Chapter 477 - Spiritual Sin
Li Huowang was convinced that Zhuge Yuan had deep feelings for that good friend of his the moment he saw the latter's exceptionally sorrowful expression. Zhuge Yuan was a righteous person, and he was always willing to go to great lengths for his friends.
One could only imagine just how much he had suffered after being forced to kill a friend with his own hands.
Zhuge Yuan added, “The spiritual sin who took away my good friend became capable of using the techniques and powers of my friend. It also grew even stronger.
“Brother Li, I know that the Surveillance Bureau has always been talking about just how formidable spirits can be, but you must be careful against a spiritual sin. You might be fighting a spiritual sin, but you might be fighting something else the next moment.”
"Spiritual Sins are capable of changing hosts, which is the reason they're both troublesome and dangerous to handle. The best way to take one down is to ambush it."
“Once you encounter a spiritual sin, you must be absolutely certain of success before you make a move against it. Otherwise, you'll suffer a fate worse than death if it manages to capture you. They’re all about sin and less about the spirit, after all.”
Zhuge Yuan was about to say something, but he paused. There was a monkey carcass lying by his feet. The carcass was dry, and the monkey's mouth was agape. Its limbs were twisted, and its belly was split open. Its rotten innards had splattered all over the ground, creating what looked like a flower.
“If we go by what you said, Brother Zhuge, does that mean we've just found the culprit behind this guy's death?” Li Huowang asked.
Zhuge Yuan nodded solemnly in reply.
Li Huowang became extremely cautious as he moved slowly into the depths of the peach blossom forest. The number of twisted and deformed corpses increased as Li Huowang walked deeper and deeper into the forest.
Eventually, he saw not just animal carcasses but human corpses twisted in bizarre shapes as well.
“Shh! Quiet! I think I heard something just now,” Li Huowang exclaimed at the monk. The monk was chanting a mantra for the deceased. Li Huowang fell on all fours and pressed his ear on the earth, listening intently. What are these noises? Breathing?
Whooo, whooo, whooo...
Rhythmic noises of what sounded like someone's breathing reached Li Huowang’s ears through the ground. Li Huowang gripped his sword tightly and moved slowly toward where the sound was coming from.
As the noises grew louder, Li Huowang picked up the pace as the noises grew louder. A thicket of branches stood before him, and Li Huowang jumped into it. Upon landing, the scene unfolding before him made his pupils quiver.
A massive pile of flesh, bones, and organs was on a large clearing up ahead. There were too many of them that a tiny lake of gore had been created from the flesh, bones, and innards.
Whooo, whooo, whooo... The pile of flesh expanded and contracted as it breathed. Streams of red light fell from up above, piercing the crevices of the flesh.
Li Huowang looked up and saw that the red light was coming from the setting sun. The entity before him was actually feasting on the sunset itself.
Am I staring at a spiritual sin? Li Huowang thought.
Squeak!
A mouse ran toward the pile of flesh in the distance and gnawed on a shriveled corpse.
The pile of flesh trembled just then. It converged at one point before assembling itself into a doe that was as huge as a one-story house. The deer had six legs and large antlers that looked like two large peach trees. It had fur similar to the colors of a rotting rainbow—dull yet colorful.
Li Huowang instantly realized that it was a doe, as a deceased fawn was hanging out of its nether region. The fawn seemed to have died during birth.
“Brother Zhuge, what is the spiritual sin parasitizing on?” Li Huowang asked in a low voice as he stared at the massive deer in the distance.
“Yingzhao. The common folk call it a Nine-Colored Deer.”
Nine-Colored Deer? Li Huowang turned and saw the deer's rainbow-colored fur.
The spiritual sin suddenly made a move. It left afterimages in the air as it dashed toward the shriveled corpse where the mouse was located. It would have crushed the mouse with just a step, but it chose not to do so. Instead, it trapped the mouse’s tail with its plum-shaped hooves, and then it pressed down on the mouse’s hind legs with its other hoof before moving its hoof back and forth.
The mouse shrieked in pain, but the Nine-Colored Deer showed no intention of stopping. It raised its head and neighed with delight. Once the mouse’s four limbs had been crushed into meat paste, the Nine-Colored Deer lifted one hoof and pressed hard on the mouse, slowly crushing the mouse beneath its hoof.
The Nine-Colored Deer did not stop pressing down on the mouse until the mouse had vomited its innards. Upon seeing the gory sight, the Nine-Colored Deer seemed to reveal a satisfied look before transforming into the same pile of flesh, blood, and innards.
Li Huowang's expression was ugly as he struggled to maintain his composure from the revolting sight. Then, he spoke in a low voice, “Brother Zhuge, has that entity gone mad, or does it simply enjoy killing?”
“It's a spiritual sin. Heaven and earth are indifferent to all living beings, and you are staring at the sin from both heaven and earth. Its birth itself is a kind of mistake.” Zhuge Yuan seemed to have recalled something, and his expression became ugly.
“Brother Zhuge, what’s the best strategy against that Nine-Colored Deer?” Li Huowang asked. He was getting ready to make a move.
“It consumes and uses the rosy light of the sunset[1]. Take a closer look at its body. Locate where the light of the sunset is leaking out of its body.”
“Okay,” Li Huowang said. He gnashed his teeth as his figure arched slightly as if he were a leopard.
The spiritual sin in the distance seemed to have sensed something. The pile of flesh, blood, and innards transformed once again into the figure of a deer. Then, it looked around and scanned the peach forest.
A Hong Zhong mahjong tile tumbled through the air, landing steadily on a peach tree.
The spiritual sin turned to look at where the noise had come from, and that was when Li Huowang rushed out from behind a tree. He whipped out his bronze coin sword and slashed out at the spiritual sin.
A crisp noise echoed, and the flesh that took the brunt of Li Huowang's attack sizzled. It emitted a plume of black smoke and withered like dead flowers. The attack from the evil-banishing sword was effective, but it failed to deliver a fatal blow.
The spiritual sin let out a cry. It returned to its original form and charged at Li Huowang.
A sea of flesh, blood, and innards shrouded Li Huowang in an instant, but he emerged unscathed. He had just switched positions with his illusion.
“Kill!” Li Huowang roared, and the purple-tassel sword slashed fiercely at the Nine-Colored Deer, carving open a massive wound.
However, the laceration healed rapidly. Zhuge Yuan saw that and said, “ Brother Li, this is not going to work. Its body is just its shell. You need to attack the spiritual sin directly inside of it for your attacks to be effective!"
A red light burst out of the Nine-Colored Deer.
Li Huowang deflected it with his sword in mid-air. The red light ricocheted off Li Huowang's sword and struck down quite a few peach trees.
“What does it look like?” Li Huowang asked while retreating to create some distance between them.
“You can’t see it. Living humans with the ten emotions and eight sufferings cannot see what it really looks like.”
“Since we can't see it, then so be it!” Li Huowang exclaimed. His expression turned fierce as he removed his red Daoist robes. Then, he whipped out his flint and slashed at himself.
1. more specifically, it’s the rosy-tinted light/clouds of sunrise/sunset ☜
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