Chapter 115

“Come on, let’s go take a look.”

Li Zhuiyuan decided to accept the invitation.

The three-surname blood bowls had already been offered, allowing Yuxuzi’s formation to continue. The big fish’s scheme had failed.

It could be said that, thanks to their enormous head start, their side had already secured the baseline. On this test paper, they had at least earned a passing grade.

If they withdrew now and he patched up the formation a little more, the score could still rise, maybe even to a good mark. If he could build an even stronger wearing-down effect on top of the original formation, then he could probably get an excellent.

But Li Zhuiyuan was used to getting full marks.

He had come all the way here from school. If he could not kill the thing outright, he would be left with regrets.

Besides, putting himself in the examiner’s shoes, if he just dealt with this wave in such a perfunctory way, then sometime in the future this place might very well erupt again.

If six college students could come this time, then next time it might be six half-baked people from the occult world causing trouble with good intentions, or even six crooked practitioners deliberately taking revenge on the living.

The four of them left the Corpse Retriever lodge and headed downhill into the village’s main road.

As they drew near, the six college students resumed their earlier posture, carrying lanterns and walking forward slowly, continuing to guide the way.

Seeing this, Tan Wenbin could not help sighing. “Sigh. Kids these days. Instead of staying in college like they should, they had to come here and work as greeters.”

Runsheng said, “You’re talking about yourself.”

Tan Wenbin said, “Hey, Runsheng, if I die by the roadside one day, when people find my body later, do you think they’ll say the same thing about me?”

“They won’t.”

“Because I wasn’t carrying my student ID?”

“I’d cremate you right there by the road.”

“At least take my ashes home and hold a vigil for me.”

“That part I’d have to discuss with your family.”

“What, you’d really take a red packet at my funeral? Hah. Just wait. If you die before me someday, I’ll personally go to your funeral and play the suona for you.”

“You’re welcome to.”

“And I’ll snap every single incense stick on your offering table!”

Runsheng frowned.

Yin Meng said, “All right, whichever one of you dies first, I’ll go cook for your family during the funeral.”

That one sentence from Yin Meng silenced both Tan Wenbin and Runsheng.

Tan Wenbin quickly changed the subject. “Brother Xiaoyuan, I want to greet my predecessors and also see what university they’re from.”

Li Zhuiyuan nodded.

Binbin jogged up and matched pace with the male student at the back of the line. Seeing an ID badge stuck to the chest of the student’s shirt, he leaned over for a closer look.

“Jinling Audit Adventure Society.

So they’re practically our neighbors. No wonder they were arranged to stay at Uncle Xue’s place when they came. They’re college students from Jinling too.”

Just as Tan Wenbin was withdrawing his gaze, he suddenly realized the other person was also slowly turning his eyeballs toward him.

The two of them met eyes in the most abrupt way.

“Holy shit.”

Tan Wenbin yelped.

The student’s eyes then began spinning nonstop.

Tan Wenbin reached out and placed his hand beneath the student’s nose. He actually felt an extremely faint breath.

“Damn, this one’s actually still alive!”

Tan Wenbin immediately went to check the one in front. It was a girl. When Tan Wenbin appeared in front of her at close range, not only did her eyeballs move, there was also a pleading look in her eyes.

“This one’s alive too!”

“This one as well!”

“Brother Xiaoyuan, they’re all alive!”

These six college students, four men and two women, all still possessed self-awareness. They simply could not control their own bodies.

What made it so shocking was that they had entered this place last month. The fact that they were still alive now was practically a miracle.

Yin Meng also stepped forward to examine them and found that all six of them had swollen lower abdomens. She gently placed her hand against one and could sense something swimming inside. Because of the contact with her palm, the thing inside suddenly became agitated.

“There’s something inside their stomachs, probably fish. We can’t save them right now, because the moment the fish in their bellies is provoked, they’ll die on the spot.”

Li Zhuiyuan said, “Then let them keep leading the way.”

If he could deal with the big fish’s true body, then the problems on these people would naturally be solved as well.

If he could not solve it in the end, then on the way out, he would kill them.

The boy understood the pleading look in their eyes. They were begging to be released.

The houses lining both sides of the village road were rotten and decrepit, but their basic frames were still intact.

However, every house they passed so far had its door hanging open, revealing the deep darkness inside.

But this “greeting party” led the four of them to a house whose doors were shut. The first two people in line reached out and pushed the doors open, while the last two stood apart at the entrance holding lanterns.

The scene looked like servants welcoming their master home.

Li Zhuiyuan carefully observed the house and found that, aside from the fact that its doors had been closed at first, it was no different from the other houses in the village. Nor did he spot any traces of a formation.

The four of them stepped through the gate and entered the courtyard.

The four college students who had gone in ahead stood in the four corners holding lanterns. Their light barely illuminated the surroundings.

In the middle of the courtyard stood a huge square table. On the table were three statues, and arranged in a circle on the ground around it were Prayer mats, each with a dried skeleton seated on it wearing a daoist robe.

Directly in front of the table was a dried skeleton in a yellow daoist robe. In its left hand was a Bagua mirror, and in its right a Peachwood Sword.

But the Bagua mirror was already shattered, and the Peachwood Sword was broken as well. The body itself lay face-down across the tabletop, its skull cracked and caved in.

This showed that when disaster struck Zhengmen Village, the villagers had once invited daoist priests to subdue the demon, only for the demon to subdue the priests instead.

Li Zhuiyuan walked to the side of the yellow-robed skeleton. On the table to either side of it were two paintings each.

The first painting showed a woman in green robes standing by a river. In the water, the shape of a huge fish could be seen faintly.

The second painting showed the badly mangled giant fish drifting downstream. At the far end of the river was the shadow of a village.

The third painting showed a daoist master in a yellow robe leading a group of disciples, standing at the village entrance. The sign at the entrance read “Zhengmen Village.”

The yellow-robed daoist master looked ethereal and transcendent, full of immortal grace. The disciples around him were all elegant and striking, every one of them handsome and dashing.

Apparently, this daoist master shared the same hobby he did, recording his demon-subduing exploits through painting.

Still, the daoist master cared more for detail than Ah Li did. Ah Li only painted a single ending, while this man’s work looked more like a picture story.

In the fourth painting, the daoist master and his disciples had set up an altar. Black mist spread out before them, and within it loomed the figure of the giant fish.

There was no fifth painting, or rather, the dried skeletons before them were the fifth painting: the picture of their ending.

Li Zhuiyuan shifted his gaze back to the first painting.

Could that woman in the painting have been surnamed Liu?

Judging from the story told in the paintings, the giant fish had likely been grievously wounded by her. Yet even after being badly injured and reduced to that state, once it drifted here it still managed to unleash a bloody disaster upon this mountain village, and those daoists had been unable to suppress it.

What happened after the paintings was probably that Yuxuzi came here and sealed off the entire Zhengmen Village, preventing the giant fish from going out and wreaking havoc.

If the woman in the painting really was from the Liu Clan, then that would explain why this giant fish had appeared in Ah Li’s dream.

Because from the giant fish’s point of view, the true culprit behind its miserable condition was not the yellow-robed daoist and not Yuxuzi, but this woman from the Liu Clan.

Li Zhuiyuan did not know whether she had been a Dragon King of one generation of the Liu Clan. Mainly because the yellow-robed daoist had not left any written notes in the painting, and the figures were rendered in that sort of style that cared more about artistic mood than concrete detail.

The only information you could really get from the figure was: female, and wearing green.

Li Zhuiyuan suspected this scene had probably only been something the yellow-robed daoist had heard about, then painted from imagination as the opening of this demon-subduing affair.

In that case, she was probably indeed a Dragon King of one generation of the Liu Clan. The daoist was obviously a rather vain man. For someone like him to personally paint himself going to deal with a malevolent spirit that had already been grievously wounded by someone else, and still take pride in it, meant that woman’s status and reputation must have been great enough.

This poor daoist was helping the Dragon King clean up the aftermath. That raised the prestige of the whole thing in an instant.

Only...

Li Zhuiyuan’s gaze swept toward the four college students standing in the corners. What was the purpose of controlling them and leading his group here?

To deliberately explain the background?

Generally speaking, the purpose of background exposition was to lay groundwork.

So, were they planning to meet him next?

Li Zhuiyuan rose onto his toes and reached a hand toward the back of the yellow-robed daoist’s head, sensing the terrible wound there.

Runsheng came over and reached out to feel the daoist robe.

Tan Wenbin and Yin Meng went to check the daoist robes on the other skeletons seated on the Prayer mats.

Li Zhuiyuan knew his companions had misunderstood what he meant. He was not trying to grope around for objects; he just wanted to confirm the daoist master’s fatal wound.

But he did not stop them. If there really were any relics that could help later generations better slay demons and defend the proper way, or even help avenge them, then the daoists would probably be willing to gift them.

But in the end, Yin Meng and Tan Wenbin found nothing, and only Runsheng managed to recover a scripture from the yellow-robed daoist.

Nearly three hundred years had passed, enough to rot most things into ruin.

Li Zhuiyuan glanced at the scripture. It was about self-cultivation and moral refinement, with no real value.

“Brother Runsheng, give me three incense sticks.”

“All right.”

Li Zhuiyuan took the three burning incense sticks, bowed empty-handed three times toward the dried skeletons of the daoists, then inserted the incense into the Incense Burner.

At that moment, the college students who had been standing in the corners moved. Carrying their lanterns again, they walked out of the house.

The feeling was like a tour guide leading visitors from one attraction to the next after they had finished looking around.

After Li Zhuiyuan and the others came outside, they followed the six college students and continued down the village road.

This time they went straight to the village entrance. There was a river there, broadened at this stretch, and many stone washing platforms extended along the bank for the villagers’ use.

The six college students walked to the edge of one of those stone platforms and split into two groups, standing opposite each other.

Splash...

A figure emerged from beneath the water and climbed onto the stone slab.

It was an old man, half his body covered in fish scales, the other half translucent.

He was not a living person, but he was not exactly a ghost either.

When he appeared, Li Zhuiyuan instinctively lifted his head. He could sense resonance between the old man and the formation here.

All things were divided into yin and yang, and the formation eye within an array could be divided the same way.

But most formations did not have such a configuration. Only someone with extremely deep mastery of formations could set one up like this.

The old man stood by the riverbank and saluted them. “This poor daoist is Yuxuzi. Greetings, everyone.”

Runsheng, Tan Wenbin, and Yin Meng were all startled. They still clearly remembered that Yuxuzi’s skull had appeared on the stone table at the entrance, while his remains lay inside the stone table. So how could he now appear here?

But Li Zhuiyuan could confirm that the other party really was Yuxuzi.

His physical body served as the yang formation eye at the entrance, while his soul served as the yin formation eye inside the array.

The old man asked again, “May I ask who you all are?”

“Ahem... ahem...”

Tan Wenbin cleared his throat and was just about to make a grand introduction when Li Zhuiyuan beat him to it.

“Corpse Retrievers, serving at Huangshan Wharf.”

Tan Wenbin immediately nodded, and Runsheng and Yin Meng followed suit.

At the same time, Tan Wenbin reached for the Seven-Star Hook, Runsheng gripped the Yellow River Spade, and Yin Meng clenched the Demon-Suppressing Whip.

Because Brother Xiaoyuan had not used the rites of the Qin Clan or Liu Clan, nor revealed his true identity, the three of them all prepared themselves at once.

As members of a team, that level of tacit understanding needed no explanation.

Yuxuzi said, “If this poor daoist has guessed correctly, it was you all who helped continue the sealing formation?”

“That’s right. It was us.”

“Then this poor daoist offers heartfelt thanks for your assistance!”

“The daoist is too courteous. This is what we should do. What truly inspires admiration is the way you and your three disciples have paid the price generation after generation.”

“As cultivators of the dao, defending the proper way and protecting the human world is simply our duty.”

Yuxuzi waved his hand dismissively. Though half his face was covered in fish scales, there was still an open, upright righteousness in his bearing.

Just then, a whirlpool appeared on the water behind him. Immediately after, a gigantic fish, huge in build and covered in festering sores, leapt out and smashed straight toward Yuxuzi.

Yuxuzi retreated and avoided the blow.

The giant fish did not give up. It twisted its body again and lunged at Yuxuzi once more.

Yuxuzi dodged again, causing the fish to miss again.

The giant fish began to go mad. Its body writhed and it swept sideways in another attack.

Yuxuzi still retreated, refusing to meet it head-on.

After three consecutive attacks that achieved nothing, the giant fish seemed furious. It raised its fish head high, leapt into the air, traced a long arc, then crashed back into the water with a huge splash.

This time it was not really attacking. It looked more like it was simply throwing a tantrum.

Back in the water, its reddened fish eyes shifted and fixed themselves on Li Zhuiyuan as it let out a hiss.

Tan Wenbin, Runsheng, and Yin Meng all looked toward Li Zhuiyuan, but Li Zhuiyuan gave no order to attack. He simply stood there watching.

Yuxuzi pointed at the giant fish and said, “This demon has been suppressed for so many years, yet its savage nature remains unchanged. Fortunately, this poor daoist has long since learned its temperament.”

Li Zhuiyuan said, “What the daoist says is true. A demon is still a demon. It only has this much brains.”

“Sadly, this poor daoist’s soul has also been polluted by it day and night, until I have become like this. Truly... humiliating and agonizing.”

“The daoist has sacrificed greatly. We admire you.”

“However, though its vicious nature remains, the life force of this demon has already been worn down by time to less than a tenth of what it once was.

This poor daoist has a plan, one that can not only completely solve this demon and eliminate future trouble, but also allow this poor daoist to gain release sooner.

Might you young friends be willing to lend this poor daoist a hand?”

“Of course we are not willing.”

“This poor daoist’s plan is... hm?”

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