Chapter 286: Blind Man

Chapter 286 The Blind Man

In the dim, oppressive temple filled with the scent of sandalwood, Li Huowang stood before three clay statues, pondering the question in his mind. "Is the sound real or illusory?"

Just entering this village, the Zuo Wang Dao hadn't appeared yet; instead, he had confused himself.

Just as Li Huowang continued to dwell on this matter, the door was suddenly pushed open from outside. The temple caretaker, with whitening hair, held a lantern and poked half his head through the doorway, the dim candlelight illuminating everything within the temple.

Borrowing the faint light of the lantern, he scanned the interior of the village temple, paying special attention to the rafters above.

However, after shining around once, he found not a single shadow of a person.

"Strange, there's no thief, so why is the lock broken?" After the suspicious caretaker inspected again, he pulled out a hemp rope and tightly bound the tiger-head door handle.

He was just about to go inside and sleep, but after thinking it over carefully, he still felt uneasy. So he simply brought a mat from inside and lay down right at the main entrance of the village temple. "Sigh, surely there won't be thieves now."

Naturally, Li Huowang, who had been inside the temple earlier, could not be locked in by him; he had already slipped out secretly and was now standing on the roof nearby, silently watching the caretaker's every move below.

But aside from that sound just now, everything else was quite normal.

If not for what the letter said, that traces of the Zuo Wang Dao truly existed here, Li Huowang would have even thought this was just an ordinary village.

If he had passed through here while traveling before, he likely would have ignored it directly.

Recalling the sound from before again, Li Huowang's brows furrowed even tighter.

"This won't do. I can't even trust my own senses now. It seems I must let Bai Lingmiao and the others come in, let them see if there are any sounds."

Thinking thus, Li Huowang hesitated no longer, flipped off the roof, and walked towards outside the village.

The village at night was very quiet; apart from the faint barking of dogs heard from afar, there were no other sounds.

On the winding goat path, specks of fireflies danced up and down among the grass at the corners of walls. Li Huowang walked along this road, yet the further he went, the more something felt wrong.

This feeling was not the sharp sensation of being watched, but rather some indescribable sense.

Glancing with peripheral vision, there was no one behind him.

"What? Did someone discover me?" Li Huowang, walking along, suddenly leaned his back against the mud outer wall beside him and slowly moved towards the previous corner.

In his invisible state, he moved steadily, yet not at all slowly. His hand gripped the sword hilt tightly, ready at any moment to slash at anyone turning the corner.

Closer, getting closer and closer, Li Huowang's heart beat faster and faster.

At the very instant of turning, Li Huowang took a deep breath, pressed his lips together, and was just about to draw his sword when a yellowish earthen wall appeared before Li Huowang.

Looking at this wall before him, Li Huowang felt as uncomfortable as if his clenched fist had struck cotton with force.

Li Huowang tried to turn around, but was firmly restrained in place by a pair of iron-cast hands.

"How is this possible! I am clearly invisible! How did he discover me!" Before Li Huowang could think about this question, a voice came from behind. "Shh~ Don't move! Lure them for a bit longer..... lure a few more........"

As soon as this extremely low voice emerged, Li Huowang's heart jumped to his throat. He stayed put according to the other party's instructions, constantly pondering the identity of the person before him in his mind.

"Sigh, bad luck, they ran away again."

When Li Huowang felt the force holding his arms disappear, the first thing he did was turn around to look at the speaker.

Borrowing the faint light of the specks of fireflies surrounding them, Li Huowang saw a blind man.

This was an old blind man with a lean body. He wore a wrinkled black gown, and beneath his feet were a pair of worn cloth shoes. Apart from the bamboo basket on his back, the wax-yellow bamboo cane in his hand, rubbed smooth, was his last possession.

Above his whitened eyes sat a black watermelon hat, and the sparse goat beard below his mouth did not lend him a trace of ethereal grace, but instead added a touch of squalor.

Seeing him like this, Li Huowang knew why the other party had detected him so easily, because he was simply a blind man.

While Li Huowang sized him up, the man was observing Li Huowang as well, only he did not use his eyes, but his nose.

"The scent of blood is heavy. Are you someone sent from the Martial Family side? My surname is Chen alone. If friends don't mind, call me Blind Chen. I am a Ren Soldier of the Sky Monitoring Bureau." An iron token identical to the one in Li Huowang's hand appeared in his grip.

"No, a junior practitioner of the Aojing Sect, Er Jiu, status is Gui Soldier within the Bureau. I pay my respects to Senior Chen." Li Huowang also brought out his token.

Hearing Li Huowang say this, a look of understanding immediately appeared on the other's face. "Oh~ So you are one of those from the Aojing Sect. Since you've come, then you must be the reinforcements I was looking for, yes?"

Finishing speaking, he tapped the stick in his hand frequently against the ground and walked briskly towards outside the village.

"Let's go, talk while we walk. I arrived earlier than you, so I can tell you about some things first."

Watching his back, Li Huowang followed behind him with a smile on his face.

"Senior Chen, was it always you handling matters here before? Could you inform me what exactly happened to this village? And what were those 'them' you mentioned just now?"

"I don't know what they are, isn't this finding a way to confirm? I just know that these things can move inside the mud. Just now, they saw you, saw you and planned to make a move on you."

"Is that so? Then this evil spirit is somewhat tricky." Li Huowang responded calmly.

"Who says otherwise? Evil spirits that can burrow underground, heaven knows what they look like. But precisely because of these things, we get paid."

"By the way, kid, since you are reinforcements sent from within the Bureau, do you have any exceptional abilities?"

"Senior Chen jokes. How could I have any exceptional abilities? Just the usual old tricks of the Aojing Sect." While answering, Li Huowang stared unceasingly at the man's eyes.

"Hehe, saying that, who doesn't know people from your Aojing Sect are not to be trifled with? It's just that every time a ritual is performed, the required catalyst is hard to find. By the way, did you come alone?"

"Ah, I came alone. Did Senior Chen also come alone?"

"Ah, yes, I'm just like you, came alone. Hehe." After Blind Chen finished saying this, neither spoke anymore, continuing to walk towards outside the village.

When they arrived outside the village, the two began to converse again.

"So Senior Chen, you're saying there is currently no method against them?"

Sitting on a stone covered in moss, Blind Chen sighed. "Who would have thought Blind Chen would one day need to bring reinforcements? You know, I am blind. Those mud ghosts are like loaches, impossible to catch. Even if caught, one can only grab one at a time."

"Sigh, by the way, Kid Er, dealing with this situation, do you have any way to force them out?"

Speaking of this, Blind Chen's tone became very confident. "You just need to find a way to force them all out. Don't look at me being blind, if it comes to gong matching gong, drum matching drum, Blind Chen really isn't afraid of them!"

(End of Chapter)