AUBTN -Chapter 140 The Female Demon

She wore a palace gown of layered, flowing cloud-brocade embroidered with subtle dark patterns. On her face was a half-mask of gold engraved with an unknown totem, revealing only a pair of eyes that seemed both smiling and not, brimming with lingering affection, and a small pair of crimson lips as red as blood.

“Zheng—”

A slender hand plucked the strings, and the notes exploded into the air.

It was not the languid, decadent melody commonly heard in brothels. The tune began with a soaring momentum, filled with the austere killing intent of clashing blades and galloping warhorses. In the next instant it sank low, like the muffled murmur of a hidden spring. The fingering was intricate, and the shifting notes pierced straight into the deepest, most secret desires of the listener’s heart.

The hand with which Shen Jue had been idly playing with his walnuts suddenly paused. In those previously indifferent phoenix eyes flashed a trace of shock and dark hostility.

This melody…

“It’s a variation of ‘Rainbow Garment, Startling Swan.’”

Su Hewan’s voice was extremely soft, yet it reached the ears of the few of them with perfect clarity.

“The fingering is rigorous, with precise rises and falls. This is the style of courtly elegant music. A wandering, self-taught musician could never play with such a sense of discipline carved into the bones.”

【Holy crap, this boss even comes with her own background music!】 Yu Qing shrank into the corner, pretending to pour wine.

Inside her mind, a tiny version of herself was frantically spamming commentary:

【This aura, this grand entrance—she’s totally set up as the villainous female overlord! And this kind of ‘half-hiding behind a lute’ style… usually when they take off the mask, the face underneath can scare people to death!】

The song ended, yet its lingering echoes had not yet faded.

The “Immortal in the Painting” slowly rose to her feet, her gaze passing through the crowd before landing on Su Hewan.

“Today’s Bliss Banquet has welcomed quite a few rare guests.”

Her voice had clearly been specially altered, sounding airy and ethereal.

“Especially this young lady. While everyone else was drunk, you alone remained sober. And even…” she let out a soft laugh, her fingertips brushing across the strings.

“You could hear the hidden meaning within my music.”

Su Hewan’s expression remained calm, showing no fear. She only inclined her head slightly.

“I’m merely a vulgar merchant who does business. I understand nothing of music—only how to read people. Your music may be beautiful, but the killing intent within it is far too heavy.”

“A vulgar merchant, you say.”

The Immortal in the Painting beckoned with a finger. Immediately, a maid beside her stepped forward carrying a tray covered with black cloth.

“Since you are Shopkeeper Su, who deals in fragrances and powders, how about we play a game? If you win, I’ll give you thirty percent of the business of this Forget-Sorrow Barge.”

“And if she loses?” Shen Jue suddenly interjected. His tone was lazy, but edged with thorns.

“If she loses,” the Immortal in the Painting’s gaze sharpened. Her eyes swept over Shen Jue’s nouveau-riche outfit, and a faint trace of disgust flickered in their depths.

“Then she’ll stay behind and become fertilizer for my flowers. What do you think?”

Shen Jue let out a cold laugh, about to flare up, but Su Hewan pressed down on the back of his hand.

She stepped forward, her voice cool and clear.

“Very well. Please enlighten me.”

The black cloth covering the tray was lifted.

Five crystal-clear glass cups stood upon it, each filled with powder of a different color.

“Please,” the Immortal in the Painting gestured, her eyes full of amusement.

Su Hewan did not touch them. She merely leaned slightly forward and inhaled gently.

The first cup.

“Base of agarwood, supplemented with borneol, with three qian of white sandalwood added,” she said evenly.

“It’s originally a formula used for worship and calming the mind. But you added Cnidium seed—turning it into a cheap aphrodisiac.”

The Immortal in the Painting’s eyelid twitched.

The second cup.

“Storax, clove, and linglingxiang,” Su Hewan continued.

“But the color is wrong. You must have mixed in the juice of Western Region Drunken Immortal Peach Blossoms. Smelling it makes one’s limbs go weak and numb.”

Cup after cup, Su Hewan not only named every ingredient precisely, she even identified their origins, their age, and the preparation methods without the slightest mistake.

The crowd that had originally gathered merely to watch the spectacle had already fallen into dead silence.

Until the fifth lamp.

It contained an extremely vivid, blood-red powder. It had no fragrance at all—only a faint metallic scent, like rust.

Su Hewan’s movements stopped.

Her pupils shrank slightly.

This smell… it was far too familiar. In a modern museum, she had once restored an excavated fragment of an ancient prescription. It was the core poison used by ancient alchemists to refine elixirs of immortality, and also—

Su Hewan straightened up, her gaze sharp as a blade as she looked directly at the woman on the high platform.

“What? Shopkeeper Su doesn’t recognize it?” The Lady in the Painting spoke with a tone of contempt.

“Don’t recognize it?” Su Hewan curled her lips into a mocking smile.

“I’m just afraid that if I say it out loud, it’ll dirty everyone’s ears.”

She took a deep breath, her voice crisp and powerful.

“This is powdered rhizome of the Seven-Leaf Soul-Severing Grass. It grows beneath the sunless cliffs of Medicine King Valley and must be nourished with the blood of live snakes to mature. Used alone, it’s a deadly poison that makes people experience near-death hallucinations.”

“But you placed it here,” Su Hewan said, pointing to the Suhe incense beside it.

“When Seven-Leaf Soul-Severing Grass meets Suhe incense, its toxicity is amplified tenfold. It becomes colorless and odorless, and those who inhale it will die from ruptured heart meridians in a state of extreme exhilaration.”

The entire hall erupted in shock.

Su Hewan’s eyes were sharp as she pressed forward step by step. “Miss Lady in the Painting, are you appreciating incense… or killing people?”

The Lady in the Painting abruptly stood up. For the first time, a trace of shock appeared in her otherwise tranquil eyes—only to quickly transform into fervent admiration.

“Wonderful! Absolutely wonderful!”

She clapped her hands, her laughter carrying a slightly unhinged edge.

“Very few people in this world can recognize Seven-Leaf Soul-Severing Grass. Even fewer know about this mixed toxicity! Su Hewan, you truly are an extraordinary person!”

She slowly walked down from the high platform, every step graceful like lotus blossoms blooming beneath her feet, her attention seemingly completely drawn to Su Hewan.

“A talent like you—if you only run a rouge shop, it’s truly a waste. How about…”

At that very instant—

Lu Yan and Shen Jue exchanged a glance.

“Oh no, the wine’s hitting me! I can’t hold it anymore!” Shen Jue suddenly clutched his stomach and shouted in agony, completely abandoning all dignity.

“Guards, hurry and help your master to the latrine! Quickly!”

Lu Yan’s mouth twitched. Suppressing the urge to kick him across the room, he darkened his face and helped support Shen Jue. “Master, this way.”

Using that crude excuse, the two of them quickly slipped away from the crowd and ducked into the side corridor.

The moment they left everyone’s sight, the pain on Shen Jue’s face vanished instantly.

“This woman’s attention is entirely on Su Hewan. We probably have the time it takes to burn one stick of incense.”

“That’s enough.” A cold flash appeared in Lu Yan’s hand as a dagger was already in his grip.

The two moved like ghosts through the maze-like ship cabins.

Relying on the Jin Yiwei’s instinctive understanding of architectural structures, Lu Yan quickly locked onto a hidden door that was heavily guarded.

Two mute burly men stood watch at the entrance. Before they could even see who had arrived, their necks suddenly felt cold—two lines of blood spurted out as they collapsed silently.

Lu Yan kicked the hidden door open.

A thick stench of blood mixed with the rotting smell of medicinal residue rushed toward them.

Even Lu Yan—who had long been accustomed to the tortures of the imperial prison—couldn’t help but suck in a sharp breath.

This was an enormous secret chamber.

The walls were lined with unknown instruments of torture and tubes. In the center of the room stood several iron beds.

Lying on them were the missing sons of wealthy families.