Beginning with the Ubume Bird

Chapter 178: Chapter 15: The Fish Calls the Soul

Wealth moves hearts. When Li Yan saw the greedy looks on the faces of the Red Flag pirates at the sight of the silver and black pearls, he didn’t say much but simply ordered that from then on, anything brought up must first be reported and opened in the presence of everyone on board. His public explanation was to prevent private hiding, and this reason was more likely to convince people.

After about four hours, none of those shadows that were diving deep under the sea resurfaced, but the old barrels didn’t stop banging against the ship.

The trouble came in succession, starting just as night fell, another barrel was salvaged.@@novelbin@@

Torches burned brightly. The deck was crowded with people.

At Li Yan’s signal, a pirate sailor with a scorpion tattooed on his neck broke open the barrel in front of everyone.

The many pirates stretched their necks eagerly, the scorpion sailor looked inside without blinking, and from the black opening, a black tentacle covered in flesh spikes and reeking of blood, licked towards the sailor’s neck.

This time out to sea, Li Yan had brought over fifty “Gaoli ghosts”, and this sailor was one of the best among them. His reaction was swift; he dodged the tentacle by tilting his neck, and before the black tentacle could sweep across, he rolled away more than three meters with his head tucked in.

The barrel exploded into pieces, and a fierce octopus flailed its stinking tentacles, its wriggling suckers outfitted with sharp teeth, lunged at the man.

“Hiss!” “Hiss!” “Hiss!”

Barbed arrows shot into the fierce octopus’s body, and a sailor, quick of eye and hand, scooped up a ladle of fire oil and smashed it right onto the octopus’s head.

In agony, the octopus curled tight into a ball, but that was not the end. Four or five torches vied with each other to be thrown onto it, turning the creature into a massive fireball in an instant.

“Swoosh!” “Swoosh!”

Several hooks stabbed into the flesh of the octopus, the ropes taut, as two muscular men pulled at the hook chains back and forth, their faces glowing red from the flames. Sweat ran down their bare backs.

The fierce flames caused the creature’s tentacles to curl and carbonize, but its body still writhed ceaselessly. The sight of its snapping teeth was enough to make people’s skin crawl.

At this moment, all the pirates felt a chill in their hearts, knowing that if they had opened the barrel on their own, they might not have lived to tell the tale.

“Gu, are you alright?”

Some pirates asked the scorpion sailor.

The man who had started to break open the barrel stood up; he covered his neck, with blood streaming between his fingers.

“I’m alright,” he said firmly.

Li Yan glanced at the sailor with “A Fleeting Glimpse” and confirmed it was just a flesh wound, then he nodded. “Go see Mr. Hu (the ship’s doctor).”

The octopus was tenacious; it had been burning for quite a while when suddenly, foul-smelling pus burst out. Several men, gritting their teeth, held onto it for dear life until the creature lay motionless and the flames weakened. Then they looked towards Li Yan with their eyes, asking whether to let go.

Li Yan nodded, and the charred mess finally crashed onto the decking.

A few pirates poked at it from a distance with long spears. Cha Xiaodao, on the other hand, didn’t seem to care. He walked over, cut off a tentacle in two or three moves, and held it in his hand, examining it for a while.

“If you’re planning to cook with that thing, enjoy it yourself,” Li Yan said, remembering the fine teeth on the suckers and the pus that burst out during burning, losing his appetite instantly.

Cha Xiaodao merely shrugged at these words.

“Splash~”

He tossed the corpse of the octopus back into the sea, smacking his lips, “What a waste.”

Xue Ba brushed his teeth with a willow twig, running while he scrubbed and spitting salty froth as he spoke to Li Yan.

“Tianbao, that old man is giving me trouble, insisting on seeing you.”

“He dares to trouble you?”

On one side, Xiaodao pulled out a net and began to sweep it through the water again. Hearing Xue Ba’s words, he turned his head and said to him.

Xue Ba, only fourteen this year, was already a notorious warrior of the Red Flag Gang.

Like Tianbao, he was an orphan, raised by the widows of the gang. Having been brought up on pirate ships, he tangled with gang members at the age of ten and nearly got beaten to death. Tianbao happened to pass by and saw Xue Ba curled up with blood on his face, still chewing on half an ear.

The pirate whose ear had been bitten off fought more fiercely, and the more fierce he chewed, the crunching sound sent shivers down one’s spine.

Tianbao was deeply impressed by him and, since they shared similar backgrounds, took special care of him.

The Gaoli ghost was a secret art of the Five Flags; within the Red Flag Gang, only Madam Shi knew it. It required a full two years to cultivate a Gaoli ghost with a body as tough as copper and iron and boundless strength.

Without hesitation, Tianbao recommended Xue Ba, who was only twelve years old at the time.

Xue Ba was usually a loner, close only to Tianbao and his foster mother. The other members of the gang, at most, would curse him under their breath as “little mad dog,” and more or less feared him in their hearts.

Such a detached and unhinged individual coming to Li Yan to confess that he had accidentally killed Lin Yuanfu did not surprise Cha Xiaodao. Old Man Lin should have had the foresight not to provoke Xue Ba.

“Trouble? Let me guess,”

Li Yan said with a smile that was not quite a smile, “You’re sick, right?”

“Yes, yes,” Xue Ba nodded repeatedly: “Vomiting and diarrhea, his face was frighteningly pale, I thought he was about to breathe his last. Tianbao, I didn’t lay a finger on him.”

“I won’t see him; let Mr. Hu go have a look. Tell him, a live Governor can’t be caught, but a dead body hung from the mast can still boost the reputation of the Red Flag Gang. Right, if he’s about to die, take care of that young one by his side too; don’t need to provide for extras who don’t contribute.”

“Oh, understood.”

Xue Ba wiped his face and left.

Cha Xiaodao asked, “Aren’t you afraid they’ll really kill him?”

“Actually, I’m not,”

Li Yan answered calmly, “If he dies, it’s just bad luck. We two are bandits, did you think this was a game?”

The South Sea beneath the night sky was as tranquil as could be, with the moon hanging solitary above and a white mist starting to rise.

Cha Xiaodao sighed, “We should be able to return to Lantau Island by tomorrow afternoon.”

“I’ve ordered some extra men to stand watch tonight. They believe that Heavenly Mother Crossing the Sea is a blessing from Mazu, but I don’t think it’s that simple.”

The prow of the agile duck boat plunged into the mist, enveloped by the grey haze, obscuring everything from view.

Close to one another, sailors were chaining the tail poles together with iron locks, connecting six large ships. This was Li Yan’s instruction, to prevent the ships from getting separated in the thick fog, though most of the sailors didn’t think it necessary, no one dared to defy Li Yan’s orders over such concerns.

Cha Xiaodao straightened his back, drew up the net, and a yellow fish tumbled into it.

“Haha, not bad luck this time.”

With a flick of the rod, he inverted the yellow fish, over three feet long, and held it steadily in his hand.

The yellow fish struggled desperately, flailing its head back and forth, its large eyes eerie to behold.

“Such a plump fish would be excellent steamed,” Li Yan remarked casually.

“You’re clueless!” Cha Xiaodao retorted, lifting his arm toward Li Yan.

“A fish this fatty needs to be braised to soak in the flavors, not steamed!”

No sooner had Cha Xiaodao’s words fallen, the yellow fish suddenly thrusted vigorously; a sharp, high-pitched cry like that of a baby came from the fish’s mouth.

“Cha Daozi!”

Cha Xiaodao felt a sharp pain in his ear, and a stream of blood shot from within, spattering forth.

Cha Xiaodao’s grip failed him, and as the yellow fish wriggled free, Ring Dragon, clear as a pool of autumn water, aimed right at the fish.

“Tianbao~”

Before the fish could finish, Ring Dragon had already pierced it straight through.

“What the hell is this?!”

Cha Xiaodao, his hand slick with blood, saw stars before his eyes. Li Yan was just over a foot away, but wore a puzzled expression, not understanding why Cha Xiaodao was so thunderstruck.