Chapter 117

Flames surged up from the giant fish’s body like a thick pillar of fire.

Bulges kept appearing around its mouth, yet it still held its jaws tightly shut.

Yuxuzi was struggling with everything he had, but the giant fish’s resentment was even more endless.

It knew its fate had long since been sealed, but it could still choose the way it ended.

Willingly taking the hook—

that was its final decision.

As a fish, of course it understood what it meant to be caught on a hook and hauled out of the water.

Only, in its eyes,

rather than be fused with and enslaved by this man, it would rather ask the Dragon King to come and grant it a swift death.

After all, that one was the true River Walk heir of the Liu Clan, the future Dragon King. And what were you, you stinking Daoist who murdered your brother and destroyed your disciples?

Yuxuzi and his senior brother had both once admired that Dragon King of the Liu Clan. From another angle, wasn’t this giant fish the same?

Perhaps it had regretted it too. Back when it faced that terrifying woman, why had it gone to such lengths to escape with its life at the very end, only to suffer for several cycles of sixty years in vain and end up unable to control its own fate?

After lying low and enduring in silence for three hundred years, the giant fish had only one thought in its heart at this moment:

To perish together.

Li Zhuiyuan stood there with a newly opened can of Jianlibao in his hand.

Firelight reflected on the boy’s face, and he finally understood why each of those little fish that had been released had their own little schemes. So it was hereditary.

This wave had passed with ease, but also with luck.

The formation the three seniors Xue, Zeng, and Zheng had arranged for their descendants back then had guarded not only against their master, but against themselves as well.

In the end, this time it was also thanks to Binbin and Mengmeng’s efforts.

Not only had they gotten the job done, they had even brought the descendants along with them.

If any part of the process had gone wrong or slowed down in the slightest, it would all have turned into a bloody, brutal battle in the end.

Runsheng, Tan Wenbin, and Yin Meng were also looking at Li Zhuiyuan. While the boy was still sighing inwardly over his companions’ effort and hard work, the looks in his companions’ eyes as they watched him were even more full of wonder.

From their point of view, ever since entering this sealed Zhengmen Village, the three of them had been muddle-headedly cooperating in the act all the way through.

And somehow, as they acted, Yuxuzi delivered himself right to their door, lay there motionless, and practically begged to be beaten.

Once all the fish scales had been blasted away, even his soul had been burned to ashes.

Then, after transforming into a Corpse demon, he had inexplicably slammed himself into the formation he had just set up, only to be punched to the ground by his own skeleton outside the array.

Just when they were thinking they had already gotten more than enough advantage and it was time to seriously risk everything in a real fight, the boy said a few words and that giant fish immediately turned on the Daoist and swallowed him whole.

Looking at Li Zhuiyuan calmly drinking his soda over there, a line from a high school Chinese textbook surfaced in Tan Wenbin’s mind: Amid laughter and casual talk, enemy fleets are reduced to ash and smoke.

At this moment, both the leader and his teammates had put a filter over each other. A win-win, really.

At last, the great fire died out.

What remained before them was a small hill of ashes.

Li Zhuiyuan took out the Seven-Star Hook from his backpack, lengthened the hook, and started rummaging and poking through the ashes.

This was his favorite part.

Ah Li was still waiting for him at home, so he had to gather more crafting materials to bring back to her.

The rewards came quickly. A fish bone, translucent and lustrous as jade, was dragged out.

This could be taken back and made into a jade hairpin for Ah Li.

Li Zhuiyuan kept searching, thinking he might turn up a few more things. Ideally, he could even find material for next year’s new bone ring in one go.

But soon, the tip of the hook struck something hard, and a force began tugging against him in a struggle.

Li Zhuiyuan let go without hesitation. If you want it, then take it.

What he sent over together with it were also Runsheng and Yin Meng.

Yin Meng flicked her whip, striking that area. The ashes scattered, revealing Yuxuzi inside.

The Daoist now looked utterly miserable. Most of his body had been melted by the fire, leaving only everything above the chest and a single arm.

Li Zhuiyuan thought it was actually a very good look and styling, the kind that would suit an art academy display room.

That hand was still clutching the tip of the Seven-Star Hook. But there was no fury or malice on his face now, only bewilderment.

Runsheng stepped forward with the Yellow River Spade in hand and chopped off his one remaining arm with a single strike.

Just as he was about to go for the head, the Daoist spoke.

“Besides the stone tablets at the bottom of the river, I also left some notes somewhere else.”

Runsheng stopped.

Logically, he should not have stopped and given the enemy another chance to talk. In all those Hong Kong gangster movies he had watched, the villains always paused at moments like this, and it annoyed him every single time.

But the problem was, the Daoist was dropping loot.

It felt like the Little Tyrant learning console Binbin had borrowed from a classmate back when they stayed at Old Man Li’s house.

The little figures inside would bounce on top of things and go ding ding ding ding.

Li Zhuiyuan walked toward the Daoist.

Looking at the boy approaching him, the Daoist said, “In the room where my senior brother died, there’s a study on the second floor. Some of my insights and thoughts on formations are in there. They’re not written very well, so try not to laugh too hard when you read them.”

Li Zhuiyuan nodded.

The Daoist asked, “Tell me, if I hadn’t given in to greed back then, if I had joined hands with my senior brother and suppressed this fish demon together... would the two of us have gotten to see that Dragon King of the Liu Clan?

“Would we have had a chance to pay homage to the Dragon King?

“And even if we hadn’t seen her, if I had gone on cultivating my Dao and stayed with my disciples, could I have left behind a few more stories in the martial world?

“Ah...

“I think... I regret it now.”

Li Zhuiyuan said, “You don’t regret it. You just failed.”

The Daoist glared at Li Zhuiyuan. The viciousness on his face surfaced again.

He was a dying man. He had thought that after handing over his notes, he might get a few words of comfort at the end. Instead, the other party had merely changed methods and stabbed him in the heart again.

“I also want to ask you something. Can you tell me why you wanted to fuse with this demon creature?”

“Isn’t that obvious? Do you really need to ask?”

Li Zhuiyuan shook his head. “I just think it isn’t easy to be a person.”

The Daoist said, “Please do one more thing for me.”

Silently, Li Zhuiyuan pulled out a piece of purple Canvas charm from his pocket. It was a consumable item, but Ah Li had an unlimited supply from the Ancestral Hall.

After Li Zhuiyuan became Qin Li’s disciple, he had also wondered whether continuing to use the ancestral tablets of his forebears as tools might be a little disrespectful. But on second thought, perhaps this counted as assistance from his predecessors. When an elder gives, one must not refuse.

The Daoist said, “Please help me look after the descendants of my three disciples. I hope they can live go—”

“Disgusting.”

The boy spread out the canvas and covered the Daoist’s head with it.

Sizzle, sizzle, sizzle, sizzle—

It was like dumping a huge bowl of water into boiling oil. Intense white steam billowed up from beneath the canvas.

“Ah!!!”

For malevolent spirits, this was an extremely cruel form of torture.

The Daoist had long since ceased to be human.

Even now, though he had lost the ability to fight back, his vitality was still astonishingly tenacious.

At first, Runsheng had thought it was a waste for Li Zhuiyuan to use something as valuable as that canvas to kill the Daoist. He could have just chopped him up with the spade. Strength cost nothing.

But as it burned, wisps of white smoke unexpectedly began rising from several corners of the ashes too.

Runsheng went over and shoveled the ashes aside. What he found were little fish roasting alive. They had actually been hiding there earlier, and from the traces in the ashes, it looked like they had been preparing to crawl out and hide somewhere, waiting for a chance to rise again.

Now, because of the canvas, they had all been wiped out in one sweep.

“Ahhh!”

As the black canvas was consumed, it gradually grew thin, revealing the purple wood shavings inside.

Through his screams and wails, the Daoist saw the carved name on one piece of the wood shavings:

Liu Qingcheng.

He thought he was hallucinating, but the moment he saw that name, the painting in the place where his senior brother had died immediately surfaced in his mind.

In the painting, a woman in green robes stood facing the fish demon in the river.

Liu Qingcheng.

That was her name.

Senior brother, I saw her...

And then he sank completely into darkness.

Once the reaction ended, Li Zhuiyuan removed the black canvas. The Daoist had turned pitch-black.

Runsheng lightly poked him with the spade, sending up a puff of Yuxuzi.

“Brother Runsheng, go down to the riverbed and feel around for all the stone tablets. Brother Binbin, make rubbings of what’s written on them. Mengmeng, come upstairs with me.”

The corner of Yin Meng’s mouth lifted. It seemed this was the first time Li Zhuiyuan had called her by a doubled name.

They entered the courtyard again. Seeing the bones of the yellow-robed Daoist and his disciples, Li Zhuiyuan paused for a moment, then went inside and climbed to the second floor.

One room on the second floor clearly showed signs of having been used. The desk stood by the window. Sitting behind it and turning one’s head slightly, one could see the courtyard.

No doubt, through all those countless days and nights, Yuxuzi had sat here often, writing while watching the senior brother he had killed below.

Yin Meng noticed it too. Frowning, she said, “I really can’t understand how people like that think.”

As Li Zhuiyuan flipped through the booklets on the desk, he said, “Trying to understand them is a waste of time.”

“Brother Xiaoyuan, Zheng Jiayi’s actually pretty nice. After we get back to Jinling, can I keep asking her to hang out?”

“Who you make friends with doesn’t require my permission.”

“I was worried...”

“There’s no need to worry.”

“Okay.”

“But you can pay special attention to whether Zheng Jiayi changes in any way after this incident. Her personality, her habits, anything like that. Keep an eye on it for me and tell me after a while.”

“Mm, understood.”

“All right, find something to wrap these booklets in. We’re taking them with us.”

“Okay, I’ll put them in my backpack.”

Yin Meng began reorganizing her hiking pack. The mission was over, and they were heading back, so the supplies inside could be thrown out to make room for the more valuable books.

“Brother Xiaoyuan, what about the books on the shelf? Should I pack those too?”

“No need. Those books aren’t worth much.”

“Then... can they be sold for money?”

“They barely count as antiques.”

“Then I’ll take all of them. When we get back to Jinling, I’ll find somewhere to sell them and buy a pickup truck.”

Runsheng’s salvaging and Tan Wenbin’s rubbings went very quickly.

When the two returned from the river, they had also taken some door planks from the village and made a wooden bed. They tied the six still-unconscious college students onto it, and Runsheng dragged it back with a rope.

The ground was rough and uneven, so some bumping was unavoidable. But getting them out alive was already good enough. There was no point expecting comfort too.

They had wanted to find a cart, but after so many years, all the wheels had long since rotted away.

Li Zhuiyuan personally set up a new formation. Once it was activated, the barrier ahead twisted, and everyone passed through it and came outside.

On the stone offering table, the offerings that had been placed there when they entered had already scattered all over the ground.

After all, the offering table had been split apart before, and the remains inside had once walked out.

“Brother Binbin, tidy up the offerings again. Mengmeng, wipe down that stone tablet once more.”

The offering table was put back in order, and the stone tablet was polished until it regained a clean sheen.

People really do have many sides.

That saying had been realized in the most literal sense on Yuxuzi.

His bones did not recognize him. His disciples did not recognize him either.

So the offering table and stone tablet were not set out for him, nor did they commemorate him. He had just shamelessly taken the same name on purpose.

Li Zhuiyuan looked around.

Yuxuzi had said that the Dragon King from the Liu Clan had once come here and seen this place.

That was also why he had made the sealing formation so sturdy.

But had that Dragon King...

really come here?

“You’re out?”

Zheng Jiayi popped out from behind a large rock nearby, a bag of biscuits still in her hand.

Yin Meng asked, “Where’s Zeng Yinyin?”

Zheng Jiayi pointed behind her. “She’s in the back.”

Zeng Yinyin was still bound up tightly.

Yin Meng said, “I’ll go untie her legs so she can walk on her own.”

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