for the divine dragon!

Besides, the shadow-recording stones had already been installed. By tomorrow, wouldn’t catching the petty thief be as easy as reaching into his pocket?

Yet the following day, when Bian Chunzhou went to retrieve the shadow-recording stones, he discovered—

“This isn’t right. This...”

“They were eaten?” Shock appeared on both Chen Zui’s and Wen Xu’s faces.

Bian Chunzhou took out the shadow-recording stone. “That’s not all. Look! She’s just a skinny little girl, but she eats an entire fish in two bites. A fish this big! She swallows it alive with her bare hands! She carries a wooden barrel as easily as someone holding a bowl of noodles. Three whole barrels of fish are no different to her than slurping down three bowls of noodle soup!”

“No wonder no one saw the fish thief,” Chen Zui said. “So the fish were eaten.”

The mystery was finally solved. He felt much better.

“The important thing is that she doesn’t even spit out the bones! Where do you think all those fish went? It’s terrifying. Could she be... a demon?”

No matter how Bian Chunzhou thought about it, that was the only possibility he could come up with.

Hengze Continent was vast. In addition to human cultivators, there were naturally demon cultivators and demonic cultivators. Their cultivation systems were different, so each group kept to itself.

More accurately, human cultivators considered themselves the orthodox heirs of heaven and earth and were unwilling to associate with demon cultivators or demonic cultivators. Demon cultivators were extremely insular and were mostly friendly only toward their own kind.

As for demonic cultivators, most behaved without restraint and indulged freely in pleasure. Their reputation throughout the cultivation world had always been rather poor.

Yonglu Mountain stood within the Yonglu Mountain Range, which was located toward the southern part of the continent. Most demon cultivators and demonic cultivators gathered in the north and central-western regions. In any case, Bian Chunzhou had barely encountered any of them.

The divine dragon did not count, of course.

How could dragons possibly be the same?

Besides, he had never even met the divine dragon Junior Granduncle-Master.

But even a demon cultivator should not have come all the way to his restaurant to steal fish.

Those barrels of fish were not worth many spirit stones. Could she be a little demon who had become separated from her people and was so hungry that she would eat anything?

“No. Tonight, I’m going to lie in wait for her!”

A little girl still could not be allowed to eat like this. His was only a small business.

Bian Chunzhou decided that he would skip cultivation tonight and go straight to the restaurant to catch her in the act.

Wen Xu asked, “What are you planning to do after you catch her? Hand her over to the authorities?”

Chen Zui said, “The City Lord’s Manor prison probably can’t hold a demon.”

Had the thief been some truly hateful villain, Bian Chunzhou would certainly have been ruthless enough to give them a beating.

But she was a little girl. Even if she could devour three barrels of raw fish, he could not actually beat her black and blue.

“Whatever. I’ll catch her first and figure it out afterward. At worst, I’ll hire some child labor!”

…

That night, the three of them descended the mountain together to catch the fish thief.

Bian Chunzhou had originally planned to stake out the thief alone, but considering that she was very likely a demon and demons were naturally physically powerful, even a little girl might be more than a rookie in the Qi Refining Realm like him could handle.

To prevent a fight from breaking out and damaging the newly renovated hot pot restaurant, Bian Chunzhou immediately stopped refusing their help.

Besides, Wen Xu also owned a share of the Shared Cup Tavern. He was a major investor who had contributed fifty thousand spirit stones.

The three of them found separate hiding places and waited for the petty thief to appear.

Yet the entire night passed peacefully.

The thief had actually learned her lesson!

Bian Chunzhou opened the lid of the fish barrel. The snakeheads inside were still jumping energetically, and not a single one was missing.

“Could she have decided that bad things shouldn’t happen more than twice, so she quit while she was ahead?”

If that was truly the case, Bian Chunzhou could only accept his loss.

Anyway...

He would just consider it his treat for the little girl, although her appetite was genuinely astonishing.

“It’s also possible she sensed the three of us and didn’t dare come steal the fish.”

“Then what do we do?”

Bian Chunzhou scratched his head. “Sliced snakehead is our second-best-selling dish after the lamb rolls. If it were something that didn’t sell well, I could simply remove it from the menu. But if I remove the fish, we’ll lose a lot of customers.”

The Shared Cup Tavern had only been open for a few days. Removing a dish now would be no different from smashing his own signboard.

Bian Chunzhou had also considered placing protective talismans on the fish barrels. But he was not at the restaurant every day. Cultivation was still his true occupation, while the shopkeeper and servers were all ordinary people.

Once those talismans were attached, they would block both the thief and his own employees.

“Let’s watch for another two days. If the fish are stolen again, we can visit Alchemy Peak and ask whether they have any medicines for dealing with demons.”

That was their only option.

The three of them waited until the shopkeeper arrived for work before leaving the Shared Cup Tavern.

For three consecutive days, the fish remained perfectly safe.

Boss Bian decided that he could only accept his bad luck regarding the theft. The loss was still within what he could afford, so he quickly put the matter out of his mind.

Who could have guessed that on the fourth day, the damn fish were gone again!

The little girl was even lying openly inside the fish barrel, fast asleep!

Wasn’t this a little too brazen?

Was there no justice left in the world?

When the shopkeeper saw the owner arrive, his legs were still trembling.

“Boss, you have no idea! I don’t know which wicked bastard put this little girl in there. Not only did they steal all the fish, they nearly caused a death in our restaurant! The water didn’t even reach above her head, but when one of the workers discovered her this morning, he thought she was dead!”

“That terrifying? Where is the girl?”

“My wife just carried her out and took her to the clinic on the corner. She truly is blessed with good fortune. Her entire body was cold, but fortunately, she was still alive. At least no one died in our restaurant.”

Bian Chunzhou fell silent.

Was it possible—just possible—that the little girl herself was the fish thief?

Unfortunately, even if he said so, neither the shopkeeper nor any of the servers would believe him.

“Take good care of the restaurant. I’ll go to the clinic and have a look.”

At the clinic, Bian Chunzhou finally saw the petty fish thief.

The shopkeeper’s wife was currently feeding her medicine. The medicinal soup was probably too bitter, because the girl’s brows were tightly furrowed and her face was filled with reluctance.

“Boss, you’re here.”

As soon as Bian Chunzhou appeared, the girl’s entire body became tense.

She truly looked very young, eight or nine years old at most. She wore a loose set of coarse linen clothes, but one glance was enough to tell that she was not a child raised by an ordinary family.

So was she a demon or not?

Bian Chunzhou had never met a demon before, nor could he detect any unusual aura from her.

He could not resist glancing at the girl’s stomach.

Where had she digested all those fish?

She was such a small child that Bian Chunzhou could not truly send her to the authorities. In the end, he did not expose her and merely asked the shopkeeper’s wife to take good care of her.

“Little girl, what’s your name?”

The girl said nothing.

The shopkeeper’s wife explained, “She seems unable to speak. Boss, don’t make things difficult for her. But since she’s like this, shouldn’t we report it to the authorities?”

That goddamned villain had committed such a cruel act that benefited no one.

The child was so young!

Had the girl not been present, the shopkeeper’s wife would certainly have unleashed a torrent of curses.

She could not speak?

That made things difficult.

The clinic was not a charity. After Bian Chunzhou paid for the medicine, he could only leave the girl temporarily in the shopkeeper couple’s care, then prepare to return to the mountain and discuss a solution with his friends.

Unexpectedly, the moment he stepped outside, he ran into Senior Sister Xia Ying.

“Senior Sister, what’s wrong? Did you find the He family’s eldest young lady?”

Xia Ying shook her head.

But when she saw the little girl being led by the shopkeeper’s wife, she froze completely.

Cultivators possessed exceptionally good memories.

And precisely because her memory was so good, she recognized the resemblance at once.

The girl looked exactly like Ah Qing had as a child. It was as though they had been carved from the same mold!

“Senior Sister? Senior Sister, what are you looking at? Senior Sister, calm down!”

The corners of Xia Ying’s eyes turned red.

“I can’t calm down! That goddamned bastard of a man—even his child is already this old! How dare he!”

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