The Great Worm Lich

In the quiet lobby, someone suddenly made a vomiting sound. Everyone, who was still dumbfounded, snapped back to reality right away and looked towards the direction of the sound. They saw that a long-haired girl crouched down on the ground and was vomiting her stomach acid out.

Her teammates began to pat her back as they comforted her in a low voice.

“Uncle, she’s practicing witchcraft and is also one of the special forces sent by the country?” Not being able to suppress the curiosity in his heart, Zhang Lisheng pointed to the girl who was vomiting and asked Old Man Xu in a whisper.

“She’s only a girl, so how can she possibly be a special soldier.”

“Since she’s also a witch, does she really have to do that? She can just chant a few spells to calm herself if she’s really scared, right?”

“She’s already scared to her wits, so how could she possibly have the time to chant a spell? That Zhao girl is fair and innocent, and she’s also quite weak as well. This Consultant Zheng is also really, really… How should I say this… Sigh…” Old Man Xu whispered.

“It’s a rare opportunity to see a great wizard demonstrating their power. Why would you become a wizard in the first place if you want to complain about this?!” Seeing how the old man held back the words that had already sprung to his lips, Zhang Lisheng muttered in an incomprehensible manner.

Just when the old man and Zhang Lisheng were whispering to each other, Captain Hu had ordered somebody to bring a set of clothes and a black leather suitcase for Consultant Zheng’s living corpse.

Upon seeing the size of the suitcase, Consultant Zheng smiled and commanded his living corpse to open it before twisting its limbs and forcing it to get inside. With its stomach bulging out, a snake-like hand reached out to pull the zipper of the suitcase.

Then, he lifted the suitcase and became the first one to walk out of the hotel to ride on the bus, but not before saying, “Captain Hu, let’s go!”

There were not more than 40 people in the entire team, so there were more than enough seats for them on the bus. A few minutes later, after everyone had boarded the bus, it began to start. Old Man Xu, who was sitting in the middle of the carriage, seemed to have exhausted his words as he finally stopped talking. Instead, he leaned against the pillow on the seat and closed his eyes to attain mental composure.

Zhang Lisheng, who was sitting beside him by the window, on the other hand, looked at the Johannesburg streets outside of the window that was shrouded with dazzling sunlight while placing his hands into his pockets. He began caressing the True Book of Witchcraft Method he had just obtained.

The feel of the book on his fingertips was smooth, with no bumps at all as if he’s caressing the soft skin of a newborn baby. After being lost in his thoughts for a while, he suddenly realized that though it would be inconvenient for him to infuse his wizard power to read the True Book in the car, he could still carry out some small unnoticeable experiments.

Remembering that the True Book was obtained from the flesh on Old Man Xu’s chest, the young man quietly took out the True Book and lifted his shirt to place it close to his belly.

Right at this moment, Consultant Zheng who was sitting frontmost in the car by himself suddenly said out loud, “You’re ignorant of the treasure you always carry and would always make the same mistake over and over again. You always want to have a meteoric rise overnight, but you never think before those who reach the sky in a single bound don’t have any foundation beneath their feet at all and would eventually fall to become a pile of meat. On the contrary, those who rise to the sky one step at a time in a thoroughgoing manner would always have a firm footing beneath their feet. No matter how high they stand. Once they become successful, it would be easy for them to reach out for the stars and moon…”

“Consultant Zheng, what are you talking about?” Captain Hu, who was sitting in the other row separated by the aisle and who had been lost in her thoughts ever since they got onto the bus, asked.

“Nothing. I had a drink at the hotel just now, so I merely said a few drunken words,” Consultant Zheng smiled as he replied. “That’s right, Captain Hu! What should we do after we have reached Cape Town?”

“Director Liang will take us to the camp of a survey team of the China National Mining Corporation to rest for a night, then we will use the name of the survey team to decide according to the changing situation.”

“This sounds like a good strategy,” Consultant Zheng nodded and said before leaning onto his seat and closing his eyes. Seeing him resting, the Captain who had been worrying about a lot of things also rubbed the bridge of her nose between her eyes and leaned back on the chair to shut her eyes.

Zhang Lisheng, who was sitting not far away, had an intuition that the words Consultant Zheng said out of nowhere seemed to be directed at him. However, he really could not recall what treasure he had and where did he make a mistake. Still, a great wizard would not just speak at random for no reason.

Putting back the witchcraft True Book back into his pocket, the teenager contemplated over it and lowered his head to look at his body. His clothes and shoes were only bought after he had come to Africa. Even though his two wizard gus were nurtured with his efforts, it was still a bit too much to describe them as ‘treasures’. After a moment of contemplation, he lowered his gaze onto the jelly gem wrapped around his finger.

As Zhang Lisheng took the jelly gem off and was about to stretch it for the umpteenth time, a perplexed sound resonated by his ears. “Oh, buddy? I-I haven’t seen you before. Since when have you joined the team?”

Wrapping the jelly gem on his wrist intuitively in an agile manner, the teenager turned around to look at the fat and strong young man who had extended his head from the back seat to look at him in astonishment. “I just joined the team today, so it’s not surprising for you to see me for the first time.”

“Oh? You’re a native from Western Sichuan too? Ling Dang! Ling Dang! Look! There’s one more native Western Sichuan in the team!” The fat young man changed into his Sichuan accent and exclaimed in pleasant surprise.

“There are more than 100 million people in Western Sichuan and many are from the same hometown with us.” A pretty looking young girl beside him pouted and put her arms on the seat in front before studying Zhang Lisheng carefully. “However, there are not many people who can suddenly join our team in such a time. Is it convenient for you to tell us about your background, little handsome?”

“What background? A person with special talent can provide that… that… oh yeah, what was it called again? That’s right, it’s called ‘strong defense support’… Ling Dang, shall both of our teams form an offensive and defensive alliance? When something happens, I’ll ask my junior nephew to look out for your team and when you have some extra power from your Witchcraft’s Gate of Life’s spell, you can also cast it on me too.” Old Man Xu suddenly opened his eyes and stared straight into the girl before saying with a joyful smile.

“No problem! As long as you can make the final call, we’ll agree with it! Team Leader Cui, did you hear what your team’s Old Man Xu said? What do you think?” The girl smiled at Team Leader Cui who was at the other side of the aisle.

“It sounds good! We’re all in a group, and we should help each other out anyway,” Cui Xiaodong nodded and replied with a smile.

The group of wizards on the bus was not mentally strong and very forgetful. When they saw that their captain and consultant began to rest, they soon forgot the terrible scene they saw in the hotel lobby not long ago. They became much more relaxed. When some of them heard Cui Xiaodong talk like a bureaucrat, they chuckled and chimed in.

“That’s enough, Team Leader Cui! If you really have that high level of realization, you would not have released your Golden Bull Gu or something when you fought with Fusheng last time.”

“Little Dong cultivates the Witchcraft’s Gate of Death, so what do you expect him to use if he doesn’t use a wizard gu during a fight? Don’t tell me you want him to hit with his head then?”

Upon hearing the sound at the back of the bus that soon became more bustling, Captain Hu, who was shutting her eyes to attain mental composure, could not help but frown. However, after spending two to three months with them, she knew that this motley group of people on the bus could not be compared to her former disciplined subordinates. She could not just suppress them but must use both soft and hard approach interchangeably. For this reason, she held back the anger arising in her heart.

Just like this, without anyone stopping them, after the bus that was getting bustling as time went by entered the downtown Johannesburg, it began to accelerate at a speed of 120 kilometers per hour on a flat highway.

As time went by, the sky slowly turned dark. The lights in the bus lit up too. It was more than 1000 kilometers from Johannesburg to Cape Town and the long journey of more than ten hours would soon come to an end.

About ten o’clock in the evening, Captain Hu arranged for the team leaders to start giving out the third round of food. After the crowds filled their tummy bumpily and tiredly in the bus, Director Liang, who was sitting in the co-driver seat, said in a hurry, “Captain Hu, watch out! There’s a checkpoint of the South African government army in front!”

“Sigh! We have merely traveled for a few hours… I thought Johannesburg is 1400 kilometers away from Cape Town? It has been ten hours of the journey already!”

“Shut up! Everyone, sit down now! Don’t speak a word!” Captain Hu promptly shouted to interrupt this untimely and ignorant question. Composing herself, she sat straight in the seat after the bus gradually slowed down and was prepared to negotiate anytime.

Not long after, a black officer wearing a beret boarded the bus under the protection of two soldiers with long guns.

“Hello, sir! I’m Wu Zulu, the director of the Macalulu Mining Company’s internal affairs department. This is our pass.” Before the officer opened his mouth to speak, Director Liang had already greeted him with a smile and handed over a document.

The black military officer took the document and took in ten lines at a glance. With a blank expression, he suddenly asked, “Chinese?”

“Yes! Macalulu Mining Company is a joint company between China National Mining Corporation and our Cape Town Jinya Mining Company. Most of our skilled workers and specialists are Chinese,” Director Liang maintained his smile as he explained.

“Chinese, Wu Zulu my ass!” The black officer glanced at the passengers in the bus and cursed under his breath. “Damn you, plunderers! I hope all of you will go to hell!”

Hastily, he threw the document back to Director Liang and stepped off the bus in stride.

A few seconds later, the bus began to start its engine again in the dark night, after passing by the opened checkpoint, Zhang Lisheng could see that there were eight heavy armored vehicles that seemed to be crouching in the African wilderness next to the road and two to three hundred fully armed soldiers taking shelters using the armored vehicles. They were looking vigilant as they held their guns up.

“Generally, the Africans, especially those who are soldiers, are not very fond of Chinese people. They think that the reason we came here is to exploit and plunder their mines. This officer was still okay, it’s only his mouth that was a little vulgar, but he didn’t purposely make things difficult for us. Otherwise, we’d have to bribe him.” After passing the checkpoint, Director Liang explained while sighing with relief.

Captain Hu looked at the dark night outside the window and asked, “Director Liang, how many more checkpoint like this do we have to pass?

“Three at most! The first one is the hardest to go through. After we enter Cape Town, I have some relationship with several garrison officers, so even in the event of an accident, I can just resolve it through a phone call.”

Upon seeing the confidence Director Liang portrayed, most of the people in the car sighed in relief.

Only Zhang Lisheng whispered in a grave expression to himself, “A disaster is about to happen…”