Chapter 891 The Mentor in My Dreams
Seeing Lazulum leaving to search elsewhere filled Li Mu and w.a.n.g Yanyi with relief.
Even if both of them were at their best, none of them would ever dare to challenge Lazulum, he who wielded pre-Emperor Realm powers.
To say nothing of the caustic properties of the water of the Sea of G.o.dly Demise still inside Li Mu.
It was like poison trying to contaminate his flesh and bones. While having the liquid inside his body was not as painful as soaking himself in it, both feeling it coursing through his veins made it no less agonizing.
Fortunately for Li Mu, he was accustomed to such degrees of pain, hence his relatively normal reaction.
In the meantime, his skin was already recovering. Much of his superficial wounds were beginning to dry and pus no flowed. Coa.r.s.e and shriveled like a roasted potato in a jacket, any disturbances to the boils and blisters bulging on his dermis would nevertheless expose fresh and raw wounds that excrete blood mixed with bodily fluids.
With even his brows and hairs fully gone, Li Mu looked absolutely hideous.
“Heal yourself quick,” urged w.a.n.g Yanyi, “We’re well hidden here, so expel that foreign thing inside you before we look for ways to get out.”
He looked rather pleased to see Li Mu in such a dismal state.
Li Mu rolled his eyes at him.
This was a first for him. Never had he been in such a miserable situation before since he began learning martial arts.
“Here’s some salve. It should help with the pain and enhance your healing,” said w.a.n.g Yanyi, handing him a white flask with the same wry smirk still on his face. He uncorked the tiny little flask and the soft aroma of herbs wafted out of its beak.
Li Mu shook his head. “Doesn’t seem like it’s suitable for me. Save it.”
He was confident that with his heightened regenerative capabilities, his body would heal quickly without the need for medicine. If anything, it was the harmful elements of the liquid still inside him.
w.a.n.g Yanyi dabbed some of the salves on his finger and applied them to Li Mu’s skin as if he barely heard a word.
“Tsssst!!”
Li Mu grimaced at the pain.
Unfazed, w.a.n.g Yanyi continued patting his back, channeling spurts of Internal Powers into him to help the a.s.similation of the medicine into him. Painful and scalding at first, Li Mu soon felt a cool and chilly sensation that was a real relief against the searing pain.
“What an amazing thing!”
The venomous liquid of the Sea of G.o.dly Demise lingered still inside him, but the salve had given him a moment of respite that at least had helped to dull the pain and restore some comfort.
“Thanks.”
Li Mu said to him.
Although he found it oddly surrealistic and creepy to have another man touching him all over.
w.a.n.g Yanyi helped to apply the salve on Li Mu’s back, chest, neck, and head before he finally squeezed the flask into Li Mu’s grasp. “Do the rest yourself. I’m going out to have a look.”
He got up, opened the door and went out.
Li Mu stared at the flask blankly.
He spent the new few minutes smearing the salve on his entire body, feeling the pain slowly subsiding.
Then he sat down and meditated, channeling his powers and cultivation discipline to help accelerate the healing process.
Time pa.s.sed quickly.
More than two hours had elapsed.
Li Mu opened his eyes with a grave look on his face.
“G.o.dd.a.m.n… Even until now… It’s slower than I expected… Just one drop of liquid from the Sea of G.o.dly Demise and now I’m stuck here… No wonder they called it ‘G.o.dly Demise’.”
Li Mu rose up slowly.
The healing of his body had been slow.
After so long, a new layer of skin was only just beginning to grow while much of him was still red and raw like a slab of pork fresh out of the oven. To make things worse, he could feel that many of his meridian channels were damaged too. If anything, the condition of his wounds wasn’t getting any better.
It was like getting burned. What could seem harmless at first was now moving steadily towards sepsis.
w.a.n.g Yanyi hasn’t come back since he went out just now.
And that was cause enough for worry.
It was still dangerous and Lazulum must be still searching for them in these parts, since it wouldn’t take a genius to guess their approximate location.
“Lady? Can you hear me, lady?”
Li Mu tried to reach the lady in yellow telepathically again.
Again and again, he tried many times, yet there was no answer.
That only intensified the desire to see and hear her.
Then he heard footsteps.
It was w.a.n.g Yanyi, entering furtively.
“That dog of yours is taking Lazulum on a treasure hunt. Fortunately for us, their hunt has been rewarding so far all thanks to that dog’s acute sense of smell. But that severed hand of a true G.o.d has gone missing. I’ve looked around and it’s nowhere in sight. How’s your injury?”
w.a.n.g Yanyi gave Li Mu a quick rundown about what was going on while he surveyed Li Mu’s wounds.
“Not well,” Li Mu shook his head. “Wait. You’re able to spy on Lazulum without being noticed?”
w.a.n.g Yanyi motioned at his rusty sword. “It wouldn’t have been possible without it.”
“That sorry excuse for a sword? How is it possible that it carries such power? Or is it actually an Emperor-cla.s.s weapon?” remarked Li Mu curiously.
“I don’t know,” w.a.n.g Yanyi shook his head. “This was given to me by my mentor. But I have yet to fully master how to control and use its full powers.”
“Your mentor? What’s his name?” Li Mu prodded.
w.a.n.g Yanyi fell silent all of a sudden.
“Um,” Li Mu realized how awkward w.a.n.g Yanyi looked, “Just forget I asked. It’s fine.”
w.a.n.g Yanyi chuckled. “I’m just wondering how should I tell you this. I have more than a few mentors and the one who gave this rusty sword to me is my newest one. He’s also the most mysterious out of all the mentors I’ve ever had the fortune to have. He’s a most amazing figure I encountered in my dreams.”
“Huh?!” a dubious Li Mu yelped, “What is this?! A Midsummer Night’s Dream?” Then he chuckled too. w.a.n.g Yanyi was not a native of Earth. There’s no way he would understand that reference.
But to his surprise, w.a.n.g Yanyi giggled. “I’m not Theseus, you know? Anyway, I didn’t take him seriously at first, being in a dream and all. But one day, he gave me this sword in my dream and when I woke up, there it was, lying just beside me.”
“I’m more surprised by the fact that you know what’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” Li Mu commented, looking rather awed.
Once again, w.a.n.g Yanyi has demonstrated his knowledge and understanding of Earth’s culture, invoking Li Mu’s suspicion of his true ident.i.ty.
“What?” w.a.n.g Yanyi responded when he saw Li Mu’s queer look, “I’m different. Unlike them, I have been on a steep learning curve about everything on Earth from the moment I arrived. Movies are especially my favorite. Nothing beats lazing a whole day on the couch with a c.o.ke and some chips over a good movie that’s played at eight times the normal speed. That’s my definition of a perfect afternoon.”
“Shouldn’t that be beer and fried chicken?”
“That’s for watching baseball,” w.a.n.g Yanyi chortled cheerily.
That was when Li Mu truly believed that w.a.n.g Yanyi could really pa.s.s off as a real native of Earth.
The two talked and chatted to unwind.
w.a.n.g Yanyi’s tunic had gone stiff with dried sweat and caked with blood from the wounds he suffered before and from Li Mu. Feeling uncomfortable, he went upstairs to have a change.
“Don’t peek,” he said at the bottom of the stairs leading up to the next floor.
“Spoken as if you’re a woman,” Li Mu scowled at him.
“Whatever. Just don’t peek,” said w.a.n.g Yanyi. Before he went up, he left his sword there and cast an enchantment.
Li Mu did not know what to say, except that he found it rather strange.
But he knew that everyone has his or her own quirks and habits.
“But wait,” he realized, “w.a.n.g Yanyi’s skinny enough for a girl. Other than his dark complexion and his mildly masculine exterior… He looks pretty enough… In fact, pretty by far even for female standards! Could he actually be a…?!”
The more he thought about it, the more Li Mu believed that his suspicions could really well be true.
It did not take long for w.a.n.g Yanyi to change into a fresh set of clothes a jet-black set of tunic and boots. With his long sinuous hair tied with a pin, he descended the stairs with every the suaveness and smartness of a well-mannered gentleman.
Li Mu gawked with muted admiration before his gaze wandered to his throat and chest, registering the presence of an Adam’s apple and no swelling bosoms. That was enough to perish his suspicion in its crib.
“Things aren’t well at all, Li. We need to get out of here. Sooner or later, Lazulum’s gonna find this place,” said w.a.n.g Yanyi.
“I concur,” Li Mu nodded.
They left the tower and picked the one direction that was in direct contradiction to where Lazulum had gone to.
They were right in the central zone of the Celestial Court where enchantments and magical traps lurked everywhere. One wrong step and they could trigger a litany of traps that could very well spell their deaths.
Ignoring his injuries, Li Mu activated his “Third Eye – Eye of Flaws” ability against his better judgment. With w.a.n.g Yanyi’s rusty sword, they made arduously-slow progress while avoiding triggering any traps.
Three thousand meters. That was all they managed to cover after a day’s worth of traveling.
Sundown descended on the ancient cityscape of the Celestial Court.
The two found themselves inside a repository of books and tomes and decided to spend the night there.
A huge luminous pearl hung from the top of the ceiling, providing ample illumination inside the chamber.
Li Mu used the time to meditate and focus on his healing.
Ditto w.a.n.g Yanyi, who meditated and recuperated as well.
Three days pa.s.sed uneventfully.
Li Mu and w.a.n.g Yanyi moved from place to place inside the Celestial Court, carefully avoiding Lazulum’s hunt for them while they used the time to recover, although the progress of the latter wasn’t quite as smooth as they expected.
What Li Mu failed to antic.i.p.ate at first was how the poisonous properties of the drop of liquid from the Sea of G.o.dly Demise were beginning to turn unstoppable, if not incurable. Like a venom that has no antidote, not even his Xiantian Skill could impede its encroachment into his bones and his marrow.
While everything seemed to be healing on the surface, the poison was already spreading into his flesh, his blood vessels, and even his organs. Like an apple that had gone rotten on the inside, the damage was getting out of hand.
By the fifth day, Li Mu could no longer walk. The lanky and gaunt w.a.n.g Yanyi had to carry him all the way.
“We need to find somewhere secure where we can fully devote our focus on getting you better,” said w.a.n.g Yanyi. “Stop using your Third Eye. Leave everything to me.”
Li Mu could barely say anything, let alone proffer any protests.
He could almost feel Death inching nearer to claim him.
But that did not prevent him from being worried about the lady in yellow.
If the liquid from the Sea of G.o.dly Demise could him so much harm, then surely the lady in yellow, who was similarly hurt by the liquid too, must be in grave danger too!
Rumble!
They were still pressing forward when a huge detonation, followed by waves of rippling force came from behind.
Li Mu could almost swear that he heard a dog barking too amidst the din.
Lazulum had found them!
Lazulum must have discovered them and in his haste, he had stormed straight this way, choosing to rely on his Emperor-cla.s.s relic to protect himself from whatever traps and enchantments that he might be triggering.
And from the sound of the explosion that just occurred, he must be somewhere just one thousand meters away.
It was only because of the countless enchantments that teemed the Celestial Court, plus the variance in the fabric of Time and s.p.a.ce here, or Li Mu and w.a.n.g Yanyi would have long been found by Lazulum.
“Leave me, w.a.n.g. Go!”
Li Mu implored weakly.
w.a.n.g Yanyi placed Li Mu on the ground just as he was told. But instead of leaving, he drew his rusty sword and stood there. Steadfast and calm, he said, “I can go nowhere without your Third Eye to point the way. We’re pretty much in the same boat, my friend.”
The explosions were growing nearer and nearer by the minute.
In fact, one could almost see Lazulum’s figure in the distance, gliding through the air with the porcelain bowl Emperor-cla.s.s relic hovering over his head.
“What should we do?! What can I do?!”
An anxious Li Mu raked his mind for solutions.
He was the dead weight and for that w.a.n.g Yanyi was going to die with him
Just when he thought all was lost, a blinding radiance streaked across the sky like a comet. The gigantic severed hand of a true G.o.d which had been missing for days appeared, descending straight down from the air and landed before Li Mu.