Free Web NovelChapter 26: Chapter 26: Sensational
「Half an hour later.」
Qin Xiaoxia, Doudou, and Su Su were sitting in a BBQ restaurant.
Su Su seemed a little reserved, while Qin Xiaoxia and Doudou were both bewildered and baffled.
When they were leaving the park just a moment ago, the two of them thought they had been caught red-handed by their victim.
Fortunately, there didn’t seem to be any other "ambushes" nearby.
They were just about to apologize to ease the awkwardness when Su Su rushed up, blurting out a string of excited "sorry"s.
Her expression was sincere, and her eyes seemed to glisten with tears—a sight that Qin Xiaoxia found rather dazzling and hard to look at.
Qin Xiaoxia and Doudou were both dumbfounded as they watched the girl bow and apologize profusely.
They quickly began to suspect that something had gone wrong with Doudou’s supposed "safe return of the Crystal Ball."
But the scene drew the attention of the surrounding crowd. The fact that the one apologizing was a beautiful blonde girl, who looked as if she had been terribly wronged, made it all the more conspicuous.
This caused the onlookers to glare at Qin Xiaoxia with extreme disapproval.
Yes, all of it was directed at Qin Xiaoxia. Doudou, being just a "child," was obviously blameless.
Qin Xiaoxia finally understood the feeling of having pins and needles on his back.
Having never even had a girlfriend, Qin Xiaoxia was completely out of his depth in a situation like this.
Fortunately, his reflexes were excellent.
In a flash, with sweat beading on his forehead, Qin Xiaoxia darted forward and grabbed Su Su’s hand.
"It’s okay, it’s okay! We found Doudou. It’s not your fault, it’s not your fault..."
Leaving the crowd with a scene ripe for speculation, Qin Xiaoxia held Doudou with one hand, pulled Su Su with the other, and vanished from the entrance plaza as fast as he could.
When he grabbed her hand, Su Su instinctively tried to pull away. But in that instant, the Magic Power inside Qin Xiaoxia’s body coiled around her, leaving her feeling semi-paralyzed.
And so, bewildered and unable to resist, she was pulled away without even the strength to speak.
Now, sitting in the BBQ restaurant, Su Su was filled with a mix of excitement and relief.
Excited that she hadn’t missed her chance, after all.
And relieved that the person who had just dragged her away wasn’t a human trafficker.
’It’s not that I’m narcissistic,’ she thought, ’but with my looks, getting kidnapped would definitely not end well for me.’
...
Perhaps it wasn’t peak time for BBQ, or perhaps this particular restaurant just wasn’t doing well. In any case, they were the only customers in the place.
The owner was a one-man show, acting as waiter and grill master. One had to wonder how he’d manage if it got busy later in the evening.
After they ordered and briefly introduced themselves, Qin Xiaoxia got straight to the point with Su Su.
"Miss, what happened today was our fault. Doudou was just being mischievous and took your Crystal Ball. This meal is on me, so let’s just call it even, what do you say?"
But how could Su Su possibly agree to "call it even"?
The way she’d been paralyzed when he pulled her away only confirmed her suspicion that Qin Xiaoxia was no ordinary person.
"No way!" she blurted out.
"Hey, Miss! That’s going a little too far. We already apologized, so why are you picking on a little kid?"
Qin Xiaoxia pushed the plum juice he had grabbed from the cooler toward Su Su. He took a slurp of his own and continued trying to reason with her like a nagging grandmother.
"Yeah, yeah! Why are you picking on me!"
Doudou chimed in, still sipping his plum juice.
"He’s just a little kid. Can’t you cut him some slack?" Qin Xiaoxia added.
"Yeah, yeah! I’m only 70 years old. Can’t you cut me some slack?"
Qin Xiaoxia: "..." ƒree𝑤ebnσvel.com
Doudou: "..."
SMACK. Qin Xiaoxia slapped a hand to his face.
Su Su, however, looked at Doudou with a strange mix of surprise and delight. Then, as if realizing something, her gaze shifted to the silver strands mixed in with the black of Qin Xiaoxia’s hair.
Seeing her expression, Qin Xiaoxia almost swallowed his straw.
He screamed internally, ’Lady, you’re not actually buying this, are you??’
After deciding this pretty girl was probably suffering from some sort of delusional disorder, Qin Xiaoxia suddenly felt that...
...convincing her was going to be difficult.
"I saw burning purple flames in the Crystal Ball!"
Qin Xiaoxia was racking his brain, trying to figure out how to get rid of the girl, when she suddenly blurted this out.
His expression turned serious in an instant. Even Doudou took the straw out of his mouth.
The big one and the little one subconsciously exchanged a glance.
’She can see Magic Power?’
This couldn’t be explained away as a simple delusion.
Qin Xiaoxia had never believed in things like divination, but now it seemed there was actually something to it.
Seeing their reactions, Su Su was secretly overjoyed.
Moreover, when she’d taken the plum juice from Qin Xiaoxia, she had keenly observed a scar on his palm.
It was a strange shape: a circle in the center, surrounded by a few irregular "points."
At first, she thought it was a hexagram, but after sneaking another couple of glances, she quickly ruled that out.
If she had to describe it, it looked more like a doodled sun.
Su Su mentally filed it away, planning to research it thoroughly when she got home.
"Miss, I think your eyes were just playing tricks on you."
After a long moment of thought, Qin Xiaoxia couldn’t come up with a single reason to tell the girl the truth, so he decided to stick with brushing her off.
If Gou Junbao were here, he’d be furious at Qin Xiaoxia’s incompetence, seeing it as a criminal waste of a perfect opportunity.
Su Su’s hand, wrapped around the plum juice, tightened and relaxed, then tightened and relaxed again.
She thought anxiously.
’What do I do? What do I do? It must have been my rude behavior earlier today that put them off.’
She desperately wanted to witness true mystical powers, and a million percent wanted to join them, but how could she force the issue in a situation like this?
Although she had never felt her looks entitled her to special treatment—especially not from beings she ought to revere.
Still, she couldn’t help but think,
’I guess looks only work on mortals...’
Just as Su Su was growing desperate, the restaurant owner approached with a cigarette dangling from his lips, carrying a platter of grilled skewers.
He set the food down, and seeing no other customers, sat down by himself near the doorway. He stared out into the street, lost in thought, without saying a word.
No matter how frustrated Qin Xiaoxia felt, Doudou was happily sipping his plum juice and digging into his first-ever BBQ meal in this world.
The taste certainly didn’t disappoint.
This made Doudou sneak a few more glances at the "chef."
"Huh!" frёewebηovel.cѳm
A moment later, Doudou quietly tugged on Qin Xiaoxia’s sleeve and whispered.
"Big Cousin, that man... look at the top of his head."
Hearing this, both Qin Xiaoxia and Su Su turned to look.
In Su Su’s eyes, there was nothing strange on the owner’s head besides a shiny bald spot that reflected the light from outside.
Qin Xiaoxia, however, frowned.
He hadn’t noticed it when they first came in.
But now that he was focusing, the Magic Power in his body activated along with his attention.
Very faintly, a few strands of cold, ominous "Uncertain Silk" floated above the owner’s head.
It would be easy to miss if one wasn’t paying close attention.
"Big Cousin, I’ve seen this once before, at the home of one of Magson’s Gray Spirit People. This means the soul is being corroded by a power of a cold, sinister nature."
It wasn’t just Qin Xiaoxia who heard this; Su Su heard it loud and clear as well.
And though she couldn’t see it, her imagination filled in the blanks.
The esoteric-sounding words made her heart start to race again.
Qin Xiaoxia was now conflicted.
At his core, he hated trouble. His motto was "the less trouble, the better," and it’s not like he knew this man from Adam.
But now that the problem was right in front of him, he had a nagging feeling that if he just ignored it, the owner would have no idea what was really going on.
"Sir," Qin Xiaoxia finally asked, "you seem troubled. Did something happen?"
The owner, who had been lost in thought, seemed to welcome the question. He clearly needed someone to talk to.
He stubbed out his cigarette and sat down at the table next to theirs.
"Sigh... at this point, there’s no reason to hide it. I’m not kidding, my house is haunted!"
His first sentence left Qin Xiaoxia speechless.
He had just been thinking the owner had no idea what was going on, and he was proven wrong in record time.
It turned out the owner’s son, who had just started first grade this year, had suddenly come down with what people were calling "lost soul syndrome."
They’d been to all the major hospitals and consulted with countless mystics and charlatans.
The hospitals couldn’t find anything wrong, while most of the mystics insisted that his soul had been "lost."
What was even more terrifying was what his family started to notice.
After the boy had been in a listless, dazed state for some time...
...his son’s facial features began to blur!
It was utterly horrifying. His eye sockets began to flatten. His nose gradually sank and seemed to shrink. His eyelashes and eyebrows fell out daily. Even when he tried to make an expression, the creases on his face were fewer, as if his skin was being stretched tight...
The only exception was his mouth!
Despite having "lost soul syndrome," his appetite was still good.
The owner hesitated for a moment before adding a comment about his son’s appetite.
"Too good..."
Then he went back to smoking, looking as if he had more to say on that particular point but was holding himself back. Instead, he shifted the topic.
He talked about the hardship of seeking treatment and the crushing financial burden.
