The Eleventh Year of Making Hate with My Lover - Chapter 7

Shen Wang remained silent, staring at his empty right hand.

The tracking Puppet Thread was invisible and ignored the bounds of range; without human intervention, it would generally not break.

“Look, another group is coming up,” Suzawa whispered, remaining hidden behind the bushes and observing the situation nearby under the cover of the leaves.

Another group of white-robed people arrived on the island shore, dragging several burlap sacks as if they were livestock, heading straight toward the building.

They were still wearing the same robes, so blending into the group posed no problem.

The line stopped in front of a heavy wooden door. The leader held a conch amulet up against the door knocker. The heavy iron door emitted a deafening sound, and dark green slime seeped from the door hinges, hitting the ground with a sizzling sound.

The moment they stepped through the porch, a heavy, thick stench of blood rushed to meet them. Shen Wang and Lang Xi both frowned, while Suzawa couldn’t help but cover her mouth and retch.

In the center of the courtyard sat a circular altar with a radius of eight meters, piled up from black reef stones. At the top, over a dozen white bones were stuck, wrapped with dried seaweed and tattered rags. The moonlight shone on the altar, reflecting an eerie luster, and one could vaguely see the dense, intricate incantations carved into it.

They followed the lead, bypassing the altar and heading toward the rooms in the back.

The burlap sacks were tossed onto the floor. When the bags were opened, several young men and women were dumped out.

“We’re lucky. These people have all successfully absorbed the promoter agent and have initially condensed their spiritual cores. Observe them for a few more days, and then we can offer them as a sacrifice.”

“No need, just lock them in Room 7 and send them to that ‘thing’ during the next ritual.”

One of them asked, confused: “Why?”

“Mr. Lin said he brought something good; it will definitely like it.”

“The ritual starts tonight.”

Shen Wang recalled the old woman’s words: “The researchers said that as long as we offer the Sea God some unique sacrifices every three months, we can guarantee smooth voyages and full hauls of fish for the village.”

Well, timing is everything.

After dropping the captives off, the lead white-robed figure led them toward the altar to take their positions.

“This isn’t right. According to my observations over the past few months, the ritual date is still several days away,” Lang Xi whispered to Shen Wang.

“Follow along. Wait for the supernatural entity to appear; don’t alert the enemy.” Shen Wang turned back to speak to him, only to find one person missing.

“Where is Suzawa?”

“?” I don’t know, she was just beside me a moment ago.

A low horn blast suddenly echoed in the distance. Every light in the building went out instantly, leaving only the array on the circular altar in the courtyard glowing with a dark green light.

Lin Xu stood in the center of the altar, holding three sticks of incense. But these weren’t traditional incense sticks to be precise, they were specialized glass tubes filled with compressed crystals, the bottoms igniting with a pale green flame.

He inserted the “offerings” into the grooves of the altar, and four supporting pillars immediately rose around them.

The flames within the tubes gradually turned a deep purple. The refined crystals flowed along the grooves, black smoke spilling out and condensing into large, thick masses of black fog in the air above the platform.

The white-robed figures each held a glowing Star Sand for light, kneeling respectfully around the altar. Shen Wang and Lang Xi crouched among them, watching as a half-human, half-snake shadow appeared within the black fog.

Gradually, the shadow, accompanied by the black smoke, manifested into a solid form. Its upper body was half-mechanical and half-flesh. A massive gash had been torn open in its chest, with ribs wrapping around its heart, and a glowing crystal was embedded within the heart itself.

The “Sea God” Lelis twisted his snake tail, coiling around a stone pillar, scanning the sacrifices offered to him. However, the altar remained empty.

A dissatisfied “hissing” sound came from his mouth: “You summoned me early just to show me your welcoming ceremony?”

Lin Xu performed a gentlemanly bow: “Don’t be impatient, My Lord. This time, we’ve caught you a high-grade piece.”

He flipped a switch. The altar array instantly erupted with blinding light, the ground shook violently, and the stone platform split open from the middle, a silver cross slowly rising from deep underground.

Bound to the cross was a man, his figure slender, long snow-white hair curling in the sea breeze. He was tilted to the side, fast asleep, with a few strands of hair clinging to his pale face, revealing his fragile neck.

Lelis pinched the man’s chin, examining his sacrifice carefully. It was a perfect man—both in appearance and in the spiritual power he could sense.

Satisfied, he extended his tail, coiled it around the man’s bare ankles and up his waist, emitting a high-frequency hum; he seemed extremely excited.

“Not bad.” This time, what had been delivered to him wasn’t an artificially evolved ability user, but a genuine Spirit-Awakening Master.

Lang Xi was stunned on the ground for a long time, stammering: “Isn’t that… Inspector Wu?”

“Hurry up and save him! Are you just going to watch that supernatural entity molests your ex?”

Shen Wang choked, neither replying nor making a move. He began to calculate what would happen if he let the entity get rid of Wu Que would the system directly initiate a self-destruct?

However, he quickly dismissed the thought. Wu Que was the only link he had to his past, and he still needed to find clues through him.

Lelis held the sacrifice in his arms with delight. The array on the ground began to rotate, and the place where they stood started to sink slowly.

Just at that moment, a golden-haired youth descended from the sky and stepped hard on his tail…

“Sorry, not the best landing spot.” Lang Xi kicked the tail hard.

“?” Lelis and the Spirit-Awakening Master who had suddenly appeared locked eyes. A second later, he cracked his mouth into an even wider smile.

“Good. Dinner tonight is high-quality.” He flicked his tail, throwing Lang Xi into the air. Lang Xi used the momentum to land behind him, bit his finger, and opened several portals in the air, weaving through them, making it impossible for Lelis to catch him.

“Why can’t my ability work without drawing blood…”

Lang Xi pulled a staff from a portal and unleashed a barrage of spells at Lelis. However, Lelis’s scales were incredibly hard, and not a single scratch could be made.

Lelis was eager to leave with his sacrifice. With a flick of his long tail, black fog instantly swirled around. Lang Xi’s vision was blocked; caught off guard, he took a lash from the tail and fell from mid-air. The white-robed people around him wove their abilities together, casting a net of light over him.

Shen Wang watched everything from the sidelines with his arms folded. He felt that the base sending Lang Xi on this mission was simply making things difficult for him no matter how he looked at it, the boy had no combat power.

“Destroy the ritual! Kill him!”

“Kill him!”

The white-robed fishermen kneeling on the ground began to shout. Anyone who stopped them from getting rich deserved to die.

“What a bunch of fishermen no, what a bunch of fools!” Lang Xi struggled, shouting: “Help! Why would you let an auxiliary-type be at the front line?”

“Capture him first. I’ll deal with him after I finish this feast…” Lelis said to Lin Xu. Before he could finish, countless black “Puppet Birds” flew past, obscuring his vision. In the blur, a black-haired youth wielding a long black sword slashed off his arm in one motion.

The sword changed infinitely in his hands, melting in an instant only to condense into countless black threads that stretched toward the person in Lelis’s arms.

Lelis let out a miserable shriek, his eyes turning blood-red. Just as Shen Wang’s Puppet Threads were about to seize Wu Que, Lelis swept his tail and dove into the activating altar.

Shen Wang knocked down the white-robed people who had come to stop him. Looking at the closing gate of the array, he plunged his long blade into the mechanism, pouring a massive amount of spiritual power into it. The entrance shattered instantly, and he followed it down.

Relying on the resistance created by his ability against the walls, Shen Wang estimated he had descended fifty meters before landing steadily.

The underground area was pitch-black, with only the Star Sand on the stone walls providing a sliver of light. There was a faint sound of water flowing ahead; Shen Wang guessed he had reached the bottom of the island, and the water must lead to the open sea.

Shen Wang pried a piece of Star Sand from the stone wall and held it in his hand, walking forward with the aid of its dim glow.

Not far away, Wu Que was soaking in the shallow water, his clothes soaked through. The white robe was torn from his shoulder to his waist, revealing a large expanse of cotton-white skin. Blood flowed from his wounds, staining the surrounding water red.

He was soaked in the bloody water, coughing violently. His rising and falling back revealed a pair of beautiful butterfly bones.

“A perfect work of art.” The voice from the shadows was thick and sticky. Lelis used his long tail to wrap around his neck, forcing him to look up, seeing him like a dying white bird.

Shen Wang said nothing, pursing his lips as he strode forward. He released his Puppet Threads, binding them tightly around Lelis’s neck and constricting with all his might. With a sound of an explosion and swirling black smoke, Lelis’s true form emerged from the water, clutching his severed arm, laughing wildly: “Isn’t this illusion excellent? Do you like him looking like this?”

Everything before his eyes turned into black fog. Shen Wang realized it too late and retreated, but countless ghost hands formed from the black fog burst from beneath his feet to restrain him. Shen Wang condensed a long blade and swung it; the blade’s energy severed the black fog, but a long tail slammed hard into his chest.

Shen Wang let out a muffled groan, lifted high into the air by the tail. At some point, there had been a circular cut on the tail.

“Who is he to you? A lover? A paramour?”

Lelis’s face showed irritation: “I didn’t expect him to deliberately pose as a captured sacrifice.”

“If I hadn’t severed my own tail and hid in the water, he would have killed me.”

“But since you delivered yourself to my doorstep…”

Just as Lelis opened his mouth to reveal his sharp fangs and lunged, a blue energy orb was precisely fired at Lelis’s body. In an instant, half of his body was blown apart, flesh charred, leaving only exposed bones.

Wu Que stood on the shore, slightly raising his hand, his index and middle fingers overlapping to fire a compressed energy blast.

He raised an eyebrow: “You’ve been standing there hitting a rock for a while; I called you for ages and you didn’t react at all.”

Shen Wang didn’t have time to answer; he fell to the bottom of the water as Lelis released his tail.

A sense of suffocation instantly gripped him. The terrible thing was that he didn’t have the strength to swim up. His vision began to blur, and he felt himself sinking backward.

The small patch of light above his head was shrinking. Just as his consciousness was about to dissipate, a white figure pierced through the current like lightning, and blue-pink eyes crashed into his field of vision.

Then, snow-white hair brushed against his face, a hand pressed against the back of his neck, and cool, soft lips pressed against the corner of his mouth.