My Ares Son-in-Law

Where the meridians should have been, there were now countless black threads entwined there. They were like living creatures, twisting and tangling constantly, emitting a chilling aura.

"Who is this person? How could he be imprisoned so cruelly?" Xiao Chen's voice was so cold that it seemed to be able to freeze into ice, and his eyes were like two sharp blades, piercing straight at Wang Chongshan who was standing beside him.

He keenly noticed that the other person's Adam's apple rolled violently, and his fat palms rubbed dark sweat stains on his straight suit pants in a panic, and his whole body exuded an unconcealable nervousness.

Wang Chongshan raised his hand to wipe the cold sweat from his forehead. His eyes flickered behind his gold-rimmed glasses and dodged around: "I know what you are thinking, Doctor Xiao, but you really don't have to worry. This is my eldest brother, Wang Chongyue. We imprisoned him here with the permission of the family's top leaders. Strictly speaking, this is not imprisonment. It is a helpless protection measure!"

Before he could finish his words, there was a sudden, ear-piercing sound of nails scratching metal from the iron cage. The sound was so sharp that it seemed to pierce the eardrums.

The man slowly raised his head, revealing a pair of bloodshot eyes - those cloudy eyes carried a childlike innocence and confusion, but at a certain moment, a beast-like brutality and ferocity flashed across their eyes without warning. The two completely different temperaments merged strangely on his face, forming a chilling contrast.

"I would believe you if you said this was your son. He looks only in his twenties." Xiao Chen stared at the collar on the man's neck that was oozing black blood. The metal surface was engraved with mysterious runes, which were greedily absorbing blood and emitting a strange red light, as if performing some evil ritual.

He noticed from the corner of his eye that Wang Chongshan's cuffs were trembling slightly, inadvertently revealing half of his wrist which was also covered with scratches. Those scratches, old and new, told of past dangers and struggles.

Wang Chongshan smiled bitterly and unbuttoned the top two buttons of his shirt, revealing the hideous bite marks on his chest. The skin around the bite marks was swollen and purple, revealing a shocking cruelty: "He really is my eldest brother, but... since he came back from that mysterious secret realm five years ago, he has become like this. At first we all thought he was possessed, but those strange black lines..."

His voice suddenly choked, as if something was blocking his throat.

He subconsciously stretched out his hand to touch the iron cage, as if he wanted to grasp the last glimmer of hope, but he suddenly retracted his hand three inches away from the railing, as if the iron cage contained a ferocious beast that would devour anyone at any time.

"On the full-moon night of last month, he suddenly broke free from the constraints of the three talismans. Even the night watch warriors were..." His Adam's apple rolled, and his throat was too dry to make a sound. The rest of the words were drowned in endless fear and he didn't say any more.

Xiao Chen's eyes were fixed on the black lines that were constantly growing on the back of the man's hand. At this moment, those lines were slowly converging into some kind of ancient and mysterious totem, exuding a mysterious aura that had been accumulated over the years.

When he activated his soul power and tried to explore again, the collar suddenly burst out with a dazzling blue light, so bright that it was impossible to open his eyes.

The man let out an inhuman roar, a shrill and desperate sound, as if it came from the Netherworld of Hell.

Along with this roar, the alloy bars of the iron cage were twisted into spider-web-like cracks, and it seemed that they would collapse completely in the next second. "I don't know what the reason is?" Xiao Chen's voice was so low that it was almost inaudible. His fingertips had quietly grasped three silver needles, and the silver needles flashed coldly on his fingertips.

"Mr. Wang, are you sure that the patient you want me to treat is just an ordinary patient?"

Wang Chongshan's fingers unconsciously stroked the old bite mark on his chest, and his Adam's apple rolled up and down with difficulty, as if he was swallowing a piece of red-hot, burning iron.

He spoke, his voice carrying a hoarse texture that had accumulated over forty years. Every word that came out of his mouth seemed to be wrapped in sandpaper, rubbing against the air.

"I really don't know the reason, but I can tell you the process in between. In fact, it's not complicated. Forty years ago, he went out to Zhongnanshan to do some work. At that time, he was only thirty years old, at the prime of his life, full of vigor and vitality. In the entire Wang family, he was the most talented child with a bright future. Everyone had high hopes for him."

Having said this, he suddenly started coughing violently, his body trembling slightly due to the coughing. He hurriedly took out from his arms a handkerchief embroidered with delicate gold thread. The handkerchief was already stained with mottled dark red, and it was unknown how long he had been coughing to leave these marks.

"No one expected that he would be missing in the depths of Mount Zhongnan for three whole months. During these three months, his family searched everywhere for him, mobilized all the connections they could, and called out all over the mountains, but there was still no response. When he reappeared..."

Wang Chongshan's gaze passed over Xiao Chen and stared straight at the man in the iron cage who was chewing his nails intently. His pupils behind the lenses suddenly contracted, as if he had seen the most horrifying scene in the world.

"He stood in front of the Taoist temple on the top of the mountain like a madman, and his whole state was extremely strange. His body was covered with those black lines, like evil little snakes entwined on his skin, and he was holding half a blood-stained bronze fragment in his hand. When we walked into the Taoist temple, we saw that the seventeen Taoists inside had all been sucked dry of their blood. Their bodies were shriveled like orange peels that had been stored for ten years and had lost all their moisture. It was a horrible sight."

Just at this moment, a shrill laugh suddenly came from the iron cage. Wang Chongyue tilted his head and gestured at them with his bloody nails. The metal collar was activated by his movements and made a sharp alarm sound, which was particularly terrifying in this silent space.

"Over the years, we have been looking for doctors everywhere, spending a lot of money and traveling all over the country, hoping to cure him and find out what happened to him."

As Wang Chongshan spoke, he took out a stack of yellowed newspapers from the inside pocket of his suit. The edges of the newspapers had become frayed from being read and rubbed countless times, and were full of traces of time.

"You see, the Zhongnan Strange News reported this incident back then, saying that there were 'living corpses coming down the mountain', and it sounded incredible. But those Western doctors, with their stethoscopes and advanced instruments like MRI, couldn't find out anything. All indicators showed normal, as if Wang Chongyue had no physical problems except mental abnormality. After the Chinese medicine doctors felt his pulse, he either fled in terror overnight or became crazy and talked nonsense, as if he was possessed by some evil spirit."

He suddenly became excited, and his fingers clenched the newspaper tightly, his knuckles turning white from the force. "Until three years ago, an old wandering Taoist priest passed by and said that this was the result of the 'Nine Nether Heart Devouring Curse', but before he could explain in detail how to break it, then..." (End of this chapter)