Mutated Tao

After pulling out the wad of cotton from his ear, a buzzing sound completely drowned his hearing. Immediately, the sound of people talking in the room adjacent to him, the sounds coming from the streets, and even the sound of his heartbeat were magnified.

Li Huowang endured the pain and closed his eyes as he tried to locate where the voice had been coming from. After some time, he finally managed to pick out the broken voice of the Black Taisui amidst all the chaos.

“I’m talking to you! Can you hear me?!” Li Huowang shouted loudly.

The Black Taisui answered, but it was not speaking coherently; it was piecing together words that meant nothing. “Mouth. Sky. Wu.”

“What are you talking about?! Do you understand me? If I die, you die too! Let’s talk!” shouted Li Huowang once more.

Since the Black Taisui could crawl out from his nose or mouth at any time, Li Huowang knew that he couldn’t ignore it. He had to deal with it right now.

Li Huowang wanted to negotiate with it. He felt that regardless of what its plans were, they could surely come to agreeable terms.

But no matter what Li Huowang did, it did not react as he had thought. It was still using simple words to answer.

As he continued listening to the fragmented words, Li Huowang had a feeling that he was talking to a child who had just learned how to talk.

“Wait… a child?! A CHILD?!” Li Huowang suddenly remembered something. He immediately crawled out from the bed and called for the servant to bring him a brush along with some ink, and paper. Then, Li Huowang ignored the chaotic sounds around him while writing down what the Black Taisui was talking about.

“Mouth. Wood. Water. Fire. Field. Art.”

He wrote down the characters one by one and looked at their arrangements. They were very familiar to him. He then remembered something.

“No wonder the arrangements of the characters sounded so familiar! It’s learning what I taught Lu Xiucai!”

Li Huowang finally understood why the Black Taisui was speaking in such a fragmented manner; it only knew these words!

The Black Taisui had only learned these words coincidentally while Li Huowang was teaching Lu Xiucai. It didn’t even know the meanings of the words and was only repeating it.

“It can’t even speak right now. How should I communicate with it?” Li Huowang wondered aloud as he stuffed the wad of cotton back into his ears and started wandering around his room. He thought of a few different solutions, but in the end, he rejected all of them.

In order to suppress his hallucinations, Li Huowang had no choice but to keep the Black Taisui inside his stomach. Due to this, he needed another way to get rid of this trouble.

After thinking for a while, Li Huowang finally decided on the crudest method—teaching the Black Taisui words.

After it learned how to talk, Li Huowang would then be able to converse with it. The battle with the Sitting Oblivion Dao this time around had shown Li Huowang just how much of an asset it could be. As long as he could communicate with it, he might even be able to use it as a secret weapon.

Li Huowang didn’t know how long it would take to teach a bunch of tentacles, but he knew that it would take a long time. Thus, this method could be considered quite crude.

“Fine, if I have to teach it, then so be it,” said Li Huowang as he sat down, took out another piece of paper, and started to write. Since it would take a long time to teach the Black Taisui how to speak, Li Huowang had decided to take it slow.

Compared to this, he had a much more urgent matter to attend to—to get his reward from the man with the doll head. This was the first mission he had completed after entering the Surveillance Bureau.

***

After his wounds had healed halfway, Li Huowang told everyone to prepare for travel. No one could stop him this time.

Bai Lingmiao argued with him and finally managed to persuade him to buy a carriage so that he could lie down in it during their trip.

They traveled for a long time before Li Huowang and group once again reached the prosperous Yinling City. By this time, the wounds on Li Huowang’s torso had also finished healing. However, his missing eye and the ribs hadn’t yet grown back.

Li Huowang had noticed that compared to his fingernails, skin, and flesh, it took quite a bit longer for him to regrow his bones and eyes.

“Senior Li, according to the map, we can just take the side path. There’s no need for us to enter the city. Troupe leader Lu’s group is likely to be performing along the way and we might be able to catch up to them,” suggested Puppy suggested as they waited at the gates of Yinling City.

“No need. We will enter the city. Go and get some rooms at the same inn as last time,” said Li Huowang. He would never tell Puppy that he was actually here to collect the rewards.

Their mission this time had been quite arduous, and so Li Huowang was looking forward to it.

Li Huowang had thought that he might have to stay for a few more nights if the man hadn’t come yet, but it was clear that they had many informants within Yinling City.

During the second section of the night, just as Li Huowang was hobbling into the stable, the man was already there, waiting for him. He was holding a yellow sack while sitting on a pile of horse feed.

Without waiting for Li Huowang to speak, the man jumped down and approached him, his tone much friendlier than usual. “Hoho, looks like you are indeed quite strong. Good job on the mission in Ganyuan Village. We hadn’t expected you to be able to keep casualties to zero.”

Hearing his friendly tone, Li Huowang felt his heart relax a little. This meant that he had passed the test and was finally officially a part of the Surveillance Bureau.

“No, no. It was just luck,” said Li Huowang humbly.

“Luck is also part of your skill. No need to be humble. Also, are you hurt? The Surveillance Bureau can treat you no matter the injury,” said the man with the doll head.

In response, Li Huowang shook his head.

Then, the man then grabbed the doll head and took it off.

Beneath the doll head, Li Huowang found a man with a friendly face. He looked well off, plump, and had eyes the size of beans. It was an amicable looking face.

The man smiled and shook Li Huowang’s hands. “Sorry about that. Without testing your powers and background, I really wouldn’t dare bring you into the Surveillance Bureau.”

Then, he fished out five lifespan pills covered in yellow talismans from his sleeves and handed them to Li Huowang. “Here, you gave me these the last time around, and so I’m returning them back to you.”

Just as Li Huowang was about to refuse, the man stopped him.

“Take them first and listen to me,” said the man as he pushed the pills into Li Huowang’s hands and began to explain in a calm manner, “You should know that I would have to take responsibility for you to join the Surveillance Bureau. If anything had happened, then I too would have been held responsible. Those lifespan pills were just collateral for that. But now, since you want to join the Surveillance Bureau for real, there’s no need for it.”

The man revealed a smile, providing an offer that no one could reject.

“My surname is Tuoba, and my given name is Danqing. Junior Er Jiu, if you don’t mind, then you can just call me brother Tuoba,” said the man.

This was the first time someone told Li Huowang their surname with good intentions. He knew what it meant and immediately bowed politely. “Thank you brother Tuoba.”

“Haha, then I will take it that you’ve joined the Surveillance Bureau. From now on, we are one family. I wish brother Er Jiu the best of luck!” said Tuoba.

Looking at the lifespan pills in his hand, Li Huowang felt a warmth in his heart. While he didn’t care all that much about the pills, he was touched by Tuoba’s attitude.

After coming out from the Zephyr Temple, except for the now deceased Abbess Jingxin, everyone else he had seen had been trying to kill him or fight him. Not once did the onslaught of enemies stop.

At this point, Li Huowang was no longer a naive boy. He knew that Tuoba had most likely put an act to be courteous; however, he had never been treated this kindly before in this world, not even for the sake of trickery.

Then, Tuoba Danqing extended his hands and brought Li Huowang out of the stable. “Come now, this is not the place to talk. Let’s go somewhere more comfortable.”

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