Searching

When Li Huowang climbed out of the well, he suddenly froze. Why was it dark again?

He looked up at the sky and saw that the Great Qi sun was even more残缺 than before. Now it was only a vague outline, eaten away by the blackness.

Suddenly, he felt a gaze from somewhere far in the distance. His mouth opened involuntarily, and he began to make a clicking sound in his throat that shifted toward a crane’s call. “Yú’er Shén!”

His body taut, Li Huowang pulled out the spine-sword and swung it hard. He slipped through the rift with extreme speed. Only when he was back in Great Liang did he take a moment to pop his dislocated jaw back into place.

By now, Li Huowang was drenched in cold sweat. He understood perfectly what had just happened. The Heavenly Calamity of Great Qi was beginning again.

The last calamity had lasted so long. He didn’t know if this time it would kill all the survivors.

Li Huowang remembered what Zhuge Yuan had said to him. He let out a deep sigh. He clenched his fist and slammed it hard against the tree trunk in front of him.

Then he turned and walked toward where he had thrown the Little Emperor of Great Qi out of the rift. He had to find that little emperor!

Li Huowang mounted a horse and raced back to where he had cut the rift open. Last time, he had only casually asked Li Sui a question about it. He hadn't paid much attention.

Now, Li Huowang began to search the forest meticulously, not missing a single trace.

But what surprised him was that even with his exceptionally sharp senses, he still found nothing at all.

“That’s not right. I stabbed the Great Qi Emperor clean through, and he bled that much. Even if a wild beast had dragged him off, there should be some bloodstain left.”

Just as Li Huowang was about to expand his search radius, a shallow footprint jolted his heart.

Great Qi could fall at any moment. He had no time to waste. Li Huowang immediately followed the shallow footprints at a rapid pace.

Li Huowang’s keen perception proved to be just as useful for tracking. As the footprints grew clearer, his hand was already on his sword hilt.

Soon, he spotted a half-bent figure among the bushes. The coiled, graying hair on his head suggested he was an old man.

At that moment, the man was crouching there, as still as a statue. Such strange behavior put Li Huowang on alert.

Li Huowang drew his bronze coin sword and swung it toward the man. The instant the sword lengthened, it sliced off the coiled hair on the old man’s head.

“Ah! Ma!” The old man’s body gave a violent start, and he tumbled to the ground.

“A living person?” Li Huowang gripped his sword hilt and quickly moved closer. He found that this man was not some strange evil spirit, but simply an ordinary old man who had wet himself in fear.

“Great immortal, spare my life! Spare my life!” The old man didn’t even look at Li Huowang’s face. He just kowtowed to him repeatedly from the ground.

“Get up!” Li Huowang pressed his sword against the man’s shoulder. “I’m asking you. During this time, have you found any infant?”

“What? A baby? I came to the forest to catch a ginseng! I haven’t seen any baby!”

“Ginseng? What ginseng?”

Seeing the man tremblingly point ahead, Li Huowang took a few steps forward and pushed through the bushes to look. He didn’t see any ginseng, only a small pit and some red strings tied with bells.

“Where’s the ginseng?”

“It ran off because you scared it! I’ve been crouching here for half a year! If I’d caught it and sold it in the city…” The old man said, his voice filled with grievance.

“What nonsense is this? I’m asking you, are you familiar with this area?”

“Yes! Yes!” The old man nodded frantically, as if Li Huowang’s sword would come down if he was even a second too slow.

“Besides you, has anyone else been here recently?”

“I don’t know about that. But the only people who come here are from our village.”

“Could someone from this village have picked up the Great Qi Emperor?”

Li Huowang recalled the Great Qi Emperor, who was only the size of a palm and whose skin was nearly transparent. It didn’t seem at all like he had walked away on his own.

“Let’s go! Take me to your village!”

The old man naturally couldn’t refuse. He led Li Huowang out of the forest.

But the more they walked, the more familiar the place felt to Li Huowang. This seemed to be the village where he had traded a jade pendant for a horse the last time.

Just as he reached the village entrance, Li Huowang saw a child, looking about eleven or twelve, stripped naked and hung from a willow tree. He was being lashed by willow branches until his whole body was covered in swollen red welts. Snot and tears were streaming down his face, and he was howling miserably, looking utterly pitiful.

Some villagers had formed a circle around them, pointing and gossiping, with no intention of stopping it.

“Ah! That’s my grandson! What’s going on?”

The old man beside Li Huowang panicked instantly. He rushed over and threw his arm in front of the big-bearded man who was doing the lashing. “Son! Have you lost your mind! You’re beating your own son to death!”

“I wish I could just beat him to death and make another one! Do you know what that bastard did? Three days ago, he shit in his own well!”

“What?!” The old man snatched the willow branch from the big-bearded man’s hand and began to beat his grandson as if spinning a top.

Li Huowang looked at the onlookers. After a moment of thought, he leaped directly onto the willow tree in two or three bounds. “Everyone! Not long ago, my elder sister gave birth prematurely. We wanted to bury the child far away, so we buried him in the forest to the east! But that Yang half-immortal said my little nephew is still alive!!”

“So my sister sent me to find my little nephew. If anyone can help me find him, I will present ten taels of gold as a token of my gratitude!”

Li Huowang’s words instantly caused the onlookers to explode into a buzz of chatter. Even the old man forgot to beat his grandson and began whispering with his son.

Li Huowang’s eyes darted rapidly, observing the subtle expressions on everyone’s faces and the ever-present Ten Emotions and Eight Sufferings on them.

Li Huowang wasn’t relying on the reward to find the Great Qi Emperor. He was relying on his own Zuowandao divine ability.

These were all ordinary people. If one of them had found the Great Qi Emperor, their expressions would certainly have shown some sign.

But to his disappointment, after looking around, he found no sign of it. It seemed none of them had found the Great Qi Emperor.

“Ai. Leaving a baby in the forest, it’s probably been dragged off by a jackal by now.”

“Yeah, there’s no way you’ll find it now.”

“This Daoist is pretty decent. Even though he left his family, he still cares about his own people.”

“Hey, isn’t this the guy who stole Mr. Song’s horse? I heard he’s also a red-robed Daoist.”

Listening to their words, the disappointment on Li Huowang’s face deepened. It seemed that these people really hadn’t seen the Great Qi Emperor.

“Ai~ Maybe he was picked up by some kind-hearted person. Some people pray for a son and can’t have one, while others have a son and throw him away. Let me tell you, about thirty-something years ago…”

When an old man in the crowd, smoking a water pipe, began to ramble through a story he had told countless times before, the people around him quickly moved away.

“Why isn’t anyone listening? So, it was thirty-something years ago, on the night of the Little New Year. Old Yan from the east end of the village really did find a bloody little baby in the forest. It looked like a skinned monkey, and its chest was still open. Back then, a few of us told Old Yan to find a place to bury it, in case it died and turned into a ghost and came back to haunt him. But in the end…”