Doumu

Chapter 438: Doumu

For every person in the Later Shu, Qingqiu, Siqi, and Great Liang who had been deceived by the stone slab, a wisp of dark purple light emerged from between their brows.

They hadn’t lost anything tangible. If anything could be said to be lost, it was the very feeling of being tricked in that moment.

These purple lights gathered together, rapidly converging above the imperial city of Shangjing. The phenomenon drew the attention of all the various powers present.

From all directions, the dark purple lights in the sky flew in, one after another, burrowing into the black pips of the four Dice.

As these purple lights joined them, the cube-shaped heads of the four Dice grew larger and larger, turning a deeper and deeper shade of purple. At the same time, their bodies began to fade from the world, as if they themselves were nothing but illusions.

Yet, as their bodies vanished, the sound of the Dice’s chanting grew louder and louder, until it seemed to be the only sound in heaven and earth.

“This pack of Zuowandao think they can defy a Siming with their mere mortal flesh? Absolutely impossible!”

The Emperor of Great Liang looked up at his still-unfinished mask. Though he deemed it unlikely, he dared not ignore the situation entirely.

With a wave of his hands, which were covered in layers of reversed dragon scales, the black clouds overhead churned and rolled directly toward the area.

Seeing this, the others from Great Liang also began to act, and for a moment, the battle, which had cooled somewhat, erupted into fresh ferocity.

At the same time, the remaining Zuowandao, as if throwing caution to the wind, hurled themselves recklessly toward that direction, blocking the approach of the black clouds.

Amidst all this chaos, the Dice’s chanting finally ended.

“When living beings face calamity, they invoke your name; the Great Being hears their cries and comes to rescue them from suffering! Boundless compassion, boundless vow, supreme sage, supreme kindness—Sacred Spirit, Great Light Queen of Heaven, Moli Zhitian Great Sage! Yuanming Doumu Celestial Venerable!”

As the final syllable, “Venerable,” came to rest, the six-sided pips on the Dice’s faces detached from their bodies. Wrapped in streams of dark purple light, they plunged into the oppressive black clouds above.

The next instant, all the Zuowandao lifted their heads simultaneously and shouted in unison toward the sky. “Doumu Yuanjun, hurry up and come! The Great Nuo is about to awaken!”

“Whoosh!”

The thick clouds that had hung in the sky all night vanished as quickly as foam dissolving in water.

Li Huowang, who was about to escape this place, suddenly found his right foot sinking into the ground.

The ground was still there, but its texture had become something very strange. It felt almost like a liquid.

It wasn’t just the ground. Even Li Huowang’s own body felt the same, soft and gelatinous. If not for the support of the writhing parasites in his abdomen, he would have already sunk completely into the earth.

“What in the…?” Li Huowang instinctively looked up.

At an impossibly high and distant point, he saw a yin-yang taiji fish, like a sun in the sky.

No—two suns. No—four! The more Li Huowang looked, the more there seemed to be, and he even felt his own eyes multiplying as well.

Just as his thoughts were about to split into six separate strands, he heard the triumphant laughter of the Dice from afar.

“Hahaha, I tricked you! The Great Nuo isn’t actually awake yet. Look at you, scared half to death!”

With a thunderous roar of laughter, the Dice openly mocked the heavens without the slightest shred of respect for their own Siming.

“See what I brought you? You were just short one eye, weren’t you? I found you one!”

“Shwaaash!”

The immense yin-yang taiji fish expanded rapidly, like a giant lid instantly covering the entire sky.

It wasn’t just the ground. The entire city of Shangjing had become terribly unstable. Things that should have existed vanished, while things that should not exist appeared out of thin air.

At this moment, Li Huowang was also struggling bitterly. Even though he was in the state of Intercalating the Five Phases, before this thing, he was utterly insignificant.

Li Huowang looked up again. Now he could see it more clearly. It wasn’t a yin-yang taiji fish. It was two interlocking oceans!

“And under that black-and-white sea is…” Li Huowang had clearly seen something. He clutched his head in agony as dark red blood began to seep from his seven orifices, his head swelling as grotesquely as the God of Longevity in a painting.

This was the first time he had seen a Siming in the real world. It was also the first time he understood just how powerful such an entity truly was—he couldn’t even bear to look at it for a single glance.

Just as a distorted, chaotic perception began to erode every part of Li Huowang’s being, a jolt of intense pain pulled him back.

His body seemed to be splitting apart. Wounds appeared out of nowhere without warning, bringing boundless agony, yet simultaneously forcing his mind back to clarity.

Coming to his senses, Li Huowang realized he was moving. He was sitting on a painting scroll, and a grim-faced Zhuge Yuan was controlling it, navigating across the undulating ground.

The narrow painting was now like a small boat, carrying them out of danger.

“Brother Li, hold on tight. Let’s get out of here first,” Zhuge Yuan said, his expression solemn under the completely transformed sky, yet without a trace of panic.

The man’s composure helped Li Huowang breathe a little easier. He had only wanted to find Bei Feng. He never imagined he would be dragged into something this enormous.

So this was the Zuowandao’s Siming, Doumu? Just what the hell did the Zuowandao plan to accomplish by bringing this thing out?!

When Li Huowang looked again toward the giant eye from before, he saw that it, wrapped in its golden mask, was flying rapidly toward the yin-yang taiji in the sky.

It seemed to try to struggle, but as it fell into the white pupil of the black sea, the entire ocean began to churn.

One thing was certain: a single eye was absolutely no match for whatever lay beneath that sea.

Zhuge Yuan stared up at everything above. His voice was unusually low. “Brother Li, I hope I’m overthinking this, because otherwise…”

“Otherwise what?”

“Nothing. Let’s just get out of here.”

As Zhuge Yuan took out his Judge’s Brush and wrote the character “Swift” in the air, the canvas beneath them began to move even faster.

Time sometimes felt fast, sometimes slow. When the city gate of the imperial capital appeared before them, Li Huowang’s heart pounded wildly.

He didn’t care what was happening in the sky. The only thing he knew was that he was about to pry the method for escaping the Heart-Element’s hallucinations out of Bei Feng’s mouth!

“Brother Zhuge, once we’re out, I need to borrow that almanac of yours. I have to force—” Li Huowang suddenly stopped mid-sentence.

Trembling, he stared at the taiji ocean covering the sky. Within the white circle of the black sea, a vertical pupil now floated—the very eye that had been behind the golden mask.

And at this moment, that eye was staring directly at him!