THE POISON DEITY

A burly man in his early twenties bellowed at the top of his lungs, "Zhong Peng, where are you?" Meanwhile, lurking in the shadows of the night, a raggedy young boy was secretly watching the bulky man, his whole body shaking with fear.

As if on cue, a new voice was heard, breaking the tense silence of the night. A dashing young man emerged from the shadows, looking suave and debonair. "It seems that he is not present," he declared, his tone confident and assured.

The burly man turned towards the handsome young man, acknowledging his statement with a nod of agreement. "Yeah, he is surely not here," he confirmed. "But where could he have gone?" He cast his gaze around, scanning the area for any clues.

After a moment of fruitless searching, he turned towards the handsome young man and motioned to leave. Together, they strode away from the scene, their path illuminated only by the faint glow of the moon above.

As the bulky man and the handsome young man vanished from sight, the shabby young man emerged from his hiding place. He peered around cautiously, surveying his surroundings before breathing a sigh of relief.

"That was a close call," he muttered to himself. As he turned to leave the alley, his eye caught a glimpse of something glinting in the moonlight. Curiosity piqued, he approached the object slowly, as he drew closer, he realized that it was a box of some sort. "What a peculiar-looking box," he marveled. The box appeared ancient, with intricate inscriptions etched all over its surface. Zhong Peng couldn't resist the urge to investigate further.

As Zhong Peng curiously observed the inscriptions on the box, he suddenly heard a voice behind him. "Well, well, well. Who do we have here?" The voice sounded familiar, and Zhong Peng's heart sank with fear. He tried to run, but it was too late. The strong arms of the burly man from earlier caught him in a vice-like grip.

Zhong Peng trembled with fear as the man grabbed his shoulder, preventing him from moving.

"Are you done hiding?" Another voice rang out, and Zhong Peng recognized it as belonging to the handsome man from earlier. It appeared that he too had arrived on the scene.

Zhong Peng had been so engrossed in examining the inscriptions on the box that he had failed to notice their approach.

He tried to talk his way out but before Zhong Peng could say anything he was cut off by a swift punch to his face. *Krrr* The sound of a bone cracking echoed through the air as the punch landed squarely on his nose.

Blood spurted from his nostrils as the force of the blow sent him reeling backward. His frail body couldn't withstand such a powerful attack, and he slumped to the ground, unconscious.

**************

When Zhong Peng gained consciousness, he was beset by excruciating pain coursing through his entire body. To his horror, he felt a sticky liquid substance on his face, and upon touching it, he realized that his visage was already a bloody mess.

To add to his misery, he was tormented by a pounding headache. As he struggled to make his way out of the alley, his gaze landed on the box he had encountered earlier.

Summoning all his strength, he managed to retrieve it and dragged his exhausted body back to his grandmother's abode. Zhong Peng had been living with his grandmother ever since the untimely demise of his parents ten years ago.

His peers had always bullied him mercilessly because of his unfortunate circumstances, and he had grown accustomed to the pain and hardship that came with it.

To avoid causing his grandmother any undue concern, Zhong Peng surreptitiously slipped into the house through the back entrance. He knew that if his grandmother were to catch sight of him in his present condition, she would be beside herself with worry.

Once inside, he sat down and turned his attention to the box he had obtained earlier. Despite his best efforts, the box proved to be exceedingly difficult to open.

Zhong Peng eventually concluded that it would be best to set the matter aside for the time being and focus on cleaning himself up instead. The blood from his nose had already dripped onto the box and his surroundings, and he knew that he needed to wash himself thoroughly.

As Zhong Peng departed, a strange phenomenon occurred involving the blood that had dripped onto the box.

Mysteriously, the box seemed to absorb the blood, and a green glow emanated from within, suffusing the entire room with a faint green light.

After some time, the glow subsided, in place of the box now stood a book. The book's title read, "The Heavenly Art of the Poison Deity."

Upon his return to the room, Zhong Peng was taken aback by the strange turn of events.

He was utterly surprised to find that the box he had left behind only moments ago had been inexplicably replaced by a book titled "The Heavenly Art of the Poison Deity." He was so stunned that he began to question his senses. "How could a book replace the box? Or am I just imagining things? Could I have been punched so badly that I can't even remember whether it was a book or a box?" Zhong Peng silently asked himself, trying to make sense of the situation.

Despite the lingering doubts in his mind, Zhong Peng decided to set them aside and approach the book with caution. He moved slowly and deliberately towards it, taking care not to disturb anything in the room.

He eventually reached the bed where the book lay and picked it up, examining it closely. To his surprise, the book appeared to be perfectly ordinary in every way. "The Heavenly Art of the Poison Deity...what a strange name for a book," he mused aloud, unable to make sense of the situation.

After a period of observation, he resolved to unfurl the tome and peruse its contents. Yet as he did so, a sudden burst of vivid green light erupted, inundating his vision and obfuscating all else.

The radiance was so intense that he could discern nothing beyond it, and as he struggled to close the book, he found himself unable to do so.

Inexplicably, he felt his very consciousness being inexorably drawn towards the pages, and though he fought valiantly to resist this pull, his efforts were ultimately in vain.

At long last, he succumbed to the book's irresistible force, his consciousness drawn inexorably within its pages.

Amidst his struggle to disentangle his consciousness from the book, he perceived a voice, ancient and otherworldly, intoning some arcane incantation.

But so great was his struggle that he could not discern the words that were being spoken. And then, with a deafening *boom*, he suddenly lost consciousness, his senses overwhelmed by the intense and otherworldly power emanating from the tome.