Ganyuan

Chapter 287: Ganyuan (Bonus Chapter for Ally morgenrote)

A child was riding an ox, leading his dog toward the village outskirts. Some young women and girls were washing clothes by the riverbank. Everyone's expression was so normal—a world of difference from the last time in Pi County.

If one judged only by its outward appearance, this village was nothing special.

Yet the more normal it seemed, the more abnormal it became in Li Huowang's eyes.

Li Huowang pulled out the letter again and gave it a careful look. It indeed stated that there were signs of Zuowandao activity here, but it didn't specify what those signs were.

Thinking back to his experience in Pi County, Li Huowang turned to the others. "Since there might be Zuowandao inside, I'll slip in first and scout things out. No need to alert them."

"Brother Li… are you really alright going alone?"

Bai Lingmiao hesitated, her words caught in her throat. The changes in Li Huowang could not escape the eyes of someone who slept beside him every night. He had been somewhat normal lately, but now he was starting to get jumpy and paranoid again.

Thinking of those voices, Li Huowang offered no explanation. On matters like this, the more he explained, the more she would worry.

Li Huowang shifted his phantom body out of alignment with his physical one, then followed the narrow dirt path beneath the willow tree at the village entrance, slowly advancing inward.

"Another… person… wind…"

The sudden auditory hallucination no longer surprised Li Huowang. He shook his head hard and glanced at the monk wedged into the tree beside him.

"What are you looking at me for? I didn't say that."

"Shh." Li Huowang lowered the finger he had pressed to his lips, slowed his pace, and crept steadily into Ganyuan Village.

His mind was entirely pried away from the hallucinations, focused solely on the crisis at hand.

Soon, Li Huowang could tell that the entire village of Ganyuan seemed to be celebrating something. The couplets on the walls and the Door Gods pasted on the gates had all been replaced with new ones. Even the villagers' clothes looked freshly changed.

Perched in a large tree strung with red cloth strips, Li Huowang silently watched everything below. So far, he had found nothing unusual.

But that soon changed.

Dressed in their finest and having eaten a hearty midday meal, the villagers began gathering in small groups and heading toward the village's far end.

Along the way, the villagers chatted and laughed, their moods visibly lifted. Still nothing abnormal.

Li Huowang followed them to the edge of the village, where they stopped before a village shrine.

Everyone's voices dropped. The occasional noisy child was yanked over by a parent and given a firm smack on the rear.

Everyone stood there waiting, expectant.

Just as Li Huowang was debating whether to slip into the shrine for a look, a brown mud statue was swayed out from beneath the pitch-black archway.

Judging by the treasure vase in its hand, this was clearly a Bodhisattva statue. A mud Bodhisattva, at that.

But its face was not kind or compassionate at all. The mud statue looked as if it had been through a torrential rainstorm—

All five features had melted, drooping into elongated streaks across its face, leaving only two irregular black pits behind.

"Ohh! Ohh!" All the villagers of Ganyuan rushed forward, helping the shrine keeper lift the Bodhisattva and begin parading it around the entire village.

"Mud… Bodhisattva…" Li Huowang stared at the two black pits on the statue's face, muttering under his breath with a furrowed brow.

From his perch atop the tree, Li Huowang watched the villagers carry the grotesque mud Bodhisattva in a swaying procession, circling Ganyuan Village again and again.

With each circuit, more red fabric was draped over the statue. By the time the sun hung high, the mud Bodhisattva was wrapped in a thick layer of red gauze.

The draped mud Bodhisattva was carried back beside the shrine, swayed in, then sent back out with a fresh chorus of shouts. Amid the crowd's cheers, it was carried in again.

In and out, three times in total, before they finally set the mud Bodhisattva down inside the shrine and began burning incense, kowtowing, and offering prayers.

Li Huowang wanted to go in and see what the shrine looked like inside.

But the villagers packed it so tightly that even invisible Li Huowang had no place to stand. He simply couldn't get close.

When the sun began to slant westward, the villagers dispersed to their homes, satisfied.

As darkness fully fell and even the hunched shrine keeper locked the doors and retired to a side room to sleep, Li Huowang slowly descended from the tree.

Before long, with a crisp click, the bronze lock snapped in two. The tightly shut door opened a crack.

As moonlight streamed through the gap and into the pitch-black shrine, Li Huowang's hand was already gripping the hilt of the Purple-Tasseled Sword.

If the Zuowandao really intended to cause trouble, this was the most likely place they would use to make a statement.

Creak.

Invisible, Li Huowang pushed the door open and stepped inside.

Because of the incense offerings, the entire room was thick with the rich scent of sandalwood. The mud Bodhisattva with the melted features loomed faintly in the darkness.

But the statue was not alone. Both sides of the shrine were lined with others—also clay, but not Bodhisattvas. These were the Eighteen Arhats.

The Bodhisattva had no face. The Eighteen Arhats, however, did. They stood there, some angry, some hateful, their expressions disturbingly lifelike. Standing inside the shrine felt like being stared at.

The mud Bodhisattva that had been carried out earlier was now set in the center of the shrine on a stone lotus pedestal.

The censer before it was filled with nothing but spent incense sticks. Every stick was an offering to the Bodhisattva.

Flanking the central Bodhisattva on the left and right, two more clay statues stood upright.

These two had faces, and judging by their size and appearance, they were clearly the Bodhisattva's attendant boy and girl.

The shrine was small. Li Huowang finished his circuit quickly. Finding nothing, he eventually fixed his attention on the red-draped Bodhisattva.

The mud statue wasn't tall—maybe two meters—but the pedestal beneath it was very high. Li Huowang had to look up at it.

In the dim, almost lightless shrine, a red-robed Bodhisattva with melted features—the sight could not have been more horrifying. And Li Huowang had long been convinced this Bodhisattva was trouble.

Should I just cut straight at it with the sword? The thought crossed his mind.

As he seriously considered the question, he abruptly whipped his head toward the boy and girl attendants flanking the Bodhisattva.

"Were they like this before? Or did they just move?"

Staring at the two clay figures staring straight back at him, Li Huowang felt a sudden chill in the dark, silent shrine.

"You… come…"

"Who?!" The garbled voice made Li Huowang spin around, but there was nothing behind him.

"Wait… was that my auditory hallucination, or… something in this shrine making that sound?"

The question struck him, and he froze on the spot. For a moment, he could no longer tell.