The Birth

1,273 words

Lü Zhuangyuan continued explaining to his eldest son. "That little Daoist is someone destined for great things. Don't think he'll care about these petty gains. But just because he doesn't care, doesn't mean we shouldn't have the good sense to act right!"

"Besides, this could be our Lü family's big break! Didn't you hear Xiucai say that skinny-faced fellow was granted a divine ability by the little Daoist? We're certainly better than him, aren't we? Think on that when you're in your bedroll tonight."

Lü Juren's eyes went wide as he stared at his father's weathered face. So that's what all the circling was about. This was his angle all along.

"Ask less, do more! Stop daydreaming about useless things all day." Lü Zhuangyuan pulled his son along, heading toward the wagon.

Before long, the Lü troupe took advantage of the idle moment to warm up their voices and stretch their limbs. Since they'd be setting up the stage again soon, they couldn't let their operatic基本功 grow rusty.

After the midday meal, everyone set off again, heading toward the Kingdom of Liang with a hint of anticipation in their hearts.

They still didn't know their exact location, but the green grass underfoot was growing sparse, replaced by scattered patches of shrubbery. Everyone understood they were getting close to Liang.

As the sun began to tilt westward, a cry of pain shattered the relaxed atmosphere among the oxcarts. Everyone turned toward the sound and saw Luo Juan sitting on one of the carts.

She was clutching her belly in panic, staring down at her skirt, which was soaked through with amniotic fluid.

"Quick! Get her onto the wagon! Juan's going into labor!" Lü Zhuangyuan's shout sent everyone scrambling, and all the oxcarts ground to a halt.

The women hurried over to help while the men kept their distance.

"What are you doing? You can't help with anything." Li Huowang asked Bai Lingmiao as she started to move.

Bai Lingmiao turned back, a faint blush coloring her cheeks as she glanced at him. "I... I want to see how childbirth works. Maybe that knowledge will be useful someday."

Li Huowang stepped on the wheel of a wagon, flipped himself onto its roof, and lay back, gazing at the clouds stained crimson by the setting sun.

Listening to the flurry of frantic activity in the distance, he closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and slowly let it out.

No hallucinations. It had been a long time since Li Huowang had felt such peace. He was no longer struggling between reality and illusion.

"Hey, Daoist. You haven't had an episode in a while."

Li Huowang turned his head and looked at the monk standing in midair, along with Peng Longteng and Jin Shan Zhao beside him.

Even though the hallucinations were gone, these three things were still with him, always.

"Mm. The Black Tai Sui is working. I don't fall into that illusion anymore. Heh, you know? When I pushed Wang Wei one last time, there was a tiny part of me that thought... maybe that side was real. Too bad. An illusion is just an illusion."

Saying this, Li Huowang stared at a cloud that looked like Yang Na, his eyes going distant, his voice carrying a deep, aching nostalgia. "I kind of wish that side was real."

"Daoist, what are you talking about? I don't understand."

"Heh." Li Huowang turned onto his side, facing the lonely green hill in the distance. "Don't understand then. Just don't talk anymore, or people will think I'm having an episode again."

After a while, he stole a glance toward the wagon in the back. It had been some time now. Why wasn't the baby out yet?

He had no idea if the time was too long or too short. He'd never experienced childbirth before.

"Hope it goes smoothly. If it doesn't, there's nothing I can do anyway."

"No, wait. I studied alchemy at Qingfeng Temple for a while. But I don't even have a cauldron with me. I can't even refine a Moistening Blood Pill."

"...Sss..." A faint, indistinct sound made Li Huowang suddenly sit up. He listened intently, but there was nothing around him.

A puzzled expression on his face, he slowly lay back down. "Did I mishear that? Where did that sound come from?" After a moment's thought, he stuck his pinky into his ear canal and scratched. There was definitely something in there.

As he scraped with his fingernail, he eventually pulled out a long strip of dried blood scab.

The moment the scab came out, everything around him became sharper—he could even hear the sound of grass growing.

"It's too loud. This won't do." Li Huowang pulled out a pair of small serrated scissors, jumped off the wagon, and cut some wool from one of the sheep, stuffing it into his ear canals.

"Ahh... much better." He looked down and put the little scissors back into the bundle of torture implements.

"Hm? What's that?" Li Huowang squinted at a small black speck on the distant mountaintop. But it was too far away. Even with his sharp eyesight, he couldn't make it out clearly.

"Waaah—waaah—waaah—" The robust cries of a newborn baby suddenly rang out, pulling Li Huowang's attention along with everyone else as they gathered around the wagon.

When he reached the wagon, he saw Lü Juren standing there grinning like an idiot, muttering under his breath, "Heh heh... I have a son... heh heh... I have a son... heh heh..."

When Li Huowang saw the wailing infant boy in Bai Lingmiao's arms, he couldn't help but feel a little puzzled. Was this kid sick or something? He was hideous. Like a hairless monkey boiled in hot water.

Chun Xiaoman, who was nearby, saw the serious expression on Li Huowang's face and immediately knew what he was thinking. She quickly explained.

"Senior Brother Li, all newborns look like this. They're different from us."

"Oh? Is that so?" After Chun Xiaoman's detailed explanation, Li Huowang finally understood that he had been mistaken. The babies he remembered were always at least three months old, after their features had developed.

When they were first pulled out of the belly, they really did look this ugly.

When he saw Lü Zhuangyuan clambering out of the wagon on all fours, Li Huowang walked over to offer his congratulations.

"Hehehe—joy to you, joy to us both!" Lü Zhuangyuan's wrinkled face bloomed like a chrysanthemum in full flower.

Then he cupped his hands to the others who had gathered around. "My apologies, everyone! There are no eggs here, but when we reach the next town, I'll make sure to make up for it with red-dyed eggs!"

As everyone offered their congratulations and the atmosphere was full of warmth and cheer, Li Huowang's heart suddenly tightened for no reason. He jerked his head up and stared at the grass in the distance.

The meadow, which should have been stained red by the sunset, now had a small black circle upon it. The speck that had been on the mountaintop earlier had moved closer!

"Something's wrong!" The anomaly in the distance made Li Huowang's face turn grim in an instant. "Drive the sheep together! We're leaving this place!"

Li Huowang's words shattered the festive mood in an instant. Though they were puzzled, seeing his serious expression, no one dared to take him lightly.

Amidst Mantou's barking, the dozens of white sheep began moving again alongside the oxcarts.

Time passed, and the sky grew dark. Using the last rays of twilight, Li Huowang saw that the patch of black was getting closer and closer!

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Reading Guide Decoding

A Breather Before the Storm: Newborns, Nostalgia, and a Distant Threat

Cultural / Xianxia Notes

Red-Dyed Eggs (红鸡蛋): Lü Zhuangyuan's promise to hand out red-dyed eggs is a classic Chinese tradition for celebrating a newborn. The eggs are boiled and dyed red with beetroot or food coloring, then distributed to friends and family as a symbol of good fortune and the "rebirth" of the family line. In the Dao-Twisted World, even this joyful custom carries an edge—he promises to "make up for it" later, as if the party can't even stop for a proper celebration.

Newborn Appearance: Li Huowang's shock at the baby's looks is a universal joke, but Chun Xiaoman's explanation that "all newborns look like this" grounds it in real biology. Human babies are born with soft, moldable skulls and wrinkled, slightly blueish skin, and they look nothing like the cherubic three-month-olds we see in media. The author uses this moment to show Li Huowang's lack of normal life experience—his only reference point for babies is the sanitized, post-natal version.

Ear scab and sensory overload: The scene where Li Huowang pulls a scab from his ear and becomes overwhelmed by sensory input is a subtle reference to the novel's ongoing horror of the body. The scab isn't a normal piece of wax—it's a physical manifestation of his contamination, something that was blocking the world's noise, and removing it unleashes a torrent of sensation he can't handle. He stuffs his ears with sheep's wool as a crude, practical solution, showing his growing resourcefulness in managing his own broken biology.

Chapter Overview

Ah, a moment of rare peace in the Dao-Twisted World—but you know that never lasts, fellow traveler. This chapter is a quiet breather, a slice-of-life interlude where the Lü troupe celebrates a newborn, and Li Huowang gets a moment to just breathe without the world trying to eat him. He's feeling the Black Tai Sui's stabilizing effect, enjoying the absence of hallucinations, and even admitting—with real, aching nostalgia—that he kind of wished the modern world was real. But that peaceful feeling? It's a trap. A tiny black speck on a mountaintop starts moving, and by the chapter's end, that speck is getting closer. The calm before the storm is over.

Key Plot Points

Lü Zhuangyuan drops the act and reveals his true motive for being so deferential: he sees Li Huowang as the Lü family's "big break," hoping his son can also get a divine ability granted to him.
During a midday rest, the troupe practices their opera basics, showing their professionalism even in displacement.
Luo Juan goes into labor; the women assist while the men keep their distance, and Bai Lingmiao volunteers to observe, hinting she's thinking about her own future with Li Huowang.
Li Huowang enjoys a moment of hallucination-free peace, reflecting on how the Black Tai Sui is working, and admits to his spectral companions (the monk, Peng Longteng, and Jin Shan Zhao) that he kind of wishes the modern world was real.
He experiences a sudden auditory spike after pulling a scab from his ear, forcing him to stuff his ears with wool to block out the overwhelming noise.
The baby is born—a healthy boy—and Li Huowang is confused by how ugly newborns look until Chun Xiaoman explains it's normal.
Just as the group celebrates, Li Huowang spots a black speck on a distant mountaintop that has moved closer since he first saw it. He orders an immediate evacuation.
As night falls, the black shape continues to close in, ending the chapter on a note of impending dread.

Reading Guide

This is one of those "calm before the storm" chapters that the Dao-Twisted World does so well. The entire first half is deceptively peaceful: a baby is born, the old man is scheming for his family's future, and Li Huowang is actually happy for a moment. But the horror fan in you knows what's coming. The black speck on the hill is a classic horror trope—a distant threat that only the protagonist notices, growing steadily closer while everyone else is distracted by joy. Li Huowang's instinct to run immediately, without waiting to confirm the danger, shows how far he's come. He's no longer the confused victim; he's the paranoid leader who trusts his gut over appearances. Pay attention to the way the author uses sensory details—the sound of grass growing after the scab is removed, the wool in his ears—to build a world that is too real, too overwhelming for a normal mind. And that final line, where the black shape is getting closer as night falls? That's your cliffhanger. Whatever's coming, it's going to be bad.