Chapter 22 Underworld

After that battle, Chen Shi was both tired and weary, sitting in the wooden cart and dozing off. When he woke up, the cart had already reached Huangpo Village.

His grandfather busied himself brewing and cooking medicine, hustling back and forth until late at night when the medicine was finally ready.

Chen Shi drank a basin of medicine and soaked in the medicinal bath, eventually falling asleep there.

Fortunately, the night passed without incident, and his chronic illness did not relapse.

"Could it be that my illness is cured?"

Upon waking up in the morning, Chen Shi was very happy, feeling that the breakfast his grandfather made was not so unpalatable anymore.

And this time, his grandfather went to the county city and, true to his word, really brought back some tasty treats for him, including candied hawthorn, rice cakes, stinky tofu, and sugar figurines, which made him so happy he couldn't stop smiling.

"Grandfather's medicine works, and so does practicing the Three Light Righteous Qi Technique every day. Maybe it can cure my illness!"

Chen Shi, anticipating a future life, became even more dedicated. After paying respects to his godmother, he practiced the Three Light Righteous Qi Technique, using the Big Dipper to temper his body.

That day went by fulfilling, and in the evening, Chen Shi drank medicine and soaked in a medicinal bath, practiced the Three Light Righteous Qi Technique for a while, and then lay down to sleep.

He didn't know how long he had slept when, suddenly during a sweet dream, an intense and unbearable pain struck his heart, causing violent convulsions!

Chen Shi woke up, knowing his heart condition had flared up again. He struggled in bed, trying to rise and stimulate the Righteous Qi Technique to resist.

However, the pain was so intense, draining his strength, that it felt as if his heart was being crushed into a lump, causing his blood to stop circulating!

He tried to breathe, but he just couldn't catch his breath.

It was as if a ghastly blue hand had emptied all the air from his lungs!

"Grandfather! Grandfather!"

Chen Shi found himself enveloped in tremendous fear. He opened his mouth to call for his grandfather, but no sound came from his throat.

It was still night, and his grandfather should not be home, completely unaware of the danger he was in.

"Black Pot! Black Pot!"

Chen Shi wanted to call for Black Pot, but still, no voice could be heard. The big black dog in the yard seemed to hear something, raised its head to listen carefully, then shook its head and lay back down to sleep.

Chen Shi's vision gradually darkened, so dark he couldn't see the moonlight outside, so dark he was losing sight of the roof beams.

His eyelids grew heavier, his mind became more clouded, his body convulsed uncontrollably, like a fish hauled onto shore facing death.

His body thrashed violently twice on the bed before it calmed down, with his limbs occasionally twitching but the frequency and intensity of the spasms slowly decreasing.

Finally, Chen Shi went still.

In the darkness, there seemed to be a glimmer of light, illuminating the darkness before Chen Shi's eyes.

He opened his eyes. All around was a dense, snow-white mist. From a distance, occasional pitiful howls sounded, like humans, yet also like wounded wild beasts.

Chen Shi's eyes widened as he tried to look around, but he could see nothing.

"Grandfather!" he called out loudly.

"Grandfather!" "Grandfather!"

Many voices echoed through the mist, from all directions, from every corner, filled with calls for grandfather, uncertain whether they were echoes or something else bizarre.

Chen Shi was engulfed by fear. He knew he should stay put, wait for his grandfather to find him, yet he couldn't help but take steps.

He felt his body become lighter than ever before, so light as if it didn't exist, the mist like countless snow-white, delicate, weightless grains of sand passing through his body, icy cold.

"I must be dead," Chen Shi sadly surmised.

Footsteps sounded through the mist. Following the sound, he saw another figure, a young woman with a ghastly pale face, aimlessly walking.

Her neck was drenched in blood, and as she walked, blood spurted from a slit in her neck, staining her clothes red.

She tried to speak, but Chen Shi heard nothing.

The woman somberly lowered her head, and her head fell off to the ground.

She squatted down, her hands searching around, but never found her head.

Helpless cries of the woman echoed in the mist.

A moment later, she found her head, picked it up, placed it back on her neck, and silently walked behind Chen Shi, unhurried.

Another person walked through the mist toward him, a man with a large belly, obviously a person of authority, dressed in gold and silver, with an air of arrogance. Yet now, he seemed desolate, his body stabbed countless times, with wounds still bleeding profusely.

Especially in the abdomen, where his intestines had spilled out, dragging on the ground.

He struggled to hold his intestines with his hands, following Chen Shi.

Chen Shi walked forward, dazed, encountering more and more people in the mist, each with their different manner of death. Some missing arms, others legs, those with huge indents in their heads, those with exploded organs, covered in pus, some half-blown apart, others burned to a crisp...

But Chen Shi was not afraid; he had seen too many ghosts and spirits to be scared anymore.

"I must be dead."

He felt somewhat desolate. "I died of pain in bed, and neither Grandfather nor Black Pot discovered it. They might be very sad when they find out I am dead the next day."

He didn't know what his face looked like. If it was too hideous, Grandfather would cry.

He didn't want Grandfather to cry.

There was a long queue ahead, stretching farther than the eye could see, filled with countless people mechanically walking through the thick fog, going who knows where.

Chen Shi, followed by the strange people behind him, merged into this queue.

They kept moving forward, with more people joining the main group.

In front and behind Chen Shi, many more people appeared, forming another two queues. Like walking corpses, they too stretched endlessly out of sight.

Up ahead, even more queues appeared, a dense, dark mass. Oddly enough, despite the sheer number of people, there was no sound at all.

Only in the fog, there occasionally came distressing howls.

Suddenly, a huge claw emerged from the fog, gaunt and scaled, unlike any human hand, and grabbed someone before retracting back into the mists, followed by the sound of chewing.

"Hee hee hee!"

Something in the fog chuckled.

Chen Shi felt fear, but the people around him seemed unaware, continuing their numb march forward.

Then, more claws reached out from the fog, snatching people back into its depths. The sounds of chewing and eerie laughter came from all directions.

They seemed to have entered a grotesque feast held within the fog, except they were the dishes, and those monsters hidden in the mist were connoisseurs, savoring their rare delicacies!

Chen Shi didn't dare to move forward, but his legs seemed to have a mind of their own and kept mechanically walking.

In the surrounding fog, "connoisseurs" who came to savor their food became more numerous, as did their mocking laughter. More claws reached out, grabbing at people who didn't seem to resist and pulling them back into the mist.

Chen Shi felt his scalp tingle. He saw a gaunt hand reach for him, tried to dodge, but his body still mechanically moved forward, unable to avoid it!

Just as the big hand was about to seize him, a sudden thundering drumbeat echoed, like drums, yet also like a gong, the sound dull and gritty, but it startled the claw back into the fog.

"Chen Shi—"

A calling voice came from behind him, accompanied by the faint sound of drums.

There was also a subtle scent of incense that reached Chen Shi's nose, equally faint.

"Xiao Shi—"

This call was clearer to him, Grandfather's voice, and the drumming grew more distinct.

"Grandfather!" he cried, tears streaming down his face.

Grandfather's voice came through, "Xiao Shi, follow the sound!"

Chen Shi strained every tendon, trying to stop walking. He turned arduously and followed the sound with great difficulty. Every step was agonizing, like walking on knives or wading through flames, with a searing pain scraping against his bones.

He pressed on towards the sound, but it was intermittent, only discernible alongside the drumbeat and the scent of incense. If either the incense or drumming stopped, he would lose his way.

The swirling masses were all around him; only Chen Shi moved against the flow, getting knocked and stumbling in all directions.

He walked for an unknown length of time, still unable to escape this ghastly banquet. The gaunt claws were everywhere, and he could be snatched away at any moment.

Just when he felt he could not endure any longer, the dense fog parted. A huge creature emerged, snorting smoke and fire from its nostrils, its feet pounding the ground, causing tremors as it charged straight towards him.

When the immense creature got closer, Chen Shi realized it was a huge black dog, resembling Black Pot, but countless times larger, like a small hill.

"Black Pot, is it you?"

The black dog seemed a demon from the underworld, fierce and savage, with eyes shooting fire, incinerating the gaunt hands and crunching down with its sharp teeth to sever one of them. Then, sniffing the air for the scent of incense, its burning eyes rolled towards Chen Shi.

"Huff Huff!"

The mountainous Black Pot, excitedly wagging its tail, whipped up gusts of wind. It lowered itself to let Chen Shi clamber onto its back before turning and sprinting off.

"Boom Boom!"

The sound of the gong grew louder, and Grandfather's calls clearer. Chen Shi lay on Black Pot's back, gripping onto the dog's fur when suddenly everything became blindingly bright.

He shielded his eyes from the intense light when a joyful voice exclaimed, "He's awake, Xiao Shi is finally awake!"

Chen Shi opened his eyes and gradually adjusted to the light. He looked around, bewildered, to find himself in a somewhat dim and unfamiliar room, the air thick with the smell of incense and the walls blackened with soot.

There sat an old woman with white hair wrapped around her head in the corner, holding something gong-like. With a gentle tap, it made a sound like a gong, accompanied by a gritty noise.

There was also a large brazier on the ground, with talismans burning inside, the flames reaching higher than a person.

Sitting behind the flames was the large black dog, its eyes reflecting the fire like glowing embers. With a snort, it expelled smoke and mist, unmistakably Black Pot.

Grandfather sat on the other side of the brazier, with a fusion of water and fire floating above his head.

"What place is this?" Chen Shi wondered.

————Thanks to Alliance Hierarch Aisin Gioro Shengjie for the reward. Long live the boss!