Chapter 498 - 250: Sojourner

Chapter 498: Chapter 250: Sojourner

「Lu Town.」

The bright moon was hidden by a thick bank of clouds. Its once-silvery light, now filtered through the dark mass, cast a hazy halo that was inexplicably tinged a faint purple.

Snake watched as the reflection on the Eternal World Painting vanished. She was intensely curious about what had happened at the Yan Chun Building. A pang of regret even struck her. ’If only I’d gone to the brothel with that kid. That would have been so much fun.’

Sitting on the roof and listening to the silence all around, Snake’s ears twitched minutely from time to time. The quiet began to weigh on her, making her restless. She lay back, her boneless body writhing with frustration. From a distance, she looked just like a wriggling Big White Snake.

Inside the inn, the pregnant young man would cry out from time to time, his pained shouts loud and disruptive. ’So noisy.’

Snake had no experience with such matters. She had once wondered, being a monster like herself, how she would marry and have children if she ever fell for a Human man.

’Would I wrap him up in my coils and drag him to my cave? Then envelop him and swallow him whole? Or is there some other strange way? If I really got pregnant, what would it feel like? Would I need to avoid hibernation? If I conceived, would I give birth to a Human child, or would I lay a clutch of snake eggs?’

She once held countless fantasies and curiosities about it. But after seeing the pain and turmoil of the pregnant Mo Kuang with her own eyes, Snake suddenly lost all her curiosity and longing. ’So pregnancy isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.’

HISS... HISS...

Snake sat up on the roof again, hugging her knees and burying her head between them. She curled herself into a ball this way, letting out a rhythmic hissing sound.

In Snake’s language, this was the word for "Mother."

Some time passed.

Curled up and motionless, Snake’s pointed ears suddenly twitched. She snapped her head up, looking toward the Yan Chun Building.

"Ye!"

She heard Ye’s reed leaf flute.

Snake and Ye were as close as sisters.

Listening to the flute’s melody, a shiver ran through Snake’s entire body.

’Something’s wrong!’

"Hiss..."

A soft hiss escaped Snake’s lips. She leaped from the roof, diving silently into the shadows below.

Snake remained motionless in the darkness. She wasn’t breathing, her heart wasn’t beating, and her body temperature was dropping rapidly, just like a "dead person." Only her two vertical pupils faintly glowed in the dark.

THUD! THUD! THUD!

A moment later, the sound of a bamboo pole striking the ground echoed from the end of the street.

A long, narrow silhouette split the night street in two—one half in shadow, the other in moonlight.

Bai Qiuyue wore a straw cloak, his tattered conical hat pulled low to hide his face.

He leaned on his bamboo pole, tapping it against the ground, the rhythmic sound carrying into the inn.

Inside the inn, Mo Kuang, who had been tossing and turning in bed, unable to sleep, let out a scream. His bulging belly contorted as a series of baby-like hands pressed against his stomach from the inside.

THUD! THUD! THUD!

"Something’s wrong... waaaah!"

Mo Kuang listened to the strange tapping, feeling the "baby" in his belly seem to respond to the sound. Even he could guess that something had gone wrong outside.

Waaah! Waaah! Waaah!

He tried to scream for help, but it was as if an invisible hand had clamped over his mouth, stifling any sound.

’It’s over!’

A boundless despair washed over Mo Kuang, his terror instantly magnified a thousandfold. He fumbled blindly at his bedside, grabbing the Eternal World Painting to call for help. But the next second, a line of small text appeared on it, leaving him utterly dumbfounded.

[You have been muted by "Mei Miaomiao" for 360 days.]

"..."

After three seconds of silence, tears streamed down Mo Kuang’s face. He was filled with regret for having rashly cursed that Orange Cat, calling it a "lousy cat." And yet, he was still cursing, "Mei Miaomiao, go to hell!"

The commotion in his belly grew stronger.

Waves of sharp pain gave him a firsthand experience of the agony known as "labor."

’I’ll risk it all!’

A chill ran down Mo Kuang’s spine. With the Eternal World Painting muted, he had completely lost his means of calling for help. His only choice was to fight for his life.

Gritting his teeth, Mo Kuang struggled to pull his "precious treasure" out from under his pillow.

Mo Kuang flipped to his most frequently used page, his finger sliding across the words.

He roared internally.

’You really think I’m a pushover, don’t you!’

’You really think I haven’t made any progress all this time!’

Mo Kuang had delved deep into the Path and mastered a new technique—silent reading!

The words on the page silently dissolved into specks of golden light.

The room glittered as motes of light swirled around Mo Kuang.

"Facts aside, after treating me like this—mocking me, ignoring me, muting me—are you telling me you’re completely blameless?!"

He chose his most powerful punch.

The golden light coalesced in front of him into a fist the size of a clay pot. With a savage expression, Mo Kuang smashed it toward his own belly.

’If I’m going down, I’m taking it with me!’

’I’ll fight you to the death!’

Mo Kuang understood now. Something was wrong. Someone outside was causing trouble.

Acting on the principle of "better to be a shattered jade than an intact tile," Mo Kuang figured that if he was doomed anyway, he might as well try a desperate remedy. If he punched the fetus to death, he might just be able to hang on until the Living Dead Situ Yong returned.

’A C-section is out of the question, so I’ll just have to perform an extremely painful abortion.’

THUD!

As Mo Kuang waged a battle of wits and will against the fetus in his belly, Bai Qiuyue, clad in his straw cloak and conical hat, arrived outside the inn. He struck his dark green bamboo pole heavily against the ground.

A ripple of pale gray energy spread out from him, and the ground beneath his feet took on the texture of a water’s surface.

"A boat ferries a stranger from a distant land; we meet by chance in the world of men."