Yellow Demon Causes Trouble in Front of the Mountain God Temple

Hu Qi Niangniang?

Zhang Wei pondered the name of the god in his heart.

The Five Immortals are not unfamiliar to anyone in the modern world. The family immortal system, which originated outside the Great Wall, has become well-known through its extension in reality and adaptations in various online stories.

Fox, yellow, white, willow, gray.

Zhang Wei had only heard of the other four families in stories, but Hu Jiaxian was not unfamiliar to him. There were many such household gods worshipped in his own county, and even Zhang Wei's maternal grandmother's family worshipped one.

Well, it's not as powerful as outside the Great Wall, where there's no need for spirit mediums or anything like that. It's just like worshipping a Bodhisattva. There's a separate shrine on the same altar, along with teacups, bowls, and chopsticks. It's a normal ritual on the first and fifteenth of the lunar month, and a way to fulfill vows after asking the gods for favors.

To be honest, this sorceress is quite effective; at least, according to Grandma and Aunt Zhang, she helped them overcome many difficulties.

Although Zhang Wei hadn't seen it much, he respected it. If his mother called him, he would kowtow a few times while making offerings, silently praying for the health of his family. Unfortunately...

The somewhat cramped room was crammed with more than a dozen people.

The sorceress, Blind Wang, Zhang Wei, and the village chief filled the square table in the sorceress's house. Although there were still a few stools in the room, the atmosphere made it clear that there was no room for them to sit.

The sorceress's granddaughter stood to one side, serving tea and water, her bright eyes constantly scanning Zhang Wei, who was about the same age as her.

In the past, our house was never short of guests, but when such a small child came to our door, he would either cry incessantly or fall into a deep sleep, waiting for his mother to beg the goddess to save him. We had never seen a living, moving child before.

What's more, this person in front of her, who was about the same age as her, not only behaved much better than the adults in the room, but staring at him for too long was also stinging to the eyes!

Coming back to his senses from the shrine, Zhang Wei glanced at the girl who kept staring at him and rubbing her eyes. He felt a little strange, but didn't pay much attention. He simply turned to listen to the argument between the three sorceresses.

These three people hadn't even exchanged a few serious words, nor had they had time to drink water.

The village chief pleaded, saying that if the shaman wouldn't help, fine, but now Mr. Wang from the next village had arrived, and he begged her to be lenient and let him help. This single sentence completely enraged the shaman.

"Pah! You old codger, ask yourself honestly, is it that I'm unwilling to help you?"

"If you knew this would happen, why didn't you do it back then? You damn fools couldn't withstand the pressure from the Japanese. You tore down the mountain god temple and replaced it with a yellow demon statue in the mountains. Fine, you could have just followed their orders. It didn't really protect you, but at least you were safe, right?"

"Seeing there's no benefit to be gained, you're now back to not contributing? Too late!"

"A shaman isn't someone you can just invite or send away as you please, especially someone from the Huang family, who's even a traitor who came in from beyond the Great Wall with the help of the imperial family. I can't afford to mess with this kind of person. They're only refraining from making things difficult for me because of my mother, and I also have to protect my eldest granddaughter. If you're so capable, then let Blind Wang handle it. Anyway, I can't afford to offend him!"

"Village chief, you never told me that you yourselves erected this mountain god!"

Although he was called by a nickname, Blind Wang wasn't angry. He just stared at the village chief beside him with his pale eyes and said, "That Yellow Demon is incredibly vengeful. If we're not careful, not only will it escape, but even if its descendants do, I, Blind Wang, will live in constant fear. And the entire Liu Family Village will suffer the same fate!"

"Mr. Wang, Mr. Wang, you can't just ignore this!"

"Please, the entire village of Xiakou, with its eight hundred or so residents, depends on you for their lives!"

Upon hearing Wang the Blind Man's slightest hint of refusal, the village chief immediately knelt down, tightly embracing Wang's legs, weeping uncontrollably and disregarding his dignity: "We didn't want this either, but the devil forced us to obey, threatening execution if we didn't. We dared not disobey!"

"There's nothing we can do about the lack of incense offerings. You know how bad the famine was a few years ago. Things have gotten a bit better these past two years, but the incense has to be used to make up for the losses from the past. We have to go up the mountain on the first and fifteenth of every lunar month, and each sacrifice requires a whole pig. And each subsequent sacrifice has to be more grand than the last one. It will take ten years to make up for the losses from the years without sacrifices. Let alone whether our village has that many pigs, cattle, and sheep, we won't be able to afford to supply them all in less than a year!"

Zhang Wei understands this:

If you dare to eat meat today, you'll dare to eat people tomorrow!

Huang Yao's request was indeed excessive, but the village chief's concealment was also quite typical. It was Zhang Wei who, carrying the blessing of the ancestor, would go up and taste the saltiness of anyone with the foundation for evil, regardless of anything else. If it were anyone else, they would have been tricked by this old man.

Huang Yao definitely needs to be dealt with, but he doesn't mind letting that old bastard cry a little longer.

Crying more helps release emotions!

Zhang Wei remained silent, and although Blind Wang found it disgusting, he pretended to ignore it and let the old man cry on the ground.

In this line of work involving spirits and ghosts, you can't get by without a hard heart.

If everyone were to be a pushover and do good deeds, they would have been ripped off and died in some remote mountain village long ago.

Blind Wang's master was a typical good-natured man. He listened to the landlord's lies and led people up the mountain. And what was the result?

Similarly, it was only because Zhang Wei, the Kitchen God's attendant, was there that the thousand-pound wild boar king was eaten. Although the Yellow Demon of the Mountain God was probably more powerful, it was not impossible to deal with it.

If he had come by himself, he would have kicked the old man away and turned to leave!

Zhang Wei didn't speak, so Blind Wang didn't act on his own. The sorceress didn't want to help in the first place, and now that she was angry, she wouldn't drag anyone into it. The other villagers from Xiakou Village wanted to say something, but as soon as they took a step, a black iron pipe was pressed against their foreheads. Accompanied by the crisp sound of metal clashing, cold sweat instantly poured down their faces, and they dared not open their mouths.

And so, in the quiet atmosphere, they simply watched the old man cry and make a scene.

Only when his voice was hoarse and his eyes were dry, and the old man lay on the ground, whimpering softly, did Zhang Wei finally relent: "I'll trouble Uncle Wang and a few cousins ​​to wait at the foot of the mountain with my uncle's family. I'll go up and test the waters of this mountain god! If it works, great; if not, we'll go back to the village and make further plans!"

To be honest, Zhang Wei wasn't sure what to expect before they met.

But lack of confidence doesn't mean he can't kill this mountain god. If he can't defeat it the first time, he'll head straight for Pig Forest, a place suspected to be a mass grave. The evil energy and malevolent aura accumulated there are astonishing, even if he only consumes half of it. He'll come back and try again with that kind of accumulation.

If he really can't win, Zhang Wei can reset himself, come to Xiakou Village to pick up the people and leave, without touching the mountain god.

We have both a way forward and a way back, so giving it a try might not be a bad idea!

As for what the people of Xiakou Village thought... Zhang Wei didn't know. Anyway, when he made the decision, he had already taken people back to his uncle's house to pick them up. The five semi-automatic rifles made the villagers who originally wanted to come along hesitate.

Meanwhile, the sorceress, who was uninvolved in the matter and was now inside the house, stared blankly at the thick layer of black ash under the table where Zhang Wei had been standing, which was almost up to one's ankles. At her feet, a gray fox, as big as a dog, stepped forward, glanced at the black ash, and then, with a twitch of its fox face, hid behind the sorceress's feet as if fleeing.

Moonlit night.

After bidding farewell to Blind Wang and the others at the foot of the mountain, Zhang Wei led the old village chief along a desolate mountain path.

On both sides are undulating mountains, and every glance gives one a feeling of trepidation, as if the next glance will reveal something on the mountain that will meet one's gaze.

Dead silence, oppressive atmosphere.

Zhang Wei felt alright, but the old village chief next to him was already drenched in sweat, his legs gushing.

Well, it started dripping as soon as we entered the mountains. A cold wind blew, and a musty, pungent smell filled our nostrils. Zhang Wei hadn't even seen the yellow demon's stench before the old village chief gave him a lecture.

"I'm here, what are you afraid of? Just like you said, today you want sacrificial animals, tomorrow you want to eat young boys, and the day after tomorrow it'll be you lot who have something to chew on. Things have to be resolved. Village chief, you don't want the incense to die out, and the whole village to be abandoned without even anyone to collect the corpses, do you?"

Upon hearing Zhang Wei's words, the village chief trembled even more violently: "Grandpa, we don't want to back down either, but this old man won't listen! How about we slow down and let me catch my breath? There's still plenty of time, isn't there?"

"What do you mean 'early'? If you think it's early, we can just head back home. If too many people die and it attracts attention, wouldn't it be safer to let the master chef from Pig Forest handle it?"

Entering the mountain at night was already a huge risk, and waiting for this old man until midnight was even more risky. Although Zhang Wei was immune to evil spirits, he didn't want to face a peak "mountain god" in the middle of the night!

Daytime would be better, but by daybreak it would be the sixth day, and a single day might not be enough to deal with the mountain god. Besides, he also wanted to go to Pig Forest to check on the situation.

Ignoring the old village chief's exclamation, Zhang Wei grabbed the man's lower back and began to run wildly into the mountains.

"Shhh!"

In no time at all, the old man and the young man had run several miles into the mountains. On a hillside not far away, a small temple exuded a terrifying aura under the bright moonlight.

The cold wind blew through the withered grass, causing it to tremble slightly.

Something seemed to be moving back and forth among the swaying withered grass.

The desolate mountains, the wild temple, the eerie shadows, the cold wind, and the old man and the young boy together—it all resembled a scene from the opening of a horror movie, a scene straight out of a deathmatch movie.

The next moment, either something popped out of the swaying grass behind them, or there was a commotion at the small temple in front, causing the two to panic and leading to further developments.

This is the story's trajectory according to conventional thinking.

However, after confirming with the nearly terrified old village chief that the small temple in front of him was indeed the source of the chaos in Xiakou Village, Zhang Wei summoned his malevolent energy and transformed it into a half-length blood-red trench coat, which he then put on.

With a wave of his hand, a streak of malevolent energy swept out, heading straight for the surrounding withered trees and bushes.

"Click-clack!"

The next instant, a series of sharp, short cries, like sneezes, rang out from the surrounding mountains.