Gou Zai Punishment Division

In the puddles of the dead-end alley, several pieces of rotten oil paper floated.

The price paid for that bowl of pig's blood soup with chopsticks stuck in it at the food stall is now being paid off.

Wen Liang paused in his steps.

The mortal body on his body was gradually growing cold. The chopsticks stuck in the bowl had finally crossed the line. The borrowed body tightened abruptly, receiving the sacrificial signal, and was forcibly collecting the contents of the body as if they were corpses.

A dull, dislocation sound came from the spine.

A hiss escaped Wenliang's throat, his fingers curled, digging into his forehead. Amidst the churning of flesh and blood, he forcefully pulled himself out of the burial shroud.

The discarded leather bag fell into a puddle and sank into the mud.

The icy rain washed away the withered form of the Night Wanderer.

Wenliang gasped for breath. The excruciating pain of being skinned made him weak, but his mind was clearer than ever before.

Rainwater mixed with the strange smell emanating from the drain—the stench of stale frozen meat mixed with damp, low-quality incense.

This direction leads to the abandoned "Third Meat Processing Plant".

Wen Liang clenched the padding paper, finally understanding. It was his superior, the patrol clerk, who had secretly been raising a powerful demon here.

It's a dead end no matter which way you look at it.

Wen Liang's eyes hardened, and he transformed into a gust of cold wind, penetrating the rusty ventilation blinds.

The city's cold rain was kept out. A foul wind howled within the pipe network.

In the darkness, only the clanging of sheet metal being blown by the wind could be heard. The smell grew stronger until the metal mesh of the ventilation duct was violently smashed open.

At the end of the pipeline was a huge abandoned cold storage facility.

The exhaust fan was bitten to death by rust, and the air was filled with the stench of blood.

A fat man wrapped in an old military overcoat sat in a tattered rattan chair. Beside the chair sat a thermos with peeling paint. He slowly twirled a string of blackened bodhi seeds in his hand, making marks and sketches in front of a yellowed account book.

"The stray dogs down there are getting harder and harder to manage. We'll have to keep two sets of accounts for this year's incense offering quota..." The fat man rubbed his temples, revealing the irritability that comes with reconciling accounts at the end of the month.

Behind him, in the industrial blood-draining tank, a massive lump of flesh was writhing. Minced meat, limbs, and dozens of murky eyeballs were compressed into a single shape—[The Mutant Tai Sui].

With each breath of the Tai Sui, incense ash would squeeze out from the cracks in its flesh.

The echo of the wire mesh hitting the ground reverberated throughout the cold storage.

The registrar stopped moving his prayer beads. He didn't get up, but merely raised his eyelids slightly, glanced at Wen Liang who was covered in blood and grime, his fleshy muscles twitched slightly, and he smirked.

"Wenliang, I know the food at the bottom of society isn't good. But in this area, going over the City God's head to dig up old grievances is just asking for death."

The registrar crushed a Bodhi seed with his thumb.

The debris bounced into the blood draining tank.

A mountain of meat suddenly appeared.

There was no embellishment, only pure, unadulterated pressure. The gentle, venerable image of the Night Wanderer was as thin as paper before the acid and rotting flesh spewed by the Tai Sui.

In a single exchange, Tai Sui's whiskers pierced Wen Liang's shoulder. Half of the god's body was corroded, hissing and revealing white bones.

Wenliang was nailed to the icy muddy water. Several barbed tentacles wrapped around his neck, pried open his jaw, and prepared to force-feed him rotten flesh.

My vision gradually blurred.

The freezer fell into a deathly silence before feeding. The only sound was the sticky smacking of minced meat from the *Tai Sui*.

"Crunch... crunch..."

Suddenly, the dry, rattling sound of chains came from outside the iron louvered window above the cold storage.

Someone was riding a bicycle, slowly driving over the puddles above.

When the sound rang out, the stench of blood in the freezer seemed to be instantly sucked away.

The bloodstains accumulated on the walls wriggled and transformed into dark shadows of people who had died tragically there.

In the few seconds it took for the bicycle to pass by, all the shadowy figures turned their heads at once, staring lifelessly at the registrar.

A faint, agonizing scream, like a tape being played in reverse, echoed from inside. The basement seemed to be being cleared out by the person in charge.

"Bang."

The wheels outside rolled over the broken bricks, causing a slight tremor.

Chen Mo touched the ground with one foot and stopped above the blinds.

He pulled out a brown paper bag with a red "Top Secret" stamp from his pocket, inside which was the "Meat Processing Plant Incense Embezzlement Case".

If the bad debts aren't settled, he can't get his fifty dollars reimbursed. In the bureaucratic system, the quickest way to balance accounts is to ensure that the person who falsified the accounts has no way to prove their innocence during a "supervisory review."

As for who will deliver this bloodstained letter of denunciation...

Hearing the muffled groan coming from beneath his feet, Chen Mo expressionlessly released his grip.

The paper bag slipped through the seam and floated lightly into the blood beside Wen Liang's hand.

The bag opening is open.

What slid out was a yellowed ledger. The numbers were filled with every secret account of the clerk's embezzlement.

On the last blank page of the ledger, there was a dark red official seal—"Ministry of Punishment".

Wen Liang's unfocused eyes sharpened.

Above, the Tai Sui's tentacles, dripping with putrid liquid, slammed down. Wen Liang did not dodge; with all his might, he used his remaining arm to pull the ledger to his chest.

"Smack."

The tentacles crashed down, splattering blood everywhere.

A drop of thick, dark demon blood landed precisely on the official seal on the last page of the ledger.

The red clay throbbed slightly.

on the ground.

The icy rain has not stopped.

Chen Mo straddled a dilapidated bicycle. A soaking wet black cat crouched in the middle of the road, its back arched, watching him warily.

Chen Mo rubbed his sore temples, his thumb instinctively moving towards the bicycle bell.

Just before my fingertip touched the cold metal sheet—

"BOOM—!!!"

The rainy night in Nanming City was torn apart.

A dark red lightning bolt pierced through the thick concrete floor of the meat processing plant and crashed into the underground cold storage.

[Exceeding the level of authority to check accounts].

The corrupt ledger, combined with demon blood, attracted heavenly lightning to settle scores.

The lightning net raged underground. The distorted Tai Sui evaporated instantly, like oil being poured over a raging fire.

Before the registrar could even show a look of fear on his astonished face, his protective divine light and soul shattered inch by inch.

However, just as the thunderstorm was about to engulf the bicycle, it strangely split off upon touching Chen Mo. Like a raging tide crashing into a non-existent reef, the energy slid to either side, creating an absolutely silent vacuum. Not even the hem of his clothes was burned.

The lightning dimmed, and the putrid stench from the ground vanished.

Chen Mo then pressed his thumb down on the metal plate.

"Ring ring—"

The cheap sound of bicycle bells echoed through the downpour.

The gentle, broken body of the god was soaking in scorched mud and water.

He looked up and gazed through the pierced dome at the dark silhouette of the cyclist above.

Before the clear bell rang, the lightning bolts, powerful enough to tear apart the soul, actually hovered in mid-air for half a second. Only after the bell rang did the lightning finally subside.

In the benevolent vision of the gods, this had already transcended the realm of magical power. The laws of Heaven were actually in harmony with the rhythm of this great figure.

In mid-air, fragments of the registrar's disintegrated divine essence scattered in the rain.

Chen Mo looked at the black cat in front of him. The shadow beneath his feet silently unfolded.

The tentacles precisely catch every scattered remnant, swallowing it like cleaning up kitchen scraps.

Then, the shadow receded back into the outline of the shoe sole.

"Meow--"

Startled by the bell, the black cat darted into the bushes.

"Troublesome," Chen Mo said in a low voice.

He stepped on the pedal, and the chain rattled again.

Holding a black umbrella in one hand and the handlebars in the other, he slowly rode into the cold fog. He seemed more concerned about being late for tomorrow's morning meeting than about the fallen center of power beneath his feet.

In the underground cold storage, rainwater cascaded down the charred, broken walls.

With his half-crippled body, Wen Liang struggled to turn over and looked in the direction Chen Mo had gone.

His withered chest heaved violently. Fear, exhaustion from surviving a catastrophe, and a hint of desperate madness intertwined in his eerie green eyes.

The system abandoned Him, and His former master wanted to devour Him. But the being above Him, who could even control heavenly tribulations, gave Him a knife.

Since this life was a fluke, why not just find a new master?

Wen Liang pressed his forehead against the cold cement floor, his whole body trembling violently due to some kind of fervor.

There was no response, only the sound of the wind.

But Wenliang's hoarse voice still echoed in the empty ruins:

"Your subordinate is gentle and kind..."

"I am willing to die for you, sir!!"