Chapter 145: The Masticated Wine Tavern, Reencountering the Senior Sister (Votes Requested for the End of the Month)

Wang Cheng parted ways with the bald-pated monk, Chen the Carpenter, and his own loyal personal guards, entering Pinghu Port via the route provided by Jiang Wenyuan.

He took the initiative to signal at a specific location—"Action begins"—which was immediately spotted by Mao Haifeng’s surveillance operatives.

Yet, they made no move.

According to the prior agreement between Mao Haifeng and Jiang Wenyuan, they needed to wait until the scapegoat, "Wang Fugui," delivered the [Pawl-Wood Effigy] into Litan Hall. Only then would they continue hiding for a minimum of three days and a maximum of seven, until Heir Wang Cheng was cursed to death.

Before that moment, not only would they refrain from stopping Wang Fugui from entering the palace, but they would even proactively facilitate his journey.

Naturally, if he managed to get in on his own, they certainly wouldn't meddle recklessly and leave handles for other factions of the Five-Peak Flag to exploit, thereby jeopardizing Mao Haifeng's succession.

Besides, their ally claimed this scapegoat was already under control. Were they supposed to keep a constant, unblinking watch on him just in case he got lost in the palace and accidentally delivered the item to the wrong place?

That joke wasn't funny at all.

This was "Wang Fugui's" first time here. He first wandered around the city twice, asking passersby for directions a few times.

He noticed that compared to when he had first arrived, the city was once again teeming with outsiders.

There were the familiar Great Zhao people, the red-haired and green-eyed Fritigians, the Sogdians with curved scimitars at their waists, the relatively short, brown-skinned Nanyang people, and the most numerous of all—the Wokou pirates. All of them had come for the imperial bounties and the Elixir of Immortality.

One wave had barely subsided, and another was already rising. How could he possibly guard against Mao Haifeng alone?

A fierce sense of urgency welled up within Wang Cheng's heart:

"I must resolve the internal hidden dangers within the Five-Peak Flag before those truly vicious, major pirates gather. I need to twist our strength into a single rope, re-suppress the Eastern Sea, and at the very least, stabilize the Eastern Sea Kingdom.

Otherwise, amidst such a motley crowd of dragons and fishes, the situation in the Eastern Sea will surely slip beyond the control of any single faction.

With the Eastern Sea in complete chaos, even the imperial court would be forced to hand out official titles as a compromise. Can the Five-Peak Flag possibly stand aloof and unscathed?

There are likely plenty of pirates out there who covet the throne of the 'Eastern Sea King.'

The only good news is that the top-tier [Living Divinities] of the Eastern Sea plundering faction have all been thoroughly slaughtered by Old Wang.

The current Eastern Sea is, in name and in fact, the weakest sea of all!

If I had a bunch of mid-tier mighty reinforcements on hand, it should be enough to hold the line."

Just as he was about to turn toward the palace, he suddenly caught a familiar figure flash past ahead. Although her appearance had changed drastically, the name "Shen Yueye" listed in the Curios Emporium remained unchanged.

Subconsciously taking two quick strides to follow, he discovered that this senior martial sister had already entered a fairly large tavern, hugging her pipa.

The red tavern sign reading "Bivalve Girl's Mouth-Chewed Wine" fluttered in the wind at the entrance.

From afar, one could already smell the clear, sweet fragrance of glutinous rice wine.

"Wait, mouth-chewed wine? When did Pinghu Port open such a bizarre tavern? Although the name of this wine is like thunder to the ear, this is my first time seeing it with my own eyes."

Hesitating for a moment, Wang Cheng followed her inside.

Legend had it that mouth-chewed wine had a history of nearly two thousand years in Yingzhou. Originally crafted through the mouth-processing of beautiful shrine maidens, it was primarily used as an offering to the deities.

Hailed as the "fairy wine" brewed from rice chewed by young maidens!

The process was extremely simple, boasting almost no craftsmanship to speak of.

First, sticky glutinous rice was boiled until completely soft and mushy—lest it damage the delicate teeth of the fair maidens. Then, they would chew the rice into paste mouthful after mouthful, spitting it out into a container to collect it.

Water was added, and it was placed in a warm spot to begin fermentation, relying on the amylase in the maidens' saliva to convert starches into sugars, ultimately turning it into alcohol.

In Wang Cheng's eyes, this was essentially the same gimmick as the white liquor brewed in the Divine Land by maidens trampling wine yeast with their bare feet.

Some people avoided it like the plague, while others flocked to it simply because they acquired a taste for it.

Judging by the signboard outside, this tavern had cooked up an even bigger gimmick.

All the mouth-chewed wine supplied in the shop did not originate from human maidens; instead, it was all brewed personally by a group of bivalve-spirit women!

The brewing workshop was located in the courtyard at the back.

Moreover, the establishment promised that physiognomists and fortune-tellers were free to divine the truth: if the mouth-chewed wine was not brewed by bivalve women, the proprietor would forfeit ten times the value for every fake item sold.

Stepping into the shop, he indeed saw many people who had come specifically to experience the local specialty.

"I wonder which business genius came up with this idea. Not only do they have the gimmick of bivalve women, but they've also hired a troupe of musicians to perform in the main hall."

Wang Cheng casually found a seat and sat down. Among the musicians, the one currently plucking the pipa—moonlighting as the pipa-player—was none other than his disguised senior sister, Shen Yueye.

Just by looking at how familiar she was with the others, he could tell that during this period, aside from searching for the oath-breaker named "Liu Jianzhen," she had been living in Pinghu Port under this disguised identity.

Foxes were renowned for their mastery of illusion. Although she wasn't wearing the [Golden Silk Veil of the Queen] to cover her face, she looked completely different from the senior sister he had seen that day.

While the true fox-eyed beauty could captivate all living beings and bring ruin to a country, her appearance here could only be described as that of a delicate, demure maiden of a modest household.

Her pipa-playing was quite melodious, living up to her origins in the song-and-dance proficient [Bodhisattva Barbarian].

Wang Cheng happened to be hungry. Skipping the specialty mouth-chewed wine, he simply ordered a basin of hand-grabbed mutton—which always tasted decent no matter how it was cooked—along with a large bowl of rice, and began to tuck in voraciously.

He planned to wait until Shen Yueye finished her performance before going over to reveal his identity.

"Both sides are on the verge of showing their true daggers; the outcome will be decided in seven days at most. I urgently need mid-tier official-rankings to hold the ground on my side.

Since I've already dragged Luo Wenlong and the diplomatic mission onto my chariot, I might as well pull Senior Sister aboard as well. Flaunting the tiger skin of the Mountains and Seas Society should be enough to frighten those pirates.

There's no longer any need to keep certain things hidden from her.

I just wonder if Eldest Senior Brother will come."

Crucially, ever since their first encounter, Wang Cheng knew that his senior sister was a good person—she was reliable!

However, while Wang Cheng was eating and waiting, Ah Ji the white-headed eagle was far from idle. As an avian bully who loved nothing more than forcibly snatching other people's chickens, it had been forced to travel for days and had bottled up a lot of energy.

Now that it had finally settled down, it could no longer suppress its nature.

Relying on the "camouflage" ability it had won by defeating the chameleon using the supernatural power [Depleting the Insufficient to Offer to the Excess], it sneaked into the tavern's back courtyard.

Just because Wang Cheng was slightly curious about this legendary specialty fairy wine, he hadn't stopped it.

In the end, Ah Ji failed to find the little Yingzhou mother-chickens it had been yearning for.

Instead, it spotted several bivalve women in the courtyard brewing mouth-chewed wine with their own mouths.

Only...

Wang Cheng subconsciously glanced back at the surrounding patrons who were drinking the specialty beverage with great relish. Even though he was just eating a meal and not drinking wine, he couldn't help but feel a little nauseated.

"Ugh..."

The bivalve women were indeed bivalve women; there was no false advertising there.

Yet they were a group of very low-grade bivalve spirits, their faces covered in wrinkles, missing quite a few teeth, chewing and spitting out the mixture.

Even just thinking about it made Wang Cheng's stomach churn violently.

What was even more tragic was that with the influx of a large number of outsiders, there were far more people than just Wang Cheng who possessed a strong sense of curiosity.

"Can these old hags even be considered bivalve women? This is bivalve grandma milk, isn't it?! Ugh!"

"Refund my money!"

Atop the wall, several pirates who had still been indulging in romantic fantasies while peeping at the bivalve women saw this scene and couldn't help cursing and vomiting simultaneously.

The sudden commotion also caught the attention of the patrons in the front hall, who swarmed toward the back courtyard in a rush that the shop assistants simply couldn't block.

Then, the sounds of cursing and vomiting rose wave after wave.

Realizing the situation was turning south, the musicians, including Shen Yueye, scattered like startled birds.

Wang Cheng and the pirates who had triggered the commotion first also took the opportunity to slip away.

Passing by, he cast a glance at the backs of those pirates: they belonged to the Red Flag Gang led by the famous female pirate Zheng Shiniang, also known as the Danjia thieves.

A thoughtful look crossed his eyes.

No sooner had these people left through the front than others arrived to clean up the mess—all of them elites of the Black Peak Flag patrolling the neighborhood.

Overhearing a few shouts from afar via [Listening to Thunder], Wang Cheng realized this establishment seemingly belonged to his sister-in-law, Wang Cuiqiao.

Running this kind of business was like using a butcher's cleaver to slaughter a chicken for a courtesan of the Qinhuai River; when he had seen her heading out in a sedan chair for leisure the other day, this must have been her destination.

Walking another street down, the shouts behind them were already ringing out continuously: "Refund the money!" "Refund the money!" "Refund the money!"...

Not wanting to meddle in other people's business, Wang Cheng simply followed quietly behind his senior sister.

Shen Yueye altered her appearance amidst the crowd, changing her facade every ten steps. Three streets later, she had completely altered her visage seven times, transforming into a thoroughly ordinary maiden whom no one would ever recognize.

Unwittingly, she walked to the adjacent Gold and Jade Ward, looking at the now-deserted "Liu Residence" and letting out a faint sigh.

"This bastard is too decisive. Trying to complete the mission is going to be difficult!"

Having been a hair's breadth away from death last time, Liu Jianzhen had been frightened out of his wits and no longer dared to continue living in his newly purchased mansion, hiding away directly in the estate of the [Credit-Pawning Peddler] Peng Laosheng.

Continuing to scatter money lavishly, he stuck to the old ship captain's side every step of the way. For the sake of the money, the latter had pinched his nose and taken him in.

Even with her immense confidence in the [Golden Silk Veil of the Queen], Shen Yueye didn't dare barge in randomly to commit murder right under the nose of a veteran mid-tier official-rank holder; the risks were simply too high.

"If I had the strength of the fifth rank, I'd definitely dare to barge in and assassinate him. But I must eliminate this target to complete the fifth-rank ritual."

Isolated and helpless in Yingzhou, Shen Yueye had fallen into a vicious cycle, unable to find even a single helper to help lure Peng Laosheng away.

Scratching her head frantically, she found herself completely unable to come up with a solution in the short term.

Suddenly, the heart-light within her trembled. With an assassin's intuitive sense, she realized that despite her seven disguises, she was still being watched.

Moreover, her pursuer was closing in rapidly.

Whirling around to look behind her, the first thing she caught sight of was a gleaming golden [Zhisui] token, which was resonating with the one she carried on her person.

A youthful cultivator roughly the same age as that royal heir—whose appearance, though falling short by several degrees, could still be considered handsome—was walking toward her with a smiling greeting.

A greeting steeped in hometown flavor, bringing a deep sense of familiarity:

"Senior Sister, have you eaten yet?"

That familiar, unabashed friendliness made it seem as though the two of them had known each other for a long time.

It also subconsciously evoked memories in Shen Yueye's mind of that peerlessly handsome, equally unrestrained young royal heir beneath the pear blossom rain.

"I've already eaten. Uh, are you Fugui Junior Brother? You came to Pinghu Port too?"

By this time, Wang Cheng had already perceived her lingering obsession and beckoned to her with a beaming smile:

"Senior Sister, my cat can do a backflip. Would you like to come and see?

As it happens, I have a welcome gift I'd like to give you."