Killing Dao Fruit
Chapter 186 - 183 Weird · Fanatic

Chapter 186: Chapter 183 Weird · Fanatic

Shanyang City, the outer city.

The buildings here are noticeably shorter and more dilapidated than those in the inner city.

They are almost all makeshift additions by the impoverished residents, lacking any unified planning, causing the streets to be crooked and chaotic.

In fact, the biggest difference between the outer and inner city was not the living environment, but the intensity of the "Dragon Qi Prohibition"!

This area was already on the edge of the "Dragon Qi Prohibition" zone of the Prefecture City, and its safety was vastly different from that of the inner city.

But for the poor families living here, figuring out how not to starve or freeze to death was a more pressing issue than being harmed by demons and ghosts.

In a corner, inside a small earthen house barely better than a hovel.

"Alright! You wretched woman, you really did hide some private money behind my back, hand it over!"

A middle-aged man with a sharp chin and greasy face forcefully took the last twenty copper coins from his bedridden wife.

With the remaining daylight of the setting sun, he admired those copper coins, which had been polished many times and no longer showed any signs of rust, glistening everywhere, and he was overjoyed.

"Yesterday, the fortune-teller Blind Zhang at the street corner told me that I’m about to come into great fortune, today I’ll definitely win back everything I lost, hahaha..."

Saying this, he put the copper coins in his pocket and was about to leave home to rush to the gambling house.

Behind him.

Life was so hard that his wife, who looked nearly indistinguishable from an old woman with gray hair, had a sickly face and a numb expression.

She had long been used to her husband’s exploitative ways and didn’t even know how to resist.

However, a teenage boy suddenly rushed out and tightly hugged the man’s legs, pleading:

"Dad, please stop gambling, we really can’t make ends meet anymore.

We don’t own any land, you haven’t brought home a single coin throughout the year, this is the money Mum saved up from washing clothes for others, scrimping and saving.

Mum was sick and didn’t even dare to buy medicine; this money is for saving lives.

Dad! I beg you, you can’t take this money!"

The man, impatient in his heart, kicked his son in the head, causing his face to be covered in blood, and cursed:

"Get lost, lost, lost! The money in this house is my money, I’ll spend it however I want, stop bothering me!"

"Ah!"

The teenager, unable to bear it any longer, stood up from the ground and pushed his gambling-addict father down.

The sharp-chinned man was immediately enraged and picked up a bamboo strip that someone had dropped on the ground and started whipping the boy with it.

"You little brat, rebelling against me! Without me, where would you be?

Once I win money from gambling, your mother won’t have to wash clothes for others, and you can bask in my glory, eating and drinking well every day.

How dare you block my way to wealth? I’ll beat you to death!"

Smack! Smack! Smack!...

The teenager was beaten until his body was covered in bloodstains, in so much pain that he crawled all over the floor, but stubbornly clenched his teeth to avoid crying out and worrying his seriously ill mother.

At that moment, both father and son paused their actions and slowly looked up.

They saw a gaunt old man who had mysteriously appeared before them.

He was wearing a robe made from pages of books, with each page filled with positive Confucian characters such as benevolence, righteousness, propriety, wisdom, faith, morality, natural law... and so on.

But for some reason, both felt a chill down their backs.

"Where did you come from, old man? I’m disciplining my own son, don’t mind other people’s business!"

The man, already a chronic gambler, swung the blood-stained bamboo strip at the old man, shouting threats.

Unexpectedly, the old man had no intention of stopping him but instead looked emotionlessly at the recently grown-up boy who had just pushed his father to prevent him from taking the money.

From his forehead to his jaw, a line of blood-red characters slowly appeared:

"Defying father as a son, violates propriety, should be killed!"

The Three Bonds: father to son, sovereign to subjects, husband to wife; the Five Constants: benevolence, righteousness, propriety, wisdom, faith, collectively called: propriety!

The badly beaten teenager just looked up at the old man, unable to fully recognize the characters on his body, then suddenly stiffened, collapsed softly to the ground, and was no longer breathing.

"Mother! There’s something demonic!"

Seeing his son die a miserable death, the gambling-addict was scared out of his wits, dropped the bamboo strip, and turned to run.

At this moment.

The bedridden woman, hearing the disturbance outside, struggled to get off the bed, fell several times, and staggered out of the house.

Besides her son who lay dead with wide-open eyes, there was no one else in sight.

The numb-faced woman didn’t cry.

She just quietly closed her son’s eyes, returned to the house, pulled out a belt, and hung it forcefully from a beam, slipping her neck into it.

By that time, she had lost all attachment to this world.

It was only at this moment that she vaguely realized, her family’s dilapidated earthen house was too low, even unsuitable for hanging.

A grim smile appeared on her face.

Without hesitating, she picked up the wooden pestle used for beating clothes from the ground and, with all her might, smashed it down on her own head.

He collapsed to the ground, breathless.

...

In another corner of Shanyang City.

Hastily arriving at the scene, Wang Yuan, Qiu Shaobai, and Bai Mo, the ever-indifferent Miao girl, formed a team, investigating a bizarre murder case that had suddenly occurred in Shanyang City the day before.

"The unknown "Weird" crime scene has always been in the outer city, and for now, it can’t break through the ’Dragon Qi Prohibition’ to enter the inner city.

All of the victims had their Essence Qi drained, a common method in weird killings—eating them alive.

Regardless of day or night, in just two short days, nearly a hundred people were devoured, and there are probably many more unaccounted for."

As the landowner of Shanyang City, Bai Mo walked and briefed the two on the specific details of the case.

"At first, not too many people had died, but the government officials of the outer city, adopting the mindset of avoiding trouble, wanted to suppress it further.

It wasn’t until the "Weird" triggered our Ventilation Bell pre-installed in the outer city that Boss Jiang and I discovered demon trickery at play.

You guys are the first reinforcements to arrive."

Although they had committed a great deed like the massacre of the Prime Minister and his entire family, the collective mind of the Prohibition Officers remained very calm, doing whatever needed to be done.

The old belief that "Dragon Qi Prohibition" could defend against Evil Techniques was deeply rooted, and no one suspected that the collective mutation of the Xue Family could be someone’s malevolent scheme.

However, it would certainly be noted in Prime Minister Xue’s heart.

After all, in the standards of the ruling class, if I want to kill you and you don’t immediately kneel to commit suicide, it’s a grave sin.

The grudges began from the moment Xue Donglou planned to assassinate the Prohibition Officers to vent his anger, and they were already irreconcilable by then.

However.

As long as the Great Yan Court does not use its official powers, they fear no one.

As for playing political games or using bodily disappearance techniques, probably no one in the entire Great Yan Officialdom is a match for the professionals of the Imperial Dragon Guard.

Just like a great detective is also a top master of criminal arts, if those Imperial Dragon Guards who deal with demons daily start playing dirty, even they themselves would be scared.

There’s a specialization in every profession.

The mysterious techniques that have become routine for them are probably unheard of by those high officials.

In other words, in times of chaos, it’s the time for guns to do the talking.

Some people have lived in peace for too long and probably haven’t realized yet that the old tricks of the government will become increasingly ineffective.

The Imperial Dragon Guard will definitely become one of the most powerful government offices in the next few years when the real chaos of the Dynasty’s collapse arrives, and this will be demonstrated even more vividly.

Of course, what Wang Yuan and the others face is not just the hidden arrows from behind; as the "Dragon Qi Prohibition" extensively recedes, the Imperial Dragon Guard’s primary duties also start to get busy.

A nation on the verge of collapse must be teeming with Evil Monsters!

According to intelligence, the demons recruited by the No-Life Dao haven’t arrived yet, but Dengzhou Prefecture’s turmoil has already started beforehand.

It’s unknown whether that "Weird" was attracted by the annihilation of the Xue Mansion, but up to now, they haven’t even seen the adversary’s face.

The victims included men and women, old and young; using these identity labels, it was also entirely impossible to determine the "Weird" killing pattern.

Their current task is to capture that "Weird" as quickly as possible, or at least identify who it is, to formulate a targeted extermination plan.

Just at that moment.

Bell—!

A very distinct, shrill bell sound suddenly rang in their ears.

The group immediately perked up.

"It’s the Ventilation Bell! The Weird has appeared!"

When Wang Yuan led the two to break through the "Yin Road" and appeared in another corner of the outer city.

They saw a garishly dressed young woman, who had silently collapsed on the ground.

Considering her attire, she was most likely an incognito prostitute, probably even a married woman.

A gaunt old man stood beside her, his face inscribed with a bloody message:

"Unfaithful wives must be killed!"

Seeing this figure marked with "Morality" all over, Qiu Shaobai immediately sensed great danger and hastily reminded the two newcomers:

"This ’Weird’ roams daily in Dai State and Yu State...a Fanatic! Upholding heavenly principles, annihilating human desires, known as killing with reason!"

And in Wang Yuan’s "Unsightly Observation" view, what was written on him—where was any "Morality"?

Looking up and down, between the lines, it was all the twisted words "Eating People!"

The old man, appearing as a Fanatic, emotionlessly turned his head to look at the three, the original ink on his face disappearing.

Toward Qiu Shaobai’s left cheek came the writing: "Commoners must bow before officials!"

Toward Bai Mo’s right cheek appeared: "A woman’s incompetence is her virtue; to show her face is indecent!"

And starting faintly to appear from Wang Yuan’s forehead to his chin was:

"Murdering your own family and clan head, great treachery..."

But before it could fully form, it rapidly dispersed, finally changing to: "Defying superiors, lawlessness, must be executed!"

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