Chapter 991: Bell

Li Huowang continued his descent. The bright sunlight gradually faded, and soon, as the ground leveled out, a dilapidated earthen grave came into view. The mound was covered in weeds, and three sticks of incense were placed at its head.

The thin wisps of white smoke didn't disperse; instead, they wavered, enveloping the tomb in a dreamlike, illusory haze.

Li Huowang stepped into the white smoke, intending to decipher the words on the tombstone. Though words were clearly present, he couldn't grasp their meaning. He must have known them previously, but now they were unfamiliar, and they were constantly shifting.

As he watched, the constantly shifting characters gradually resolved into two distinct ones: 橠 and 欎.

The two characters began to move. After a brief mutual probing, they started to fight. They were constantly tearing off each other's strokes and appending them to their own forms.

Evidently, 橠 was no match for 欎. Not only were many of its strokes torn away, but its remaining structure also became disheveled and loose.

Finally, 橠 forcefully hurled the character “多” at 欎. Seizing the moment 欎 bent to retrieve it, 橠 hastily fled downwards.

As Li Huowang slowly squatted, 橠 gradually moved to the lower half of the tombstone. It traversed mountains and rivers, crossed the deepest abyss, bypassed strange, pale halos, and finally reached the ground, running directly beneath Li Huowang.

Li Huowang, lowering his head, also followed 橠 through his own legs, gradually sprinting into the distance.

He shifted one eye above 橠 and the other above 欎, intently watching their next move.

Just as 欎 was about to overtake 橠, their forms began to overlap, transforming from single characters into a stack of them. Furthermore, these stacked characters started to vibrate rapidly.

Along with the trembling, the characters rapidly expanded. Not only 橠, but the pursuing 欎 also grew in size.

As they continued to change, their individual strokes gradually transformed into other things.

Li Huowang laboriously took two steps back, attempting to make space for the two expanding characters.

However, the speed at which these two characters grew was beyond anything he could have imagined.

Almost instantly, the two characters grew to immense sizes, larger than the sky, completely engulfing Li Huowang before finally vanishing from his sight.

Li Huowang tilted his head back, staring blankly at the chaotic sky above, frozen in place.

As he gently wiped his hand upwards, the sky above seemed to lighten, becoming somewhat hazy.

When Li Huowang lowered his head, he found that the grave beside him had transformed into a large mountain, while the tombstone where the two characters had just fought had vanished without a trace.

Gazing into the distance, he spotted a path on the mountain. Li Huowang then followed this narrow trail, continuing his journey forward.

He walked for an unknown duration, but it was clear that a significant amount of time had passed. As Li Huowang crested the mountain, the sky brightened once more. He continued, observing the surrounding trees gradually come into sharper focus.

“Ding-a-ling!” A bell chimed. As a cold gust of wind blew a fallen leaf, Li Huowang felt a chill. He wrapped his arms around himself, hunched his shoulders, and continued to walk.

The weather grew increasingly cold. Li Huowang’s nose began to run, and his body shivered uncontrollably.

When the familiar bell chimed once more, Li Huowang finally realized it was the sound of bells on a camel's neck.

Several camels had stopped before a simple stall, where their owners were eating. The enticing aroma and warmth emanating from the stall instinctively drew Li Huowang closer.

Hearing his footsteps, the people at the stall all turned to look. These individuals had no discernible facial features, and their hands, clutching chopsticks, were fused together. Moreover, the boundaries between the colors of their clothes and skin were incredibly blurred.

When they saw Li Huowang take a seat at an empty table, the others, whose forms lacked clear color boundaries, turned back to their meals.

Soon, a meal with equally indistinct color boundaries was placed before Li Huowang. He picked up his chopsticks and began to eat.

Although the blurred boundaries meant Li Huowang ingested some of the colors of the plate and table, he finally felt warmth return to his body.

Wiping his mouth, Li Huowang, feeling much better, stood up, preparing to depart.

Just then, Li Huowang noticed the shopkeeper pulling at him, and his expression showed a hint of hesitation.

He tentatively extended a hand towards the shopkeeper, whose features were indistinct. With a gentle touch, the figure instantly disintegrated into yellow sand in the air.

Immediately after, the stall, the camels, and the diners all dispersed into yellow sand in the air. The surroundings became a vast, featureless white expanse.

The “ding” of the bell continued, and Li Huowang instinctively walked towards the direction from which it rang.

The vast white expanse gradually faded, replaced by a lush green forest appearing before him.

Li Huowang continued to walk through the forest, following the persistent chime of the bell. Yet, as he proceeded, he felt a sense of unease; this place felt unsettlingly familiar.

“I think I’ve been here before,” he murmured. As he spoke, Li Huowang noticed the surrounding forest deepening to a dark green, and the ground becoming muddy, making walking very uncomfortable.

Cold and sticky, Li Huowang instinctively wanted to leave. He quickened his pace toward the source of the bell's sound.

More and more familiar sights—trees, rocks—emerged in Li Huowang’s mind.

As these elements became increasingly familiar, the surroundings grew more vivid and real. Eventually, even the bell's chime felt deeply familiar. “Who am I? Why am I here? I want to go home!”

At this moment, the bell's chime grew clearer and more urgent. What was just ahead now sounded from behind.

Li Huowang spun his head to look behind him, but found nothing there.

The situation had reversed: moments ago, Li Huowang pursued the bell, but now the bell pursued him.

Though nothing was visibly behind him, Li Huowang instinctively felt terror, fleeing forward frantically, without regard for direction.

Along with the bell's chime, overlapping footsteps gradually became audible.

Suddenly, Li Huowang felt an immense force from behind; he was directly kicked away and violently thrown to the ground.

A wrinkled hand seized Li Huowang's clothes and hoisted him upward. As Li Huowang looked up, he found himself face-to-face with the hand's owner.

“Haha, good fortune is unstoppable! Daoist Master here can even pick one up right off the road,” Danyangzi, holding a Daoist bell, looked at the person he held and threw his head back, laughing.

“Hah!” Li Huowang jolted awake. He gazed at the empty warehouse and the figures of Bai Lingmiao and Yi Donglai before him, feeling an overwhelming sense of unfamiliarity.