A Stubborn Illness Called Eternal Life

The croaking of frogs was incessant, and the drizzle that had lasted for several days finally ceased; after this autumn rain, the mountain paths became muddy and treacherous.

Yet, in the dead of night, a carriage emerged from the end of the mountain trail.

The waning moon was obscured by clouds, and though the carriage bore no lanterns, it traversed the gaps between the towering mountains as if traveling on flat ground.

The interior of the carriage was pitch black; the windows were sealed with wooden planks, and the entrance was covered by a curtain. Only by the intermittent moonlight could one see the burly figure of a coachman behind the fabric.

The coachman remained motionless, emitting a foul, bloody stench that seemed to mingle with the peculiar odor of rancid grease.

Li Mo stared at the coachman's back for a long time; an instinctive fear sent a chill down his spine, and with the carriage being cold and damp, his thin, small frame involuntarily huddled tighter into his cotton coat.

He appeared to be just over ten years old, with plain features, skin the wheat-colored hue of a farm boy, and slightly pale lips.

Only in Li Mo's eyes, which were brimming with vitality, did he appear somewhat distinct from the other impoverished children.

Suddenly, he heard a few hisses from outside the carriage.

Based on Li Mo's knowledge of livestock, these were certainly not horses or oxen, nor did they sound like donkeys or mules; he could only discern that they were walking on two feet.

Suppressed sobbing from a child immediately erupted within the carriage.

Li Mo, accustomed to this, took out some dry rations and swallowed them, subconsciously touching the Peace Amulet carved from hardwood hanging around his neck.

There were fourteen children in the carriage, all of them around the same age.

Their exposed skin generally lacked any trace of blood, and among the slightly older ones, there were already clear signs of premature aging.

Zhao Zhu leaned toward Li Mo, looked at the coachman, and asked cautiously, "Hei Wa, how much longer do you think until we reach Smelting Town?"

Hei Wa was Li Mo's childhood nickname; his parents were still alive back home, along with an older brother who had inherited the family carpentry business and a sister who had long since married.

"Zhu Zi, don't be reckless. Don't think we're still in Niu Family Village."

Li Mo patted Zhao Zhu on the head, then replied, "Counting the days, we should arrive in two more days."

After saying this, he ignored Zhao Zhu and closed his eyes, as if resting his mind.

How could Li Mo not understand Zhao Zhu? He was likely missing his family, but there was no turning back once the arrow had left the bow; he had never heard of any boy who went to Smelting Town ever returning home.

Even so, whenever there was an opening for Smelting Town, the villagers would fight tooth and nail for it.

Li Mo wanted to doze off for a moment, but he couldn't fall asleep no matter how he turned; his mind remained in a state of constant agitation, and his heart hammered wildly.

He wasn't feeling homesick or cowardly; it was mainly because he was about to come into contact with an unimaginable world.

Li Mo was not a native of this place; in his previous life, he came from the technologically advanced Blue Star, only to accidentally inherit the body of a child who had drowned.

He had been in this bizarre and inexplicable world for five years, and he had almost forgotten the neon lights and bustling life of his past.

Li Mo gripped his left wrist to check his pulse, unable to help but think to himself, My heart rate is forty-five beats per minute, even slower than it was a week ago.

If this continues, I, too, will become neither living nor dead.

Seeing Li Mo tossing and turning, Zhao Zhu asked with concern, "What's wrong, Hei Wa?"

"I'm fine."

Li Mo shook his head and said no more. Just then, the morning sun rose outside the carriage, and he used the light to examine this group of children of similar age.

Among them, Ma Ergao was the oldest, already over sixteen.

He looked somewhat timid, huddled in the corner with his arms wrapped around his knees, his temples stained with white patches—the gray hair of premature aging.

Li Mo sighed.

The constitution of the people in this world was extremely bizarre.

Children were perfectly normal until the age of eight, but once they passed eight, their heart rate would decrease year by year until it stopped at twenty.

Then, the internal organs would lose their vitality, the skin would turn a grayish-white like a corpse, accompanied by a series of symptoms such as premature aging and muscle atrophy.

It could be said that if a person did not marry and have children before the age of twenty, they would lose the ability to reproduce, as their body gradually transformed into a half-corpse that was neither living nor dead.

Of course, compared to the drawbacks, the benefits gained were even more incredible.

That was "Eternal Life," also known as the "Death Sickness" that the elderly spoke of with terror.

Once a person passed the age of twenty, the vital signs of the body disappeared completely; they were no longer eroded by disease, and no matter how much they aged, they would never die from a depleted Lifespan.

They didn't even need to consume food.

In Li Mo's memory, there were several elders in the village over three hundred years old.

Even though their bodies were so fragile they could no longer move, they continued to live day after day until they requested to be burned alive.

It was said that in the ancestral hall of Niu Family Village, there was an ancestor who had lived for a thousand years.

The joints of the ancestor's body were completely locked, and the flesh was decayed to the extreme; he was only carried out by the young and strong during ancestral rites to bring good luck.

Li Mo had always felt that eternal life was a curse.

One could only watch helplessly as their own body withered, their soul trapped within a shell, forever enduring the torture of being unable to die.

Li Mo was heading to Smelting Town because he had discovered that there was a way to slow down the Death Sickness there.

Every twenty years, a shop assistant from Smelting Town would come to Niu Family Village, though this time it was the shopkeeper himself who had come, ostensibly to recruit young apprentices.

Li Mo had inquired about this from the elders.

It is said that Smelting Town rarely opens its gates to outsiders, and ordinary people never encounter it in their entire lives; only the residents within the city can bring strangers inside.

Although the elders are tight-lipped about Smelting Town, they still push their own grandchildren to go, vying for the few spots available for shop apprentices.

As a carpenter, Father Li holds a respectable status in the village, so a spot was naturally available, and it just so happened that Li Mo had reached the age where he would soon be separated from the family.

Li Mo was unaware of this at the time, but Father Li had already submitted his name to the shopkeeper.

Because of this, Li Mo saw the true face of Steward Tian. Although his appearance was slightly peculiar and he was clearly over forty, the signs of corpse-ification he displayed were negligible compared to others of the same age.

The driver of the carriage was none other than Steward Tian, who had come to Niu Family Village alone.

To resolve the Death Sickness, Smelting Town seemed to be one of the few remaining options.

"What a pity..."

Thinking of this, Li Mo could not help but close his eyes tightly, his consciousness drifting into the chaotic depths of his mind, where a book floated in the void.

The material of the book seemed to be a cross between cloth and paper, and the mist leaking from it constantly transformed into celestial birds and rare beasts, while the cover was inscribed with the three characters: "Book of Fortune."

The Book of Fortune had appeared in his mind inexplicably, its origins unknown.

Li Mo saw at a glance that the Book of Fortune was extraordinary, but unfortunately, from the age of five to ten, he had never found a way to open it.

Li Mo stared at the Book of Fortune, drifting into a half-asleep, half-awake state, vaguely hearing Zhao Zhu's incessant chatter.

Soon, Zhao Zhu also fell into a deep sleep, his light snoring echoing in Li Mo's ears.

It was not until the carriage came to a complete stop that Li Mo instinctively jolted awake, but he did not act rashly, continuing to pretend his eyes were closed.

He heard the sound of bones clashing outside the carriage, but it ceased after only a few breaths.

"Cough, cough, cough."

The curtain was lifted and sunlight spilled into the carriage, causing all the children to cover their eyes in discomfort.

"Everyone, come out."

The children, feeling like they were sitting on pins and needles, scrambled out from under the curtain, with Li Mo following closely behind.

Steward Tian had a kindly expression, wearing a purple-black straight-collared robe with a cyan-white cloud-patterned sash around his waist.

His protruding belly looked like that of a woman ten months pregnant, seemingly ready to burst through the constraints of his ribs.

Steward Tian's skin had many wounds; although no blood flowed from them, the whitened flesh did not look like it would ever heal.

This, too, was the price of longevity—injuries were difficult to fully recover from.

The carriage was parked on the gravel-paved Official Road, and because the sky was just beginning to brighten, the travelers and merchant caravans on the road appeared sparse and scattered.

They intentionally bypassed the carriage, not daring to approach Steward Tian, their eyes filled with fear.

Li Mo observed secretly and discovered that the beast hoofprints stopped in front of the carriage, and the reins were stained with spots of blood, as if the animals pulling the cart had vanished into thin air.

Steward Tian's cuffs were also stained with a few drops of blood.

When he first came to the village, Steward Tian had not brought any livestock, and the carriage had been parked more than ten miles outside the village.

Li Mo dared not dwell on what had been tied to the reins earlier.

"Little ones, there is still a stretch of road to Smelting Town. Follow my footsteps closely; if you fall behind, you'll have to walk back to Niu Family Village yourselves."

Steward Tian wore a smile, his features bunched together by wrinkles like an old fox wearing human skin, which was truly hair-raising.

The children retreated a few steps, only to see Steward Tian already walking away along the Official Road.

They hurried to follow, and fortunately, Steward Tian's pace was not fast, so even the children could keep up by jogging without falling behind.

Li Mo blended into the back of the line.

His stamina was not bad; in fact, when he first transmigrated, he had thought that exercise might delay the Death Sickness.

Therefore, Li Mo ran around the village entrance every day, and although it didn't make him sturdy, his endurance was enough to rival that of a seventeen or eighteen-year-old youth.

After more than an hour, the group stumbled over the hills.

Only a young girl named Li Qingfang had sprained her ankle, and Ma Ergao had carried her for most of the journey.

Li Mo watched the passersby out of the corner of his eye, noticing that their corpse-ification was even more severe than that of the villagers, yet for some reason, it did not affect their movements at all.

There were children from other villages heading to Smelting Town as well, but judging by the attire of their leading clerks, they did not belong to the same shop as Steward Tian, and their gait appeared slightly uncoordinated.

Gradually, the sun began to set, and at the end of the Official Road, a town leaning against a mountain appeared.

Smelting Town was not just situated at the foot of the mountain; even the peaks were covered in clusters of houses, but because the mountain was steep and rugged, the houses were crooked and twisted, appearing exceptionally awkward.

Grey-black dust swirled around the summit, and the mountain wind carried a faint, putrid stench.

Outside the town was a vast, continuous stretch of farmland where farmers were planting crops. They did not flee when they saw Steward Tian, but continued to bury their heads in pulling weeds.

The exposed faces of the farmers were covered in black spots, their gums were receding, their eyes were bloodshot, and scattered wounds actually appeared to be rotting.

Li Mo's expression became dazed; he had the illusion that he had seen this Smelting Town in a dream.

At this moment.

The lifeless Book of Fortune suddenly produced a strange phenomenon; the celestial birds and rare beasts circling the book transformed in an instant into a Corpse Mountain Sea of Blood.

Then, the Book of Fortune opened to the first page.

The pattern on the page was a living, pulsing brain.

Li Mo's mind was flooded with a vast array of fragmented memories, depicting a town that bore a thirty to forty percent resemblance to Smelting Town.

Mountain peaks hovered a hundred meters in the air, tethered to the ground by iron chains, with rows of Taoist temples arranged in perfect order, shrouded in a faint, ethereal mist.

Taoist priests came and went, tending to birds and beasts; they looked ordinary, showing none of the telltale signs of the Death Sickness.

Li Mo's expression turned to one of astonishment, for according to the fragmented memories, seven thousand years ago, Smelting Town had been an immortal sect primarily dedicated to raising spirit beasts.

It was known as [Heart Beasts].

New book, please add to your library!!!