"Giggle giggle giggle"—nestled in Eli Crane's arms, Little Snowball kept laughing nonstop, clearly happy.
"Come on, say 'Seventh Daddy.'" Eli Crane dotingly took his tiny hand, bending down to gently tease the baby in his arms.
"Oh, oh, oh!" Little Snowball babbled all sorts of unclear sounds, as if he really understood what everyone was saying.
"Wow, this is delicious! Xin'er, how do you know how to make hotpot? That's something only people from the modern world would know!" Master Xuanluo exclaimed as he gobbled down lamb, eyeing her curiously. Had Xin'er actually been to the modern world?
Ivy Shen just smiled and didn't say anything. Other than her Seven Husbands, she hadn't talked to anyone about her past. Sometimes, when Yvonne Li didn't get her modern slang, Ivy would just say she learned it from Master Xuanluo, and Yvonne would let it go. Still, Ivy found these new words pretty interesting.
"By the way, Master, what did you do in the mortal world?" Ivy asked while munching vegetables, puzzled at how long he'd been gone.
"Master went for training! There's a centuries-old tree in the mortal realm, and its essence can help me cultivate," Master Xuanluo replied plainly.
"But I remember your training never used to take this long. This time you were gone for ages," Ivy pressed. Still, she felt a bit relieved inside—thank goodness he made it back at the crucial moment. Otherwise, the consequences...
She didn't dare imagine those consequences, nor did she want to!
"Sigh!" Thinking of his earlier mishaps, Master Xuanluo set down his chopsticks and let out a tragic sigh.
"What's wrong?" Ivy Shen asked, a little confused.
"Master Xuanluo, are you okay?" The crowd looked puzzled too—why did the Daoist suddenly look so tragic? Did something happen to him in the mortal world?
They had no idea where the 'mortal world' even was, but since Xin'er said it was her hometown, everyone just felt a weird sense of kinship.
"Ugh, it was a disaster," Master Xuanluo groaned, taking a swig of wine and sighing, "You guys have no idea, I was so unlucky this time!"
"Huh?" Everyone paused, chopsticks mid-air, curiosity piqued. What could possibly make Master Xuanluo sigh like that?
I mean, he's an immortal!
"You know, when I train in the mortal world, I have to transform into my true snake body. And when I do that, I'm just like a regular snake—totally defenseless. That place is usually deserted, but this time I ran into a woman. Yep, a vicious woman." He took another gulp of wine, still fuming about the whole thing.
"And then?" Everyone pressed him for details, clearly dying of curiosity.
"That woman was seriously terrified of snakes. Probably got bitten as a kid. You know that saying, 'Once bitten by a snake, ten years afraid of well ropes'? Anyway, I was just unlucky enough to run into her, and when she saw me..."
He sighed again and downed more wine.
"Did she run away?" Felix Bloom blurted out instantly.
Everyone nodded, totally agreeing with Felix—if she was that scared of snakes, she should've bolted, right?!
"No way! If she'd run, none of this would've happened. Not only did she not run, she actually plucked up the guts to kick me—sent me flying! Ugh, I thought my bones were gonna shatter." He finished, looking utterly tragic.
"What?!" Everyone was stunned.
"And then—ugh, talk about bad karma—I got rescued by some kind guy who took me home to treat me. But guess what? That guy turned out to be the woman's brother! And of course, she spotted me again!" Master Xuanluo shuddered at the memory, clearly still traumatized.
"No way, that's so unlucky! What happened next?" Everyone except Ivy leaned in, totally hooked by the story.
Meanwhile, Ivy frowned, eyes narrowing. Wait a minute—why did this story sound so familiar?
"Then that woman, behind her brother's back, dumped me straight into the toilet pit—yeah, that's basically our latrine here." Master Xuanluo spat several times, as if trying to get rid of the stink just by talking about it.
"Whoa, that's way too much!" Everyone burst out, scandalized.
"Seriously, how could she be so cruel? That's just over the top!"
"Seriously! No compassion at all!"
"Yeah! If I ever met that woman, I'd beat her up for sure!"
Everyone kept chattering away, totally oblivious as Ivy's face grew darker and darker.
To them, snakes were just their own kind. How could any human be so horrible—dumping a kind, noble Daoist Master like Xuanluo into a latrine? That was basically unforgivable!
"And then, Master?" Felix Bloom nosed in again, dying to know more gossip.
"Master, you didn't just let her off easy, right?" Adrian Night couldn't help asking, actually feeling a bit sorry for the woman—messing with a Daoist Master, her fate was probably tragic.
"Of course not! How could I let her off that easy? My poor old bones were nearly broken, and when has a Daoist Master like me ever been treated so badly? Am I right?" He looked around, beaming with righteous indignation.
"Absolutely!" Everyone nodded along, totally backing him up.
"You know what she said? She called snakes disgusting, said we're cold-blooded animals. Ha—what a joke! We're snakes too, just, you know, snake-people." Master Xuanluo huffed. "And get this—when she dumped me in the toilet pit, it wasn't over! I barely managed to crawl out, and wouldn't you know it, I ran into her again. She dumped a whole bag of trash on me, then stomped on me!
"What? That's way too much!" The crowd was furious—how could anyone act like that?!
"Exactly! So I got so mad, I used all my spiritual energy to curse her!"
"What did you curse her with?"
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"Wasn't she afraid of snakes? So I cursed her to transmigrate to the Snake Kingdom and have a bunch of snake husbands. Uh, let me think—was it one, two… oh, right, I think I said seven?" Master Xuanluo frowned, his voice trailing off as he noticed Ivy Shen's face getting darker and darker.
The crowd saw Master Xuanluo's odd expression and followed his gaze to Ivy Shen. As soon as they looked, they froze.
The seven husbands looked confused, but then a thought popped up—didn't Xin'er say she just randomly woke up in this world?
Just now, didn't Master Xuanluo say he cursed her to transmigrate to the Snake Kingdom and marry seven snake husbands?!
Uh…???
"Xin'er, you…" Master Xuanluo looked at her, then at the seven husbands, his face suddenly changing. No, it couldn't be, right? That's impossible! She can't be the woman I cursed—she has memories, she remembers being Xin'er, that's got to be it!
Master Xuanluo hurriedly tried to comfort himself!