Ye Mu couldn’t help but smiled. “Now you’ll have a clear conscience after helping someone! In the past years, I’ve always heard people talking about the good deeds you’ve done. I heard you gave away free items and even gave people medical treatments for free! But there is something I really want to know.”
She lowered her voice and said, “You’ve always been doing good deeds. I’m curious, have you ever done anyone bad in your life?”
Wouldn’t he be a saint if he hadn’t done anything bad at all?
But her brisk words pierced heavily through his mind. His eyes widened suddenly as he stared at Ye Mu.
If someone had asked the question before she had, then he was able to say that he had never done anything bad without any hesitation. He had never harmed or deceived anyone. Ever since he became in charge of Tianshou Temple, it became a habit for him to do good deeds. He would endure any hardship gladly.
But now that he thought back, had he committed any bad deeds?
In a trance, he suddenly remembered the field of corpses littered at the foot of the mountain.
At first, he awakened Ye Mu before everyone else and intensified the internal energy inside her body. He did this because Wen Feng said that Mo Linyuan was coming to pick her up soon.
He wanted Ye Mu to kill Mo Linyuan.
However, he never expected so many people were chasing after Mo Linyuan to kill him. Yet even under such circumstances, he still came to look for Ye Mu. What was most unexpected at that time was that even though Ye Mu was only six years old, she had enough willpower and determination to control herself! She killed off all of Mo Linyuan’s enemies and to prevent herself from hurting Mo Linyuan, she destroyed some of her meridians.
He originally wanted Ye Mu to kill Mo Linyuan. But in the end, the beast he released helped Mo Linyuan with his plight and saved him.
When he descended the mountain and saw the field of corpses, he cried and laughed. In the end, he puked out blood.
It was definitely God’s punishment for wanting to harm other people! He didn’t harm the person he wanted to harm and actually harmed himself in the end!
“Hey! Hey!” Ye Mu waved her small hands in front of him. “If my question is too difficult to answer, then forget it. Your face looks so unsightly.”
The silent master looked in her direction, but he didn’t dare to meet her gaze because she was someone he unintentionally hurt in the process.
Ye Mu poured him a cup of tea and said, “You should be tired after such a long day. Rest well tonight!”
The silent master looked at the teacup in his hand and suddenly said, “The truth is, I had done something bad in the past.”
“Huh?” Ye Mu’s eyes widened in surprise and she immediately smiled. “I never expected that answer! What did you do?”
The silent master looked at her with his delicate and bewitching eyes. In the candlelight, Ye Mu’s round face looked very cute and lovely.
“I hurt someone.”
The people who chased after Mo Linyuan to kill him were all killed off. Their deaths were justified. But Ye Mu was still suffering the injuries she had received from that day.
He intensified Ye Mu’s powers too much, forcing her to be on the end of qi deviation. Even if he helped Ye Mu stabilize the internal energy inside her every month, she will still become more and more unstable.
The reason she was able to maintain her sanity until now was that she never fully healed her meridians!
Ye Mu’s ability to recover from injuries was very strong. Although she may appear insignificant, tiny, and thin, she possessed hundreds of years of stored internal energy inside her! As a result, her body was different from others, no matter how serious her injuries are, she would quickly recover from it.
But in order to prevent herself from hurting other people, she broke two meridians each time her other two meridians recovered.
Qi deviation – It’s literally translated as “to catch fire and become possessed by devils”. This happens when cultivation becomes unstable and dangerous. The cultivator could no longer control the internal energy inside their body.
Since her two of her meridians were broken, her internal energy would fail to circulate throughout her body. This caused her body to experience varying degrees of pain and internal bruising. However, she never complained about that and continued to smile every day.
The one bad deed he did made him hurt Ye Mu.
Ye Mu didn’t know why he was staring at her so intensely. She tiptoed and patted the silent master’s shoulder.
“No one is perfect. You’ve already done a great job. At the very least, you had only done one bad deed,” she maturely said as she sighed with regret.
The silent master didn’t say anything else. He had bid her goodnight and told her to rest early before leaving.
The next morning, the silent master went to the street, as usual, to medically treat poor people for free.
Due to his good reputation, no matter the person who came to see him for treatment was rich or poor, they were all polite toward him.
She was bored after sitting there for a while, so she helped the silent master wrap the medicine for the patients. During her stay here, she learned a lot about herbs. In addition, the medicinal herbs the silent master used are the commonly used ones.
“Your condition is difficult to completely cure. You should go back and soak your feet with hot water. If you can, I would recommend that you don’t live on the mountain anymore,” the silent master said to an old man.
After he finished treating the old man, he prescribed some medicine to dispel heat for him. Just as he tiredly stood up to stretch, he saw Ye Mu stumbling toward him while she carried a tall medicine box.
The medicine box was piled even higher than her head. The reason she was stumbling was not that she couldn’t hold the weight of the boxes, but it was because the pile of medicine boxes was too tall. If she wasn’t careful enough, all the boxes would fall to the ground.
Even though he can’t see her face, the silent master couldn’t help but laughed when he saw the amusing scene.
The person sitting in front of the silent master was dazed by his smile.
The silent master was a handsome monk. He generally smiled at everyone gently, but for him to suddenly so brilliantly, it really made people’s hearts pound!
Ye Mu didn’t witness the silent master’s smile. She finally reached the table with her short legs and put the stack of medicine packages on the table. Then she wiped off the beads of sweat on her little face.
“Cough. All the heatstroke prevention medicines are here. There will be none left after we used up all of this,” she said seriously
She looked at the silent master with her big round eyes as the silent master pursed his lips to prevent himself from further smiling. He handed her a bowl of water.
Ye Mu was really tired! Her hands were filthy, so she took the silent master’s hands and leaned in to drink the water!
At that moment, they were very close to each other. The silent master didn’t expect Ye Mu to use her mouth directly, instead of using her hand, so he was dazed for a moment!
An old man came here to see the doctor, saw the scene and said, “Look at how gentle the silent master is! He really knows how to take care of other people!”
A female patient snorted and muttered, “Where did this little fox girl come from? How could you make the silent master feed you water in broad daylight? Don’t you feel ashamed?”
Ye Mu wasn’t someone who would willingly allow other people to bully her. She wiped her mouth and she finished drinking the water.
“Your words are so sour! It’s obvious that you’re jealous!”
As soon as she finished speaking, she disappeared like a wisp of smoke. Since the monk was here to do good deeds, it was best if she walked away and not quarreled with other people.
After the girl’s intentions were exposed by Ye Mu, the surrounding people were smiling smugly at her. Since Ye Mu had left, she couldn’t even defend herself, so she could only turn away and leave.
The silent master helplessly stared at Ye Mu’s disappearing figure. He watched as Ye My rushed back to the house and helped move the stack medicinal packages that were even taller than hers. He couldn’t help but shake his head and smiled bitterly.
He didn’t realize it, but whenever Ye Mu was there, his dull and quiet life was full of different colors, vitality, and energy.
The next day, the silent master was about to help Ye Mu circulate the internal energy in her body when a large group of people came knocking on the temple.
The Zhong Family was one of the three major families. They were used to oppressing and bullying other people. Although they’ve restrained themselves in the past year, they would still fight back if they were bullied.
Madam Zhong personally brought someone here personally. Yesterday, she was scared away by Ye My, but after pondering over the events for a night, she felt that something wasn’t right. So, she came here to destroy the temple today!
“Find that woman and that bastard child!” Under her orders, the people she brought with her began to force their way in. The monks didn’t dare to hurt anyone, so they couldn’t prevent the outsiders from forcing their way in.
The silent master was in a difficult position after hearing the news because the woman hadn’t woken up yet.
Ye Mu said, “Why don’t you give her some internal energy to temporarily wake her up? Then, we can figure out the situation after she explains everything to us, and we can make a decision.”
The silent master practiced the Clear Heart Cultivation method. It was a gentle style of cultivation.
After he awakened the mother, Ye Mu carried the child in her arms. Her eyes became tender and soft with the child in her arms.
The child had been drinking goat milk since his mother was unconscious. Ye Mu asked her, “Who are you? Do you know how to write? There are some questions we want to ask you now because the Zhong Family is here.”
The woman’s complexion immediately turned pale as soon as she heard the Zhong Family was here. She nodded her head and looked at them pleadingly. She was indeed a mute.
Ye Mu brought a pen and paper to her. She asked her, “They said you’re a concubine from the Zhong Family. Is that true?”
The woman shook her head quickly and wrote down her bitter experience/
It turned out that she was a prostitute working in official brothels. Her name was Fang Ru. When the emperor ascended the throne a year ago, she was finally let go as a prostitute. She used the silver she accumulated over the years and bought her freedom. Then, she met the young master of the Zhong Family.
Young Master Zhong liked her, but because she was a prostitute in the past, the Zhong Family forbade Young Master Zhong from marrying her. They didn’t allow him to even take her in as a concubine. She could only become his mistress living outside the Zhong Family.
A few months ago, she found out that she was pregnant. Because she was afraid that the Zhong Family would force her to abort the child, she broke off her relationship with Master Zhong. However, her pregnancy was discovered by the Zhong Family ten days ago. The Zhong Family forced her to abort her child, but she refused. She decided to go to the countryside to lie low until the matter died down. But before she left the city, she went to the temple to burn incense for her unborn child. But she was caught at the temple, leading her child to have a premature birth.
Ye Mu looked at what Fang Ru wrote and snorted, “The Zhong Family really are a heartless bunch, they don’t even want their own flesh and blood.”
Fang Ru revealed a sad expression and pulled Ye Mu’s hand, hoping Ye Mu could save her!
She also wrote——as long as her child remained safe, she was willing to pray for her child’s blessing in the temple for the rest of her life!
Ye Mu looked at the silent master, “Do you accept nuns here?”
For the first time, the gentle expression on the silent master’s face cracked a little, “No, we don’t.”
Ye My scratched her head and said, “We should meet them head-on first!”
The Zhong Family couldn’t find the woman or child, and they couldn’t enter the rear court either. So, they resorted to slandering the temple and the monks.
“Everyone please come and take a look. Look at what kind of monks they are! They’re forcibly detaining a concubine from the Zhong Family in the temple. Don’t even know what they’re planning to do with her!”
Her words became more slanderous and unpleasant each passing second. Many of the Buddhist worshippers overhead the commotion and gathered around. They also felt that it was against the Buddha’s teaching for Tianshou Temple to imprison a pregnant woman in the temple.
When the silent master came out, he heard Madam Zhong’s loud voice and frowned. “Who is making such a racket in the temple?”
Madam Zhong stood in front of the servants and put her hands on her hips. “It’s me! Silent master, I see that you’re still young, so it’s natural for you to fall in love. Even so, you shouldn’t have fallen for an escaped concubine! What’s more, she’s pregnant with someone else’s child.”
“Presumptuous!” A crease appeared in the space between the silent master’s brows when he heard the woman’s accusations. This was the first time he had been so angry! “A Buddhist temple is a sacred place; how can your mouth be so filthy?”
“I’m filthy?” Madam Zhong laughed shrewdly. “Am I the filthy one or are you the one with an impure mind? Not only do you have a young girl living in the temple, but you’re also forcing a pregnant woman to stay here. Who knows what you’re preaching here?”
The silent master was furious! But before he could do anything, there was a ‘pa’ sound and Madam Zhong was slapped hard by someone. Madam Zhong screamed out in pain and retreated a few steps. “Who is it? Who hit me?”
Ye Mu shook her hand and jumped in front of her. “I’m really sorry for not slapping you hard enough. What did you just say? Is there a problem with a young girl staying at the temple? I’m here right now, why don’t you say it to my face?”
Madam Zhong covered her face and glared resentfully at her, “You little slut, how dare you slap me! Don’t be impudent just because you’re one of His Majesty’s people! I’m here to catch a runaway concubine. Even if I report you to Yizheng Manor, they’ll still side with me!”
Ye Mu didn’t back down. “You said she’s a runaway concubine from the Zhong Family, where’s your proof?”
At this time, Fang Ru walked out from the rear court and looked at Madam Zhong with red-rimmed eyes.
Madam Zhong was furious when she saw that Fang Ru had actually given birth to the child.
“You want evidence? I’ll show you!”
She took a book listing all the concubines from the Zhong Family from a box. “Look right here. She personally inked her fingerprint right here, so this can’t be fake.”
As soon as Madam Zhong took out the concubine book, the surrounding people immediately became discussing. Ye Mu looked at Fang Ru strangely, but Fang Ru turned pale and was on the verge of collapse.
She had signed the book in order to become Young Master Zhong’s concubine. But later, Young Master Zhong told her that because his mother disagreed, the page listing her was torn by his mother. Could it be that she didn’t tear it?
When Madam Zhong smirked when she saw Fang Ru retreating in fear with her child in her arms.
She arrogantly said, “This isn’t a fake document! She is the runaway concubine from the Zhong Family. Now you have nothing to say, right? Take her away!”
Then, she turned around and glared at Ye Mu. “Damned brat, just you wait. I’ll return your slap soon!”
The servants from the Zhong Family walked toward Fang Ru, but Fang Ru kept retreating backward. She couldn’t speak, so she could only scream as she held her baby. The silent master wanted to help, but the document was signed by her. This matter was something he no longer interfered with.
“Stop!” Ye Mu jumped in front of Fang Ru and said, “Did I allow you guys to touch her? Are you looking for a fight?”
Fang Ru quickly hid behind Ye Mu. Although Ye Mu was small, she was the only one willing to defend her.
The silent master certainly wouldn’t let Ye Mu, a child, bear the weight of the whole situation. He walked forward and said, “This humble monk will personally verify the truth of this matter with the people from Yizheng Manor. However, she is still weak from giving birth, so you can’t take her away.
Madam Zhong didn’t expect this group of monks to be so stubborn. “Okay, just you wait. I will go report this temple for corruption!”
Madam Zhong’s sharp and arrogant voice irritated Ye My. Her hands were itchy for action when a familiar voice could be heard.
“Why is it so lively here?”
Ye Mu’s eyes brightened! Mo Linyuan was here!
She subconsciously ran towards Mo Linyuan, and Mo Linyuan was also very happy to see Ye Mu. He came here today to bring Ye Mu back, but he had unexpectedly walked in on this scene.