Chapter 1192 — The Female Swindler Comes Knocking

"Junior wife? Little sister-in-law?" Er Gou Dan's expression turned a little strange, but having only just met her, he could hardly press the matter, and merely said, "Hello... about what happened before, my apologies..."

"It's nothing at all, really — from now on we're all one family!" Shen Yushu waved a careless hand. "But since you're Brother Arrow Brand's underling, then the lion counts as your underling too. Surely you're not going to keep demanding satisfaction from your own underling?"

"That... no, I suppose not..." Er Gou Dan thought it over and shook his head. Since the lion was his underling, going to the lion's leader for an accounting would be no different from going to himself — and who ever demanded satisfaction from himself? It seemed the matter would simply have to be let go.

"Hello!" Gu Mengyao greeted Er Gou Dan with a proper nod and held out her hand. "My name is Gu Mengyao. Don't listen to Wei Zhao's nonsense. I used to be his employer, but now we are good friends. I have asked Wei Zhao to live here and protect Xiaoshu and me."

For reasons she could not name, Gu Mengyao simply did not want her bond with Wei Zhao defined by the word employer. In the beginning she had been fond enough of that title, and had often used it to scold and order Wei Zhao about; but as time went on, she liked it less and less.

"My... my hands are dirty..." Er Gou Dan flushed red, embarrassed, and did not dare take her hand.

Gu Mengyao did not mind. She gave a faint smile and drew her hand back, sparing them both the awkwardness.

"Wei Zhao, since that Yu Yuanyuan's mother was bitten by the lion, shouldn't you go and have a look at her right away? We mustn't let the injury go untreated." Gu Mengyao had just heard Er Gou Dan explain the whole affair, cause and consequence. Since Wei Zhao was such a formidable physician, he must have some way to heal the wound.

"Mm, all right. Then let's go and have a look," Wei Zhao said with a nod.

"Leader... there is really no need to be in such a hurry..." Er Gou Dan felt rather embarrassed. He said this not from any indifference to Mother Yu's injury, but for fear that Wei Zhao had other business to attend to — he could hardly expect everything to bend to his own convenience. He hurried on, "Leader, this is the medicine you had me bring. I delivered it safely! You were in a hurry to use it to save someone, weren't you? You had best treat whoever needs it first. The moment I stepped out the door I lost the address you gave me, and I have wasted a great deal of time..."

As he spoke, Er Gou Dan drew a bottle of medicine from his bosom and handed it to Wei Zhao.

"It's fine, there's no hurry about this," Wei Zhao said. Taking the bottle, he mused for a moment, then said, "Those others are all old wounds of many years' standing; a little delay will not add to their suffering. Your friend's mother must be in terrible pain right now, so we had best go and see her first."

"Then... then thank you, Leader!" Er Gou Dan said gratefully.

"Why stand on ceremony with me!" Wei Zhao laughed and clapped him on the shoulder. "Wait here for me a moment. I'll change my clothes and fetch a few things, and we'll go together."

"All right!" Er Gou Dan nodded quickly.

Wei Zhao turned and went back into the villa to change, leaving only Gu Mengyao, Shen Yushu, and Er Gou Dan outside.

"Why didn't you beat that hag Gou Huli to death as well!" Shen Yushu looked at Er Gou Dan with a touch of regret. "That woman is truly hateful!"

"This... it isn't really right to beat people to death just like that..." Er Gou Dan scratched his head, thinking to himself that the leader's junior wife was a ruthless one indeed — worthy of being the leader's woman!

"Ah, they got off far too cheap," Shen Yushu said, shaking her head.

"Um... if I may ask, are you really the leader's junior wife?" Er Gou Dan gazed at the pretty Shen Yushu, unable to fathom it: how could a girl this beautiful go and become another man's junior wife? Even if the man was the wise and mighty leader Wei Zhao, it was still rather astonishing to Er Gou Dan.

"That's right!" Shen Yushu nodded earnestly. "Haven't you seen that I'm already living with Brother Arrow Brand? And still you ask such an obvious question!"

"Xiaoshu, don't talk nonsense!" Gu Mengyao cut her off helplessly, shooting her a glare, then turned to Er Gou Dan. "Don't listen to her drivel. Wei Zhao has a girlfriend."

"Oh..." Er Gou Dan did not know whom to believe. He thought it over — this was a matter he would have to put to Wei Zhao himself.

While they were waiting for Wei Zhao, a knock suddenly came again from outside the villa!

At the sound, Gu Mengyao, Shen Yushu, and Er Gou Dan all turned at once, and saw a girl standing at the villa's gate!

Neither Gu Mengyao nor Shen Yushu knew this girl, but Er Gou Dan did! At the sight of the newcomer, his eyes went red at once — this was the very truth of the saying that when enemies meet, their eyes burn with hate.

The visitor was none other than Yu Xiaoke!

Truth be told, Yu Xiaoke was rather ashamed to come knocking, for she had not yet scraped together the money to repay Er Gou Dan. She had meant to wait a while, until the rumors died down, or until she received a mission from the Thief Sect, and then repay the sum.

But the orphanage had run into trouble again! Misfortune upon misfortune, worse even than the last time misfortune had come in pairs!

Xiaoyan, an orphan who helped in the orphanage kitchen, had dropped a cleaver on the floor while chopping vegetables, and cut her own foot. At the time it had seemed like nothing; she had merely bound it up carelessly — after all, such a cut was nothing much to the children of an orphanage.

But a few days later the wound on Xiaoyan's foot began to fester, and only then did she take fright. She sought out Yu Xiaoke, who hastily dabbed on some mercurochrome and the like, but the effect was slight: the wound ulcerated badly, and Xiaoyan was running a fever as well.

This frightened Yu Xiaoke badly — she feared the girl had caught tetanus. There might have been rust, or something of the sort, on that cleaver, inflaming and infecting the wound. In a panic, Yu Xiaoke wanted to take Xiaoyan to a hospital, but alas, the orphanage's accounts held not a single coin. They had been scrimping on every meal for days; where was spare money for a doctor?

At her wits' end, Yu Xiaoke turned the matter over and over in her mind, and thought of that great benefactor she had met at the train station, Er Gou Dan! There was a warm-hearted man for you — he had lent her every cent he carried! Though it sat ill with her to borrow money from him again, Yu Xiaoke truly had nowhere left to turn, and no other way; she could only swallow her pride and, following the address Er Gou Dan had left behind, come knocking at the door.

"I never thought we would meet again so soon?" Er Gou Dan walked toward Yu Xiaoke. He truly wished to give this swindler woman a beating, but one look at her clear-browed, delicate face, and his hand would not obey him.