Chapter 43
Chapter 43
Inside the room, the temperature plummeted and moisture crystallized into frost.
“Auntie Miao” was trapped inside a sphere of water. She struggled desperately but could not escape.
“He dared grant you divine investiture! He usurped the divine authority of that place… You will die! All of you will die!”
She shrieked the curse, but the water gradually froze. Spikes of ice began piercing into her body.
“No… You can’t do this!”
“Auntie Miao’s” voice trembled. “You cannot treat me this way. I represent the power of calamity. You will enrage the calamity itself…”
Lin Xiaoyu remained perfectly calm and merely watched her.
Soon, the sphere froze solid. A stream of black mist abruptly shot out of Auntie Miao’s body and slithered like a black snake, attempting to escape.
Its power was tremendous. In a desperate burst, it actually cracked the ice. Lin Xiaoyu raised a hand, however, and a scarlet dragon shadow descended to suppress it. The black snake instantly became immobile and froze solid.
Lin Xiaoyu approached and extended her hand. The black mist was compressed into a small block of ice, which she tucked into her sleeve.
She could suppress the black mist, but she still could not scatter it completely as Li Que had done.
Then she looked at Auntie Miao.
The ice surrounding her aunt gradually melted, turned to vapor, and disappeared.
“Auntie…”
Lin Xiaoyu called softly. When the woman did not respond, she took out a piece of White Rabbit milk candy, removed the wrapper, and placed it in Auntie Miao’s mouth.
After a while, Auntie Miao’s fingers twitched. At last, she opened her eyes with difficulty.
“Xiaoyu…”
Her face was pale and she remained weak, but her voice was urgent.
“Leave this place quickly… The black mist is here…”
“I’ve already caught the black mist,” Lin Xiaoyu said. “It can’t hurt anyone again.”
Auntie Miao froze. Only then did she realize what had happened. She looked at Lin Xiaoyu in astonishment.
“You… inherited the divine authority of the five Water Gods?”
“Wonderful… That’s wonderful!”
She was overwhelmed with excitement.
“No. The divine authority I inherited didn’t belong to the five uncles.”
Lin Xiaoyu raised a hand. A red cord appeared around her wrist, with the faint shadow of a scarlet dragon coiled around it.
“This is…”
Auntie Miao stared at the cord in profound shock.
“This came from that place?!”
Lin Xiaoyu asked curiously, “Auntie, what is that place?”
Even the black mist possessing her had seemed extremely wary of it.
“I don’t know either. I only heard the five Water Gods say that their divine authority was actually very weak. If they wanted to oppose the black mist, they had to find the place where gods are born…”
Auntie Miao sighed. “But the five Water Gods eventually gave up. That place has rules. It will not grant divine investiture to anomalies.”
“Xiaoyu, how did you do it? Did you enter that place?”
Her eyes brimmed with curiosity.
“No. Sir gave this to me. The divine investiture… must have come from him too.”
Lin Xiaoyu’s expression grew complicated. She briefly recounted what had happened.
Auntie Miao was left dumbfounded. Only after a long silence did she murmur,
“Something the five Water Gods did not even dare ask for back then…”
Yet Lin Xiaoyu had obtained it with such ease.
“Xiaoyu, that teacher of yours… is truly extraordinary.”
Auntie Miao’s expression turned solemn. “But helping you this time may bring him a great deal of trouble.”
Lin Xiaoyu looked puzzled.
“Many anomalies in this world are like the five Water Gods. They want the divine authority of that place, but its rules bar their way, so they can only become ‘wild deities.'”
Auntie Miao had once served the five Water Gods and knew many secrets.
“But now, despite being an anomaly, you’ve successfully received divine investiture… The other wild deities won’t remain still.”
“And you won’t be able to hide. A god who has received divine investiture is like a light in the darkness. Many anomalies will see you. Even the black mist that represents calamity will not permit you to exist…”
Worry covered her face.
Lin Xiaoyu gently gritted her teeth.
“I’m not afraid of them!”
“And Sir… certainly won’t be afraid!”
Auntie Miao nodded. Things had already reached this point, and worry would accomplish nothing.
“Wait…”
Suddenly, she seemed to realize something.
“Why do I… feel different from before?”
“Joy, worry… Are these human emotions?”
She looked lost.
Auntie Miao was an S-class anomaly who had followed the five Water Gods for many years. Her spiritual awareness naturally far exceeded that of an ordinary anomaly.
But awareness did not mean possessing emotions. For an anomaly, the birth of emotion was an uncrossable chasm!
Yet now…
“Once you eat the candy, you learn how to be happy. Once you learn happiness, you can learn sadness and all the other emotions too.”
Lin Xiaoyu took out another piece of White Rabbit milk candy and offered it to her aunt.
“Sir gave these to me. Auntie, have another one!”
Auntie Miao was even more shocked. Had Teacher Li given her something like this as well?
…
Not long afterward, Lin Xiaoyu and Auntie Miao emerged from the house.
“Well? Did you get what you came for?” Li Que immediately asked as he stood.
Lin Xiaoyu nodded.
Auntie Miao, meanwhile, was visibly excited.
“You’re Teacher Li, aren’t you? Teacher Li, thank you!”
“If you hadn’t come all this way, I would still have been under that thing’s spell. I nearly harmed Xiaoyu…”
She was like an entirely different person now, her manner extraordinarily warm.
Qin Shiyu stared at Auntie Miao in disbelief.
The woman had clearly broken free of the black mist’s control completely.
Qin Shiyu also noticed that Lin Xiaoyu seemed to have undergone some kind of change. The red knot around her wrist had disappeared!
Had Lin Xiaoyu completed the containment?
Even after witnessing her become a demigod the night before, Qin Shiyu could not help marveling anew.
Destroying the black mist and completing the Water God’s containment ritual-any other faction would have to pay an unimaginable price for even a chance of accomplishing either feat.
Yet everything had come so easily to Lin Xiaoyu.
She had truly found herself a wonderful teacher.
“There’s no need to thank me. I’m just glad you two cleared up the misunderstanding,” Li Que said happily. “After all, you’re the only family Xiaoyu has left in this world.”
Auntie Miao nodded firmly. “Don’t worry, Teacher Li. I’ll guard Xiaoyu’s family property on Five Dragons Mountain. Whenever she returns, she will always be the mistress of this place!”
“Oh, that’s right. You like eating insects, Teacher Li. I’ll fry some more for you!”
She hurried toward the kitchen.
“No, no, that’s all right!”
Li Que hastily stopped her and rose to his feet.
“We still have matters to deal with, so we can’t stay long. It’s time for us to head back.”
After all, Gao Shen was still tied up at the old wooden house!
Unable to persuade them to stay, Auntie Miao could only sigh.
“All right. Thank you again, Teacher Li!”
“Please take good care of Xiaoyu from now on!”
Li Que nodded in agreement, then left with Lin Xiaoyu and the others.
Auntie Miao stood at the entrance, watching them descend the mountain.
Just before their figures disappeared, she suddenly called out at the top of her lungs,
“Xiaoyu! Study hard when you get back to school, and listen to Teacher Li! Do you hear me?”
“I hear you, Auntie!”
Lin Xiaoyu’s voice drifted back from far away.
Standing before her home, Auntie Miao felt an inexplicable touch of sorrow.
“Is this what it feels like for humans to miss someone?”
She shook her head gently, returned to the courtyard, and closed the gate.
Then she looked up at the wooden rack.
The black goat hanging there abruptly began to change. Human hands and feet gradually emerged.
It was Zuo Yuanfeng.
He had died a gruesome death!
Inside the pen, the herd of goats suddenly began bleating. Their cries slowly transformed into human exclamations.
“Ah…”
“Are we… human again?”
Shi Xuan, Zuo Qingting, Wang Zhong, and the others were overwhelmed with excitement.
But when Auntie Miao looked toward them, every one of them became unbearably tense.
“We’ll leave immediately! We swear we’ll never set foot here again!” Zuo Qingting cried in terror.
He had personally watched Auntie Miao gut his third uncle, tear out his tendons, and skin him.
It had been horrifyingly brutal.
“Which one of you is Xu Changjiang?” Auntie Miao asked.
Xu Changjiang’s face was pale. “I am.”
Auntie Miao nodded. “Xiaoyu told me that you and Teacher Li were on fairly good terms.”
“Take your people and leave the mountain.”
Xu Changjiang was ecstatic. He immediately glanced toward Shi Xuan.
“Director Shi, we’re safe!”
Shi Xuan let out a long breath of relief and nodded. Then he said quietly, “Bring Wang Zhong too.”
Doubt flashed through Xu Changjiang’s eyes, but he nodded anyway.
The three immediately left the pen.
“Director…”
Zuo Qingting’s expression was wretched. He pleaded, “For the sake of all my years of hard work for the Anomaly Suppression Bureau… could you take me too?”
“I can tell you everything about the Eclipse Organization. I know I was wrong. I’ll turn over a new leaf from this day forward…”
Shi Xuan merely shook his head. “You don’t know you were wrong. You only know you’re about to die.”
Zuo Qingting’s expression twisted. Anger suddenly flared in his eyes.
“Why should we accept this? Everyone, attack together! Fight our way out!”
The other Zuo family anomaly wielders finally reacted to his cry.
“We want to leave too!”
“That’s right! We’re leaving!”
They tried to charge out, only to transform into black goats again. They rammed helplessly against the fence, looking both feeble and absurd.
Xu Changjiang, Shi Xuan, and the others grew solemn at the sight.
Auntie Miao’s Beastmaking was truly unfathomable.
“You’re friends of Teacher Li, so please eat something before you leave. I would hate to be an inconsiderate host.”
Auntie Miao handed Xu Changjiang the remaining half-plate of fried insects.
Fear crept across his face.
“Don’t worry. I’ve treated these. They will only benefit you,” Auntie Miao said.
Shi Xuan was the first to step forward. He accepted the plate, picked one up, tossed it into his mouth, then chewed and swallowed. His eyes immediately lit up.
“These anomalous insects can make my anomalous entity… grow stronger?”
He was overjoyed.
Xu Changjiang brightened as well and immediately joined him.
Wang Zhong licked his lips and moved to take one, but Shi Xuan stopped him.
“This is powerful nourishment, best suited to older men like us. Little Wang, young people already run hot enough. You’d better not have any.”
Wang Zhong was speechless.
…