Hearing Yang Guo's words, Lu Wushuang couldn't help but glare sideways at him:
"I don't need you to meddle!"
Yang Guo immediately called out to Lu Liding:
"Did you hear that?"
"Your daughter isn't grateful at all."
Yang Guo thought to himself:
"Manor Master Lu, you should have run when you had the chance. Now that you want to flee, how could it be that easy?"
Li Mochou said coldly:
"In a fight against me,"
"you still dare to be distracted?"
The next moment, the whisk snapped taut.
Lu Liding had no choice but to raise his saber to block, but the silver strands had already struck the blade.
A powerful force surged along his arms.
Bang!
He flew sideways through the air, knocking over a mahogany Eight Immortals table inside the room.
Teapots and teacups shattered all over the floor.
"Father!" Lu Wushuang cried out.
She flung off Cheng Ying's hand and dragged her injured leg forward to rush over.
Taking just one step, she swayed in pain.
Yang Guo hurriedly stepped forward to support her.
"Are you crazy?"
"Your leg is only supported by a rotten stick! Where do you think you're rushing to?"
Lu Wushuang turned her head and shouted at Yang Guo:
"That's my father!"
Yang Guo paused. The words "you'll only get in the way if you go" were swallowed right back down.
He moved around to Lu Wushuang's other side, joining Cheng Ying left and right.
Together, they supported her toward Lu Liding.
Meanwhile, Lu Erniang had also been driven back. She quickly shielded her husband.
"Husband, how are you?"
"I'm fine." Lu Liding pushed himself up against the broken table, blood already trickling from the corner of his mouth.
Yet Li Mochou's gaze passed over the Lu couple, landing directly on Lu Wushuang.
Raising an eyebrow, she asked:
"Is this your daughter?"
Lu Liding's face paled in horror: "Li Mochou, don't you dare harm her!"
Li Mochou ignored him, her gaze remaining fixed on Lu Wushuang's face.
"Lu Zhanyuan's niece!"
Before her words had finished, two fingers of her left hand slipped out from her sleeve.
Yang Guo's heart leaped into his throat.
A cold glint shot out from between Li Mochou's fingers.
It was so fast that only several silver streaks were visible, flying straight for Lu Wushuang's chest!
Yang Guo recognized this projectile.
The Ice Soul Silver Needle!
"Dammit, is this something that can be taken head-on?"
Before his brain could even process it, his body had already moved.
Shifting his feet, Nine Yang true qi surged into his legs.
Yang Guo hurled himself sideways, blocking directly in front of Lu Wushuang.
Pfft!
With a soft thud, the silver needle struck him right in the chest.
Standing behind, Aniu turned deathly pale with fear and screamed:
"Yang Guo!!"
Lu Wushuang and Cheng Ying were both stunned as well:
"Yang Guo, how are you?"
Yang Guo lowered his head to look at his chest.
The silver needle was stuck in his outer coat, its tail end still exposed.
A bone-chilling coldness seeped inward along the fabric.
Fortunately, beneath his three layers of padded jackets, he had bound a wooden plank with strips of cloth.
The needle tip was stuck in the wood, still a bit away from his skin.
Yang Guo tore a strip of cloth from his clothes, wrapped it around the three Ice Soul Silver Needles to pull them out, and tossed them aside.
Aniu ran up to him:
"Yang Guo, how are you?"
"Don't die on me!"
Yang Guo looked up and said:
"Shut up, I'm far from dead."
Li Mochou frowned slightly, feeling puzzled:
"My Ice Soul Silver Needles clearly hit their mark."
"Why is this little beggar acting as if nothing happened?"
Lu Erniang did not know the reason either, but seeing Yang Guo take the poison needles for her daughter and niece, she was utterly stunned. By the time she snapped back to reality, her eyes were already red.
She exchanged a look with Lu Liding, who had just pushed himself back up, both of their faces filled with absolute resolve.
"You demoness, we'll fight you to the death!"
Lu Liding raised his saber and charged forward again, with Lu Erniang right behind him.
Neither of them planned to leave alive; saber striking from the front, sword stabbing at the ribs.
Every move was a desperate bid for life.
Yang Guo grabbed the dazed Cheng Ying with one hand and supported Lu Wushuang with the other:
"What are you all standing around for! Run!"
Snapping back to his senses, Aniu also took off running right behind Yang Guo.
Just then, a sudden clatter of green roof tiles rattled across the roof of the front hall.
"Li Mochou."
"Bullying a few children."
"Is that worthy of the Scarlet Maiden putting on such a grand show of majesty?"
Yang Guo looked up at the roof, where a middle-aged woman had appeared at some point without anyone noticing.
Holding a weapon, dressed in plain clothes, she looked down coldly at the courtyard.
This woman was Wu Sanniang.
She was the lawful wife of "Farmer" Wu Santong, one of the four main disciples under Southern Emperor Master Yideng.
Her arrival at Lu Manor today was no coincidence.
A few days ago, Wu Santong had suddenly left home without taking leave.
Others did not know where he went, but Wu Sanniang had guessed it almost spot on.
These days marked the expiration of the ten-year pact between Li Mochou, Lu Zhanyuan, and He Yuanjun.
He Yuanjun was originally an adopted daughter raised from childhood by Wu Santong and his wife.
However, when she grew to seventeen or eighteen, her features bloomed and she matured into a slim, graceful beauty.
The way Wu Santong looked at her gradually began to change.
This change was something even he himself refused to admit.
One was a foster father, the other a foster daughter.
Priding himself as a hero of the jianghu, even if improper thoughts had truly sprouted in his heart, he never dared do anything beyond the line.
Yet the more he suppressed it, the more suffocated he felt in his heart.
Precisely at this time, He Yuanjun fell in love with Lu Zhanyuan, who had come to Dali for sight-seeing.
He was a handsome young man from Jiangnan.
When Wu Santong found out, he blew up instantly, pointing at the sky and cursing the earth with harsh words:
"Those pretty boys from Jiangnan are cunning and deceitful, every last one of them unreliable mud!"
He mouthed insults that Lu Zhanyuan was sweet-talking, saying Jiangnan people were the best at tricking others, nine out of ten being untrustworthy.
It sounded like he was looking out for his foster daughter, but in truth, it was laced with an unexplainable jealousy and rage.
Coincidentally, he already held an old grudge against Jiangnan people.
Back then in Xiangxi, Huang Rong was injured by Qiu Qianren's Iron Palm, and Guo Jing accompanied her to seek healing from Master Yideng.
At that time, the two were blocked by the four disciples: the Fisherman, the Woodcutter, the Farmer, and the Scholar.
All of Huang Rong's cleverness was used to dupe Wu Santong, that honest farmer.
With just a few words, she tricked him completely.
She tricked him into taking over the thousand-jin boulder and yellow ox resting on Guo Jing's shoulders.
Though the misunderstanding was resolved later and they made peace, Wu Santong never forgot the incident.
So when Lu Zhanyuan appeared, old debts combined with new fury.
The more he looked at this young fellow from Jiangnan, the more an eyesore he found him.
In the end, the obstacle he truly couldn't overcome was never "Jiangnan people are unreliable."
It was that when He Yuanjun grew up, she would ultimately have someone she loved.
And that person was not him.
Later, He Yuanjun eloped with Lu Zhanyuan.
Wu Santong's Dao Heart collapsed on the spot, turning him into a madman who was clear-headed one moment and an unmitigated scoundrel the next.
Now the ten-year period had arrived.
Wu Sanniang saw things as clear as a mirror in her heart.
Li Mochou was bound to bathe Lu Manor in blood tonight, and her mad husband, whose head was full of Ah Yuan, would eighty percent likely charge into Lu Manor like a wild dog sniffing out blood.
Wu Sanniang first hid her two sons in a rotten vegetable cellar outside the city.
Taking up her weapons, she then headed for Lu Manor.
She had originally planned to crouch in the dark and wait for Wu Santong to show up, knock him out, and drag him away.
Who knew that the moment she arrived, she would find the courtyard of Lu Manor already embroiled in absolute chaos.
As a mother herself, Wu Sanniang naturally couldn't stand by and watch Li Mochou torment a few children, so she stepped out to stop her.
Li Mochou forced back the Lu couple with a palm strike and swept a glance over the roof:
"Wu Sanniang, where is that delirious husband of yours?"
"What? Are you tired of living too, rushing here to fill the grave for the Lu family?"
Wu Sanniang sneered:
"What? Are you afraid of him?"
Li Mochou let out a soft laugh:
"Afraid of him?"
"If he truly had the ability to seek revenge,"
"he should have come for me ten years ago."
Wu Sanniang wasted no further words. Tapping her feet, she dropped from the roof, her weapon aiming straight for Li Mochou's shoulder.
Clang!
Li Mochou swept her whisk around.
In an instant, the two were locked in combat.
The Lu couple also seized the opportunity to join the fight.
Three against one, the situation finally looked a little less dire.
Yang Guo stole a glance, then dragged the others toward the doorway.
"Quick!"
"While we have the chance!"
Cheng Ying supported Lu Wushuang and followed closely.
Limping along, Lu Wushuang's small face turned pale with pain, yet she didn't utter a single cry.
Just as they were about to reach the courtyard gate, Li Mochou bellowed:
"I said no one gets away today!"
Yang Guo's heart sank, and he glanced sideways.
While fending off three people, Li Mochou actually still had the spare effort to look over at them.
With a flick of her wrist, the whisk's silver strands instantly wrapped around a nearby weapon rack.
Exerting force in her wrist, she yanked the rack, bringing down all the sabers, spears, cudgels, and staves with it to slam over, blocking the narrow moon gate completely.
Then, Li Mochou violently struck out with a palm.
Bang!
Lu Liding staggered back three steps.
The long sword slipped from Lu Erniang's hand.
Wu Sanniang was also jolted so hard her shoulders shook.
Even with the three of them joining forces, they still couldn't suppress her!
Li Mochou flicked her sleeve:
"Today, at Lu Manor,"
"not a single living thing gets out alive!"
Yang Guo completely understood now.
Flee? Flee my ass!
Li Mochou was fighting three at once and could still spare the breath to suppress small fry like them.
As things stood, trying to run was nothing more than a pipe dream.
Aniu asked anxiously:
"Yang Guo,"
"what do we do now?"
Yang Guo said calmly:
"What else can we do?"
"You guys go move the rack out of the way first. I'll go stall her."
Aniu almost thought he misheard. "Ah?"
Yang Guo shouted in his heart:
"Li Mochou!"
"Since that's how it is, don't blame me for being ruthless."
"Sneak attack!"
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