Mutated Tao

When Li Huowang's words fell, his tense spirit filled with guilt could no longer hold out against the exhaustion. Li Huowang's eyes closed slowly as he passed out. The footsteps, the shouts of the prison guards, and Yang Na's crying gradually faded away.

After an unknown amount of time, Li Huowang woke up to the smell of incense. He couldn't see anything but blue the moment he opened his eyes. Li Huowang took a deep breath to compose himself and realized that he was lying down and staring at the sky. The sea waves crashing against the ship’s hull and the prickly sensation of the wooden deck against his back made Li Huowang realize that he was back on the ship.

Li Huowang looked downward upon hearing weird noises and was shocked by the sight that unfolded in front of him.

A crowd was prostrating before him, and there were rows of offerings and incense burners just beneath Li Huowang's feet. Li Huowang felt a shiver down his spine when he saw two children among the offerings. Li Huowang felt as if they were worshiping him like he was some kind of god.

Li Huowang was furious. He stood up and kicked the incense burners away.

“Are you all fools? Why do you guys always place your hopes on others? And you're even offering children to me!” Li Huowang roared and pulled the two children away from the offering plates. The children had red dots on their foreheads.

Li Huowang’s sudden outburst terrified everyone. They retreated backward, and the captain repeatedly kowtowed and begged for mercy. “Dragon King, please calm down! Please calm down!”

Dragon King? Li Huowang looked down to see writhing tentacles black tentacles all over him. His arm was still severed and had been replaced by five tentacles entwined together.

Clearly, the black tentacles all over him had made everyone misunderstand that an evil spirit had possessed him.

“Li Sui, go hide. You're scaring them,” Lu Huowang said. The tentacles vanished instantly at Li Huowang’s command.

Li Huowang glanced at the drenched deck and the clear skies. He didn't feel like explaining anything, so he turned to the captain and ordered, “Get up and continue sailing to Xing Island!”

“All right, all right! I’ll sail!” the captain hurriedly said. He dared not resist nor kick up a fuss. Even if Li Huowang weren't the Dragon King, he was still someone he couldn't afford to provoke.

Li Huowang walked through the crowd and settled in a quiet corner of the ship’s cabin.

He took deep breaths to calm himself down before turning to the monk.

“How did I get back on the ship?”

“Daoist, you crawled out from that creature's belly. It was too dark underwater, so I couldn’t really see what it looked like. Ah, I remember seeing another living person in that creature's belly, but I don’t know whether he managed to crawl out or not. Also, the creature's back was riddled with eyes,” the monk replied.

Li Huowang pieced together the scene using the puzzle pieces that the monk was handing over to him by recounting.

Li Huowang had expected it, but it turned out that his assumption was right. He had crawled out of the creature's belly by jumping down that gray prison building. Crossing the electrified cage with spikes meant that he had gotten rid of what had bound him underwater while climbing the watchtower meant that he had climbed onto the deck.

Li Huowang saved his life by moving in his hallucination. It was a valuable experience, and Li Huowang reckoned that he could use the same method if he ever found himself in another pinch.

Li Huowang believed that the encounter wouldn't have been so difficult if the creature hadn't been able to negate Black Taisui's ability in his abdomen. Fortunately, the outcome was still satisfactory despite the many twists and turns.

“Daoist, Li Sui helped you a lot. If it weren’t for him, you wouldn’t have been able to climb onto deck.”

Li Huowang put a hand on his stomach and felt relieved as he reviewed everything he had just gone through.

“Huowang!” A shrill noise echoed, and Li Huowang instinctively covered his ears.

The voice belonged to Yang Na, and Li Huowang couldn't possibly mistake that voice for someone else's voice. Li Huowang felt like someone had stabbed him in the heart with a dagger upon being reminded of her extremely haggard appearance.

Li Huowang covered his ears with a determined expression and comforted himself.

It's definitely a hallucination. There were too many coincidences for it to be otherwise. Yes, it's a hallucination! I don’t need to care about what happens over there, as it's all a hallucination!

Li Huowang murmured to himself for a long time in an effort to push Yang Na’s image out of his mind. Eventually, he removed his hands from his ears, and he could no longer hear any voices or the incessant ringing.

Li Huowang finally sighed in relief.

The auditory hallucination just now had to be a side effect of the hallucination. Li Huowang knew that he had to be more careful against an unfamiliar evil spirit in the future, as he wouldn't know for sure if Black Taisui's ability would work on them.

“Hehe... Looking at you like this, I think it's better if you just die,” Hong Zhong mocked.

Li Huowang ignored Hong Zhong and took out the Fiery Scripture to treat himself.

No matter how painful the suffering I'll go through, there's going to be an end to it. I can get rid of this life that’s worse than death! I just have to find Bei Feng and force his method out of him!

“Three coins.”

“Empty bottle.”

“Half a coin, I win," said Li Huowang, revealing his leaf cards to the players.

The other three players threw their cards in frustration.

“How come you've won again? Are you using some kind of supernatural power to change your cards?”

"If I were to use a spiritual power, I'd use it to rob you guys. Why would I bother going through such a hassle by playing? Anyway, stop the nonsense and pay up.”

The other players could only hurl dark silver pieces and some old as well as new bronze coins toward Li Huowang.

Li Huowang piled them up into a tiny hill on his side of the table and was about to shuffle the cards when stomping noises echoed from above.

“The ship is about to dock! We’ve reached Xing Island!” the captain shouted.

Everyone stopped whatever they were doing and made their way toward the cabin ladders.

Li Huowang soon found himself outside the ship, and he sighed in relief as he looked around Xing Island's harbor district.

He was finally here.

Li Huowang suddenly felt a little lost about what he ought to do next. According to the ship’s captain, Xing Island was like half the Jiang Nan region in size. It was such a vast island, so how was he supposed to find Zhuge Yuan?

Li Huowang pondered for a while before taking out a ginger-yellow paper from his pocket. He needed a talisman to divine, which would help him find Zhuge Yuan.

Unfortunately, he needed bone relics to perform a divination, and he didn't expect that he would have to perform a divination, so he didn't have any bone relics with him.

It took Li Huowang half a day to find an alternative for the bone relics.

Li Huowang cut open his healing severed arm. Then, he gnashed his teeth and sunk his hand into the flesh and blood. Once he found the bone inside, he grabbed it tightly and yanked it out.

Li Huowang felt empty and sore at the same time as he pulled out the bone holding together his flesh as if he were pulling out a radish from the ground.

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