Grace still wore that detached, three-nos expression of hers — except her eyes were darting about, a telltale flicker of guilt.
"You absolute wretch."
Li Fei stamped on Grace's foot, fuming: "I treat you like a sister, and you actually — you actually went and..."
I gave you two pecks on the cheek, and you had the audacity to seal my lips with yours!
Without even paying!
Truly bold.
"I'll forgive you this once. But if there's a next time... I won't go out alone with you anymore."
Li Fei poked her in the cheek, one hand on her hip. "Understood?"
Grace offered no reply either way.
"And another thing — you are not to tell Sister Zhihua."
Li Fei strained to keep her voice fierce, working hard to mask the undercurrent of delight beneath it.
Grace remained wordless as ever.
"Hmph. Let's get going."
Li Fei unslung her broom from her back, turned, and said, "There's nothing left worth exploring here. We should head back early — if we leave now, we should make it to Loxibrook before dawn. I need to see the principal about arranging an 'extradition.'"
Three, two...
Li Fei had barely counted down two seconds in her head before she heard Grace speak:
"Let's... wait until dawn to head back."
"Why? I have no desire to spend the night in a half-orc village."
Li Fei played innocent.
"Visibility is poor at night — it would be hard to avoid the miasma."
Grace paused before answering, her voice carrying an unmistakable undercurrent of sheepishness. "Besides, my luck hasn't been great lately..."
Sure. Keep spinning that yarn.
This kind of excuse was the same species as "it's so late, the dorms are locked, should we just get a room?" — it only worked when both parties were already on the same page.
"You do have a point."
Li Fei saw straight through it but said nothing, letting hesitation color her voice: "So where exactly would we sleep?"
Without a word, Grace reached into her bracelet and produced a pile of folded tent components.
— So she came prepared.
"Just the one tent?"
Li Fei crossed her arms and slanted her a sideways look. "Honestly, Miss Grace, after what you just pulled, I'm not feeling entirely safe around you..."
"I promise. I won't act against your will."
Grace ducked her head, voice taut with nervous tension.
Before meeting Li Fei, Grace had sometimes wondered if there was something physically or psychologically wrong with her in that department.
Li Fei had, in a sense, cured her of that. Even so, those yearning thoughts were hardly beyond her control — the impulsive transgression just now wasn't something Grace could entirely be blamed for. She had simply made the kind of mistake any woman might make.
Whatever the case, right now she simply, purely did not want Li Fei to return to Loxibrook so soon and become someone else's girlfriend again.
She wanted their time alone together to last a little longer.
"Swear it. You're allowed — at most — to hold hands. Nothing else."
Li Fei clasped her hands behind her back and leaned her face in close, the tips of their noses a single centimeter from touching.
"Mm."
Grace answered, perfectly earnest.
"Then... I suppose I'll trust you. Just this once."
The corner of Li Fei's mouth curved upward without her meaning it to. She gave Grace one last light stamp on the foot and jutted her chin: "What are you standing there for? Set up the tent."
"Mm, mm."
Grace nodded vigorously.
A moment later, the tent was standing outside the village. Li Fei bent down, gripped the heel of her ankle boot, and her slender foot — wrapped in thin white cotton socks — wriggled a few nimble times before she pulled it free of the boot with a faint wisp of steam still rising from it.
With thoroughly un-ladylike flair she dropped the boot onto the ground with a thud, let out a satisfied "mmph," and flopped contentedly into the tent. The thick padding beneath her served as excellent cushioning — she actually bounced a few centimeters off it.
Grace lowered her gaze, slowly removing her narrow-cut caramel-colored boots that rose to mid-calf. She was considerably more fastidious than a certain Miss Li — first casting a Cleanse on herself via her special-enrollment brooch, then stepping carefully into the tent. She settled herself with her knees drawn up to her chest, looking a touch stiff.
Li Fei rolled her head sideways. There, in her line of sight, were two feet — noticeably smaller and more delicate than her own — encased in a pair of pure-white openwork ankle socks. Through that featherlight white mesh, pale skin played at appearing and disappearing; the cuffs were trimmed with lace, and paired with those dainty, refined feet, the overall effect was terribly cute.
— Who would've thought she had such a feminine side? I'd half-expected plain grey mid-cut socks from this one...
As if sensing Li Fei's gaze, those slender toes curled inward, looking almost shy.
Li Fei propped her cheek on one hand, ran her tongue briefly over her lips, then pressed them together and smiled. She laid her palm gently over those small, anxious little feet, her voice taking on a languid drawl: "How come... you seem so scared of me?"
"I'm not..."
The moment they made contact, Grace's body gave a faint shiver — not unlike Bai Mengtian when someone brushed her ribs.
"I'm going to sleep now. Wake me in five hours, and I'll take the second half of the watch."
Li Fei stretched out unhurriedly. Rather than removing her mage's robe, she flipped up its hem and began taking out the items she carried on her person one by one, setting them neatly within arm's reach, ensuring she could grab them at any moment.
The situation might look safe enough — but neither Li Fei nor Grace was foolish enough to sleep entangled in each other's arms inside a Folded Space.
"Mm."
Grace nodded, shifted slightly, and settled back into her knees-to-chest seat, chin resting on her kneecaps. Her face was angled toward the tent's opening, her gaze sweeping the full scope of the village outside.
Then, all at once, she felt a warm softness against her palm and couldn't help but glance down.
Li Fei had adjusted her sleeping position. One hand had reached out and closed around Grace's, and with her eyes shut she murmured, "Good night."
"Good night."
Grace closed her fingers around Li Fei's hand in return, her voice soft.
...
Some people pretend to be asleep while actually lying with eyes closed in Meditation, pausing every now and then to glance at their System Panel.
By the time Li Fei interrupted her Meditation for the fifth time, a new message had finally appeared on the panel.
[You have slain a Savage Boar Half-Orc. +10 EXP]
[You have slain a Savage Boar Half-Orc. +10 EXP]
...
So it really worked.
Li Fei's eyes snapped open, their depths still and unreadable.
The poison had begun to take effect.
This variety of poison did not bring its victims much suffering — organ failure would carry them off quietly. If someone were still awake when it struck, they might yet cry out and struggle. But tonight's celebration had been lavish; the young adult half-orcs had drunk themselves into exhaustion — not heavily, but enough for sleep to come easily. The young and the elderly were sleeping even more soundly.
Dying in one's sleep with a few convulsions wouldn't draw much notice.
Those who were still awake might have sensed something wrong with their bodies — but in a primitive tribe this destitute, medical resources were essentially nonexistent. There was no such concept as "get sick, seek treatment." Minor ailments were weathered through sheer stubbornness; serious illness meant scrounging whatever herbs could be found, and then leaving the rest to fate.
And so, as the old and frail and young drifted off never to wake, certain young adult half-orcs were gritting their teeth to close their eyes, forcing themselves to ignore the distress signals their bodies were sending — telling themselves over and over: "Maybe I'm just tired." "Probably just the drink." "I'll be fine after some sleep."
And that was precisely why, even as Li Fei's EXP ticked up by the thousands, the village fell silent when the festivities ended — no uproar, no commotion. Just darkness.
As her morality stat slid down once more, Li Fei lay with her eyes open, waiting.
"Wake up."
Roughly a quarter-hour later, Grace's body shifted, and then her hand was on Li Fei's shoulder, shaking her.
"What is it?"
Li Fei sat up effortlessly in a single smooth curl — a display of rather remarkable core strength — and reached a hand to grip her sword hilt, asking quietly.
"There's movement in the half-orc village."
Grace's brow drew together as she watched scattered lights flicker on in the distance, tilting her head to catch the faint sounds of shouting drifting over.
— Took them until nearly half were dead to notice?
Li Fei permitted herself one cold, silent sneer, then briskly finished strapping on her gear and stepped out of the tent. "Do we leave directly, or go take a look?"
"...Let's observe a little longer."
Grace pulled her boots on hastily and answered after a brief pause.
That suited Li Fei perfectly.
She gave a quiet nod of agreement.
The half-orcs who hadn't yet perished were being jolted awake by screaming and howling.
Couples clutched their children in anguish, and husbands watched helplessly as their wives collapsed beside them in convulsions.
Half-orc youths retched blood, shrieking themselves hoarse as they shook parents who would not move.
Others stumbled out of their hovels in a daze, cradling the frail, aged bodies of fathers in their arms, eyes wide open, weeping without a sound.
"What happened?"
Kenan stormed out of his dwelling, still yanking his hide skirt on. He took one look at the carnage laid out across the village and his eyes went crimson as he threw back his head and howled at the sky.
He had bullied his kinfolk plenty — but he had loved his home, deep down. The two were not mutually exclusive.
Then Kenan saw a childhood friend staggering toward him, mouth twisted into a weak, trembling smile, one hand reaching out.
But before Kenan could close the distance, the half-orc pitched forward with a heavy thud and died at his feet.
How quickly a poison took effect depended on individual constitution — the stronger the body, the longer it held out, as a general rule. But individual variation always existed, and Kenan's robust, powerfully-built friend had, by some cruel twist, gone before several of the frailest among them.
Kenan dropped to his knees in silence and pulled his only friend into a fierce embrace, his face trembling.
Only after a long moment did he gently close his friend's eyes and lay the body down on the ground.
When he rose again, his eyes were red and wild, his whole face splitting with a roar of pure rage:
"Humans!"
He went back inside, seized his stone axe, and walked through a carpet of corpses out toward the edge of the village.
"Humans! You will die!"
At the village entrance, Li Fei watched the half-orc come charging at her in a screaming fury, her expression cold.
Were it not for the Principle Contract binding her, one sword stroke would have ended this.
Pity she couldn't kill him.
Against the half-orc's savage, ferocious assault, Li Fei twisted her waist and swept her sword — one clean arc that sheared the stone axe in two — then seamlessly launched a kick that scythed through the air like a war-axe and drove into Kenan's chest, sending him crashing to the ground, spitting blood.
"Tell me what happened."
Li Fei stood over him and demanded with cold contempt.
"Vile outsiders — you poisoned my people..."
Kenan clawed himself upright, screaming, "I hate you! I hate you all!"
"Poisoned you? From the moment Grace and I entered your village, we were in sight of your people at every second. We never went anywhere near your food while it was being prepared."
Li Fei said evenly: "If anything, you're the ones who had reason to poison us. What possible motive would I have to poison you?"
She glanced at her level — now 19. The half-orcs were nearly all gone. She pressed on: "What, has someone in your tribe been poisoned?"
"Ha... dead. All dead..."
Kenan laughed a hollow, broken laugh.
"What do you mean?"
Li Fei's expression shifted sharply, alarm bleeding into her voice: "Don't tell me your entire village has been poisoned?"
Kenan only went on laughing, wild and senseless, the kicked-in ribs stabbing at his organs with each convulsion, blood frothing at his lips.
Li Fei used her Bronze Nature Medal's healing ability on him to keep the fool from dying on her, then turned to face Grace, her expression grave: "Go check."
Without waiting for Grace's answer, Li Fei strode into the village.
The thriving settlement had become hell on earth.
Just hours ago, every home had glowed with lanterns and celebration. Now the air was filled with cries for help and wails of grief without end; doorways were blanketed with bodies lying every which way, the devastation searing itself into the eyes at every turn.
Most of the half-orcs had died in the arms of loved ones. A female lay curled on her side by the road, perfectly still, a cub nestled in her embrace — one that would never cry or fuss again.
A couple sat propped against a wall, hand in hand, having passed into endless sleep together.
To have brought about the erasure of a civilization with her own hands — however primitive and backward that civilization — left Li Fei with a weight that dwarfed anything the Secret Garden had ever stirred in her.
She understood, now: every point of experience she had ever earned was steeped in deep and genuine sin — filthier and uglier than the wealth of any capitalist or slave-master who had ever lived.
But so what?
Behind those dark, still eyes, Li Fei severed the last thread of empathy she had ever held for anyone outside the circle of those she loved.
"Save my grandson! Please!"
Suddenly, an elderly half-orc came crawling toward Li Fei, stumbling and lurching with every movement.
It was ancient — already coughing blood. By rights, it should have been among the very first to succumb. And yet, on something close to a miracle of will, this half-orc had kept a body ravaged by age and poison moving, cradling a cub in its arms, crawling to lay that child before the strangers.
Instinct told it: this was the only way.
Thud. Thud. Thud...
With trembling hands, it set the cub — whose breath had already stilled — down at Li Fei's feet, then gathered the last of its strength and knocked its head against the ground in a full kowtow, again and again, scarlet blood spattering with each impact.
Li Fei said nothing. She reached into her pack, produced an antidote, and poured it into the cub's mouth.
Two or three hours earlier, a single vial of antidote would have been enough — clean cure, no question.
But when the poison had nearly run its course, the body's functions were already in collapse. For a feeble cub, even the antidote could only delay death; survival required a healing potion alongside it.
As for this particular cub, among all the people Li Fei knew, perhaps only Bai Mengtian — or Priestess Maria — could have saved her now.
Li Fei acted as though she hadn't grasped that reality, and administered the antidote anyway.
No miracle came. The cub grew slowly rigid and cold. The grandmother remained in her prostrated position — motionless, silent, gone.
"Grace. Antidote."
Without looking back, Li Fei extended her hand.
"It's already..."
Grace said quietly.
"Give it to me!"
There was a tremor in Li Fei's voice — something perilously close to a sob.
Kenan, who had been trailing behind them in a hollow daze, stared at the scene unfolding before him, a splitting pain cleaving through his skull.
If... she wasn't the one who did this — then who?
Into Kenan's mind flashed his father's face — that gentle, reassuring smile.
"No. That's impossible..."
The world lurching around him, Kenan stumbled a step back and beat his own head with his fists, a sound wrenching out of him — pleading and despairing and broken — from a man who had never begged for anything in his life.
Grace said nothing. She quietly took out every last antidote she had and made the silent decision to stand guard over Li Fei's stubborn, irrational kindness.
Li Fei pressed her hand over her mouth.
With her morality stat having sunk this far, there was no conscience left to prick her.
All she needed to do was exhaust the "surplus" antidotes.
A short while later, seven or eight empty vials littered the ground around them. Li Fei, face streaked with tears, picked up the last antidote vial and a substandard antidote, and with trembling lips murmured:
"I'm sorry. I..."
The answer was an embrace.
"It's not your fault."
Grace held her close, arms tight around her. "You did everything you could."
Yes. I did everything I could.
Li Fei's eyes were deep and dark as she answered, in the silence of her own heart.
____
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