Free Web NovelChapter 253: Chapter 57: Three Men Walk Together
"...We must tread lightly—make as little noise as possible. In this village, every encounter with a strange creature could lead to unforeseen transformations. The best thing is not to startle them too much, at least until we can hand over the most significant matters to the Zhu family."
Said Bai Wu, resolutely setting the main goal afterward:
"We must eradicate it completely, just like pulling out a demon, piece by piece."
"In this world, everything is divided into good and evil, and that is the ultimate line. Zhao Jinkun and the others, despite their evil intentions, are but pawns in Zhu Xu’s broader strategy of benevolence," Bai Wu thought.
He wondered if he should go take a look at the Zhu family—just the thought of this vengeful aura so intensely powerful could even affect people like paper dolls, Bai Wu thought again.
Bai Wu shook his head, deciding not to bring up this point with Hongyin, as it was an extremely dangerous move to try and reclaim that overwhelming Pang resentment here, hence Hongyin hadn’t mentioned it.
"How should we find it? Where is that powerhouse you mentioned?"
Jiuyan asked, looking at Wu Jiuyan and Wu Jiuwu, who had just walked out of a similar-looking courtyard.
The sun seemed to drip blood-red.
But the sky was still as white as day, only overlaying with a red filter, the color alteration still present throughout.
Bai Wu crawled out of the earth cellar, not in the original second-act scene crowded with countless paper people in their bedrooms, but roaming aimlessly above on the street.
He always considered himself the best at making line-ups, especially since he felt it was quite a challenge for Jiuyan.
"You will learn to accept it, but I’ve decided it’s me who will do it. You may think Xie Jiaxing is very strong, and you may feel very competent, but in this place, everything’s an emotional trap, and you’re all tangled up in a web of willpower and spirit," said Bai Wu.
He no longer identified with being the entire team’s strongest in discernment and judgment or warfare ability; Jiuyan at this moment hadn’t seen that sort of self-confidence from him before.
"Xie Jiaxie’s psychic powers are not necessarily inferior to his; there’s no need for whatever amount of Xingli," Jiuyan said, knowing full well there were many questions he was certain about, but he walked unhurriedly as the formal unfolding of the trilogy of risks was about to begin, nodding his head in agreement.
"Is the whole village the scope of our investigation, all the way to the lakeside?" asked Jiuyan.
Bai Wu blocked Jiuyan with a single phrase:
"I don’t want to die."
"Why do you need to go forward into the red zone at all?"
"You need to bring your own people to follow, and the stone stele has already given a warning. It’s obviously the red zone up ahead. Do I have to follow your monitoring team? Are you teaching me what to do?"
"Is this all you have for your last stand? Only this level of a fight?"
Jiuyan clenched his fists, listening to Bai Wu’s unimpressive words.
"A big chance of victory could rise to a hundred percent with a good counterattack," Bai Wu said.
"Although I don’t know exactly how that supreme evil energy you speak of works, what if we were to reclaim it, hypothetically?"
Bai Wu’s face turned an iron shade of blue in an instant; he was one hundred percent seeking death if he looked at it that way.
"What if we can’t reclaim that fierce power, how big a chance of victory do we have then?"
"Do you have a few ace cards up your sleeve... to annihilate the supremely powerful evil and avoid the catastrophe of this world?" Jiuyan said, both he and Jiuyan showing a deep solemnity in their spirits.
"But the fact is, although the power on the other side has just reached a strong threshold, it’s not stable; this energy is undeniably formidable. Just reclaiming this portion of energy should be enough, the only thing we should do. My chances of victory would surely increase if we can reclaim it, yet it’s nearly impossible for me to win the fight right now," Jiuyan said.
"How should we handle this situation now?"
Jiuyan said with a smile, his expression unchanged. "There hasn’t been much trouble for quite some time."
"It’s just a tiny bit insignificant, but still not enough evidence." freewёbnoνel.com
Chi Jie replied.
It was strange that he, who was observant and good at solving mysteries, was beaten by a high four-story tower, making Xuan Jiang feel a trace of frustration.
Xuan Jiang, who had escaped from the bottom of the lake and managed to create these circumstances, was now observing keenly.
How could Xuan Jiang, in such a short time, know the full path of the dragon vein? Despite having his own eyes of insight and heavenly peering eyes, he had not found too many clues; yet Xuan Jiang did.
Jiuyan was quite fascinated. "How did you observe and figure out the first scene we encountered... giving us the choice of entering and exiting?"
White Mist spoke very quickly, simplifying the story of what happened in the village, because for these two, the situation seemed muddled and frightening.
White Mist thought for a moment and decided to share the situation with Jiuyan and Pang.
"Can you tell us exactly how you figured it out, what’s the situation in this district now?"
Jiuyan asked.
If he were to assume Ma Li’s position, he would have to take charge, naturally. Chi Jie, who had attentively noticed White Mist, didn’t take Jiuyan lightly at all; he found him very reliable.
"I’ll lead in front, you two follow behind," Jiuyan said, nodding his head.
"Remember, don’t touch anything unusual. We can very easily be consumed if we touch something we’re unfamiliar with for too long. If we’re caught by the strange things of this place, we can very well become prey to various dangers and might end up killed by others," White Mist instantly knew what to do.
Though Jiuyan’s value hadn’t changed. His numeric value had increased from 0.40% to 1.550%, a sudden spike. It was just a few seconds that Jiuyan had touched something.
1.550% — The rate of mental intrusion. White Mist paid attention to the changes in Jiuyan’s values.
All three of them, especially after a recent incident, looked around warily, not daring to touch these objects, afraid of attracting trouble.
Paper scraps, that had suddenly lost their vitality, floated down, as if losing their life essence.
It was Ma Li who tore off a small piece of paper that stuck to his leg.
On the paper, the character for "seal" was written. Jiuyan glanced down at his left foot where a paper human’s remnant was sticking, and said,
"There’s something on your left leg, Jiuyan."
White Mist finally figured out the reason.
The paper figures kept attacking Jiuyan relentlessly.
They hadn’t reacted or fought back originally because they hadn’t expected a fight, and only now had they discovered that these paper figures were not so easy to deal with.
Suddenly, as if on some mysterious command, scraps of paper darted towards Jiuyan, sticking to him closely.
Paper figures were quickly sticking onto his feet.
Jiuyan was constantly moving but was unaware of the seventy-eight paper human remnants that had been attacked; he only paid attention to Chu Qing and Liu. Their teamwork wasn’t that great against those paper figures, which were easily dealt with before.
Although Jiuyan didn’t have the eyes of insight and heavenly peering eyes, he, just a butler in a house, was able to wield an ax and draw a sword, fighting earnestly for the group with a large brain—quite naturally so.
But at the moment he drew out Ruler Ring to strike down those paper figures, he felt something extraordinarily real, though he did not know why.
He knew this was a supernatural realm, and even though absorbing the chilling breath of utter desolation was hard, he could see right through it. He would not stop being dragged incessantly into a lake, being soaked over and over in its waters, experiencing a vision.
Just as Jiuyan suddenly remembered a vision, already transforming in such a manner, this was only his entry into but the first chamber of this supernatural world.
Despite the paper figures not being overly strong, he felt an increasing pressure, a certain fear. Accompanied by various expressions of venomous resentment, pain, and eerie smiles on the paper figures, a child’s shrill, piercing voice echoed endlessly in a dungeon.
"...Dad... Dad... why won’t you play with me?"
Six or seven paper figures burst into the cellar in an instant, wailing and crying with grief-stricken faces.
Though their bodies seemed to mimic being twisted and turned by someone, they faced forward but crawled backward, and their bellies faced upwards, looking like wall-climbing tigers. They were entirely like little children in form, but they crawled on the ground as if imitating the living.
The three people had been on the offensive right from the start, never relenting against their adversaries. However, even Jiuyan, who narrated what had happened, couldn’t even keep up with them, much less the white fog that suddenly dispersed.
The danger was even greater, and it was a place that had accumulated thousands of years of resentful qi... it was the epitome of evil.
It was a tenfold danger zone of crime consciousness and spiritual illness,
In the world before the white fog, there was indeed a close correlation with the world of crime consciousness and spiritual illness.
[The crazy paper versions of them were incredibly agile, moving with remarkable dexterity, all while possessing the same abilities as them.]
The paper figures were covered in bloodstains, after the white fog had rolled back the heavens’ screen.
You would know just by looking at this one point, at this screen of heaven,
That everything here must be twisted and hideous; it was only part of the evil world. Naturally, to Chu Qing, all these results were part of Jiaxie’s research for his human body project.
"We are only in the outer world; the division between the inner and outer worlds also exists, but what is essential is the spiritual world," he said.
Jiuyan, who had a vague understanding of this point in the white fog, said, "But it is not strange at all."
"Could it be that we are in someone’s mind?"
Jiuyan, who was still harboring doubts, said. After all, he had always believed in the white fog, which was still rather cold despite Wujiu’s calm.
"If this is a big chess game in the world of ssoq, and if we, they, we all die, can you explain why they were eliminated yet we can still advance into this place with only three people? It could be a reason why they were eliminated," the white fog, very patient, confronted their question.
"Why are you two having a meeting here without them? Where are Liu Hu and Jiaxie?"
Jiuyan also asked.
"Where is this place?"
Wujiu said.
Remarkably succinct.
[Though Ma Li has not yet appeared, even though Ma Li’s sequence has no image at all——Exorcism ratio: 0.015%. Erleipu has been strongly influenced!]
Wujiu looked toward Ma Li, whose sequence was still completely absent.
Wujiu also came to his senses.
White fog felt an acute and final urgency as he realized that Jiuyan’s eyes lacked any sequence, a sign of red, earnest people.
White fog didn’t even know what this power was; after all, the sequence was too reliant, too much to handle.
[Exorcism ratio: 0.04%. Two sequences are still interchanged——Chu Qing’s sequence grant, another power of his, which is better. Your sequence has already lost its efficacy, Jiuyan, and without your work tool functioning, you, the pitiful little thing who can barely manage on your own, must be informed of one incident: you’ve been invaded by malicious thoughts.]
Although there was one more reference number for the intrusion——and no manifestation of Jiuyan’s partner’s power and birthmark——it was interesting that within the world, at the junction of aggregated bodies, there was an alteration in attention toward the two people.
Wujiu and Xie Ge had entered, and only then did White Fog discover this.
The voice of Jiuyan came through, "Why would you suddenly come here, I remember sinking into the lake... Where is this?"
White fog felt somewhat reassured by this proxy screen, which could still be used.
[If you’ve already entered this, the deepest layer of the evil spiritual world or even the creator of odd hallucinations, there’s no need to think that you’ll see anything strange; everything here is alive. Some are indeed cursed artifacts, while others just embody peculiar fantasies.]
The cellar with cans and jars was growing longer, and every single Buddha statue was covered with bloodshot eyes.
But, although there were no talismans, the cellar still had many cans and jars arranged around its perimeter; he had returned to the cellar once more.
He looked at the cracked and broken hair on his head, which seemed to wriggle like earthworms in an extremely fast manner after reaching the shadowy corner. Frowning, he tore those pieces of hair apart,
Suddenly seeing from between the decorative boards in the ceiling that the hair wrapped one point after another around himself. Feeling an itch at the nape as white mist began to ooze out, his consciousness became clear once again.
In the world within,
...
...
The door of this small room didn’t move an inch as if everything was meaningless. Nevertheless, he attempted to push the door open; Bai stood in the distance in front of the red room.
There was no connection between the three rooms. The three rooms, with their stone monuments of blue, purple, and red, didn’t necessarily have a rising hierarchy, and each had its own special properties, but it was worth mentioning the three rooms all tightly locked—the blue room, the purple room, the red room.
The only difference in the three rooms was that each was wide open in the world within. The reason he was in a place with white mist in the world within,
was that he couldn’t see the white mist most of the time, unless he was specifically called upon to piece together the fragmented summons from the outside world, unlike this place he was currently in.
Bai had already disappeared.
Whether Bai said something like that or not, she only thought that ultimately, Gege would make a choice, and Hongyin did not press her.
The answer she and Jiuyan should choose was in hiding.
"Boss, you and the team must fight with me shoulder to shoulder. It doesn’t matter how much horizontal or vertical, we don’t have to worry about that much,"
The last of the white mist light fell on his nine-five body.
"Those guys on the fifth level have been causing trouble early on. They can’t be ignored; they might join the fight, or the ensuing battles would leave them no choice but to keep their strength, because he is the surveillance team, and the lack lies with him,"
"...Despite being incomplete in feelings, he has some advantages over Jiuyan in that respect. He’s certainly not evil in the world within, even though he might be considered a perversity, and Erleipu might be capable of becoming a hindrance with those eyes... Yet, even though he is ranked in the sequence ordained by the heavens, his main weakness is still his emotional incompleteness,"
Moving his focus up from Liu Hu’s body, he shifted very quickly, without even a moment’s delay from the pressure of the white mist gaze.
The white mist jumped over and landed in the mirror in the center of Liu Hu,
"Xuan Jiang is but a specter in the world within, but I and my team can still suppress him. He’s not actually too dangerous, since the main weakness lies with him..."
"He should have a wealth of combat experience, facing all sorts of malevolent spirits within the world, and he is among the few extremely strong spirited people in the world... He has that advantage over me,"
Although definitively the strongest, Jiaxie was still somewhat unstable and hard to discern; no doubt,
the white mist turned its gaze towards Jiaxie.
The white mist has its own set of spiritual power evaluation criteria—righteousness in the face of evil intentions, fortitude in people with stronger willpower.
Bai was the first to be ruled out by white mist.
"Although it’s not below the belt in the spiritual world, he might still have some power left in him, but comparatively, he has an imminent weakness in this existing world right now..."
"I’m the one standing closest to him, and compared to a few of those rulers, he has that advantage,"
Bai was the first to be noticed by white mist.
He had indeed made a definitive choice by that time, but there was still a definite secret, as white mist recognized from Bai and Hongyin’s conversation.
Absolutely ruling out each option one by one, one doesn’t grab a topic of choice at such a time.
(Since progress is slow albeit, I have no choice but to let go at this point. 05/6 progress complete, I can not use the White Silver Union’s master machine anymore.)
