The First Legendary Demonic Scholar

Chapter 118: Chapter 118: The Master Returns

Shen Yuan moved his hands down from her neck. His hands slowly moved down her body as he admired his own work.

Then he slowly reached out for the forefinger of the woman’s left hand and chopped it off from her finger with a small blade that came out of thin air.

The blade did its work and disappeared just as same.

He looked at the finger and raised it in the air, blood dripping down on her exposed body.

This was his reward. His trophy.

Serial killers were creatures of habits. Just like wild animals, they liked to keep a pile of their own version of treasures from the victims of their terror.

And Shen Yuan was like one of them, but his rituals were more intense and complicated.

Once her finger was thoroughly cleaned to the bone, he placed it in the inventory among the pilee of many before focusing on rest of the body.

He gathered the edge of the sheet together, folding her body within it with the same efficient care he’d used to wrap the servant’s corpse he’d never actually touched, drawing the whole bundle closed until nothing remained visible but smooth, water-slick fabric.

Then, without ceremony, he opened his inventory and let it vanish entirely from the physical world, tucked away into that same strange pocket dimension where the sword, the knife, the sack of iron shards, and now, quietly, a body all rested together in silent, dimensionless storage.

Then finally, he looked around the room with a faint smile on his face. There was no blood or a sign of struggle left behind in the small wooden shed that had, moments ago, been the site of Lin Xia’s final, fatal misstep.

Shen Yuan exhaled slowly, glancing around the room one final time to confirm nothing remained out of place.

He had not even let the hidden blade fall from her hands and the small compound-soaked cloth, that was already discarded into his inventory alongside everything else that might raise questions if discovered.

’Now the real work begins.’

He settled back onto his cot, silver eyes distant with calculation as the weight of the night’s events finally began to settle into place within his mind.

Lin Xia was gone, but her absence would need an explanation soon enough.

He did not know how much Bang Fo would care about her disappearance. But one thing he did knew was that he could not sense his survailence even now.

People going mission from this place was nothing new but it was Lin Xia who made it happen and now she herself was gone.

He already knew what he would do.

Pretend like nothing ever happened.

What could be the chance that she told anyone before coming here,

’Bang Fo barely looked twice at a servant with his heart cut out. He’s unlikely to spend much effort mourning the disappearance of the woman even if he slept with her.’

Still, caution demanded he move carefully.

Whatever role Lin Xia had actually played in this estate’s deeper secrets. Her death was bound to draw attention now that she was gone.

Maybe Bang Fo would think she ran off with his secrets or someone got to her to get them.

’So many problems, I have to take one at a time.’

He closed his eyes, letting his qi settle back into its careful, practiced rhythm, the same disciplined calm he always returned to no matter what chaos surrounded him.

Sleep wouldn’t come easily tonight, not with so many ends still hanging loose and when there was so much on his mind.

But Shen Yuan knew he had to rest in some way and be prepared for the next day. After all, anything can happen.

Shen Yuan’s breathing slowed, his mind recalled the night’s events one final time before he even allowed himself to drift toward whatever rest he could manage. ’Let’s see what the morning brings.’

Outside, the estate remained exactly as still and unaware as it had been hours before, utterly ignorant of the fact that within one small servant’s shed, a predator far more dangerous than anyone in this household suspected had just quietly claimed his newest victim—and walked away without a single trace left behind.

...

The veil of the night was slowly uplifted by the rays of sunshine.

And the moment it was gone, Shen Yuan’s eyes opened to a new day.

He rose from his cot without hesitation, his body already falling into the same disciplined rhythm that had carried him through every morning since arriving at this estate.

Qi circulation.

Stretching the stiffness from muscles that had barely rested.

A quick, methodical glance around his small shed to confirm, one final time, that nothing remained out of place.

Nothing did.

Everything looked as it was the day before.

Shen Yuan stepped outside into the pale morning light, folding himself back into the role of an ordinary, unremarkable servant with practiced ease.

The estate moved through its usual routines exactly as it always did.

Servants swept courtyards. Water was hauled from the well.

The scent of breakfast porridge drifted faintly from the kitchen quarters.

No one so much as glanced twice in his direction, no whispers, no unusual glances, nothing to suggest that anyone had yet noticed the absence of the woman who normally oversaw half the estate’s scribing work.

Shen Yuan made his way toward the small side chamber where he usually worked, settling in at the familiar desk and pulling a fresh stack of documents toward himself, brush already dipped and ready.

The morning stretched on in quiet, mechanical normalcy.

Shen Yuan transcribed one report after another, his silver eyes moving across the pages with the same practiced efficiency he’d shown every day since arriving, his expression betraying nothing of the calculations still turning steadily beneath the surface.

The servants were had already started to notice the absence of the nagging bitch that overlooked each one of their mistakes.

But no one seemed to mind it. In fact they looked more at peace while working.

He was halfway through a routine trade ledger when the front door of the estate creaked open.

Footsteps echoed down the hall and they seemed familiar.

They were the same measured cadence Shen Yuan had come to recognize over the past two weeks.

He kept his head down, brush moving steadily across the parchment, giving no outward indication that he’d noticed anything at all.

The footsteps drew closer.

Then stopped.

Shen Yuan felt the presence pausing just at the edge of the doorway before he looked up.

He lifted his eyes, and found Bang Fo standing in the entrance, green hair falling neatly over one shoulder, his usual calm, unreadable expression fixed squarely on Shen Yuan.