Chapter 53: The Notes to Help the Youkai Move Their Houses (end)
Throughout history, the “carrot and stick” approach was the one of the more useful methods.
If they let the youkai move their houses without a good reason and forced them to follow the White-hart Taoist Temple, living with them and have to be regulated by them, many youkai would curse the taoist temple and even comply in appearance but oppose in their hearts and will eventually do something bad. That was still within his handle scope, but would be a big trouble to deal with.
If so, what he needed to do was changing “the White-hart Taoist Temple requests youkai to move their houses behind the mountain” to “the White-hart Taoist Temple allow youkai to move their houses behind the mountain”.
In order to survive, the youkai had to move their houses behind the mountain of the White-hart Taoist Temple. They would owe the White-hart Taoist Temple a lot. If so, the youkai should be easy to manage.
The only cost was that Xu Shenxing had to bear the youkai’s resentment.
Of course, he didn’t talk about this with Qin Xingyan. Because with his understanding of Qin Xingyan, though she was a carefree girl, she was a kind-hearted person. She wouldn’t agree to his plan.
Hence, he hid his lane. Moli told her his plan, then she had to play the role.
“Landlord, do you want to eat watermelon?”
Before anyone could notice, Moli had walked to Xu Shenxing and showed him half a watermelon.
“Hey, hey, hasn’t the sweet central part been hollowed out?”
Looking at Moli, whose face was covered with little watermelon seeds, Xu Shenxing smiled and softly rubbed her small head.
At least, no matter where he was going, Moli would always stay beside him. That was already way more better than his lonely experience in the past.
“My friend, please hold your steps!”
This time, a hoa.r.s.e voice called out to Xu Shenxing from behind.
What the h.e.l.l!? Are you freaking Shen Gongbao?! [1]
Xu Shenxing twisted the corner of his mouth. He turned back and found that it was the maple youkai Master Redleaf who was calling out to him.
“What? If you want to have a fight, I can play with you.”
“I came to say my sincerest grat.i.tude. Thank you.” Master Redleaf bowed to Xu Shenxing.
“A masochism!” Moli looked pretty shocked.
Xu Shenxing observed his expression for a while but didn’t see a tiny clue of irony. He finally
drew a conclusion, “Too bad, it seems that my punch was too heavy. It damaged your brain…”
“I was just blind. I didn’t see your true intention.” Master Redleaf just ignored Xu Shenxing’s offensive words and said slowly, “My friend, as what you had said, you didn’t want to hurt us on purpose, right?”
“…” Xu Shenxing was choked. He had to roll his eyes and did not speak.
He did don’t use his true power. After all, if he really killed any youkai, the hatred would make them have to fight to the death. But now, none of the youkai including Huang Laowu was badly hurt. Though as a yellow weasel, his face puffed out like pig’s face. But if he took a good rest for a week, his youkai physique would
let him recover completely.
“If you were really going to kill us all, you didn’t need to show the slightest of mercy. That means that you weren’t planning to hurt us from the beginning.” Speaking of which, Master Redleaf smiled bitterly. “I was too anxious that I didn’t realize this.”
“It’s just your guess. It proves nothing.” Xu Shenxing turned his head aside and said, “There is also a probability that I was playing ‘cat and mouse’. I could’ve left you alive for the sole reason of messing with you.”
“Tsundere man isn’t cute at all.” Moli lowered her voice but Xu Shenxing still heard her words, which made him feel pretty embarra.s.sed.
“I’m the oldest plant-type youkai in the woods. Except the White-hart Taoist Temple, all plants are my eyes and ears… after your leave, I investigated what you did before, and found that before your coming, you had told the mortal landlord that they must leave my true body in their territory, right?”
The old monk youkai smiled. “I don’t think that a person like you would kill the youkai race without reason.”
“No, believe it or not, I did have exterminated a race once.” Xu Shenxing murmured, then asked with doubt, “How did you know where I was?”
As a man with mosaic, unless Xu Shenxing himself removed his “Divine Protection”, in theory, no one could search him by using supernatural means.
“Because in all of the pictures, only you were covered with mist.”
“…”
In other words, it wouldn’t be a mistake to regard anyone who was covered with mist as Xu Shenxing.
“Will you tell the other youkai the truth?” Xu Shenxing frowned.
“Of course not.” Master Redleaf shook his head. “From the beginning, I supported to move our houses. I was even worried that where we should move. Since the people of the White-hart Taoist Temple are willing to help us, then that will be for the best. Your plan was perfect, I didn’t need to do anything else. But your reputation has been destroyed…”
“Never mind. I’m already used to that.” Xu Shenxing shook his hands. “Moli, let’s go… Ah, no! The watermelon is empty, you only left me the rind!”
While Master Redleaf and Xu Shenxing were deep in their conversation, they hadn’t noticed that Moli had eaten up the whole watermelon.
“If you freeze the watermelon rind, it should taste good.” Moli said seriously.
“That isn’t even better than eating preserved vegetable!” Xu Shenxing curled his lip.
“Friend, I know you are a n.o.ble character and don’t want any reward, but for the sake of all the youkai on Dan Xiao Mountain, I express my grat.i.tude.”
Afterwards, Master Redleaf brushed away his sleeves and bowed to Xu Shenxing.
To this, Xu Shenxing and Moli looked at each other. Then as if they had rached a tacit understanding, Xu Shenxing picked up the back of Moli’s collar, Moli with the watermelon sh.e.l.l in her embrace, and disappeared into the woods.
Even so, Master Redleaf still kept bowing. When he stood up from the ground, looking at the way Xu Shenxing and Moli disappeared, he shook his head and said, “What an incredible man… humans have infinite possibilities, no wonder that they can replace youkai to become the master of the world…”
This time, Xu Shenxing and Moli had reached the foot of the mountain.
“Get ready, we’re going home.”
Since he had helped the White-hart Taoist Temple, Xu Shenxing thought that it was the time that he should go back to Jiangjin City. After all, there were still many things waiting for him to deal with.
For example, teaching the guy who “cheated” him a lesson.
“Landlord, what to do with the mutation of the stream of spirit qi?” Moli was still picked up in Xu Shenxing’s hands. She looked back and asked.
“Oh…”
Right, he remembered it. Qin Xingyan was back to the White-hart Taoist Temple for that…
[1] Shen Gongbao: a negative character from the novel “Invest.i.ture of the G.o.ds”. Every time he said “My friend, please hold your steps!”, the person he talked to would die in the following chapters