Chapter 129
Chapter 129
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>Translator: Ryuma
>Chapter: 129
>Chapter Title: It's Not Me
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Chapter 129: It's Not Me
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> The flames kept burning, incinerating everything about Li Huowang, his appearance gradually drawing closer to that of the charred Hand Three.
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> Whether it was due to the pills he had swallowed or the flames engulfing his body, everything Li Huowang saw began to distort.
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> The bones around him, which should have been motionless, started growing like trees, twisting in bizarre and grotesque ways as they grew.
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> “Ah…… ah…… ah!!!”
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> With Li Huowang’s roar, the flames seemed to find an entrance and burrowed inside instantly, starting to scorch his internal organs from within.
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> “Friend Xuanyang, it’s time.”
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> Hand Three walked over and unfurled the Great Thousand Record from Li Huowang’s waist, laying it out before him.
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> Li Huowang, tormented by double layers of agony and wishing for death, peered through the roaring flames.
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> At this moment, what he saw was no longer rows of neatly arranged bamboo slips. Instead, the Great Thousand Record had become wriggling meat worms, their bodies etched with strange characters, lined up in orderly fashion to form a row of extremely bizarre flesh slips.
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> “This… what the hell is going on?!”
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> At this point, Li Huowang felt his mind was a complete mess, or perhaps under the intense heat of the flames, his brain had truly turned into mush.
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> From all directions, the Ao Jing followers who had shed their robes gradually closed in.
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> Dragging their broken bodies, they sat encircling Li Huowang in a ring, following some kind of pattern.
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> But in Li Huowang’s eyes, they all now appeared as bloodied, monstrous aberrations.
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> Hand Three looked at Li Huowang amid the inferno and took a slight step back.
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> “Friend, don’t forget why you came to our sect. The moment is ripe now. It’s time to open the door to the bitter sea and behold Ba Hui once more.”
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> Li Huowang turned his equally burning eyes toward him.
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> “You lied to me!? This is all your deception!?”
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> “No, this old man hasn’t deceived you. It just happens to be an opportunity, so I made slight use of it. Don’t you want to be rid of your master? As long as you summon Ba Hui, the elders have ways to deal with Danyangzi clinging to you.”
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> Li Huowang, in excruciating pain, let out a wail as he raised his charred hands and gently pressed them onto those meat worms inscribed with text.
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> In that instant, both his physical and mental torment began to transform into something else entirely, just as before.
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> An aura of utter, terrifying despair emanated from Li Huowang, making everyone present shudder. This was a power that absolutely did not belong to the mortal realm.
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> Li Huowang was all too familiar with this scene—these were the preludes to Ba Hui’s manifestation. His senses of sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch began to twist and merge. The previously cloudless sky abruptly changed color.
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> Seeing this, Hand Three grew excited, his body trembling as if in anticipation. “After all this trouble, it’s finally coming.”
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> However, things did not unfold as he expected. The anomalies started off intense but quickly subsided into calm.
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> “What’s going on?”
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> The thrilled Hand Three instinctively looked toward Li Huowang. For some reason, in that instant, he sensed something off about him.
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> At the same time, Li Huowang was slowly lifting his hands from the Great Thousand Record.
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> The pain was gone from his voice, replaced by a hint of bewilderment.
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> “You say… why should I be suffering like this? What do their deaths have to do with me? Nothing’s holding me back now. So what if I kill a few people? Who’s going to say anything about it?”
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> “This place is all about the law of the jungle. They’re weak, so they deserve to die—either by my hand or someone else’s. It’s ridiculous. What do I have to feel guilty about?”
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> “Besides, all this might just be a trick by those masochists from the Ao Jing Sect!”
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> As soon as he said this, Li Huowang felt the mountain-like pressure on him vanish into thin air.
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> Looking at Li Huowang, who seemed like a completely different person, Hand Three asked uneasily,
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> “Friend? Have you been influenced too deeply by your master? Stay true to your heart! Don’t you want to avoid being fully possessed by him?”
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> No sooner had he spoken than Hand Three saw Li Huowang in the flames clutch his head fiercely with both hands, his face contorted in agony as he began arguing with himself.
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> “They’re dead? So what! What business is it of ours? Are you some great saint? You can barely keep yourself from being a piece of shit, and you’ve got time to worry about others!”
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> “Danyangzi! Get out of my head!! I control my own values!! You won’t influence me anymore!!”
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> With his shouts, the surrounding unnatural sky and terrifying aura expanded and contracted in tandem.
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> As time passed, it ultimately shifted toward the smaller change.
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> At this critical juncture, Li Huowang once again felt everything around him shift abruptly. The extreme physical and mental pain rapidly receded, replaced by a serene peace enveloping him.
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> When he came back to his senses, he found himself in a restraint jacket, sitting in a wheelchair being pushed by his mother into the hospital courtyard to bask in the sun. The pain and torment vanished in an instant.
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> “Huff…… huff…… huff……” Li Huowang gasped for air, still shaken.
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> Tormented by all sorts of things, he finally had a moment to breathe.
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> Right now, he just wanted to do nothing and rest quietly for a while.
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> “Son? Son, are you clear-headed now?”
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> Sun Xiaoqin joyfully noticed that her son was markedly different from his previous deranged state—he was actually looking at things with his eyes.
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> Li Huowang looked at his mother, his expression extremely complex.
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> “Mom, you know what? I really don’t want to go back there. Life there is so exhausting.”
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> Sun Xiaoqin pulled him into her arms, stroking him tenderly.
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> “It’s okay, don’t be scared. Those were all hallucinations, all fake.”
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> Li Huowang closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Truth be told, he really wanted to escape right now—he didn’t want to suffer anymore.
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> Compared to the peace and warmth here with his family and Yang Na, that other side was pure hell.
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> The events that had just transpired seemed to catch up to him now, burrowing into his mind. His expression began to twist in pain.
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> “Mom… who am I, really?”
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> “You’re Li Huowang! My son!”
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> “Then what kind of person is your son?”
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> Li Huowang’s pained voice carried a trace of confusion.
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> Sun Xiaoqin stroked her son’s head.
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> “Li Huowang is a good boy. He’s sincere with people, sensible, studies hard. Do you remember that afternoon in eighth grade? On the bus that day…”
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> Listening to his mother’s words, Li Huowang recalled fragments of his past, the things he had done.
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> Having been through so much since arriving there—too much—Li Huowang had even forgotten what kind of person he was.
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> He had changed, grown much worse, not just from Danyangzi’s influence but from that world’s as well.
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> Gradually, his gaze grew resolute.
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> “Yeah… this is me. This is the real Li Huowang.”
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> “That suspicious, foolish, easily deceived person with no sense of right and wrong—that’s not me. That’s Danyangzi. That’s not me!”
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>(End of Chapter)