If he weren't being trampled underfoot, and if the situation weren't so dire, Fang Jie would have patiently explained to the proprietress that eunuchs don't use scissors. Scissors can cut cloth into beautiful clothes, cut paper into delicate window decorations, and cut many things, but they're definitely not specifically used to cut that thing.
"You should leave!"
Fang Jie almost pleaded, his throat burning from spitting blood, making his voice hoarse.
"Oh, you heartless man! You're so young, yet you're already deceiving women! You said you wouldn't marry anyone but me, and now you've changed your mind? If you were a few years older, wouldn't you be deceiving people all the way to the palace? I hate heartless men the most! If I don't cut off your hairless thing today, I'm not a Du!"
She didn't leave; instead, she strode towards Fang Jie.
Mu Da's eyes narrowed, and he cursed, "Get lost!"
Mu Er waved his hand, saying, "Brother, don't let her leave. Skinning this short, ugly man is boring. This woman, though dressed in a rustic way, is still quite pretty. If we skinned her and made a palace lantern, it would be extremely beautiful."
"Don't delay things, hurry up!"
Mu Da said coldly, then ignored him.
Mu Er chuckled, abandoned the large dog, and walked towards the proprietress. "Don't worry, my skills are renowned in the capital. It won't take me long to skin a whole person. The lanterns hanging in the secret passages of the Dali Temple prison are all made by me; each one is more beautiful than the last."
"Really fast?"
The proprietress stopped and asked timidly. "It'll be quick!"
Mu Er chuckled, pulling a short knife from his robes and brandishing it as he walked, saying, "This knife has skinned countless people, but I've only used it twice since leaving the capital. The knife is lonely, and so am I. You may look a bit old, but you're still passable. You haven't disgraced this knife..."
Bang!
A sudden, muffled thud rang out, and then Mu Er vanished. Immediately following was another bang, as if something had crashed heavily to the ground. Mu Da quickly turned to look, only to see Mu Er embedded in the city wall!
Mu Er's body flew out like a cannonball, creating a large crater in the wall.
Too fast!
So fast that even Mu Da didn't see who made the move. In other words, he guessed it was the extremely rustic-looking woman, but he hadn't seen her clearly at all! He hadn't even caught a glimpse of how she attacked, let alone her movements. When they finally saw that Mu Er was completely embedded in the city wall, they realized the woman was standing where he had just been.
"The thing I hate most is people saying I'm old!"
The landlady muttered angrily.
Mu Er's back slammed against the city wall, shattering several bricks. His body was bent over like a shrimp, most of him embedded in the wall. The broken stones hit the ground with a muffled thud, followed by a cloud of dust. Mu Er coughed several times, blood trickling from his mouth. The impact was too severe; he didn't know how many ribs were broken. But he was, after all, a sixth-rank expert, and he endured the excruciating pain, struggling to get out of the wall.
Thump!
Another muffled thud, and then, the landlady suddenly appeared in front of Mu Er! A foot clad in a green embroidered shoe pressed down on Mu Er's chest, forcing him further into the city wall. Dust billowed again as Mu Er was completely submerged within the wall.
This scene left everyone utterly astonished. Fang Jie lay on the ground, his face turned to the side, mouth agape, staring dumbfounded at the landlady. Big Dog's eyes nearly bulged out of their sockets, seemingly still unable to believe what he was seeing. Mu Xiaoyao stood there, somewhat dazed, muttering, "How is this possible? How could they possibly hide it from me?"
As if hearing Mu Xiaoyao's mutterings, the landlady smoothed a stray strand of hair from her forehead and chuckled, "Someone like you is truly rare, able to sense the strength of others. Unfortunately… your cultivation is still too low. Hiding it from your senses is no difficult task. As far as I know, I'm not the only one in this Fan Gu City who can do it."
"There are others…"
Being trapped by others didn't discourage Mu Xiaoyao, but the landlady's words plunged her into utter despair.
"Of course there is. At least our master kept it from you, didn't he?"
She spoke casually, seemingly not taking Mu Da seriously at all.
"You...who are you!"
Mu Da swallowed hard, instinctively taking a few steps back.
"I'm your mother!"
The proprietress said this from at least twenty meters away from Mu Da. She took a step after saying the first word, lifted her foot for the second, and lowered it for the third. The fourth and fifth words were spoken to Mu Da face-to-face. The distance between them was less than half a meter; in the blink of an eye, the proprietress was standing right in front of Mu Da.
*Slap!*
A crisp slap rang out, even Jing Ye was shattered. The slap was so loud that everyone in the east of the city could probably hear it. Five clear finger marks slowly appeared on Mu Da's face, the veins clearly visible on them. This slap left the already stunned crowd even more dumbfounded. "Oh dear... I forgot to put in my strength again. If my husband sees this, he'll laugh at me again."
The proprietress looked at the red handprint on Mu Da's face and smiled apologetically, "I'll try again, sorry."
Although Mu Da was stunned, he dared not stand still any longer. He immediately tried to leap backward to avoid the proprietress, but just as he was about to push off, the proprietress's second slap landed heavily on his face. This time, it wasn't as loud as the first, but it sent Mu Da flying sideways. Mu Da couldn't control his body at all, and his back slammed hard against the city wall. With a thud, Mu Er, right next to him, was also embedded in the city wall.
"Awesome!"
The proprietress let out a long sigh of relief. "I haven't felt this good in ten years."
...
...
"Big sister, if you're done beating me, could you help me up first?"
Fang Jie bit his lip to make sure he wasn't dreaming, then looked pitifully at the proprietress and said, "I don't even know how many ribs he broke."
"Keep lying down!"
The proprietress didn't turn around and shouted at him, rolling up the sleeves of her floral blue cotton-padded jacket as she walked towards the two people embedded in the city wall: "I haven't had enough yet!"
Fang Jie obediently continued to lie down, but couldn't help but exclaim, "So domineering, so d*mn domineering! Now I finally understand why Su Tu Gou was so submissive."
The big dog also obediently lay on the ground, watching... The woman walking towards the city wall couldn't help but shudder: "Marrying a woman like that, wouldn't you be tortured to death? Fang Jie... you say her husband is still alive? A miracle... it's a f*ck*ng miracle."
"Actually..."
Mu Xiaoyao still stood there blankly, her eyes somewhat vacant: "She couldn't sense it... how is that possible? What method did she use... how could she hide it from me?"
The proprietress ignored the three men, quickly walked to Mu Da, and looked at the twisted man coldly, saying: "Looks like you brothers have done a lot of harm to women over the years, haven't you? You can last an hour, right? And you like to gouge out people's eyes and cut off their noses while you're doing it, right!"
As she said she could last an hour, her scissors flashed, and with a snip, she cut off Mu Da's manhood. As she spoke of liking to gouge out people's eyes, the scissors had already ripped both of Mu Da's eyeballs out of their sockets. When she mentioned her fondness for cutting off people's noses, she casually tossed the scissors aside, pinched Mu Da's nose between her right thumb and forefinger, and ripped a nose off his face.
In an instant, Mu Da's face became a bloody mess.
"One hour!"
With a thud, the landlady punched Mu Da in the chest, his body bending and being slammed further into the city wall. The landlady seemed to be enraged, saying "one hour" with each punch, repeating this five times. After five punches, Mu Da was nowhere to be seen; he had been smashed into a crater the size of a washbasin.
Having destroyed Mu Da, the landlady dragged Mu Er out of the city wall and tossed him away like a sandbag, at least twenty meters away. The next second, the landlady was beside Mu Da. Despite such a brutal beating, Mu Er was still alive. He struggled to open his eyes, wanting to beg but unable to utter a sound. His eyes were filled with terror, an overwhelming, boundless terror.
"Do you know what my husband does?"
The landlady squatted down beside Mu Er and pressed her hand hard against his chest. With a ripping sound, Mu Er's clothes tore off and flew everywhere. It was unclear what methods the landlady had used, but despite the severe beating, Mu Er showed hardly any marks.
She picked up Mu Er's dagger from the ground and said, word by word, "Su the butcher is a butcher, his specialty is skinning mountain dogs. But nobody in the entire city of Fangu knows that I taught him how to skin them!"
"A few lowlifes dare to commit such evil deeds. They're not just disgracing the court, but the entire Sui Dynasty! If you really want to act fierce, go to the Great Snowy Mountains in the west and find the Buddhist sect to act fierce. Doesn't the Buddhist sect say that even Buddha has moments of wrath? Then go gouge out Buddha's eyes, cut off Buddha's nose, and skin Buddha! You don't have the guts, yet you commit atrocities on your own turf. If I don't kill you and skin you alive, I'll be too angry to sleep!"
After she finished speaking, a bloodied corpse lay on the ground. The landlady casually tossed a complete human skin onto the ground, pulled a handkerchief from her sleeve to wipe her hands, then straightened up and stretched: "That's more like it's over."
After stretching, she abruptly turned to look at a rooftop: "You cripple, I'm done! Have you had your fun yet?!"
...
...
On the roof of a house, the old cripple, lying along the ridge drinking, couldn't help but shake his head and sigh. He carefully and meticulously plugged his gourd, then tied it to his waist. He sat up straight on the roof, looking at the landlady below with a hint of helplessness, and said, "You kill your people, I watch my show. I don't care about you, why are you taking it out on me?"
As he spoke, he double-checked that the gourd was properly secured. The gourd was just an ordinary gourd, filled with the cheapest Northwest liquor. In the taverns of Fangu City, ten copper coins could fill a gourd. Although the gourd was ordinary, both its upper and lower parts were larger than a human head. This gives a glimpse into how cheap the liquor in the Northwest is.
The proprietress pointed a finger at the old cripple and yelled, "Just tell me, if I hadn't come, would you have intervened?"
The old cripple nodded. "Of course I would, otherwise why would I have come?"
"Then why didn't you intervene?"
The proprietress asked again.
"But you came, didn't you?"
The old cripple chuckled. "Besides, even if I intervened, I wouldn't have saved that tasteless little brat, much less that guy who's uglier than me. If it weren't for this old man's good potential, I probably wouldn't have come back today. Getting involved with the imperial court is such a troublesome matter; I'd rather avoid it than risk getting myself into trouble. This old cripple least wants to get involved in something like this."
Having said this, he was already in front of Mu Xiaoyao. The old cripple looked into Mu Xiaoyao's eyes and asked, word by word, "Are you willing to be my apprentice? I've searched for an apprentice my whole life, and before I die, I've had an incredible stroke of luck—I've actually found one I like. I was planning to wait a few years to see just how good your potential is, but alas, you're leaving… Are you willing or not?"
Mu Xiaoyao shook her head painfully and murmured, "Another one… I didn't even sense it!"
The old cripple was about to speak when he heard someone shout from behind, "I've made the decision for her! From now on, she's your master, and you're her apprentice… uh, no, she's your apprentice, and you're her master! Such a high-quality apprentice—you couldn't buy one even if you wanted to!"
The old cripple smiled and said, "You're quite decisive! Just for the sake of having a good apprentice, tell me what you want, and I can fulfill your request."
Fang Jie struggled to his feet and sat on the ground, panting heavily. Once his qi and blood flowed smoothly through his chest and abdomen, he said seriously, "Buy one get one free. I can only take her if you take her."
"Buy you?!"
The old cripple glared at him and said, "I wouldn't buy you even if I were blind!"
Fang Jie shook his head earnestly and said, "You're wrong!"
He pointed at Mu Xiaoyao and said, "She's bought, I'm giving her away."
The old cripple almost instinctively said, "Can't you just buy her? Can't you just not take the freebie?!"
Fang Jie gritted his teeth and said decisively, "Not for sale!"