The Fox corners unsuspecting prey

Xiao Yuan's face fell, the flicker of hope going out from his eyes like a snuffed candle.

His gaze lingered on Chu Yun's face only a moment before he turned to Fan Jiang on the bed. "Name your price," he said, dispirited. 

He wasn't even going to try to bargain, or threaten Chu Yun that he could just go behind him and find the physician anyway. Maybe curse him out the house and say he would summon all the physicians in Haolin. Surely one of them could come up with a cure.

But Xiao Yuan was too tired for any of that. He was a man beset by enemies on every side. 

The man Chu Yun spoke with when he dropped off Fan Jiang wasn't broken yet, but the man who looked at him from behind those empty eyes was.

He was on the verge of losing the one person he had left, and he couldn't take it anymore.

That was why Chu Yun knew he was going to get what he wanted. 

Sometimes, a clean break could be a fresh start.