Beginning with the Ubume Bird

Chapter 139: Chapter 38: A Hundred Demons Competing for Food

The cleaver chopped down on the chopping board, and the flames on the stove grew stronger.

Li Yan, with his arms crossed, suddenly asked, “Sometimes, do you feel like you’ve gone off track?”

Since they were temporary allies who could be trusted, Li Yan could ask such things more casually.

Cha Xiaodao paused in his work.

“Taotie should be a patron, not a chef…”

Seeing that Cha Xiaodao didn’t immediately respond, Li Yan also fell silent.

Cha Xiaodao tilted his head and focused on the pots and pans in front of him.

“I used to be of the Five Immortals category, Yi Yi’s Sword. My ability’s direction was decided back then, but later my inheritance was stolen, and I barely escaped with my life. Luckily, I managed to switch to Taotie, which I can also wield adequately.”

He shrugged his shoulders, “Yan Fu, after all, is full of people robbing and snatching from each other. It’s pretty normal.”

Li Yan picked up a tomato from next to the stove, took a big bite, and red juice filled his mouth.

“Then for you to make a comeback, you really do have some skills.”

Seeing that Cha Xiaodao did not reply, Li Yan asked another question, “What are you making?”

“The most skill-demanding dish from Dongxing Building. It’s not something the average person can learn.”

Cha Xiaodao weighed a piece of chicken gizzard in his hand, cut away a thick membrane with his knife, and tossed it aside.

“This dish is called Crispy Blast. Authentic craftsmanship like this has been rare since the Republic of China. Bite into it and feel the tender crunch; and the way it crackles in your mouth, that flavor~”

The chicken gizzard and pig stomach were covered in fine knife marks. As he spoke, Cha Xiaodao put the cleaned chicken gizzard into the pot, turned up the heat, then added the pig stomach. The mix of red and white was striking to behold.

Add in scallions, ginger, and minced garlic to fry until fragrant. With a sizzling crackle, white smoke rose from the pot, and the aroma wafted through the room.

He added sauce and tossed the food skillfully. The heavy wok seemed weightless in Cha Xiaodao’s hands as he flipped it up and down.

Hot oil splattered. Reddish-brown sauce sprayed into the air, coating each airborne piece with a shiny gloss.

“Tsk tsk~”

Lady Dan was visibly tempted by the sight. Li Yan, however, was scanning his surroundings.

It was like that first thrilling moment when he had bent over in front of his bicycle to pick up money.

That odd feeling, as if the air was boiling in the dead of night, surrounded him once again.

From outside the door crept a noisy, dark murmuring. It buzzed annoyingly.

Li Yan could not make out the words clearly, but they were roughly “Delicious!” “Want to eat~” “Mine.” This sort of talk.

“The boiling midnight has arrived early, limited to this room. It’s also attracting some things. Perfect, as Lady Dan’s desired souls have a destination.”

Li Yan deduced.

Beyond the quaint red-lacquered paper windows, twisted shadows showed their fangs and claws, and a whirling cold breeze blew in, causing the door latch to clatter to the floor.

The fragrance inside the room became even more appetizing.

Cha Xiaodao suddenly spoke up.

“Don’t go out, and don’t let anything in. This dish is for you, after all.”

Hearing this, Li Yan laughed heartily and drew his Ring Dragon Sword.

He gave Lady Dan a reassuring look and walked toward the restaurant’s main entrance.

“Creak~”

The old mahogany door was pushed open by Li Yan.

The cool moon hung in the sky as withered black leaves were whipped up, dancing everywhere.

The lanterns hanging at the doors of shops on both sides of the street swayed back and forth, their bright lights reaching far into the distance.

From afar, it seemed like the sound of watchmen’s gongs could be heard, yet in this era, who would still be keeping watch?

Dong~ Dong~

Starting from the far end of the street, one lantern after another went out, as darkness crept closer step by step.

Li Yan’s face, originally lit a fiery red by the lanterns, began to fall into shadow as the lanterns on the street extinguished, one by one.

Until the two lanterns in front of the door went out, Li Yan heard Cha Xiaodao utter a murmur from inside the house.

“The art of cooking is like retrieving treasure from fire. Underdone is raw, slightly overdone is old, contended in a flash, lost in an instant.”

Lost in thought, Li Yan was suddenly confronted with a dark, robust arm!

“Bang~”

The old door panels could not withstand the force and shattered, flying outward with dust billowing.

A huge shadow flew by!

The person was kicked out of the doorway by Li Yan, tumbling onto the stone slab like a rolling gourd. Li Yan also felt a surge of blood churning, with a dark fist mark on his chest.

Outside, lying on the ground, was a stout man with ox horns and a pig’s tail, wrapped in moldy rags, his knotted muscles and bulging veins exposed. He held a gong and drum, dressed as if he were a watchman.

Blood bubbled grotesquely from the hole in his chest; it was clear he couldn’t stand up again.

Li Yan didn’t take a single step back, blocking the entrance firmly.

Behind the stove, Cha Xiaodao’s hands were sweaty, all her vitality poured into preparing this famous Shandong cuisine.

The crackling of the snapping firewood and the continuous pop of bursting oil filled the air.

Even as the horned watchman lay on the ground, the sinister wind on the long street did not cease.

A dim green candlelight floated over. The first thing Li Yan noticed was the pair of delicate white embroidered shoes on the feet of the newcomer.

“Miss, helping yourself without an invitation isn’t a nice habit,” he said.

Li Yan raised the edge of his sword.

The girl holding the pale green candlelight moved gracefully, her chin pointed, her face pitiable.

Her watery eyes looked at Li Yan. She lifted her slender neck, almost touching the blade of the Ring Dragon Sword as she spoke in a soft and delicate voice,

“Fortunes to you, sir. This little girl…”

Li Yan, with a backhand swipe of the sword, blood splattered.

The girl with her hair up and wearing hairpins threw her head back as it rolled on the ground, her black blood spurting high.

Li Yan kicked firmly onto the chest of the female ghost.

The body fell to the ground, and the green flame candle Li Yan had stomped on was extinguished beneath his foot.

The bone-chilling wind abruptly stopped for two breaths. Even those strange beings that wouldn’t spit out the bones of their victims seemed bewildered by Li Yan’s fierceness.

“Whoosh!”

Dark clouds quickly covered the sky as sand flew and stones raced, with purple lightning streaking chaotically, flickering uncertainly.

From the end of the long street, the distant sound of a tsunami could be faintly heard.

“`

Li Yan’s eyes were wide open as a blood wave several meters high rushed towards the houses and lanes, roaring towards him.

The sticky scent of blood almost clogged Li Yan’s mouth and nose.

Even Li Yan, who crawled out of a mountain of corpses and a sea of blood, was shocked by such an exaggerated and bizarre scene.

“You’ve got to be kidding, an illusion?”

“General, it’s an illusion,”

Lady Dan interjected.

Though she usually addressed him as “Li Yan,” the title “General” instinctively slipped out during critical moments.

Li Yan also realized what was happening and, on the spur of the moment, pulled out a few “Paper Star”-like objects from his Seal Space.

[Star-Patterned Bullets]

Quality: Excellent

Only causes damage to spirits, explodes upon contact.

Li Yan swung his arm, and three bullets traced a smooth arc, inconspicuously swallowed by the blood wave.

“Boom!”

Li Yan instinctively closed his eyes, and at the very moment he did, several foot-long black shadows hissed down from the eaves overhead, heading straight for Li Yan’s neck.

These were several ugly black babies, with mouths full of sharp teeth.

Li Yan’s sword gleamed brightly.

Although his head spun fiercely and he could barely grip his spear, Li Yan’s Hook Star state was still active.

Without the Tiger Head Great Spear, he couldn’t use Tiger Rises with the Ring Dragon Sword; however, he could perform Swallow Through the Curtain with the Ring Dragon Sword without any discount, releasing it with its original flavor.

The Ring Dragon Sword rang out loudly, and the tip of the blade blossomed into a sky full of silver lotuses, as silver swallowtails swept across the swordscape.

The black infants, struck by the Ring Dragon Sword, were instantly minced into a mash of blood and bone, collapsing powerlessly to the ground.

With a steadied wrist, the towering blood wave before Li Yan’s eyes also vanished. The large bull-headed man and the decapitated female corpse on the ground disappeared without a trace.

In the room, Lady Dan’s palms were empty, and initially, various faces, either ugly, fierce, or beautiful, could be seen in her palms. After a few breaths, only green dots of light remained.

Cha Xiaodao spoke in a low voice.

“Almost there.”

Li Yan smiled, “Your food isn’t so easy to come by.”

“Clap!” “Clap!” “Clap!” “Clap!”

All the windows were flung open by the gloomy wind, plunging the room into darkness.

Dimly visible, faces of all walks of life transformed into countless strands of dismal green silk, swarming in through the windows, chimney, and even the mouse holes.

A feeding frenzy of a hundred ghosts.

Growl~

Li Yan’s chest felt unbearably hot, and an indescribable fierce aura seeped out, as though a gigantic beast had stepped through the ancient wilderness.

Fierce! All ghosts retreat.

It sounded like a balloon being popped, one after another. Those dismal green faces moaned in anguish, withering away like melting ice and snow.

Lady Dan brought her hands to her chest, as countless remnant souls and shadowy filaments converged in her palms, coalescing into a piercing green light.

“Ready to serve.”

A cross-shaped knife diced pig’s stomach into a continuous chain of dice-sized chunks, and with a pinch of the chopsticks, the tender and white crispy blast could be stretched over a foot long without breaking.

Cha Xiaodao took a deep breath, turning noticeably paler, but her eyes were filled with fervor.

Taotie Food Banquet · Crispy Blast.

Quality: Rare

Category: Consumable

Consumption time: fifteen minutes.

Restores all vitality and removes persistent negative states, including but not limited to: soul damage, witchcraft, curses, etc.

“I didn’t expect you had this skill.”

Cha Xiaodao couldn’t help but admire.

Li Yan touched his chest, showing no joy on his face. He heard Yan Fu’s prompt in his ear.

“The chaotic aura contained in the Hongmen Tattoo is exhausted.”

“You have lost the state: Fierce! (All ghosts retreat).”

“The effect of accelerating wound healing by 20% is retained.”

“The effect of exemption from stray bullet damage by 30% is retained.”

“You can find chaotic energy or the aura of an Exotic Beast within any Yan Fu Fruit to recharge your tattoo. Different auras will infuse different effects into your tattoo.”

Only used twice, but it can be considered put to good use…

Li Yan got up on the table, Cha Xiaodao brought over two pairs of chopsticks, handing them to Li Yan and Lady Dan, and confidently made a “please” gesture.

“Have a taste. Back in our day, you couldn’t find such authentic Crispy Blast.”

“Eh?” Lady Dan glanced outside unintentionally: “It’s snowing.”

…

The snowflakes fell.

Pei Yunhu looked up, his eyes open wide, gazing at the sky.

Goose-feather sized snowflakes continuously blew into Pei Yunhu’s eyes, melted by his body heat, water droplets fell down his cheeks.

“Actually, I hoped you could take the heat off me a little longer. After all, it took great effort for me to take care of Ren Si and Ren Jiu’s troops for you.”

Ren Ni, no, “Ren Ni,” squatted beside the fallen Pei Yunhu, holding a cup of bubble tea, slurping nonstop.

“But, those people will soon realize I’ve obediently returned and will come to the conclusion that I’m a fake. From that perspective, whether you act or not doesn’t make much difference to me.”

The man in a suit tossed away the bubble tea cup, stood up, and without giving Pei Yunhu another glance, turned and walked into the blizzard.

“In any case, I appreciate your reckless actions, walking in Yan Fu.”

The corner of the man’s mouth twisted into a grin.

“When the thunder roars again, the sky is bound to clear up, isn’t it?”

The crimson blood dried up, leaving a large puddle behind Pei Yunhu’s head.

That face with gold-rimmed glasses, once handsome, was now stiff and blue, devoid of any trace of life…

“`