Chapter 17: Thicket Village (Seventeen)

Li Yulin was startled by his words and stammered, “What… what do you mean? Did you… did you swallow the Buddha statue?”

“Idiot,” Fu Wuxuan shot him a sideways glance. “He swallowed the Six-Armed Bodhisattva’s yin soul.”

The old monk nodded. “That’s right. I used Weird Power to lock down Its yin soul, preventing It from going out and harming people. That trick worked well—Thicket Village had two years of peace.”

“But in the last two years, Its Weird Power has grown stronger, and I’ve found it harder to keep It under control. One night, It caught me off guard, and Its yin soul escaped my suppression. I don’t know where It fled to.”

Yun Xueqing pieced it together. “So you came down the mountain today for two reasons: first, to search for It, and second, without the Six-Armed Bodhisattva’s yin soul suppressing you, you could no longer hold back your instincts and came down to devour human corpses.”

The old monk nodded in pain. “It was my fault. I let It loose to wreak havoc on the world. That year, when I gave the Six-Armed Bodhisattva statue to the village chief, it was already a mistake… It was wrong from the very beginning.”

Yun Xueqing fell silent for a moment before suddenly saying, “Perhaps it wasn’t your fault. Perhaps It planned it all along.”

He rolled up his wide sleeve, revealing the “plague” character on his arm.

His fair-skinned arm was covered in pus-filled boils. The flesh was torn open and rotting, with yellow pus dripping and pooling together. At first glance, it looked like the face of the Six-Armed Bodhisattva—utterly nauseating.

The old monk was horrified. “The plague from ten years ago! It’s back!”

Li Yulin understood too and said angrily, “It was that Six-Armed bastard spreading the plague! It was all Its scheme! That thing is so insidious!”

Hearing his words, the old monk couldn’t hold back his tears, murmuring, “Wrong… It was wrong from the start! It was my fault!”

Fu Wuxuan suddenly asked, “Since the Six-Armed one escaped, what about the Bodhidharma Sword that suppresses It?”

The old monk composed himself and said slowly, “When I devoured Its yin soul, I saw a sword stabbed into Its body… That must have been the Bodhidharma Sword.”

He paused subtly on the word “sword,” but Fu Wuxuan didn’t pay attention to the minor detail and pressed, “So where’s the Bodhidharma Sword now…”

The old monk replied, “If the Bodhidharma Sword isn’t on the Six-Armed one, then it should be in my stomach.”

“What! The sword’s in your stomach!” Li Yulin’s mouth gaped in shock. “Doesn’t that mean we’d have to cut you open to get it out!”

Yun Xueqing imperceptibly frowned.

“No need,” the old monk said, startled by his words. He quickly added, “My stomach has a small inner space. You just need to jump in through my mouth to retrieve the sword directly.”

“What! Into your mouth!” Li Yulin reacted strongly.

This old man was a Man-Eating Ghost who not only ate people but was a terrifying Weird!

Weirds were full of lies—not a single word could be trusted!

He was probably saying this to trick them into becoming his dinner!

Afraid the other two would agree, Li Yulin waved his hands frantically. “No way, absolutely not! I’d rather die than go into your mouth!”

He forced out a dry excuse: “What if you have bad breath… No way, absolutely not!”

The old monk didn’t try to persuade him and just shook his head helplessly, falling silent.

“I believe him.”

Yun Xueqing, who had been quiet, suddenly spoke. “I believe his tears.

“Since entering this temple, the old monk had cried twice, each time more anguished than the last. He believed the emotion in those tears couldn’t be faked.

“If even genuine pain could be pretended, then what in the world was real?

“For once, Fu Wuxuan nodded too, saying objectively, “Mm, I believe you aren’t deceiving us, old master. You still have a human side because true Weirds can’t shed tears—they have no tear glands. Since you’re still human, there’s no reason to lie to us.”

Of course, even if the old monk was tricking them, he had ways to kill him from inside.

Li Yulin had felt a flicker of emotion from Yun Xueqing’s words, but Fu Wuxuan’s made it vanish. “Shut up, you science nerd!”

But thanks to Fu Wuxuan, Li Yulin’s mind started thinking of scientific methods. “The Bodhidharma Sword is probably made of iron, right? If so, could we use a magnet to fish it out!”

The other three: “…”

It was an unexpected idea.

Before they could respond, Li Yulin shot it down himself. “But where would we get a magnet? No one carries one around—unless they’re crazy…”

As soon as he finished, Yun Xueqing pulled a brick-sized magnet from his sleeve. “Here.”

Li Yulin: “…”

Damn, he really met a crazy one.

Everyone’s expressions varied, especially Li Yulin’s, which was more colorful than a palette. Only Yun Xueqing looked normal.

Magnets were common forging materials for swords; having a few wasn’t strange.

It was Li Yulin’s idea, so he took the magnet and dutifully found a long rope in the temple, tying it on.

Once prepared, he turned to the old monk, scratching his head awkwardly. “Uh, mind opening your mouth?”

The old monk: “…”

Resigned to his fate, he transformed into his Corpse-Eating Ghost form and opened his mouth wide.

Li Yulin eyed the Corpse-Eating Ghost, as tall as the Buddha hall, and felt a chill. Gripping the rope’s end, he closed his eyes and tossed the magnet into its mouth.

The magnet entered with a bang—he’d missed, hitting the front teeth.

Hearing the Corpse-Eating Ghost hiss, Li Yulin winced, his own teeth aching in sympathy. Forgetting his fear, he scratched his head embarrassedly. “Sorry.”

He maneuvered the rope, sweeping around before pulling it up—nothing, as expected.

He sighed deeply. “Looks like we really have to go in ourselves.”

Yun Xueqing glanced at Fu Wuxuan, meeting his eyes. The other nodded.

Understanding, he grabbed Li Yulin’s right arm while Fu Wuxuan took the left.

Li Yulin’s eyes widened. “Big shots, what are you doing!”

Fu Wuxuan chuckled lightly. “Can’t tell? In you go!”

They lifted him into the air and tossed him straight into the Corpse-Eating Ghost’s mouth.

With the biggest obstacle gone, the two didn’t dawdle and jumped in after him.

They immediately heard Li Yulin’s breakdown shout: “Why’d you push me! There are so many corpses here!”

Looking around, they saw mountains of animal corpses, with a few human ones mixed at the top.

They were the people from the secret room whose souls had been eaten.

Li Yulin muttered softly, “Looks like that old geezer didn’t lie after all.”

Fu Wuxuan warned, “You’re still in his stomach—watch your mouth.”

He immediately straightened up, bowed rigidly. “Sorry!”

Ignoring his comical behavior, the two searched for a path through the corpse mountain.

The stench was overwhelming—even without germaphobia, no one wanted to stay.

Li Yulin quietly suggested, “What if the Bodhidharma Sword is buried in this corpse pile?”

Fu Wuxuan fell strangely silent. “It shouldn’t be that disgusting…”

Before he finished, Li Yulin, digging through the corpses, yelled excitedly, “Found it!”

Fu Wuxuan: “…”

It really was that disgusting.

He walked over and saw Li Yulin holding a plain iron sword. He shook his head. “Not this one.”

After all that effort, Li Yulin’s find was dismissed lightly. Unconvinced, he said, “You’ve never seen the Bodhidharma Sword—how do you know? What if it’s plain like this?”

Fu Wuxuan laughed at the fool. “You read plenty of novels. This sword has zero Weird Power—think it’s the one?”

“Oh.” Li Yulin looked disappointed.

Yun Xueqing pointed to a glowing circle in the distance. “Maybe check there.”

They looked over.

Opposite the corpse mountain was a dark red light circle, like a hole leading to some entrance.

The three approached. Yun Xueqing touched the circle, confirmed no danger, and passed through expressionlessly.

The scene changed.

A vast space of pure white nothingness, with a blade stabbed in the center.

The blade was slender overall, its straight edge more like a Tang horizontal knife than a Japanese one. The blade was thin as a cicada’s wing, emanating chilling cold that gripped the soul.

Was this the Bodhidharma Sword? Or more accurately, the Calamity Blade.

He waited, but Fu Wuxuan and the others didn’t enter. It must have been isolated by the Weird Domain.

After hesitating, he stepped forward and gripped the hilt.

The blade hummed, the space trembled, and in a blink, the scene shifted.

The blank room became a blood-red wasteland.

The sky was blood-red, raining blood. Distant mountain ranges were deep black, coldly thrusting into the sky.

Black-feathered crows flew from the black mountains. Yun Xueqing followed their path and saw a figure atop one.

Or perhaps not a person.

It stood sideways, hair in a high ponytail draping to Its waist, wearing a wide black-patterned haori, gripping a drawn long knife.

Yun Xueqing watched for a while, heart pounding.

As he tried to look away, their eyes met.

Bright blue eyes, inhuman, with ominous double pupils. Being stared at by It intensified the heart palpitation.

Cold sweat dripped down Yun Xueqing’s back. He hadn’t felt such pressure in ages—like an unbearable weight, suffocating him.

Uncomfortably clutching his chest, he blinked, and the “person” on the mountain vanished.

But the pressure didn’t lessen—it grew!

Tensing, he scanned around and saw something approaching at inconceivable speed from afar!