An hour later, two tall, slender shadows kept watch from the roof ridge of the Palace of Yong’an’s large great hall.
They both wore masks. The white-clothed man’s expansive sleeves fluttered, and the white silk band wrapped around his arm danced madly in the wind. The black-clad man was sleek and agile and wore a long saber at his waist. He kept guard at the white-clothed man’s side, gazing in the same direction he did. This scene under the moonlight was somehow at once dangerous, uncanny, and beautifully harmonious.
The newly crowned King of Yong’an was inside this great hall. Xie Lian snorted.
“He set up so many obstacles in his palace to ward off evil. It seems he’s quite scared that something will come knocking, huh.”
“Your Highness, I will open the path,” Wuming said.
However, Xie Lian stopped him. “No need. I’ll do it myself.”
Then he leapt down like a white blossom blown off the tip of a branch by a breeze and landed soundlessly before the palace hall.
Just as he was about to push open the gates, he heard a baby’s wailing from within.
Lang Ying didn’t have any consorts, and his son had died a long time ago. Where had this baby come from?
Xie Lian didn’t care, though. Never mind a baby, he wouldn’t be afraid if an army of millions was hidden inside. He raised his leg and kicked open the palace door!
Strangely, there was only one person within the great hall. There was not a single other soul present, and certainly no baby. When the lone person saw who had arrived, he raised his head.
“You’ve come? I’ve been searching for you.”
The one within the palace was Lang Ying.
Although he was now an esteemed king, he wasn’t dressed in lavish robes, and he sat woodenly upon the throne. Xie Lian was puzzled for a moment at his reaction, but then he realized that he was wearing a mask and funeral garb. Lang Ying had taken him for White No-Face.
There were arrays set up within the palace hall as well, and when Xie Lian crossed the threshold, he could sense something blocking him from approaching further. However, it only took putting a little more force into his steps for him to easily walk forward into the hall. The sound of something shattering rang out.
Night and the chill of winter came pouring in from outside the palace hall, filling Xie Lian’s sleeves with wild winds. “Why were you searching for me?” he asked gloomily.
When he heard Xie Lian’s voice, Lang Ying’s expression changed slightly. “It’s you?”
Xie Lian approached slowly, his snow-white boots advancing across the icy stone floors step by step. “It is I.”
Lang Ying, a brutish commoner, had led an army and destroyed Xianle. With the kingly aura surrounding his body, ordinary evil couldn’t come close to him. However, Xie Lian had brought with him millions of souls of the battlefield’s dead!
He refused to believe that Lang Ying would be able to defend himself against so many ghosts that bore him such powerful resentment. The vengeful spirits were agitated and impatient, ready to break free and seize the fresh, new flesh of their enemy as a host. It was impossible for anyone not to have heard their roiling, but Lang Ying didn’t look particularly alarmed.
“You’ve come to kill me?”
Xie Lian didn’t answer. In the blink of an eye, he appeared right in front of Lang Ying and grabbed him by the hair, yanking him down and pressing him to the ground.
Success!
Under the cry-smiling mask, Xie Lian’s lips unconsciously curled upward.
He knew it! He knew it! He could now defeat Lang Ying!
His heavenly official status had once restricted Xie Lian and made him powerless before this man with a king’s fortune. But now, Xie Lian was stripped of such bondage, had thrown away his godly state—and he could finally defeat Lang Ying. Xie Lian’s heart was pounding, and he was just about to move on to the next step when his face dropped abruptly.
“What’s that sound?”
Waaaaah, waaaaaaah! He heard a tiny baby’s cry again—but there was clearly no baby within the great hall.
He listened again. This wasn’t right—the crying was coming from Lang Ying, who was currently subdued under his hand! Or more accurately, it was coming from somewhere on Lang Ying’s body. Xie Lian ripped off Lang Ying’s robe, and his eyes widened. He jumped to his feet.
“What is this?!”
Lang Ying slowly rolled over and sat up. “Don’t be scared.”
His words weren’t directed at Xie Lian but to the thing attached to his body.
There were two distinct faces growing on Lang Ying’s chest like protruding tumors. Each one was about the same size as a normal human’s face. The larger face was elegant and beautiful, and easily identifiable as a woman. The smaller face was slightly scrunched up like a baby’s. The halting cries had been coming from the “baby’s” mouth.
Human Face Disease!
Xie Lian was dumbfounded. “How did you get infected with Human Face Disease?!”
“This isn’t Human Face Disease,” Lang Ying said.
“How is it not? What is it, then?” Xie Lian exclaimed.
“This is my wife and my son,” Lang Ying explained. “They’re not a disease.”
His voice was soft as he raised his hands to gently caress the two faces on his body, truly looking like a husband and father soothing his wife and child. However, the two faces couldn’t even open their eyes; they could only open their mouths to cry and sob. They had the shape of humans, but they were not human at all.
A moment later, Lang Ying looked up. “Where’s White No-Face? He said my wife would return if I did this, but it’s been so long now. How come she still can’t talk? What’s going on? Tell him to come find me, quick!”
Hearing this, Xie Lian understood. “You let White No-Face plant the vengeful spirits of your wife and son on your body?”
So that was it. All the spells and arrays in the palace weren’t to impede intruders from outside but to prevent the escape of the things hiding within! Lang Ying, who had already become king, was using his own flesh and blood to secretly raise these two vengeful spirits!
Xie Lian had come to seek vengeance, yet who could’ve guessed that he wouldn’t need to do anything? Lang Ying had already infected himself with Human Face Disease. These two faces must’ve been on his body for a long time now; they had grown tiny, deformed arms and legs that drooped heavily off him in a disturbing display. Moreover, they had already sucked their host dry—Lang Ying’s ribs were abnormally visible, his gut was shrunken in, and his skin was wax yellow. He looked wan and sallow, like he didn’t have much longer to live. He was no longer the same brave, fierce warrior he’d been on the battlefield.
It seemed he hadn’t been living well despite winning the war and becoming a king. But Xie Lian didn’t feel gratified at all, and he seized Lang Ying.
“What kind of joke is this?!” he exclaimed angrily.
He didn’t even get the chance to take his enemy’s life—his enemy was about to die on his own! What the hell! What should he do now?
Something tumbled off Lang Ying as Xie Lian grabbed him. It shimmered and glinted red as it bounced and bounced and rolled away. Lang Ying clutched Xie Lian’s hands; even such a simple gesture seemed quite difficult for him.
“Pearl… That pearl,” he panted.
Xie Lian looked over. Rolling on the floor was the red coral pearl he had once given Lang Ying.
“I’ve always wanted to say this to you: thank you for the pearl,” Lang Ying said.
Hearing this surprised Xie Lian; he never expected Lang Ying to say that so suddenly. Something within his heart was about to be unburied, but he forced it down.
“You…!”
“Things would’ve been better if you’d given it to me sooner, though,” Lang Ying said softly. “Too bad…”
Before he finished, the body in Xie Lian’s grip slackened. Lang Ying died just like that, his eyes still wide open.
