Chapter 54 Ashes
For a moment, Chu Hengkong wanted to question his opponent, asking why he, a man of self-respect, chose to associate with a monster. But he didn't speak, knowing that his opponent would respond with the same question, asking why he became a killer in the first place.
It's just the reason why my ears are callused from hearing it.
Yan's body was no longer visible, only ashes drifting from the blue flames. Chu Hengkong dragged his knife out of the duel arena. The stairs leading to the top floor had already collapsed. He blew out the flames with his knife, punched through the stone to clear the way, and walked up step by step.
Yan's knife was incredibly heavy, weighing a thousand pounds. Was it this heavy during the previous fight? Chu Hengkong shook his head and breathed in the hot air. His lungs ached dryly, as if they were burned. He was clearly in the burning house, yet he felt a chill. Blood had already soaked through his clothes, rolling to the ground, leaving scattered traces.
Even with his immobility and light armor, Yan's slashing blow nearly killed him. Chu Hengkong's head was groggy, and he walked like a clockwork soldier, stopping and starting. Flames, stairs, corridor. He closed his eyes. The smell of blood. He followed the scent. Corridor, rubble, breaking through, continued walking, and saw a body.
It was the corpse of a club thug, a grotesque smile on his lifeless face. Not far ahead was the corpse of a member of the Resurrection Corps, a quirky smile visible through a shattered helmet. Died with a smile, that's good. After stumbling through life, one should at least be happy when dying...
Chu Hengkong slapped his forehead with a tentacle, and after regaining some clarity, he opened his eyes wide. This entire floor had been converted into a chapel, dotted with circular stained glass windows, reflecting light onto a massive oil painting that dominated the entire wall. The painting depicted a wealthy old man, seated at a table piled high with food and treasures, his smile warm and benevolent.
The old man's eyes in the painting moved spontaneously, and Chu Hengkong instinctively realized he must not meet their gaze, so he immediately lowered his head. Corpses piled up in front of the old man's portrait: thugs, gamblers, and team members. All of them stretched out their hands toward the painting, all of them smiling, as if they had died happily after all their wishes were fulfilled.
"If you get close, you'll die." Chu Hengkong muttered vaguely. He was almost losing consciousness and had to remind himself, "If we make eye contact, I'll die too."
——What is your wish?
——What kind of happiness do you desire?
He heard the old man's voice, gentle and kind, like Santa Claus asking a child what present they wanted. Chu Hengkong didn't reply. He closed his eyes and wrapped his tentacles around the knife handle. The tentacle blade flew across the chapel, slicing through the face of the old man in the painting. He hacked away with all his might until the frame shattered into pieces, the shattered canvas flying into the flames.
Under normal circumstances, he should have realized one thing. The portrait that killed anyone who saw it wouldn't lose its effect at such a short distance, so there was no reason why he could have cut it down safely. But Chu Hengkong's consciousness was beginning to blur, so he didn't have time to think. He closed his eyes, unaware that the old man was observing his tentacles at the moment the portrait shattered.
——We will meet again.
The old man's voice faded, and so did the eerie atmosphere surrounding the entire floor. This should be enough. Chu Hengkong sheathed his sword and turned around. He wanted to leave, but he had no strength left. He simply sat down, leaning on his sword, and watched the fire that dominated his vision.
"It's almost the same when it's over." He sighed incomprehensibly.
The past flashed back to his mind: the fire at the family headquarters, the bodies in the pool of blood, the overturned car. Past and present intertwined eerily in the flames, making it impossible to tell whether they were memories or illusions. Chu Hengkong suddenly felt tired and wanted to rest a little longer.
At this moment, a dazzling light shot out from the fire, rudely and recklessly breaking the illusion, and in reality he met the girl's purple eyes.
"Are you okay? Are you still breathing?" Ji Huaisu held up the light shield and stretched out his hand towards him. "Let's go, let's go home after we finish it!"
It was really noisy, so noisy that it made one forget about anything, but it made him feel a little relieved. He mustered up some strength, stretched out his arm, and held Ji Huaisu's anxious hand.
The last fragment of my memory is the night sky outside the fire scene.
·
Maivia Club, fourth basement floor.
Even the club's most senior employees were unaware of the hidden depths beneath the garage. No elevator could reach this area; only Maivia, Dumuyan, and the family's heirs were qualified to unlock the secret passage and reach the bottom floor, where the secrets lay.
Visap struggled through the tunnel. He had fallen to the bottom of the well with only a heart left, but the maggot-like vitality of the fallen kept him alive. He attacked several deserters and women, and pieced together a shell from his broken limbs. Revenge fueled Visap's actions. He had to reach the secret chamber, so that he could have a chance to "pray."
Only with deeper persistence and more sincere emotions can one receive the moon's deeper blessings. He now has this obsession. He wants to kill Ji Huaisu and Chu Hengkong, and tear every person in the City Lord's Mansion to pieces. He wants revenge!
The tunnel finally came to an end, and Visafu eagerly looked up. Inside the secret room, just as before, stood a circle of five porcelain figurines representing the family: father, eldest son, second son, eldest daughter, and the unborn second daughter. A triple-circle summoning circle was carved into the floor tiles, and in its center was a mirror as dark as the moon.
He picked up the black mirror with one hand and wiped it carefully with a soft cloth.
"Finally found it! I told you Maivia wouldn't be so clueless. A summoning circle involving the abyss should be placed on the bottom floor!"
Kanin put away the mirror and looked sideways at the dazed Visav: "You look good."
Visafu understood, completely. Begging for mercy, revenge, and a false front—his expression at that moment was so complex that even the most skilled actor couldn't replicate even a tenth of it. He spoke, but Kanin simply snapped his fingers, and a column of green flame rose, incinerating the last of Maivia.
"Let's part ways in peace." Kanin said happily.
Benson then walked into the chamber and stomped out the ashes. Behind him came the masked "crows." One crow, seemingly feeling hot, removed its mask, revealing a face as clammy and sticky as a mollusk.
"I am not full yet," the demon said. "You promised me a full meal in the swamp, but now I have only side dishes."
These demon-possessed beings from the swamp stared at Kanin, their eyes filled with naked greed and cruelty. When it came to profit, they were no different from the Fallen. Kanin remained unmoved, only smiling and shaking his finger. "The main course will be served later. You must have some faith in me. Look how full Bethan is!"
"Don't compare me to this bunch of trash," Bethan said disdainfully. The crows fell silent upon hearing his words, not daring to say a word. "I took advantage of the chaos to collect some useful relics. What results did you get?"
Kanin held up the mirror. "This thing connects to the First Abyss. Using it directly will kill everyone. Next, we need to find a way to modify this mirror so that it connects to... the Spiral Tower? Or the sea where your main body is?"
"The Spiral Tower," Bethan said. "My real body isn't far from here, so I can make it there in time."
"As you say, it's time to retreat. Time waits for no one, guys!"
Kanin transformed into flames, leading the crows into the tunnel and away. Bethan then detached himself from the puppet and flew away. The abandoned puppet lay within the summoning circle, its eyes flashing. A second later, it exploded, burying the Maivia family's final secret along with the club.
·
Two days later.
The wealthy area was crowded with people, and countless pairs of shoes stepped on the charred ground, surrounding the burnt building.
The city's once most luxurious buildings were destroyed in the fire, leaving behind a giant, withered skeleton. A execution platform was set up at the entrance to the former club, displaying a dozen barely recognizable bodies or heads.
They were all members of the club, or former criminals who had been harbored. Above the scaffold, a wanted poster corresponding to the head was posted, detailing the crimes these men had committed in the simplest terms. Citizens hurled filth and stones, whipped the bodies of the criminals, and occasionally roared, mingling with the weeping of the people.
"This is not the time for you to act so recklessly! Not anymore!"
Such flogging was legal and unacceptable, but the people had waited far too long for this righteous vengeance. The club had brought nearly a decade of suffering to the city, and the long-suppressed resentment and grievances needed an outlet, much like when the tyrannical Dong Zhuo was slain by Lü Bu, the citizens of Chang'an celebrated, and the corpse-keepers used his body as wax to ignite a fire that lasted for days.
This celebration of revenge had already lasted for half a day, and it was clear it would continue until the last victim's rage was exhausted. Many, tired of shouting, searched for familiar figures, wanting to express their gratitude to those who had brought justice to everyone. But they searched everywhere, only the grassroots police officers around, no detectives or captains in sight.
An old lady holding a bouquet of flowers trembled as she tugged at the team member's hand: "Aren't the detectives coming?"
"They have something to do." The player, wearing a helmet, still smiled and replied, "It's something they have to do."
Chu Hengkong, dressed in a suit, listened to the fading chimes. Green grass covered his surroundings, and the wind blew across the gray stone tablet, stirring up the old dust from the carved lines.
While the citizens were celebrating, the inspector was attending a funeral.
The cemetery was located behind the headquarters building, protected by a complex of buildings shaped like a sun disk. Headstones rose from the small hill behind, descending all the way to form gray waves on the grass. The eulogy had already been delivered. Ji Huaisu laid flowers at the newly erected headstone, and the funeral concluded with the tolling of bells. The team members dispersed in groups, their faces filled with lingering sorrow but also with a sense of relief that the dust had settled.
Ji Huaisu put down the bouquet and sighed: "You seem to have adapted well."
"Funerals were held after conflicts in the past," Chu Hengkong said. "It feels similar to now. We would also report the battle situation to our deceased brothers at their graves, and tell them how many people from the opposing family were sent to accompany them. Although everyone knows that the dead can't hear, it still brings some comfort, as if dying this way would be more meaningful."
"The meaning of the dead is borne by the victors," Ji Huaisu said. "The meaning is that we won this battle, and we must continue to win in the future!"
She waved her fist vigorously, clearly having experienced many life-or-death situations and not being bogged down in hesitation. Chu Hengkong knew that it would be better to be busy at times like this, so he asked, "Will we investigate the scene later?"
"I was just about to tell you this." Ji Huaisu patted his back, "Go drive."
Chu Hengkong dodged the slap and said, "I don't drive for others."
"Tsk, you're so petty." Ji Huaisu curled his lips, "Then I'll see you at the door."
She left first, but Chu Hengkong didn't rush to leave. He walked towards the hill in the cemetery. Along the way, the tombstones kept changing styles. At first, they were mostly regular stone slabs, then they became more diverse, with flowers, sculptures, geometric shapes, and finally, they became like performance art, with checkerboard tombstones and even seesaw tombstones. It seemed as if a group of extremely bad children had once caused a disturbance in the cemetery, playing with the untouchable nature of death.
These tombstones, inscribed in words or images, bear names from different islands, their birthdates varying, but their mostly similar deaths. Seventy percent of the souls in the cemetery died twenty years ago. These earliest departed, along with the most ornate tombstones, gather at the top of the mountain. A man sits before a tombstone carved into a lily blossom, quietly drinking.
"Is it beautiful?" Ji Qiufeng asked.
“Very distinctive.”
Ji Qiufeng chuckled, "This is Jie Wen's tombstone. He always liked to dress up as a scholar in white, but he was actually quite a flirt. He originally wanted to design the tombstone as a nude female statue, but we managed to persuade him to change it. Otherwise, Xiao An might end up crying and laughing when he comes to pay his respects to his father, which is pretty unethical."
Chu Hengkong raised his eyebrows: "You also designed your own tombstone?"
"We were all young back then. I don't know when we got drunk and started talking about our afterlife plans. We decided to die in style, to truly feel like we'd lived. We took turns designing our own tombstones, rating each other's designs. We agreed that if someone passed away, the rest of us would be responsible for the funeral. Only music would be allowed at the funeral, no elegies allowed, and the more beautiful the grave, the better," Ji Qiufeng said. "In practice, you'll find these requirements ridiculous. You won't be able to cry or laugh, but we had no choice since we all agreed on it. So graves were built one after another, and people passed away one by one, until in the end, only Youyou and I were left."
Chu Hengkong was silent for a moment. Arriving at the cemetery, he fully understood the plight of Huilong City, and how these supposedly powerful people had fallen to such a state of desolation. Because everyone had died, died during those bleak twenty years, so many that not even a single skilled hand remained. Their unit was called the Huisheng because the survivors hoped to be resurrected.
He knew the man wasn't expecting any comfort. Standing alone in front of a tombstone, no matter how much or how little he spoke, he was only talking to himself. But he couldn't help but speak, out of a kind of sympathy.
"I understand how you feel... It was the same thing when my family was destroyed. Everyone who was famous and influential was gone, and I was the only one left to collect their bodies," the killer said. "There were a few days when I really wanted to die, but after thinking about it, I decided to go out and kill all my enemies one by one."
"This is the last person's responsibility." He said to Ji Qiufeng, "Mr. Ji, you have to work harder too."
Ji Qiufeng looked at the dark sky for a long time.
"I have to try hard," he said softly. "If I die, who can avenge them?"
He poured the remaining wine on his old friend's grave and slowly walked away. After a few steps, he straightened his back, as if supported by invisible hands, and transformed himself from a destitute man at the grave into the lord of the city.
"Remember to come to class on time tomorrow."
Chu Hengkong changed direction and walked away, his steps becoming as brisk as usual. When he reached the exit, he stopped and found Jie An standing in the shadow of the stone archway, looking down at the crack in the stone.
"Like a woman." Chu Hengkong pressed down his hat.
"Go to hell." Jie An smiled bitterly, "I can't quite figure it out."
"What?"
"I've never been on a major battlefield in my life," the cook said. "I don't understand why people go on the battlefield even though they know they're going to die..."
Chu Hengkong thought of the swordsman who had fallen in the fire, and with it his sword. He took out the silver-eyed book, and the words on the latest page shone with a faint silver light.
【Steel Sword·Rock】
Rating: 2
[Origin: Senluo Secret Realm - Huilong City]
[Effect: 1. Rock Knife
Can block and return attacks within the range of Sephira 1. When emotions are high, the blocking range can temporarily break through to Sephira 2.
2. Steel Front Flow: No Return
You can use Du Muyan's dying sword. 】
[Missing: The so-called Steel Edge Flow is a laughing stock on Shura Island.
The down-and-out warriors who have neither swordsmanship nor skills are deceiving others under the banner of Steel Edge Style.
Mai Wei Ya, who was unaware of this, hired Du Muyan with a large sum of money and respected him as a master.
Yan practiced diligently every day, improving his swordsmanship and adhering to his lies until his death.
Chu Hengkong put away his book. An impatient horn blared from a distance. He felt that many things were universal, whether on Earth or in another world, in the underworld or the white world.
"It's just for loyalty," he said.
(End of this chapter)
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