"S-Sister Jingliu, doing it this way… wouldn't it be a little bad?"
Looking at Jingliu who already had a confident, victory-in-hand appearance, Stelle swallowed hard and said very tactfully: "Isn't this a bit… immoral?"
She was afraid that if Jingliu really did this, she would end up like Herta—being doxxed, harassed, and insulted… though it wouldn't be entirely undeserved.
But she still couldn't bear to watch Jingliu fall to that level. After all, even if Jingliu herself didn't care, she still had to consider whether it would affect her relatives and friends, right?
Sister Jingliu probably wouldn't want her beloved disciple Jing Yuan to suddenly get sacked and beaten on the street while walking… right?
"Really?" Jingliu gave Stelle a strange look and said: "What's immoral about this?"
"Have you heard this saying? People cannot hold onto wealth beyond the scope of their own ability. If someone gets their money taken by me, it only means that money was never supposed to belong to them in the first place. It was merely temporarily stored in their wallet."
"I'm simply taking a portion of the money that was stored with them. Since it was stored with them, it means someone would take it sooner or later. I'm just doing what I should do. What's immoral about that?"
Stelle: ???
Eh? How strange? This logic sounds like there's nothing wrong with it, but why does it feel so weird?
"Not only that, I'm only taking money they shouldn't have gotten in the first place, but I'm also giving these people a lesson. It's equivalent to them getting a free class from me at zero cost. In the end, I'm the one who loses out! They should even thank me!" Jingliu said righteously.
("Achoo!" At this moment, on the other side, Jing Yuan suddenly sneezed and muttered: "It must be Master talking about me behind my back.")
Stelle couldn't help saying: "But no matter what, this is still tricking money out of other people's pockets. It will definitely cause public outrage. What if some hot-tempered people start a fight..."
"Start a fight?"
Jingliu sneered: "Those people? Then I'd like to ask, how much have they tipped me? Anyone who jumps out to attack me probably won't tip much anyway."
"If they have the ability, let them pull out their receipts and show me. If they can't even reach an average of one million credit points, why should I care about them?"
"Why are they trying to show off their presence?"
"They're nothing but a bunch of stinking bugs!"
"..."
Stelle suddenly realized what the passersby had meant earlier when they said "the master-disciple pair with strange behavior."
Jingliu had already gone this far into madness. She was one hundred percent possessed by something unclean!
It had to be a Heliobus!
That was why she immediately called Bailu and the others. The reason Stelle had said on the phone that "combat power isn't important" was because the person possessed this time was Jingliu.
Even if she called over a bunch of people, they still wouldn't be able to beat Jingliu! Not to mention using physical means to exorcise the Heliobus.
So this time they could only rely on wits.
"Old Jing, please hurry and think of a way? Stop her before Sister Jingliu puts her idea into action, otherwise the reputation of the Five Heroes of the Clouds will be ruined..." Stelle prayed silently in her heart.
[Mysterious Narrator of the Honkai: Star Rail World: Sigh, our poor protagonist is inside the story and doesn't have the readers' omniscient perspective. She knows very little about the stories of the Five Laughs of the Clouds.]
On the other side, the Greedy Heliobus possessing Jingliu felt increasingly strange.
It felt more and more out of place with Jingliu.
Who exactly was the Greedy Heliobus here?
Although those ideas had indeed been generated under the Greedy Heliobus's influence, that influence was limited. The Greedy Heliobus had only made Jingliu greedy. The related thoughts, plans, and logic… were all things Jingliu came up with herself.
This left the Greedy Heliobus very puzzled, because it believed that with its own morals and conscience, it could never have thought of such things.
Also, what exactly was Penacony thinking? Why did it feel that even someone as greedy as itself could not fully understand the profundity of this kind of thinking?
Just as people cannot imagine things they have never seen, the same applied to the Greedy Heliobus. In the end, it was only the portion of the Great Heliobus [Blaze] that corresponded to "greed." Even its main body had never seen Penacony, so what could a mere fragment understand?
Originally, the Greedy Heliobus's plan was: possess Jingliu, snatch away half of Jing Yuan's savings, and then use that money to speculate in the stock market...
But now Jingliu had opened its eyes: Even harvesting leeks shouldn't be done like this, right? Wasn't this exhausting the pond to catch the fish? Shouldn't true greed be sustainable leek harvesting?
Why can't I understand it? Could it be… that I'm not greedy enough?
The Greedy Heliobus fell into deep thought.
...
On the other side.
Bailu awkwardly put down the phone, squatted down, and poked the sprawled-out Jing Yuan: "Old Jing… sorry. I-I got it wrong just now. I apologize."
"..."
Jing Yuan said nothing and simply silently moved a little further away.
Bailu scooted closer: "Old Jing, I was wrong. For the sake of our many years of friendship, can you not hold it against me?"
Jing Yuan remained silent and continued moving away.
Bailu hurriedly said: "I-I'll treat you to a meal! How about two meals?"
Jing Yuan still said nothing.
Bailu was getting anxious: "Old Jing, even if you don't forgive me, you still have to help Stelle, right? She said she already found the Heliobus. It's on Miss Jingliu. She said only you can help. Otherwise—"
"Jingliu was possessed by a Heliobus?"
Hearing this, Jing Yuan suddenly raised his head with a serious expression: "Where?"
Bailu was stunned for a second, then quickly took out her phone: "I'll show you the location..."
Jing Yuan glanced at the position Stelle had sent, then patted the dust off his body and stood up as if nothing had happened. He even directly summoned the "Stonefire Dream Body."
At this moment, the gloomy look on Jing Yuan's face had completely vanished, replaced by excitement.
"Perfect, Master. Don't blame your disciple for committing insubordination this time. I'm here to repay your kindness of teaching me! Hahaha!"
With that, Jing Yuan grabbed his glaive and rushed out.
"Eh...?"
Bailu stared blankly at Jing Yuan's gradually shrinking back, feeling a wave of emotion: As expected of Old Jing. He really is a good person.
Even though he had just been beaten up by her, the moment he heard his Master was in danger, he immediately became a different person. He didn't even ask any questions and just grabbed his weapon to help. From this, it seems Old Jing still cares a lot about his Master.
Bailu's eyes curved into crescents. She did not follow Jing Yuan, because Stelle had said earlier that her going there wouldn't be very useful. The priority now was to contact the other members of the ghost-hunting team so they could all gather and help.
Hmm... she was actually a little curious about what Old Jing's Master looked like.