260: Chapter 58 Princess Ping’an and Master Maitreya 260: Chapter 58 Princess Ping’an and Master Maitreya Li Mumu’s gaze fell on her own wrist.
Previously, she had bought a pair of white jade bracelets to wear on her wrist to highlight her status as a young lady.
Princess Ping’an also had a pair of fine red agate jade bracelets, which, after this catastrophe, became as red as blood, eerily beautiful.
Li Mumu raised her hand and held the bracelet close to her ear, listening carefully, still faintly able to hear the desperate wailing of a young girl.
Princess Ping’an was already dead, and her final resentment resided in this pair of blood-red agate bracelets, beyond that, she left nothing else.
And her life sacrifice summoned a terrifying strangeness from an alien world.
In the darkness, several elders, dressed in tattered clothes and hunched figures, cautiously approached, warily sizing up the black-haired girl in red, holding a human head in her hands.
“Did the ritual succeed?
Are those Foreigners’ methods truly effective?”
“Does this look like success to you?”
“Why wouldn’t it be successful?
Look, isn’t she wearing red?”
“Then did you feel the dread of the Fierce Ghost?”
“It must be because it hasn’t started eating people yet, right?
A maiden and a married woman are definitely not the same…”
“Can’t you hope for something good?”
Li Mumu, holding the human head, looked nervously at these elders, silently facing each other.
“What, is the Blood Food not to your taste?”
Suddenly, an indifferent voice came from the sky, followed by a pair of huge hands descending from above, looming over Li Mumu’s head.
“Not even eating the Blood Food, it couldn’t possibly be a failure…”
The indifferent voice stopped abruptly, as numerous writhing red strings burst forth from beneath the girl’s robe, instantly piercing through the giant palm and voraciously devouring the flesh and blood within.
With a snap and a flash of the blade, the other party didn’t hesitate to sever their own palm, letting the severed hand drop onto the altar.
In just a few seconds, that giant hand turned into nothing but white bones, and the red string, satiated with flesh and blood, retracted back beneath the robe.
Li Mumu lifted her head, her gaze cutting through the dark mist, and finally saw the owner of the hand clearly.
It was a fat-eared monk who was just sitting there, as tall as six or seven stories, looking like an ancient Buddha statue carved out of the mountainside.
“Amitabha!”
The fat monk’s severed wound writhed with flesh, and a plump white hand grew back.
He brought his hands together in a prayer and smiled at Li Mumu, “This humble monk had no idea that a disciple of the Guiding Bodhisattva was coming, and I failed to meet you from far.
My apologies.”
Li Mumu didn’t speak; she was somewhat unclear about the origins of this monk.
“I am Maitreya, may I inquire about the lady’s honorable name above and below?”
Although the fat monk spoke of Maitreya, his face bore none of Maitreya’s compassion; his eyes were full of malice and calculations.
Li Mumu glanced at the head in her hands.
“Ping’an.”
Hearing the word “Ping’an,” the Maitreya Monk seemed to suddenly realize, “So it turns out that Princess Ping’an is the lady’s Dharma Body in this world.
This humble monk was blind and has offended the royal carriage, I hope the Princess will not hold the offense of a nobody against me…”
Li Mumu stared at his huge, plump body for a long time, then bit her fingertip and wrote a line of blood writing in the air.
Moha Jiedi, the Bodhisattva who Guides the Dead!
In the pitch-black night sky, a distant star suddenly burst into radiant light.
A gaze that spanned past and future pierced through layers of temporal barriers, casting down on this land.
The Maitreya Monk put away his fake smile, got up from the ground, turned around, and started running with his legs.
He even found his legs not fast enough, using his hands as well, much like King Kong racing across the center of New York City, using all fours, speeding away into the darkness.
Why run…
Really, I thought you knew my big boss.
Tsk.
Li Mumu turned back and cast her gaze towards the elders kneeling before her, trembling, as if she had realized something.
They were Blood Food.
These elders were presented before her as nourishment for the Red-Clothed Fierce Ghost.
However, to Li Mumu’s eyes, it seemed that the flesh and blood of that plump monk were still more nourishing…
Ptui, ptui, ptui!
What in my eyes?
It was the Red String that moved on its own, what does it have to do with me?
I’m just a little princess who has been kidnapped by demons, weak, pitiable, and helpless.
“Where is this place?”
Li Mumu asked.
Those elders had already closed their eyes waiting for death, but they hadn’t expected that the red-clothed woman not only didn’t devour their flesh, but actually scared away the Maitreya Monk.
They looked at each other, hastily kowtowed, and said, “Your Highness, please forgive us, this is West Spring Mountain.”
“And where is West Spring Mountain?”
Li Mumu didn’t have a map; she was just asking casually, trying to gather more intelligence.
“Eighty li to the west of the Imperial City.”
Eighty li…
isn’t that just the suburbs?
It didn’t sound very far.
She had thought she was kidnapped by the demon thousands of li away.
Right, what am I here for?
Li Mumu suddenly remembered that she seemed to be here to find her father.
With it so dark, where do you expect me to start looking?
If it’s come to this, then so be it.
Carrying the head that didn’t belong to her, she walked out of the altar and followed the path outwards, with the old people trailing behind her, cowering in fear.
West Spring Mountain was vast.
Standing at the summit, one could see the mountain ranges stretching out for who knows how many li on either side.
In the far East, amongst the darkness, one could barely make out specks of light, which must be the so-called Imperial City.
At the foot of the mountain was a small village, shabby like a slum.
Despite this, it was one of the few places where lights were on amidst the darkness.
And further in the distance, Li Mumu saw many writhing shadows creeping on the earth, slowly moving towards the East.
“What is that?”
“That is the Rebel Army, Your Highness,”
replied an elder hastily from behind her.
“The Rebel Army?
Whose Rebel Army?
Why are they rebelling?”
This question left the elders dumbfounded, and only after a while did someone stand up and say in a low voice, “Natural disasters and famine made it impossible to farm the land, to feed ourselves, to survive, so there was no choice but to rebel…
The Big Leader says this is called rising in rebellion.”
“Who is the Big Leader?”
“That’s Master Maitreya.”
“Are you also part of the Rebel Army?”
“Yes…”
“Are they going to attack the Imperial City?
Why aren’t you going?”
“We’ve been there before.”
The elder offered a wry smile, “Last time, we had already breached the city.
Master Maitreya broke into the palace, ‘retrieved’ Your Highness…
ah, no, I mean, invited Your Highness back, and then we withdrew to West Spring Mountain.”
Wow, turns out you all are accomplices!
Li Mumu asked in confusion, “So by withdrawing here, have you found a way to survive?”
The elder replied with a bitter smile, “What way to survive?
We are doomed sooner or later.
It’s just that Master Maitreya believed the nonsense of the Foreigners, saying that if we seize a Dragon Vein and suppress it beneath West Spring Mountain, it could restore some vitality to this place…”
“There are Foreigners here?”
The Red String, just filled from beneath Li Mumu’s robe, suddenly perked up with vitality.