Chapter 145: Hares Seem to Love Bumping Into Trees

Frustrated, Wen Hui slapped her forehead. Transformed into a rabbit girl, she secretly regretted wasting all that pain for nothing just moments ago.

"Where on earth is this? Could it be because of an illusion? What should I do? Xiao Yuan is nowhere to be found either. A running track? I should go check it out." Failing to find Zhuang Xiaoyuan's figure, and though somewhat worried about her entering the Guardian Deity's trial, Wen Hui found herself trapped in this strange illusion as well. She could only press down her anxiety with an optimistic mindset, following the track before her toward the finish line.

"Oh oh, keep it up, do your best!" As she gradually drew closer to the end of the racecourse, lively cheers drifted over from the finish line. When Wen Hui walked all the way along the track and finally caught sight of the finish line, a giant tortoise was just lumbering across it.

"It's that rabbit!"

"She actually dares to show her face here!"

"Match-fixer!"

"Damn rabbit, pay us back our money!"

"Refund our tickets, pay us back!"

"Refund our tickets, pay us back!" The moment they noticed Wen Hui approaching, the countless spectators gathered on both sides of the finish line suddenly began to hurl furious abuses. Wen Hui stared blankly at the enraged crowd, completely clueless about what was going on right now.

"Wula! Wula!" With crisp wailing sirens, black-and-white police cars surged onto the track. As the doors flew open, a swarm of cat-folk wearing police uniforms leaped out, looking entirely ready to apprehend Wen Hui and bring her to justice.

"Sergeant, that's her! She intentionally fixed the match and made us lose all our money!" The shouts of the spectators by the track reached Wen Hui's ears. Although she had no idea how she had suddenly gotten roped into some race out of nowhere, now was definitely not the time to worry about such things. Faced with the ferocious, tiger-like feline police officers charging at her, Wen Hui turned tail and ran.

"O wind, come dance." While fleeing back the way she came, Wen Hui began to reach out and channel the divine power within her body. To her surprise, upon attempting to connect with it, she realized she could not sense the existence of her divine power at all.

"What is going on? My divine power is gone? My body? How could this be?" Although she had noticed earlier that her clothes were different from before, compared to her surroundings, clothes were just a minor detail, and Wen Hui hadn't paid them much mind. But the fact that she could not commune with her divine power forced Wen Hui to start examining her own body. Feeling the soft, slender ears atop her head and the round, short tail behind her, and recalling the angry curses of the spectators just now, could it be that she had actually turned into a rabbit?

"Detective Pigeon." Watching Wen Hui's retreating figure as she fled swiftly, the Black Cat Detective chased after her while calling out to the white dove in police uniform beside him.

"Leave it to me, Sergeant." The pigeon gave a military salute with its wing, took flight into the sky, and pursued Wen Hui.

"Stop right there, you can't run anymore." The flying pigeon quickly caught up to Wen Hui, beating its wings to block her path and cutting off her advance.

"Don't get in my way! Move, move!" With the giant pigeon blocking her view, Wen Hui tried to shoo it away while continuing to run forward. Her vision obstructed, she completely lost all sense of direction.

"Hey, stop running, watch out!" After the two of them tussled for a moment, Detective Pigeon suddenly stepped aside and shouted loudly at Wen Hui.

"You want me to stop just because you told me to? As if I'd listen—bam." Running and turning her head at the same time to make a face at the evasive Detective Pigeon, Wen Hui actually sped up. Thus, accompanied by a crisp impact sound, she dashed forward at high speed and slammed squarely into a tree.

"Hah, running pretty fast, are you? I guess this is what they call waiting by a stump for a hare. Take her away." A hint of a smile appeared on the Black Cat Detective's solemn face as he cheerfully caught up and grabbed Wen Hui, who was dizzy from hitting the tree and seeing stars spinning before her eyes.

As the police sirens wailed once more, the squad car carrying Wen Hui sped away into the distance.

"Mm, truly delicious. Ah, thanks for the meal." Placing the empty bowl that had held her pork cutlet rice back onto the table, Zhuang Xiaoyuan let out a long sigh of relief and expressed her gratitude to the white cat officer sitting across from her. With her stomach finally filled, her entire body felt warm.

"You've eaten your fill, so shouldn't you explain how all this happened?" Seated across the table, the white cat officer watched Zhuang Xiaoyuan finish her meal, tapped a pen against the desk with his right hand, and asked with a stern expression.

"Explain what? Didn't I already tell you the whole story? Cold and starving, I was just trying to sell matches. Who could have known that old grandpa would frame me and call me a witch? I'm just an ordinary person!" Although she was grateful to the officer for treating her to pork cutlet rice, Zhuang Xiaoyuan had truly done nothing out of line. How was she supposed to account for anything? Besides, she didn't even know the specific details of the situation, nor why a witch had to be arrested—even though she wasn't a witch to begin with.

"Then how do you explain this? According to witness testimonies, you used matches to conjure countless gold coins." The white cat officer looked skeptical, reaching out to tap a small box of matches on the table.

"I have no idea about that either. When I woke up, the matches were right beside me. Besides, these matches can't conjure gold coins; otherwise, I wouldn't have been cold and starving. It was entirely just an illusion." Frowning slightly in distress, Zhuang Xiaoyuan didn't even know where to begin. After all, she didn't know the prior experiences of the little match girl, and the origin of these matches remained a total mystery to her.

As she spoke, beneath the white cat officer's slightly wary gaze, Zhuang Xiaoyuan struck a match. The moment it was lit, a cascade of gold coins tumbled down from the sky, landing on the table and piling up into a sizable mountain of gold.

"Look, these are completely illusory. You can see them, but you can't touch them at all." Holding the match in her right hand, Zhuang Xiaoyuan plunged her left hand back and forth into the gold mountain, meeting zero resistance or tactile sensation whatsoever, which perfectly proved she wasn't lying.

"Even if it's just an illusion, wielding power that transcends common knowledge—are you still going to deny that you're a witch?" The white cat officer wore the expression of someone who believed the real culprit was standing right before him.

"A witch again. I find it strange why you people are so obsessed with arresting witches." Although it was already bizarre why a medieval-style building would house an ultra-modern police station and police cars, given that architectural style, Zhuang Xiaoyuan refused to believe these officers possessed the closed-minded superstition of ancient medieval folks that witches were inherently evil.

"Hmph, why we're arresting witches? Take a look at these. This is what the witches caused. They injured a couple living in a cave and destroyed their home." Hearing Zhuang Xiaoyuan's question, the white cat officer pulled a stack of photographs from his coat and slapped them onto the table.

"This... was done by a witch? Are you sure this wasn't done by the Calabash Brothers?" Upon seeing the photographs thrown by the white cat officer, Zhuang Xiaoyuan felt a torrent of sweat well up on her forehead. The so-called couple in the pictures were unmistakably a snake spirit and a scorpion spirit.