Corpse Retriever

“Thud! Thud. Thud! Thud! Thud!”

Five heavy sounds fell in succession, and the ground trembled five times with them.

The first:

A giant black serpent. It had no tail. Both ends of its body were snake heads.

Its coils were piled up in the middle, each head occupying half its length. A knife was stuck through one head, and a sword through the other. The two heads swayed back and forth in alternating turns, tongues flicking, as though ready to choose someone to devour.

The second:

A green ox. Two enormous nose rings hung from its nostrils, and its body was covered in dense whip marks. Its hide was split and its flesh torn open, and from the cracks in that flesh, countless hands reached out. They varied in size, color, and age, but every one of them gripped the hand above and the hand below, joining forces in that way to forcibly hold together the ox’s body, which should have burst apart.

The third:

A monkey, crimson from head to toe. Its skin had long since been stripped away, leaving behind only writhing blood and flesh. Amid the rolling scarlet mass, chains kept thrusting out from the flesh and sinking back in again, as though they were shackles, yet also as though they were helping pin the chunks of meat in place so it would not fall apart.

The fourth:A centipede, white all over. Every one of its feelers was itself a tiny centipede. When it raised its body, the densely packed legs under its belly looked like white maggots crawling everywhere, wriggling in and out of the cracks split open across its underside.

The split was huge, as though it had once been cleaved straight through by a sharp weapon, leaving behind a wound that could never heal. Some of the feelers dropped down, only to quickly crawl back inside again, making it look as though a flowing white waterfall hung from its belly.

The fifth:

Its whole body was covered in fine yellow fuzz. It had a human torso and stood upright, but atop its shoulders sat a pig’s head. Its hands and feet were pig hooves, front and rear, and behind it curled a pig tail.

It stood there with its enormous pig mouth open, its snout twitching, letting out a chilling laugh.

Li Zhuiyuan’s gaze swept across them one by one.

All five appearing at once was something he had not expected.

But that did not stop him from following his usual habit and memorizing each of them in turn.

Their colors, their features, every detail on their bodies, all of it burned into his mind.

Now that they had stepped out from the concealment of the white fog, these five Corpse demons no longer seemed to have so many scruples.

The black serpent writhed, the green ox pawed the ground, the monkey beat its chest, the centipede lashed its body, and the pig-headed thing grinned viciously.

Together, they began moving toward the flat-roofed house, pressing forward. Their unrestrained menace stirred a jubilant response from the countless malevolent spirits hidden in the white fog behind them.

If all these years of swarming attacks had merely been for the sake of tormenting the sole surviving blood descendant passed down by the Qin and Liu Clans,

then now, their true target had become the one legitimate inheritor of the Qin and Liu Clans of the present generation.

The memorial tablets of the two families had already lost their spiritual power. Just when they thought they could revel however they pleased, the boy suddenly appeared.

The boy treated them as fish raised in a pond, using the white lantern as a hook to fish for them, as though each and every one of them were sacrificial beasts already reserved for the chopping block.

They were not angry because their dignity had been insulted.

How could creatures like them possibly have any dignity?

It was simply that, as the defeated remnants beneath generations of Dragon Kings from the Qin and Liu Clans, they were gradually realizing that this boy before them was far too young, yet his bearing was no less than that of those adult Dragon Kings of the past.

A person like this, once he grew up, once he successfully completed River walk...

What the Dragon Kings of the Qin and Liu Clans throughout the generations had wanted to finish but could not fully accomplish, he would be able to finish.

Those filthy scraps of hidden rot, clinging to life in cracks and corners, he would dig out piece by piece and clean away completely.

He could clear the past, hold the present in place, and even keep his gaze fixed on the future.

A person like this, beginning River walk at such an age... who could say for certain that even the Heavenly Dao did not fear him?

And when those filthy things thought of how they, as malevolent spirits, might one day actually “represent the Heavenly Dao,” their grins became even more gleeful and savage.

Li Zhuiyuan silently wedged the white lantern into a crack in the wall, turned, and stepped back over the threshold.

The things outside thought he was afraid, that he had shrunk back in fear, and the five Corpse demons immediately pressed in closer and closer.

The haze behind them also gradually thinned, until the outlines of one figure after another inside it could be seen clearly.

With his back to them, Li Zhuiyuan looked toward the rows of shattered memorial tablets on the offering table.

If those people were still here, it would never be so noisy outside.

Li Zhuiyuan knew Ah Li did not actually hate them, but she did not truly respect them either.

In an ordinary family, even if the blessings left behind by one’s ancestors were nothing more than an illusion, they could at least provide a little emotional comfort. When burning incense on holidays, you would not feel like everyone else had something while you had nothing.

For Ah Li, what her ancestors had left her was simply an enormous pit, and that pit was filled with filth and pollution.

Li Zhuiyuan stood there with both hands in his jacket pockets, looking at those memorial tablets.

Behind the boy was a dance of demons.

In the end, at this stage, the things behind him had won a temporary victory.

Because Li Zhuiyuan still had things he needed to do.

He closed his eyes.

When he opened them again, he was back in Ah Li’s bedroom.

The girl sat on the bed with her knees hugged to her chest, looking at the boy.

Li Zhuiyuan knew Ah Li had probably sensed this situation even before he had.

Because he was only a passerby there, while Ah Li was far more familiar with that flat-roofed house, that threshold, and the world beyond it.

And because of that, the girl was worried about him. Mixed into that worry were guilt, unease, and anxiety.

Those were emotions that would never have appeared in the old her, because she simply had not possessed them.

The old her cared about the window that let her glimpse the scenery outside. She was afraid that window would be sealed shut.

The current her cared about the boy holding that window up for her. She was afraid he would shatter because of it.

The view outside the window, no matter how beautiful, would eventually grow stale. What one could not bear to part with were the hands supporting the sill, the contact, the habit.

Her condition really was getting better.

Though she still seemed a little rough around the edges, she truly was trying to show the outside world the finer, gentler parts of herself.

Li Zhuiyuan took a crumpled two-yuan note out of his pocket.

It was one Taigong had once tucked into a letter. Whenever Taigong enclosed money in a letter, he always added a line saying: It’s easy for letters to get lost, so I’m only tucking in a little for the gesture. Even if it gets lost, it won’t hurt.

Li Zhuiyuan knew that the two remittances every month had already emptied all the big money out of Taigong’s pockets, so when he sent letters, he could only fumble around in his clothes for a few small bills. He had written it that way purely to save face.

The boy waved the crumpled banknote in front of the girl and grinned smugly.

“Ah Li, don’t worry. I’ve got plenty of money, plenty of money.”

By the standards of a farming household, Taigong was well-off, and the family lived comfortably, but it had nothing to do with wealth or luxury.

And yet Taigong truly had the confidence to say words like that,

because he could give you everything he had.

The boy placed the bill on the bed.

The girl picked it up and kept smoothing it with both hands, trying to flatten it out.

But no matter how hard she tried, the creases on it remained clear.

“Ah Li, endure it a little longer. They’ll quiet down soon enough, and this time they’ll understand silence better than before.”

Turning around, Li Zhuiyuan pulled open the floor-to-ceiling window and stepped outside.

Dreams were extensions and reflections of reality.

Arguing with them in a dream was meaningless.

Only by making them hurt in reality, making them ache in reality, would they no longer dare bare their fangs even in dreams.

When he pushed open the courtyard gate and walked out, Li Zhuiyuan paused for a moment, lifted his head to look at the sky again, then quickly lowered his gaze.

“You acted very well. The problem is, you acted too well.

You almost,

really almost,

tricked me.”

…

On the way back, the autumn wind had begun to lift the dry yellow leaves from the ground, spinning them over and over in front of the boy.

If nothing unexpected had happened, then Runsheng, Yin Meng, and Tan Wenbin had all run into something unexpected.

This time, in truth, the basic format of the test had not really changed.

The Heavenly Dao had not rushed in to rewrite the rules either.

In fact, this was not even a contest between the one setting the questions and himself.

Li Zhuiyuan thought back to his old days in the gifted class, when the old professors had been worn to exhaustion by students like him, until in the end they had no choice but to adopt another way of dealing with them.

But no matter what, one could not deny that the lofty, inscrutable Heavenly Dao above the river had given the situation a push from behind.

As he walked, Li Zhuiyuan bent down and picked up three fallen leaves.

Now there were three choices before him.

The first was to take the most radical approach and try to force that thing to come before him.

But at the same time, this was precisely the move he had refrained from making earlier, and the very move the other side wanted him to make.

The moment he truly made that choice, he would be throwing himself and every member of his team into a rhythm set by the other side.

That would be too stupid.

Li Zhuiyuan crushed the first leaf in his hand.

The second option was for him to act as a firefighter, rushing out to rescue whichever of his three companions was currently in trouble.

Tan Wenbin should be near Zhou Yunyun’s university. Runsheng should be near that hospital. Yin Meng should be near the shopping mall she frequented most often.

Though he could not contact them right now, as long as he got close to the general area and then used the Bagua Compass for Compass divination, supplemented by scent tracking, he should be able to slowly locate them. Since accidents were happening to them, the magnetic field around those sites would definitely be changing. As long as he was willing to spend the time, finding them would not be hard.

But the problem was time. The time he had left was actually fairly ample, but only in relative terms, because he only had enough time to rescue one companion.

If he went nowhere, all three companions would be in mortal danger.

If he chose one out of the three, he could probably ensure that one person’s safety.

Danger did not necessarily mean death.

He suddenly felt lucky that he had already helped Tan Wenbin make up for that weakness of his ahead of time. Otherwise, in a situation like this, where the enemy had made the first move, Tan Wenbin’s situation would have been the deadliest.

Then the situation before him would become this: Runsheng and Yin Meng would be in mortal danger, while Tan Wenbin would likely have no vital signs left at all.

Now, at least, the lives of all three companions had become a matter of probability, some chances higher and some lower, like the roll of dice.

To gamble with the lives of his companions was a cruel thing.

They were all windbreak grasses Li Zhuiyuan had carefully planted. If even one withered, it would deal a blow to his condition.

But when one stood in the position of making decisions for the team, one had to make cold judgments like this.

Still, if he looked at the same matter from another angle, it produced a different effect.

Li Zhuiyuan kept holding the two remaining leaves in his right hand, while his left hand could not help touching his own face.

So I’ve started thinking from other people’s point of view too. Is it because I’m trying to ease the guilt in my heart?

I actually... have this kind of emotion now.

Like Ah Li, his condition was also improving.

Sometimes even the person in question would overlook these quiet changes, until the moment he suddenly noticed them and was startled by himself.

Li Zhuiyuan continued forward. There was still some distance left before he reached the school dormitory. It was a road he had to walk anyway, and just right for thinking through the decision.

In the boy’s field of vision, Runsheng’s figure appeared in front of him. He always stood habitually in front of him. At his side appeared Yin Meng, who always stood off to one side.

Footsteps came from behind as well. That was Tan Wenbin, who always protected his back.

Tan Wenbin had always thought he was the weakest among them, so he never fought for the front or the flank. He stayed in the rear, figuring that at the very least he could serve as a human shield if a sneak attack came from behind against Brother Yuanhou.

Li Zhuiyuan asked, “If it’s one out of three, who do I save?”

No one answered.

“Everyone” simply kept walking with Li Zhuiyuan.

The boy passed one leaf into his left hand. He did not rush to decide. Instead, he lifted the last leaf in his right hand and gave it a little shake.

“The third choice is this: I don’t go save any of you. I don’t care about any of you. You try to survive on your own.

I go straight to the end point and wait for it there. I overturn the rules of this game it set up from the root.

That way, we still might not win, but at least the chance of winning will be in our own hands.

And it...

might lose very badly.”

Runsheng: “Pick the third one!”

Yin Meng: “Pick the third one!”

Zhuangzhuang: “Pick the third one!”

These figures, these voices, all came from Li Zhuiyuan’s imagination.

But they were also simulations based on his judgment of these three companions’ personalities.

If he chose one out of three, he could only ensure one person’s safety. The other two would still be in mortal danger.

At that point, both the rescuer and the one rescued would feel awful when facing the possibility that the other two companions had died.

So it would be better

to save none of them at all

and go flip that thing’s table directly!

No matter who ended up dying in the end, as long as that thing could be dragged down to be buried with them, then when the funeral was held, at least it would count as a happy funeral.

Li Zhuiyuan crushed the leaf in his left hand, leaving only the third one.

This was River walk.

Li Zhuiyuan entered the bargain shop again. Lu Yi still shook his head at him, indicating that no one had returned the call yet.

“Brother Lu Yi, help me page them all again: Zhengyang Street crossroads, Pingju Photo Studio, gather for a photo.”

Lu Yi immediately nodded and picked up the phone to start paging them again.

For some reason, this was clearly a very ordinary matter. It was only taking a photo. What was the big deal?

And yet cold sweat began to bead on his forehead, and his palms grew damp. In the autumn weather, this big Northeastern man actually started shivering.

Even when he spoke to the switchboard operator, he stumbled over his words. The woman on the other end had to confirm several times before the location was finally made clear.

By the time all the calls had been made, the prodigy brother was already gone.

Lu Yi put down the phone. Someone came to the counter to pay and called out several times, but he did not respond.

At last, he stood up and motioned for the student working part-time there to handle the checkout counter. Then he hurried off toward the dormitory.

He did not know what was happening, but he had an inexplicable premonition that something was indeed happening.

He did not know what he could do. All he could do was run back to the dorm room, close the door, take out the red sausage his family had mailed him, slice it up, and set out cigarettes beside it.

Using a storage bin as a makeshift little offering table, Lu Yi pressed his palms together and kept swaying as he prayed.

“Ghost from back home, help out. Please protect them. Let everything stay safe.”

...

While Lu Yi was making the calls, Li Zhuiyuan arrived at the dormitory. He did not go upstairs. Instead, he stood below and shouted toward a corner window on the third floor,

“Lin Shuyou!”

Lin Shuyou, who had previously been told to stay in the dorm and not leave, immediately stuck his head out through the window.

Li Zhuiyuan tilted his head slightly to one side.

Lin Shuyou withdrew from the window.

Then,

with a hiking backpack on his back, Lin Shuyou jumped straight out of the window.

It was class time, so there was hardly anyone moving through the dorm courtyard. A few passersby in the distance saw it and thought their eyes were playing tricks on them.

Li Zhuiyuan walked in front, Lin Shuyou beside him.

Though he had no idea what they were going to do, Lin Shuyou thoroughly enjoyed this feeling of being personally chosen.

And he was also gradually beginning to understand the pattern. Every time he helped Brother Yuanhou with something, he always got something in return.

At first, he had only been a temp.

Then he had moved up to day wages.

And now he had finally risen to the level of unofficial staff.

His next goal was to advance toward a real permanent post.

They left the school gate and hailed a taxi.

Back at the Zhengyang Street crossroads, when they got out, Lin Shuyou took the initiative to pay the fare and even flicked his hand with a flourish, pretending he was terribly busy.

“No need for change.”

But when he got out of the car, he discovered that Brother Yuanhou, who had been sitting in the back seat, only got out after taking the change from the driver.

Li Zhuiyuan handed the change to Lin Shuyou, who accepted it awkwardly.

“Don’t spread meaningless karma for no reason.”

“Understood! Got it!”

The door of Pingju Photo Studio was shut, and a wooden sign hung from the pull ring: Temporarily Closed.

Li Zhuiyuan lowered his head to glance at the bricks on the ground and the glass display window, then stepped back a few paces and pointed at the second-floor window in the alley next door.

“Go up there and open the door.”

Lin Shuyou shot forward in a dash. When he leaped up, he suddenly realized he had not jumped high enough. But he did not want to embarrass himself in front of Brother Yuanhou, so he quickly planted a foot against each side wall of the alley and used them to kick upward, finally catching hold of the window.

The window was locked, but the lock had long since rusted through, and with a little push it opened. Inside was a blue photography backdrop.

As he tried to squeeze his body through, he got stuck for a moment. Only then did Lin Shuyou realize that when he jumped, he had forgotten to take off the hiking backpack first. No wonder it had felt so heavy.

Before long, Lin Shuyou came downstairs from the second floor and opened the door for Li Zhuiyuan from the inside.

Li Zhuiyuan flipped the wooden sign over. Temporarily Closed became Open for Business.

Then he pulled open all the curtains in the shop, found a rag, and began wiping down the counter and the glass display case.

Lin Shuyou moved in and out of the different rooms. After checking everything, he reported, “Brother Yuanhou, there’s nobody in the shop.”

“Mm.”

Lin Shuyou scratched his head. So Brother Yuanhou had already known the place was empty. He stepped forward, intending to grab a rag too and help clean.

But the shop had already been kept spotless, nearly without a speck of dust. Li Zhuiyuan was only cleaning for the sake of appearances. If another pair of brisk hands joined in, it would turn into a comedy sketch.

“You don’t need to clean.”

“It’s fine. Leave it all to me, Brother Yuanhou.”

Li Zhuiyuan stopped what he was doing, looked out the window toward the street across from them, and tugged at Lin Shuyou’s sleeve.

Lin Shuyou immediately crouched down a little and leaned his head over. Following Brother Yuanhou’s gaze, he carefully studied the opposite side of the street and lowered his voice.

“Brother Yuanhou, where is the abnormality?”

“See that Liu’s Fried Skewers shop across the street?”

“I see it.” Lin Shuyou silently tightened his grip on the rag in his hand. So that shop had a problem. Entering the photo studio was for the sake of watching that fried skewer shop more conveniently?

“Do you see the old pastry shop next to it?”

“I see it!” So both shops had problems.

“Go to that fried skewer shop first and buy a lot of skewers. Chicken skewers, sausages, fried tofu, chicken racks, buy more of everything. Then go next door to the pastry shop and buy egg cakes, crisp biscuits, peach pastries, all of that, lots of it.

When you’re done, sit at the entrance of this shop and eat slowly. No matter who comes into the shop, do not stop them.”

Lin Shuyou blinked. This assignment was so strange. Had he failed to grasp Brother Yuanhou’s deeper meaning?

Li Zhuiyuan patted him on the shoulder.

“Go on.”

“Okay, Brother Yuanhou.”

Though he did not understand the purpose, Lin Shuyou still did as told.

He ran to the fried skewer shop and the pastry shop, bought two large bags of food, then came back, sat on the curb outside Pingju Photo Studio, and started eating.

The fried skewers were delicious, and the pastries tasted good too.

Traffic on the road was light, the dust was not bad, and with the afternoon sun shining on him, it felt pretty comfortable.

At first, Lin Shuyou ate with some confusion, but the more he ate, the more immersed he became.

Martial artists naturally had much bigger appetites than ordinary people. Even if he was not especially hungry, if he really set his mind to it, he could keep stuffing himself.

Back when they had stayed at Li Sanjiang’s house during the holiday, there had been no leftovers the first day. The reason was that the food portions had been prepared according to Runsheng’s and Tan Wenbin’s appetites, which should have been more than enough. Who knew that the newly arrived mule could eat like a thief too, leaving everyone still wanting more.

That was also why, on the day before they left, Li Sanjiang had specifically taken everyone out to catch crabs, fish, and chickens in the village, then came back and cooked a huge feast. It would not do for someone’s child to come visit for the first time and leave without even getting one full meal at the house.

After wiping down the counter and display case, Li Zhuiyuan looked at the broom and mop in the corner, then at the spotless tile floor shining with reflected light.

Forget it. No more acting.

Li Zhuiyuan sat down behind the counter and leaned back. This position and angle were probably the posture that boss Deng Chen usually kept most often.

Not only did it face the sunlight and the street, but in the display case on that side were all children’s portraits. Looking at all those lively, cheerful, adorable children ought to put a person in a good mood.

There was also a candy box beside him. He opened it, picked out a piece, unwrapped it, and put it in his mouth.

Li Zhuiyuan put on a show of liking sweets very much, slowly savoring it, while also letting a relaxed, lazy expression appear on his face.

Boss Deng Chen was not in the shop.

Because Li Zhuiyuan had come before, and he was afraid.

But Li Zhuiyuan believed that even if Deng Chen was not here, his eyeballs would still be fixed on his old lair.

Maybe hidden among the foot traffic on the street, maybe in a room in one of the buildings opposite, maybe even beneath a manhole cover in some sewer below. Wherever he was, he had to be watching this place.

Li Zhuiyuan lightly tapped the glass countertop with his fingertip, and his eyes gradually closed.

He really did not like those cute, innocent photos of children, because he had spent too much time in the past observing and imitating them.

To others, they were childlike and adorable. To him, they looked more like old model lesson plans for acting.

As for the candy in his mouth, it turned out to be filled. The outside was not too sweet, but once it melted to the center it was practically syrup. He endured without frowning.

Come on.

Be good.

Come out.

“Burp...”

Lin Shuyou let out a belch. No matter how much of a martial arts expert he was, once he wolfed down too much greasy, sugary food all at once, it became cloying.

Just then, someone across the street started walking this way.

Lin Shuyou felt his eyes twitch, as though his vertical pupils were about to appear.

But when he remembered Brother Yuanhou’s instruction not to stop anyone, he could only hug his head and bury it deep down.

That person also seemed to be startled by Lin Shuyou’s posture. His steps faltered, and instead of coming forward, he even took a step back.

Lin Shuyou thought, Go on, go on over there, hurry up!

After hesitating, the man seemed to make up his mind. He quickly circled around Lin Shuyou and came to the entrance of the photo studio.

He swallowed nervously and stretched out his hand to push open the shop door.

Li Zhuiyuan let out a breath in his heart.

He had staged himself here as calm and leisurely, and had Lin Shuyou sit outside enjoying food, all in the hope that the other side would come back.

He opened his eyes,

stood up,

and braced one hand on the counter as he looked at Deng Chen, the owner of this place, entering through the door.

“Welcome.”

...

At the hospital.

“Doctor, how is Sun Hua doing?”

The doctor was holding the scans, his brow furrowed.

“Not optimistic. There’s a blood clot in his brain. If it isn’t handled in time, it may...”

“Can surgery be done?”

“The main problem is that the clot’s location is a bit tricky. Wait a moment. Let us study it a bit more.”

“Okay. Thank you, doctor.”

Runsheng walked out of the doctor’s office.

In his heart, he was worried about his fellow townsman Sun Hua, but he also had another suspicion.

Could this be the karmic clue Little Yuan had written about in Chronicle of the Orthodox Demon-Suppressing Arts?

During the incident in Min’an Town last time, Tan Wenbin and Yin Meng had each followed a separate lead, while he had followed Little Yuan.

Though he was the strongest among the three in terms of raw power, he was taciturn and poor at dealing with people, so even now he still felt somewhat uncertain.

Fortunately, he had memorized everything in the manual, so next he should...

Runsheng pushed open the doctor’s office door again. Under the gaze of the doctors inside, he carefully looked over the nameplates on each doctor’s desk or chest and memorized their names.

Then he left the office once more and headed toward the ward.

The moment he pushed open the ward door, gray mist spilled out from inside. Runsheng waved his arm to drive it away, but the fog kept pouring out endlessly.

There’s a problem?

No, the clue has come.

He excelled at crude, direct fighting. He had little way to deal with this sort of twisting, winding business.

But fortunately, Little Yuan had equipped him well.

Runsheng took out the yellow talismans from his pocket, selected one CaCalming Talisman, and pasted it onto his forehead.

The gray mist before him immediately dispersed quite a bit, and he was finally able to see clearly what was inside.

Sun Hua had been lifted up from the hospital bed, and behind him stood a doctor in a white coat. Red light flowed through the doctor’s eyes as he gnawed at the back of Sun Hua’s head.

Their gazes met through the thinning mist.

Runsheng clenched his fists at once, his momentum rising.

The doctor quickly shoved Sun Hua down, jumped off the bed, and lunged straight at Runsheng.

His speed was unbelievable. In the blink of an eye he was in front of Runsheng, arms raised and swinging down.

Runsheng could only block first with both forearms.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

A series of rapid, violent impacts rang out. Even Runsheng was startled by the force.

But the qi gates in his body immediately activated. Seizing the opening while the doctor shifted force, he threw a punch.

Smack!

The doctor was extremely fast. He retreated in time, climbed straight up to the ceiling of the ward, and hung there upside down, staring at Runsheng.

“You...”

Before Runsheng could finish, the doctor was already running hand and foot along the ceiling toward the window.

Runsheng saw through his intention and got to the window ahead of him.

The doctor pounced at Runsheng, bringing tremendous force with him.

Crash!

The window shattered, and the two of them tumbled out together.

But neither fell. Each had one arm hooked over the windowsill.

Seeing this, the doctor quickly climbed upward along the wall, and Runsheng followed at once.

One after the other, they arrived on the rooftop.

The instant they landed, without a single word exchanged, their clash of fists and feet began again.

But as one qi gate after another opened within Runsheng, his force grew stronger and stronger. No matter how vicious the doctor’s moves were, no matter how ruthless that style was, something like Tongbei Fist, he was gradually suppressed by Runsheng’s strong, continuous force.

And the reason Runsheng was increasing his force step by step was also because he was afraid the other side would suddenly turn and run again. Along with the rising force came a pull on the doctor’s surrounding aura.

Runsheng’s clothes swelled and flattened again and again. The currents generated by that movement bound the doctor’s limbs. If the doctor wanted to disengage and flee now, he would have to expose his back to Runsheng and take a punch.

That was a burden he could not bear.

Yet under this kind of dragging, soft-knife way of carving away at him, he was steadily being forced into decline.

That was the brilliance of The Qin Family’s Guide to Viewing Flood Dragons. Though one stood alone, the force it created went on without cease, wearing you down forever.

At last, after one of his punches was knocked aside, the doctor was unable to organize another wave of defense, and Runsheng’s fist struck him in the chest.

Bang!

The doctor’s body flew backward. Runsheng’s qi gates opened, and the surrounding air currents rushed toward him. Even the doctor who had been blasted away was forcibly reeled back in.

Runsheng slammed another punch down. The doctor barely managed a block, but the next punch he could no longer raise a defense against. He tried with all his might to dodge, yet was still struck in the shoulder by Runsheng.

Crack!

The doctor’s body twisted, and both knees smashed into the ground, splitting a large patch of concrete.

The skin at the shoulder that had taken the blow split open, exposing fresh red flesh inside. The flesh was still writhing, and strands of bloody light spilled from it and drifted into the air.

Runsheng reached out, seized the doctor by the throat, and drew back his other fist. The qi gates howled as power gathered.

“I’ll teach you to harm people!”

The doctor, held up by the throat, spoke.

“I wasn’t... not harming anyone...”

Runsheng’s fist stopped.

“I saw it with my own eyes.”

“I was... sucking out... the blood clot... in his brain...”

Runsheng frowned. Under normal circumstances, he would never believe a malevolent spirit’s excuses at the brink of death, but he had indeed just come from the doctor’s office and knew about Sun Hua’s blood clot.

“You’re telling the truth?”

“The truth... I was... saving him... not harming him...”

“Then why did you attack me first?”

“I thought... you were here to catch me... righteous... righteous people... I... I was scared... so... so I...”

In the end, Runsheng’s fist did not fall.

“I need to check Sun Hua’s condition before I can confirm whether what you said is true.”

Confusion appeared in the doctor’s eyes.

His explanation just now had only been because he did not want to be wrongly accused before being killed. He truly had not expected the other side to actually stop.

“If it’s proved... I was saving him... then you won’t kill me?”

“If you were saving someone, why would I kill you?”

“Because... I’m evil...”

“But.”

Doctor: Heh. As expected. There’s still a but.

“But you need to apologize and make amends for attacking me first.”

The doctor stared at him in astonishment and asked in return, “Are you... one of the righteous?”

“I am,” Runsheng said with complete certainty. “We devote ourselves wholeheartedly to the righteous path.”

If it turned out to be a misunderstanding, then there was no need to fight to the death.

When it came to so-called malevolent spirits, their team’s standards had always been somewhat flexible.

The lofty Yin gods who were supposed to represent flawless justice had begun to flatter and fawn.

Little Oriole, a Dead Sinker, had become a helper in Li the Corpse Retriever’s household.

When Little Yuan had told them about it, even they themselves had found it rather strange. As for shock, not really. Runsheng knew very well the relationship between Little Yuan and Little Oriole.

He had even seen Little Yuan call Little Oriole up out of the pond and invite her to the family courtyard, just so she could chat with Ah Li.

And the one beneath the peach grove, everyone had practically come to regard it as the local earth god protecting Shinan and Shigang and the nearby towns.

“I need to go downstairs and check, but you...”

Runsheng looked at the doctor. He could not release him right now. What if the other side was lying?

Runsheng began thinking: if Little Yuan were here, what would he do?

Little Yuan would probably beat him half to death or cripple him, strip him of any ability to resist, seal him up, and only then go examine Sun Hua’s actual condition. If the other side really had been telling the truth, then Little Yuan would remove the seal, treat his injuries, and help restore him.

But Runsheng did not know how to seal, and besides, he had trouble controlling his own strength when he struck.

As if sensing Runsheng’s thoughts, the doctor’s body, which had been taut all this time, suddenly relaxed completely. Like a ribbonfish, he went limp in Runsheng’s grasp.

A smile appeared on Runsheng’s face. As a martial artist, he knew exactly what this meant. If the other side wanted to attack again, he would first have to gather his strength and tense his muscles. That would give Runsheng plenty of time to react and snap his neck first.

“Good.”

Runsheng was very satisfied and prepared to take him downstairs to check on Sun Hua’s current condition.

They had climbed up the exterior wall to get to the roof. Going down, there was no need for that. They could simply take the stairs.

Sigh. He would also have to pay for the ward window.

No, wait. If Tan Wenbin were here, he would probably accuse the hospital window of being poor quality if it shattered so easily, and insist the hospital pay compensation. At the very least, they should reduce Sun Hua’s medical fees.

However, just as he was about to head down the stairwell, Runsheng suddenly seemed to hear strange sounds around him.

As if someone were speaking, but not in any human language.

What was that sound?

Runsheng looked left and right.

He did not know Walking the shade. He felt that if he could do it at this moment, he would probably be able to see more.

And then the doctor, who had been hanging limp in Runsheng’s hand, suddenly began shaking his head wildly.

“No... no... no... no!!!”

The doctor’s skin began peeling away, and his white coat was soaked blood-red.

“Hiss...”

Runsheng let go. The palm of his left hand had already been burned red.

“No... no... no... no!!!”

The doctor dropped to his knees, raised his head, and roared.

His flesh and skin split completely open, turning him into a living mass of blood. His body was burning, and inside it chains seemed to be racing back and forth. Along with that came a violent surge in malevolent aura.

“Righteous... righteous people... I... I’m going to kill you, kill you!”

The blood man lunged at Runsheng. Runsheng thrust out both hands to block him, but the fresh blood coursing over the other man’s body was like molten lava. When it splashed onto him, the pain was nearly unbearable.

Left with no choice, Runsheng kicked him away.

When he looked down at his own arms again, they were already scorched into a bloody mess.

“Ah, kill, kill, kill!!!”

The blood man came at him again on all fours. Every swing of its arm that struck Runsheng was like a jet of lava erupting. Even when Runsheng blocked the blows, the pain was still excruciating.

If it was this powerful, why had it held back so much earlier in the fight?

Bang!

Runsheng was struck by a flurry of arm-whips and sent flying. After hitting the rooftop, his body slid a long distance across the concrete.

There was no way to fight like this. If only the Yellow River Spade were by his side... no, facing an enemy in this state, it would not matter much whether he had a shovel or not.

Unless Little Yuan were here and could use techniques to break through the searing blood around the thing’s body, there was no way to fight something like this in close combat.

Runsheng struggled back to his feet, looked at the pitted burns scorched all over his body, drew a deep breath, and prepared to open all his qi gates.

When Uncle Qin had taught him this move, he had warned him that unless there was absolutely no other choice, he should not use it. Once it was used, he would be crippled for a long time afterward, unless he could be certain that the enemy before him... was the only one.

But just then, Runsheng suddenly realized that the aura around the other side was starting to weaken.

What’s going on?

Could it be that it couldn’t maintain this state?