Do Not Offend the Reborn Wicked Wife

The old man chuckled and didn’t answer a thing. He darted in again, his palms shifting through a flurry of strikes in front of him, and only when he was close to Li Qingmu did he suddenly claw up and down at the same time, reaching for his crown and chest.

Li Qingmu didn’t dare meet him head‑on. He pushed off hard with his foot and sprang into the air, matching the old man’s palms with both feet, borrowing the force to fly backward, then suddenly stamped down with both legs and shot forward like a cannonball straight at the man’s face!

The old man hadn’t expected Li Qingmu’s offense to turn so sharp all of a sudden. There was no time to dodge left or right, so he had no choice but to bend backward in an iron‑bridge, and as Li Qingmu’s body flew over him, he hooked his right foot up behind him and kicked out!

Li Qingmu noticed the old man’s change of move. His legs dropped straight down and kicked at the old man’s calves, using that force to press his upper body down at the same time as he aimed a rapid punch at the man’s chest and belly!

The two of them traded over a hundred moves without a clear winner, but the old man was after all getting on in years; his strength began to fail, and he had no choice but to look for a chance to break away.

Li Qingmu, on the other hand, fought fiercer the longer he fought, as if every bit of potential in his body had been forced out. He was like a raging tiger, pressing the old man so hard he could only defend again and again, completely on the back foot.

The old man grew anxious. If they kept fighting like this, he would definitely end up dying in the other man’s hands from sheer exhaustion. So he braced himself, took two punches and a kick, suddenly broke off the fight, then leapt up onto the courtyard wall, ready to flee.

But just then, Li Qingmu suddenly pulled a poisoned dart from his robe and, by sheer "good luck," shot the old man right in the buttocks. The pain made him yelp, and he toppled off the wall.

Even so, the man still managed to escape. When Li Qingmu vaulted the wall to chase him, there was only a small puddle of blood left on the ground; the man himself was long gone. Still, he wasn’t worried. The poison on that dart was his own concoction—without the antidote, the victim was guaranteed to die within three days.

Staring at the specks of blood on the ground like little signposts, Li Qingmu gave a cold laugh and followed the trail.

He’d always been the sort to use any means to reach his ends. Hurting people with darts from the dark, even smearing them with deadly poison, cost him no sleep at all. As long as he followed the blood, he was certain he’d find that old man sooner or later.

A master with skills like that—if he wasn’t hunted down and killed to the last breath, Li Qingmu wouldn’t be at ease in the slightest, because he wasn’t out here alone this time; he had Qi Jingyu and Yue’er with him.

For their safety, he had to cut the grass and pull up the roots!

Back at the inn, Long Yue was leaning slantwise on the bed, too worried about Li Qingmu’s safety to sleep. Only when daylight fully broke did she finally see the man she had been longing for return from outside.

"Well? Did you catch up to him?" she asked with concern.

"No. But it’s fine, I know how to drag him out." Li Qingmu smiled with quiet confidence, gently stroking Madam’s glossy black hair. "Didn’t sleep well last night, did you? Sleep a bit more. I’ll call you for a meal when you’ve had enough rest."

"I can’t sleep soundly when you’re not here." Long Yue gave a sweet smile, yawned, and said, "I’m going to make up for it now. Call me at noon."

With that, Long Yue pulled the quilt over herself, lay on her side, and closed her eyes.

Li Qingmu tugged the corner of her quilt into place for her, then walked out of the room with a gloomy face, running right into Qi Jingyu, who was waiting for news.

"Imperial Uncle, how did it go? Did you catch anyone?"

"No. I ran into a very formidable old man. His skills are on par with mine. I hit him with a dart—the dart was smeared with a deadly poison I made myself. Without the antidote, he’s as good as dead!"

In truth, even he wasn’t entirely sure about that. There were plenty of capable people in this world; since the other side could hire such a powerful expert, they might well be able to find some miraculous doctor who could cure strange poisons.

But he already had a plan for this. After explaining to Qi Jingyu what had happened during his chase that morning, he took him out onto the street to buy Poisonous Herb. His demand was simple: aside from the largest pharmacy in town, every other pharmacy and herbal shop’s stock of Poisonous Herb had to be bought out completely!

The most crucial ingredient in his antidote was that same deadly Poisonous Herb. By buying up all of it, he would force the other side to purchase from the one designated pharmacy, and then he’d have no trouble finding clues to the mastermind behind the scenes.

The two of them were flush with silver notes. Short on hands, they simply splashed money on the street to hire people, offering double the market price to purchase Poisonous Herb. They gathered everything up and stored it in the woodshed at the inn.

Very soon, every pharmacy in the city had been stripped clean, leaving only one shop, called Miaoshou huichun Hall, with any Poisonous Herb left for sale.

Li Qingmu and Qi Jingyu took up positions on either side of the pharmacy’s entrance, keeping watch. They handed the Shopkeeper a silver note of one thousand taels and instructed him that if anyone came to buy Poisonous Herb, he was to ring the hanging bell immediately.

The long wait was excruciatingly dull. Qi Jingyu, unable to stand the boredom, went to the bun shop next door and bought a few beef soup‑filled buns, eating as he waited. "Imperial Uncle, aren’t you hungry? The buns here are pretty good. Want to try one?"

"You eat. I’m not hungry." Li Qingmu had taken a bit of internal injury that morning and had no appetite.

On top of that, he had just taken a Nine Spirit Pill to treat his internal wounds, and it wasn’t advisable for him to eat anything greasy or meaty.

Once that brat Qi Jingyu heard this, he actually started thinking up ways to tempt him. After finishing the buns, he went to buy roast chicken and mutton soup, eating meat and slurping soup, and every now and then tossing out a "So fragrant, so good," just to tease his Imperial Uncle.

"You itching for a beating?" Li Qingmu couldn’t stand his feasting, his face turning as dark as the bottom of a wok.

The boy clearly knew he couldn’t eat, yet kept making those noises on purpose. Lately, this brat was getting more and more in need of a good thrashing.

Seeing his Imperial Uncle angered, Qi Jingyu finally reined himself in a bit and went off to eat and drink by himself.

They waited until the sun slanted westward, yet no one came to buy Poisonous Herb. Li Qingmu began to feel that perhaps their way of waiting was wrong—too obvious. He had originally thought that even if the other side realized there were people watching outside Miaoshui Huichun Hall, they would still risk going in for medicine for that old man. But half a day passed and no one showed.

These people really were patient to a fault. Surely they wouldn’t wait until nightfall to buy medicine?

That possibility wasn’t out of the question, so Li Qingmu decided he couldn’t just wait around like an idiot any longer. He went across the street to the second floor of Yichun Pavilion, rented a private room, ate some vegetables and sipped tea, only occasionally lowering his head to glance at the situation below.

Qi Jingyu had no idea his Imperial Uncle had changed positions. After he finished eating and drinking, he went back to Miaoshui Huichun Hall, only to find that his Imperial Uncle had vanished, and he hurriedly began searching around.

Just then, a wine cup suddenly crashed down from above, almost hitting him on the head. Furious, he looked up, ready to blow his top, only to see his missing Imperial Uncle sitting by the railing above, smiling down at him.

"Quit gawking, you little fool. Get up here," Li Qingmu said with a grin.

Yichun Pavilion was not a restaurant but a place for drinking flower wine. The moment Qi Jingyu stepped through the door, he was surrounded by a flock of girls: "My lord, come have some fun," "Oh my, aren’t you that young master, how come you haven’t come see me for so long?"

Every oily, honey‑tongued sales pitch was thrown at Qi Jingyu, but he had absolutely no interest in these gaudy, vulgar women. In the end, he suddenly bellowed, "All of you, get out of my way!"