A Word To Heaven

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When business grew bigger, there were more customers. When there were more customers, there were more troubles.

After the New Year, Plum Fragrance Tower, which had already made a name for itself, began to encounter various troubles one after another.

The first source of trouble came from Shen Liu, the man whose engagement Mei Sanniang had broken.

“Tell your madam to come out!”

Early in the morning, the limping Shen Liu stood in the main hall, disheveled and dirty, hands on his hips as he shouted: “She’s my wife! Behind my back, she’s running a flesh trade here. Did she ask the Shen family? How dare she make me wear a green hat—I’ll make sure she can’t do business for even a day!”

In these times, the aggressive feared the reckless, the reckless feared the desperate, and the desperate feared the shameless.

Faced with this troublemaking Shen Liu, the group of women couldn’t handle him. He was clearly here to cause trouble, and he was barefoot while they wore shoes. Mei Sanniang had such a large establishment right here—it couldn’t be moved or run away from. If Shen Liu blocked the entrance and caused trouble every day, attracting gossip didn’t matter since it was a brothel anyway, but if he really disgusted away several wealthy clients, that would be a huge loss.

“What do you want?” Mei Sanniang walked out from the back hall with a dark expression.

“What do I want?” Seeing the main person, Shen Liu immediately sneered: “Money. Not much—thirty thousand taels!”

“Bah!”

Mei Sanniang cursed angrily: “I, Mei Sanniang, broke the engagement with you first. You and I have no more connection. I’m not a member of the Shen family. Stop bothering me in the future.”

She threw out a two-hundred-tael bank note: “When I left home last year, I only had three hundred taels of dowry. I gave you one hundred taels then. Now I’m giving you all the rest. From now on, we’re completely severed.”

Hurriedly picking up the bank note, Shen Liu’s eyes lit up, then he looked at Mei Sanniang viciously: “This time it’s two hundred taels. Next time there’ll be more. I’m telling you, Mei Sanniang, I, Shen Liu, am not so easily dismissed. Hmph!”

Having gotten the bank note, the gambling addict finally left Plum Fragrance Tower. Judging by his direction, he was going gambling again. A group of women gathered around, chattering non-stop, all cursing that scoundrel Shen Liu. But these gentle, weak women couldn’t help much. Apart from their righteous indignation, they could only comfort Mei Sanniang to calm down.

Mei Sanniang didn’t look angry, but her expression was somewhat gloomy. When she looked at Shen Liu’s retreating figure, a fierce glint flashed in her eyes.

Xu Yan was busy at the entrance and not only saw this scene but also caught the murderous look in Mei Sanniang’s eyes.

Sighing inwardly, Xu Yan knew what it meant when his Third Sister showed that kind of expression.

When she had put poison in the well at Yuan Mountain Stronghold, Mei Sanniang had that same fierce, murderous look in her eyes.

Killing someone in a big city like Fengshan City wouldn’t be wise. Although Xu Yan thought it would be very simple for Mei Sanniang to kill Shen Liu, after the murder, it would inevitably bring more troubles.

Killing wasn’t good, but beating someone up was fine.

Following the principle of helping when seeing injustice, Xu Yan put down his work and left Plum Fragrance Tower. Seeing him follow Shen Liu out, the murderous glint in Mei Sanniang’s eyes finally disappeared. She smiled slightly, like a bullied sister feeling proud because her younger brother was standing up for her.

“Ouch!”

“Who threw that rotten fruit? It hurts so much!”

Walking on the road toward the gambling house, Shen Liu accidentally stepped on a rotten fruit. Not only did he fall down, but his only good leg hurt terribly. Rolling up his pant leg to look, the shinbone was dented in a large area, as if it had been viciously struck by an iron rod. It looked like this leg was going to be crippled too.

His pig-like wailing attracted onlookers. Those who recognized him knew he was a gambling addict and local ruffian, so people just watched the excitement without anyone stepping forward to help.

In the crowd, Xu Yan, holding a second stone in his hand, was also curiously watching the excitement. His watery eyes were full of sympathy, and he kept muttering “mercy, mercy,” making the nearby passersby think he was some kind of good Samaritan. Little did they know that the one who had broken Shen Liu’s leg was this very young man who kept saying “mercy.”

Actually, even if Mei Sanniang hadn’t shown that murderous expression, Xu Yan would have taught Shen Liu a lesson. The tragic death of the Zhao family girl at Yuan Mountain Stronghold had taught Xu Yan a principle: nip danger in the bud rather than wait until danger was upon you to think of countermeasures.

If Xu Yan had acted earlier and created some chaos at Yuan Mountain Stronghold, the Zhao family girl probably wouldn’t have fallen to that state and ultimately committed suicide by jumping into the well.

Actually, the past events couldn’t be blamed on Xu Yan. At that time, Lu Hai had been watching him closely, and he could barely protect himself—how could he save others? But even so, the little Taoist still carried a trace of self-blame in his heart.

Since he could see clearly that Shen Liu was a menace, Xu Yan decided to cripple his other leg. With both legs crippled, this fellow could only stay home and crawl around. If he could still crawl to Plum Fragrance Tower, Xu Yan wouldn’t mind breaking both his arms too.

After the Shen Liu incident, Mei Sanniang felt she needed to hire some guards. Such a large brothel couldn’t rely on Xu Yan, a half-grown child.

Mei Sanniang was very clear about Xu Yan’s abilities, especially that heart that was even more ruthless than her own. She didn’t want to involve Xu Yan too much—not because she worried about Xu Yan getting into trouble, but because she feared that if the little Taoist really lost his temper and created a massacre of thousands in Fengdu, she, Mei Sanniang, would also suffer the consequences.

Guards were easy to find—you just needed money.

The next day, Plum Fragrance Tower had over ten burly men with broad shoulders and thick waists. These guards only needed to deal with troublemakers and keep Plum Fragrance Tower safe.

The head guard was a man in his thirties. Both his hands were missing their little fingers. His surname was Wang, and his given name was Wang Tiedan. The name didn’t sound good, so he gave himself the nickname “Eight Fingers Wang.”

Within a few days, Xu Yan had become very familiar with these guards. No wonder—at first, Eight Fingers Wang thought this kid was a male prostitute at Plum Fragrance Tower. Only after careful inquiry did he learn that he was Mei Sanniang’s sworn younger brother.

A sixteen-year-old sworn younger brother, and the sworn younger brother of a brothel madam at that. After learning this news, every time Eight Fingers Wang saw Xu Yan, he would wiggle his eyebrows with a disgusting expression, as if he thought he knew some secret.

“Brother Eight Fingers, you say you’re a disciple of Ghost King Gate. Why are you working as a guard for others?”

When he had nothing to do, Xu Yan always liked to discuss the current martial arts world of Qi Nation with him. Don’t look down on Eight Fingers Wang just because he was a head guard—his background was quite impressive. He was actually a disciple of Ghost King Gate, a first-rate sect in Qi Nation.

“Brother Yan, everything about you is good except your mouth.”

Eight Fingers Wang, who had long become familiar with Xu Yan, squatted at the entrance cracking sunflower seeds and said with pursed lips: “Who calls someone ‘Eight’ like that? It’s only because I consider you a brother. If it were someone else who dared call me that, I would have punched them long ago.”

After demonstrating his punching position, Eight Fingers Wang looked at his fist and said: “See this? This little finger was broken off when I was fighting someone back in the day!”

To break your own finger while fighting someone—that must have been some deep hatred. Xu Yan perked up when he heard there was a story and quickly asked: “It must have been a blood feud, otherwise you wouldn’t have broken your own finger, right?”

“What blood feud? I didn’t even know the guy.” Eight Fingers Wang snorted and said indignantly: “I threw a punch, but who knew he’d pull out a sword! It’s only because I pulled back quickly, otherwise all five fingers would have been gone.”

Hearing this, Xu Yan’s eyes went wide. He’d seen stupid people, but never anyone this stupid. Using your fist to fight someone’s sword—wasn’t that seeking death?

“How did the other hand also lose a finger?” Xu Yan asked in complete bewilderment.

Eight Fingers Wang sighed: “Your brother threw double punches back then, and damn it, that guy pulled out twin swords…”