Chapter 424
Chapter 424
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>Translator: Ryuma
>Chapter: 424
>Chapter Title: Return to the Capital
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Li Sui gripped her own eye and poked out from her dad’s belly button, peeking stealthily outside. She had just heard someone chanting something and thought a visitor had arrived, but there was nothing there.
“Dad, why do I hear voices but see no one? Where’s that person?” Li Sui’s question received no reply, and she grew anxious. “Dad, are you mad at me?”
Li Sui felt this wasn’t her fault. She truly hadn’t expected there to be two dads—one headless and one headed.
She hadn’t heard the headed dad’s order, so it was understandable for her to emerge from the headless dad’s body and head to the headed one.
But at this moment, Li Huowang had no time to deal with Li Sui. He stared suspiciously toward the capital. He was absolutely certain that the bizarre chanting had come from that direction.
At first, he thought it was another hallucination of his own, but after seeing some common folk clutching their heads and writhing in agony on the ground, Li Huowang realized this was no small matter.
He was so far from the capital, yet he could feel it. One could only imagine the scale of this event.
“Something huge must have happened in the capital. I can’t wait any longer—I need to hurry back. Has the Bureau of Celestial Surveillance begun their encirclement of the Path of Sitting and Forgetting?”
Li Huowang turned back and rushed onward, but even after traveling until late into the night, he still hadn’t reached the capital. There was no helping it—when he’d come, he’d been empty-handed, but now he was hauling a heavy corpse on his back.
Though the head was gone, Li Huowang hadn’t forgotten that he was a pureheart. Once he found a way to refine purehearts, this corpse of his would surely prove very useful.
He drained it of blood and rubbed coarse salt all over, inside and out—a simple preservation method.
He glanced at the winter sky, let out a panting breath, wiped the sweat from his face, set the corpse down from his back, and turned to head into the woods to gather firewood.
It hadn’t been long since the new year, and the weather was still bitterly cold. He couldn’t sleep through the night without a campfire, or he’d risk falling ill from the chill.
As Li Huowang hacked at branches with his Violet Tassel Sword, flecks of white began to drift slowly down from the sky. It was snowing—this was the first snow Li Huowang had seen since arriving in this world.
He tilted his head up to gaze at the white-furred moon flickering in and out of view amid the clouds, huffed out a plume of white breath, and chopped even faster.
He needed to gather more. It would surely get even colder tonight.
“Click clack, click clack.” Sparks flew as he struck the fire starter repeatedly, but though they landed on the twigs, they wouldn’t catch.
Li Huowang tried for a bit longer before suddenly recalling something. He pulled an old almanac from his robes.
After a few more “click clacks,” he tossed the ignited almanac into the pile of wood, and a campfire sprang to life.
As the orange-red glow illuminated Li Huowang’s face and hands, he immediately felt much more comfortable.
Li Huowang scooted his body closer to the campfire. Then, leaning back-to-back against his headless corpse, he slowly closed his eyes.
“Hey, Daoist, mind if I talk to you about something?”
The hallucinated monk suddenly sidled up.
“I’m tired. I’ve got a ton of things to handle tomorrow once I reach the capital. Whatever it is, we can talk later.”
“No, it’s about that faceless kid called Hongzhong—you remember him, right? I heard him say you can turn the fake into the real? Is that true?”
Li Huowang slowly opened his eyes and looked at the bald head nearly pressed against his face.
The monk rubbed his hands together, his expression full of anticipation.
“So... does that mean it’s possible that... maybe... someday you could turn us into real beings too?”
“What?”
Li Huowang’s drowsiness vanished in an instant. He shot upright and scanned the hallucinations around him—Peng Longteng, Hongzhong, Jinshan Zhao, the monk.
His eyes narrowed as he fixed on the skinless face of Hongzhong.
“You put the monk up to probing me. What’s your angle?”
“Heh heh, no angle. Just curious, you know? Imagine if you killed me, then turned me real. Wouldn’t that be something?”
Hongzhong’s expression was one of delight.
“Heh. Keep dreaming. You can have anything you want in your dreams.”
“Hey now, that’s cold of you. We’ve been through thick and thin together as one big family. If we end up with real bodies, we could help you out if you ever run into trouble down the line.”
“Don’t worry—even if I became real, I wouldn’t hurt you. I’ve gotta say, I find you fascinating. Especially that bit where you impersonated Hongzhong to stir up trouble. That was pure Path of Sitting and Forgetting style!”
Li Huowang simply ignored him and closed his eyes to sleep.
In that hazy state between hot and cold, Li Huowang didn’t know when he finally drifted off. When he opened his eyes again, he found himself buried under snow.
He drew in a breath of dry air, scooped up a handful of white snow, and crunched it in his mouth. Then, dragging his body stiff from the cold, he trudged step by step toward the capital.
The capital had eyes everywhere. Dragging a corpse inside would surely get him spotted by the Bureau of Celestial Surveillance—he wouldn’t be able to explain it away.
Li Huowang simply dug a pit and buried his headless corpse on a hillside. Fortunately, with the cold weather and the salt rub, it wouldn’t rot.
He eyed the somewhat desolate city gate, took a deep breath, and strode right in.
Li Huowang had assumed that bizarre chanting would throw the capital into chaos, but nothing of the sort had happened. It was merely a bit deserted due to the snowfall.
He was right about the eyes in the capital. Not long after he entered, he was surrounded.
Seeing Nangong before him, Li Huowang struck first, his expression extremely grim.
“Brother Nangong, the Path of Sitting and Forgetting deceived me.”
Nangong looked at Li Huowang with a complicated expression. After a long daze, he finally spoke.
“Come with me. You’d never guess what the Path of Sitting and Forgetting did using your identity.”
Under Nangong’s lead, Li Huowang returned to the Bureau of Celestial Surveillance yamen. They passed through wooden corridors, weaving continuously until they reached a room thick with a stifling atmosphere.
Inside the room, a head with features twisted into Hongzhong’s likeness sat openly on the table, with three sticks of incense burning before it.
Beside it stood a Daoist in a yellow Dao robe and a headdress from Yin-Yang Temple, wielding a copper coin sword as he performed a ritual.
“Deputy Director, Erjiu has returned.”
When the Daoist looked up, Li Huowang saw two infant heads crammed onto the left side of his neck.
“This deputy director has two nascent souls. He must be from the Rascally Cult.”
Li Huowang instinctively heightened his vigilance.
The Daoist deputy director set aside his work and sized Li Huowang up and down. He grabbed the head on the table and tossed it toward Li Huowang.
Li Huowang caught the square head and examined it closely for a moment before blurting out in utter shock.
“What?! This Hongzhong from the Path of Sitting and Forgetting is actually a pureheart!!?”
(End of chapter)