Take Her Away

Little Mute had not been born mute. She still remembered that when she had been very, very small, it seemed she had been able to speak...

Those memories were already terribly hazy, nothing more than vague shadows. There seemed to have been a bridge, some sweet red candies, and a temple where someone had led her to see a Buddha statue.

It had not been a wooden or clay Buddha statue. It had seemed to be made of gold, and the temple itself had been resplendent and magnificent...

The Buddha statue had smiled, kind and benevolent...

But wasn't Buddha supposed to bless people?

Then why had she been taken from her family and fed that bitter medicine until she could not say a single word?

Beatings, starvation, forced kneeling...

So cold... so painful...

Little Mute inched toward the Buddha statue. Her tiny body was covered in blood, her muscles ground raw against the gravel, leaving blood and shredded flesh all over the ground...

At the same time, Wu Pifu and the brawny yaksha man were locked in a frenzied struggle within the burning, collapsing inn.

At this moment, Wu Pifu's only remaining arm was half-crippled. His palm had suffered a comminuted fracture, and his body was covered in bruises and impact injuries.

The brawny yaksha man was no better off. Half his face had rotted away, and several tendons and strips of flesh on his back had been torn apart earlier by Wu Pifu's tiger claws. Just now, he had used a one-handed wrestling Heaven-and-Earth Reversal, only for Wu Pifu to twist it around by grabbing his neck with both hands. The force had been so immense that it had bent the yaksha man's neck bones crooked, causing loud, strange sounds whenever he breathed.

Yet he seemed incapable of feeling pain. His attacks remained immensely powerful. Though he had no technique, his inability to feel pain, fear death, and his wild close-range throwing and striking made him terrifying to anyone.

Wu Pifu's mind was now utterly muddled and chaotic, filled nearly to bursting with distracting thoughts and demonic impulses. Yet his body seemed to possess some instinct that could always find an opening to defeat his enemy.

In the inn's main hall, the brawny yaksha man roared and threw a punch at Wu Pifu's head while reaching with his other hand to seize his throat.

Wu Pifu lowered his head and hunched over, avoiding both the punch and the grab. At the same time, he kicked at the yaksha man's shin with one foot and drove the bony spike protruding from his wrist into the wrist reaching for him.

In the span of an instant, the bony spike in Wu Pifu's wrist pierced the vein in the yaksha man's arm, while his foot struck the yaksha man's shin. The force sent the yaksha man pitching forward, and the bone spike sliced upward along his arm, nearly cutting open all the muscle on one side.

An ordinary person could only have clutched his arm and howled while rolling around by then. But the brawny yaksha man ignored it completely. He reached down and grabbed Wu Pifu by the hair, then grinned viciously and yanked him upward. The arm with its muscles sliced open clenched into a fist and smashed toward Wu Pifu's face.

Three dull thuds rang out. Wu Pifu's entire face was smashed inward, and several teeth flew loose. The brawny yaksha man grinned viciously as he lifted Wu Pifu and charged at the jagged stump of a broken beam, intending to impale him upon it.

After three punches to the face, Wu Pifu's consciousness began to scatter. But he was circulating the blood-and-qi method of the Tiger Demon Art. Countless stray thoughts surged through his mind, yet at this moment of life and death, a trace of clarity appeared amid that chaotic muddle.

Whether it was a final flash before death or fortune emerging from extremity, in that instant between life and death, Wu Pifu's Tiger Demon Art advanced from barely entering the threshold to truly mastering the hall. Amid the chaotic demonic thoughts, he maintained a trace of clarity. Thus, a single clear divine thought remained undying, allowing him to reflect inward and observe every aspect of himself.

National Arts were arts of killing, but also methods of cultivation, so naturally there were ranks of advancement and growing stronger. The general introduction to the Tiger Demon Art mentioned them: the three external stages of Clear Force, Hidden Force, and Transforming Force. Once Transforming Force was perfected, one progressed from exterior to interior, through the three internal stages of Golden Core, Astral Qi, and Seeing God Without Destruction. Upon reaching Seeing God Without Destruction, one could be called an earthly immortal.

The most important thing among them was self-observation of one's spirit and flesh.

Hidden injuries in the body needed to be healed, and the circulation of blood and qi needed to be refined until it perfectly matched oneself, thereby prompting the body to evolve and develop anew. Upon ultimately reaching Seeing God Without Destruction, the body could attain the peak of life and remain at that peak until one's lifespan ran out.

Observing the spirit could keep the mind clear, preventing one from being deluded by external things, danger, or life and death. Its highest realm was called Cicada Senses Autumn Before the Wind, and it could even grant foreknowledge and premonition of danger.

For National Arts, this self-observation was the very core of the core.

By the usual ranks of National Arts, Clear Force to Hidden Force was a threshold. Crossing it granted the first rudiments of self-observation. At Transforming Force, self-observation improved further. After that, every rank could greatly enhance self-observation. By Seeing God Without Destruction, one could clearly observe even the tiniest cells and every stray thought amid the restless monkey-mind and galloping horse-will.

But the Tiger Demon Art took a different path. Entering it was exceedingly difficult. Once one practiced and circulated it, distracting thoughts would arise in droves. Without a method of cultivation, one could die even at the initial threshold. With one's mind full of stray thoughts while circulating blood and qi, a single deviation could cause sudden death on the spot.

Yet once the Tiger Demon Art reached the level of truly mastering the hall, it immediately underwent its first qualitative transformation. Its self-observation instantly rivaled the Transforming Force stage of other techniques. A thread of clear divine thought remained undying, and only then did its true might reveal itself!

At that moment, Wu Pifu's eyes were blood-red. Behind him, the jagged broken beam was only a meter from his back. Before him was the brawny yaksha man's savage face.

At that instant, everything around him seemed to slow. Only one divine thought amid Wu Pifu's distracting thoughts remained unextinguished and undisturbed. Every sight around him imprinted itself upon his heart. As he was lifted and shoved backward, he twisted hard against a protruding burning beam beneath his foot, pulling the brawny yaksha man slightly off balance with him. Then Wu Pifu violently twisted his upper body. At the critical moment, the broken stump did not pierce his back. Instead, it grazed through the flesh beneath his armpit, passed through, and stabbed into the yaksha man's chest.

With his chest pierced, the brawny yaksha man's arms weakened. Seizing the opportunity, Wu Pifu abruptly opened his mouth and bit down hard on the web of the hand gripping his throat.

Though the brawny yaksha man felt neither pain nor fear, he was still flesh and blood. With muscles torn and tendons and bones dislocated, he naturally could not exert strength. One hand was bitten at the web between thumb and forefinger by Wu Pifu, and as Wu Pifu tore at it, his grip naturally slackened. His other arm could not rise for the moment because his chest had been pierced. In that flash of lightning, Wu Pifu broke free from his control.

But Wu Pifu did not retreat. Instead, he pressed forward. Twisting beneath him, he darted to the brawny yaksha man's side, stomped on the top of his foot, and lunged at him. Opening his mouth, he bit into the yaksha man's throat at the Adam's apple. But with several teeth missing, his bite could not hold firm. At that moment, the yaksha man's other leg, the one not being stepped on, kicked out hard and struck Wu Pifu in the stomach. With a tearing sound, Wu Pifu was kicked into the fire, still biting down on half a windpipe.

The brawny yaksha man wheezed for a moment. Muddy sludge seeped from his throat, chest, and the web of his hand, filling the wounds. Meanwhile, the muscles throughout his body swelled further. He stood at least two meters thirty tall, with a body two Wu Pifus wide and thick. Nearly all the skin on his body had burst apart, revealing black-and-red mottled muscles beneath. He looked like some black-red aberration, barely human any longer.

The brawny yaksha man's eyes were completely black, and the horn on his head had grown two inches long. The bones in his arms and ribs began extending outward, forming bony growths like spikes. At that moment, it emitted meaningless growls from its mouth and prepared to pursue Wu Pifu into the fire.

But just as it was about to charge into the flames, it abruptly stopped. Because... something dark, something terrifying, lurked within that fire. It was something that made even it—ignorant, painless, and unaware even of what death was—feel fear.

At the same time, Little Mute had crawled beneath the Buddha's pedestal. Looking up at the clay Buddha statue, she gritted her teeth and forced herself upright, then pushed at the statue with both hands.

But even if it was merely clay rather than gold or bronze, the statue was still far too heavy for her to move. No matter how hard she pushed, it did not budge in the slightest.

Little Mute made ah-ah sounds as she pushed with all her strength. The bones in her fingers dislocated and tore from the effort. Then, a chirping sound suddenly came from the sky. A little emerald-green bird descended, intending to land on Little Mute's shoulder, but ultimately stopped beside her feet.

The little bird was extremely anxious and wanted to peck at Little Mute, but Little Mute's skin was gone all over her body and she wore not a scrap of clothing. The bird did not dare touch her and could only chirp anxiously without stop.

As Little Mute struggled to push the Buddha statue, she looked at the little bird. She anxiously made ah-ah sounds as well, even kicking at it with her foot, trying to drive it away.

The little bird hopped back and forth across the offering table, its chirps unceasing.

Little Mute looked at the bird, then at the offering table. She froze for several seconds before suddenly rolling off the table and kneeling before one of its corners.

She had no strength to move the Buddha statue, but she could destroy the offering table and make the clay Buddha statue fall...

Even if it fell on her!

Ever since she could remember, she had been alone and helpless. Mute, malnourished, thin, and ugly, she had still longed for happiness. Even a life in coarse clothes and a shabby house would do. Even a rough man who beat her when he was irritated would do. Even if...

He had said it. He had said he would take her away!

Little Mute used all the strength in her body to break off one leg of the offering table. The table toppled toward her, and the Buddha statue, grinning viciously, shifted down with it. Its immense weight crushed down upon Little Mute...

Those red, sweet, sour candies, each one strung upon a wooden stick...

They tasted so good...

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