HELP! These Girls Wants To Kill Me-Chapter 257

Sun Qiao looked at her split image standing in front of her with a sharp knife as her blood ran cold. How could she not understand what was going on and what was about to happen?

"Let’s start with some talisman making first before we move on to some questions and answers."

With a smirk, Yang Ze slashed the scalpel towards the woman’s right hand and with that, the woman’s muffled scream filled the entire room.

—------------------

"That... Wasn’t pleasant."

Sitting at the corner of the room with his eyes closed, Yang Ze tried his best to regulate his breathing, but the occasional trembling of his body betrayed the nervousness and fear that came after the adrenaline wore off.

In the heat of the moment, he decided to act out of anger. And now that he was done with the deed and his mind cleared a bit, he was terrified to realise what he had just done.

He glanced back from the corner of his eyes, only to see a dense, neatly folded skin that was stacked for almost three meters, almost touching the ground. But it wasn’t just a single stack; more than ten stacks were placed neatly.

If one didn’t know any better, they would have thought that all this skin came from the population of an entire village.

And yet, the truth couldn’t have been far from this.

Just behind Yang Ze, the figure of the woman was slumped to the ground, no longer bound by the ropes.

Even though she was still lying there completely naked, she didn’t move. Not because she was dead, but because her mind was no longer in a working condition.

At the moment, her mouth was wide open as a thin line of drool escaped from the corner of her lips, touching the ground underneath.

Her eyes were in a daze, but if one were to look carefully, they would realise that they had lost the spark of life.

If not for her occasionally mindless hums and the twitching of her body, she would appear no different from a corpse.

*Slap

The sound of a loud slap filled the room as Yang Ze gritted his teeth before raising his hand and slapping himself once again.

He didn’t hold back in the slightest. Using every ounce of his strength, his strike was enough to shatter the heads of even Pulse Opening experts, yet they only left bright red handprints on his face.

*slap... slap...

He didn’t stop until he slapped himself a few more times before exhaling a mouthful of air.

"Pull yourself together." Yang Ze muttered in a low voice. "In the future, you are going to come across even more wretched people like her. How can you stay soft?"

"Steel your heart."

Exhaling a mouthful of cold air, Yang Ze constantly reminded himself not to feel guilt for people like her.

"Now then... I finally have a basic understanding of this imperial place."

"And finally a valid identity as well."

Muttering to himself, Yang Ze tossed the identity token of Sun Qiao into the air before catching it as his mind recalled everything that he had managed to extract from her.

Initially, she wasn’t being cooperative... the information she gave initially was completely identical to what that crazy woman that Yang Ze cooked alive gave him. But when Yang Ze asked her about the Royal family of Yan, she became hysterical, almost turning into a mindless animal.

But how could Yang Ze leave her like that?

So, he tightened the cloth in her mouth and began the long and arduous process of taking off her skin.

Just to make sure she wouldn’t die, he even learned the Starlight Healing that Lin Meilin handed to him.

Initially, he wanted to take his time to learn it, but the circumstances didn’t offer him any choice.

The Starlight Healing was unlike any other technique Yang Ze had seen. It wasn’t divided into grades or realms.

The only way to practise it was to visualise stars and turn one’s internal energy into a gentle and soothing starlight that would heal wounds.

The more stars one manages to visualise, the stronger the healing will get, with no upper limit.

It has been written that if one were to visualise a million stars, they would be able to heal the world itself.

Although Yang Ze didn’t know what those words meant, it didn’t matter to him.

Under the heaven-defying effects of the Enlightenment, he had managed to visualise one star. With it, he could easily heal some skin injuries.

And thus began the long and arduous process of taking off the woman’s skin before he healed her and repeated the process.

After taking off her skin one time, he would ask her questions that he wanted to know, and if not satisfied with the answers, would repeat the process.

Though he managed to gather a lot of information, unfortunately, the woman didn’t give him anything about the royal family.

In the end, Yang Ze could only settle on the next best thing... her identity.

Initially, he wanted to join the Imperial city under a different identity, but now, he had changed his mind.

After seeing all the horrors hiding in plain sight, he had decided to play it safe and figure things out by himself. As for the person Lin Meilin was talking about, who would tell him about the so-called treasure, he had decided not to risk any contact.

He was going to observe and figure out things on his own. Even though he had no clue as to how he was going to do that, he had a feeling that as long as he persisted, he would be able to accomplish the task that Lin Meilin sent him here to do.

"Talismans, huh!" Exhaling a mouthful of air, he focused on the information that he got from the woman.

The so-called Harvest Hall was all about finding more ways to empower the Yan Kingdom.

It was a group of extremely talented women who willingly joined the Imperial city for knowledge.

These were the people who tried to find the lost knowledge, looked into myths and stories and then experimented and came up with results.

It didn’t matter what the results were or how the results were accomplished. As long as they were making progress in any direction, they had the complete freedom to do as they wished. And yet, even with such freedom, almost all the women in this Harvest Hall subdivision chose to just stick to the vicinity of their houses and plunge themselves into experiments.

The previous woman was trying to create an Elixir of life... something that would grant one eternal youth.

Till now, she had come up with an array of bizarre solutions. Some of them worked, while others didn’t.

As for the woman behind him... Sun Qiao... She found an old storybook about the talismans when she was a child, and from that day onwards, she devoted herself to its study.

But till now, she had yet to make any breakthroughs. If not for the fact that the ’material’ she made was useful in an array of things, she would have been kicked out of the Harvest hall a long time ago.

"Well..." Thinking till here, Yang Ze rubbed the corner of his eyes.

"I was thinking of giving you a swift death, but then again... I need to provide the ’material’ now, don’t I?"

He didn’t care if Sun Qiao, behind him, understood what he just said or not. God knows how many children this evil witch has tortured and killed. What she was getting now was nothing compared to the evil she had done.

"Also... was it really necessary to use human skin in the talisman making?" He couldn’t help but shake his head.

"You should have just focused on the tree barks."

"And besides..." Holding the book in his hand, he couldn’t help but tilt his head slightly. "Do you think that talismans actually work?"

"The very first paragraph of this book says that it is just a myth... A story made up by the storytellers."

Speaking till here, Yang Ze reached out to pick another book from the side, titled ’Modern Myths’.

It had a great explanation about everything that people still believed to this date, which were proven myths.

The Talisman making was one such thing mentioned in the book.

According to it, the claims that talismans could be used to alter heaven and earth were nothing but mere exaggerations.

Not to mention how a single piece of bark or paper with dense lines could perform such a feat... how could a person even draw something like that?

What was the principle behind it? How did it work? And how could someone who can’t even use internal energy make something like that?

The entire Chapter about the talisman was full of facts like that.

The more Yang Ze read it, the more he felt it was the case. The previous excitement that he felt after seeing the ’talisman-making book’ was extinguished completely. Initially, he wanted to give it a try. In his mind, regardless of how difficult it was, under the effects of Enlightenemnt, it was going to be a piece of cake for him.

But now...

"Well, I could at least give it a try." Muttering to himself, he decided to give it a try later. But unlike this crazy woman behind him, he wasn’t going to use the skin. Instead, he would take his time preparing the barks and bamboos.

"Now then..." With everything in order, he forcibly opened the woman’s mouth and popped in a fasting pill before tying her with another set of ropes and stuffing another piece of cloth... just in case.

It was only then that he nodded in satisfaction.

And just when he was about to head to the other room, he heard someone knocking on the door.

"HUH!?" Even under the sound of heavy rain, this sound of knocking was particularly conspicuous.

With furrowed brows, Yang Ze took one last glance at the basement he was in before making his way up.

Once inside the simple room, he closed the lid, looked at his reflection in the mirror that was now of a woman in her forties, before nodding to himself and walking towards the door.

And then, without any hesitation, he opened the door.

The moment Yang Ze opened the door, what came into view was the figure of an old woman in her late seventies, holding a small, exquisite umbrella with a face full of discontent.

"You took your time." With a cold snort, she directly barged in, bypassing Yang Ze and sitting on the chair in the room.

"....." For a moment, Yang Ze didn’t know how to react to this situation. He didn’t know how Sun Qiao talked to this woman or what her relationship was, so he chose the next best course of action...

Silence...

"Saw a doll-like thing today after so many months, only for her to be snatched by that bitch..." The old woman seemed used to the silence as she continued her rambling.

"Just a step late... I was just a step late, and she was snatched by that whore."

"She makes it look like she is young and all smiles when in reality, she is just an old whore who relies on those stupid potions."

"Who knows if she is just taking those things to keep her appearance?"

"Disgusting whore."

It took a moment for Yang Ze to realise who the old woman was talking about.

"If only I got my hands on that young lass... I would have definitely made a breakthrough in my puppet art." The more she spoke, the crazier she got.

For the next ten minutes, she kept on rambling about how she just needed the young girl for her research and how that whore just got lucky.

She even cursed the little girl for being stupid enough to follow a complete stranger.

It wasn’t until ten more minutes passed that she finally stopped, turned her head to look at the middle-aged woman beside her and spoke in a hoarse voice.

The annual gathering is just a week away. How is your progress?

Yang Ze’s eyes turned into slits as he heard her sentence. He didn’t know what it was, but at the time, he couldn’t just ask about it.

He thought for a moment before asking with a frown.

"So soon?"

His words only made the old woman let out a soft chuckle.

"Look at you... So lost in that damned talisman making that you have even forgotten about the annual gathering."

"What are you going to show there?"

"I have managed to make some progress, so I was thinking of showing it."

"As for that whore..." Speaking till here, she grit her teeth in anger.

"She just got fresh blood and meat, so I am guessing she would make another breakthrough."

*Hwak thu...

With a face full of disgust, she spat to her side and kept on rambling for another ten minutes.

Yang Ze quietly watched everything, not daring to disturb her. Instead, he tried his best to remember everything that the woman was saying.

And just when Yang Ze thought she was never going to stop, he saw the woman turning to look at him and speaking in a flat tone.

"I have run out of materials... Give me some."

With some thought, she raised both hands in front of her, keeping almost a foot’s distance between them.

"About this big."

It took a moment for Yang Ze to realise what she was talking about as he nodded in response.

"Wait." He just spoke a single word and, without any hesitation, walked into the basement once again.

He didn’t lock the door. On the contrary, he wanted the old woman to come inside so he could grab her as well to gather some more information.

He was completely unfamiliar with her, and taking action against a complete stranger for his own gains wasn’t something that he was willing to do. So, he placed a bait.

If the old woman came in, he would have a perfect reason to grab her.

But even after waiting for a while when she didn’t come in, he let out a heavy sigh before shaking his head, grabbing a pile of old skins, and walking out.

"Here it is..." Handing over the pile of skins, he watched in silence as the old woman’s figure gradually disappeared in the heavy rain.

"Annual gathering, huh!" Tapping his fingers on the door frame, Yang Ze’s eyes flashed for an instant. As for what he was thinking... perhaps only he knew.