Chapter 407
Chapter 407
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>Translator: Ryuma
>Chapter: 407
>Chapter Title: Youdu
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Looking at the map that belonged to him right in front of him, Li Huowang's mind was utterly scrambled. He truly couldn't figure out just what was going on.
The people aside, that could be chalked up to the heart entanglement ability being some kind of area-wide hypnosis. But why had his own map turned into Daqi's? Why was this heart entanglement ability so bizarre? Why couldn't he understand it anymore?
Was Daqi some other parallel world? Or was there no Daqi at all, with everything being a distortion from the heart entanglement ability?
"Brother Li, it's getting late. Let's get moving, or we'll end up camping in the wild." Seeing Li Huowang frozen in place, Zhuge Yuan began to urge him on.
Li Huowang shifted his gaze away from the map and looked earnestly at the pale-faced scholar before him.
"Brother Zhuge, can you tell me the truth? What exactly is your heart entanglement? I really don't want to keep guessing."
"Can't say, can't say." The utterly composed Zhuge Yuan pointed upward once more with the folding fan in his hand.
"I'm not asking about the source. I'm asking what abnormalities happen when you're around! I really can't get used to this."
Hearing this, Zhuge Yuan replied as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.
"Around me? Around me, there are always people claiming to be from Daliang, insisting that so-called Daqi was destroyed a millennium ago. Just like Brother Li here. I naturally know they're from Daliang, but Daliang is fake. Daqi is real."
"But Daqi clearly is—" Li Huowang cut himself off. Continuing the argument would just loop back to the same pointless debate, with neither able to convince the other.
"Fine, I won't ask anymore." Li Huowang rolled up the map in his hand.
"Let's head out. I'll follow you to Daqi's capital, Youdu!"
There was still no sign of the Sitting and Forgetting Dao along the way. If not for that incident on Apricot Island, Li Huowang might have thought they'd completely abandoned their revenge on Zhuge Yuan and gone off to do something else.
With the black shop's carriage, and as the Daqi Surveillance Office members' wounds healed, their pace quickened.
Even taking the back roads, it wasn't long before they finally arrived at their destination.
The crimson sun slowly rose above the towering, thick city walls. Li Huowang, standing atop the carriage roof, slowly exhaled a puff of white vapor.
"Finally back in Shangjing. Or rather... we've arrived in Youdu."
He turned his head for a glance at the group of people in the distance, tearfully clasping hands in welcome. Standing there, Li Huowang seemed so utterly out of place.
"Daoist, it's the first of the month today. Remember to eat the Black Tai Sui, or you'll start going mad again." The hallucinated monk spoke up in reminder.
"I know." Li Huowang drew his dagger and reached into the carriage compartment, hooking out a large chunk of Black Tai Sui and stuffing it into his mouth to chew vigorously.
"Great Elder, what are you eating? Can that stuff help with your cultivation?" Right then, Xia Ri—who had been furtively watching Li Huowang's actions and could no longer contain his curiosity—walked over and asked cautiously.
Li Huowang ignored the man, leaped back onto the carriage, gave the reins a light shake, and the horse pulled the carriage forward, following Zhuge Yuan's group toward the massive city gate.
Once inside the city walls, Li Huowang carefully scrutinized his surroundings, trying to spot any changes from when he'd left before.
He discovered that this so-called Youdu was still the same as the old Daliang: wide roads bustling with people coming and going, the shops lining the streets the same as ever, just with some details altered.
"Grandpa~! Come play!" A soft, glutinous voice drifted into Li Huowang's ears.
He followed the sound and saw that the speaker was actually a youth with an effeminate face. Dressed in gossamer as good as wearing nothing, he struck seductive poses inside a bamboo cage adorned with red flowers.
"This..." As he eyed the heavily made-up men locked one by one in their cages, Li Huowang's brows furrowed deeper. He distinctly remembered this place selling women before—why were they selling men now?
"Hmph!" A cold snort issued from Old Qin's mouth. His fists clenched tight, his body trembling with rage.
Just then, two fair-skinned, plump men disembarked hand in hand from a carriage. Though they were some distance away, Li Huowang could still smell on them the exact same stench he recalled from the prime minister back then: thick perfume laced with a pungent urine reek.
The two eunuchs paid no mind to the stares of passersby. Smiling ambiguously at each other, they walked hand in hand into the courtyard called Xunwei Pavilion.
And right at that moment, a white-haired scholar-official emerged from within, flanked left and right by two identical exquisite young men who supported him as they headed toward an ox cart.
When one of the youths lay flat on the ground to serve as a stirrup for the scholar-official to step into the ox cart, they didn't depart. Instead, they poked their heads into the cart and rode off together with him.
"Outrageous! Outrageous!! This is all the work of those castrated dogs, turning the whole capital into this filthy den of vice! Dragon Yang everywhere! Utterly outrageous!"
"These degenerates even call such filth elegant! Bah! Cowards who've thrown in with the eunuchs—those sage classics must've gone straight to their dog guts!"
Freshly recovered from grave wounds, Old Qin grew so incensed that he started wheezing again. Those around him hurriedly clustered close and hustled him away from the area, lest he harm his health.
As the group gradually receded into the distance, Li Huowang remained rooted in place, as if waiting for something.
The moment Zhuge Yuan and the others walked far enough away, Li Huowang was surprised to see those posing men all transform into women.
Their features hadn't truly changed; their facial structures had simply softened considerably, turning them fully into women.
Li Huowang's brows furrowed as he reached out and grabbed an old man by the roadside, bent under a load of firewood as he entered the city to sell it.
"Is it Daqi or Daliang nowadays?"
The old man stared at Li Huowang like he was an idiot.
"This is Daliang's capital Shangjing. What do you think?"
"Heh." Li Huowang let out a low chuckle. Evidently, this shift existed only within about a hundred feet of Zhuge Yuan.
Anywhere within that range around him turned into another realm—Daqi.
As for the finer details, Li Huowang could sense the oddity, but putting it into precise words eluded him.
As for why it happened this way, or whether Daqi was real, Li Huowang didn't know yet. It was likely tied to that thing above the Three Corpses.
Fortunately, he didn't need to grasp it all. Knowing Zhuge Yuan's bizarre ability posed no harm to him was enough.
"Giddyup!" Li Huowang cracked the reins sharply across the horse's rump and hurried after the direction Zhuge Yuan had taken.
(End of chapter)