Versatile Mage

 Not long after, cries were heard across the hospital, most of them from women and the elderly.

 Mo Fan went out and saw many parents had brought their children to the hospital. The medical personnel were awfully busy all of a sudden.

 Mo Fan proceeded to the wards and saw that the children were all unconscious. Their auras were extremely weak, as if they had seriously fallen ill.

 Every child had similar symptoms, similar to the unconscious Bai Hongfei. However, Bai Hongfei was in a better spot, since he was perfectly fine, apart from unable to wake up.

 “Chief Wei, didn’t your men catch the moth woman? She must be the reason why our children ended up like this!” a woman yelled while sobbing in tears.

 “Yeah, it must be her. We have had similar cases in the town for some time. Who would have thought that this female monster is so cruel, to even harm the kids! You must save the children!” an old man exclaimed.

 “No, we’ll go right now! We should be able to get rid of the curse once the moth woman is dead!” a bunch of farmers snapped furiously.

 The men were infuriated when they saw the kids unconscious and the women sobbing, accusing the moth woman of being responsible for it. They quickly left the hospital.

 Mo Fan was startled. He followed the group of angry men too.

 “Please calm down, none of you knows how to use magic! It’s no use being reckless now. Just leave it to us, the City Hunters will handle it!” Captain Feng Guangkuo said.

 “No, we’ll kill her with our own hands!”

 “Yeah, she’s been spreading fear around the town for some time, and she’s harming the kids now. We don’t care if she’s human or a monster, we are going to skin her alive!”

 Their anger was contagious. The people in the town were constantly living in fear of the rumors about a moth woman after many people had gone missing and died in strange ways in the town. The City Hunters had paid countless visits to the town, yet they had done nothing to put a stop to it. The townfolks were terrified of the moth woman, but now that their kids had fallen ill and the moth woman had been arrested, the pressure they were feeling had turned them into vengeful beasts!

 A whole bunch of people quickly made their way to the entrance of the town hall and ran right into the main hall. They were unstoppable.

 “Where is the moth woman!? If anything happens to my kid, I’ll make sure that she pays for it!” a muscular farmer snapped furiously.

 “There she is!” one of the men quickly noticed a woman tied firmly to a stone pillar close to the center.

 The City Hunters were around too. They did not expect the townsfolk to just come rushing in like a furious tide. They immediately went up to stop them.

 “Shishi? Why are you here!?” The farmer that was leading the group suddenly froze in his track. He stared blankly at the woman that was tied to the pillar with chains made of ice.

 The rest of the men were dumbfounded too. Their murderous looks dissipated as soon as they saw the woman’s familiar face.

 “Captain, did…did you make a mistake? Shishi is one of us,” the huge bloke Guan Ping said.

 The captain Feng Guangkuo let out a sigh and said, “We didn’t make a mistake. It’s the reason why we didn’t want you to come here.”

 “But…”

 “Shishi is a kind woman, how is she the moth woman!?” Guan Ping said on behalf of the others.

 “A kind woman my ass! Humph, I always thought something wasn’t right about her. She always comes back late at night and is missing most of the time. I thought it was only because her life was slatternly and she was messing around with the men, but I now realize that she doesn’t just flirt with the men, she’s a man-eating monster too!” a relatively plump woman blurted out harshly behind the group of men.

 “Huh? Woman, did you really see her eating a man?” The rest of the young women had pale faces after hearing the words.

 A number of women had followed the group of farmers to the town hall. They were shocked when they learned that Yu Shishi was the moth woman.

 “Of course, did you remember the drunkard on the streets? Didn’t he always go to her place before he went missing!? The man is still missing now. Where else could he be apart from inside that monster’s stomach!?” the plump woman said.

 “Yeah, she’s right, the drunkard did visit Yu Shishi quite often before he went missing!”

 “Oh my, why would a woman like her eat people!?”

 “She’s the moth woman, she can transform!”

 “Dear, don’t say that. Why would Yu Shishi do such a thing? Once, our child tripped and fell into the drain when we were away. It was Yu Shishi that saved his life…” Guan Ping said.

 “Humph, are you seriously trying to explain on behalf of the monster? Didn’t we all know that the kids like to hang around with her? Look what happened to them; she poisoned them all! She’s just putting up an act all this time, she’s just waiting for her chance to kill us all!” the plump woman Wang Tianhua declared.

 “Yeah, she’s right, the kids in the towns and the villages like to hang around with her. She must be the reason why they have fallen ill! Don’t try and stop me, I’ll stab her to death right now!” a woman with bloodshot eyes ran forward holding a pair of scissors!

 There were not many City Hunters around, so they were having a hard time calming the townfolk down.

 Yu Shishi watched the people expressionlessly. When the woman tried to stab her with the scissors, strings of blue silk suddenly appeared from her and surrounded her like a cocoon. The scissors landed on the silk, but they were unable to move an inch further.

 The blue silk was slightly transparent. The people could still see Yu Shishi’s pale face.

 “Please calm down! Stop stirring up a mess here if you seriously care about your children! We’re still trying to figure out if the children are placed under a curse. If it’s a curse, we can get rid of it by killing her, but if it’s something else, the children will be in danger if we don’t find a way to save them through her!” Feng Guangkuo yelled.

 More City Hunters soon showed up and drove the infuriated townfolk away.

 “Captain, you have to save our children! I only have one child, I can’t let anything happen to him.”

 “Just go home, you are only interfering with our investigation!” Feng Guangkuo snapped back.

 Feng Guangkuo was quite popular among the townfolk. He had helped the town a lot whenever something happened in Tongxiang.

 The crowd left while murmuring under their breath. Mo Fan was dumbfounded after witnessing it all. Wasn’t this a typical scene in an ancient drama?

 The men in the village were particularly fond of a beautiful woman, so the other women in the village were extremely jealous of her. As such, when something happened in the village, the women would blame it all on the beautiful woman by accusing her of being a monster, and the reason why the disaster had happened in the first place…

 The only difference was that Yu Shishi was indeed not an ordinary human. She was the moth woman, and she definitely had something to do with the children that had fallen ill!

 “Why are you here still?” Feng Guangkuo asked in an unpleasant tone after he saw Mo Fan.

 Mo Fan showed the man his Hunter Master badge and the proof of his identity as a mentor of the Pearl Institute before replying, “I’m here for an investigation. She seems to be the reason why the water has stopped flowing.”

 “Oh, I didn’t expect you to be a Hunter Master at such a young age, not to mention a mentor of the Pearl Institute too. Pardon me!” Feng Guangkuo said.

 “Can I have a few words with her?” Mo Fan asked.

 “Sure, but I doubt she’s going to tell you anything. Whenever we try to do something to her, the silk will show up and protect her,” Feng Guangkuo said helplessly.

 —

 Mo Fan went up to Yu Shishi. The silk had disappeared on its own when Yu Shishi was not in danger.

 The woman wearily lifted her gaze and looked at Mo Fan.

 “I should have killed you back in the woods!” Yu Shishi was furious as soon when she saw Mo Fan.

 She had spared Mo Fan’s life, but to her surprise, the man had reported her to the City Hunters instead.

 “You’ve misunderstood me, I didn’t tell them anything. I did send someone to keep an eye on you, but I didn’t ask the City Hunters to arrest you. Are you the reason why the kids have fallen ill?” Mo Fan asked seriously.

 “They won’t live if I’m dead, including your student!” Yu Shishi said coldly.

 “Why are you doing this?” Mo Fan asked.

 “Why?” Yu Shishi suddenly burst out laughing. Her smile was cold and sinister, “Does a demon creature need a reason to eat humans?”

 Mo Fan was stunned.

 She was right; if she really was a demon creature, she did not need a reason to kill and eat humans. It was part of her nature, just like how humans ate meat.

 “Let the kids go, and I’ll make sure you leave unharmed. Otherwise, you will have to spend the rest of your life locked away,” Mo Fan said.

 “Hehe, who do you think is going to compromise when the kids are about to die?” Yu Shishi said coldly.

 “Fine, but why did you stop the water from flowing? Are you trying to take out the food supply of the entire Tongxiang valley?” Mo Fan asked.

 Food was extremely important due to the limited space of human territories in the safe zone. The space available for crops-planting was limited. Tongxiang was a huge source of food. If the water stopped flowing, it would greatly hinder the production of food.

 “That’s right! I want them all to starve to death!” Yu Shishi said.

 “You are seriously an incisive monster, unlike the ones that pretend to be kind and pure-hearted in the TV dramas,” Mo Fan said.