Chapter 59: Dissolution of the Mortal Body

Mount Luofu remained perpetually damp and chill. Huang Huotu quickly began to feel physically unwell after arriving here, and was forced to clear a patch of ground to dig a pit and build a bonfire. To prevent sparks from flying and causing a wildfire, he piled a high ring of stones around the edge of the pit, making it look rather like a stove at first glance...

Towering trees blotted out the sky, and his mobile phone signal fluctuated constantly. He wanted to walk out of the forest, yet feared running into accidents...

Just then, his brow suddenly furrowed, and he pricked up his ears in alert suspicion. It sounded like crying!

Deep in the desolate mountains and old forests, the sound of weeping was utterly hair-raising!

Huang Huotu hurriedly grabbed a burning branch from the bonfire, looked all around, and trembled violently, staring in disbelief not far ahead!

The ground was thickly piled with dead leaves, damp, foul-smelling, and even teeming with carrion-eating insects.

A little girl came walking unsteadily towards him, stepping deep and shallow. She had no protection whatsoever, wearing only a short-sleeved shirt and shorts. Her exposed skin was covered in wounds and stained with numerous smudges.

Huang Huotu felt momentarily dazed and raised a hand to slap himself across the face. Feeling the stinging pain, he looked again and realized he was not hallucinating.

With a trembling voice, he asked, "Meimei?"

The person who had approached was none other than Huang Meimei. Her eyes were red-rimmed as she said, "Dad... Daddy?"

Meimei could speak?

Huang Huotu was as shocked as if he had seen a ghost. It took him a long while to snap out of it. He tossed the branch back into the bonfire, rushed forward to tightly grasp Meimei's shoulders, and said with rising emotion, "You can speak! You... Wait, why are you here? Weren't you supposed to go live in Japan with your mother for a while?"

Two years ago, he had reported his brother-in-law for embezzling public funds by abusing his official position.

In a fit of anger and shame, his brother-in-law kidnapped Meimei in an attempt to exact revenge on him. Driven out of his mind, the man pointed a pistol at her forehead, but the gun accidentally went off. Somehow, the bullet struck the brother-in-law himself, killing him instantly on the spot.

Ever since that time, however, his daughter Meimei had never spoken another word. The doctors said she might have been traumatized and needed time to recover naturally...

Two years had passed, and his daughter remained just like that, while his wife had turned against him as an enemy.

He had thought his life would simply go on like this until the end, yet he never expected his daughter to recover!

A sudden surge of overwhelming joy washed over him...

Pearls of tears slipped from Huang Meimei's eyes, and with a sob in her voice, she said, "An uncle said Mom was an evil person and wanted to kill her! We escaped from Japan, but when we got back to Taiwan, we couldn't find you, Dad. Mom said you might be around Guangdong, so we traveled all the way here...

"Then that uncle suddenly appeared, claimed Mom was a demon, and killed her. He wanted to kill me too, so I just kept running and running..."

An uncle?

Huang Huotu was so overwhelmed by Huang Meimei's sudden appearance that his mind instinctively jumped to Li Gan.

That Li Gan possessed strength far exceeding his imagination; not only had he single-handedly dismantled the True Immortal Temple, but he had also terminated two IC heavyweights of the Huang family and slaughtered over a hundred believers...

A case involving a death toll exceeding a hundred. Even without Li Gan telling him, he had already heard about it all the way on the mainland.

Huang Huotu fell into deep thought.

Seeing this, Huang Meimei pressed both hands onto Huang Huotu's head, her eyes wide as double pupils locked onto his gaze!

"Meimei... You..."

The moment Huang Huotu caught sight of those double pupils, his mind went completely blank, as if some foreign entity had invaded his thoughts, leaving his entire being feeling sluggish and numb.

Silver-white dust continuously seeped from the ten fingers of Huang Meimei's hands, invading Huang Huotu's brain as she chanted an incantation. She soon noticed a large amount of dark blood flowing from his nostrils.

Reaching into Huang Huotu's jacket pocket, she pulled out a talisman paper, letting out a cold scoff: "A Body-Purifying Talisman?"

The talisman paper fell to the ground and swiftly turned to ashes.

With his consciousness blurred, Huang Huotu staggered back a few steps as he saw "Li Gan" walking in from outside the forest. He muttered, "B-Brother, you're here... Meimei said you killed my wife. Is that true?"

The entire forest turned a washed-out, bloody red.

With a gloomy expression, Li Gan strode over, grabbed Huang Meimei's hair with his right hand, and said coldly, "Huang Huotu, you were born with deficient Lesser Yang and Greater Yin, and your daughter is even a vessel cultivated by a demon. Her body has now been occupied by a fiend; I must destroy her to save you..."

A brutal tug!

A patch of scalp was actually torn away along with Huang Meimei's hair, revealing a bloody mess. Excruciating pain wrung a miserable scream from her: "Daddy!"

Huang Huotu's heart felt as though it were being shredded. Panicked, he dropped to his knees and pleaded desperately, "Brother, don't do this! Meimei is the only reason I have left to live. If she dies, what meaning is there in my existence! I beg you, spare her, and I'll do anything!"

Not a shred of emotion remained in Li Gan's eyes. While his right hand clutched her hair, his left hand clamped around Huang Meimei's neck, hoisting her into the air. Tightening his five fingers, he declared, "Heretical demons must die, even if it is your own daughter!"

Huang Meimei's legs kicked aimlessly in mid-air, her small black boots falling to the ground and rolling several times.

With snot and tears streaming down her face, she stared despairingly at Huang Huotu and said word by word, "Daddy... I saw Mom coming to pick me up..."

Such a striking visual impact!

Huang Huotu's scalp tingled fiercely. Clenching his teeth, he began beating his own face wildly with both hands: "No, no, no, Brother Li told me that the heretics of the True Immortal Temple excel most at illusions! I must have fallen into an illusion. Talismans—I need talisman papers to help me break free!"

He rummaged frantically through his clothes, fished out a "talisman paper" from his pocket, stuck it straight onto his forehead, and cried out hysterically, "Quickly break this illusion for me!"

Huang Meimei's face turned ashen as her tongue was forced out by the pressure in her throat—she was in a state of near-death.

Huang Huotu tore off the "talisman paper." Why was there no reaction at all from this talisman? Could all of this actually be real? Millions of "insects" seemed to be tearing at his brain, bringing unbearable pain, and his eye sockets burned a bloody red.

He spun around, retrieved a dagger from his tent, and the gleaming blade made his features look exceptionally ferocious!

Meimei could not die!

She cannot die!

Huang Huotu's eyes brimmed with agonizing pain and murderous intent. Fixing a death glare on Li Gan, he let out a roar, gripped the dagger tightly in his right hand, and thrust it forward with all his might!

Anyone who harms my daughter must die!

Die!!!

The gloomy expression on Li Gan's face gradually softened. He released his grip on Huang Meimei, looked down at the dagger buried in his heart, and flashed an enigmatic smile. The pupils within his eyes split into two, rotated back and forth twice, and he said, "Huang Huotu, the human demon has been slain, and the evil karma has now been inherited by this body. You have ended the evil karma with your own hands, opening the path of merit. It is time for me to reap the harvest."

Huang Meimei on the ground dissolved and drifted away with the wind.

Meanwhile, the stabbed Li Gan slowly transformed into the likeness of Huang Meimei, wearing a bewitching smile as she staggered back a few steps and collapsed onto the ground...

Huang Huotu was plunged entirely into bewilderment and despair. Wh... what was going on? Why had the dagger pierced Meimei's heart? Wasn't it Li Gan who wanted to kill his daughter?

Feeling physically unwell with his stomach churning violently, he retched, vomiting a large quantity of dark liquid.

As his mind gradually cleared and he looked upon the scene before him, the world spun wildly around him. He rushed forward to gather Meimei into his arms, tears falling unstoppably onto her face as he murmured, "What on earth is real, and what is fake? I beg you all, please don't hurt Meimei—I am willing to give you anything!"

He had already guessed that some sort of "consciousness" was hidden within Huang Meimei's body—something akin to a ghost possession—and it had found him ahead of Li Gan...

Using illusions to force him into "terminating" her with his own hands!

Huang Meimei looked gently at Huang Huotu and said, "You seem to be in great pain. Do not grieve; birth, old age, sickness, death, sorrow, joy, separation, and reunion are the natural states of the mortal world. As the saying goes, 'From love stems worry, from love stems fear; if one is detached from love, there is neither worry nor fear.' Once you learn to sever it, you shall become infinitely powerful!"