Chapter 33: A Hundred Infants Crying at Night

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The look on Uncle Hu’s face frightened me, and I nervously asked, “Uncle Hu, what’s wrong? Has something happened to me?”

I questioned him anxiously, my entire expression growing tense in an instant.

“July, do you feel unwell anywhere? How could one of the three lamps of your life fire have gone out?”

Only then did I notice a strange soreness beginning in my left shoulder. It had never happened before.

“July, don’t panic. Come back inside with me. Let me examine you properly.”

Uncle Hu urged me not to worry, promising to help me find a solution.

“July, when you went to the Liu residence today, did anything unusual happen? Don’t lie to me. Tell me everything, exactly as it happened.”

Seeing how tense Uncle Hu looked, I told him every detail of what had happened at the Liu residence.

When he heard my account, astonishment spread across his face.

He had never imagined that I would not only subdue a green snake that had transformed into a dragon and make it my spirit beast, but also awaken the evil entity buried in the General’s Tomb.

It had all been far too reckless.

“July, do you know who is buried in the mountains northwest of the Liu residence?”

Uncle Hu’s voice trembled slightly, as though the person buried there had been an extraordinary figure.

“Uncle Hu, who is it? Why are you so frightened?”

I stared at him in confusion. Given his mastery of occult arts, he should not have been this afraid.

There could only be one reason for his fear: the person buried in those northwestern mountains was terrifying.

His sinister nature was enough to make even Uncle Hu, who practiced martial arts to exorcise demons, feel a trace of fear.

“The General’s Tomb. The Netherworld General!”

The moment Uncle Hu uttered those words, I suddenly remembered an ancient book I had once read.

It contained an account of the Netherworld General.

His abilities had been so vast that he had served the emperor by guarding the dragon veins. He was especially renowned for subduing rivers and dragons.

I had never imagined that the being I had disturbed that day was none other than the Netherworld General buried in the General’s Tomb.

At the thought of this, my body shuddered involuntarily.

Yet I found it strange. Though the Netherworld General possessed terrifying powers, I had no connection with him whatsoever.

He should have had no reason to attack me. Then why had the lamp of life fire on my left shoulder gone out?

Could it have been because my spirit beast had transformed into a dragon and disturbed him?

Puzzled, I looked toward Uncle Hu.

“Stop making wild guesses. Eat something and get some proper rest.”

“The extinguishing of your life-fire lamp may have something to do with the geomancers who were present. Have you really not suspected Chen Yanlong and his grandson?”

“I don’t think so. I never saw them make a move. I subdued the green snake as my spirit beast, and it completed its transformation into a dragon in front of everyone. I doubt they would have dared attack me.”

I could not be certain. I was merely expressing my general thoughts.

“Stop speculating and get some rest. I’ll go to the kitchen and prepare something for you. Eat it while it’s hot, then get some sleep.”

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After saying this, Uncle Hu walked out of the room.

As he left, he even closed the door behind him.

The Netherworld General, the green snake’s transformation into a dragon, the grandfather and grandson from the Chen family, Liu Qingqing, my destiny...

The moment I closed my eyes, all these matters began flashing through my mind, making it impossible for me to calm down.

Now that the life-fire lamp on my left shoulder had gone out, I found it even harder to sleep.

I had to find out what the proverbs spoken by the Netherworld General really meant.

Before long, Uncle Hu finished preparing the meal.

I devoured it, then returned to my room and lay down to rest.

Seeing how exhausted I was, Uncle Hu did not say much. He only urged me to sleep early, saying that perhaps everything would be fine after I woke up.

I nodded to show that I understood.

Thus, night soon fell, and waves of drowsiness began to wash over me.

Perhaps because so much had happened during the day, I actually dreamed that Liu Qingqing and I had married and entered the bridal chamber.

The dream was bizarre. We had only just married when Liu Qingqing became pregnant.

The child was terribly strange. The moment it was born, it smiled at me. Then, as it continued smiling, it suddenly began wailing like a ghost, its cries filled with an eerie wickedness.

That bizarre crying startled me awake. When I opened my eyes, I found myself drenched in cold sweat, while my left hand had become intensely sore.

The dream had felt so real, as though it had truly happened.

Fortunately, it had only been a dream. I let out a long breath of relief.

I sat cross-legged on the bed and began massaging my aching left hand with my right.

But after only a few rubs, my entire body suddenly broke out in gooseflesh.

Just then, I heard an eerie infant’s cry beside my ear.

It was exactly the same as the crying I had heard in the dream.

The sound was unmistakable. It continued ringing beside my ear, instinctively filling me with tension.

I silently recited the Heart-Calming Mantra my grandfather had taught me, forcing my mind to steady itself. Then I enveloped my entire body in my profound yang energy.

Only after completing all this did my mind finally settle.

I wanted to determine where the infant’s cries were coming from, but I discovered that the eerie sound was coming from every direction, as though the infant had surrounded my entire room.

I muttered inwardly, This is bad. There is more to this than meets the eye.

One of my life-fire lamps had gone out during the day, and now a hundred ghost infants were crying through my room at night. I had clearly provoked something serious.

Could the Netherworld General be taking revenge on me because I had transformed the green snake into a true dragon?

After thinking it over carefully, I shook my head. It seemed unlikely.

If he truly wanted to attack me, he could have done so directly during the day. Why would he waste time speaking to me?

If it was not the Netherworld General, then who could it be?

After turning the matter over in my mind, I decided the most likely culprits were Chen Yanlong and his grandson.

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They had always wanted to seize the opportunity my grandfather had left behind and alter the destiny of Chen Yanlong’s grandson.

I had stopped them that day, so they must have resorted to such despicable methods to deal with me.

They truly were a pair of wretches!

I cursed them viciously in my heart.

No matter how detestable Chen Yanlong and his grandson were, my most urgent task was to find the crying infant.

If I allowed it to continue, the disturbance might damage my spirit and soul, which would greatly hinder my future cultivation.

With no other choice, I took out my soul-subduing bell, sat cross-legged, and prepared to perform an exorcism.

“Jingle...”

I held the bell in my right hand and shook it gently while forming hand seals and chanting an incantation with my left:

“The Divine Eye dwells within me, its radiance shining in all directions. With my left hand I drive away evil spirits; with my right I explore the netherworld. Wherever my gaze reaches, all things belong beneath Heaven. By command of the law, depart at once!”

After reciting the spell, I shook the bronze bell once more.

As its clear chime rang out, the infants’ cries in the room weakened considerably.

The hundreds of voices that had filled the room at first were reduced to a dozen or so.

The tension in my heart finally eased a little.

Clutching the bronze bell tightly, I rose from the bed.

My Heavenly Eye had now been opened, and I wanted to see where the culprit was hiding.

I knew very well that there could not truly be so many ghost infants in the room.

Even if there was one, there could only be a single entity.

The many crying voices had to be something it had deliberately created to frighten me.

However, after carefully sweeping my gaze around the room, I did not see even the slightest trace of a ghost infant. The brief relief on my face vanished, replaced by renewed tension.

This thing was no ordinary entity. It seemed to possess considerable power.

Even with my Heavenly Eye open and the Demon-Seeking Art activated, I still could not find its whereabouts.

It seemed much more difficult to deal with than I had imagined.

Ordinary people could not see ghosts unless the ghosts deliberately revealed themselves.

Another possibility was that a person’s body had grown extremely weak; when death was approaching, they too could see spirits.

As a geomancer skilled in occult arts, I should have been able to locate a hidden ghost with ease once my Heavenly Eye was open.

Yet I still could not find it. Could this be because one of my life-fire lamps had gone out?

I quickly rejected that thought. Judging by the level of my profound yang energy, even with one life-fire lamp extinguished, I should still have been able to locate it effortlessly.

That left only one explanation for why I could not see it: the ghost’s baleful energy was overwhelming, and its strength far surpassed mine.

The situation had become troublesome indeed.

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