Peerless Bodyguard of a Stunning Beauty

Hearing Zhao Rong’s words, the Village Beauty mustered her courage and said, ”Brother Zhao Rong, it’s like this... In this village, there’s a path that leads directly to the Palace of Yama—a road between the living and the dead...”

Before she could finish, a red throwing knife shot out from the crowd, aimed straight for her.

Faster than words could describe, Zhao Rong leaped into the air, snatching the blade between two fingers before spinning to face the crowd.

Lili stepped forward to shield Zhao Rong. Facing the villagers, she warned, ”Brother Zhao Rong, be careful! Someone in that crowd threw a knife at you...”

Shielding the Village Beauty, Zhao Rong pulled a detector from his pocket. ”It’s fine,” he told the three women, ”I’ll find the culprit right now.”

He pressed a button on the device and placed the throwing knife inside it.

The device emitted a single BEEP, and a mechanical voice announced, ”Return to sender.”

The knife instantly flew back into the crowd. A scream rang out, and a man fell to the ground, dead.

When the women saw the knife thrower identified and struck down by his own blade, they stared at the device in Zhao Rong’s hand with curiosity. ”Brother Zhao Rong, what in the world is that thing? How did it find the person hiding in the crowd so quickly? And it even returned the favor—an eye for an eye, blood for blood—delivering justice on the spot...”

”I forgot to tell you,” Zhao Rong explained with a smile. ”This is the latest weapon I bought from the Paradise Shopping Cart. It’s called the Flying Knife Detector. If someone throws a knife at me, I just have to pick it up and place it inside this detector. It will then find the attacker and return the knife right back to them.”

When the three women heard how miraculous the weapon was, they immediately turned to the hostile villagers and issued a warning.

”You troublemakers, listen up! The person who just threw that knife died a miserable death! If any of you dare to try another sneak attack, this machine in Brother Zhao Rong’s hand will find you and kill you! So, you had better stand here quietly and cooperate with Brother Zhao Rong. Otherwise, you’ll suffer the consequences!”

When the surrounding villagers saw the knife thrower killed by the mysterious device in Zhao Rong’s hand, they immediately cowered, not daring to make another move.

”So,” Zhao Rong continued, turning back to the Village Beauty, ”you were saying there’s a path in this village leading directly to the underworld. Does that mean the people here can come back to life after they die? Can they return from the underworld using this yin-yang road?”

The Village Beauty nodded. ”That’s also why everyone from our village has memories of their past lives. They could have been reincarnated after death, but they chose not to. Instead, they walk that yin-yang road to come back and keep living in this world.”

Hearing this, Lili was stunned. A sudden thought struck her. ”Village Beauty, I get it!” she exclaimed. ”Every single person in this village must be at least a thousand years old! They can’t truly die. Whenever one of them dies, they just quietly come back through that yin-yang road. That means all the villagers possess an Immortal Body, right?”

The Village Beauty nodded. ”Sister Lili, you guessed correctly. I just discovered this secret myself, in the village’s ancestral shrine.”

The village’s ancestral shrine, where ancestors were worshiped, was always sealed off, with no one permitted to enter. However, when the Village Beauty managed to get inside, she was astonished to find that the very ancestors supposedly worshiped there were actually living among them in the village.

That’s when she understood. Everyone in the village, except for herself and her younger brother, possessed an Immortal Body. After death, they all chose to return via the yin-yang road and come back to life.

Yu Lan’s eyes widened as she scanned the area. ”Village Beauty, I think I understand the secret of this village now,” she said tentatively. ”The secret *is* the yin-yang road. If we destroy it, everyone here will lose their past-life memories and be able to live normally, right?”

Xuelian added from the side, ”Village Beauty, in this village, only you and your brother are reincarnated souls. The rest of the villagers are all thousand-year-old undying demons, aren’t they?”

Hearing Xuelian’s words, the assistant was stunned. He stared incredulously at the hundreds of villagers, old and young alike, and exclaimed in horror, ”Xuelian, if what you’re saying is true, then all of them—the old and the young—are just dead people who have walked the yin-yang road countless times, right?”

Just as they were speculating, an elderly man suddenly stepped forward from the crowd. ”Sir,” he said to Zhao Rong, ”you mustn’t be fooled by this demoness’s words! We are all normal people here. But ever since she appeared, a strange phenomenon has plagued our village. Now, no matter who dies, they come back to life within a month.”

Following him, an old woman stepped forward. She pointed an accusing finger at the Village Beauty and her brother, crying as she spoke. ”Young man, you mustn’t believe this demoness and her demonic brother! They aren’t from our village. Before they came, our village was peaceful and harmonious. But ever since their arrival, our lives have been thrown into chaos, with one bizarre incident after another! We want to capture these siblings and hand them over to the public security bureau in town. This will restore peace to our village so we can live happily again, not in the constant state of panic and fear their presence has caused!”

Hearing the villagers’ words, Zhao Rong was thrown into turmoil. He didn’t know who was telling the truth—the Village Beauty or the villagers.

Are the villagers the righteous ones, and the Village Beauty evil? Or is she the righteous one, and the villagers evil? Who is right and who is wrong? Who are the good guys, and who are the bad guys?

At that moment, Zhao Rong simply couldn’t figure it out.