The snake-tail tendrils on the three-year-old boy's head, combined with the rumors, made the villagers unshakeable in their conviction.

No one's heart softened. The village well could not be without water for a single day. The child had to be thrown into it, handed over to the Well Dragon King for judgment.

Even without the rumors, even if the well hadn't run dry, the child couldn't be allowed to live. He was an abomination; how could he be allowed to exist in the world of men?

Abominations must die. This was true not just in a superstitious village like this one; even people in a big city, upon seeing a boy's head covered in snake-tail tendrils, would find the thought so terrifying they would choose to kill him.

However, in modern times, under the protection of the law and science, a child is innocent no matter what.

But in ancient times, forget a case like this one. Even if a child were born with a slightly severe deformity, it would be called 'a crime against Heaven.'

Such a label carried immense weight. It was seen as Heaven's punishment for you, perhaps for some evil committed in a past life, now receiving its karmic retribution. In such cases, the child had to be… dealt with.

The typical method was to dig a pit at night and bury the child alive.

Some were declared stillborn the moment they were born, even if they were alive, and then buried.

Those who couldn't bear it might abandon the child in a remote part of the deep mountains, leaving them to fend for themselves. But fundamentally, these children could not escape their fate of death.

Even a child born to the Emperor, if afflicted in such a way, could not escape death.

The villagers now believed that the village belle's child should have been killed at birth. Letting him live for three years was what brought disaster upon them.

And so, the abominable little boy was carried away. The village belle tried desperately to stop them, crying ceaselessly. Even if the child was an abomination, a scourge, he had still come from her own womb.

The ten months of pregnancy, the pain of childbirth—how could anyone else possibly understand?

Besides, he was the only thing she had. If her child was gone, she would have no family left in this world.

But the villagers were dead set on their course. How could one weak woman stop them? The three-year-old boy was carried to the mouth of the well. His hands and feet were bound, a stone was tied to his legs, and he was mercilessly thrown to the bottom.

"No... Don't! My son!"

Beside the well, the village belle's cries were heart-wrenching, her sorrow absolute. It was as if she had been abandoned by the entire world.

Her only family in this world, her only child, had just been brutally killed.

The childish voice of her son, who had already learned to speak, echoed in her mind.

"Mother, is Wu'Er a monster? Why am I different from the other children?"

"Mother, why are you crying? Did Wu'Er make you angry again?"

"Mother, even though I don't have a father... just as the earth can't exist without the sky, I can't exist without you. Wu'Er will grow up fast and take care of you, Mother!"

Such a young child, his clear little voice bursting with a firm vow to his mother.

The light faded from the village belle's eyes. She looked up at the gray, hazy sky and took a deep breath of the wind blowing against her face. Like a vibrant flower, all the life in her grew dim and, in an instant, she withered.

"Wu'Er, Mother won't leave you behind. I'm coming…"

With a final, tear-filled scream to the heavens, the village belle threw herself into the well. Her body didn't float but sank straight into its depths.

The nearby villagers looked at each other in dismay. They had only wanted to dispose of the little abomination and hand him over to the Well Dragon King; they never wanted the village belle to die too.

The old village chief quickly ordered men to go down and retrieve them, but strangely, the bottom of the well was empty. They found nothing. After searching for days, they couldn't find the village belle's body, nor that of the abominable boy.

The people of Ping'an Village were all uneasy, no longer sure if what they had done was right or wrong.

They were all simple, honest villagers. They had never wanted to harm anyone in their lives, only to live out their days in peace.

Whether it was a coincidence or not, a few days later, a torrential downpour ended the village's drought. The well filled with water, and the anxious villagers' hearts were greatly eased.

They hadn't done wrong. As soon as the little abomination died, the heavens sent a great rain, and the nearly dry well returned to normal. It must have been the Well Dragon King who sent the rain. Moreover, it seemed the spring was constantly overflowing with water.

Everything was back to the way it was, returned to normal.

It was just that afterward, whenever the villagers drew water, they always felt a little unsettled, knowing that two bodies were buried in the depths of the well.

But as time passed, three years later, everyone had gradually forgotten the incident.

If Tie San's body hadn't been fished out, no one would have wanted to remember or even mention it.

"You ignorant fools! Just like that, you took two innocent lives!"

After hearing the whole story, Celestial Master Zhang's face was livid with rage. 'These villagers deserve to die,' he thought furiously. 'You throw another's child into a well, you might as well have murdered that poor woman yourself.'

Tu Xiao'an's expression was also grim. 'This kind of absurd thing only happens in superstitious, feudal societies, right?'

A villager retorted, "Celestial Master, you didn't see the boy! His head was covered in snake-tail tendrils, without a single normal strand of hair. If that's not an abomination, what is?"

Celestial Master Zhang opened his mouth to reply but was at a loss for words. What could he say? That no matter what, it was still a life?

Tu Xiao'an fell into deep thought. 'The village belle's son was certainly strange, and there are many questionable parts to this whole story.'

'Who was the boy's father? It seems that after the mother and son died, the matter was considered closed. The father never appeared from beginning to end.'

'Also, the boy having snake tails on his head is truly bizarre. Could it be some kind of genetic mutation?'

'Or was the man the village belle was involved with... not human?'

Suddenly, Tu Xiao'an recalled the Snake Born Woman from his previous mission—how an Ancient Cultivated Snake had used a woman's body to gestate its offspring.

'Could this be a similar case?'

'But that's not right. Although that Cultivated Snake used a woman's body, the embryo in Shu Yao's belly had the form of a snake.'

'This village belle's child, aside from the snake-tail tendrils on his head, was no different from a normal baby in any other way.'

'If he wore a hat, you wouldn't be able to tell at all.'

Now that Ping'an Village was suffering retaliation from a hidden Snake Spirit, connecting it to this absurd story, Tu Xiao'an was almost certain that the village belle's secret lover was that very Snake Spirit.

'Her taste couldn't have been *that* exotic, could it?'

'The mental image was something he didn't dare to dwell on.'

Then Tu Xiao'an considered a deeper possibility. 'Even if a being at the Rank Two Snake Spirit Level did... something with a human woman...'

'...the result would basically be the same as the situation with Shu Yao, the Snake Born Woman. It would be impossible to give birth to a child that had human arms and legs, with everything normal except for the snake-tail tendrils.'

'But there is one other possibility.'

'That this wasn't a mere Snake Spirit, but a Rank Three Creature that had already attained a higher state of being.'

'One that could take human form.'

'Think about it. The village belle looked down on all the young men in the village, which means she had high standards. How could she possibly... do *that* with a giant snake?'

'Her tastes couldn't have been so exotic as to be earth-shatteringly, supernaturally bizarre.'

'Only a Rank Three Creature that had achieved Transformation could have fooled her, causing her to fall into its trap unwittingly.'

'And only a Rank Three Creature that had attained a higher state would be able to hide so well that even Tu Xiao'an, the enthroned Snake King, couldn't find it.'

'Otherwise, with the aura of the Snake Race so dense throughout the village, he could have found it with his eyes closed.' 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝘦𝓌𝑒𝑏𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝘭.𝒸𝘰𝑚

'If his guess was right, then this situation was a whole lot more serious than he'd thought.'

'The fact that Ping'an Village hadn't been wiped out already was an absolute miracle.'