Zyklon-Säbel

Kapitel 56

"What are you doing?" Li Hai asked.

"Let's see if there's any resentment or anything here. I remember Fang Lei tested the Spirit Whirlwind at Heart Lake before!" I'm now hoping that magic can help us.

“The Spirit Whirlwind is a spell of the Emei sect, which I don’t know,” Li Hai said. “However, I can try our Maoshan’s Gate to the Other Shore.”

"The Gate to the Other Shore?" I frowned and asked, "What is that?"

"It's a spell similar to the whirlwind of spirits, which can summon wronged souls on the other side. It's also a spell commonly used to test resentment!" Li Hai explained.

"What is the other shore?" I pressed.

"The other shore is the underworld where people go after they die!" Li Hai looked around and said to me, "Go and gather some branches for me!"

"What are you doing?" I asked curiously.

"This spell requires setting up an array, but I don't have anything with me right now, so I can only make do with tree branches!" After Li Hai finished speaking, he pulled me towards the woods.

"Why didn't you bring anything with you?" I complained as I walked. "You have no professional ethics as a Taoist priest!"

“How would I know you wanted to use magic to test me? I just wanted to come and take a look today!” Li Hai said, picking up a few rather long branches from the ground and handing them to me.

Following behind Li Hai, I became a free porter. I had no choice but to carry these branches, and after carrying a huge pile, Li Hai finally pulled me back to the ruins and started fiddling with the branches.

He arranged the branches into a heptagonal frame, completely surrounding the ruins. He assumed the ruins were quite large, so the branches fit perfectly.

After arranging the branches, Li Hai walked back to the very center of the ruins, the very center of the heptagon, and said to me, "Stretch out your left hand!"

"What are you doing?" Although I had questions, I still obediently stretched out my left hand.

“If some ghosts are summoned from the Gate of the Other Shore later, people without magic will easily be possessed by the ghost energy! Generally speaking, some things always go in from the left hand and out from the right hand, so I need to stamp your hand to prevent the ghost energy from entering!” After Li Hai finished speaking, he stretched out his finger and drew a circle in the air, bringing out a burst of blue light, which imprinted on my left palm.

"Ouch, it hurts!" The moment the blue light entered my palm, I felt an excruciating pain, as if a knife was scraping my palm bones. The pain was so intense that I cried out.

"What?! It's a ghost character!" I looked at the bright red ghost character in my palm with dissatisfaction and said, "Are you afraid that ghosts won't recognize me? You had to mark me too."

"You don't understand, do you!" Li Hai glanced at me and explained, "Generally speaking, what ghosts are most afraid of is you telling them they are ghosts, or showing them the word 'ghost'!"

"Really?" I muttered, touching the blood-red ghost character as if it were tattooed into my skin, and it even felt slightly warm on the surface.

“Anyway, only I can go there, so let it stay with you until we leave this place. This ghost talisman has the power to ward off evil spirits!” After Li Hai finished speaking, he pulled me behind him and said, “Stand behind me and don’t move. I’m going to activate the formation.”

I looked up at the sky. The gray clouds seemed to be gathering and churning, and the mountain wind seemed to be getting stronger. Did they also foresee the power of this gate to the other side?

Li Hai formed a sword incantation with both hands and chanted incantations. The branches that were originally still on the ground began to tremble slightly, gradually intensifying until they were even suspended five or six centimeters above the ground. The unseen mountain wind also gradually gathered in our direction, and I could see a blue whirlwind spinning out from the heptagon formed by the branches.

For a moment, the world seemed to lose its color, and only the huge blue whirlwind raged before my eyes, ravaging the surrounding scenery. The increasingly blurry vision made me uneasy!

As it spun incessantly, I seemed to feel those white masks of the dead projected onto the blue wind curtain like a projector, twisting and deforming along with the whirlwind, their cracked smiles seemingly writhing and opening and closing.

Suddenly, I felt as if something was pressing against the palm of my left hand, as if something was trying to burrow into it. The blood-red "ghost" character began to heat up. My breath caught in the violent whirlwind.

Looking up, I saw a dark, door-shaped shadow gradually taking shape amidst a swirling blue wind. Perhaps this was the gate to the other side, slowly opening towards us...

Volume Two: The Devil's Left Eye, Chapter Thirty-Two: The River of the Child Demon

Volume Two: The Devil's Left Eye, Chapter Thirty-Two: The River of the Child Demon

With a loud bang, the black door swung open towards us, and a chilling wind swept in from its depths, carrying with it a stench and the smell of blood, making me instinctively touch my nose.

The doorway was pitch black, and we couldn't see anything clearly, but we could feel countless hands reaching out from inside, beckoning us as if to lead us into another world.

"Why is there nothing here?" I asked Li Hai beside me worriedly. He was already drenched in sweat, his whole body heaving from heavy breathing.

"Don't rush!" Li Hai pulled me back a step.

Staring blankly at the black door, a blurry figure slowly took shape in the doorway, and I could feel the smell of burning gradually spreading in the air.

The vague figure grew clearer and clearer; it was a person, charred beyond recognition by the fire, standing upright before us. The charred, blackened skin had cracked open, revealing the reddish internal tissue. The face was completely unrecognizable due to the fire, and the scalp was covered in patches of reddish-yellow pustules, resembling a bald patch; not a single hair remained. However, from its sunken left eye, I seemed to have guessed its identity: Mu Wanrong, the woman I had seen on A Bao's computer, a woman who had once been so beautiful and gentle.

"Mu Wanrong?" Li Hai asked cautiously, holding a talisman in his hand.

Because her left eye had been gouged out, and her right eye was covered by charred flesh from the fire, it only moved its remaining head somewhat blankly before nodding. I suddenly felt a lump in my throat. If her infidelity was a form of infidelity, then what prevented her from being with the one she loved? If loving someone is a mistake, I'd rather make that mistake.

"Mu Wanrong, tell us your grievances!" Li Hai shouted.

Upon hearing this, Mu Wanrong immediately moved her stiff body like a robot, and I seemed to hear the creaking sound of bones rubbing against each other.

"Give it back...give it back...give it back..." The sound, like fingernails scraping against glass, gave me goosebumps.

"Give you back what?" Li Hai continued to ask.

"My children, give me back my children!" Mu Wanrong suddenly became hysterical and rushed towards us in a frenzy, her right eye, which had been closed, suddenly bulging out.

"How could this happen?" I yelled at Li Hai. Didn't this guy guarantee that everything was safe?

"Perhaps her resentment is too strong, don't panic!" After calmly reciting a spell, the talisman in Li Hai's hand seemed to grow wings and flew towards Mu Wanrong, sticking to her face with a slap. Mu Wanrong, who had been going crazy, immediately calmed down and stood straight in place.

"That scared me to death!" I patted my chest, relieved, and asked Li Hai, "What do we do now?"

"Of course, keep asking!" Li Hai rolled his eyes at me, took a step forward, and prepared to continue asking.

I looked around and saw that the surrounding whirlwinds seemed to have sensed Mu Wanrong's powerful resentment and were growing stronger. The branches that formed the array looked like they were about to be torn apart by the wind, which gave me an ominous feeling.

The surrounding scenery was already blurred by the whirlwind, but the rows of dense trees were still faintly visible. Catching my breath, I wondered if I was just being paranoid, but I felt that the eyes that had been watching us were still there, behind some tree. The pale mask of the dead began to laugh, and I could vaguely hear its hoarse laughter.

"Li Hai!" I grabbed Li Hai, who was about to walk any further, and said, "I feel something's wrong. You should dismantle this formation first!"

"No!" Li Hai rejected my idea with unusual firmness, saying, "Do you know? This Gate to the Other Shore consumes a lot of my magic power, and after one use, it takes almost a month before I can use it again. Now that we've already summoned Mu Wanrong, we can't just stop!"

"Really?" I sighed, letting go of Li Hai's hand. It seemed I had no choice but to continue. I glanced around worriedly, and suddenly felt a chill.

"Mu Wanrong, you..." Li Hai's question had barely begun when a loud crack came from beside me. I turned around and saw that one of the branches forming the heptagonal formation had snapped, perhaps due to the whirlwind. The whirlwind that had been swirling around us seemed to have found an outlet and began to surge towards the broken point. In an instant, it was almost a scene of darkness and chaos, and the powerful wind even blew away the talisman pasted on Mu Wanrong's face.

"How could this be?" Li Hai exclaimed in surprise, staring in horror at the whirlwind twisting and turning erratically before his eyes and the black door that had begun to sway slowly.

"What's going on?" I spread my hands over my head. The wind was so strange that it felt like knives cutting my face.

"The formation actually cracked! This is impossible!" Li Hai stood there dumbfounded, clearly still in disbelief at the formation's failure.

"Then stop!" I felt the red ghost character on my palm getting hotter and hotter, it hurt so much!

"Stop...it won't stop!" Li Hai said hoarsely, his eyes fixed on the black door that was spinning faster and faster around us.

The rapidly spinning gate seemed to multiply before my eyes, swaying back and forth, left and right, until I felt dizzy and my legs began to tremble. Perhaps because the rapidly spinning whirlwind was gradually drawing air away from its center, I began to feel chest tightness and shortness of breath, and my vision blurred with stars.

"Watch out!" Li Hai pulled me back. I only felt a black figure brush past me, and the strong smell of burnt corpse filled my nostrils.

It was Mu Wanrong! She was even more terrifying than before. Her bulging right eye was bloodshot, and her entire body was arched, like a cat in attack mode. Her burned skin was being torn apart by a surge of energy, revealing red flesh and thick, dark red fluid. Even without any magic, I could sense immense anger and resentment emanating from her, and… murderous intent!

"Be careful, don't fall through the door, or you'll never be able to come back!" Li Hai warned me while keeping a close eye on Mu Wanrong.

"Got it!" I cautiously turned around and looked at the black doors that seemed to float in the air, as if countless eyes were staring intently at us from inside.

"Break!" Li Yang unleashed several talismans in succession, but unfortunately, they all evaporated into wisps of black smoke about half a meter in front of Mu Wanrong. It felt as if Mu Wanrong had already built an invisible wall in front of him.

"Oh no, the resentment is too strong!" Li Hai's voice was trembling. I had never seen him so panicked and helpless.

"Give me back my children!" Mu Wanrong's voice seemed to have changed, as if more than one person was speaking. Were those overlapping voices the voices of all the mothers in the world who had lost their children?

"Damn it!" Li Hai charged toward Mu Wanrong, who was rushing toward us. I saw a round ball of blue light forming in his hand, which he then threw toward Mu Wanrong.

"Ah!" Mu Wanrong's magic power suddenly became stronger at some point, and with a strong flick of her hand, she flung Li Hai's blue ball of light away.

With a loud bang, the azure ball of light was flung into the continuously spinning whirlwind, instantly exploding and seemingly tearing a small gap in the wind barrier. However, it quickly coalesced again in an instant. The reassembled whirlwind then swept towards Li Hai as if it had gone mad.

"Watch out behind you!" I immediately warned.

Li Hai immediately touched the ground with his left foot and jumped more than three meters high, which was more impressive than any Olympic champion! However, before I could finish praising him, the whirlwinds seemed to have eyes. After turning in the air, they shot back towards Li Hai, who was still in the air.

A flash of blood streaked across my vision, and I felt as if warm blood had splattered onto my face. As I stared in disbelief, Li Hai tumbled towards me. Just as I raised my foot to step forward, I suddenly saw the large black door freeze abruptly where Li Hai was about to fall! Without thinking, my only thought was to check on Li Hai, I leaned forward and caught him in my arms. Losing my balance, I crashed to the ground, rolling backward with Li Hai in my arms. In the tumble, I tried to free one hand to steady myself, but the large black door suddenly appeared behind me out of nowhere.

With a crack, I heard the sound of my wrist twisting, and my body, along with Li Hai, rolled into the doorway. Instantly, everything went completely dark.

As I rolled, I felt as if my body was rolling over stones that appeared to be round on the surface, pressing down on my back and causing a sharp pain. Ignoring the pain in my wrists, I nudged Li Hai beside me.

"Are you alright?!" I don't want to be unable to explain myself to Li Yang later!

"Oh!" Li Hai groaned in pain, thankfully, at least he was still breathing. I helped him up with all my might, but unfortunately the light was too dim, and I couldn't see his face at all.

"How are you? Where are you hurt?" I touched his body with concern and felt a sticky liquid oozing out from his right shoulder.

"It's alright...it's just a minor injury to my right shoulder." Li Hai seemed to have cheered up again and comforted me.

"So, what do we do now? It seems we're already inside the door." I looked around, but all I saw was darkness.

"Really?" Li Hai gave a wry smile and said, "I've never been here before!"

"Come on, this isn't a vacation!" I said irritably.

“I really don’t know what’s inside the door, because…” Li Hai hesitated for a while before slowly saying, “Because no one has ever walked out of this door alive!”

"What?" I gasped immediately.

"Don't worry, there's always a way out." Li Hai seemed to be comforting me, but it was more like he was comforting himself.

Supporting the unsteady Li Hai, we groped our way through the darkness, the only sound our breathing. The path was difficult to walk on; the small round stones seemed loose, and we kicked them away a few times. We felt something rolling in the darkness, and when the rolling sound faded, suddenly, I saw a pair of blood-red eyes emerge from the ground, glowing eerily, like cats in the night. Then another pair, and another… until our feet were filled with pairs of blood-red eyes.

A sudden burst of crimson light blazed around us, and I unconsciously squinted. Within that intense, sun-like red light, a magnificent, vast, eerie, and unnatural fantasy world unfolded before me. I hoped it was all just a hallucination. But judging from Li Hai's expression beside me, it all seemed real.

What we were stepping on weren't stones, but... the skulls of children. Why children? Because these skulls were incredibly small, much smaller than a normal adult's skull, and their sutures hadn't fused. Those pairs of blood-red eyes emanated from the sockets of these tiny skulls. Though the eyes were long gone, their dark sockets still reflected a venomous gaze filled with resentment and despair. This plain of children's skulls stretched as far as the eye could see, and those countless blood-red eyes were like stars in the sky. But stars give us light; these eyes only bring us death.

Beside them, a blazing red light emanated from a raging river of blood, teeming with countless embryos. Some of these human embryos, still seemingly attached to their placentas, had already taken human form, while others were merely indistinct pieces of flesh and blood. Pale little hands protruding from ruptured placentas were strikingly glaring. The river, hundreds of meters wide, meandered and roared deeper into the Skull Plain.

"Tong Guihe?" Li Hai exclaimed in surprise, but his voice sounded more like it was stuck in his throat.

"What?" I turned around and asked Li Hai, who was trembling all over and had a deathly pale face.

“I once heard my master talk about the River of Ghosts, which is a river formed by the intense longing and resentment of countless children who died unjustly and mothers who lost their children. It is a gateway to the underworld,” Li Hai replied.

Children who died unjustly? I looked at the countless skulls at my feet and the thousands upon thousands of embryos in the river of blood. The resentment of countless children must have gathered here! I've heard that innocent children possess a more acute spiritual power than adults; surely, the resentment they generate upon death must be immense! As for the mothers who lost their children, their resentment must be even more terrifying, because in this world, besides one's own mother, no one loves you so unconditionally. For those mothers who lost their children, there must be nothing more painful than losing their own flesh and blood.

"Then, is there any way to escape?" I asked, clinging to a sliver of hope.

“No.” Li Hai shook his head and said, “Because no one can escape alive.”

"Don't jump to conclusions so quickly," I comforted him, saying, "We won't die that easily."

"How did the formation go awry? This is unbelievable," Li Hai said in frustration.

"Don't think about these things." I supported him; the important thing now was to find a way out. But the door we had just come through through had completely vanished, and we were now in an endless plain with nothing but a river of blood.

********

Inside the Maoshan Sect, a handsome boy of about seven or eight years old was anxiously looking at an old man with a white beard in front of him. The withered, layered wrinkles seemed to proclaim the vicissitudes the old man had experienced.