Chapter 221
Chapter 221
As the man spoke, Feng Lishu glared at him with bloodshot eyes, coughing up clots of blood one after another.
Suddenly, she laughed. Her chest heaved from the force of it, and despair gradually filled her eyes.
By the moment she drew her final breath, Feng Lishu could no longer make a sound.
Her lips moved several times, as though she were saying, “Brother Qiu… you’re… so cruel…”
The man tightened his grip once more. He gritted his teeth, the corners of his mouth drawn taut.
And just like that, Feng Lishu died at his hands.
She hit the ground with a heavy thud. She did not even twitch before her life slipped away.
The ground began to shake violently. Instinctively, I touched my right cheek.
Feng Lishu was dead. She had been the dominant party in the Symbiotic Curse, essentially the mother parasite. What would her death do to me?
The man took out a spotless white handkerchief and meticulously wiped the blood from his hands as he said to me, “Ah Li, I’ve come to take you back to the Phoenix Clan. Once we return, we’ll fulfill our marriage agreement. You will become the most honored woman in the Phoenix Clan, and no one will ever dare demean you again.”
Without a shred of reluctance, he tossed away the blood-soaked handkerchief. It landed squarely over Feng Lishu’s face, covering her eyes that remained wide open in death.
He walked toward me one step at a time and held out his hand. “Come, Ah Li. Let’s go home.”
But all I could think about was Feng Lishu’s gruesome death and the words she had mouthed before she died.
Brother Qiu… Brother Qiu…
Feng Lishu had used that form of address in front of me before.
Whenever she said it, her tone was unmistakably different.
It carried a strange, lingering tenderness.
I realized almost instantly that the relationship between Feng Lishu and the man before me was far from ordinary.
That suddenly reminded me of the dream I’d had before.
The dream in which I was pinned down inside a massive pit while Feng Lishu passionately kissed a man at its edge…
Could that man have been this Brother Qiu?
I instinctively tried to retreat, but at that moment, the mouth on my chest began moving again, chanting an incantation over and over.
Countless roots sprouted from the Cangwu Nether Seal, streaking toward the man in threadlike strands.
The hand he had extended toward me immediately formed a hand seal. A blast of black energy erupted from his palm and hurtled toward the roots.
The instant the roots collided with the black energy, a shower of sparks burst forth and set the black energy ablaze.
Flames flared up, burning the black energy away in the blink of an eye.
Just as the man was about to unleash a second blast of black energy, a sharp pain pierced the back of my neck. Immediately afterward, an unknown force seized my entire Soul Body and dragged me away. Wind roared in my ears, intermingled with what sounded like chanting.
Boom!
When I opened my eyes again, I found myself staring at Jiang Sique.
He was still holding the Silver Needle and watching me nervously.
The moment he saw me open my eyes, he clapped his hands in excitement. “It worked! I finally pulled you back!”
I was still inside the same underground cavern.
I had returned to my physical body.
Beside me, Jiang Bin lay unconscious on the ground, but his limbs were relaxed and his expression peaceful.
Next to him, Du Chan was awake as well.
Her eyes were red as she looked at me.
She did not know who I was.
But when Jiang Sique transferred the characters for “Du Chan” from the back of her neck onto mine, our souls must have fallen into sync and resonated with each other during that time.
Tentatively, I asked, “Du Chan, you… saw her too, didn’t you?”
Du Chan nodded hard. “She’s my older twin sister.”
“Yes. She’s your older twin sister, Du Lian. But she died when she was three years old. The Du Lian you see now is only a puppet.” I needed to make that clear first. I was afraid Du Chan might become trapped in the horrifying scene of Du Lian’s death and suffer some lasting psychological harm.
But Du Chan was clearly stronger than I’d imagined.
She nodded to show that she understood, then turned her concern to me instead. “Sister, are you okay?”
To be honest, even I didn’t know what condition I was in right then.
True, Jiang Sique had successfully pulled back my Souls at the critical moment, but far too much had happened during the time I existed as a Soul Body.
And that was without even considering everything that had happened outside. There was also the face that had suddenly appeared within my Souls — and the mouth on that face, which incessantly chanted incantations, summoned the Cangwu Nether Seal, and commanded it to attack…
When had that face taken root as a parasite in my Souls?
It seemed incredibly powerful.
What worried me now was why it had parasitized my Souls in the first place.
Was it waiting until the time was ripe to use Body Possession on me?
Would it become a second Feng Lishu?
The moment I thought of Feng Lishu, the sight of her final struggles and the words she’d screamed began replaying in my mind.
Only after calming down did I seize upon one crucial detail.
When that face appeared and summoned the Cangwu Nether Seal, Feng Lishu had mentioned the “Grand Witch.”
Could that face belong to the Grand Witch?
The Grand Witch of the Phoenix Clan had lived on Cangwu Mountain and was known as the Fire Witch Goddess. Which brought me back to the same question: Why had that face parasitized my Souls?
Just thinking about it made my skin crawl.
“Sister, what’s wrong?”
I had become lost in thought. Du Chan waved a hand in front of my eyes, jolting me back to my senses. A little flustered, I said, “Nothing. My Soul Body has only just fused with my physical body, so I’m still a little disoriented.”
With that, I rose to my feet and looked at Jiang Sique. “It’s chaos outside. Stay here and don’t wander off. Wait until I come back for you.”
I had barely started to leave when Du Chan grabbed me. “Sister, you can’t go outside right now.”
Jiang Sique also stepped in front of me. “Shopkeeper Xiao Jiu, you can’t go out. Seventh Master gave us strict instructions.”
I frowned. “Why not?”
I knew what was happening in Tafeng Village, and I knew what Liu Junyan and the others were doing. I had to go help them.
Jiang Sique pointed above us. “Shopkeeper Xiao Jiu, listen to that thunder.”
That’s right — the heavenly lightning!
Back at the underground palace, the thunder of the heavenly lightning had already been directly overhead.
So much time had passed, yet the heavenly lightning still hadn’t struck. It was probably being held back by the spell formation encompassing Tafeng Village.
As long as I stayed hidden underground, I was relatively safe.
But the moment I surfaced, it would probably lock on to me immediately, and I would have to face the Calamity!
The Karmic Burden Feng Lishu and the others had tailored specifically for me had been accumulating until today. If I took the full force of this Calamity, even if it didn’t kill me, it would still leave me half-dead.
But I couldn’t spend the rest of my life hiding underground, could I?
I opened my mouth to speak, only for a deafening thunderclap to erupt without warning. The entire cavern shook as if it were about to collapse, and dirt rained from the ceiling.
My ears rang for a long while before I finally recovered.
Then I heard Jiang Sique murmur, “The first bolt of heavenly lightning has finally fallen. They did it…”