All Beings Will Save Me [Mythology Crossover] - Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Today was a glorious, sun-drenched day.

However, the atmosphere within the Li Manor of Chentang Pass was clearly not as bright and clear as the weather outside.

“Is the Madame still keeping her doors closed and refusing to come out?” Li Jing put down the official documents in his hand that were awaiting his attention, asking with some irritation.

“Yes,” the maidservant nearby replied with lowered eyes and a submissive manner. “Madame still does not allow us to approach.”

Li Jing could not help but feel increasingly frustrated.

His wife, Lady Yin, was naturally virtuous and gentle. In the past, they were considered a loving couple in perfect harmony. But on one point, there was always a rift between Lady Yin and Li Jing, and that was regarding their youngest son, Nezha.

Li Jing had never liked the child Nezha. From the moment the boy was born after three years in his mother’s womb, Li Jing had regarded him as a monstrous and ominous thing. Even though the boy had been taken in as a personal disciple by Taiyi Zhenren—one of the Twelve Golden Immortals of the Chan Sect—and was taught with care, it was difficult to change Li Jing’s prejudice against Nezha.

Moreover, Nezha later committed such a monstrous error that Li Jing often felt regret, thinking it would have been better if he had simply strangled the possibility of Nezha’s birth from the start.

However, Lady Yin clearly held a different attitude. Toward this child, she still gave all her love, even going behind Li Jing’s back to agree to that rebellious son’s request to build a temporary palace where he could enjoy incense offerings.

Li Jing was a cultivator himself. After seeing that palace, how could he not understand that this brat actually intended to use the incense to return his soul to a physical body and descend upon this world again!

Li Jing naturally could not allow such a thing to happen.

Therefore, he had shown no mercy in destroying that palace, smashing the statue of Nezha enshrined within, and returning home to have a massive row with Lady Yin.

However, Lady Yin, who was usually gentle and refined, seemed like a different person this time. Not only did she have a fierce argument with Li Jing, but she also started a cold war immediately afterward, refusing to have any communication with him—it was clear that regarding the matter of Nezha, she was not without resentment.

This caused Li Jing much distress. Lady Yin was, after all, his first wife, and her maternal family possessed a certain amount of power. In short, she was not someone Li Jing could over-reproach.

“Forget it.” Li Jing stood up. “I will go and have a proper talk with Madame.”

Just before he actually reached Lady Yin’s door, however, he was tripped up by another matter.

“Master—Master!”

The military officer rushed in, drenched in sweat, with a faint look of terror on his face as if something fearsome were chasing him from behind.

He tumbled and practically threw himself to his knees before Li Jing, his voice shrill as if he had seen a ghost in broad daylight: “The Third Young Master is outside with a spear!”

Li Jing reflexively countered: “Stop talking nonsense! That rebellious son is long dead. I personally smashed that divine statue. How could he possibly have a reason to be resurrected!”

“But, but…” The officer was sweating profusely. “That truly is the Third Young Master, no mistake…!”

Li Jing was furious: “Shut up! This is truly a case of bewitching the masses with demonic talk!”

Someone let out a laugh.

This laughter was undoubtedly a challenge to Li Jing’s authority as the Regional Commander of Chentang Pass. He immediately glared with wide eyes toward the direction of the sound, only to see a youth leaning against the doorframe, though he knew not when he had arrived.

When Li Jing looked over, the youth tilted his head and smiled. Upon that exquisite face, which looked like a New Year’s woodblock doll, Li Jing could vaguely see a few familiar shadows.

If Nezha’s brows were a bit sharper, his lips redder, the baby fat on his cheeks faded, and the angles of his face more defined—

The appearance abstractly depicted in Li Jing’s mind gradually overlapped with the youth before him.

—Then a grown-up Nezha should look exactly like this.

He almost instinctively took a step back.

This step seemed to startle the youth, who had been slightly closing his eyes as if thinking about something. He opened his eyes, and a golden light seemed to flash through them, like leaping flames.

“You look like you aren’t very welcoming of my arrival.” Nezha gave a quick, short laugh. “Does the matter of ‘seeing me’ make you feel that much fear? Li Jing.”

“You monster!” Li Jing only felt he was being provoked. He raised his voice, his hand gripping his halberd: “How do you still have the gall to appear before me?”

“Is that so?” However, Nezha merely toyed with the Golden Universe Ring in his hand, asking with a half-smile, “Exactly who is it that dares not appear before the other? Do you, Li Jing, not know that better than I?”

Li Jing vaguely sensed a very subtle feeling of dissonance.

Was Nezha… like this?

But before he could catch this fleeting inspiration in his mind, he glimpsed out of the corner of his eye something golden smashing toward him with great force. Li Jing hurried to raise the halberd in his hand to block; though he managed to withstand it with effort, he felt both his arms go numb, and his entire body staggered back seven or eight steps before he barely dispelled the force transmitted from the weapon.

The golden ring drew an arc in the air, circling once before flying back into Nezha’s hand. He gripped the Golden Universe Ring tightly. Li Jing suspected he heard a laugh full of mockery.

The youth’s cold eyes were suddenly close, and Li Jing saw his own reflection in those eyes.

“Li Jing.” He heard the other’s voice, which contained a laugh, like a cat toying with a mouse, waiting to see how many scenes a destined loser could still perform to bring him pleasure. “You didn’t truly think that I wouldn’t kill you, did you?”

The tip of the spear burning with flames lunged upward in the next moment. Li Jing had already used his fastest speed to defend, yet his arm was still pierced by the spear tip, to the point where he could no longer hold the weapon in his hand.

“Hmm? Only to this extent?”

He heard the monster in front of him let out what seemed to be a very regretful sigh: “This won’t do. Isn’t this too easy to defeat?”

“—In that case, the satisfaction brought by crushing you would be far too little.”

“Neither he nor I would be satisfied with just this.”

Li Jing had no time to worry or think about who the “he” mentioned in Nezha’s words was. He looked at this youth who had once been his son and realized two things with absolute clarity.

He could not beat Nezha, and Nezha was truly going to kill him.

Escape!

Such a thought immediately appeared in Li Jing’s mind. At this moment, he didn’t care about face or dignity. His only thought was to escape immediately, otherwise, the monster in front of him would definitely not show mercy because of that tiny bit of meager father-son bond from the past.

Li Jing was a cultivator after all. Having discarded his pride and catching Nezha off guard, he actually managed to find an opening to escape.

“Running?”

The Nezha behind him, however, did not seem in a hurry to chase.

The youth carried his spear, watching Li Jing’s back as he fled in a frantic, bumbling manner, and stomped heavily on the Wind Fire Wheels.

“Then I’ll just see where you can run to.”

The golden wheels burning with flames instantly understood their master’s intent and chased after with a whistle.

Jiang Ganqing had not originally intended to strike so early.

As Taiyi Zhenren had said before, even with great divine powers and a great creation forcing Nezha’s soul to return, this body was not the original body, after all, but a puppet forcibly molded from lotuses. Adapting and adjusting would require a process that was not short.

Let alone Jiang Ganqing’s soul, which was not Nezha’s but had occupied the magpie’s nest.

Even though the Spirit Pearl now resided in his sea of consciousness, having handed everything over to Jiang Ganqing to allow him to walk this world in the identity of Nezha before any existence—including the Heavenly Dao—this process would still appear lengthy.

Unfortunately, Jiang Ganqing was never a fellow with a good temper or patience. The countless eons of imprisonment in the gap between life and death had clearly not allowed him to make even a shred of progress in that regard.

He followed behind Li Jing unhurriedly, watching how the other fled in panic and made a spectacle of himself, feeling only a sense of gratification in his heart.

“This is only the first payment,” he said to the Spirit Pearl in his sea of consciousness, which seemed to sense something and began to vibrate violently. “I will help you take back everything he owes you.”

“You feel happy and gratified too, don’t you?”

The Spirit Pearl even began to emit a misty, colorful light, clearly satisfied beyond measure with all of this.

Jiang Ganqing gauged the current distance between himself and Li Jing, used the Golden Universe Ring to take aim, and then threw it out with force.

A lot of strength was used in this strike, and Li Jing was only focused on fleeing. By the time he heard the sound of air breaking from behind and turned his head, it was already too late. The Golden Universe Ring carried a momentum of overwhelming power. If this hit landed squarely, Li Jing might not die on the spot, but he would definitely be left with more breaths leaving his body than entering.

At the critical moment, however, a pair of twin swords flew from a distance, knocking the Golden Universe Ring aside, allowing Li Jing to escape this calamity by a hair’s breadth.

The pair of twin swords began to clash “ping-ping-pang-pang” with the Golden Universe Ring in the air. Both were spiritual treasures that could communicate directly with their masters’ hearts; currently, each fighting for its own master, the battle was actually thirty percent more intense than if they were being manually manipulated.

A youth rushed over hurriedly from the direction the twin swords had come from, looking sixteen or seventeen years old: “Who dares to harm my father!”

Jiang Ganqing raised one eyebrow, unable to understand why there were still so many dogs minding other people’s business by catching mice.

He kicked the shaft of the Fire-Tipped Spear and performed a flourish: “It is I who wish to kill.”

He met Muzha’s angry gaze and laughed with a “Ha.”

“I want to kill, so I shall kill. What can you possibly do to me?”

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