Chapter 25: Forest Path

Chapter 25: The Forest Path

"Clang~" The longsword struck the Heavenly Book, emitting an ear-piercing screech of friction that made the others in the room instinctively cover their ears and step back.

"Not even a scratch. Changming's sword is useless. Isn't he a sword cultivator? This blade shouldn't be an ordinary weapon." Li Huowang held the sword aloft, pondering for a few seconds before gripping the hilt with both hands, swinging it in a wide arc, and bringing it down with heavy force once more.

Gritting his teeth, he hacked away several times in succession. Finally, a change occurred, but it came not from the so-called Heavenly Book, but from the longsword in Li Huowang's hands.

With a resonant clang, the blade split in two at the point of impact, and a fine longsword was reduced to a broken relic.

Staring at the shattered blade in his hands, Li Huowang was momentarily dazed; a weapon just acquired, now lost in an instant.

Glancing left and right, he quickened his pace and snatched the sword from the dead Changren's grasp. "Fortunately, there's a spare."

With a swift shhh, the longsword slid into its sheath. Li Huowang circled the Heavenly Book, contemplating his next move.

He had originally intended to destroy this so-called Heavenly Book, but now it seemed to possess some genuine substance; it was hard to deny it might be a treasure.

Having resolved no longer to abandon himself to despair, he naturally couldn't just discard something so valuable. "No matter what, I'll keep it for now. At the very least, I can pawn it for some silver."

As for the impractical notion of achieving immortality through this object, Li Huowang cast it aside entirely. He had seen the fate of those who tried before, and he had no desire to be the next.

Li Huowang hoisted the stone tablet with effort and weighed it in his arms. It was far heavier than he had imagined, yet still within his limits to bear.

Wrapping the tablet in cloth and slinging it onto his back, he turned to the others waiting nearby and said, "Let's go. We're leaving this place."

Lamp oil was splashed into Danyangzi's foul-smelling cavern. Tongues of fire spread along the oil on the ground, igniting everything flammable in the room, including Changming, Changren, and Xuan Yuan lying on the floor.

The blaze roared fiercely. Witnessing the scene before him, Li Huowang realized that human corpses were natural kindling.

Retracing their steps, they set fire to every room along the way. The scorching flames danced and gradually merged, consuming all that could burn within the Qingfeng Temple and blackening everything that could not.

"Cough, cough~" The thick smoke began to make the others cough, and everyone quickened their pace.

After the time it takes to burn three joss sticks, everyone stood beneath the sunlight, silently watching the mouth of the Qingfeng Temple cave as it belched thick smoke.

Billowing and swirling upward, the dense smoke enveloped all the darkness and evil within the Qingfeng Temple, vanishing into the bright sky.

Looking up, Li Huowang chuckled again. With the longsword and stone tablet on his back, he turned toward the distant forest path. "Let's move on."

The others, carrying grain on their backs, followed suit. Unknowingly, Li Huowang had become their leader.

Gazing at the forest path drawing nearer in the distance, Li Huowang's spirits were no longer heavy.

"Ah, this place looks quite peculiar. I wonder what kind of people and what kind of events we'll encounter in the future. Suddenly, I feel quite expectant."

Sunlight bathed his face, and breathing in the fresh air, his mood began to shift for the better.

"Senior Brother Li, slow down. My eyes hurt."

Li Huowang turned his head and realized that Bai Lingmiao was covering her eyes against the sunlight.

He walked over, cupped her face, and examined her closely. To his surprise, he could see the blood vessels behind her eyeballs right through the center of her pupils; the pink hue was the dark red vessels illuminated by the light.

"This... must be some sort of defect, right?" Li Huowang guessed inwardly.

He was no physician and didn't understand such things, but he could guess a little, for he remembered that the elderly albinos who told fortunes and gave massages were mostly blind.

It seemed Bai Lingmiao's condition caused a defect in her eyes, making them far more fragile than those of ordinary people.

This wouldn't do. Li Huowang cut a strip of cloth from the hem of his green Daoist robe and gently blindfolded Bai Lingmiao. "From now on, whenever the sun is out, keep this on."

"But... then I won't be able to see."

"It's fine. I'll lead you." Li Huowang grasped Bai Lingmiao's soft right hand and led the others striding boldly into the woods.

After stumbling a few times, Bai Lingmiao broke into a light jog to keep up with Li Huowang.

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"Tap, tap, tap~" Lü Zhuangyuan, his face covered in wrinkles, struck the opera trunk hard with his long-stemmed pipe.

Knocking out the stuck black tobacco, he pulled fresh tobacco from his pouch, packed it in, and lit it with his tinderbox.

Taking a satisfying drag, he shouted toward the woods near the horse's head, "Boy, are you done yet?"

"Almost, almost!" came a young boy's reply from that direction.

"A lazy donkey shits and pisses more when grinding the mill. Taking a dump shouldn't take this long. Anyone who didn't know better would think I'm mistreating you and feeding you Guanyin clay." Lü Zhuangyuan puffed on his pipe, grumbling discontentedly about his youngest son.

His gaze shifted behind the cart, looking at his entire opera troupe on the forest path. Besides a horse-drawn cart carrying the opera costumes and instrument trunks,

there was his eldest son's family of three, and two distant nephews brought from the village. Small as the troupe was, it was the livelihood he had painstakingly amassed over the years.

It was relying on this small opera troupe that, in these hard times, he could keep his whole family fed.

"Father, have some water and a steamed bun." Lü Juren handed food and a water gourd to his father.

"Eat what? It's not mealtime! Do you think grain is picked up for free? Do you know the price of grain now? Your daughter is two years old, and you still act like a child! How can you be so senseless!"

Scolded fiercely, Lü Juren wasn't angry. He gave a simple, honest smile, stepped back, and handed the items to his wife to put away.

"How did it go? Scolded again, huh? You're just a wretch, begging for a scolding." Luo Juanhua put the food back on the cart and playfully poked her precious daughter sitting on the trunk.

"A scolding won't make me lose a chunk of flesh. Let him scold. Ever since Mother died, Father's temper has been like this."

"Hey, husband, what I told you last night, did you actually talk to Father about it?"

"Let's wait a while. We haven't found a good venue lately, and Father is short on cash." Speaking of this, Lü Juren's face turned bitter.

"Tsk! Short on cash, and you can't even afford cloth for your granddaughter's clothes? She's wearing opera costumes right now."

"Opera costumes... actually, they could..."

"Ahhh! A ghost!!" A terrified scream interrupted the couple's conversation, instantly tensing the atmosphere of the entire troupe.

Soon after, the others saw a bare-bottomed boy crying for his parents as he burst out of the woods and threw himself into Lü Zhuangyuan's arms.

"Ghost, my foot! Where would a ghost come from in broad daylight! Put your pants on, now!"

Though scolding his youngest son, Lü Zhuangyuan still shielded Lü Xiucai behind him, gripping his pipe tightly and staring vigilantly toward the woods.

Shadows flickered within; it seemed someone was coming.

(End of Chapter)