Page 201
Page 201
Dou Tang frowned deeply: "Is the association really that bad?"
Lu Zizhen scoffed: "That's because exorcists need to demonstrate their necessity."
“Suiten Kyouzaburo is an ordinary person, a communicator between the normal world and exorcists. Guess what means he needs to maintain his existence?”
"All exorcism cases around Tokyo must be resolved by someone who is a Tokyo exorcist in order to maintain his status."
“It’s unpleasant,” Dou Tang concluded.
"really."
Dou Tang weaved through the traffic, and a gentle slope gradually appeared in front of him. After getting off the overpass, there were far fewer vehicles on the road.
According to the navigation system, which was slow to update due to the high speed, we were about to reach Okutama Town. The road began to rise, and trams whizzed past Todoroki.
"So, if you're going to take on this, I'll report it to the Exorcist Association first, okay?" Lu Zizhen asked.
"No." Dou Tang stopped her instead. "I don't want to be held accountable later for failing to save someone. I have no responsibility or obligation to do those things."
"Such a massive barrier of resentment couldn't have been created in an instant. The local exorcists of Okutama Town have failed in their duties."
“I will fight my way through, but I will not take responsibility for it.”
“That’s just like you…” Lu Zizhen muttered twice, then sighed, “I understand. I’ll just pretend I don’t know. You won’t have to take responsibility or explain anything you do over there, since you’re not under the jurisdiction of the Exorcist Association.”
After their conversation ended, an even narrower road appeared before Dou Tang, winding and twisting all the way to the depths of the dark, low mountains in front of him.
At this time, vehicles on both sides of the road were still heading towards the mountains.
Dou Tang clicked his tongue and, as he passed by the vehicles, suddenly reached out and tapped on the car window.
"Bang bang bang..."
Dou Tang photographed all the vehicles on the road, and they all braked sharply to a stop. Some of them then got out to check the shattered windows, completely unaware of what had happened.
All Dou Tang could do was to stop the vehicles heading towards the area bound by the resentment barrier in this way.
Are there many different resentment barriers... distributed along the valley? Does that mean I have to go through them like I'm going through a series of levels?
Or take the mountain road... but taking the mountain road would be slower, so it's better to just rush in!
A strange, thin mist had appeared in front of Dou Tang. Behind the mist, the town not far away was pitch black, with no lights on and no one in sight.
Just like the headhunters back then.
Chapter 147 Acting vigorously and resolutely
Dou Tang dispersed the fog around him, his figure materialized from the illusion, and then plunged into the thin black fog.
The fog was thicker than Dou Tang had imagined, seemingly stretching for more than ten meters. When Dou Tang burst out of the black fog, all he could hear were human voices, and in front of him were anxious faces.
"Someone's coming in!"
"Is it a rescue team? What are the Self-Defense Forces doing?!"
After Dou Tang emerged from the thin mist, he frowned and looked at the people around him.
There were at least several dozen of these people. They blocked the road, and there were vehicles parked haphazardly around them. Clearly, these were people who had tried to leave but failed.
Dou Tang slammed on the brakes, and the motorcycle spun around on the ground, emitting a pungent burning tire sound. The motorcycle also made a strange hissing noise. Dou Tang looked down and saw that the whole motorcycle was emitting puffs of white smoke.
Although honking the horn for miles can protect the vehicle, it seems there is still a limit. Dou Tang's journey took less than ten minutes, and the motorcycle endured more than it should have.
Dou Tang looked around, and a woman approached him, asking, "Who are you? What's the situation outside?"
Dou Tang didn't want to get entangled with them any longer, and instead asked, "Has anything strange happened here?"
The woman immediately shouted, "What else could be strange besides this fog?! Who exactly are you?"
Dou Tang shook his head and said, "I was just passing by and got lost in the fog."
He casually brushed off the people gathered in front of the fog, continued to accelerate, and headed deeper into the town. The people around him quickly stepped back, afraid of being run over, and curses filled the air.
Dou Tang opened his senses. The town was small, and his senses were just enough to cover the entire barrier of resentment. All the abnormal power in the town was reflected in his mind.
In an instant, he spotted a wisp of resentment spreading through the town, leaving faint traces in its wake.
Without hesitation, Dou Tang rushed towards the source of the resentment.
Okutama Town is composed of several small towns, which are only a few kilometers apart. Toudou is located in the main town of Okutama Town, which is generally referred to as the town by the locals. Although the other small towns belong to the Okutama Town area, they each have their own names.
These small towns are like chess pieces scattered on a chessboard, forming a long string along the mountain roads. At this moment, Doutang is in the main town of Okutama.
The town was in a state of panic. This town, which was based on tourism, did not have much police force, because the town police were already exhausted just from maintaining public order. Dou Tang's actions were not hindered in any way.
But when Dou Tang got closer to the resentful aura, he heard screams.
Turning a corner, Dou Tang saw the scene that troubled him the most, but also gave him some peace of mind.
A corpse-like figure with its head swollen like a balloon was staggering down the street. Several passersby screamed and ran away at the sight.
There's only one... Does the birth of the Big-Headed Corpse Man take time? Or was something done in advance?
But Dou Tang had no time to think further. After a brief moment of confusion, the corpse locked its eerie eyes onto the passersby on the street. Although its legs trembled, it unleashed tremendous power and charged toward the passersby.
Dou Tang twisted the throttle, and the motorcycle roared, the engine's furious roar echoing through the street. Dou Tang reached behind his back with his other hand and took out an unsheathed longsword from his bag.
Like a knight on horseback, Dou Tang charged toward the corpses by the roadside, stood on the motorcycle, and his face under the helmet showed a resolute expression.
"Buzz—whoosh!"
The motorcycle galloped like a warhorse, and Dou Tang brushed past the corpse!
"Boom!"
With a muffled thud, the corpse's head fell to the ground with a thud, its flesh cracking and melting, leaving behind a hardened brain on the ground. However, it did not look as solid and glowing green as the one Dou Tang had encountered before.
The dim brain hit the ground and cracked open, with fluid flowing out. Dou Tang also felt a soul rush into his body, which he then collected.
At this stage, the souls of the corpses are not completely sealed within the emerald brain. Although they cannot be saved, at least their souls are not tormented...
Without stopping, Dou Tang continued rushing towards the next source of resentment.
I sensed a cloud of resentment flying through the town, and wherever it went, people were tainted by it.
First, he fainted, then his head began to swell. It seemed that all the water in his body was being supplied to his head, and while his body became thin, he possessed great strength.
Dou Tang continued along the way, slaying the corpses along the way, ignoring their screams, and finally caught up with the culprit who was constantly creating the resentful corpses.
On the empty street, a figure invisible to ordinary people, shrouded in resentment, with a hunched back like an ape, leaps across the ground using both hands, pouncing towards a person by the roadside.
The passerby was oblivious, but turned his head to look at Dou Tang speeding down the street, seemingly wondering why someone would speed at this time.
Dou Tang roared, "Squat down!"
The man's eyes widened as he watched Dou Tang rush towards him at high speed, his mind blank, seemingly stunned.
Dou Tang clicked his tongue and charged straight at the passersby.
He stepped forward with his sword held horizontally, and with a sudden jerk of the handlebars, the sword was turned sideways to prevent it from directly striking the strange evil spirit and causing it to splatter with blood and cause further complications.
He slammed the blade of his sword into the lower back of the evil spirit, who screamed in agony as the force from behind pinned it to the sword, rendering it immobile.
Dou Tang then made a sharp turn, and the motorcycle tires were only ten centimeters away from the pedestrian, narrowly missing him by skidding.
The passersby behind him were still standing there in a daze, while Dou Tang rushed out more than ten meters, then suddenly swung his sword horizontally and slashed hard.
"Hey!"
A sharp sword flashed, and the evil spirit in front of him was cut in half at the waist, its blood splattering everywhere, and its body gradually turned into emerald green pus.
Before the limbs that had been slinged off even hit the ground, they had already turned into a pus-filled mess, making a hissing sound as they fell to the ground.
The fog over the entire town slowly dissipated.
The true method of the brainless monk is to consecrate evil spirits and then use them to transform ordinary people!
"Tsk...disgusting."
Dou Tang cursed and put his longsword back into his backpack.
The fog that enveloped the entire town slowly dissipated, and exclamations came from not far away, while Dou Tang headed deeper into the mountains, gradually leaving the town behind.
Only after Dou Tang completely disappeared did a strangely dressed person arrive at the street where the evil spirits had died, scratching his head as he looked at the pus on the ground.
"Huh...? Another colleague came in?"
Several more people followed behind them; they were exorcists from Okutama Town.
"What's going on? You've already killed the evil spirit?" someone asked.
"I don't know!" The first exorcist was still completely bewildered. "How could I have done something wrong?"
"Is it over?"
Chapter 148 Breakthrough
Two flowers bloom, one branch each.
Even as Dou Tang broke through the first layer of resentment barrier, strange phenomena were still occurring in the ancient temple.
In the quiet ancient temple, the mournful cry of a child could be heard. The repeated whispers, like a toddler learning to speak, seemed not to come from a human, but rather from some strange creature imitating human speech.
The photographer was horrified, too terrified to utter a sound. He could only watch as the frosted glass in front of him was soaked with the slime from the large-headed monster, making the monster's appearance behind the glass even clearer.
The translucent, jelly-like skin and flesh writhed and piled together, the pores and wrinkles on the face turned into tiny marks, the bulging eyeballs were dull and lifeless, and the outline of the skull could almost be seen beneath the crystalline flesh.
"Waaaaah..."
The big-headed monster cried, its thin, bony hands pounding against the glass in front of it, making muffled thuds.
The photographer's legs trembled, and he took a half step back, wanting to run away as quickly as possible, but he felt as if he had bumped into something.
"Ah, you're really naughty." A rather gentle male voice came from behind the photographer, his tone flippant and amused, yet it sent a chill down the photographer's spine.
He turned his head and felt like his whole body was rusty, his neck making a cracking sound as he twisted it.
Standing behind him was the brainless monk who had been so kind during the day.
At this moment, the brainless monk was not wearing a straw hat, which allowed the photographer to see his true appearance. On his angular young face was a severed head.
Starting from the forehead, the brainless monk's head was completely empty, with no trace of a brain. His entire being resembled a highly realistic doll that had been destroyed, revealing an absurd and grotesque nature. The smile on his face was chilling.
"You, you don't, you have no brains..."
The photographer's lips trembled, and immense fear gripped his heart, preventing him from uttering a single cry; he could only stammer out a few words.
The brainless monk chuckled and said, "Only by being brainless can one escape the many mundane affairs of this world. Benefactor, why don't you give it a try?"
Meeting the photographer's despairing gaze, the mindless monk slowly raised his staff and lightly tapped it on the photographer's forehead.
A pale green light emanated from the tin staff and entered the photographer's head. The photographer was immediately jolted and fell to the ground with a thud.
After doing all this, the brainless monk dragged the photographer into the next room and locked the door behind him.
He looked at the black mist in the sky and frowned.
"One of the barriers has been broken... So fast? Could it have been done by a local exorcist? They're more capable than I thought."
"We need to speed things up a bit."
He muttered to himself as he entered the room where the big-headed monster was. A scream immediately came from inside the room, followed by whimpers and gasps.
A moment later, the room fell silent, and the brainless monk emerged with a head full of green light.
The light from the emerald brain was transmitted to all parts of the body, and streaks of light moved like long snakes crawling under the skin, even the fingertips emitted a faint green light.
The brainless monk was a cautious man. He knew the principle of having multiple burrows, so he had many more places to keep the corpse man, so that he could make a comeback after each defeat.
It definitely doesn't mean that I often suffer setbacks.
Moreover, even this current body is just one of many stored bodies.
Having caused such a huge incident so close to Tokyo, the brainless monk must have already prepared an escape route for himself.
He picked up the staff, intending to go to the house where Kume Chika and the other person were, but sensed an unusual presence suddenly rushing into his resentment barrier.
"Oh? Exorcists have come to support the Nihara Ward? They're here so quickly?"
The brainless monk had calculated that there were very few exorcists in the entire Okutama Town. He was well-prepared for this attack. Those exorcists should all be trapped in the other resentment barriers. Even if someone broke the barrier, they wouldn't come to the Hihara Ward where he was hiding first.
Nichihara Ward is just a small town next to the Nichihara Caves, a tourist attraction. It only has a few man-made hot spring guesthouses that are somewhat lively. It is unlikely to become the focus of exorcists' rescue efforts, since exorcists usually choose to save the place with the most people first.
The brainless monk wasn't so arrogant as to think he could take over the entire Okutama Town by himself. If he really could set up a terrifying spell to transform thousands of people, he wouldn't have specifically chosen a place like the Human Head City to keep the corpses.
For the past few years, Headhunter had been the stronghold of Mindless Monk. After Headhunter was completely wiped out by Fall Guys, Mindless Monk remained silent for a long time before planning to cause a big disturbance. Although he did not intend to plunder many souls, he could at least take advantage of the chaos to get some urgently needed Emerald Brains.
The fact that the plan was laid out for so long, even right under the noses of the local exorcists in Okutama Town, suggests that the power possessed by the brainless monk is far more complex than what he displayed when he first met his head.
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