“When the hell did I become your nephew?! Huh?! I’m two years older than you, you little brat! You think you can just take advantage of me like that? Aren’t you afraid of shortening your lifespan?!”
Zhuge Buhuo had been happily gaming in his room when someone came to tell him his little uncle was at the main house looking for him. He sprang up from the bed in confusion.
Where the hell did he get a little uncle?
With a head full of question marks, he went out and saw Fu Sang’s face through the half-open ebony door.
The dark circles under his eyes almost reached his chin, his face was pale, and his lips were bloodless.
In summary, he looked even more like a dead person than last time.
“Why not?”
Fu Sang glanced at him indifferently.
Zhuge Buhuo almost laughed in anger: “Alright then, show me how exactly I’m your nephew.”
“Your master is Zhuge Cangmang.”
“Yeah.”
“Zhuge Cangmang’s master is Zhuge Heng.”
“Yeah.”
“Zhuge Heng’s junior apprentice brother is Zhuge Lin.”
“Yeah.”
“Guess who’s the only disciple Zhuge Lin ever took in his entire life?”
“You.”
“Yeah.” Fu Sang mimicked his tone.
Zhuge Buhuo thought for a moment:
“So what?!”
“Then what should you call me?” Fu Sang looked at him, with a hint of encouragement in his gaze.
“Obviously…”
Zhuge Buhuo almost got caught up in his logic…the answer was on the tip of his tongue. But fortunately, he reacted at the last moment and stopped in time.
“No, does this have anything to do with whose disciple you were before? Are you still one now?!”
“Once a master-uncle, always an uncle.”
Fu Sang took advantage of this situation with a clear conscience, his tone carrying the lecturing air of an elder:
“No matter how high a position you reach in the future, the order of seniority must not be disturbed. One must never forget their roots.”
“Get lost, get lost…!”
Zhuge Buhuo really couldn’t be bothered to listen to him ramble on, he’d probably get pulled into his logic again before long:
“What exactly do you want? Spit it out! You didn’t come all the way here just to take advantage of me, did you?”
“It’s still about the same thing as last time.”
Fu Sang got back to the point as he wished, then stated his request:
“I need to get into Jingguan Pavilion.”
“?” Zhuge Buhuo’s eyes widened again:
“Non-direct-line disciples can’t enter Jingguan Pavilion. Are you talking in your sleep?”
“If I could get in myself, why would I come to you?”
Fu Sang pulled up his mask and coughed twice, his voice a bit muffled:
“Figure out a way to get me in.”
His tone was so self-righteous that anyone listening might think Zhuge Buhuo owed him half a life.
Zhuge Buhuo was almost laughing in disbelief.
Jingguan Pavilion, in plain terms, was the Zhuge family’s main library. Since it housed ancient texts and spell methods that weren’t shared with outsiders, only direct-line family members were qualified to enter. Anyone from the inner or outer branches had no such privilege, unless they had made a great contribution and received a limited-time access pass as a reward. Other than that, forget it.
“You say you want in and I’m supposed to figure out a way? On what grounds? You’ve got some nerve, I almost forgot….Yesterday you had me look up that forbidden blood-sacrifice soul-resurrection technique, saying it was related to the Hei Mountain Pass incident, and I did it for you, didn’t I? So where’s the information you promised to give me in return? You brushed me off with a single ‘I forgot’, treating me like I’m a fool. You know the principle of ‘borrow and return, borrowing again is easy,’ right? You just led me on with that last thing, and now you’re already making another demand? Who do you think you are?!”
“Your master-uncle.”
Fu Sang calmly shut him down, then held up one finger toward him:
“Let me into Jingguan Pavilion for one hour, and I’ll give you one zhuan in return.”
“One…”
Zhuge Buhuo was about to retort, but he only got out one word before he froze, as if only then realizing what Fu Sang had just said.
He looked at Fu Sang suspiciously.
“Where would you even get a zhuan to give me?”
The Zhuge family had grown enormously over time. Almost every renowned nether-path spirit master outside could trace their roots back to the Zhuge family. In a way, they basically had a monopoly on the nether-path profession.
With so many disciples, for easier management, the clan was divided into the direct/main line, the inner branch, and the outer branch.
The direct line all bore the Zhuge surname. The inner branch, in xianxia novel terms,were equivalent to non-surname inner disciples. The outer branch consisted of people like Fu Sang: those who knew a bit more than Muggles and had a bit more ability, but weren’t qualified to truly enter the spirit master profession. To draw the analogy further, outer disciples were small fry who only learned the surface-level stuff.
Of course, to encourage new blood, there was a promotion system from outer branch to inner branch to direct line, and within the direct line from lower to higher ranks. What Fu Sang called “one zhuan” was a merit point system the Zhuge family used internally.
This was borrowed from the Tang dynasty’s twelve zhuan, but within the family, “zhuan” wasn’t a title, but a merit.
Merit was generally obtained by completing tasks of varying sizes issued internally, with points recorded based on the task. Within the direct line, seventeen points counted as one zhuan, and seventeen zhuan counted as one promotion. By that measure, one zhuan was already quite generous compensation.
But Fu Sang couldn’t even see underworld spirits, where would he get a zhuan?
He was probably making it up again.
This person had zero credibility left with Zhuge Buhuo.
“A serial blood case, involving underworld spirits, with a unique method, at least five lives lost…very worth documenting. I’ve already figured out the whole story, from the details to the killer’s name, age, gender, occupation, and motive, everything you could want. Tell me, isn’t that worth one zhuan?”
Fu Sang raised an eyebrow slightly:
“I can exchange this case for access to Jingguan Pavilion, but there’s one condition: you can’t mention me when you report the case.”
As he spoke, Fu Sang had once again become the aloof negotiator, as if this zhuan was something Zhuge Buhuo was begging him for.
But Zhuge Buhuo didn’t have time to dwell on that right now.
“Why?” Seeing that Fu Sang was speaking with such conviction, as if it were real, Zhuge Buhuo was almost ready to believe him…but unfortunately, he was naturally suspicious:
“You’re that noble of character? Doing a good deed and not wanting credit? If this case is really that big and you reported it yourself, you could get into the inner branch, why would you give it away to me for nothing?”
“Do you think everyone takes pride in having your family’s name attached to them? I’m not interested, and I don’t want the connection.”
Fu Sang’s tone was cold:
“I’m not joking with you. No matter what else you might learn about this case, anything involving me has to stay buried in your stomach. I need you to swear a blood oath on this, if you break it, whether by directly saying my name, hinting at my existence to others, or leading anyone to harm me, you will immediately have your intestines rot and your spirit suffer unrest after death until your soul dissipates entirely.”
“??? Isn’t that a bit too vicious???” Zhuge Buhuo felt that a normal investigation shouldn’t require such secrecy, so he boldly guessed:
“Damn it, you’re not the killer, are you? What, you do the killing and I clean up after, and I have to swear not to report you? You’re leading me on again?!”
“It’s not me.”
“Then why are you being so dramatic?”
“Stop wasting words. Are you in or out?”
This deal was practically free profit for Zhuge Buhuo. After all, letting Fu Sang into Jingguan Pavilion only required a casual swipe of his ID card and a few small lies, and in return, he’d get an entire zhuan that would normally take him at least a year to accumulate. It was a big windfall, right?
So, even though he wanted to scrutinize every single hair on Fu Sang’s head, he ultimately chose to take the gamble.
The deal was struck, and Zhuge Buhuo swore the blood oath as Fu Sang requested. Fu Sang then swiped Zhuge Buhuo’s ID card to enter Jingguan Pavilion.
Jingguan Pavilion was a freestanding three-story cylindrical building. Fu Sang had visited this place often as a child and knew exactly which floor held what, so his goal was clear from the start. He went straight to the top floor after entering.
On the top floor of Jingguan Pavilion was a locked solid wood cabinet with a copper lock that looked quite old.
He didn’t have the key, nor could he possibly get one, so Fu Sang simply pulled a bobby pin from his pocket, straightened it, poked it into the lock, and twisted it a couple of times.
With a click, the lock opened.
He pulled open the cabinet doors, and the air that rushed out carried dust.
Fu Sang waved away the dust and searched through the rows of ancient texts in the cabinet for what he needed.
This cabinet was filled with old forbidden techniques passed down through the generations. Fu Sang flipped through one book after another but found no records related to blood-sacrificing dead souls.
Getting annoyed, he simply called Zhuge Buhuo.
Zhuge Buhuo was downstairs keeping watch. He picked up and immediately said, “What happened, what’s wrong?”
Fu Sang couldn’t be bothered with small talk and asked directly:
“Which book did you find that blood-sacrifice soul-resurrection method in?”
“I didn’t. I did look through a lot of books, but it wasn’t in any of them. Yesterday, the family head happened to be at the main house. I happened to run into him, asked casually, and he told me.”
“Besides that spell, did he mention anything else?”
“Anything else? Like what?”
“Like, who developed this forbidden blood-sacrifice soul-resurrection technique.”
“Oh, he did mention that, actually… wait, let me think…”
Zhuge Buhuo thought for a moment, and his memory finally came back:
“Oh! It was that ancestor, the one called Qiyueban.”
Once he had his answer, Fu Sang hung up immediately.
He stood up and went straight for the top shelf of the bookcase, pulling out a very old, thick book from the very back.
The book had a cowhide cover, its pages tattered and yellowed. The first page had five characters written in cinnabar: Secret History of Qiyueban.
Fu Sang still remembered that in Su Li’s memory, the two young disciples had complained that Qiyueban had a very strange temper.
That was indeed true. This ancestor had a poor reputation; the book described him as vengeful, stubborn, and moody, but exceptionally gifted. This was because the few positive remarks about him basically all praised him as the greatest figure in the nether-path in the millions of years since the founding patriarch.
That wasn’t an exaggeration.
If the founding patriarch was the founder of the three spirit-master paths, then Qiyueban was the guide. He explored many new possibilities within the foundational framework the patriarch had established for the nether-path, laying a solid foundation for later generations, which allowed the nether-path to become the foremost of the three spirit-master paths.
It could be said that most of the talismans, formations, and magical artifact crafting methods in circulation today originated with him. However, the vast majority were versions improved by later generations. This was because Qiyueban was extremely vicious, and his spells were extremely ruthless. For example, the Seven Watch Blood Crying Prison and the Ten-thousand-deaths-without-reincarnation Talisman used at Hei Mountain Pass to suppress Qi Changying, as well as that forbidden blood-sacrifice soul-resurrection technique Wei Luyuan had used.
So although Qiyueban created many spells, very few survived in their original form; most had to be modified again and again. Those that couldn’t be changed were classified as forbidden techniques and prohibited from use, because every single one of them was fierce, bloody, and The price to be paid was too cruel and heavy.
As for the “blood-sacrifice soul-resurrection” Zhuge Buhuo mentioned, in Qiyueban’s secret history, its formal name was “Sacrifice.”
A living person sacrifices their own flesh, blood, and lifespan to summon a ghost, binding their life, death, and pain together from then on. But the prerequisite was that an extremely pure bond must exist between the person and the ghost, and the one making the sacrifice had to do so willingly.
It seemed like a rather useless spell, requiring a lot of effort for little reward, with the losses far outweighing the gains.
The one who created it was a madman, and the one who used it was also a madman.
Thinking of this, Fu Sang unconsciously raised his hand and pressed it over his left shoulder through his coat.
He hadn’t properly treated the wound on his shoulder, and that penetrating injury was still hurting.
This pain reminded him every second that there seemed to be some kind of symbiotic bond between him and Qi Changying
…one nail could wound two people. And no matter which of them was hurt, the other would receive the same wound and pain.
But Fu Sang was certain that he had never lost his memory in his twenty-four years of life, nor had he ever been brainless enough to sacrifice himself to any ghost.
If that was the case, then what was going on between him and Qi Changying?
Fu Sang frowned but didn’t expect to find an answer here and now.
He quickly flipped through the thick ancient book in his hands, trying to find records about the strange seal and bone coin at the bottom of that nameless lake.
But after going through the entire book, he didn’t find anything similar.
So Fu Sang closed the book and put it back in its place.
But as his hand reached deep into the top shelf, his knuckles accidentally bumped against the back panel of the bookcase.
This would normally be completely unremarkable, but the sound of his knuckles hitting the back panel made Fu Sang pause.
Coming back to his senses, he immediately moved all the books on the top shelf aside and reached for the back panel, running his fingertip carefully along its edges.
Sure enough, he felt a small notch at the bottom edge of the back panel.
He pressed his finger against the notch and pushed.
With a click, the back panel lifted up, revealing a dust-filled compartment behind it.
The compartment wasn’t large, with only one book placed flat against its side.
Strictly speaking, it wasn’t really a book…it looked more like a journal, with scattered, disconnected records of feng shui arrangements and fate calculations, written in such scrawled handwriting that it was hard to read or understand, and not particularly interesting.
But flipping to the latter half, the handwriting suddenly became more dense, and two full pages were devoted to a hand-drawn diagram of a massive formation.
Fu Sang recognized it almost immediately. The diagram depicted the Seven Watch Blood Crying Prison that he had seen in the mysterious cave.
He frowned and continued flipping through the pages.
The journal had numerous pages of scribbles and diagrams about the Seven Watch Blood Crying Prison; the formation diagram he had just seen was only a small part.
Unfortunately, so much time had passed that some of the writing had faded, making it impossible to clearly read what was written. But even the parts that were legible were enough to make Fu Sang’s expression grow increasingly grave.
According to the journal’s contents, the Seven Watch Blood Crying Prison required more than just the main formation itself.
Beyond the main sealing formation used to suppress the soul, seven additional seals were needed as supplements, each suppressing a separate part of the corpse in seven different directions, for the formation to be complete.
Soul, blood, head, torso, limbs…the flesh and soul are refined into magical artifacts, branded with seals and curses, then scattered in different places and left without a single chance of survival. This is to ensure that after a thousand years, the Crimson Evil’s spirit and soul would both be destroyed, with no possibility of ever rising again.
