Taoist priest goes to America

Chigur was sprawled on the broken porcelain shards beside the bathtub, his legs spread apart and his back against the side of the tub.

His arms hung down at his sides, each forearm with a cut, bone fragments protruding from the flesh. The bone in his left hand was broken even more brittle, protruding out of the muscle and facing the light above.

Qiguer looked down at his two hands, then laboriously stretched out his right hand, pulling a pack of cigarettes and a lighter from his shirt pocket with two fingers.

The pack of cigarettes had been soaked in bathwater, and the cardboard box was crumpled. He held a protruding cigarette in his mouth, tilted his head slightly, pulled the cigarette out of the soaked box, and held it in the corner of his mouth.

Chigur threw away the cigarette pack, his fingers trembling as he lit a cigarette. It took him two tries to get it going, and the flame leaped up and the cigarette started burning. He took a deep drag.

He leaned against the edge of the bathtub, enjoying taking his first puff of cigarette smoke.

His collapsed left chest was agitated by his breathing, and Qigu's body suddenly lurched forward. He coughed, vomiting up a mouthful of smoke along with blood.

Blood splattered on the cigarette holder, staining the originally white paper red. The cigarette butt was still glowing, lying on the ground. Qiguer looked down at the cigarette but didn't pick it up.

Ang Lee walked in through the door, the wound on his left neck already scabbed over, a thin layer of dark red covering his skin.

His right hand was still gripping the Glock, the muzzle pointed at Chigur's head. He stood at the toilet door, not taking another step forward, signaling to Old White to go and deal with Chigur.

Old Bai walked up to Qiguer, raised his right hand, spread his five fingers, and aimed at Qiguer's head, ready to smash his head open with a slap.

"Wait a minute," Li An said.

Old White's hand stopped there, and he tilted his head to look at Li An, his palm hovering above Qiguer's head without lowering it.

Ang Lee lowered the gun slightly, aiming it at Chigur's torso. "Use poison. Don't destroy his body."

Qiguer is a superhuman. Just handling his corpse would greatly enhance Li An's strength. Not to mention, he can also acquire Qiguer's skills. The skills that an assassin like him can acquire are incomparable to those of other ordinary professions.

Old Bai understood what he meant, lowered his hand, and spread his ferocious fingers into a claw shape, inserting them into the gap below Qiguer's ribs. The skin at the gap where several ribs were broken had been pierced by the broken bones, and the flesh and blood were directly exposed.

Old White's fingernail pierced the wound, and a sound of flesh being torn apart rang out. A layer of dark liquid seeped from the crack in its fingernail; it was the venom from Old White's body, flowing down the fingernail into Qigu'er's wound.

Chigur's body tensed abruptly, his fingers gripping the blood-soaked cigarette pack tightly before relaxing.

His body suddenly sprang upwards, something bulging deep within his torso pushed him off the edge of the bathtub, lifting his upper body slightly off the ground.

His mouth opened, and something was moving in his throat, like rumination. A clump of something emerged from his mouth, wet and coated with a layer of sticky saliva, still attached to a transparent thread as it fell to the ground.

After landing, the thing quickly started moving, bounced on the ground, and flew into the air, shaking off the mucus on its surface to reveal the dark red muscle fiber tissue inside.

It flipped over in the air, and its shape began to change.

The fleshy buds on the ball of flesh stretched out, spread out on both sides, and narrowed at the tail, and the outline of a bird emerged from a shapeless mass of flesh.

It has no feathers or skin, only a layer of bare muscle fibers, like a live anatomical specimen that has just had its skin peeled off.

The head of the bird-like muscle is a contracted mass of flesh, and the two eyeballs bulge out from under the muscle layer.

When the fleshy wings are spread, the bones protrude from the muscles, like a skinless bird flapping its muscles.

The bird darted towards Lao Bai, who reached out to grab it. But just as it got close to Lao Bai's hand, the bird flapped its wings sharply, accelerated, and changed direction, flying past Lao Bai's armpit and straight into the night outside the window.

Ang Lee raised his Glock pistol and fired four shots in quick succession, the spent cartridges clattering onto the floor tiles.

The first shot hit the window frame, the second shot grazed the bird's tail fin, and the last shot hit the brick wall outside the window.

The fleshy bird was bright red, blending into the night. His gun couldn't lock onto the target or aim accurately. Li An hadn't received any special training, so the reason he shot Qiguer so accurately was because Doyle's skill was working.

However, the principle of "fighting violence with violence" is completely inaccurate when dealing with things that are not black.

The bullets were all used up, and the fleshy bird had disappeared into the night sky.

Ang Lee put down his gun and glanced down at it.

Qiguer's body slowly slid down the edge of the bathtub, the back of his head resting on the broken porcelain shards, his eyes still open, a thin stream of clear liquid hanging from the corner of his mouth, dripping down.

"What exactly is this guy?" Li An really couldn't understand it. This person had gone beyond the realm of superhumans and was more like a monster.

However... Li An squatted down and turned Qiguer's body over.

It doesn't matter if it's a black cat or a white cat, as long as it catches mice, it's a good cat.

Ang Lee placed the back of Chigurh's head on the floor tiles. After Old White's toxin seeped into the wound, it spread rapidly. The dark purple color spread from the shattered ribs to the heart and then up to below the collarbone.

Next came the usual procedure: he took out cinnabar and yellow paper, picked up a pinch of cinnabar and crushed it on the paper, then heated it with a lighter, turning the dark red into a bright red.

He placed yellow paper on Qigu'er's forehead, dipped his index finger in cinnabar, and drew a resurrection talisman. The three hooks of the talisman were aligned, and when the yellow paper was pasted on, the talisman was imprinted on the skin.

The system panel pops up.

[One intact human corpse has been detected. Was it a case of corpse transport?]

"Yes."

Qiguer's fingers twitched first, and his entire body stood up straight from the ground. He raised his arms in front of him, and the exposed white bones were covered by gray muscles, returning to their original position. The depression on the left side of his chest also began to wriggle, and black ribs grew out.

The system panel flashed.

[Corpse transport successful. Corpse servant +1. Current number of corpse servants: 3/4 (Isya has been destroyed).]

[An abnormal physical condition was detected in the corpse servant before his death. Analyzing...]

The text on the screen paused for a moment, then a new line of text appeared.

[Traces of non-human modification have been detected within the corpse servants. Evolution prediction is being revised.]

Qiguer's body began to change. A layer of fine white down emerged from his skin, starting from his neck, spreading down his collarbone to his feet. The texture of the white hair was different from that of Old Bai; it was coarser and harder, like frost on a person's body.

Li An was stunned for a moment. He turned to look at Old Bai. Old Bai had eaten so much blood food before white hair grew on his body. Doyle and Isya hadn't reached that stage yet.

Qigul hadn't even recovered its full form yet; it started growing hair as soon as it stood up, skipping the purple zombie phase and turning directly into a white-haired zombie.

The text on the screen jumped again.

[An abnormally accelerated evolution process of the Corpse Servant has been detected; the White-haired Zombie form has been achieved... Observation continues.]

Ang Lee stared at the white fur. The white down grew from the center outwards, completely covering Chigur, and then the color of the white fur began to change.

Starting from the roots, it changes from white to dark gray, and finally to black. That layer of black climbs up the tips of the downy hairs, from the soles of the feet to the waist, from the chest to the forearms, as if someone had poured ink on it.

The black down was longer and denser than the white fur, clinging tightly to the skin, and gleaming with a dull sheen under the dim bathroom light.

The text on the screen has changed again.

[The Black-haired Zombie form has been achieved. Corpse Servant Evolution Stage: Black-haired Zombie (Primary Stage).]

[Detection indicated that the zombie servant underwent dehumanization modifications before death, and the modification traces merged with the zombification process after death. The evolutionary progress exceeded expectations.]

[Current Corpse Servant Level: Black-haired Zombie (Beginner)]