Chapter 672
The stone streets of Qingyun Town were immersed in the damp and cold morning mist. The lanterns of the teahouses swayed in the wind, and the dim light reflected the scattered fallen leaves on the ground. Fu Shaoping stood on the eaves of the town hall. The dew between the green tiles soaked the soles of his boots, and the coldness climbed up along his ankles. He closed his eyes and concentrated, his consciousness spread out like a net, capturing every trace of spiritual movement in the town.
The heavy sword "Zhenyue" was placed horizontally in front of his knees. On the black scabbard, seven dark red bloodstains were particularly dazzling in the morning light. This was the seventh anomaly he had marked in the past seven days - the three bronze toads on the roof of the Golden Toad Chamber of Commerce were supposed to be objects to protect the house, but at this moment they were trembling slightly in the mist, and the toad's eyes were glowing with a strange red light.
"Three Corpses Soul Locking Formation..." Fu Shaoping whispered the name, his fingertips involuntarily touching the bloodstains on the scabbard. The "Disha Chronicle" once recorded that this formation could secretly devour the essence of cultivators and silently turn people into puppets.
-
"Fu Zhenshou!" There were hurried footsteps in front of the hall. Zhou Zhubu was stopping a monk with disheveled hair. The man looked dazed, and his fingers were nervously rubbing the jade pendant on his waist. Fu Shaoping's eyes were fixed - a trace of black air was oozing out from the edge of the jade pendant, spreading along the monk's fingertips to the meridians.
"Friend Li, do you really want to resign from the Town Affairs Hall?" Zhou Zhubu said anxiously, "You just signed the contract the day before yesterday, and you regret it today?"
"I...I've been having a lot of cramps recently..." Li's eyes were dazed, and his lips were trembling as he spoke, "This town...is not right..."
Fu Shaoping's eyes turned cold, and his fingertips were already on the hilt of the sword.
-
At the beginning of the Si hour, Nangong Wan stepped into the side hall of the Town Affairs Hall.
She was wearing a man's hair crown today, and a hint of rouge-red skirt was faintly visible under her snow-white Taoist robe. The cuffs were stained with cinnabar, and it was obvious that she had just come out of the formation. On the map in front of the table, seven silver needles were pinned to seven directions, and the red ropes at the ends of the needles formed the shape of the Big Dipper, which was trembling slightly.
"Has the Xunfeng Formation in the east of the city been set up?" Fu Shaoping pushed over a roll of secret reports on the table.
Nangong Wan tapped the map with her fingertips, and the silver needle suddenly stopped: "The seventh node is completed, but the center of the formation is unstable." She looked up at Fu Shaoping, and suddenly used a tea whisk to pick up the jade pendant on his waist, "You have also been marked."
The back of the jade pendant is covered with fine golden lines, which reveal the pattern of a miniature toad in the sunlight.
The heavy sword came out of the sheath with a buzzing sound, but was pressed back by Nangong Wan's fingertips with a green light: "Two-way sensing mark, rashly destroying it will only alert the enemy." She curled her lips slightly, "Why not... take advantage of the enemy's trick?"
-
On the twelfth day of the twelfth lunar month, Zuixian Tower is decorated with lights and colors.
Nangong Wan was dressed in a plain white dress and gilded armor as she brushed past the bronze tripod on the display stand. As she practiced the Tracing Origin Technique, her pupils suddenly contracted - in a mine late at night, dozens of monks were watering blood-colored crystal clusters with their essence and blood, and they all had golden toad jade pendants hanging around their waists!
"Miss, you have good eyesight!" The blue-robed steward smiled flatteringly and came closer, "This is an ancient artifact from the Zhou Dynasty..."
"Fake." Nangong Wan's armor flicked, and the delusion-breaking talisman turned into a stream of fire and sank into the ears of the cauldron. When the manager's face suddenly changed, she turned around and pointed at the copper incense burner: "That one is interesting."
The steward forced a smile: "Miss, you have a keen eye, this is..." Before he finished speaking, the incense burner suddenly trembled, and wisps of black smoke seeped out of the cracks in the cover. Nangong Wan took a half step back, and his fingertips had already grasped three talismans.
-
At midnight, the headquarters of the Golden Toad Chamber of Commerce was as silent as a grave.
Fu Shaoping sneaked along the wall, the jade slip on his waist showed seven spots of light. Six of them were scattered in the warehouse area, and only one stream of blazing white light went straight to the third floor of the main building. He deliberately kicked over the wine jar and stumbled towards the door: "Open the door! Swindler!"
When the guards held the "drunkard" in their arms, a muffled sound came from the backyard. The moment the window on the third floor opened, Nangong Wan's shadow passed over the wall.
-
In the east wing, seven incense burners formed a strange formation, and the blood-colored crystal ball suspended in the center was madly devouring spiritual energy. Nangong Wan's photo stone had just recorded the third breath when a paper crane suddenly shot in from the window and burned into two words: "Quickly retreat!"
Three copper coins fell to the ground in the direction of heaven, earth and man. The moment the door was kicked open, golden light burst out. The purple-robed monk waved his sleeves to disperse the strong light, but saw the window curtains swaying slightly, and the copper coins on the ground had turned into powder.
-
In the town hall at dawn, the image projected by the photo stone made everyone change color.
Fu Shaoping slashed the map with his heavy sword: "The spiritual power of the seven towns will eventually converge into the Black Mist Canyon."
"The Soul Devouring Sect's blood sacrifice formation." A talisman butterfly flew out of Nangong Wan's brocade bag, "I mixed soul-chasing sand into the blood crystal. Three days later..."
A shrill scream suddenly interrupted her words. The purple-robed monk who was being interrogated suddenly started bleeding from all seven orifices, and black worms swelled up under his skin. "Heart-eating poison!" Fu Shaoping's sword flashed, and two heads rolled to the ground.
-
At the celebration banquet, Nangong Wan's moon-white skirt was stained with wine. When Fu Shaoping chased her into the courtyard, she was staring at the red night sky in the northeast.
"Worried about the blood sacrifice formation?"
"What we cut today were just tentacles." She turned over the wine glass, and the reflection of the blood moon distorted in the wine. "The real mastermind..."
The heavy sword suddenly trembled like a dragon's roar. The two turned their heads at the same time - on the eaves of the town hall, the eyes of three bronze toads were oozing blood.
At the moment when the blood drops in the eyes of the bronze toad on the eaves fell to the ground, the twelve talismans in Nangong Wan's sleeves had already formed a formation in the air. At the moment when the blood-red moonlight penetrated the "Ziwu Sealing Talisman", the talisman paper actually ignited a green ghost fire.
"It's not a physical entity!" Fu Shaoping swung his heavy sword at the toad, but the tip of the sword pierced through the shadow and went straight into the green tiles. Dozens of sticky blood tongues suddenly stretched out from the shadow of the eaves, entangled the sword body, and made a corrosive "sizzling" sound.
Nangong Wan turned her wrist and showed the magnetic powder in the hidden pocket of her rouge skirt. Her bloody tongue spasmed and contracted when it met the powder. She suddenly broke the red string around her neck, and the seven copper coins on it shot out in different directions - exactly the seven-star array center set up during the day.
“Show yourself!”
Amid the muffled sound of copper coins embedded in the floor tiles, a giant toad meridian map appeared on the ground of the town hall. Zhou Zhubu's screams came from the wing room. When everyone rushed in, they saw that his chest was covered with golden toad patterns and he was holding half of the burnt "Black Mist Canyon Mineral Vein Map" in his hand.
As soon as the autopsy needle touched the golden toad pattern, the tip of the needle melted into red. Nangong Wan used magnet powder to copy the pattern, and under the lamp, he showed the lost "living ink" technique of "Lu Ban Book".
"The mechanical art of the Mohist school is mixed with the Yin-Yang school's curses." She suddenly cut her fingertips, and the blood dripped onto the lines and was absorbed. "These lines are growing with the essence of blood!"
Fu Shaoping interrogated the accountant of the Golden Toad Chamber of Commerce overnight. When the Qingfeng sword opened his collar, the monks present gasped - the accountant's heart was embedded with a bronze toad mechanism, and twelve golden needles connected to the meridians, pulsating slightly with his breathing.
"The Soul-Devouring Sect became extinct fifty years ago." The accountant laughed crazily, "The one who is about to wake up now is 'the one' in the Mo family's underground palace!" Before he finished speaking, the mechanical toad suddenly exploded, and the flying bronze fragments were all engraved with miniature "Kaogong Ji" pictures and texts.
At the entrance of the Black Mist Canyon, Nangong Wan's Taoist robe fluttered without wind. She threw the soul-chasing sand that had been mixed with blood crystals three days ago into the air, but the sand grains fell to the ground abnormally.
"Magnetic countercurrent." She suddenly untied the laces of her Taoist robe, revealing the star map embroidered on the lining. "The bottom of the canyon is a reverse yin-yang pattern!"
Fu Shaoping's heavy sword suddenly made a buzzing sound. Densely packed mechanical insects emerged from the cracks in the rocks, and each insect's abdomen was embedded with blood crystals as big as rice grains. When the sword wind swept through the insect swarm, the splashing juice actually formed four bloody words in the air:
[Opening the coffin at midnight]
In the sudden tremor, seven vertical cracks appeared on the cliffs on both sides of the canyon - this was not a natural canyon at all, but the traces left by the opening and closing of a giant mechanism!
-
When the moonlight at midnight was swallowed by the canyon, Nangong Wan was using the gold thread of her rouge skirt to wrap around seven copper coins. When the cracks opened to a width of ten feet, she suddenly threw the copper coin chain into the abyss: "Beidou Falling Formation, open!"
The falling copper coins made a clear dragon roar, illuminating the densely packed hanging coffins on the top of the underground palace. Bronze chains extended from each coffin, interweaving into a neural network covering the dome. The moment Fu Shaoping cut the chains with his sword, the entire underground palace was filled with the sound of a baby crying.
"That's the mark of the Mohist School of Non-Attack!" Nangong Wan caught the broken bronze fragments, the three-legged black pattern on it was melting. She suddenly tore off the front of her Taoist robe and wrapped it around the fragments. The three-dimensional structure of the underground palace emerged where the "Xuan Ji Formation Diagram" and the pattern on the cloth overlapped.
After passing through the arrow rain mechanism, the two found that the central altar was filled with blood-colored crystal clusters. Each crystal contained the soul of a monk, and at the top was the accountant who exploded and died in the daytime.
"This is not the Soul Devouring Sect." Nangong Wan's armor scratched the surface of the crystal. "They are using the 'Spirit Turtle Technique' from the 'Mozi·Preparing Acupoints' to resurrect."
The altar suddenly sank three inches, revealing a bronze disk with a diameter of ten feet. Three hundred and sixty toads of different shapes were engraved on the disk, and each toad's eyes were movable buttons. Fu Shaoping inserted his heavy sword into the center of the disk, and the lightning pattern on the sword spread along the engraving, illuminating the small seal script on the edge:
When Nangong Wan pressed the 72nd toad eye, a crystal coffin rose in the center of the disc. The old man in the coffin placed his hands on the bronze toad, with a half-broken order stuck in his chest.
"The third generation of Qi Mo, the Qin Huali!" She suddenly sprinkled magnet powder on the coffin, and countless golden nematodes emerged from the old man's beard, "Oh no! This is the 'corpse Gu'!"
The entire underground palace shook violently, and the chains of the hanging coffins were all stretched straight. The peeling murals on the dome showed that when the Mohist School split, the Qi Mo lineage turned living people into "Golden Toad Taoist Soldiers" in order to fight against Qin Mo's mechanical techniques. And deep in the canyon vein, a dull sound of mechanical mechanisms biting came.
When they rushed out of the underground palace, the mountains on both sides of the canyon were deforming. Countless bronze components stretched out from the rock wall, forming a giant toad that was hundreds of feet tall. Its eyes were inlaid with the blood crystal that Nangong Wan had been looking for, and it was absorbing the moonlight and emitting corrosive light beams.
"Use the Xuanji formation diagram to infer the weakness!" Fu Shaoping swung his sword to split the light column, and the lightning pattern exploded countless sparks on the toad's body. Nangong Wan tore open the entire Taoist robe, and used blood as ink to draw on the lining star map. Suddenly, his pupils shrank:
"It's not a mechanical beast. It's a living furnace filled with the souls of three hundred monks!"
When the giant toad opened its mouth to swallow, Nangong Wan suddenly untied her hairband. Her rouge-red skirt spread out like a flag under the impetus of her true essence, and the golden thread of the skirt "Dragon Binding Rope" wrapped around the toad's upper jaw. She pulled out a silver hairpin from her hair and stabbed it into her collarbone - blood splashed on the magnet at the end of the hairpin, instantly causing all the blood crystals to resonate and tremble.
"Now!" She threw the silver hairpin at Fu Shaoping. The heavy sword wrapped with magnet pierced the toad's left eye, and continuous explosions came from inside. In the falling bronze rain, three hundred soul streams rushed towards the Big Dipper. As soon as a trace of fish belly white appeared on the blue-gray sky, Fu Shaoping had already woken up.
He opened his eyes and saw a few wisps of morning mist climbing up the window frame, drifting into the room like a veil. The heavy sword "Zhenyue" beside the bed leaned against the corner of the wall. The bloodstains on the scabbard had long faded, leaving only a few dark lines, like marks left unintentionally by time.
The person next to me is still sleeping.
Nangong Wan was lying on her side, her long black hair spread out on the white pillow, a strand of hair hung down to her lips, rising and falling gently with her breathing. Fu Shaoping reached out and gently pushed the strand of hair aside, his fingertips touching the corner of her lips, slightly cool and soft.
He did not wake her up, but got up quietly, put on his coat, and pushed the door open to go out.
-
Outside the courtyard, morning dew condensed on the bluestone slabs, gleaming wetly.
Fu Shaoping bent down, picked up the wooden bucket from the firewood pile, and went to the stream to fetch water. The stream water was clear, reflecting the morning light. He scooped up a handful of water to wash his face. The cold water rolled down his chin and dripped onto his clothes, spreading a dark color.
There were a few bird calls in the distance, clear and distant, as if they were floating from the other side of the mountain.
The fire in the stove was burning brightly and the firewood was crackling.
Nangong Wan rolled up his sleeves and stood in front of the stove, holding a spoon in one hand and gently stirring the porridge in the pot. White mist rose up, carrying the fragrance of rice and the sweetness of wild vegetables, and filled the kitchen with a warm atmosphere.
Fu Shaoping sat on a low stool, adding firewood, the flickering light of the fire reflected on his face.
"How did you sleep last night?" Nangong Wan asked without turning his head, his voice lazy, as if he had not fully woken up yet.
"Not bad." Fu Shaoping smiled, "How about you?"
"I dreamed about some old things." She paused and tapped the spoon lightly on the edge of the pot. "The Golden Toad Chamber of Commerce, the underground palace, and those hanging coffins... When I woke up, I felt like I was in another world."
He was silent for a moment before he said, "It's all over."
Nangong Wan turned his head to look at him, and raised the corners of his lips slightly: "Yes, it's over."
-
The porridge is cooked and served steaming hot in a bowl.
The two sat opposite each other, with the morning light outside the window and white mist rising inside the house.
The afternoon market was bustling and lively.
Nangong Wan was carrying a bamboo basket, walking slowly, stopping from time to time to pick the fruits and vegetables on the stall. Fu Shaoping followed behind her, holding the rice and flour he had just bought, but his eyes were fixed on the candy and cake stall in the distance.
"Want to eat?" Nangong Wan noticed his gaze and asked with raised eyebrows.
"...kind of."
She laughed, took out a few copper coins from her sleeve and put them into his hand.
"Go ahead, don't be greedy."
-
When Fu Shaoping came back with the sugar cake, Nangong Wan was standing in front of the cloth shop, his fingertips stroking a piece of plain white brocade.
"What do you want to do?" he asked.
"Make a new robe." She whispered, "The old one... is too worn out."
He glanced at her, said nothing, and just handed the cake over.
Nangong Wan took it, took a bite, and the sweetness melted on the tip of her tongue. She squinted her eyes, as if she was very satisfied.
In the evening, they sat under the old locust tree in the yard.
Nangong Wan held a cup of tea in his hand, an old book on his knees, and occasionally turned a page with his fingertips. Fu Shaoping leaned against a tree trunk, whittling a piece of wood in his hand, sawdust fell down, and gradually revealed a small sword shape.
In the distance, the sounds of children playing could be heard and the smell of cooking smoke wafted through the alley.
"Fu Shaoping." Nangong Wan suddenly spoke.
"Ok?"
"How long do you think we can go on like this?" Her eyes were still on the pages of the book, and her tone was light, as if she was asking casually.
The hand that was cutting the wood paused for a moment.
"...for a lifetime," he said.
Nangong Wan raised her eyes, looked at him and smiled.
"it is good."
-
The sun sets, and the afterglow dyes half the sky red.
The wind blew through the locust tree, and the leaves rustled, like a whisper, or a sigh. (End of this chapter)