The Second Spirit

“Dong—dong—dongdong—” In the low earthen house, the drumbeat never stopped, and Li Zhi's chanting never ceased either.

“I, the summoner, head touching the rafters, feet treading the beams, in my left hand the drum, in my right the whip, ei-hei-ei-hei yo-ei—!” “Dong! Dong! Dong!”

Off to the side, Li Huowang could see that as the chanting continued, the red bridal veil covering the Er Shen's head was gradually being pushed up from inside.

Through the red veil, Li Huowang caught glimpses of strange animal-head outlines forming beneath it.

Calling them animal heads wasn't quite right either. None of these things resembled any ordinary beast; they were all severely mutated and deformed, with only some of them retaining even a hint of an animal's shape.

These things surfaced and sank beneath the red veil like flowing water, writhing unceasingly.

The scene before him, combined with the hazy white smoke, felt utterly uncanny.

Li Huowang rubbed his eyes hard and saw that the Er Shen was now stepping to the drumbeat, following Li Zhi as they moved toward the Eight Immortals table, which was now completely shrouded in white smoke.

“Strike once, shake three times—strike three times, shake nine times—three front, four back, five left, six right, sixty-eight strikes—ei!”

Within the hazy white smoke, Li Zhi and the woman circled and danced, one ahead of the other.

The woman seated at the Eight Immortals table began to clutch her own throat in agony.

“Get out!! Get away from me!!” A tremor crept into her voice.

“I summon the soldiers—summon Huang Tianba—summon Huang Tianqing—summon Huang Tianhei—summon Huang Tianhong—the Great Scout, the Second Spirit, the Quick-Tongued Brother, the Mimicking Essence—ei!” “Dong! Dong! Dong!”

The moment those words rang out, Li Huowang's mood began to grow strangely restless for no reason he could name.

He heard some sort of inexplicable noise filling the space around him, but when he strained to listen, it vanished.

Whatever "Old Immortal" Li Zhi was invoking, it was definitely different from anything he had encountered before.

“It sounds like he can invite more than one type of immortal… How many can he summon at most?”

While he was still absorbed in this thought, the drumbeat gradually softened.

Frowning, Li Huowang swept the white smoke aside with one hand and strode toward the table.

But before he could get close, a black shadow shot out from within the white smoke and lunged straight at his face.

“Clang!” His razor-sharp longsword caught it, and the next second, two rows of bloody teeth clamped down on the blade with a grinding screech.

The completely naked woman had terrifying strength. Her clawed hands scrabbled desperately toward Li Huowang's eyeballs.

Her bloodshot eyes bulged so far they looked ready to fall out of their sockets, and her twitching face was filled with nothing but murderous rage.

“Li Zhi!! What the hell are you doing?!” Li Huowang gritted his teeth as he struggled to hold her off, shouting into the white smoke.

“Dong! Dong! Dong!” “Laoo—immortal—ji—a—ei—!”

The summoning chant rang out again, and the bright red bridal veil spun out from the white smoke, landing squarely on the woman's face.

The woman struggled with all her might, but she couldn't stop the animal faces on the veil from writhing down and burrowing into her mouth.

“Shoop—” She was yanked back into the white smoke by some invisible force, and Li Zhi's chanting continued from within.

“Old immortal jia—leave your ancient cave, leave your mountain, grab a handful of yellow sand to seal the cave door. Walk on clouds when it's overcast, ride the whirlwind when it's clear. Clouds and whirlwind, come and go without a trace of smoke—!”

When a shaken Li Huowang raised his longsword and cautiously stepped into the white smoke, he found that the frenzied woman from moments ago was now limp on the table, her face sallow and her body drenched in cold sweat.

Beside her, Li Zhi and his trembling, hiccuping wife were still circling the woman in their dance.

“If you want to go, I won't stop you. At Overlord's trough, I'll saddle the horse. First untie the girth, then put on the saddle. Old immortal, crack the whip and ride—back to the mountain—ei-hai-yi-hou-hei—!”

As he sang the last line, Li Zhi flipped his drumstick and struck the center of the drum three heavy times.

The drum fell silent. The white smoke around them began to slowly dissipate, and that strange, restless agitation in Li Huowang's chest gradually faded as well.

“Nothing serious. Zoned out for a second there. I knew you had this covered—thing couldn't have gotten past you anyway.” Li Zhi wore that same careless grin.

“Zoned out? You can zone out at a time like this?” Li Huowang couldn't fathom the man's logic.

“Fifty coppers—that's all I get. How much does a bowl of noodles cost in the city these days? The evil's gone, the person's still alive, so what more do you want? It's already a damn good deal.”

“If you're gonna blame anyone, blame the old-timers who set the rules back in the day. What kind of garbage rules are these? Spirit-dancers are doomed to be poor.”

Li Huowang suppressed the urge to roll his eyes and walked over to the Eight Immortals table to examine the woman more closely.

She looked mentally shattered. Her vacant eyes were filled with terror, and her body trembled uncontrollably.

After glancing around for a while, Li Huowang couldn't see anything the "old immortal" Li Zhi had mentioned taking from her.

“It doesn't want money, and it doesn't take anything physical. So the payment this so-called immortal demands… is it something on a spiritual level?” Li Huowang wondered to himself.

Just then, the afflicted family rushed in. When they saw that their family member had returned to normal, they immediately embraced, crying and laughing all at once.

Li Zhi walked over to them. “This little wife just hit a nasty spirit—her body's weak. On top of that, your family's feng shui is bad. I'm worried more trouble will find its way to your door. How about this: you invite a Protecting Immortal?”

“Protecting Immortal?” Li Huowang's attention snapped to him.

“Yes, yes, yes! Whatever the master says!” The old man, completely at a loss, didn't dare refuse.

Li Zhi reached into his pack and pulled out a small clay figurine.

Then he took out some red string and began wrapping it around the figurine, mumbling something under his breath as he worked.

Once everything was tied, Li Zhi fetched a ladder and placed the object high up on the roof beam.

“Big worship on New Year's Day, incense on the fifteenth of every month. Got it? Alright, that's one hundred coppers total—tea money for the summoning plus the cost of the Protecting Immortal. Pay up.”

Ignoring Li Zhi as he haggled for payment, Li Huowang walked over to the ladder and carefully examined the Protecting Immortal on the beam.

It was a palm-sized clay figurine that looked like it had been casually pinched into shape.

But strangely, its eyes were molded with remarkable vividness. Staring into those eyes, Li Huowang felt as if he were truly locking gazes with a living thing.

Just then, Li Huowang suddenly saw the Protecting Immortal twitch. “What the—am I seeing things?”

“Don't look…” A tiny, thread-thin voice came from behind him.

Li Huowang spun around and found himself face-to-face with the Er Shen under her red veil.

They were standing so close that his faint breath made the red veil sway.

A storm of thoughts raced through Li Huowang's mind. “Is this person really alive? Why did she tell me not to look?”

He glanced over at Li Zhi, who was busy counting coppers, then lowered his voice to the barest whisper. “Is there something you need to tell me?”

Hearing this, the pale hands with their long fingernails gently pinched the edge of the red veil and slowly lifted it.

“Gulp.” Li Huowang, gripping his Daoist bell tightly, swallowed hard. He was nervous.

“Ge—ya—time to go. Let's find a local to borrow a bed for the night.”

The red veil fell back into place. The Er Shen turned and quickly followed after him.