Mutated Tao

The Baiyu Capital crumbled as Li Huowang chewed. The chaos started to tear apart, revealing the unending darkness before him.

Still chewing, he raised his sword and spat on it, covering his spine sword with Death.

Turning, he glared at the Three Ancient Ones, who continued scattering Fear around.

“Qing Wanglai!”

Li Huowang raised his blade and swung it down. Death swept away everything, cutting off the source of the fear and despair.

Li Huowang found the Heavenly Dao of Growth within the Three Ancient Ones’ body. He tore it apart and swallowed it. Then, he did the same with the Heavenly Dao of Secrets.

After devouring everything, he uncovered a bone inscribed with the character “Wang.” When he touched it, the character returned to his name, reuniting with him.

Li Huowang finally learned what Qing Wanglai had taken away from him.

It was the counterpart of Bewilderment, the Heavenly Dao of Clarity. Every Heavenly Dao had its counterpart. He hadn’t known because the Three Ancient Ones had taken Clarity before he became the Siming of Bewilderment.

With his Clarity restored, Li Huowang’s thoughts sharpened. He was fully awake now, and even his way of thinking changed.

He sensed something above and turned his gaze to the crumbling Baiyu Capital.

Tearing through it, he shot upward like a chick breaking free of its eggshell. Outside, he crushed the remnants of the Baiyu Capital and shoved them into his mouth.

Li Huowang looked up and finally saw Fu Shengtian’s true form.

It was massive—like a suffocatingly enormous planet bearing down on him, crashing toward everything. Fu Shengtian wasn’t just attacking; it had attacked a long time ago, its actions transcending time.

Fu Shengtian raised a bident made from fear and despair. The weapon’s tips bore the heads of the Three Ancient Ones and Qing Wanglai. With a mighty thrust, it shot the bident, piercing Li Huowang’s chest.

Li Huowang grabbed the bident and pulled it out, wrestling it away from Fu Shengtian’s control.

He swung the bident to scatter the fear on it. He raised the cleaned bident and pointed it at Fu Shengtian. “Come at me!”

Fu Shengtian attacked again, forming a new bident and flinging it straight at Li Huowang. This time, it had the heads of Wang Changxu and Tong Guchang.

Li Huowang blocked the attack and broke the bident with his spine sword cloaked in Death. Unlike before, the bident did not pierce him.

To Li Huowang’s surprise, Fu Shengtian created even more weapons. However, they were much more bizarre than bidents.

Each weapon’s tip was steeped in fear and despair. They rained down upon Li Huowang. Though he tried to deflect them all, he failed.

A trident bearing the heads of Shangguan Gedeng, Kouyin Liangong, and Zhu Cuifeng pierced Li Huowang’s eyes, pinning him to the void.

In that instant, an archnemesis called Kouyin Liangong appeared in Li Huowang’s past. It had two Twisted Ones—Shangguan Gedeng and Zhu Cuifeng. Its existence marked Li Huowang’s past with even greater despair.

Taking advantage of the opening, more and more spears stabbed into Li Huowang, forcing their way into his body and starting to squeeze out his insides. The spears were overwhelming him!

“Fuck off!”

Summoning his strength, Li Huowang swung his spine sword and splintered the spears, shattering their shafts. However, their tips remained lodged in his body, altering his past and future.

He panted with all of his strength, but he saw another rain of spears flying towards him. Fu Shengtian was too strong. He couldn’t win.

As soon as the seeds of despair grew in his heart, they began to flourish uncontrollably, growing and giving birth to more spear tips aimed directly at him.

As more and more spear tips pierced his body, he finally realized he could not win against Fu Shengtian. He lost the moment he became aware of Fu Shengtian’s existence.

The moment he felt fear was the moment he became part of Fu Shengtian. He would become Fu Shengtian’s pawn, just like the Three Ancient Ones.

The Three Ancient Ones, who held the world’s secrets, succumbed to madness from knowing too much.

“Is this it? Is this all I’m capable of? I refuse to yield! I refuse to give up! So many people died—why can’t I win?”

Li Huowang shouted, kneeling as despair consumed his heart. It started to destroy everything in his body.

Under such intense despair, he held onto Death and pointed at himself.

“Daoist, don’t give up!” A voice cut through the darkness of the void.

Li Huowang raised his head and saw the illusion of the old monk beside him again. “Daoist. You are a good Daoist. You cannot die now.”

Another voice joined in—Jin Shanzhao. “Young Daoist, you made a promise. That’s why I left.”

“You want to kill yourself? Don’t be an embarrassment to the others!”

The illusions appeared one after another until even Jiang Yingzi and Dan Yangzi appeared.

Li Huowang saw Zhuge Yuan’s illusion once more. “Junior LI, don’t give up. Don’t lose to yourself.”

Li Huowang looked at them as he despaired. “Who are you people?!”

“It doesn’t matter who we are. What’s more important is who you are.”

“Me? I’m Li Huowang!”

His own declaration made him pause. He searched through his fragmented memories, looking for something important.

“Yes, that’s right! I’m Li Huowang. I was mentally ill!”

He stood up, shaking his head as he surveyed the chaos. “No! This isn’t me. This isn’t me!”

Li Huowang began to tear off his own Heavenly Daos, one by one. He even tore off the last character of his name: “Wang.”

He forced everything into Yi Donglai, who had somehow appeared beside him, helping him stand up. “Take it! Take all of it! Everything is yours!”

After forcing everything into Yi Donglai’s mouth, Li Huowang swallowed him whole, hiding him in his stomach.

Then, Li Huowang closed his eyes and shouted, “None of this is real! This is all an illusion! Wake up!”

Only the purest form of Bewilderment remained within Li Huowang. At that moment, a faint voice echoed in his ears.

Li Huowang had once rejected the voice, but he was now embracing it with open arms. He followed the voice, and gradually, it became clearer.

“Li Huowang, wake up! Li Huowang, wake up! Everything you’re enduring is fake! It’s all a lie!”

The voice shattered the darkness. It reached the ears of Li Huowang, both past and present.

He opened his eyes. Bright light filtered through white curtains as a sharp wailing sound echoed beside him.

Li Huowang glanced down. White hospital beds, an electric wall fan, and the pungent scent of disinfectant surrounded him. It felt surreal yet familiar.

He remembered where he was.

He was in ward number thirteen of the White Tower Hospital.

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