Yang Na

Chapter 122: Yang Na

Li Huowang stared at the body before him—a sight so visually shocking it left him deeply shaken.

"All of this... they did this to you?" His voice trembled slightly, and his disgust for the Ao-Jing Sect deepened another notch.

"At first, yes. Later, some of it I did myself. It was the only way to integrate into the sect, to become one of them." Yingzi said calmly as she pulled her robe back on.

Then a hint of bitterness crept onto her face. "I thought sacrificing that much meant I had truly become part of them. But I was wrong. In their eyes, I was never family. I was just something they could discard whenever they felt like it."

Li Huowang wanted to say something, but in the end, he said nothing. He lay back down.

"Don't worry. I'll get us out of this hellhole. You can start over."

This time, Yingzi didn't answer.

Li Huowang knew that his glib words couldn't solve anything. She couldn't start over. Her life was already utterly destroyed.

Schlick. A wet tongue suddenly licked Li Huowang's face. It was Mantou, the dog in his arms.

He pressed down on the dog's head, his eyes wide open, staring silently into the darkness above.

The next morning, breakfast was already brought to the door: sweet potato congee with coarse-grain flatbreads.

He fed some of the food to Mantou first. When the dog showed no signs of poisoning, Li Huowang ate together with Yingzi.

Today, he didn't question Yingzi about anything else. Her status in the Ao-Jing Sect was low; the things she knew were all common knowledge. He figured it would be more effective to look around and find an opportunity himself.

If Shou San asked, Li Huowang already had an excuse ready: he wanted to learn how these people manufactured pain.

Under Yingzi's guidance, Li Huowang began to wander through the entire cave complex.

Whether it was because they truly followed the rules, or because the abbess's letter had worked, the Ao-Jing sect members did not block his movements. They only watched him with dead, fixed stares.

His increasingly acute perception allowed him to sense that there was more in those stares than just vigilance and curiosity. There was something else—an emotion he couldn't quite name.

But soon, Li Huowang couldn't spare any more attention for the others' gazes. The scenes inside the cave made his eyelids twitch.

If the Eighteen Levels of Hell from Buddhism truly existed, this was it.

Flaying, waist-chopping, tearing apart by five carts, the Five Punishments, death by a thousand cuts... a variety of tortures he had never even seen before churned his breakfast in his stomach. The thick, cloying smell of blood assaulted his nostrils.

He had barely managed to stagger out of that zone of screams and tearing flesh. Clinging to the wall, he hadn't even managed half a breath of relief.

A small figure holding a pinwheel ran past him. It was a little boy in tiger-head shoes and a tiger-head cap, laughing as he held up his paper pinwheel. "Dad, you're so slow!"

Behind him, a robed member of the Ao-Jing Sect opened his scar-covered hands and chased after him. "Son, you're so fast!"

Watching them walk off together, Li Huowang's face turned very ugly. "These madmen! Don't they have any hearts?"

Yingzi, leading the way ahead, turned her head to glance at him. She said nothing and continued walking.

"Benefactor, you seemed interested in the other books of the Ao-Jing Sect last night. If you want, I can give you mine. What do you think?"

Yingzi's words trailed off. She realized there was no response.

When she turned around, she saw the red-robed Daoist clutching his head in pain, his expression twisted.

"Damn it, not again!" Li Huowang felt the world around him collapsing. He knew the hallucination was about to take hold.

"Benefactor? Benefactor, what's wrong with you?" Jiang Yingzi hurried back.

Li Huowang was breathing in ragged gasps. He watched helplessly as the Yingzi before him twisted and morphed into a nurse.

"Roll your tongue back up. There's a good boy. Don't bite it again," she instructed him.

Seeing that Li Huowang was staring blankly at her without any more nonsense, the nurse shook her head regretfully and turned to leave.

Li Huowang turned his head to look out the window at the sunlit sky. For a moment, his mind went completely blank. He had no idea what to do next.

"Wait! I'm over there, I'm still outside! This situation is extremely dangerous!"

On high alert, Li Huowang quickly spoke in a rushed tone. "Yingzi, listen to me. Get me back inside the room right now. Tie me up with rope—"

"Huowang."

He looked up instinctively and saw her at the door.

Yang Na stood there, tears welling in her eyes.

She was still dressed simply: a white sweater with jeans, and a small ladies' crossbody bag hanging at her waist.

"Huowang... you reacted to my voice? You're awake, aren't you? You recognize me, right?" She rushed over and grabbed his hand.

Feeling that familiar touch, Li Huowang's mind was a chaotic mess. Almost instinctively, he froze in place, pretending he was still having an episode.

Yang Na called out to him a few more times. Her expression shifted from excitement to profound disappointment.

Her long eyelashes beaded with tears. Her gentle voice carried a tremor.

"Huowang, you big liar. We promised we'd go to college together! Why am I already a freshman, and you're still not awake?"

Hearing that, Li Huowang's heart ached. He knew this was a hallucination, but he truly couldn't remain indifferent.

"Na’na... I'm sorry."

Upon hearing those words, Yang Na's expression swung from extreme disappointment to extreme excitement. She threw herself onto him and began to sob loudly.

"I'm sorry. I really wanted to come see you. But ever since you were on TV, my mom and dad forbade me from coming. I finally managed to sneak here today."

Li Huowang gently hugged Yang Na, then pushed her away.

"Na’na... your dad was right. Don't come anymore. I'm afraid I really won't be able to control myself..."

He left the other half of the sentence buried in his heart. I'm afraid I really won't be able to stop myself from thinking this is real again.

Yang Na couldn't believe her ears. It was as if she had been struck by lightning, or doused with a bucket of ice water from head to toe. She stood there, frozen.

She had never imagined that the first words out of Li Huowang's mouth, when he finally seemed lucid, would be these.

Suddenly, she snapped out of it. She raised her small bag, the one she kept her phone in, and began to beat him over the head with it. Crying, she screamed.

"How can you say that? Have you ever thought about how I feel? Why are you saying this too?!"

"My parents told me to give up! My brother told me to give up! My best friend told me to give up! And now you're telling me to give up too! I'm so tired of holding on! Why do you have to twist the knife! You said you loved me! I don't want to give up!"

(This chapter ends here.)