Chapter 105: The Evil Star

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“Of course, no problem.”

Li Guangxu nodded without hesitation, smiling. “I’m a man of my word.”

“To explain how I learned the arts of sorcery, I must start from ages ago—long, long ago, when there was a mountain in the sky and a temple upon it…”

Li Changqing spoke on without pause, dragging out the time.

A demon’s tale was no guarantee of truth, so they could only hope Bai Chuan would arrive in time.
Thinking this, Li Changqing kept muttering inwardly, Come quickly, Old Bai.

At first Li Guangxu seemed interested, but as Li Changqing kept going and going, he frowned and said, “I don’t care what happened after you crossed that mountain and met the blue sprite. Get to the point!”

“Mm.”

“After meeting the blue sprite, I met a witch named Gege. She brewed a pot of soup, and after I drank it, I could use sorcery.”

Li Guangxu fell into thought. Could there truly be such a witch, powerful enough to let a zombie practice sorcery?
He asked seriously, “Where is Gege Witch?”

Li Changqing thought inwardly, What do you want me to do, ask her for directions?

“I just told you where she is now. Is there still a way out?” Li Changqing said evenly. “Release us, and afterward I’ll tell you where Gege is.”

Li Guangxu stared at him with cold, steady eyes. After a long moment he said, “I’ll count to three. Tell me where Gege is, or I’ll kill this female ghost.”

He had no patience for Li Changqing’s games.
Seeing no response, Li Guangxu’s refined brow creased.

Li Changqing said, “Count to two first.”
With that much talking, he could still buy a little time.

“Are you toying with me?” Li Guangxu suddenly lunged at Tang Xiaoyu, so fast that neither Tang Xiaoyu nor Li Changqing had a chance to react.
Li Guangxu’s hand radiated overpowering demonic energy, as if a single grab could wrench Tang Xiaoyu’s spirit from her body.
At the last moment, a short sword flew in from afar.
He hastily withdrew his hand and dodged.
Clang.
The blade struck the ground, and Bai Chuan burst into the area from a distance.

“Who is that?” Li Guangxu stamped hard. In an instant, the stones under his feet shattered and surged upward, over a hundred of them flung into the air.
Li Guangxu swept his hand, and the stones—laden with ferocious demonic aura—shot toward Bai Chuan at lightning speed.
While still running, Bai Chuan touched two fingers to his brow. “Trick-Character True Formula, Shield!”

Then he lifted his left hand; a pitch-black shield appeared.

Clang, clang, clang.

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The stones kept pounding into the shield and bursting apart.
Their force was stronger than gunfire by countless times, yet it was easily blocked.
“So this is him,” Li Guangxu saw Bai Chuan and quickly recognized him as the one from Bureau Thirty-Six.

“Ha—have you already alerted the men of Bureau Thirty-Six?” he asked Li Changqing in disbelief.
This fellow was clearly a demon; how dare he summon Bureau Thirty-Six?
That zombie of his would not escape death in the end anyway.
If it had been anyone else, Li Guangxu would not have feared them, but it was Bai Chuan.
It was he who once turned half the demon world into a red-soaked slaughter.
Since Bai Chuan joined Bureau Thirty-Six, every demon and monster in Nanlin had been as docile as rabbits.
He was the main figure behind the plan to blast Bureau Thirty-Six into the sky with explosives.

“Run!”

Li Guangxu shouted and fled. Seeing their leader go, the other demons bolted after him.
Bai Chuan, however, did not pursue.

“Are you alright?” Bai Chuan cast one glance at Li Changqing and Tang Xiaoyu, then fixed his gaze on Liang Daoyi.

“Why didn’t you chase them down and deal with them?” Li Changqing could not help asking.
They had all gotten away.
If only…
“They’re too many; they would drain the force from my body,” Bai Chuan said calmly. “Even for me, to fight all of them to the end is uncertain.
It could become dangerous.”
Li Changqing understood then. These demons had fled because Bai Chuan had merely shown up.

“What have you done before?” he asked.
To rely only on former reputation, to frighten an entire pack of demons into panic-flight—just that. Yet Bai Chuan did not seem so fearsome at a glance.

Bai Chuan did not answer. He knelt beside the python, already near collapse, sniffed it, and said, “A red snake demon. By the looks of it, it seems to be an escaped one from three years ago, when Bureau Thirty-Six failed to catch them all.”

“Ten or twelve demons—recruiting so many, and he wanted to blow up Bureau Thirty-Six. What did he want to achieve?” Bai Chuan narrowed his eyes, his expression grave.
“Perhaps we can get some answers from him.” Li Changqing stepped forward and removed the tape binding Liang Daoyi’s mouth.

Liang Daoyi felt his whole body go weak. Even the giant serpent nearby made him feel nearly suffocated.
For an ordinary person, contact with such an uncanny world is a violent shock. Before, though he knew they were demons, they still had human bodies, which limited the visual impact.
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Page 3 had nothing more to soften that thought.

“Take him back to Bureau Thirty-Six first,” Bai Chuan said slowly.

……
“Ha. The plan failed.”

In a forest five li from the paper mill.

“Boss, our plan has failed.”

The demons’ faces showed strange expressions.
Li Guangxu sat beneath a tree, his eyes deep and hard, and with one punch broke through a trunk nearly a meter across.
Even that did not cool his rage.
He had bought explosives in secret and bribed the delivery man of Bureau Thirty-Six.
Had the leak never happened, they could have sent Bureau Thirty-Six to the skies in one stroke.

“The Evil Star is about to appear,” Li Guangxu said, exhaling heavily, his gaze flickering.
“When it surfaces, countless demons and ghosts will pour into Nanlin.”

……

In Bureau Thirty-Six, after interrogation, Liang Daoyi spoke of everything he knew in full.
It was not much different from what he had already told Li Changqing.

After the questioning, Li Changqing handed him a cup of hot water. “Mr. Liang, their plan has already been exposed. Whether or not we arrest you now is of little consequence. You should be safe.”

After he drank, Liang Daoyi seemed steadier. “Thank you, Detective Li. If anything new turns up later, I’ll come back and tell you.”

“Mr. Liang—one more thing. Please don’t tell anyone else. You understand what I mean,” Li Changqing reminded him.
It referred naturally to his own zombie nature, which Liang had seen.

Liang Daoyi nodded gravely. “Detective Li saved my life. I will never reveal it to anyone else.”
After that, he took his leave.

Watching his back disappear, Bai Chuan said in an even tone, “The best way to make someone keep a secret is to make it impossible for them to speak again.”

“Otherwise, any promise means nothing before profit or threat.”