The Voice

Chapter 283: The Voice

“Senior Brother Li, look! Lanterns in the sky!”

Everyone who heard the shout looked up at once, and there they were—tiny flames suspended in the air, a cluster of round, bulging paper balls drifting like jellyfish.

“Just Kongming lanterns. Nothing special.” Li Huowang picked up his bowl and took a sip of the impossibly fresh shrimp soup.

Kongming lanterns bearing the surnames “Fu,” “Miao,” “Zhao,” and “Li” drifted slowly toward the sky, merging with the scattered stars above.

The people who had released them were wiping their tears. It seemed to be some kind of funeral rite in Great Liang.

“They’re not just in the sky! Look, on the river too!”

Tiny flames also appeared on the great river that ran through Yinling City, swaying among the boats.

“Great Liang really has its own way of doing things,” Li Huowang murmured to himself as he watched the lanterns.

He could feel the difference between Great Liang and the other places he had passed through. The sheer depth of its history alone made it incomparable.

“By the way, Miaomiao,” he said, turning to Bai Lingmiao beside him. “We’ve come through Siqi, Shu, Qingqiu, and now Great Liang. What country lies beyond Great Liang?”

“Beyond Great Liang?” Bai Lingmiao thought for a moment. “There’s nothing beyond Great Liang. It’s all ocean.”

Li Huowang nodded with understanding. So Great Liang was a coastal nation after all. He wondered if there were other, different countries across the sea.

“But even if there are, I suppose they probably—”

Just as he was thinking this, an extremely faint sound brushed against his ear. It was muddy, chaotic, but scattered among the noise were fragments of human words.

“Hu—n—gry… wood…”

The instant the sound appeared, every hair on Li Huowang’s body stood on end. He shot to his feet, his face ghastly pale as he scanned his surroundings.

His movement was so abrupt that even the soup on the table sloshed over the rim. The warm, lively atmosphere instantly froze into silence.

Everyone at his table—and those at neighboring tables as well—turned to stare at him in bewilderment.

“Senior Brother Li?” Sensing the worried glances of his fellow disciples, Li Huowang shook his head slightly and sat back down. The expression on his face quickly smoothed into calm.

“It’s nothing. You all know me—it’s my old problem acting up. Eat, everyone, eat.”

Hearing this, everyone set aside their concern and resumed their meal.

But Bai Lingmiao, seated on Li Huowang’s left, noticed that his hand, gripping the bowl, was trembling slightly.

After they had eaten and drunk their fill, they left the tavern and headed toward the inn. All the way there, a pained Lü Zhuangyuan was mentally calculating how many pigs that one meal could have bought.

It was wonderful while they were eating, but when it came time to pay and he watched the white silver he had earned leave his hands, it hurt more than killing him.

“Senior Brother Li, are you really okay?” Bai Lingmiao took his right hand in both of hers—the hand calloused from long months of gripping a sword.

“Don’t worry. I’m taking the Black Tai Sui now. My condition is mostly stable.” He gave her a reassuring look.

Back at the inn, everyone went to their own rooms, chatting about the evening’s sights before washing up.

Nothing happened until the inn’s doors were bolted and the candles were blown out.

In the dead of night, Li Huowang’s eyes snapped open. He turned his head to glance at Bai Lingmiao sleeping beside him, gently slipped his wrist out from under her neck, and pushed the quilt aside to head for the inn’s backyard.

The moment he reached the cart holding the Black Tai Sui, Mantou, who had been guarding the vehicle, crawled out from underneath and wagged its tail at him.

Li Huowang yanked open the cart’s curtain and saw the Black Tai Sui bound tightly inside with ox-hide ropes.

Staring at the Black Tai Sui, his face grew dark as he recalled the sound he had heard earlier.

Ever since he started taking the Black Tai Sui, everything had been normal. So normal, in fact, that Li Huowang had almost forgotten he was a Heart-Element. But today, the auditory hallucinations had returned.

His voice trembling slightly as he looked at the Black Tai Sui, Li Huowang whispered, “Mom… can you call Dr. Wang over? I need to talk to him about something.”

After a moment, he looked at the Black Tai Sui again, his voice flat. “Wang Wei? Is that you? Did you use some kind of drug on me a few hours ago?”

The Black Tai Sui showed no reaction to his questions. It merely continued sluggishly secreting filthy, viscous fluid through the wounds on its body.

“If it really was you, let me tell you—the drug worked. Give me a bigger dose now. Try it.”

Li Huowang waited in silence for the hallucination to return. Nothing happened.

Staring at the writhing mass of tentacles in front of him, his breathing grew heavy. His voice dropped to a low growl, his face contorted. “Don’t give me these half measures! If you want me to believe that side is real, then have the guts to pull me all the way back!”

As he shouted, the Black Tai Sui’s body writhed, struggling to free its bound tentacles, but the tough ox-hide ropes made every effort futile.

Huff… huff… Li Huowang breathed heavily. That sudden sound had thrown his heart into chaos.

He stood there in the stable, as if waiting for the entire world to collapse around him.

No one knew how much time passed. From outside the wall came the sound of bamboo clappers striking. “Dok—The air is dry, beware of fire—dok—dok—”

Hearing the night watchman’s call, Li Huowang knew it was already the fourth watch. He had been standing here for hours, yet nothing in the world had changed. Only then did his panicked heart begin to calm slightly.

He pulled a dagger from the torture-kit at his waist, cut another piece of flesh from the Black Tai Sui, and shoved it into his mouth, chewing hard.

As he chewed, Li Huowang stopped. An indescribable sadness welled up in his heart.

He had always thought he had let it go. But when that faint, illusory hope reappeared, Li Huowang realized he had only been fooling himself.

The place where you were born and raised is not so easily abandoned.

Especially when you have nothing to compare it to—because then you wouldn’t know how much you’re missing.

If he could choose, Li Huowang wished so badly that that side was real, and this side was the lie.

“Maybe… maybe it wasn’t about that side. Maybe it was just my illness. Don’t second-guess yourself. It was just an auditory hallucination. Nothing more. Yes, that’s right. It has to be.”

The moment this thought occurred to him, an unfamiliar gaze instantly cut through his mind like ice water, bringing his racing thoughts to a halt.

“Who’s there?” Li Huowang quickly closed the cart’s curtain and spun around.

In the dim light of the stable stood a lone figure—someone wearing a big-headed doll mask.

“Someone sent me to check on you. Said you wanted to work for the Supervisory Heavenly Office?” A voice, as hoarse as Li Huowang’s own, came from beneath the mask.