The story is divided.
Li Yueshu followed the Poison King of Pangshan out of the small town. As they continued forward, the surrounding population grew sparser.
Looking at the direction of the road, Li Yueshu suddenly stopped.
She stared coldly at the Poison King of Pangshan. "Where is Ayi?"
"Youngster, don't be impatient." The Poison King of Pangshan smiled like a kind elder. "You should know, this is the way out of Tongmu County. This old man just wants to leave peacefully."
Li Yueshu frowned, her face full of vigilance. "Didn't you say you were going to take me to see Ayi?"
The Poison King of Pangshan narrowed his eyes. "Why do you pretend to be foolish? This old man has been in the martial world for so many years, how could he not sense someone following? I'm afraid by the time this old man went to the Immortal Wine House, your people had already gone to rescue her!"
As soon as he said this, Li Yueshu instantly became alert, her sleeve covering her hand as she gripped a sharp scalpel.
The Poison King of Pangshan, unaware, stroked his beard and chuckled, "I wonder if they will like the gift this old man has prepared."
Hearing this, Li Yueshu's heart leaped. "What did you do?"
The Poison King of Pangshan did not answer her question but asked, "Let's make a deal. You become my disciple, and I will detoxify your daughter. How about it?"
Li Yueshu's expression changed drastically. "You poisoned Ayi?"
Each word was as cold as if ice shards were about to fall.
The Poison King of Pangshan seemed completely unfazed. "This old man didn't want to either. If you had been willing to follow this old man obediently before, this old man wouldn't have laid a hand on your daughter."
"Although she is your stepdaughter, you are truly devoted to her. Surely you don't want her to die at such a young age because of you?"
Li Yueshu's face was icy, her eyes filled with murderous intent. "I'll go with you, and you'll hand over the antidote?"
The Poison King of Pangshan slowly walked towards her. "If you pass the test and become my disciple, we will be family. This old man will naturally not make things difficult for your daughter."
As he spoke, he took out a black pill. "Eat this, and leave Tongmu County with this old man. Your daughter will naturally be fine."
Li Yueshu gritted her teeth, hesitating for a long time.
After a while, she slowly raised her hand, her mind seemingly made up.
Suddenly, her hand, which was reaching for the pill, changed direction and went straight for the major artery in the Poison King of Pangshan's neck. The sharp scalpel glinted between her fingers.
Li Yueshu was fast, but the Poison King of Pangshan was not slow to react.
He was already wary of Li Yueshu. The moment he sensed something was wrong, he quickly dodged, but his neck still sustained a cut.
Before he could check the wound, Li Yueshu attacked again.
She had no internal energy, but she was skilled in close-quarters combat, each strike aimed at a vital point.
However, the Poison King of Pangshan's poison techniques were unpredictable, and poisoning at close range was difficult to guard against. Li Yueshu had to switch from offense to defense to avoid his poison.
This approach wouldn't work!
A flicker of thought flashed quickly in Li Yueshu's eyes. Then, feigning a move, she directly created distance between herself and the Poison King of Pangshan.
Seeing her suddenly stop attacking, the Poison King of Pangshan did not retract the poison he held in his hand.
"Madam Shen, have you made up your mind and decided to go with this old man?"
Li Yueshu did not reply, only a cold smile played on her lips.
She put her hand behind her back, putting away the scalpel. Her actions seemed as if she was retrieving something.
The Poison King of Pangshan saw her movement and looked over with a puzzled gaze.
He saw Li Yueshu raise her hand again, and a strangely shaped, entirely black object appeared in her hand.
The Poison King of Pangshan did not know what it was, but an involuntary sense of crisis rose in his heart.
Before he could react, Li Yueshu suddenly pulled the trigger.
"Bang!"
With a loud noise, the Poison King of Pangshan felt something pierce through his knee, causing him to fall to the ground.
"Ah—"
The Poison King of Pangshan cried out in pain instinctively, his hands trembling as he clutched his bloody knee.
He looked at Li Yueshu in disbelief. "What... what is that thing?"
Li Yueshu did not answer. Holding the gun, she walked up to him and aimed the muzzle at his forehead. "Hand over the antidote."
The Poison King of Pangshan had already experienced the power of the gun. Looking at the dark muzzle now, he felt a chill crawl up his spine.
He subconsciously flinched, his current pathetic appearance a far cry from his earlier kind and amiable demeanor.
He forced himself to speak, "I never carry antidotes on me. If you kill me, your daughter will only have to be buried with me!"
Li Yueshu tightened her grip on the gun, her voice filled with coldness. "I won't take your life, but I have a hundred ways to torture people. You wouldn't want to try them all, would you?"
Meeting her gaze, the Poison King of Pangshan did not think she was joking at all.
"You..."
He pointed a trembling finger at Li Yueshu, but could not utter a single word.
"Fine, I'll give you the antidote!" the Poison King of Pangshan said through gritted teeth, full of resentment.
Enduring the excruciating pain in his knee, he took out a bottle from his embrace and handed it over.
Li Yueshu, holding the gun in one hand, reached out with the other to take it.
The moment her fingers touched the bottle, something shot out from the Poison King of Pangshan's sleeve.
She saw it, but it was too close, and she couldn't dodge in time. She instinctively retreated.
"Swish!"
After a faint whistling sound, Li Yueshu felt a sharp pain in her wrist. The next moment, all her strength seemed to drain away instantly.
Li Yueshu collapsed to the ground with a thud, the gun falling from her hand. A throbbing sensation gripped her heart.
A triumphant smile spread across the Poison King of Pangshan's face. A snake as thick as a little finger slithered back into his sleeve from the ground.
With a sinister grin, he said, "I wanted to spare your life, but you insisted on seeking death."
The Poison King of Pangshan, limping, got up from the ground. He had only taken a few steps forward when he suddenly heard an anxious voice: "A Shu!"
He looked up and saw a figure rushing towards them, their brows filled with murderous intent.
The Poison King of Pangshan glanced at Li Yueshu not far away, gritted his teeth in frustration, and finally turned and left.
Li Yueshu couldn't afford to care about anything else. She quickly took out a syringe from her spatial storage but had no strength to inject herself.
Damn it, was her life going to end here!
So unwilling!
She just wanted to live a good life, to have a clean existence, why was it so difficult...
Just then, Qin Moyuan suddenly appeared in her vision, his deep eyes filled with anxiety.
"A Shu..." Qin Moyuan's voice trembled, his face full of panic.
Li Yueshu trembled from the pain, her vision blacking out intermittently.
But her unwillingness made her hold on with her last ounce of strength, struggling to say, "Inject... the medicine..."
Qin Moyuan saw the strange syringe in her hand and instantly recalled what had happened the night she dealt with Shen Wang.
Without any hesitation, Qin Moyuan picked up the syringe, and mimicking what he had seen that night, injected it into Li Yueshu's neck.
However, Li Yueshu could no longer hold on and completely fainted.