Chapter 531
Chapter 531
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>Translator: Ryuma
>Chapter: 531
>Chapter Title: Dwelling
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Chapter 531: Dwelling
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> In the desolate cold palace, Li Huowang looked at the monk hallucination before him with a hint of dissatisfaction.
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> Li Huowang wasn’t heartless, but at a time like this, he clearly had no bandwidth to deal with some mysterious pregnant old eunuch of unknown origins.
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> This was Great Qi, not Great Liang, after all—who knew if this guy was a trap?
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> His top priority right now was to hurry back and inform the Celestial Surveillance Division about Prince Ren’s collusion with the Dharma Folk.
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> “Let’s go!” Li Huowang said as he turned to leave, but after just a few steps, a bloodcurdling scream erupted from behind him.
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> The eunuch was clutching a sharp knife in one hand, thrusting it viciously into his swollen belly. Amniotic fluid mixed with blood into a pus-like liquid, gushing out from the gash.
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> Seeing that Li Huowang wouldn’t help, it looked like he intended to deliver the baby himself.
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> At the sight of this gruesome scene, the monk could no longer sit still. He scratched at his ears and cheeks before scrambling back in front of Li Huowang. “Daoist, save him! As the saying goes, saving one life is better than building seven pagodas. Even if you won’t save him, the baby in his belly is innocent, right?”
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> “It’s fortune from several lifetimes to be reborn as a human—this is a life we’re talking about!”
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> Li Huowang let out a soft sigh as he looked at the monk before him, pressing one hand hard against his temple. “Fine! You’re the kind one, the living bodhisattva. If you want to save him, go save him yourself.”
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> The monk didn’t react at first, unsure what was happening, but he soon noticed something different about his body.
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> “I’m real? I’m real?!” The monk slapped his bald head in delight, hopping and jumping like a child.
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> “Aren’t you going to save him? Hurry up—I can’t hold this for long.”
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> “Oh, right, right!!” The monk snapped back to attention and rushed toward the eunuch.
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> But faced with this bloody scene, the monk seemed at a loss, clearly no more experienced in midwifery than anyone else.
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> Seeing help arrive, the eunuch—who already seemed on his last breath—couldn’t care less where this person had come from. Propping himself up through the sweat pouring down his face,
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> he parted his chapped, cracked lips and trembled at the monk: “Great Master! Don’t save the mother—save the child! Save the child no matter what!! It doesn’t matter if this servant dies—as long as the Wang family has an heir, even in death! When this servant goes to the underworld, I won’t have let down the ancestors!”
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> “Oh, oh, oh!” The monk nodded repeatedly, dropping to his knees. He gripped the knife in the eunuch’s belly and yanked downward with grim determination.
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> “Aaahhh!!” Accompanying the eunuch’s agonized howls, blood and amniotic fluid sprayed from the gash, splattering the monk’s body and face.
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> “Thank you, Great Master... May you... may you attain Buddhahood soon...” With his final ounce of strength, the eunuch shouted those last words. His neck went limp, life extinguished, a satisfied smile appearing on his sweat-drenched face.
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> With the eunuch dead, the filth-covered monk was still rummaging around inside. Li Huowang couldn’t stand watching any longer and walked over.
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> To the monk, the scene before him was like a blood-filled treasure basin. His hands swam through it, fishing desperately.
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> Suddenly, he felt something like a baby’s ankle. His face lit up as he yanked hard—but out came only half a length of the old eunuch’s intestines.
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> Li Huowang walked over with a hint of impatience, reached straight in, and his keen senses quickly latched onto the only thing still moving in the “treasure basin.”
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> With a flex of his arm, there was a “pop”—like yanking a radish from the mud—and he pulled the thing right out.
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> When he saw what Li Huowang held, the monk’s eyes bulged as he stumbled back several steps in terror. “What the hell is that?!”
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> Li Huowang was holding an infant upside down by the foot—or rather, a creature, because its body was that of an ox or sheep, covered in sodden short fur, its limbs ending not in fingers but in solid hooves.
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> If the eunuch had simply birthed an ox, the monk wouldn’t have been so horrified. The truly chilling part was that while its body was bovine, its head was unmistakably human.
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> Instead of the male heir to carry on his line, this eunuch had birthed a grotesque human-faced ox monster!
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> “What kind of messed-up crap is this?!” Li Huowang flung the human-faced ox monster against the wall in disgust.
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> “Splat!” The human-faced sheep smashed into the wall and fell to the floor—yet it didn’t die. Instead, it propped itself up on its hooves and spat out mouthfuls of amniotic fluid.
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> Now Li Huowang could finally see its face clearly. The human-faced sheep bore a face identical to the eunuch who birthed it: the same bald pate, the same wrinkled skin, the same ugliness.
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> As Li Huowang frowned and gripped his sword hilt, drawing the Violet-Tasseled Sword from its sheath to slay this evil, the human-faced ox opened its malformed maw and burst into laughter. The face was that of an old man, but the voice was an infantile babble—the combination utterly bizarre.
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> “Hahahaha!! The moon shall rise, the sun shall soak, well water overflows to the flowing golden gate. Morning seeks ascent, evening seeks union, coiled dragon answers serpent—hard to survive. Slay the oxen sheep, drink the wine, great and small all rejoice in life! Eat his mother! Wear her mother! All have a joyous romp! Hahaha!”
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> After chanting these cryptic words, the human-faced ox went limp, collapsing dead to the floor, its eyes rolled back.
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> Li Huowang couldn’t make sense of what had just happened. Why was everything in Great Qi so bizarre? “And what the hell was that nonsense it was chanting? Cursing me or something?”
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> Frowning, he sheathed his sword again and spoke to the monk hallucination beside him, who had returned to being illusory: “What did I tell you? You wouldn’t listen, had to try it yourself. How’d that good deed work out for you?”
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> With that, Li Huowang didn’t wait for the guilt-stricken monk to respond and prepared to leave the Great Qi cold palace with Li Sui.
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> “Brother Li!” Zhuge Yuan’s words halted him.
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> When Li Huowang turned to look, he was shocked to see extreme tension on Zhuge Yuan’s face—even regret mingled with it.
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> “Brother Zhuge, what’s wrong?” Li Huowang asked. Zhuge Yuan’s demeanor seemed off.
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> “I need you to do me a favor—deliver a message to some friends of mine in Great Qi!”
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> “Of course, but Brother Zhuge, can you tell me what’s going on?”
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> Li Huowang didn’t buy that Zhuge Yuan had simply returned to Great Qi and grown nostalgic, seeking to catch up with old friends. That wasn’t his style.
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> Moreover, he had never seen Zhuge Yuan lose his composure—not even when he had single-handedly held off the Doumu, facing soul-death with calm serenity.
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> (End of chapter)