"To be honest, just after coming out of the Nether Pond, I felt the heavenly fire was even stronger." I lowered my voice to speak the truth to him, "But ever since arriving at Fengdu, something feels off."

"Your Yang Fire is a bit weak now, let me check your pulse." Yu Longting checked my pulse for a while, and his expression became increasingly grave.

I was extremely flustered, feeling like I had a terminal illness, "Could it be that I got injured by the surreptitious energies in the Nether Pond and developed an incurable disease."

"Not exactly, but it’s not much better." Yu Longting pulled me into his arms with a low sigh, "You’ve got your period."

"What period? What kind of period could follow me all the way to Feng... Fengdu?" I bit my tongue hard, feeling a tingling pain, "You didn’t mean a menstrual period, did you?"

My tone was quite sinister.

If it really was that thing, I really wanted to beat him up in the street.

Me on my period and he’s got that grieving expression like I’ve got a terminal illness??

"Yeah, can’t get intimate with you tonight." Yu Longting’s eerie, sinister tone had a hint of a coyness in it.

My heart instantly softened, I patted his back in comfort, then suddenly thought of something, "Then I... I don’t have... any bloodstains or anything, right?"

"Not visible for now, the charms we carried went into the Nether Pond, so they’re temporarily unusable. I’ll go buy some talisman paper and draw new ones." Yu Longting tapped the back of my head, then tightened his arms around me reluctantly, "Stay here and don’t move. With your current condition, it’s inauspicious to enter the alley. I’ll be quick! Don’t wander off, if anyone bullies you, beat them to death."

"Alright, you go ahead, you won’t be gone long enough for someone to bully me." I was completely speechless, Yu Longting treated me just like a child.

Even though he’s my husband, he acts just like a worried father.

Always afraid his daughter would be abducted by traffickers.

Yu Longting released a snake, and taking advantage of the moment when no one was paying attention, it actually slipped into my cheongsam, "Five minutes at most, I’ll be back soon."

With that, he darted into another narrow alley selling Peach Wood Sword charms and the like.

It’s hard to imagine that this side is a dark little shop selling evil objects and strange things, while that side is a whole street full of Feng Shui, Eight Trigrams, Wealth Gods, Kitchen Gods, and Peach Wood charms.

And the two sides coexisted peacefully...

"It’s quite a fate, little girl, and so we meet again." An old lady came towards me holding an oiled umbrella, her face whiter than wall ash, smiling like a flower.

The old lady had silver hair, but her scalp was black.

Even from a great distance, I could see white maggots crawling between her silver hair.

I frowned, instinctively reaching into my shoulder bag for my charms.

When I took them out, they felt so eerie they were unusable, and I remembered Yu Longting mentioning the charms were likely ruined by the Nether Pond.

"Indeed quite a fate, old lady, why do you always cling to me? Do I know you?" I took a hairpin out of my hair, pricked my finger, and quickly drew a Palm Talisman in my palm.

Isn’t she the old lady who turned to ashes last time when Qing Li gently pinched her wrist, yet here she was again, relentlessly haunting me.

The old lady was startled by my charm-drawing technique and laughed to tears as I clumsily performed the Hand Seals, "So it’s a dud, watching TV learning from Ling Zhengying, really thinks she’s a Taoist? I consider it your good fortune that I fancy you; if it weren’t for your pure Yin fate, suitable for passing on lineage with my son, I wouldn’t bother with you."

Having been caught off guard due to my weakened physical condition from the period, I was a lot slower to react.

Before I could resist, her coarse, calloused hand, clawed into my shoulder blade, dragging me away like a dead dog.