Chapter 8: 第085章 脱了我衣服，你还有理了？

Although her internal organs were not injured, the constant jolting along the way meant her wounds would never be able to heal properly.

Gu Xizhi looked at Dugu Xun in disbelief, unable to understand how someone who was perfectly lively during the day could suddenly face a life-threatening situation at night.

"Uncle, please don't panic. If Xiao Wu's poison can wait, it would be best to find a place to stay until her injuries improve before we return to Jiangning City." Her injuries were not suited for the rigors of travel; the only reason she had agreed to press on during the day was because of the poison.

If her poison could wait, they truly needed to find a place to settle down first.

"This..." Gu Xizhi hesitated. To be honest, he truly didn't know if this girl, Cheng'er, could afford to wait with her poison.

Seeing Gu Xizhi's expression, Dugu Xun guessed that he also didn't know what kind of poison Gu Xiaowu had contracted.

"We are currently in the middle of nowhere, and staying here indefinitely isn't a solution. We should keep moving. Once we reach the next town, we will stop and wait until Xiao Wu wakes up before deciding what to do. Besides, we also need to purchase some medicinal herbs," Dugu Xun said.

He didn't have many medicinal herbs with him, especially fever-reducing ones, which were even scarcer.

Without herbs, even the best medical skills would be useless.

"Alright, I'll go prepare the carriage. Dugu, I'm leaving Xiao Wu in your hands." Gu Xizhi patted Dugu Xun on the shoulder and leaned down to exit the carriage.

Dugu Xun looked at Gu Xiaowu with a heavy expression. After reaching out to touch her forehead, his face grew even more grim.

Because not only had Gu Xiaowu's fever failed to subside, but her body temperature was actually rising higher and higher.

At this point, he could no longer afford to be cautious.

Through the door curtain, he instructed Gu Xizhi, "Uncle, I will find a way to reduce Xiao Wu's fever now. Do not come in until I tell you to."

At a time like this, he had to try any method available, even if the method was somewhat improper.

However, saving a life was the priority. If the girl, Xiao Wu, truly took offense, he would simply take responsibility for her.

"Dugu, I'm leaving Xiao Wu to you. Don't worry, I won't step inside until you call for me."

Only then did Dugu Xun feel somewhat at ease. He retrieved a sandalwood box from a trunk, placed it by his hand, and then helped Gu Xiaowu up, making her sit cross-legged on the mattress.

Immediately following that, he actually began to strip Gu Xiaowu's clothes off, piece by piece!

He only stopped once he had stripped her down to nothing but a camisole.

Sitting cross-legged behind Gu Xiaowu, he opened the box by his side. Inside was, unexpectedly, a box filled to the brim with gold needles!

Dugu Xun took a heavy breath, then picked up a gold needle from the box and swiftly inserted it into Gu Xiaowu's smooth back.

After the first needle, Dugu Xun did not pause; he picked up another gold needle and plunged it into her back.

The more he proceeded, the faster his needlework became. In just a quarter of an hour, Gu Xiaowu's back and head were covered in gold needles.

It wasn't until he had used the very last needle in the box that Dugu Xun stopped, his forehead already drenched in sweat.

Looking at the empty box, Dugu Xun finally breathed a sigh of relief.

He had finally finished. If he hadn't finished the needling, he would have collapsed himself.

He wiped the sweat from his forehead and closed his eyes to slowly regulate his breathing.

If this still didn't work, then they would truly have to leave it to fate.

After another quarter of an hour or so, Dugu Xun reached out to feel Gu Xiaowu's forehead. To his pleasant surprise, he found that her forehead was no longer as hot as before, and even her breathing had become much steadier.

The heart that had been hanging in suspense finally settled. Dugu Xun felt he had never been this nervous in his life.

He picked up a cloth from the side to wipe the sweat from Gu Xiaowu's forehead. Only after her complexion returned to its usual state did he begin to pull out the gold needles from her back and head one by one.

Because of the heavy sweating just now, the disguise on her face had been smudged by the perspiration.

Upon discovering this problem, Dugu Xun couldn't help but freeze.

What... should he do first? Dress her, or fix her disguise?

Since she didn't want her face to be seen by others, that meant the face was more important, right?

Thinking this way, Dugu Xun decided to fix her disguise first.

He laid Gu Xiaowu on the mattress, covered her with a quilt, and then found her disguise tools to begin working on her face.

Whether his luck was too good or too bad, just as he completed the final step, Gu Xiaowu... woke up!

Gu Xiaowu waking up was originally a good thing, but the crux of the problem was...

He had stripped her clothes off just now and hadn't put them back on yet!

If this girl found out he had stripped her, she would surely split him open with a blade! Absolutely!

At this thought, Dugu Xun couldn't help but break into a cold sweat.

Gu Xiaowu felt as though she had been having a very long dream. In the dream, someone had stripped her clothes and kept pricking her with needles. No matter how she struggled, that person refused to stop. What was most hateful was that she couldn't even see the person's face!

She slowly opened her eyes and saw Dugu Xun looking at her with a face full of terror.

She reached out to rub her eyes, but suddenly felt that her arms seemed quite cool.

Wait, cool?

Gu Xiaowu looked down at her bare arms, and only then did she realize with a delayed sense of shock that... she didn't seem to be wearing any clothes?

Seeing that Gu Xiaowu had discovered the fact that she was undressed, Dugu Xun instinctively retreated backward, as if trying to move to a relatively safe distance.

There was no scream as Dugu Xun had imagined, nor was there the cold laugh he had anticipated. After discovering she was naked, Gu Xiaowu was terrifyingly calm!

Dugu Xun couldn't help but wonder: was Gu Xiaowu even a woman?

Gu Xiaowu slowly sat up, using the quilt to cover her chest, and looked at Dugu Xun with a half-smile, asking, "Where are my clothes?"

Dugu Xun pointed tremulously to the side of Gu Xiaowu, while thinking to himself why she wasn't asking who had stripped her, or why this had happened.

Gu Xiaowu was in no hurry to grab her clothes. "A-Xun, could I trouble you to turn around?"

"Ah? Oh, okay." Dugu Xun turned around mechanically, his heart feeling cold.

He didn't know if it was his imagination, but he felt that this version of Xiao Wu was quite terrifying. But then again, wasn't this girl clearly smiling?

After the rustling sound of putting on her clothes, Gu Xiaowu said, "Alright, you can turn back now."

Dugu Xun slowly turned around, only to see Gu Xiaowu's enlarged, smiling face staring directly at him.

"A-Xun, don't you have anything to say?" Gu Xiaowu leaned closer to Dugu Xun, her smile exceptionally bright.

"Ah... that... this..." Dugu Xun stammered, truly not knowing how to speak.

After all, stripping a maiden who had not yet been married was a matter far too awkward to mention.

"That? This? Which one is it exactly?" Gu Xiaowu's smile suddenly vanished. Before Dugu Xun could react, *slap!* She delivered a sharp palm to his face.

Dugu Xun clutched his left cheek where he had been struck, staring at Gu Xiaowu in bewilderment, completely forgetting to react.

He, Dugu Xun, had lived in this world for a full eighteen years. Although he had been bullied as a child, this was the first time someone had slapped him in the face! And it was a woman who had done it!

"You hit me?" Dugu Xun stared blankly at Gu Xiaowu, his expression exceptionally gloomy.

"Yes, who else did you think did it? Aside from you and me, there isn't a third person in this carriage, is there?" Gu Xiaowu showed no remorse; there was even a faint hint of killing intent in her eyes.

"You actually dared to hit me?" Dugu Xun was utterly incredulous. The Gu Xiaowu who had been chatting and laughing with him had suddenly turned violent against him, and even slapped him!

"Why wouldn't I dare?" Gu Xiaowu tilted her head back, her aura in no way inferior to Dugu Xun's.

In this world, there was no one Gu Xiaowu dared not hit. Even if it were the Emperor himself, she would never be afraid!

"Why did you hit me?" Not knowing if he had been stunned by the slap, Dugu Xun asked another extremely idiotic question.

"You stripped my clothes. If I don't hit you, do you expect me to thank you?" Gu Xiaowu's smile was incredibly fake. When others fake-smile, at least their eyes don't match their mouth, but she merely twitched the corners of her lips.

"Who stripped..." Dugu Xun instinctively wanted to argue, but then suddenly remembered that he seemingly had indeed stripped her clothes, so he could only shut his mouth.

"What? Are you trying to deny it?" Gu Xiaowu raised an eyebrow, her face clearly reading: *'Try saying it and see what happens.'*

Dugu Xun turned his face away and said disdainfully, "Would I be that kind of person? I, Dugu Xun, dare to do what I do and dare to take responsibility. However, the reason I stripped your clothes was because you couldn't reduce your fever, so I had no choice but to use needles on you! If it weren't for that, who would want to strip you? No chest, no butt—who would care to look!"

"What, you stripped my clothes and now you think you're in the right?" Gu Xiaowu gritted her teeth, looking as if she might pounce on Dugu Xun and bite him at any moment.

In her heart, she was muttering: *So it was to perform the needling? No wonder her back felt so strange and painful.*

But even if it was to perform the needling, she couldn't forgive him, especially since he had the nerve to say she had no chest and no butt.

She had a chest, and she had a butt; they just weren't prominent yet.

A thirteen or fourteen-year-old kid—even if she had a chest and a butt, how big could they possibly be? Besides, she didn't even like big chests or big butts; she wasn't a dairy cow!

"Fine, I'm in the wrong, alright? I apologize to you. Is that enough?" Dugu Xun rolled his eyes incessantly. They say that women and petty men are both difficult to deal with; that saying was truly not wrong at all.

He would never attempt to reason with a woman, especially a violent woman like Gu Xiaowu.