Chapter 88
Chapter 88
-----------------------------------------------------------------
>Translator: Ryuma
>Chapter: 88
>Chapter Title: Rules
>-----------------------------------------------------------------
“Don't move! Nobody move!”
As Li Huowang's voice echoed through the dim bamboo grove, everyone instantly froze in place.
They stood utterly still, heads tilted upward, staring at the row of bamboo tips overhead, terrified that they might come stabbing straight down.
“Don't move, okay.”
Li Huowang spoke as he lifted his right foot and took a step forward.
Seeing this, the others' hearts leaped into their throats. But when the bamboo overhead showed no change, they all let out a collective sigh of relief.
Li Huowang took a few more steps forward and circled the area once. The bamboo remained the same—no changes.
“Is it possible... that the bamboo in this damned place just grows weird?” Gouwa said hesitantly.
Whether it was or not, Li Huowang wasn't about to guess. He shook the bell with one hand, and the Wandering Lord, formed by lines, swiftly began patrolling around the bamboo grove.
After a while, when the Wandering Lord returned to Li Huowang and indicated no problems, Li Huowang finally relaxed a bit.
What reassured him wasn't what the Wandering Lord had signaled, but the fact that the strange sense of being watched had vanished.
Li Huowang didn't immediately put away the Wandering Lord. Instead, he advanced with it by his side.
Though the bell's ringing made their heads spin and eyes blur, it was still better than being ambushed by that so-called “Eighteenth of the Twelfth Month.”
“Stick close, everyone. Let's hurry through this grove.”
Li Huowang shook the bell as he walked deeper into the bamboo. He flicked open the clasp on his cowhide pouch with a finger, and the torture instruments inside spread out at his waist, glinting faintly under the fluorescent stone's glow.
At that moment, everyone gripped their weapons, held their breath, and followed one after another, tight as could be, terrified of falling behind and losing the group.
As time ticked by, the bamboo tips overhead grew lower and lower, until they scraped against the carriage roofs.
The harsh, shrill scraping of bamboo tips on the carriage roofs filled everyone with dread, yet the Wandering Lord still showed no enemies.
Traversing this bizarre bamboo grove, they all felt like they were crawling inside the mouth of some massive thing, with those bamboo tips as its sharp teeth.
In this environment, Li Huowang lost all track of time amid the dizziness.
Suddenly, he spotted light in the distance—the exit!
In excitement, he swung his iron-cutting longsword with all his might, felling a swath of bamboo. Dazzling sunlight poured in.
The sun in the sky made everyone squint instinctively—it was blinding. Judging by its position, it was now afternoon.
When everyone recovered and looked ahead, their eyes widened in shock. Behind this bizarre grove lay a village.
Scattered tiled-roof houses dotted the distance, no different from any village they'd passed on the road.
By a crystal-clear pond at the village entrance, young women and brides beat clothes while chatting and laughing about trifles.
“Senior Brother Li, are you sure this is the place? Did we take a wrong turn?” Xiaoman asked, brows furrowed in doubt.
Li Huowang quickly reviewed the location Abbess Jingxin had given him in his mind, pocketed the daoist bell, and strode toward the distant village.
“Stay tight, everyone. Don't drop your guard—this could just be the ‘Eighteenth of the Twelfth Month's’ illusion.”
“Would the Eighteenth of the Twelfth Month... be a village?”
Bai Lingmiao's murmur echoed Li Huowang's own thoughts. The only information he'd gotten from the abbess about the Eighteenth of the Twelfth Month was that this evil thing was red.
As Li Huowang and the others drew near, the women washing clothes naturally spotted them first. They gathered their laundry, whispering as they headed into the village.
Such a large group approaching with black-veiled conical hats clearly drew the villagers' attention. Young and strong men gathered in clusters, farm tools in hand, warily converging at the entrance.
“Out-of-towners! What brings you to Wu Family Village? Passing through or visiting kin?”
An old man with a goatee called out to Li Huowang from afar.
Li Huowang scanned every villager's face but detected no anomalies. On the surface, this seemed like any normal village.
“Would the Eighteenth of the Twelfth Month be here?” Li Huowang wondered to himself.
When the village head shouted a second time, Li Huowang led the group over, cupped his hands, and unfurled the map for them.
“Elder, if you would—does this spot on the map match your village?”
“Huh? Asking directions?”
The old man took the map and conferred quietly with those nearby.
Li Huowang watched their faces intently, scrutinizing every expression.
After a long discussion, the village head handed the map back with both hands.
“Out-of-towners, you've got the wrong place. That spot on the map is twenty or thirty li from here.”
“Wrong place? Not there yet?”
Li Huowang quickly estimated the distance from Anci Nunnery. Abbess Jingxin had said it was two hundred li away, and since he wasn’t a machine, a slight margin of error seemed only natural.
“Heh heh, my apologies for the blunder—I must've mixed up the location.”
Li Huowang graciously cupped his hands again to the group before him.
“But elder, the sun's setting soon. Could we trouble you for lodging one night? We've been traveling half a month straight—we're worn out.”
“Well...”
The village head eyed Li Huowang and the others warily.
“Elder, please do us this favor.”
The smiling Li Huowang leaned in, his long sleeve draping over one of the man's hands.
Feeling a slight weight in his palm, the village head's expression shifted as he gave it a pinch.
“Fine. Our west wing is empty—you can stay there. But remember, just one night.”
As the two carriages rolled over the moss-covered stone path into the village, Gouwa sidled up and whispered:
“Senior Brother Li, didn't they say we got the wrong place?”
Li Huowang glanced sideways at the villagers peeking from doorways.
“Maybe we didn't. Maybe this is exactly where we're looking.”
After all this time out here, the most important lesson he'd learned was that you could trust at most three-tenths of what anyone said.
Since the Eighteenth of the Twelfth Month could become anything, a whole intricate village was an ideal hiding spot.
Who knew if it ate people? If it did, the village made a perfect feeding ground.
His gaze began searching, hunting for any red in the entire village. Even after reaching the house under the gate archway, he found none.
Standing beneath the gate archway, the village head clasped his hands behind his back, eyeing these outsiders.
“Now, I'll lay this out upfront: Wu Family Village has many rules, passed down from our ancestors—can't be changed. If you want to stay, fine, but you must follow the rules. If you can't, best leave now.”
“Rules?”
(End of chapter)