Chapter 173: It's Good That You're Fine

"The Supreme General remembers me?" Zi Yanran felt a pleasant surprise in her heart, regardless of whether it was the three moles behind her neck or Hu Xiong recognizing her identity as Jiang Xin.

All of this already proved that Hu Xiong was indeed the reincarnation of Zhao Lingxing, and she had not waited in vain.

Zi Yanran tightly grasped Hu Xiong's hand. "When I learned that the General had fallen at the front lines, I cut my throat to follow you in death. I was reincarnated five hundred years ago, but I was unwilling to die again."

"I was afraid that through continuous reincarnation, I would slowly forget the General in the long river of rebirth, so I hired a fangshi to seal my soul within my body, becoming a Water Corpse."

Corpse monsters were divided into many kinds, such as zombies, living corpses, and so on.

And what Zi Yanran had transformed into was one of the Five Elements Corpses: the Water Corpse.

Legend had it that although a Water Corpse was not as indestructible and overwhelmingly powerful as a regular zombie or a Golden-Armored Corpse,

nor could it control earth and tunnel through the ground like an Earth Corpse,

a Water Corpse with high magical power could whip up towering waves and even make great rivers flow backward.

"A Water Corpse." Hu Xiong slightly frowned. He pulled his hand away from Zi Yanran's grasp; it turned out she had mistaken him for someone else.

Hu Xiong awkwardly rubbed his nose. "Miss Yanran, you must have mistaken me for someone else."

"I have not made a mistake." Seeing Hu Xiong refusing to acknowledge it, Zi Yanran hurriedly said, "You and the Supreme General both have the exact same three moles on the back of your necks, and you even recognized that I am Jiang Xin. How could you not be the Supreme General?"

"I..." Hu Xiong thought for a moment, sorted through his own thoughts, and began, "I did indeed see the story of a General named Zhao Lingxing and Princess Jiang Xin in the dream just now."

Zi Yanran reminded him, "You are very likely his past life."

Hu Xiong raised a hand and stated, "It seems Miss Yanran does not understand my meaning. Even if I am indeed the reincarnation of Zhao Lingxing,

I am no longer Zhao Lingxing. I am Hu Xiong.

Can Miss Yanran understand the meaning of my words?" Hu Xiong indeed held quite a bit of favorable feeling toward Zi Yanran, but upon learning that Zi Yanran viewed him as someone else, he could not help but feel a bit depressed.

He was Hu Xiong, and in his eyes, he was his own unique self, not the reincarnation of some so-called other person.

"Supreme General, you probably haven't considered this clearly yet. It's fine, there's no rush." After a slight moment of astonishment, Zi Yanran still said, "We can elope and go far away. Gradually, you will always—"

"Miss Yanran, I am a member of the Paranormal Investigation Bureau." Hu Xiong's gaze carried a serious expression. "When I officially joined the Bureau, I swore an oath that in this lifetime I would pledge my loyalty to the Bureau and never betray it. You are a corpse, and I am a human. Do you think there is any possibility for the two of us?"

Zi Yanran slightly bit her lip and said, "But you once swore an oath to me as well, that you would wait for me forever."

"That was not me."

"I believe the Supreme General's oath is carved deep within his soul," Zi Yanran said in a deep voice.

Hu Xiong sighed, shook his head, and asked with a complicated gaze, "Did you kill Xia Yi and Old Qin?"

Zi Yanran originally wanted to deny it, but looking into Hu Xiong's eyes instantly made her feel as though Zhao Lingxing himself was interrogating her.

"Yes."

Hu Xiong slightly clenched his fists, and crackling sounds echoed out. "You killed my comrades, yet you still dare to come find me."

His fists flashed with bursts of red light as he abruptly stood up, wanting to avenge Qin Shenggen and Xia Yi.

Zi Yanran, however, did not dodge; instead, she stood right in front of him, refusing to believe that the Supreme General would ever harm her.

Hu Xiong threw a punch, originally intending to strike Zi Yanran's forehead, but in the end, his fist landed heavily on her abdomen.

Zi Yanran frowned slightly and took half a step back.

Hu Xiong clenched his fists tightly, wanting to kill Zi Yanran to avenge his colleagues, but recalling the scenes and stories he had seen in the dream,

unwittingly, he found it difficult to deal a fatal blow to Zi Yanran.

"I am not any Zhao Lingxing!" Hu Xiong said in a deep voice, "If I see you again, I will definitely kill you!"

Leaving behind those words, Hu Xiong turned and strode away.

Watching Hu Xiong burst out through the door of the villa, Zi Yanran slowly sat down on the sofa, shook her head slightly, her gaze filled with disbelief, while her voice was laden with intense sorrow: "You are not the Supreme General. The Supreme General would never hurt me a bit. You are not him."

Within the Thirty-Sixth Bureau, although the sudden appearance of Zi Yanran did catch some people off guard, the Bureau did not fall into the slightest bit of chaos.

On the contrary, after Zi Yanran departed, Zhang Guichuan immediately reported that they were not afraid of the enemy being too strong;

they were only afraid of the enemy failing to show up.

Based on Zi Yanran's appearance, the strength she displayed, and her corpse Qi,

within the entire Vermilion Federal Republic, the people who met all these conditions were not very numerous.

Soon, they locked onto a target.

"The Snow Mountain Corpse King."

In a small conference room, members of the Second Team—Li Changqing, Bai Chuan, Li Minghao, and others—sat together.

The light from the projector shone onto the screen, displaying a somewhat blurry photograph.

It was a vast snowy mountain frozen in ice. Although the person in the photograph was slightly blurred, having been secretly filmed from afar,

one could still recognize that the person inside was indeed Zi Yanran.

"Why did the Snow Mountain Corpse King suddenly abduct Hu Xiong? What is this all about?" Li Changqing could not help asking. Logically speaking, the Snow Mountain Corpse King targeting him would have had a reasonable excuse.

After all, he had intercepted one of her subordinates halfway.

Yet why would she make a move against Hu Xiong? What kind of situation was this?

The people in the conference room chatted for a long time, yet they were unable to deduce why the Snow Mountain Corpse King would want to abduct Hu Xiong.

Li Minghao held a ballpoint pen in his hand, sitting in a chair and twirling the pen with his right hand as he guessed, "Could it be that she took a fancy to Hu Xiong's looks? That he suits her tastes, and she snatched him back to be her bridegroom?"

This was a guess Li Minghao made by combining the possibility of Hu Xiong and Zi Yanran getting closer and closer prior to this incident.

"Suits her tastes? You might as well just bluntly say the Snow Mountain Corpse King has heavy tastes." Zhang Guichuan shook his head.

At that moment, the door to the conference room was pushed open, and a staff member rushed in hurriedly, saying, "Hu, Hu Xiong is back."

"He's back?"

Everyone present was filled with question marks. Hu Xiong managed to escape from the Snow Mountain Corpse King's clutches?

That made no sense; given the Snow Mountain Corpse King's strength, how could Hu Xiong possibly escape?

Right then, Hu Xiong walked briskly into the conference room.

Zhang Guichuan circled around him several times, his gaze filled with incredulity.

Li Minghao also could not help saying to Hu Xiong, "We were just discussing how to rescue you, so how did you end up back here?"

Hu Xiong laughed awkwardly and then said, "I don't know what happened either. That Corpse King knocked me unconscious, and when I woke up, I found myself in a forest. There was no trace of that Corpse King around, so I just escaped back first."

"Oh? There's such a thing?" Zhang Guichuan pondered for a moment and patted Hu Xiong's shoulder. "As long as you're safe, that's what matters."

"However, why on earth did she abduct you?"