Chapter 101: A Predetermined Prophecy?

The text was twisted, appearing as if it were the script of demons, faintly radiating malice. Zhou Bai felt it was more akin to a prophecy, and given the scope—involving the lives of thousands—he had to treat it with extreme caution.

Beside him, Daoist Hou recited the text repeatedly, cold sweat breaking out across his body. Judging by the size of the "Heavenly Dog" depicted in the painting, he felt like nothing more than a large ant before it.

Zhou Bai frowned, deep in thought for a long time, before finally speaking: "If it follows the pattern of the first painting, then this so-called Heavenly Dog likely has some connection to the Ghost Domain. Its birth may very well be linked to ordinary dogs."

"Damn it all, what are we supposed to do now..." Daoist Hou grew flustered, his inner ferocity triggered involuntarily as his skin turned a deep, bruised purple.

"Don’t rush. Let’s keep looking."

Zhou Bai stowed the second painting into his storage satchel and removed the third from the wall. By the time Tang Yin had reached the third painting, it was clear he had run out of ink; he had likely resorted to using his own flesh and blood, as Zhou Bai could see blood dripping from the edges of the paper.

When Zhou Bai unfurled the scroll, there was nothing else depicted but a full moon. What was deeply unsettling was that, presumably due to running out of ink halfway through, Tang Yin had painted with his own blood, leaving a large portion of the moon blood-red, stained with fragments of flesh and bone.

A vivid image flashed through Zhou Bai's mind: a man sitting at his desk, taking a knife, and forcefully slicing his wrist to let the blood flow into an inkstone. As the painting progressed, the wound would clot, forcing Tang Yin to slice his wrist open again and again until he had severed his entire left hand. Throughout this process, he must have descended into madness, whether driven by the influence of the Ghost Domain’s aura or coerced by some grotesque entity.

Zhou Bai stared at the blood-red moon on the scroll; the crimson portion looked as if it were devouring the rest of the moon, a truly chilling sight.

"Old Hou, how long until the next full moon?"

Daoist Hou pondered for a moment before saying in a low voice, "The moon should reach its fullness on the nineteenth of every month. There might be some slight variance, but the full moon is about seven days away."

"Seven days..." Zhou Bai murmured, then turned and continued, "According to this painting, a lunar eclipse might occur during the full moon, and I fear some catastrophe will unfold on that day."

"You mean that during the lunar eclipse, this ghost creature called the Heavenly Dog will manifest and devour thousands of people?"

"Not necessarily. The Heavenly Dog could appear at any time."

Daoist Hou felt his scalp prickle. What kind of situation was this? Currently, Hangzhou City was peaceful, with not a single sign of impending chaos.

Zhou Bai, however, was much calmer. After putting the painting away, he said flatly, "We cannot jump to conclusions yet. Tang Yin was a madman, after all; we mustn't lose our composure. But to be safe, we must make preparations."

Daoist Hou immediately prepared to leave. "Let's go, then. We'll have Xiao Wu report on any strange occurrences in Hangzhou recently to see if we can find any clues."

Zhou Bai quickly stopped him, pointing to the desk where a painting covered in dried flesh, blood residue, and dust lay. "There is one more. The final painting Tang Yin created before he died."

He walked briskly to the desk, and Daoist Hou, swallowing hard, followed. Zhou Bai waved his hand; his immense strength generated a gust of wind that blew away the dust, revealing the full image.

The painting was a bloody mess. By the end, Tang Yin had clearly descended into total insanity. The world he saw must have been different from reality, and thus, his work was distorted. He had reached a point where he could no longer hold a brush, his body on the verge of collapse. The entire painting looked like an unfinished piece, splattered with blood that had likely been coughed up from his own throat.

To Daoist Hou, the patterns looked like a chaotic tangle, impossible to decipher, though he could vaguely make out a human figure against a backdrop that resembled a town.

But what Zhou Bai saw was entirely different. From his perspective, the chaotic lines of the painting began to shift. The humanoid figure became increasingly distinct, soon manifesting as a giant, while the town beside it blurred, as if shrouded in thick fog.

Zhou Bai gasped, involuntarily stepping back. He failed to control his strength, leaving a shallow crater in the floor. This was clearly the thousand-foot giant he had seen when he first awakened his Yin-Yang Eyes and accidentally slipped into the deep Ghost Domain. The sheer terror of that encounter remained buried in his heart, and even now, just recalling it made his hair stand on end.

Daoist Hou noticed his reaction and studied the painting again. "Zhou Bai, what do you see? Why do I feel like I can't make sense of any of this?"

Zhou Bai forced himself to stay calm. He offered no explanation, carefully stowing the painting away into his storage satchel.

"Forget about this painting for now. Tang Yin’s works must have a sequence: first the Child-Bestowing Guanyin, then the Heavenly Dog and the lunar eclipse, and finally this one."

Daoist Hou nodded. "That seems to be the case. We aren't the official guardians of Hangzhou. If we truly can't handle this, we should report it to the Underworld Records Department and evacuate."

"Indeed."

Zhou Bai was noncommittal. His first instinct was to contact the Underworld Records Department, but according to Wen Meng, Xu Prefecture was currently in the aftermath of a disaster, and they likely lacked the resources to deal with what might prove to be a baseless alarm.

Therefore, Zhou Bai intended to use his token to briefly inform Wang Zhen. If the giant from the deep Ghost Domain truly descended into the mortal world, Hangzhou would be flattened, and he certainly wouldn't stay behind to wait for death.

However, it was possible he was overthinking it; such an entity surely faced massive restrictions and could not appear easily. Perhaps Tang Yin had been influenced by the Ghost Domain’s aura and, like Zhou Bai, had briefly entered the domain. Having seen the thousand-foot giant and the Heavenly Dog, he had been driven to madness and, upon returning to reality, painted these images.

The two left the house and headed toward the mouth of the alley. Wang Yuanfang and Lin Chong had been waiting for some time; the yamen officers, busy with their duties, had mostly dispersed to patrol the streets.

Seeing Zhou Bai emerge, the crowd of onlookers nearby scattered. He stood at the alley entrance and, without rushing back to the yamen, turned to Wang Yuanfang. "I have a task for you. Contact the county magistrate. Tell them it is an order from the Underworld Records Department: give them two days to gather every single dog in Hangzhou and keep them in one place."

Blocking is better than diverting. Zhou Bai had considered killing every dog in the city, but if the Heavenly Dog were indeed born from an ordinary dog, even one that slipped through the cracks would spell catastrophe.