The Great King Ordered Me to Marry – Chapter 42
by Little PandaSpeaking of the Tiger Demon Awakening Clear-Minded After a Swoon
Misty rain blurred the sky, the night thick and dark.
The surroundings were dead silent. The villagers who had followed probably weren’t close enough to hear the commotion here.
Zhuoxue’s heart pounded with fright, and she muttered several apologies for the offense in her mind.
She had committed many offenses this time, but the situation was urgent and she had no other choice. Longming could be angry all she wanted, but she couldn’t take it out on her.
But if not for being trapped in the Nightmare Dream, she never would have known she possessed such divine power — that a single melon ladle could knock Longming unconscious.
It seemed a good melon ladle was worth half a dharma artifact.
Zhuoxue hoisted Longming up, looking every bit like a murderer burying a corpse on a rainy night. Trembling, she scanned her surroundings on high alert, hunched over as she inched toward the distance.
She sneaked along, deliberately wading through puddles so the heavy rain would wash away her footprints in the mud before they could be traced — leaving neither mouse trail nor fox track.
Back when she used to sneak down the mountain behind Lan Hui’s back to steal chickens, she had honed an impressive set of skills. She never expected they would all come in handy now.
Half of Longming’s body dragged across the ground as the fox hauled her forward. Ripples of water snaked outward, only to be churned into a blurry mess by the chaotic rain.
The melon ladle was a treasure — there was no telling when Longming might open her eyes and start shouting again. Zhuoxue couldn’t bear to abandon it, so she tucked it into her waistband.
At first glance, it looked like she had a gourd bottle hanging from her waist. Unfortunately, the gourd was only half complete — it couldn’t hold any elixirs or miracle cures, only the remarkable power to make someone’s head loll as they crumpled to the ground.
Zhuoxue pressed on through the rain. After a moment’s thought, she removed her straw rain cape1 and draped it over Longming, then fished out a handkerchief and stuffed it into Longming’s mouth to gag her.
Longming sat half-upright on the ground. It was too late to keep the rain off her now — the rain cape was meant to cover her face so the pursuing villagers wouldn’t immediately recognize her as a person.
At this moment, she didn’t dare steal more than a glance at Longming. This was more than an offense — it was gross disrespect toward the Demon Lord.
But what was done was done. With one burst of resolve, Zhuoxue dragged Longming in silence to a cornfield a li away.
The cornstalks grew taller than a person — more than enough to hide in.
Zhuoxue let out a long sigh and tilted her face up to the cold rain. Her body was growing hotter and hotter, like a boiling cauldron — even her breath was scalding.
She looked at Longming lying motionless, her pale, wan face cold and severe. She couldn’t help but crouch down and observe her quietly for a long while.
At this moment, Longming bore the black hair of a mortal, her face free of the sharp black markings. Without that fierce edge, she was truly beautiful.
Zhuoxue suddenly entertained some other thoughts — a desire to do, all at once, everything she had failed to accomplish back at Lingkong Mountain.
It was too late anyway. Longming was bound to be furious — adding a little more fuel or a little less made no difference now.
Zhuoxue decided to go all in. She pushed Longming onto her side, then drew a deep breath of the thick, earthy scent of the rainy night.
Once past this village, there would be no other inn2. She raised her arm slightly, reached forward, and her slender five fingers landed abruptly below Longming’s lower back.
Like swatting a mosquito — one touch, then a hasty retreat.
Where there is a willful fox, there is a way.
The fox yanked her hand back, quickly rolled Longming face-up again, and pretended nothing had happened.
Zhuoxue had committed every misdeed imaginable, but in truth, she still hoped Longming would regain her senses soon.
She stared for a long while, wondering whether Longming might be cold without her demonic power to sustain her. After a sigh, she simply pulled Longming into a tight embrace.
It just so happened that her body was burning hot — she could turn the rain itself to boiling water — so Longming wouldn’t catch a chill.
The two demons pressed close together — one was forcing the transaction, the other had no choice.
If Suli saw this, she could jump into the nearest river and still never wash herself clean. She had knocked the woman unconscious, dragged her here, and now clung to her without letting go — wasn’t that the very picture of obsessive longing?
If there were a magistrate’s office here, she would go beat the drum and surrender herself3.
Fortunately, there wasn’t.
But half a shichen passed, and Longming still hadn’t opened her eyes.
Zhuoxue thought it over and decided to strap the swaddle — wrapped in its silk pouch — to her own back, as if carrying a baby.
She wound the cords around herself loop after loop until she was dizzy from the spinning. Anyone who wanted to snatch it away wouldn’t be able to untie it in a hurry.
After about another half shichen, Longming’s fingers twitched twice, as though she were about to wake.
Zhuoxue burned with anxiety. If she still couldn’t rouse Longming this time, she truly had no other options.
The great demon in her arms suddenly opened her eyes, startled into a brief daze by the face hovering impossibly close. Such an expression was exceedingly rare on her.
One couldn’t blame her for being startled. If beauty were the measure, among all demons, the fox was the most beautiful.
Now, washed by the heavy rain, the fox seemed veiled in gossamer, like a spirit apparition, impossible to see clearly.
Longming’s brow was tightly furrowed, her tangled thoughts all locked upon her face.
She momentarily forgot to push the other away. She truly couldn’t fathom why this Yuxue was playing tricks, leaving behind such an imagination-sparking letter — even the words just spoken invited wayward thoughts.
Zhuoxue sensed it — this was still not the real Longming. She lowered her head to meet Longming’s searching gaze and smiled. “You’re awake.”
Longming snapped back to her senses and shoved the person before her away, rolling out of her embrace. Her eyes immediately fell on the swaddle half-visible behind Zhuoxue, and she said coldly, “Give the child back to me!”
The bell tower of Yunjing was no great wonder of the world — this moment was.
Zhuoxue froze for an instant, then refused to hand it over, raising her voice: “Once it’s in my hands, it’s mine.”
Longming’s gaze turned cold. “You’re mad. What does this child have to do with you?”
Zhuoxue played along and feigned madness. Longming wasn’t in her right mind right now — she only needed a few words to fool the Nightmare demon.
She put on a look of confusion and replied, “What’s yours is mine, and what’s mine is still mine. How could it have nothing to do with me?”
The letter was already written — she might as well play the part through and fully embody the obsessed fool pining for unrequited love.
She had read and heard plenty of romantic tales. She had a hundred varieties of lovesick madwomen in her head — surely one would fit this particular script.
Longming looked at her as one would look at a lunatic and lunged forward to snatch the swaddle back.
Without spells or demonic power, without any aura of intimidation, she truly resorted to hands and feet, grappling at close range.
Zhuoxue prided herself on being the lucid one and thought her meager fighting skills could best Longming. To her surprise, her limbs were all pinned down, and she lay flat on her back in the cornfield, unable to rise.
Longming leaned over her, her expression indifferent.
Zhuoxue’s body grew even hotter, yet her eyes still shone bright as stars, looking cunning and lively. She scoffed, “What’s mine, I won’t let you send into the mountain on a whim.”
“You are going into the mountain too.” Longming’s expression didn’t change.
Zhuoxue was taken aback. “Do you despise me so much that you insist on sending me to my death?”
At those words, Longming paused for a moment before saying, “There is no hatred. You and I have never met. I merely learned through divination that the Fox Immortal has named you specifically.”
There was a divination involved?
What Fox Immortal — it was obviously the Nightmare Tribe trying to get her killed.
Zhuoxue smiled and stayed lying where she was. Her long hair fell in wet strands around her, half her body smeared with mud, yet she was beautiful as an unpolished jade stone.
She feigned sudden enlightenment. “So you don’t actually want me dead either. You do have some fondness for me, don’t you?”
This was plainly twisting logic to suit her argument.
Longming was momentarily speechless, then reached for the swaddle again. But Zhuoxue had planted herself flat, pressing the swaddle tightly beneath her body.
If this had been a real baby, it would have been breathing its last by now.
Zhuoxue was panting from exertion. She shoved at Longming’s shoulders twice. After their tussle, her collar had come slightly undone, and her skin was impossibly whiter than the mud caked on her.
Longming faltered slightly.
Zhuoxue narrowed her eyes and said, “You treasure this baby so dearly that you won’t abandon it even though it’s gravely ill. So why can you suddenly harden your heart and offer it to the Fox Immortal?”
Longming was silent for a while before saying evenly, “The villagers need to survive. If Qiufeng Village wishes for lasting peace, it cannot anger the Fox Immortal. All those chosen by the Fox Immortal are fortunate across three lifetimes4. They are not being sent to their deaths — they are contributing to Qiufeng Village’s future, adding bricks and tiles5 as it were.”
What a fine “adding bricks and tiles.” Zhuoxue listened, dumbfounded, and thought to herself that if Longming were in her right mind, she would surely want to smack herself over the head with a ladle too.
Zhuoxue drew up her knees, pressing them against Longming to keep her at bay, and said indignantly, “Go ask those people forced to their deaths whether they feel fortunate.”
Longming looked down at her. “Some cannot accept it and take their own lives. Fortunately, the Fox Immortal is wise and merciful — as long as Qiufeng Village can deliver the full tribute, no punishment follows. The village’s harvest the following year will simply diminish somewhat.”
Zhuoxue couldn’t listen anymore. She snapped, “It seems you aren’t particularly attached to that old friend of yours either — so quick to sacrifice her.”
“I…” Longming stopped short, a hint of sorrow rising to the corners of her eyes. “It is time I put the past behind me.”
What? How dare she forget Jueguang.
Zhuoxue couldn’t take it anymore. She covertly grabbed the melon ladle and brought it down hard on Longming’s head once more.
Fortunately, it was only her demonic power she couldn’t use. Longming’s body, tempered through three hundred years of cultivation, was surely still as hard as stone, indestructible as vajra.
Sure enough, Longming went limp and fainted again, collapsing squarely on top of Zhuoxue and pinning her beneath.
Zhuoxue tossed the melon ladle aside. Longming’s hair tickled her cheek, and suddenly she felt at a loss.
It was uncomfortably hot. Slow, warm breaths fell against her ear, and she seemed to become that soft spring silk6 again, melting into a hopeless puddle.
After a long while, Zhuoxue recovered enough to conclude with certainty: Longming was ensnared by the Nightmare.
To ensnare Longming to such a degree — the one who cast this nightmare spell must be the Nightmare King, mustn’t it?
In the cornfield, a figure poked her head out furtively. Seeing no one around, she hastily dragged the unconscious woman into the deep forest.
But on the way to find a hollow tree, Zhuoxue stumbled upon a footprint. Judging by its size, it clearly wasn’t Suli’s.
The villagers had followed Longming out, and when no signal came for a long time, they must have noticed something was wrong and begun searching everywhere.
They had overlooked this stretch of forest before — they wouldn’t make the same mistake again.
But Zhuoxue was already inside the forest. Turning back would be worse than pressing deeper into the woods.
She strained to drag Longming along. Sure enough, shouts erupted in the distance — villagers calling to one another.
“Not over here! Who knows where those two girls are hiding!”
“Nothing on my end either!”
“So they’ve been playing tricks on us all these days — no wonder we couldn’t find any bodies.”
The voices drew closer and closer. Left with no choice, Zhuoxue wrapped her arms tight around Longming and submerged themselves in a pond.
Fortunately, the pond’s edge was lined with jagged rocks, and the water wasn’t too deep — just enough to cover the tops of their heads.
It was dim underwater. Before her eyes floated Longming’s hair, drifting like algae and tangling against her neck.
Longming’s eyes were shut tight, her long lashes motionless — she looked for all the world like a beauty succumbing to a watery death.
Zhuoxue stared, dazed. Afraid that Longming might actually drown, and though she herself was near her limit, she couldn’t help but lean closer.
Lips drew near — a hair’s breadth apart.
She wanted to pass a breath to Longming. She couldn’t let Longming die like this.
To die within the Nightmare Dream would mean never waking, perhaps for a lifetime.
In that fleeting instant, the great demon who had seemed to be drowning suddenly opened her eyes — and the gaze was deep, still, and lucid, entirely different from before.
Zhuoxue couldn’t hold her breath any longer. She could faintly hear the patrolling villagers moving away, so she finally surfaced, leaning against the pond’s edge and coughing incessantly.
With a splash beside her, Longming surfaced as well and without warning seized Zhuoxue by the back of the neck, flipping her onto the ground.
Zhuoxue stopped coughing and looked up at Longming in silence. The corners of her eyes were still red as ripe cherries — so vivid that one could immediately imagine the sweet, juicy flesh beneath.
She didn’t struggle. From that single glance alone, she knew Longming had regained her true senses.
Longming released Zhuoxue’s neck, then lowered her head without a word and undid the swaddle’s bindings in a few quick motions.
Her eyes were dark and heavy. No matter how astonishing her words had been earlier, she now wore an expression of utter composure — perhaps deliberately feigning normalcy, terrified that the slightest flush of embarrassment would cost her all dignity.
Her slender fingers seemed to brush accidentally past Zhuoxue’s nape, grazing the rim of her ear — burning hot from mating heat.
Zhuoxue was shoved aside and started coughing again. The swaddle slipped from her back, and Longming gathered it up.
She turned her head suspiciously, muttering inwardly: She must be pretending. How could this great tiger show not the slightest shame, not the slightest anger?
Longming held the swaddle in one arm. With her other hand alone, she gathered both of Zhuoxue’s wrists together and said coldly, “You must enter the mountain.”
The tables had turned. This time it was Zhuoxue who received a chop to the back of the neck from Longming — but Longming’s strength fell far short, barely more than a tickle.
Zhuoxue reasoned: That was so light — surely it wasn’t deliberate retaliation.
She paused for a breath before feigning unconsciousness, closing her eyes and letting herself drift into sleep.
After two exhausting days, the fox couldn’t help but start snoring softly. Longming hoisted her onto her back. It felt as though a fire clung to her — she pondered briefly and understood what was happening.
When one’s mind is calmed but not fully settled, when thoughts remain tangled, one is more susceptible to being pulled into a nightmare realm.
But the fox happened to be in mating heat, her thoughts in chaos. Even though the nightmare realm had an opening, it couldn’t fully cloud her mind.
Zhuoxue fell into deep sleep. When she next woke, the surroundings were noisy and boisterous — sounding almost festive, as the villagers drank and made merry.
The room she was in now was far sturdier than the previous thatched hut. At least the windows didn’t let in drafts, and the roof tiles didn’t leak.
Looking around at the clutter, she gathered this was a storage room. Fortunately, Longming had been kind enough to lay out a straw mat for her.
Zhuoxue yawned and got up. She tested the door with a couple of pulls — it wouldn’t open, so she gave up.
She turned and poked a hole through the window paper. Outside, she saw the villagers feasting in the rain, a crowd beside themselves with joy, raising their arms and singing — like a horde of demons dancing wildly.
The door suddenly opened. The great demon, swaddle in arm, stepped in with unhurried grace. She surveyed her surroundings with haughty ease, and the sharp edge had returned to her eyes.
Someone followed her in, carrying a low desk on his shoulder. On the desk were brush, ink, paper, and inkstone.
The man bent down to set things up, not daring to look at Zhuoxue’s expression. After grinding the ink, he held out a brush and sighed, “You’ll be setting off soon. If there’s anything you want to leave behind, write it down.”
Zhuoxue looked at Longming. After a moment, she reached out with her left hand to take the brush.
Longming asked, “Why don’t you write with your right hand?”
Footnotes
- 蓑衣 | suoyi | Traditional Chinese rain cape woven from straw or coir fiber, worn by farmers and travelers against heavy rain.
- 过了这村就没有那店 | guo le zhe cun jiu mei you na dian | Chinese folk saying meaning 'once you pass this village, there won't be another inn' — a missed opportunity is gone forever.
- 击鼓自首 | ji gu zi shou | Ancient Chinese legal practice of beating a drum placed outside the magistrate's office to surrender oneself and confess a crime.
- 三生有幸 | sansheng youxing | Buddhist-derived expression meaning 'fortunate across three lifetimes' — past, present, and future — denoting supreme good fortune.
- 添砖加瓦 | tian zhuan jia wa | Literally 'adding bricks and tiles'; a common Chinese idiom meaning to contribute to a collective endeavor or build something greater.
- 软春罗 | ruan chunluo | Soft spring luo, a lightweight silk gauze fabric associated with delicacy and gentleness in classical Chinese literature.
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