Jia Louluo stood in front of the bathroom mirror, staring at the two toothbrushes in the mouthwash cup—one blue, one pink. After a moment’s consideration, he chose the pink one.
If he absolutely had to share a toothbrush with someone, his first choice was the Phoenix; after all, Phoenix Wisdom King was his biological mother, which was psychologically easier to accept. His second choice was Maha; although Maha’s personal hygiene habits were questionable, the brothers had slept in the same bed as children and had seen each other naked more than once or twice.
Last place went to Zhou Hui. Although his father’s teeth were so dazzlingly white that even TV stars would feel ashamed, the immense psychological discomfort was more terrifying than tooth bacteria, enough to make one’s soul shiver with goosebumps.
Jia Louluo finished brushing his teeth and washing his face. Zhou Hui pushed the door open, yawning, his sturdy upper body bare. He gave his son a cold look: “Morning.”
Jia Louluo said, “Morning.”
The next second, he saw his father walk to the sink and naturally pick up the pink toothbrush, squeezing toothpaste onto it.
“…” Jia Louluo’s expression was indescribable. He turned around and rushed out of the bathroom without a word.
If a large amount of death qi were to be transported from the Four Evil Paths to the Human Realm at once, the only channel was the Hell Blood Sea, which had nine entry points into the Human Realm. Four of these were in deep mountains, two in the deep sea, and one in Japan, which was not under the jurisdiction of National Security Team Six.
Only the remaining two were within the jurisdiction of National Security Team Six—Beijing and H City.
The Beijing exit point had been tightly sealed by Zhou Hui after the Snow Mountain Goddess’s disturbance last time, making it almost impossible for a large amount of death qi to escape. Only H City remained, located in the central plains, sparsely populated, and with its city foundation largely destroyed after the “earth-birth” incident. It was almost obvious that the Demon Lord would choose this as his breakthrough point.
Zhou Hui, as per usual, divided his combat strength into two teams. One team was led by Yu Jingzhong, who could not leave his post under any circumstances, and included Yan Lanyu, Situ Yingzhi, and the cleaner Long Jiu, who always lived in Jianghu legends (i.e., folk tales/mythology), never appeared in broad daylight, but diligently cleaned up everyone’s messes.
The other team was led by Zhou Hui to H City, and included Wu Bei, the Nine-Tailed Fox, and Shenwan Tiansi.
Before leaving, Yu Jingzhong worried about insufficient combat strength and asked Zhou Hui if he should bring the cleaner as well—after all, the cleaner had been to H City, and he was responsible for sealing and cleaning up the large-scale collapsed grottoes during the “earth-born fetus” incident.
“No, let’s not,” Zhou Hui said. “Our second son has pica, he likes to eat live snakes, which is a bit incompatible with Long Jiu’s attributes…”
Jia Louluo’s sensitive ears twitched slightly. Snakes?
“No!” Zhou Hui immediately guessed what he was thinking and sternly said, “Your mother already forbids you from eating venomous snakes, and he’s a proper dragon! Be careful or I’ll go complain to your mom later!”
Jia Louluo walked away expressionlessly.
The group flew from Beijing to H City by plane, taking off in the morning and arriving in the afternoon.
It was Jia Louluo’s first time on a plane, and he was very interested in the large iron bird that could soar in the sky. From the moment they boarded, he kept looking around and even tried to sneak into the cockpit. Fortunately, when Wu Bei came out of the restroom, he saw him peeking in and promptly asked, “Little brother? Little brother, what are you doing?”
“Nothing.” Jia Louluo turned his head, looking indifferent.
Wu Bei looked Jia Louluo up and down in confusion. He saw that Jia Louluo’s gaze was calm, similar to the Phoenix’s, giving off a desireless, unconcerned aura like a glacier or snowfield. Paired with his deeply chiseled, handsome, and steady face, he looked exactly like an improved and upgraded version of Zhou Hui v.2.0.
“…I haven’t had a chance to thank you. Thank you for what you did on the train.” After several seconds of awkward silence, Wu Bei broke the deadlock, “If you hadn’t stopped him, Peacock Wisdom King would have already…”
“It’s nothing.”
“This… did your injuries heal later?”
“Yes, they did.”
The two stood facing each other in the narrow aisle. After a moment, Wu Bei opened his mouth and finally couldn’t help but ask the question that had been buried deep in his heart for a long time: “I’m sorry, I really want to know, why did you and your brother bother taking the train instead of transforming into your true forms and flying directly from Tibet to Beijing?”
Jia Louluo clearly didn’t expect him to ask that. He looked back with a somewhat surprised gaze for a moment and said, “But we don’t know the way.”
Wu Bei: “…”
A flight attendant pushed a meal cart past, curiously observing the rare pair: a tall man in a black long trench coat, with a golden watch strap showing at his wrist, wearing sunglasses like a triad boss, forcibly embracing a sturdy teenager whose face was half-covered by bandages. As they walked towards their seats, the man slapped the teenager’s shoulder vigorously and enthusiastically declared, “Let me give you something as a token of appreciation!”
“No… no.”
“Let me give you something!”
“No.”
“Let me give you a Russian smuggled military GPS!!!”
“…”
Jia Louluo suddenly stopped and turned to Wu Bei, his expression seemingly very pained and hesitant to speak.
Wu Bei: “…?”
The next second, Jia Louluo let out a sudden, unannounced “Wah!” and thoroughly vomited all over Wu Bei.
Two hours later, the plane landed. Wu Bei walked across the tarmac under the gaze of many strange eyes, came to the terminal building, calmly took off his Burberry black trench coat with leather trim, and threw it into the trash can.
H City was completely unchanged compared to a year ago. Mayor Huang showed no signs of losing weight; on the contrary, when Zhou Hui and Li Hu saw him at the airport entrance, they both felt he had gotten fatter. Unlike a year ago, his face was wreathed in smiles, seemingly extremely proud, and he was holding a chubby, wailing baby with a tiger-head hat.
Li Hu asked curiously, “You found a partner?!”
“A relative introduced me to them; they’re a family of weasel demons who moved here from out of town. Five hundred years ago, they were even distantly related to our family, isn’t that fate?” Mayor Huang showed them the wailing, red face of the weasel baby like he was showing off a treasure. “Does he look like me? Doesn’t he look like me? He’s just as sturdy and easy to raise as I was when I was little, hahahaha—!”
Li Hu said sympathetically, “It’s a son, you’re doomed. Definitely don’t have a second one; if your second is also a son, your life is over…”
Jia Louluo frowned, seemingly not understanding why these people were so familiar with a low-level weasel demon. Seeing this, Zhou Hui said flatly, “He’s your mom’s friend in H City… Be careful what you say, this is a friend officially recognized and stamped by the Phoenix.”
Jia Louluo nodded and went to look at the wailing infant in the swaddling clothes. Mayor Huang had been terrified by the Great Demon King Maha during the “earth-born” incident, so he was a little scared to see Maha’s brother, but he couldn’t immediately hide. He watched as Jia Louluo examined the infant for a moment, then suddenly reached out and pointed a finger at the child’s forehead.
A golden light flashed, revealing an incredibly complex Sanskrit inscription, which sank into the infant’s forehead and disappeared.
“This, this is…”
“This is my exclusive Sanskrit seal, the Golden-Winged Great Roc’s Blessing Charm. It can protect the recipient from disasters and extend their life.” Jia Louluo said politely, “My brother caused you trouble here. This small gift is a token of apology.”
Mayor Huang was dumbfounded. He watched Jia Louluo turn and walk away, then couldn’t help but poke Zhou Hui: “…He, he’s really from your Old Zhou family?”
Zhou Hui retorted angrily, “This kid is just showing off; do you really think it works? Come, come, let me draw you a few peace talismans. Original price 8,888,888, now 1% off, credit card payment adds 2% handling fee…”
Zhou Hui rolled up his sleeves, looking for paper and pen. The weasel demon frantically hugged his child and ran off.
Mayor Huang publicly announced that these were officials from the National Land Survey Bureau on official business in H City and arranged for them to stay at the city’s best five-star hotel. Actually, according to Zhou Hui’s temperament, when on a business trip, he liked to stay in good places, eat well, and even take time to inspect entertainment venues, checking on the spiritual civilization construction for the local people. But this time in H City was completely different. He put his luggage in the hotel, announced a half-hour rest time for everyone, and then immediately set off for their destination.
Wu Bei wanted to buy a coat first, and Shenwan Tiansi was hungry and wanted to eat. Luckily, they didn’t bring it up. Li Hu covered her mouth and advised them against it: “You two didn’t experience the last battle to encircle the Hell Path. Old Man Zhou is like a woman with PMS at times like this. If you dare to slack off, he’ll really whip you with his belt buckle…”
Shenwan Tiansi retorted, “Is it that serious? When he went to exorcise a ghost at the Military Commission’s No. 1 boss’s house, didn’t he first lie on their sofa playing Candy Crush for half an hour?”
Li Hu said, “Are you stupid? Last time, he was arguing with Phoenix Four and deliberately delaying coming home to cook. This time, his runaway wife might be returning to her parents’ house with her adulterer. Can the situation be the same?!”
The two suddenly understood. They turned around and saw Zhou Hui standing by the hotel corridor window, smoking. The light from behind cast a gloomy silhouette, half his face shrouded in cigarette smoke, only a faint red glow flickering in the shadows.
Jia Louluo walked forward with his hands in his jeans pockets. Zhou Hui pulled out a cigarette pack from his pocket and tossed it to him. Soon, father and son stood face to face, smoking, not a word exchanged between them, the atmosphere terribly grim.
Wu Bei blinked twice, then turned and tiptoed away.
H City was cloudy today, but the air wasn’t humid, with no signs of rain. In the morning, a barely perceptible breeze blew through the city center, but by afternoon, the wind speed suddenly increased. As they drove from the city to the suburbs, the wind grew tighter and tighter, even making whooshing sounds against the car windows.
Zhou Hui drove silently, sitting in the driver’s seat. Jia Louluo, in the passenger seat, asked, “Where are we going?”
“The upwind area on the outskirts of the city, the boundary where the Blood Sea connects to the Human Realm.”
“…Why upwind?”
Zhou Hui didn’t answer, only saying, “This is Wu Bei’s method for dealing with death qi invasion. You’ll know when we get there.”
Upon reaching the designated location, Jia Louluo rubbed his temples hard as he got out of the car. He saw that the surrounding area was a high plateau, with high-voltage power lines standing on a nearby hill. From atop a mound, half of H City’s buildings were visible. Wu Bei opened the car’s back door, hauled out a huge travel bag, easily over two meters tall, and placed it on the ground with a thump. He unzipped it and began to carry out Buddha statues.
Jia Louluo was completely stunned. He watched as Wu Bei knelt, bringing out over a dozen camphor wood Buddha statues of various sizes and forms. They were uniformly placed on a four-meter square golden cloth spread out on the ground. Then, he stood up and called to Shenwan Tiansi: “That’s about all we could get. Use them sparingly.”
Shenwan Tiansi looked at the Buddha statues: “You ran how many trips to Nepal just to get these few?”
“I visited over twenty temples and donated millions just for incense offerings, okay? I even took the train through Tibet on the way out to avoid being caught at the border, so stop whining.”
“Why didn’t you just order custom ones from Tiantai Mountain?” Li Hu interjected from the side.
“Can’t. They must have received incense offerings to have spiritual power. The more incense and the older they are, the stronger the power.” Shenwan Tiansi knelt down, picked up the nearest Buddha statue, sniffed it, and said, “Hmm, this one’s good.”
Jia Louluo pulled up his jacket hood, narrowing his eyes in confusion, then his eyelids suddenly twitched.
He watched as Shenwan Tiansi, with a strong force, completely broke the Buddha statue into pieces!
Jia Louluo lunged forward a step: “What are you doing!”
“Don’t go over there!” Zhou Hui grabbed Jia Louluo and said in a low voice behind him, “No one except Shenwan Tiansi can touch them. Buddha ash damages divinity, so stay away!”
“Buddha ash?!”
Zhou Hui nodded. He saw Wu Bei drag out another extremely heavy black cloth bag from the car’s back seat. When opened, it revealed a single-person rocket launcher, its barrel gleaming brightly, inscribed with countless densely packed Sanskrit Buddhist scriptures. Even the shoulder strap was drawn with hundreds of 卍 Buddha seals in gold.
Jia Louluo seemed to understand something, but as a divine child who had cultivated Buddhism for thousands of years, he still found the scene a bit hard to accept: “Are you trying to—”
“After the Snow Mountain Goddess Shakti released large amounts of death qi in Beijing, I realized that this stuff would pose a huge threat to the Human Realm and began researching methods to quickly neutralize death qi. Records show that the most effective way to counteract death qi is with the blood of divine beings, such as divine beasts like the Phoenix or Qilin, who naturally possess true fire. Their blood burns death qi very quickly. But if Fan Luo keeps coming to the Human Realm to release death qi every day, I can’t just have your mother cut her wrists every time.”
Zhou Hui’s eyes were somewhat gloomy, as if recalling unpleasant memories, but he had no intention of telling his son.
“Later, I went through your mom’s diary.” He continued his previous topic. “The Phoenix started keeping a diary a long time ago. He even named it ‘Corpse Embracer’, and it contains many anecdotes and folk remedies. I found some entries about Buddha and discovered records about the ashes of burnt Buddha statues being able to ward off demonic invasions. So I had Shenwan Tiansi get a Buddha statue to try, and it really worked.”
Jia Louluo said in astonishment, “But this is destroying Buddha! You’ll be reincarnated into the animal realm in your next life!”
Zhou Hui said, “That’s why I specifically asked Wu Bei to get Buddha statues from Tibet and Nepal. Do you know why only Shenwan Tiansi can do it?”
Jia Louluo turned his head. He saw Shenwan Tiansi break all the Buddha statues, the soil and wood shavings piling up on the golden cloth. Then he took out a lighter and lit it. The flames immediately flared up with crackling sounds, quickly burning the pile of Buddha statue fragments into black ashes within minutes, forming a peak on the undamaged golden cloth.
“This is my image.” Shenwan Tiansi clapped his hands, satisfied. “I’m a living Buddha after all. Some local temples enshrine statues of my previous life and spiritual child. It’s just convenient to borrow them.”
Jia Louluo: “…”
This actually works? Jia Louluo’s feelings could only be described as fantastical.
Wu Bei pulled out several blank cartridges from his bag. The casings were also densely inscribed with countless scriptures. He used a dagger to pry open the blank cartridges, grabbed Buddha ash, mixed it with gunpowder, and filled them until all the cartridges were full. He then reattached the bullet heads, loaded one into the rocket launcher, and arranged the rest in a row at his feet.
Then he shouldered the rocket launcher, aiming its muzzle at the densely built city center of H City in the distance.
—The wandering poet, the dream-seeking traveler, Comrade Wu Bei, who calls for love at the end of the world, truly lives up to his reputation as a famous amateur triad boss from China’s Northeast. His series of actions were swift and skilled, fully demonstrating the professional quality of a modern arms smuggler.
“Death qi invasion usually emerges from earth fissures, forming a hurricane. Once its concentration reaches a certain level, it condenses into a death qi sea covering the ground.” Zhou Hui said in a deep voice, “Watch carefully. When the black wind comes out, Wu Bei will fire the rocket launcher at it, eradicating it in its gaseous stage… We cannot give the death qi any chance to condense into liquid, otherwise, where would we find an ancient divine beast to freshly slaughter?”
Jia Louluo looked at the row of Buddha ash shells on the ground, frowning deeply, and looked up at the city.
Zhou Hui’s plan was actually very thorough. Once the rocket launcher exploded, it could cover a large area with Buddha ash, giving the death qi no chance to form a hurricane. Although people in close proximity would still be in some danger, it was better than high-concentration death qi turning large numbers of people in the city into living corpses.
The group waited quietly on the hillside for a moment, only feeling the wind becoming more intense, and dark clouds swirling high above, forming huge vortices.
A slightly salty, metallic moisture filled the air. A few minutes later, a drop of water fell on the ground in front of them.
Li Hu rubbed her nose, quietly exclaiming in surprise, “This rain…”
At this moment, no one noticed the anomaly, but then Zhou Hui’s pupils suddenly contracted, and he looked up at the sky.
—Raindrops fell, starting transparent, then turning light gray, dark gray, and then sweeping down with tiny black droplets.
“Death qi sea—!” Li Hu suddenly exclaimed, “What’s going on? How is the death qi sea falling directly?!”
Zhou Hui wiped the water from his face and shouted, “Shen Wan and Fox back to the car! Wu Bei! Fire all Buddha ash shells at the city center, don’t aim too precisely!”
Death qi appearing directly in liquid form had never happened in the history of the Human Realm. The only explanation was that it had already condensed into water due to excessive concentration on its way from Hell to the Human Realm. If that was the case, a small amount of Buddha ash would be useless. All Buddha ash explosions had to be fired at once, covering the entire city center in thick smoke and dust, to maximize the eradication of the death qi sea.
However, this was very dangerous. No one knew what violent reactions such high concentrations of Buddha ash and death qi sea would produce. Perhaps it could trigger widespread explosions in an instant.
Wu Bei frowned tightly, pulled the trigger, and with a sudden “Bang!”, recoiled half a step as the shell shot out.
The Buddha ash shell soared across the sky in a white streak, flew over the city, and exploded with a crash!
In an instant, the Buddha ash dispersed, forming a gray mist that enveloped the city, raining down with the water. Then, the death qi entangled in the rainwater reacted with the Buddha ash, generating countless dazzling electric sparks, like hundreds of thousands of bright little snakes hissing through the air.
The scene was spectacular. Many people in the city center must have been looking up from the streets and windows, their expressions dumbfounded.
Wu Bei quickly loaded the second single-person rocket launcher, but Jia Louluo grabbed his hand: “Wait!”
He looked up sharply at Zhou Hui and said sternly, “Buddha ash breaks magic and harms divinity. Mother restored the Demon Lord at the cost of her heart’s blood to take his divinity to save Maha’s life! What if the Buddha ash spreads widely and the Demon Lord’s divinity is burned again when he descends? Even Phoenix Mahamayuri could be severely burned by this high concentration of Buddha ash!”
Zhou Hui, however, stood in the rain, quietly looking at him.
Jia Louluo held Wu Bei’s hand tightly, not letting go, and angrily said, “Father!”
“…Last time you asked me if I would stop the Phoenix if he killed the Demon Lord and gave the Demon King’s divinity to Maha? At that time, I said it was the Phoenix’s own business.”
Zhou Hui paused, a cold light flickering in his eyes, and said calmly, “I really didn’t intend to stop him, provided the Demon Lord truly dies by his hand in the end… not by mine.”
