Mutated Tao

Before him were two fist-sized red pills with a metallic luster, two pills with a fleshy texture that seemed alive, and two decaying black pills with a pungent odor.

Li Huowang nodded in satisfaction; he had used everything he could think of when refining them. With so many ingredients, these pills were most definitely lethal and wouldn’t leave behind any possibility of life.

A stick of incense was lit up beside him, representing the time remaining before the beginning of the new year. According to his fabricated cultivation technique, he had to start cultivating at the moment the new year started and absorb the spiritual energy that descended from the heavens.

Li Huowang sat down cross-legged and prepared himself, picking up the fist-sized red pill. He was about to die, yet he was unexpectedly calm.

Yes, he had not prepared any contingency plans.

Li Huowang understood that he would definitely have to consume these pills, otherwise Dan Yangzi would never consume them.

His amiable attitude during the New Year’s Eve dinner was nothing but a facade. The matter of attaining Immortality together was just a way to use him as a test subject.

However Dan Yangzi would have never anticipated that Li Huowang wouldn’t care about his own life at all.

Li Huowang had long since grown indifferent about his own life and death; in the first place, he never even belonged here.

His only reason for staying alive was to watch this disgusting bastard, Dan Yangzi, being lured into his own grave.

At this point, Dan Yangzi was seated opposite him, and he had also picked up a red pill.

Under both of their gazes, the incense stick gradually burned up.

Just as the incense stick was about to burn out, Li Huowang took a deep breath and stuffed the pill in his hand into his own mouth, and then swallowed it whole.

Meanwhile, Dan Yangzi, who had also been preparing to take the pill, paused and focused completely on observing Li Huowang’s actions.

Li Huowang had an excited look on his face, not paying any attention to Dan Yangzi. He then swallowed the remaining two pills directly. Then, he closed his eyes and formed gestures with his hands before resting them on his knees.

Sweat slowly trickled down his cheeks as his body began to tremble, while an uncontrollable ecstasy gradually appeared on his face.

“There’s so much innate spiritual energy! This… This… This is how it works, I understand! I’m really going to attain immortality~!”

A hint of anxiety appeared in Dan Yangzi’s eyes, but he still didn’t consume the pills immediately. It wasn’t until he saw wisps of white smoke rising up from the top of Li Huowang’s head that he hurriedly swallowed the three pills.

Then, the cross-legged Dan Yangzi closed his eyes and began to practice the Internal and External Heavenly Circulation technique.

At that moment, Li Huowang slowly opened his eyes to watch his Master, his smile wider than even before.

When he saw the white smoke rising from atop Dan Yangzi’s head and dark substances crawling through his veins, Li Huowang relaxed from his cross-legged sitting posture. He clutched his stomach that was suffering from excruciating pain and began to howl maniacally with laughter.

“HAHAHA! Baldy! Baldy! You can’t attain Immortality! The only thing you will become is a ghost. Let’s meet again on the Bridge of Helplessness, hahaha!”

Dan Yangzi seemed to have heard him but showed no reaction. With his eyes closed tightly and his teeth clenched, he sat cross-legged on the spot, excitedly circulating the Internal and External Heavenly Circulation technique.

“You’re still cultivating? All of that was made up by me! I copied it all from Xianxia novels, hahaha! Ouch, my stomach hurts, hahaha…”

Li Huowang slowly crawled to Dan Yangzi’s side, laughing at his pale-white face. He raised his trembling right hand and slapped it onto Dan Yangzi’s face. “Hey, are you deaf? I’m talking to you.”

Another slap followed, but there was still no reaction from Dan Yangzi.

Trembling, Li Huowang took out a pill from his pocket and stuffed it into his own mouth. Immediately, his veins bulged, and his body became filled with strength.

“I told you to stop cultivating! Can’t you hear me?” Li Huowang punched Dan Yangzi’s face, deforming his mouth and nose.

At that moment, Dan Yangzi, whose mouth was now filled with blood, suddenly opened his eyes and glared vehemently at Li Huowang. Then, he flicked the sleeves of his Taoist robes, sending Li Huowang flying.

"Get lost! You demons won’t hinder me from becoming an Immortal! I’m about to attain Immortality! The ancestors are about to receive me!”

Li Huowang didn’t get up from the ground after he was thrown aside. He simply lay there and looked at Dan Yangzi, mumbling to himself, "He’s gone mad. His obsession with becoming an Immortal has driven him completely crazy. Ah! My stomach really hurts."

Just like that, one person sat while the other person laid down, as some time passed. In the meantime, the pain in Li Huowang’s abdomen became more and more intense, and his body instinctively curled up like a shrimp.

"Ouch, why is it so painful? When will this suffering end? Maybe I should have prepared a knife to slit my throat." Li Huowang writhed on the ground in pain.

Amidst the intense pain, Li Huowang’s consciousness gradually blurred. In his confusion, he once again saw Yang Na’s face. "Yang Na, are you here to receive me?"

Yang Na’s face quickly melted before rearranging into the face of his attending physician. "Bed 14, impaired consciousness. Preliminary diagnosis—food poisoning! Quick, bring in the electric suction for a gastric lavage!"

Li Huowang slowly closed his eyes, and an extremely faint voice slipped out from his lips.

“Gastric lavage my ass … Don’t forget, we are in a psychiatric hospital. Where would you find a gastric lavage machine? Can’t you guys at least make the hallucination be more logically consistent?"

After uttering this last sentence, Li Huowang lost consciousness.

He was very comfortable now, his stomach no longer hurting.

Amidst his daze, Li Huowang felt his body falling continuously without ever reaching the bottom.

“Huowang, you have to hang on. You promised me!” A hazy, yet urgent female voice rang beside his ear.

After some time, Li Huowang suddenly opened his eyes. He propped himself up with both his hands and began to vomit uncontrollably.

He expelled a mass of black liquid mixed with fragments of hair, flesh, and dumplings, as well as a few pieces of internal organs.

The pieces of flesh in the black liquid quivered a little before they stopped moving.

Meanwhile, Li Huowang was stunned by the sudden turn of events. He was still alive? How was that possible? If he was still alive, then Dan Yangzi—!

When this thought struck him, Li Huowang broke out in a cold sweat. He subconsciously turned around to look across, his mouth uncontrollably gaping open as wide as possible.

Damn, did he become some kind of a god… what?

Then, he saw his master’s body had been completely deformed. His grotesque head had been split open, and three fleshy mouths were protruding from within. Inside each of the mouths were three or four smaller mouths with disgusting yellow teeth within. The mouths twisted around one another and opened wide toward the ceiling.

Besides his head, his body had also undergone some significant changes. Feathers were stuck to his flesh with an asphalt-like substance and protruded from his flesh forcefully like thorns.

What’s this? Three flowers blooming, with feathers sprouting from the body during ascension to Immortality? Isn’t this a sign of one becoming an Immortal?

Just as this thought passed through Li Huowang’s mind, those three mouths opened as wide as possible, and then three different voices belonging to Dan Yangzi in his youth, in his middle age, and in his sunset years rang out. “So that’s how it is, I understand! Hahaha!”

Bang!

There was an explosive sound, and Dan Yangzi’s strange body immediately burst apart, flesh and blood scattering across the entire Pill Room.

Chacha and Char’s Thoughts

Is... Is Dan Yangzi dead?