Chapter 604
Chapter 604
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>Translator: Ryuma
>Chapter: 604
>Chapter Title: Wooden Ship
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Just past the New Year, the weather was still very cold, and the seawater was even more piercingly icy.
But this bit of cold meant nothing to the battle-hardened Li Huowang.
Under a bustling wooden dock teeming with voices, Li Huowang—his body misaligned—kept his colored phantom submerged underwater. He cautiously poked his transparent real body out of the water and gazed toward the distant target.
There sat a wooden ship. It was called a "ship" rather than a "boat" because it was enormous—far larger than the warships Li Huowang had seen on Apricot Island.
The massive bow resembled a fathead fish perched on the water's surface. Paired with its uniform wooden yellow hue throughout, it exuded the overwhelming pressure of a mountain.
"Hurry up or take it slow, I finally caught up! Hmph! Thinking of running, huh? As soon as things went south, you immediately flee Da Liang? Not that easy!"
"That debt you owe for ambushing me alongside Huangfu Tiangang hasn't been settled yet! Li Sui, let's go!"
Li Sui's tentacles extended from Li Huowang's wounds, thrashing rapidly in the seawater and propelling him swiftly toward that strange flat-bottomed giant ship.
Though Li Huowang had lost three limbs, Li Sui's skinless dog paws and legs—covered in black tentacles—had taken their place. Even his left hand, reduced to a single finger, had been replaced by tentacles.
Li Huowang was absolutely certain that since they were on his body, they were his. Thus, he could wield her limbs as freely and skillfully as his own hands and feet.
He had hesitated at first about rushing so hastily, but now it seemed fortunate that he had raced here nonstop after prying the location from Huangfu Tiangang.
Had he waited for his limbs to fully regrow, this massive ship would likely have vanished to who-knows-where by now.
Li Sui's tentacles were exceptionally adept at swimming; she was right at home in the water, like a fish.
Soon, Li Huowang's hand touched the wooden hull. Yet he did not act immediately. Instead, he waited quietly for nightfall—better for a stealthy assault.
In any case, now that he had found the ship, Li Huowang no longer feared it sailing off midway.
Time ticked by slowly. As the sun dipped westward, the sky gradually darkened.
Once the lights on the distant dock began to fade one by one, the black tentacles extending from Li Huowang's limbs used their suckers to cling to the hull, hauling him swiftly upward.
Hooking his remaining single finger over the gunwale, Li Huowang cautiously peeked his misaligned, invisible head over the edge.
The bow was vast; the forward deck alone seemed as large as a sports field. Yet amid this expansive space, not a soul stirred—save for the three man-high incense sticks burning slowly in the giant cauldron at the prow.
Three pillars of white smoke rose, merging into the darkness.
Before the cauldron lay offerings: the usual pig, cow, and sheep heads, alongside incense, yellow paper, and paper ingots.
"Dad, what are they worshiping?"
"Never mind what they're worshiping. Our target is to find Doumu's Heart Pan and kill him! Ignore everything else."
Li Huowang dragged his mutilated body toward the wooden cabin door.
He pushed his keen senses to their utmost, attuned to every movement around him. The moment he was spotted, he would charge right in.
Yet when Li Huowang carefully opened the door, to his surprise, nothing happened.
"What trick is this? Could that Heart Pan truly not detect my invisibility?" Li Huowang wondered as he pressed his back to the wall and slipped into the cabin.
The cabin was larger than Li Huowang had imagined—and far more cramped. Not only was it cluttered with debris, but both walls were covered floor-to-ceiling in densely packed wooden carvings of buildings, like a three-dimensional Riverside Scene at Qingming hung on the walls.
Tiles, pine trees, sleeves, donkeys, horses, cow dung—every detail on the carvings was rendered with startling realism.
Li Huowang, his guard at maximum alert, slowly reached back and grasped the hilt of the spine sword on his back.
But the instant his fingers touched the hilt, everything on the walls came alive. The densely packed little figures crowded to the windows, pointing at Li Huowang with curiosity as they craned their necks.
"These things can see me!" Li Huowang's body flickered, reappearing a zhang away. No time to tangle with them—he dashed forward.
"Thud!" The towering Peng Longteng crashed down beside Li Huowang, raising a fist encased in heavy armor to smash at the wall carvings.
Yet after just a few blows, Peng Longteng froze in place, his entire body transforming into wooden grain.
"What in the world are these things?!" Li Huowang gripped his spine sword tightly and slashed at the wall. A rift shot forth, swiftly sending a huge swath of the carvings to Da Qi.
But as the wooden wall split open from the rift, in the next instant, a wooden eye socket crammed with eyeballs of all sizes flashed past. The gaze sent chills racing through Li Huowang.
With the path ahead narrowing, Li Huowang thrust the purple-tasseled sword into the floor.
After swiftly drawing a circle with it, he leaped straight down.
The level below was far darker than he had anticipated—pitch black, where one couldn't even see their own fingers.
The moment Li Huowang pulled out a block of ghastly green fluorescent stone, a collapsing face frozen in laughter appeared right before him.
The sword poised to strike halted midair. Li Huowang stepped back slightly and finally took in the full form of this three-meter-tall thing.
If memory served, this was Iron Crutch Li, one of the Eight Immortals—or more precisely, a root carving of Iron Crutch Li.
It seemed this root carving hadn't been shaped to make the root more humanlike; rather, the human form had been carved to follow the root's natural contours.
The dense clusters of root nodules were all preserved, fully integrated into Iron Crutch Li's bodily form.
Iron Crutch Li had no legs; instead, twisted, knotted roots took their place, lending the figure a bloated, grotesque appearance.
Once Li Huowang confirmed that this Iron Crutch Li was truly just a carving and wouldn't move, he began to back away slowly. But after just a few steps, he suddenly sensed eyes on his back.
Whirling around, Li Huowang faced another of the Eight Immortals: Lu Dongbin. He too was a root carving, but fashioned from a worm-eaten trunk.
Lu Dongbin's overall form matched Iron Crutch Li's exactly, save that he was hollow inside, his empty cavity riddled with large and small wormholes.
Li Huowang halted, no longer retreating. He pulled out every piece of fluorescent stone he had brought from Clear Wind Temple and tossed them around.
In an instant, the other Eight Immortals—each in bizarre, grotesque poses—appeared before him all at once.