Chapter 2: The Most Poisonous Is The Human Heart
In front of Fang Shu, however, where was the shopkeeper anymore.
The old fox and several waiters had all run off like a puff of smoke.
The monsters in the building, those on the beams climbed up the beams, those into holes entered holes, and some monsters were so frightened their bodies went numb, stiffly collapsing in place, playing dead.
At this moment, at the restaurant’s doorway, a figure was coming against the flow.
Those monsters that had burrowed out all looked uneasy, scared shitless, and burrowed back in.
Fang Shu looked over.
“No running out on the bill, all roll back inside.” A muffled voice sounded from outside.
The monsters that returned to the building fearfully glanced at Fang Shu, then at behind them.
They dared neither advance nor retreat, so could only stand obediently at the restaurant doorway, motionless, holding their breath.
Whispers arose on site: “Owner, the owner has come!”
“The old fox finally invited his sugar daddy.”
Fang Shu was surprised; wasn’t that old fox the one in charge?
Suddenly, a tiger head full of bitter expression poked in from outside the curtain.
Its appearance was somewhat similar to that old fox, with a furrowed brow and gloomy face as it surveyed the scene in the building, then slowly hopped into the hall.
This tiger was extremely skinny, shoulder blades protruding, head drooping listlessly.
（Bee Tiger Diagram – Painter Hua Yan）
If not for its large tiger skeleton, it would look no different from a sick cat.
But Fang Shu looked at this thin tiger and did not dare be careless.
The thin tiger stood upright, grabbed a wine jar from inside the shop, looked at Fang Shu, and asked: “Is it this young Daoist Master demanding wine?”
Fang Shu sized up the other, calmly nodded, and tapped the wine bowl with the copper bell in his hand:
“Fill it up.”
The worry on the thin tiger’s face did not fade; it said: “No rush, no rush.”
This fellow held the wine jar in one hand, walked to the side of a deer spirit, snapped off a bloody section of antler, and chattered: “Wine this stuff indeed isn’t tasty without soaking. Must have more soakings to have flavor.”
Before the words were finished, it went to a ox demon, and gouged out its two eyeballs alive.
Finally, it carried the wine to Fang Shu, placed it on the table, and dropped the two ox eyeballs and three demon hearts into the jar together.
“Done.” The thin tiger owner then stepped back, bitterly saying: “Esteemed guest, after finishing this jar of wine, please be on your way.”
“On which road?” Fang Shu asked.
The thin tiger squeezed out a few strands of smile on its face: “Of course, the road you came on.”
Fang Shu, however, slammed the wine bowl upside down on the table and laughed:
“Take it away, take it away. What I want is human heart soaked wine, not demon heart.”
The smile on the thin tiger’s face receded.
It stood in the hall, its tiger frame slowly rising, eyes shooting fierce light.
Roar!
Its tail like a long scorpion, fur like copper wire, teeth like steel saw, in the blink of an eye it transformed into a ferocious striped tiger, arms thicker than Fang Shu’s waist, body nearly ten feet long, mouth reeking of foul stench.
The building instantly fell silent, so quiet you could hear a pin drop.
But Fang Shu sat steadily, his smile even greater, staring straight at this tiger.
Ao! Suddenly, this tiger owner shrank back its frame.
It flopped on the ground again, looking up meekly at Fang Shu: “If the guest won’t leave, then I’ll leave.”
Fang Shu neither confirmed nor denied, merely pointed at the three “human sacrifices” in the hall.
Seeing this, the thin tiger lightly sighed and explained:
“Young Daoist Master, this shop is just small business; though we sell humans, we don’t sell many.
Besides, they don’t count as humans; please discern clearly, Daoist Master.”
The thin tiger wandered in the hall, extending its claw to point at the skinny dog and white pig tied to the wooden bench:
“This female committed adultery with a dog, causing her husband to die miserably in the dog’s mouth, penis severed.
This male mated with a pig, bringing shame to the family, parents hanging themselves in the hall.”
Fang Shu listened quietly, said nothing, merely frowned.
The thin tiger pointed again at the old sheep on the beam pillar:
“And this old thing, as the saying goes ‘even tigers don’t eat their young,’ but this old thing successively drowned three granddaughters in the cesspit, not one left.”
After speaking, it bowed low to Fang Shu, voice respectfully saying: “Dare I ask young Daoist Master, are they human or not human?”
Fang Shu’s brows relaxed, but he still said nothing, merely his throat gurgling.
Suddenly, he reached to his lips, plucked out the long tongue from his mouth.
This thing was soft at first, pink and tender, shaped like a belt, but when he stroked it with his hand, it became rigid throughout, transforming into a three-foot long sword.
Clang! Fang Shu flicked the sword body, then exhaled and answered: “True or false, human or not human, what does it have to do with me!”
Before the words finished, his body sprang from the wine table, thrusting a sword.
Though the thin tiger hadn’t looked at Fang Shu, it was constantly vigilant.
As soon as Fang Shu’s body surged up, its pupils contracted, its tiger tail like a long whip snapping out, easily yanking the old sheep from the beam pillar and hurling it at Fang Shu.
As for the thin tiger itself, without looking back, it bolted toward outside the building.
Puchi!
Facing the hurled old sheep, Fang Shu neither dodged nor evaded, stepping forward with a sword swing, splitting the old sheep in two, without the slightest snag.
The long tongue sword like a bolt of silk continued flying out, stabbing toward the thin tiger exiting the door.
Amid shaking blood water.
The thin tiger showed shock: “Such a ruthless heart, such a fast sword!”
It had to abandon the idea of escaping the restaurant, instead rolling at the doorway, body shrinking, drilling into tables and chairs, counters, and wine stacks like a big cat.
Seeing the thin tiger fully escape, Fang Shu’s face showed no regret, but rather delight.
He did not move to chase, but turned his body, standing before two cloth curtains.
Looking back into the building, silently, a hazy mist had risen in the hall.
The monsters that had just been trembling in the building now rose one after another from the ground as if possessed, eyes glowing green as they looked at Fang Shu.
Even Fang Shu himself felt his head slightly dizzy.
He immediately extended a finger, flicking the copper bell at his waist.
Ding ling ling! His mind cleared.
The monsters in the shop had begun to stir, crawling and walking toward him, crying in their mouths: “Daoist Master spare us, I haven’t eaten a bite.”
“Please have mercy, I have eighteen little ones crying for food in my cave.”
Pleas for mercy arose loudly.
Fang Shu heard this and showed a shy expression, responding: “Good! I am kind-hearted and can’t bear to see pitiful things.”
Chi chi!
He casually swung a sword: “Today I’ll send you all on your way together.”
A rat spirit and chicken spirit were pierced through together, collapsing dead on the spot.
Aaaah!
The other monsters saw this, fear in their eyes intensifying, yet they squeezed even harder toward the doorway, heedless.
Fang Shu didn’t care about this; he blocked the monsters, striking swiftly.
Old ones come, kill the old ones; young ones come, kill the young ones; seductive ones come, kill the seductive ones; flying crawling jumping walking, plain or meaty, whoever comes gets killed.
He one sword per, two swords per pair, killing with great relish, sword body dripping with monster blood.
After killing for a while, the monsters downstairs thinned out; Fang Shu simply took off the copper bell from his waist, hung it on the cloth curtain to seal the exit.
He himself strode forward.
Once away from the copper bell’s protection, in the building, Fang Shu found the scenes before his eyes blurring.
The monsters still popping up in the building transformed, no longer just scared shitless, but now kowtowing and bowing, looking quite human-like.
But Fang Shu paid no mind.
A man shouted: “I’ll be your slave, guard the house for Daoist Master.”
“Dog servant, you worthy?”
An old man kowtowed: “I’m a grass-eater, one who gets eaten.”
“On what basis do you eat grass.”
He first killed a round on the ground floor, then killed all the way up to the second floor.
On the second floor, the scenes in Fang Shu’s eyes changed again; relatives and friends appeared.
He laughed.
Holding the sword he continued walking, killing people he met, killing Daoists he met, killing parents he met, killing kin he met.
He killed whoever he encountered, like chopping melons and cutting vegetables, killing until the huge restaurant was heads rolling, corpses piled up.
Finally, after a full circle, Fang Shu killed back to the restaurant hall, the long tongue sword in his hand already sated with monster heart blood, bright and dripping.
Even he himself was flushed and hot-eared, body swaying, as if drunk.
At this time, in the hall, a ragged woman holding swaddling clothes knelt, an infant’s cry coming from the swaddling in her hands.
The woman looked at Fang Shu piteously: “Daoist, please have mercy; I was captured, I don’t beg to live, only beg you spare my child; it knows nothing…”
“Good.” Fang Shu stepped forward, reaching as if to take the swaddling.
The woman was overjoyed, immediately offering the swaddling.
But pa! A sound of jar shattering rang out!
Fang Shu smoothly thrust a sword, not only piercing the swaddling in the woman’s hands, but nailing the woman to the ground, blood flowing nonstop from her heart.
Whoosh! The surrounding scenes instantly changed.
The restaurant shook, tiles gone, beams gone, bricks gone, only hair matted into felt, rotten bones in heaps, stuck together with blood into tattered curtains.
Curtains covered three sides, beyond the three sides were cliffs, over a hundred zhang deep, misty.
The original restaurant doorway was the only path down the cliff, in the center of the path hung two dripping human skins, with a copper bell still attached.
Blown by the wind, the human skins immediately clanged.
As for the old and young corpses in the restaurant, they now all turned into chickens ducks cats dogs, oxen horses pigs sheep, snakes insects rats ants, great and small dead miserably on the ground; only in the hall lay two halves of a dry skinny human body.
And that woman in the hall, at a glance from Fang Shu, was the tiger owner.
The swaddling in its hands was the jar of wine it had offered earlier.
Its wine black and red, after spilling it sizzled, and a nest of venomous bees buzzed out, stinging the thin tiger’s body, immediately burrowing into its flesh, making it writhe in agony, howling endlessly.
This old monster flopped on the ground, resentfully glaring at Fang Shu; knowing its life was done, it merely wheezed: “Such ferocity, such ruthlessness! Such a butcher of people…”
Fang Shu looked at this tiger monster, somewhat surprised.
He wasn’t surprised at its deceitful hypocrisy, but surprised this fellow was so fragile, done in by one sword.
But Fang Shu wasted no words; he slurped back the sword, thoroughly piercing its heart, and severed its head.
Only then did he discover the trick; using the sword to pick up the tiger monster, he gave it a light shake.
Gurgle!
From inside the tiger skin rolled out a dry skinny fox body; the huge tiger head also became a pointed skinny fox head, precisely the old fox from before.
It died with eyes wide open, resentfully glaring at Fang Shu, mouth still slightly agape.
Fang Shu realized: “So it’s ‘fox borrowing tiger might’.”
His body also swayed, alertly dodging a few venomous bees emerging from the old fox’s mouth.
The venomous bees wobbled to the ground, turning to pus, actually corroding the rock on the ground with sizzling.
Fang Shu raised a brow at this.
Then he paced among the spirits’ corpses all over the mountain and cliffs, checked if they were dead after a look, then swallowed the sword into his mouth.
He stopped, suddenly looking back at the old fox’s corpse, shaking his head: “Why use poison; did the shopkeeper forget?”
“Green bamboo snake’s mouth, hornet’s tail needle. Both not yet the most venomous—” Fang Shu recited from his mouth.
He smiled faintly:
“‘Most venomous is the human heart’.”
