The Reeds

Chapter 306: The Reeds

Seeing the last of the Bai family—Bai Sai himself—disappear into the dense reeds, Li Huowang lifted his foot to give chase.

“Wait!”

A giant hand—larger than his own body—suddenly grabbed him. But when Li Huowang looked down, there was no giant claw on him at all.

He snapped his head around, glaring at the Office agent beside him who wore the wooden mask. Another one of this man’s illusion tricks.

Meeting Li Huowang’s murderous gaze, the man raised both hands and took several steps back. “Brother, I’m trying to help you here.”

“Those people all know who you are now. If you go in there alone, you’ll be walking to your death.”

Frustrated, Li Huowang shook his head violently. Images surfaced in his mind—the small details Bai Lingmiao had described about her family.

In her words, her parents and her entire clan were all good, kind-hearted people. The complete opposite of what this man was implying.

“Is she… lying to me? No. She wouldn’t lie to me!” Li Huowang’s wavering eyes hardened in an instant.

From his own brief contact with the Bai family, they didn’t match this description either.

“There must be some misunderstanding. I need to ask them face to face!”

With that, he left the masked Office agent behind and, ignoring the man’s shouts, walked straight into the reeds.

The moment Li Huowang stepped into the thicket, the daylight dimmed sharply. The sausage-like reed heads above squeezed out almost all contact with the outside world.

Lowering his gaze to the footprints on the ground, he began to follow them slowly. “Chief Bai! It’s me! Come out! Let’s talk!”

After a few calls with no response, he glanced back at the unbroken wall of yellow reeds, then spoke again. “Don’t worry. I’ve been through life and death with your second daughter! If the Bai family has something unspeakable, I will do everything in my power to help!”

“I’m on your side! That man with the wooden mask—I met him for the first time today! As long as I’m here, he wouldn’t dare touch you!” Li Huowang’s voice carried far through the reeds.

Not long after he said this, two able-bodied young men from the Bai family leaped out from the reeds ahead. They stood in silence, watching him.

Seeing that someone had come out, Li Huowang let out a small breath and continued. “I know you think I’m with the Office now, that you can’t trust me. But honestly, my connection with them isn’t as close as you think. How about this? Let’s go back to Niuxin Village first. Your second daughter is there. She can explain everything to you.”

The two young men said nothing. They spread their legs wide—one foot left, one foot right—tore open their shirts, and began performing a bare-bodied routine.

Li Huowang couldn’t make out what they were doing. It looked like boxing, but they weren’t making fists. It looked like a spell, but they weren’t forming hand seals.

As their hands traced patterns in the air, they chanted under their breath. “A true divine skill bestowed by the immortals; the heavenly soldiers and generals show their power. All you gods, hear my command—enter swiftly into this mortal body!”

The next moment, Li Huowang saw a tall, thin, shimmering silhouette wrapped in black bands float up from the ground and drift toward them.

“What kind of evil is that?!” Li Huowang immediately drew his bronze coin sword, intending to drive it away.

But before he could get close, the two young men snapped their eyes open. Their gazes were now dark and eerie, fixed on Li Huowang.

Startled, Li Huowang stopped in his tracks, staring at the two men whose demeanor had completely changed. “What is this? Divine possession? Summoning evil spirits into the body?”

If Li Huowang had doubted the Office agent’s words before, the sight of these two men caused a seed of suspicion to slowly take root.

“Listen. I really don’t want to fight you. Whatever you did in the past, it’s none of my business. It’s the other Office agents you have to worry about!”

Swish!

The two young men lunged at Li Huowang, their bodies trailing afterimages. Possessed by some nameless evil, they were profoundly wrong—every part of their bodies seemed to have a will of its own.

Their fingers spread apart like separate, writhing snake heads, stabbing toward Li Huowang’s throat.

They didn’t seem strong, but Li Huowang hesitated to strike back. Everything he had learned was lethal.

If he fought back, they would end up dead or maimed. That was the last thing he wanted.

He twisted and dodged through the reeds, constantly evading their attacks.

Whatever had possessed them was surprisingly agile. Li Huowang was quickly put on the defensive.

Slap!

He lost his footing. The two men pounced, but instead of attacking him directly, they went for the bronze coin sword in his hand.

Li Huowang pressed down, but the next instant—

Clang.

He felt a weight lift from his back. “Shit!”

He spun around. A flash of cold light. The purple-tasseled sword, reeking of killing intent, stabbed straight for his face.

He tried to counter or block, but both his arms were already pinned by the two Bai youths.

In that hair’s breadth moment, Li Huowang’s body twisted, shifting inches to the left.

“Azina lingguang dashe!”

The bronze coin sword in his hand exploded outward. Under the pull of red strings, it sliced clean through the fingers closing in on him.

He kicked the man in front of him hard, quickly putting distance between himself and the others.

As they stared each other down, the man clutching the purple-tasseled sword grimaced and dropped to one knee. The eerie look on his face rapidly faded.

The sword fell from his hand, impotent, as he knelt on the ground, roaring in violent fury.

Li Huowang let out a soft sigh, looking at the two young men whose fingers he had severed, and the other Bai family member now corroded by the sword’s killing intent. “Did it have to come to this? Can’t we just talk?”

As his words faded, the reeds all around began to rustle. One after another, cold, dark faces emerged from the yellow stalks, flickering in and out of sight.

Those lifeless stares sent a chill down Li Huowang’s spine. A good part of the Bai family had been entered by evil spirits.

From among the crowd, the old man with the single tooth, supported by Bai Sai, hobbled into view. Trembling, he began to speak.

His mouth—with that one tooth—opened and closed in a rhythmic chant, and filth-black sludge dripped from the corners of his lips.

“Dān～tuán～lěi～xié～shí~”

As that half-familiar, half-alien sound rose, several familiar figures appeared before Li Huowang.

It was the Wandering Lord.

Though without the trembling of the bell, their forms were exceptionally blurry, but Li Huowang had summoned them so many times that he could still recognize their shape.

Staring at the ghostly, half-seen Wandering Lords suspended in the air, Li Huowang remembered the information Bai Lingmiao had once told him back in Qingfeng Temple.

How did an ordinary girl like her know about evil spirits like the Wandering Lord?

Looking at the scene before him, it all clicked into place. This old man was the grandfather who had told her those stories.