Chapter 229
Chapter 229
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Translator: Ace
Chapter: 229
Chapter Title: Creation Third Grade, Demon Wood
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The fortune-teller was quite astonished. He looked Chen Shi up and down.
"You know the young master too?"
"Just who the hell are you?"
The young master owned a great many businesses. There were three or four properties in Nandu alone, and he didn't want to offend one of his own.
Chen Shi gently stroked the blade of the Youquan Roaming Dragon Sword.
The young dragon within the sword swam along with his fingertip, seemingly quite intrigued by it.
"Bath Capital's Rouge Alley Matron, Fast Joy Grove's Du the Divine Hand, Red Matchmaker Society's Auntie Xue, Phoenix Cry Loft's Manager Qiu."
Chen Shi smiled faintly.
"All of them died by my hand."
"You're the Mountain-Moving Sect's fortune-teller. Why don't you divine your fortune for today? Let's see how accurate you are."
The fortune-teller's expression shifted slightly. A abacus appeared in the nascent soul behind his head.
The abacus was exquisitely crafted, no more than an inch or two in size, yet its ninety-one beads were clearly distinct.
Most peculiar of all, each bead bore different talismanic seals. Both sides featured five kinds of runes corresponding to the five elements.
The frame between the beads was even more intricate, engraved with as many as eight kinds of runes corresponding to the Eight Trigrams.
The abacus itself was etched with all sorts of bizarre talismanic patterns, outlined in gold thread mixed with cinnabar. The workmanship was so masterful it took one's breath away.
A single bead from this abacus was probably worth over a hundred taels of silver!
Such divine craftsmanship could only be the work of the Hundred Refinements Hall or the Lu Ban School.
"You calculate fortunes, but now you're counting coins."
Chen Shi snorted. He stepped forward and thrust out with sword fingers.
The fortune-teller heard the sound of air exploding. The Youquan Roaming Dragon Sword was already before his eyes. He tilted his head to dodge, while his nascent soul sacrificed the abacus to meet the roaming dragon sword.
"Dodged it!"
He widened his eyes, watching the roaming dragon sword flash past him as a streak of cold light. Joy filled his heart.
Chen Shi's strike had been far too swift. His life had hung by a thread. Fortunately, his neck was sturdy enough, and he'd tilted his head in time. Otherwise, that blow surely would have taken his life!
But his reaction had been too quick, causing the abacus to fly out at the wrong moment and miss intercepting Chen Shi's sword.
At that instant, the power of bead after bead began to activate. The runes for metal, wood, water, fire, earth on their surfaces lit up. The trigram runes for heaven, earth, wind, thunder began to spin on their own. The abacus beads rapidly expanded.
This talismanic weapon possessed tremendous power. Once activated, the layered runes on its ninety-one beads compounded their might, with the five elements mutually reinforcing one another to unleash explosive force, augmented further by the Eight Trigrams runes for even greater devastation.
Added to that were the five elements' clashing properties. If the enemy proved too formidable, the beads could encase them, binding externally with the Eight Trigrams while detonating the five elements internally, often reducing foes to shattered fragments.
His abacus boasted over a hundred and eight uses, evolving into a hundred and eight techniques. It excelled in close-quarters defense or long-range spellcasting, handling all with ease.
"This man may have obtained the Youquan Roaming Dragon Sword, but he doesn't know the inspection and refinement methods. He just treats it like an ordinary sharp blade."
In the span of a spark, countless thoughts flashed through his mind, including a touch of showing off.
"I'll use the inner cycle of five elements generation to trap his lower body. Metal qi to shred him, wood qi to make him swell, fire qi to incinerate him, water qi to wash him to ashes, earth qi to crush him flat. Then the outer five elements to blast him to bits! Finally, refine him with the Eight Trigrams into a dainty little human-flesh spirit pill!"
His abacus's power was expanding outward at that moment. The fortune-teller prepared to rein it in.
At the same instant, dozens of zhang away on a rooftop behind him, a nascent soul realm cultivator's neck suddenly bore a red line.
This man had seen the roaming dragon sword flying toward him too, but its speed was simply too great. With a flash of light, it reached his eyes and whisked past his neck.
Panic gripped him. He hurriedly leaped into the air. Midway through his jump, a thought struck him: Why do I feel so light?
He looked down!
His body from the neck down was below, sprouting eight arms held wide in jumping pose.
He had jumped along with his body, only his head had leaped a bit higher.
As the roaming dragon sword struck him, Chen Shi had already shifted from piercing sword form to cloud sword form.
The cloud sword form's motion unfinished, it transformed into cleaving sword form, then into wiping sword form—a total of four moves, all the simplest techniques of the Subduing Evil Sword at Noon and Midnight. Moves any scholar could perform.
Four crisp, decisive strikes.
Above him, the man who had unleashed over a hundred flying needles saw every needle severed in a sweep of the cloud sword.
That man's neck was also decapitated by the cloud sword.
The cleaving sword form swept past from above to below, cleaving open the head and the divine shrine's divine embryo at the back of the head of the man a hundred zhang behind Chen Shi!
The wiping sword form was incredibly swift. On the lake surface a hundred zhang away, the water dragon had its throat slit and scattered with a splash.
Sharing the throat-slitting fate with that water dragon was the nascent soul realm cultivator standing atop its head. One hand clutched his throat while the other frantically rummaged for medicine vials on his person, seeking bone-mending salve in a desperate bid to prolong his life before the end!
In his panic, a vial slipped from his grasp and fell into the lake.
He let out a great cry. The blood from his neck could no longer be contained and sprayed outward. His corpse sank into the lake.
Chen Shi caught the returning roaming dragon sword and lightly wiped its blade with his sword fingers.
The blade rippled like water, the young dragon within swimming docilely along with his fingers.
"Figured it out yet?"
Chen Shi's fingertip swept across the sword tip. Without glancing sideways, he stared at the tip and spoke softly.
"Are you living or dying today?"
The fortune-teller had just thought of "human-flesh spirit pill" when the abacus's power had already been reined in. He was about to unleash a second technique.
Only then did he suddenly realize that his four companions were dead.
Cold sweat beaded on his forehead. A heavy thud came from behind him—two sounds in succession. The first was the headless body falling, the second the head dropping.
Then came sibilant sounds as a string of flying needles rained from the sky.
The severed needles landed precisely around them, forming a large circle.
Next, the flying needles' owner's corpse plummeted down with a whoosh of wind.
Chen Shi took a step to the left. The corpse thudded to the ground with a thump, not touching him in the slightest.
From behind him came the sound of the head-cleft man's corpse collapsing, along with the splash of a body hitting the water on the lake.
Cold sweat poured down the fortune-teller's brow. He had never seen such a swift flying sword.
Too fast!
He had assumed the flying sword was aimed at him. When he dodged it, he'd even felt a flicker of relief, thinking himself the stronger.
He never imagined the sword's target wasn't him at all, but his companions!
Before he could even retract his technique, his four companions—spread across different directions, one or two hundred zhang apart—had all perished!
He had never seen such a swift flying sword!
The Mountain-Moving Sect teemed with experts and extraordinary individuals, yet none wielded a sword this fast!
Looking at Chen Shi, he felt an inexplicable pressure.
"I…"
His body trembled. All the techniques he'd just considered vanished from his mind, leaving it blank.
Chen Shi walked up to him, withdrew the roaming dragon sword, and took out the dragon whisker brush. He said indifferently, "You can calculate it slowly once you get back."
Using his vital blood as cinnabar, he drew a bizarre talisman with the dragon whisker brush. With a light flick of the tip, the talisman floated up into the air and landed on the fortune-teller's chest.
This talisman lacked the traditional structure of divine form, divine name, and divine incantation. Instead, it depicted a massive tree with roots curling like snakes or octopuses.
Its internal structure was extraordinarily complex, brimming with intricate details.
Drawing it with a cinnabar brush would likely take two or three days, with a high risk of errors.
But with this brush, it was simple. And if one could form it with a single thought, the error rate was extremely low.
This talisman was called Nightmare Wood. In the *Talisman Creation Treasure Codex*, it ranked as a third-grade creation talisman—the most complex one Chen Shi could draw at nascent soul realm.
Drawing this talisman required many rare and strange materials: even snake-molt shed skin as a primer, ghost souls refined into juice, mixed with morning dew to grind the cinnabar for painting.
Yet the *Treasure Codex* also noted that with a brush that bridged yin and yang, one could forgo those materials. Merely, the resulting Nightmare Wood would be slightly less potent.
The fortune-teller rasped, "You'll let me go?"
Chen Shi instructed, "I've left a talisman on your chest called Demon Wood. Once you return to the Mountain-Moving Sect, immediately find your sect master and have your best talisman masters come to break it."
"I'll give you three hours. Don't dawdle."
The fortune-teller shuddered and bolted away at top speed, his feet a blur as he fled Sheng hurriedly.
Chen Shi flicked his fingertip lightly. A great blaze shot out, igniting the corpses on the ground and reducing them to ashes.
He also disposed of the other two bodies in the village to prevent them from being exposed to moonlight and turning into evils. Only then, under the villagers' terrified gazes, did he head toward A Zhuo's home.
The woman A Ying had seen him kill and was scared out of her wits. She had already barred the door and was hiding in the courtyard, clutching her two children and trembling.
Hearing the knock, and seeing A Zhuo about to open it, she hurriedly said, "A Zhuo, don't open it! He's killed people!"
A Zhuo said, "Little Ten won't harm us."
The woman A Ying said, "He won't harm us, but what about his enemies?"
A Zhuo hesitated. Chen Shi's voice came from outside. "Uncle A Zhuo, it's Little Ten."
"One bears one's own deeds. I've done wrong, and I'll face the consequences myself. I've come to resolve this, so I won't disturb you any longer."
A Zhuo stood behind the door and instructed, "Go on ahead."
"Grandpa Chen Yindu's descendants aren't weaklings. Don't tarnish your grandfather's name."
Chen Shi bowed. "Uncle, rest assured. I'll give it my all."
"Auntie, don't worry. I won't implicate you."
The woman A Ying didn't dare speak.
Chen Shi stuffed several banknotes through the door crack. "Auntie, I have no time to teach Little Tiger and Little Wei."
"Uncle A Zhuo has many affairs and doesn't earn much."
"Here's some silver. Take it and find a good private school for them. Don't hold them back."
He turned and left.
A Zhuo pulled out the banknotes and opened them. They were all hundred-tael denominations from Wan San Money House, redeemable anywhere for silver.
A Zhuo intended to open the door and return them. The woman A Ying hurriedly stopped him. "This is your nephew's filial piety. Why not accept it? Without this money, how will your two sons study and learn? With the pittance from your beekeeping, they'll never set foot in a private school this lifetime! I don't expect anything from you, but Little Tiger and Little Wei can't be delayed!"
A Zhuo thought for a moment. "I've wronged you and the little ones."
Though he was a陰帥 and appeared glamorous, he was like a donkey dung egg—shiny on the outside only.
陰帥 received salaries from the underworld: high pay in afterlife paper money usable only after death, accumulated as yin merit.
That money and merit couldn't buy a single copper coin in life.
To feed his family, he could only rely on beekeeping for income.
No matter how mighty his cultivation or exalted his status in the underworld—surrounded by attendants and basking in glory—in the mortal world, he was just an ordinary beekeeper, laboring for three meals a day and scraping by.
Had his heart been even slightly wicked, his family wouldn't be so destitute.
He would have endless wealth, beauties, servants.
But if he were even slightly wicked, he would no longer be陰帥 A Zhuo.
Chen Shi arrived at the bridge and saw someone inspecting the ashes on the ground. Seeing him approach, they scattered in panic.
"Quick, report to the officials!"
Someone shouted.
Chen Shi reached out remotely. That person whooshed backward through the air and landed before him, scared limp and motionless.
Chen Shi said, "What's your village called?"
"Shuikou Village."
The villager trembled.
Chen Shi pointed in the direction the fortune-teller had fled. "What's that way?"
"Luhua Village."
"A bit farther."
"Roundwood Town."
"Farther still, and it's Nandu City."
Chen Shi nodded lightly and released the villager. He took out a small ingot and pressed it into his hand. "I'm Chen Shi, of Qianyang Mountain in Xinduo. The two-province examination graduate from Xinduo and Gongzhou Provinces."
"Those four were killed by me. No one else is involved."
"Report to the officials and make that clear."
The villager nodded repeatedly.
"Go report it."
Chen Shi waved him off. "Make it clear: two-province graduate Chen Shi, not juren Chen Shi!"
The villager clutched the silver tightly and jogged off.
With silver in hand, he ran far faster than the other messengers.
Chen Shi strolled unhurriedly toward Nandu.
The fortune-teller didn't dare pause for a moment, racing straight for Chandu. Upon arrival, heedless of propriety, he barged into the Mountain-Moving Sect's hall in Nandu and cried, "Save me—"
The entire Mountain-Moving Sect was roused. Members poured out to look at him.
Camp Saintess and Sect Master Baili Mu of the Mountain-Moving Sect hurried over upon hearing the commotion. They saw the fortune-teller in the midst of the crowd, surrounded by concerned people asking nonstop what had happened.
The fortune-teller bellowed and tore open his robe. "The others are all dead! That sword-stealing brat planted a talisman on me! It will take my life in three hours! Half an hour's already passed!"
On his chest gleamed the vermilion Demon Wood talisman, starkly vivid.
Its structure was impossibly complex. Imprinted on his flesh, it seemed alive, its root tendrils writhing ceaselessly, burrowing into him as if drawing his vital blood, treating him as human fertilizer.
"Everyone back off!"
Several Mountain-Moving Sect talisman masters with profound expertise pushed through the crowd. One beheld the talisman and exclaimed in shock, "Did the one who planted it tell you what it is?"
The fortune-teller said, "He called it Demon Wood."
That talisman master's face changed slightly. "Southern School talisman, third-grade creation: Demon Wood! Someone actually refined this talisman. Impressive skill, impressive skill!"
He pulled down the fortune-teller's lower eyelid. Countless tiny rootlets writhed in the white of his eye.
He tapped the fortune-teller's brow. The man's body quivered slightly as the divine shrine leaped out from behind his head. Between the shrine and jade pillow acupoint sprouted numerous rootlets!
Everyone gasped in shock.
Such a talisman was pure demonic art!
That talisman master inspected the nascent soul and saw it seated in the shrine's inner void, unentangled by rootlets. He breathed in relief. "Good, the nascent soul hasn't been ensnared."
"If the nascent soul were wrapped too, the Demon Wood would mature far faster."
"It would erupt in moments. Below Soul Transformation Realm, none could escape!"
Baili Mu asked, "Can it be undone?"
The talisman master smiled faintly. "Sect Master, if this person's talisman mastery surpassed mine, breaking it would be perilous. But he's just a child. Undoing his talisman is no trouble."
He immediately prepared cinnabar, black dog blood, and the like to break the talisman.
Baili Mu relaxed and asked the fortune-teller, "Where did you encounter the sword thief?"
"Shuikou Village."
Baili Mu's gaze flickered. He said coolly, "Shuikou Village, eh? Good!"
He turned and strode out, followed swiftly by a band of Mountain-Moving Sect elites. Behind him, the talisman master raised his brush and applied it to the fortune-teller's chest to dispel the talisman.
Suddenly, Baili Mu sensed a heart-palpitating aura from behind. He whipped around, only to see the fortune-teller's flesh ballooning outward. A monstrous, alien tree burst from his body, shredding it and sprouting in all directions.
Whooshes of piercing air filled the hall as chaos erupted. Rootlets speared through the rear brains of fleeing Mountain-Moving Sect members.
One after another, sect elites were struck, floating into the air as more rootlets and branches sprouted from their heads.
Terror twisted their faces as they plummeted into endless nightmares.
"Save me! Quick, save me!"
The talisman master breaking the Demon Wood talisman wore a look of horror. A tendril pierced his brain. He cried, "My nightmare... so terrifying!"
End of chapter.