The Unruly Immortals

Li Huowang looked at Hong Zhong, who remained silent, then shifted his gaze to the other three individuals: the monk, Peng Longteng, and Jin Shanzhao.

Ever since these things had appeared, they had been following him. In the past, he always thought they were hallucinations caused by Xinsu.

But when he heard about the entity known as Ren Zhong from Hong Zhong's mouth, he realized that things might not be what they seemed.

Moreover, Tuoba Danqing might know something about this, but Li Huowang didn't dare to ask, for fear that the other party would deduce that he was Xinsu.

"If they're not hallucinations, then what are they? Why are they following me?" This was the first time Li Huowang seriously considered this question.

Suddenly, Li Huowang remembered Jiang Yingzi, who had appeared and then vanished earlier, "She had appeared because of the shame in my heart and disappeared for the same reason. Could it be..."

Li Huowang felt as if he had touched upon some threads of thought in the darkness, yet it seemed as though they were always separated by a layer of paper, the more he thought about it, the more elusive it became.

Seeing Li Huowang deep in thought, the smile on Hong Zhong's face grew even more pronounced.

"Can't figure it out? How about I help you think, do you know what it means to be a tiger's lackey? They say that after a tiger eats a person, the soul of the deceased becomes a ghost in its belly, which often lures others into being eaten by the tiger. Perhaps you're the tiger, and we're just your lackey ghosts?"

"Lackey ghosts?" Li Huowang looked up at Hong Zhong, who had spoken, full of disbelief in his eyes. "If you really were my lackey ghosts, then what help have you provided me?"

"Aside from being an eyesore, you're completely useless! The only impact you have on me is that when I talk to you, everyone else thinks I'm going crazy!" Li Huowang's tone grew harsh as he spoke.

Hong Zhong's laughter became even more grotesque. "Maybe you are going crazy. I've long thought you were not normal."

Upon hearing this, Li Huowang glared at Hong Zhong with a gaze that seemed capable of consuming someone alive, the veins on his forehead pulsating fiercely.

"Oh~ Glaring at me again? I call you mad, and what can you do to me? Little Huowang~" Hong Zhong leaned back, and on his face, devoid of skin, red muscles twisted into an exaggerated grin.

The mockery from the other stirred a surge of anger in Li Huowang's heart, his mind buzzing violently.

With a "clang," Li Huowang drew his sword with one hand and, with a ferocious expression, stabbed it towards his own neck. "Come on then! Let's walk the path to the underworld together!"

Upon seeing the crimson blood spraying into the air, Hong Zhong immediately panicked. "Hey, hey, hey, what are you doing?"

Before Hong Zhong could finish speaking, a Fangtian Halberd pierced through his abdomen, lifting him into the air and then violently flinging him onto the ground.

It was Peng Longteng wielding the Fangtian Halberd, her body emanating a murderous aura as she frantically attacked Hong Zhong with the weapon in her hands.

The monk quickly ran over, his voice anxious as he urged, "You can't die, Taoist! Don't you still want to rid yourself of Xinsu? To find your woman? Don't give up."

Just then, a writhing tentacle extended from his navel, wrapping around Li Huowang's wrist and pulling tightly.

As Li Huowang sat on the ground, gasping for air, more and more tentacles emerged from his navel, firmly gripping the hand that held the sword.

The feeling was unsettling, making Li Huowang feel as if the intestines in his abdomen were being wildly churned.

Seeing that Li Huowang had finally calmed down for a bit, the monk came back to Hong Zhong and murmured softly, "You better not agitate him anymore. The Taoist is now free of attachments, and he won't hesitate at all to harm himself. Just like kindling, a single spark can ignite it."

Hong Zhong glanced at Li Huowang from a distance, snorted coldly, and hid his body in the nearby river water. "What a lunatic..."

With the monk and the black tentacles' persuasion and obstruction, Li Huowang slowly calmed down. When he pulled the sword blade from his neck, some wriggling black tentacles mixed with a viscous liquid rapidly filled the wound.

The now calm Li Huowang felt very alienated when he thought of his actions just moments before, questioning why he had suddenly become so radical—was that really him?

"Taoist, quick, get moving. People are using those children for alchemy. Saving a life is far better than building many temples. Just keep doing good deeds; Buddha is watching from above."

"If you save enough people, maybe one day Buddha will descend to hеlp you escape the sea of suffering."

The monk's ludicrous words made Li Huowang laugh. He slowly sheathed his bloody sword and then staggered to his feet, heading towards the place where the candle had disappeared earlier.

"Monk, you are not my haunting ghost. You are not someone I killed, and whether you are actually dead is not even certain," Li Huowang said.

The monk's body flickered imperceptibly. He widened his eyes in surprise and asked, "I'm not dead? Then who am I?"

Li Huowang didn't answer him and silently walked into the dim and uneven underground cavern.

He hadn't walked far when a twisted-limbed demon slowly crawled out, extended its long tongue, licked the blood Li Huowang had left on the ground, and then quickly fled away.

Invisible Li Huowang walked silently through the darkness, searching for the vanished demons.

Now that he had found them, it was time to get rid of them. Li Huowang didn't care about anything else at the moment; there was a fire burning within him that he particularly wanted to release.

As he walked, Li Huowang heard some voices, chaotic yet unusually orderly.

Following the sounds, he soon came upon a very eerie scene: a group of demons was striving to sit upright, following a demon in tattered Taoist robes, chanting something.

The leader of the demons, with a black horsetail whisk sticking out of his neck, seemed to be in charge, as he had a thick piece of paper in front of him that he was reading from.

The limbs of these demons looked especially deformed, yet they still coiled their long-nailed feet together.

This sight shocked and felt strange to Li Huowang. "Is this...morning prayers? Are they conducting morning prayers?"

Watching these demons that seemed to be performing morning prayers, Li Huowang's thoughts drifted back to Qingfeng Taoist Temple. The monsters, their delusions of becoming immortal—this familiar scene filled Li Huowang with an urge to vomit, feeling an intense rejection from the inside out.

"What kind of crap is this? They even fucking dare to aspire to immortal cultivation!" Li Huowang clenched his teeth and immediately drew his sword and charged.

"Wait a moment! Taoist! First, look for the infants! If those children can't return, their mothers will be heartbroken," the monk said.

Hearing the monk's words, Li Huowang gradually slowed down, hesitated for a moment, and then let go of the sword hilt, groping around in the surrounding darkness.

Just as Li Huowang was about to search for the infants, a demon quickly crawled towards the group that was holding morning prayers and whispered something to them.