The Mirror Fights Back

Chapter 391: Li Huowang

“What are they after? Do they know I’m a Heart-Element?”

His expression flickered uncertainly for a long time. After confirming that there was no activity around him, Li Huowang decided to return to the fishing village and wait until dawn.

He looked up at the full moon, almost entirely shrouded by black clouds, then quickened his pace. Using the longsword in his hand, he carved three marks into a bamboo stalk before slowly walking back toward his original position.

To avoid getting lost, Li Huowang left sword marks on the bamboo stalks at regular intervals.

As he walked, the sky gradually lightened, but the situation didn’t improve much. A hazy morning mist enveloped everything, offering little advantage over the darkness of the previous night.

Just as Li Huowang was beginning to feel weary, two dim lights pierced through the distant mist, lifting his spirits. “Did I make it?”

He quickened his pace and rushed forward, only to find that the lights came from two white lanterns hanging at a gate. On each lantern, a large black character was written: 奠 (Funeral).

The wall before him was a wide, earthy yellow, curved in an arc, and stood several stories high.

Li Huowang glanced back at the thinning mist. “What kind of trickery is this?” he muttered to himself.

Though the situation was bizarre, Li Huowang wasn’t truly afraid. He had faced far worse.

Raising his right foot, he stepped through the gate. As he passed through a narrow alleyway, a massive circular fortified building appeared before him. Rows of black-tiled structures were built together, forming a ring.

A breeze blew a yellow paper funeral offering past his face, drawing his gaze toward a distant funeral hall.

Inside the hall, draped in white, two black coffins—one large, one small—sat in silent stillness.

Li Huowang walked to the edge of the hall and peered inside. The funeral hall had everything—except people.

“No offense intended,” he murmured, giving a slight bow toward the coffins.

The next moment, Li Huowang suddenly dashed into the hall. Gripping the coffin lid with one hand, he shoved it open and thrust his head inside, shouting at the top of his lungs, “May the dead rest in peace!!”

Seeing that the coffin was empty, disappointment flickered across his face. He lifted his head from the coffin and surveyed the funeral hall, now draped in white cloth and paper effigies.

“I don’t care what you are! I’m busy right now. I don’t have time for this nonsense.”

“If you try anything else, don’t blame me for burning down this whole building and the bamboo forest outside!”

The open space at the center of the circular building echoed his voice. But, as before, there was no response from any object or entity.

Li Huowang patted the coffin lid twice, then turned and walked toward the exit.

As he walked, halfway across the open courtyard, a red figure suddenly flashed past the second floor of the left wing.

Li Huowang immediately spun around and charged. Just as he was about to hit the wall, he slapped two talismans written in his own blood onto his thighs.

Dark veins bulged across his legs. With a powerful leap, he jumped horizontally to the same level as the red figure on the bamboo structure.

When he saw the figure’s face, a surge of hot blood rushed to the back of his head. He roared with all his strength, his teeth clenched in rage: “Zuowandao!!”

The red figure was none other than a person who looked exactly like Li Huowang himself!

The moment he saw that face—a perfect copy of his own—Li Huowang understood instantly. The Zuowandao had already infiltrated Apricot Island.

It was them. All the strangeness he had experienced before—it was them.

Feeling his body begin to descend, Li Huowang whipped out his bronze coin sword. “An Sha Tong Ling Po She!!”

The red string binding the coins on the sword lengthened rapidly, lashing out like a whip and wrapping around a pillar.

With a sharp tug, Li Huowang’s body shot toward the other Li Huowang like a cannonball. The imposter remained motionless, standing there woodenly as if stunned.

Just as Li Huowang’s bronze coin sword was about to pierce the other’s body, his heart sank. There was no sensation of contact on the blade.

Then he saw the Zuowandao before him draw a sword and stab it directly upward at the empty air. Blood inexplicably appeared on the empty sword tip.

At the same moment, Li Huowang felt a sharp pain in his abdomen. The figure before him was merely a phantom—the enemy was using his own misalignment ability!

Li Huowang tried to use the same misalignment ability to escape, but his body remained completely unresponsive.

In that instant, he understood. The Zuowandao had used some unknown method to steal his misalignment ability.

He had fought many Zuowandao before, but none of them had possessed such a powerful ability.

The Zuowandao before him was no ordinary foe. This was likely one of the Four Joys or the Three Yuans!

Realizing this, Li Huowang held nothing back. He reached up, dug his fingers into his right eye, and then clenched the eyeball in his palm, squeezing with all his might.

With a sharp pop, translucent liquid squeezed out from between his fingernails.

In an instant, everything around him was replaced by an indescribable, strange-colored light. The world became grotesquely slow.

Seizing this moment, Li Huowang quickly pulled himself free from the sword still embedded in his abdomen.

Knowing the enemy had stolen his ability, Li Huowang refused to be led around by the nose. He pulled out a fire striker, ready to unleash something big.

But after striking it a few times, his body didn’t catch fire. He quickly realized the problem—his skin had been stripped to be refined into a magical artifact. He had no new skin left to offer to Bashe.

Seeing that the Zuowandao before him was about to return to normal, Li Huowang’s heart tightened. He pulled out a blackened iron forceps and shoved it into his mouth.

Several of his back molars were ripped out, scattering through the air like heavenly flowers.

Li Huowang knew the limit of his stolen misalignment ability was within one zhang. So his teeth covered that entire radius.

With a bang, the bloody teeth exploded, raining down like a storm of bone shards toward the enemy.

With no cover, the enemy took the full brunt of it. The countless shards of teeth pierced through the Zuowandao’s body, turning it into something like a sieve.

Yet, despite such grievous wounds, the imposter still stood there, showing no sign of falling.

Seeing this, Li Huowang’s heart skipped a beat. He suddenly understood something.

He pressed a hand to the wound on his abdomen and received a very bad piece of news: the Zuowandao before him had also stolen his powerful healing ability.

“This bastard’s abilities are too troublesome. What do I do?” Watching the other glare at him with a ferocious expression, Li Huowang’s heart sank further and further.

(End of Chapter)