Chapter 998 - Draw

Li Huowang stared at Yang Na’s severed finger, the rain pouring down as he held her hand.

The finger had already healed, but this wasn’t just a matter of Yang Na losing a finger. If her finger had indeed been severed, everything else he saw must have also been real.

The realization that his grim visions had manifested in reality struck Li Huowang with bone-deep dread. A profound horror filled his eyes as the truth dawned on him: this Siming of Fu Shengtian had altered his past, rewriting the events of his life.

No... this can’t be! I have to kill it! I need to go back and change everything back to the way it was before!

Li Huowang struggled to his feet, with his head bleeding and his body still wounded. He dragged himself toward the ruins of the dilapidated temple.

“Little Li! You’re badly injured! Lie down, don’t move!” Yi Donglai blocked his path and shouted at him to stop. He was completely soaked by the rain.

“Get out of my way! You don’t understand what I’ve been through!” Li Huowang roared, his veins bulging as he raised a hand to shove Yi Donglai aside.

Yi Donglai moved first, shoving Li Huowang back into Yang Na’s arms. “No! I do understand!”

Yi Donglai’s eyes were bloodshot, perhaps due to the rain or some other reason. He continued, “I was your attending physician! I know everything you’ve been through! I even know exactly what you’re thinking now!

“Don’t forget I studied medicine! I know way more than you do! Now, sit tight! Leave this to me!”

Without waiting for a response, Yi Donglai turned and walked toward the temple ruins. He bent down, picked up a broken tile, and moved purposefully through the debris.

The temple’s rubble was in a mess. There were all sorts of shattered bricks, broken tiles, and splintered wood piled haphazardly, making it easy to get injured while walking through.

However, Yi Donglai didn’t care. He used his hands to push aside the debris, clearing a large area of uneven bricks.

Shards of broken tiles scraped his arms as he did, but he ignored the pain. He held up a shard and began to furiously scratch lines onto the rough surface of the stone bricks.

The shard scraped against the stone with a grating sound as the lines began to take shape.

Yang Na supported the battered Li Huowang over to Yi Donglai’s side. At that moment, lightning lit up the sky and illuminated everything for an instant.

In that fleeting, silvery light, Li Huowang finally saw what Yi Donglai was drawing. It was a roughly sketched figure with certain distinguishing features. Li Huowang immediately recognized the person Yi Donglai was depicting.

It was a slim woman with tattoos on her left side, a forked tongue, and a lip piercing.

Yi Donglai was drawing Ba Nanxu, Ba-Hui’s projection.

The figure of Ba Nanxu was strange and distorted in an almost inhuman way. Perhaps Yi Donglai’s lack of skill had made her body unnaturally elongated and twisted.

Ba Nanxu seemed to be emerging from a vague, contorted shape. Her mouth was wide open like a serpent, as if ready to devour the surrounding rubble.

Yi Donglai didn’t stop there. His hand moved feverishly, sketching the other Simings who had departed with Zhao Shuangdian. Each figure was crudely drawn and sketched in a strange form, yet imbued with an eerie, lifelike quality.

“What are you doing?” Li Huowang shouted amidst the rain.

Yi Donglai didn’t stop drawing. “They couldn’t come here because they couldn’t find the path! They need a medium! Do you get it, Li Huowang? Qing Wanglai was right! They’re all projections! They’re all projections, and projections need a background!”

For a moment, doubt flickered in Yi Donglai’s eyes, but when he caught sight of his own reflection in a nearby puddle, he steeled himself. He tightened his grip on the shard and drew with renewed vigor.

“It’s okay! We won’t lose! I finally get it—I am the projection of Da Nuo! That’s the truth! The difference is that it’s insane, while I’m not!”

Yi Donglai’s newfound resolve didn’t shock Li Huowang as much as the next figure he drew. It was a bloated young man with something seemingly stuffed beneath him.

Although the face was unfamiliar, his smile was disturbingly recognizable. Li Huowang instantly knew who it was—Qing Wanglai, the projection of the Three Pure Ones.

The Three Pure Ones hadn’t left at all. He was just hiding nearby.

A fire blazed in Li Huowang’s heart when he saw that disgusting face. Memories of Qing Wanglai’s past despicable deeds flashed through his mind.

Without hesitation, Li Huowang picked up a piece of broken brick and smashed it down onto Qing Wanglai’s face in the drawing. There was a crisp, cracking sound.

As Li Huowang approached Yi Donglai's artwork, he couldn't help but notice something peculiar. Qing Wanglai was disturbingly close to Zhao Shuangdian's figure, almost overlapping with her.

“What is he doing? What’s he planning? At a time like this, how dare he!”

Li Huowang had broken into a cold sweat. He pushed Yang Na aside, leaped high, and plunged headfirst into Yi Donglai’s drawing.

Splash!

He was instantly submerged in freezing liquid. He was in.

Without even bothering to survey his surroundings, he hastily shouted, "Zhao Shuangdian, watch out! Qing Wanglai is stealing your Heavenly Dao!"

The icy liquid rushed into his mouth, and he felt like his organs were coming alive. He realized the kind of liquid that had surrounded him, as it had the same dark, iridescent hues he’d seen before. It was the same liquid that had engulfed the Great Qi in the past.

He had entered Fu Shengtian.

A chill swept over him as he realized a horrifying truth hidden in all this chaos.

Fu Shengtian was disturbingly close to Baiyu Capital, much like Qing Wanglai's drawing was to Zhao Shuangdian's.