The pill in his throat was extremely spicy, but it dissolved very quickly. Yin Ci bent his body and coughed loudly. The spicy energy jumped up and down in his throat, and a heat exploded throughout his body. A thin layer of sweat instantly broke out behind him.
"Alive, alive." Shi Jingzhi said with lingering fear, "Aci, you almost scared me to death. I thought you couldn't stand the hypothermia. Come, eat two more!"
Yin Ci pushed Shi Jingzhi's paw away and said faintly, "Thank you, Master. One is enough."
Seeing that he was in a talkative mood, Shi Jingzhi turned his attention back to the paper figures - the three servants transformed into paper figures actually fit in perfectly with their surroundings, just like new servants in a brothel.
The black-blooded woman took out a long needle and poked and stirred the paper man. When she pulled it out, the silver needle was bright green and had a lot of willow-like silk balls stuck to it.
After a while, she sighed, "This creature is called the Firefly Spider. Its eggs are like cotton wool and will fall apart when exposed to heat. The eggs hatch inside a living creature, eat all the flesh and bones, and then use their webs to form the shell of a living creature to lure other prey to touch it... This is an extremely rare monster, but Yan Budu actually used it to make a 'paper man'."
After these words, even the dullest person would understand - these paper figures of men and women who were talking and laughing around were not made by the skilled hands of famous craftsmen, but were originally made from living people.
"Mother-in-law, is there any way to deal with this paper man?" The head of the Changle Sect wiped his sweat.
"Don't touch it, don't drop it, just use something to push it away." Wuxue Po waved her cane again. "Go away, hurry up and clean up your room. It's getting dark, everyone stay in your room."
When he heard that it was getting dark, the head of the Ma Gan sect turned pale and said, "Mother-in-law, this..."
Wuxue Po ignored him and turned away.
"I am not here to be a servant of the Chigou Sect." A believer sneered, "Who knows what will come out of the tomb at night. If you are really afraid, you might as well ask for help from the famous and upright sects over there. They are born to suffer losses."
The Taiheng sect, who loved to suffer losses, reserved the tea-making hall. They moved the paper figurines to the corners, blocked them with screens, and slept on the floor with thirty people. The Chigou sect took the best room, sprinkled medicine powder all over the outside of the room, placed a bunch of strange things in it, and then closed the door and refused to see anyone.
The rest of the people could only choose the nearest room. Shi Jingzhi was quick and grabbed the one closest to Taiheng Sect.
"Aren't we sleeping on the floor with the Taiheng Sect?" Yin Ci asked curiously.
"The big window outside faces the yard, and the yard is full of those... cough." Shi Jingzhi pushed the door with a pale face, "Look, the Chigou Sect has entered the house. It's definitely better to have a door than not."
The door creaked open, and the firelight in the room was dim, and the sweet fragrance of powder became stronger. In the colorful gauze curtain, two paper figures with disheveled hair and naked bodies overlapped.
Shi Jingzhi was so horrified by this hellish scene that his hair stood on end. He slowly stepped back and closed the door.
"Yan Budu is mentally ill." He gritted his teeth and said, "Come on, Ah Ci, let's sleep on the floor."
Yin Ci looked at him with amusement, snatched the flag, and pushed the door open again. He used the flagpole to carry the paper man under the bed, spread out the bed sheet, and laid out the mandarin ducks playing in the water quilt.
Finally, he pulled out the face of a good disciple in the Twenty-Four Filial Piety Stories: "Master, please."
Two paper figures were huddled under the bed, with a snow-white paper arm sticking out from under the bed. Shi Jingzhi almost shook his head and said, "I still don't want to."
Yin Ci threw the flagpole back, with a pure face: "Master, you can kill people, so why are you afraid of corpses?"
"Listen carefully, blood and evil spirits are two different things. As a master, I am not afraid of blood, but of evil spirits." Shi Jingzhi pinched the flagpole with two fingers, with a painful look on his face, as if saying "I don't want this flag anymore."
Yin Ci managed to hold back his laughter, tucked his arm back under the bed, and lay down on it first: "Don't be afraid, I'll suppress the negative energy first."
I have been a living dead for three hundred years. Even if there really is an evil ghost in this tomb, I have to call him senior.
Poor Shi Jingzhi knew nothing about this. Seeing his apprentice so enthusiastic, he had to force himself to stay calm and climb onto the bed with his hands and feet together. With the gauze curtain separating them, he looked vaguely as if he was in Qizhou and everything was just a nightmare.
However, the annoying silence constantly reminded him that he was still immersed in this nightmare.
Shi Jingzhi wanted to cover his head with the quilt, but he was afraid of losing face in front of his apprentice, so he had to straighten his body, looking more dead than a real dead person.
"Aci..."
Yin Ci interrupted him: "This is not a solution. How about Master go to sleep first, and I will guard the first half of the night. We can switch in the second half."
"We are thinking the same thing." Shi Jingzhi pulled the quilt and added firmly, "If there is any movement, wake me up immediately."
Having said that, Shi Jingzhi did not fall asleep immediately. He gradually relaxed his limbs and suddenly laughed softly.
Yin Ci was shocked - could it be that he stimulated Shi Jingzhi too much and frightened him crazy
"It's great to have an apprentice." Shi Jingzhi's voice was filled with boredom. "It is said that a teacher is a father for life, and the ancients were right. We have only known each other for a few days, and you even followed me to a place like this."
Yin Ci was a little unsure whether he was touched by his son's filial piety or by his apprentice's stupidity.
I should say something, but it's a bit too late to talk about broadening my horizons now. If you are a normal person, no one wants to have such a perverted perspective.
So he spoke from the heart: "I told you, I have nowhere to go."
"I was like that originally." Shi Jingzhi said in a muffled voice, "But it's different now... Now there is the Kushan Sect..."
The second half of his sentence was unclear. When Yin Ci looked again, Shi Jingzhi was already asleep. Yin Ci reached out and ran his fingertips across the man's Nuo mask. The Nuo mask was crudely made, with some wood thorns left on the edges.
The face is taken off for a human being, the face covered for a god. [*Note]
Perhaps the facial features of the Nuo mask were too distorted, and it contained too many stories about gods and ghosts, which led him to have some illusions - the level of despair in the first half of Shi Jingzhi's sentence was comparable to his own.
Forget it, it's so mysterious, it only gives rise to distracting thoughts. Yin Ci took out Shi Jingzhi's white handkerchief and covered the Nuo mask with it in a very wicked way.
Before he adjusted his handkerchief, he heard footsteps outside.
The rustling sound was light and even, coming from far away and approaching, and sounded like straw sandals stepping on the ground. However, among the more than a hundred people in this group, no one was wearing straw sandals.
Yin Ci was shocked and shook Shi Jingzhi: "Master, the movement you ordered has arrived."
Shi Jingzhi stiffened when he heard that, the quilt covered his head, and he slowly curled up. Yin Ci lifted the quilt mercilessly and tried to act nervous: "Listen, is that the sound of footsteps outside?"
Shi Jingzhi, who was very sharp-eyed and sharp-eared, said: "Indeed, indeed."
The master and the disciple held their breath and listened carefully. The sound of straw sandals paused for a moment at their door, then continued forward.
"Maybe someone from the Taiheng Sect got up to relieve himself." Shi Jingzhi whispered.
Yin Ci: "Going to the toilet specifically? In this damn place?"
Shi Jingzhi: “…” That’s right, according to Yan Budu’s madness, there is definitely a paper doll in the toilet.
The two were talking halfway when the rustling sound of straw sandals was heard again. They actually walked back and stopped at the door of the two people. I don't know if it was an illusion, but the paper man under the bed seemed to move a few times. This was good. Shi Jingzhi pulled Yin Ci up and shrunk to the corner of the bed.
The two of them were wrapped in silk quilts, looking like a newlywed couple who had been attacked by bandits on their wedding night.
Yin Ci struggled to pull open the quilt: "I'll go take a look. We mountain people kill a lot of people, and the evil spirit is heavy. Maybe I can suppress it."
Yin Ci didn't believe in ghosts. He had traveled all over the country for hundreds of years. He had never seen a fierce ghost, but he had seen many people pretending to be ghosts. Now that he saw something new in the tomb, he became curious for the first time in a long time.
As a result, just as he stood up, the sound of straw sandals faded away. The person wearing sandals seemed to be wandering back and forth in the corridor, stopping from time to time. Strangely, whether it was the surrounding small sects or the Taiheng Sect sleeping in the hall, it seemed that not many people noticed this strange phenomenon.
Yin Ci opened the door, and the wooden door creaked sharply. He looked to the left first and found three more people at the end of the corridor.
Shi Zhongyu was in the front alone, with her sword unsheathed. Jin Lan and the blind Yan Qing followed behind her, all three of them looking pale. Before Yin Ci could speak, Shi Zhongyu spoke first: "Can you hear it too?"
Yin Ci: "Master heard the clear sound of footsteps, but I could only hear a little bit."
When Shi Jingzhi saw Yin Ci talking to the creature who was not sure whether it was a human or a ghost, he finally plucked up the courage and came forward.
Shi Zhongyu nodded to Shi Jingzhi and pointed with his finger: "Can you see it?"
Only then did Yin Ci follow her hand and look to the right.
A monk was standing at the end of the corridor, holding a crudely made tree bark lamp. He was more than eight feet tall, wearing straw-soled monk shoes and a tattered monk's robe. His face had no facial features, as if a boiled egg was on his shoulder.
The monk stopped moving and turned his blank face towards them, as if observing them.
Shi Jingzhi's confusion overcame his fear: "… Why are there monks in a brothel? This is not good."
Three people from Taiheng Sect: "..."
Yin Ci was in awe of his master's ability to grasp the key points.
Fortunately, there was someone at the scene who was more frightened than Shi Jingzhi. Jin Lan trembled for a while and explained with difficulty: "Yan Qing's ears are better than ordinary people. He said he heard a strange sound. I couldn't hear anything, so I went to find the senior sister... and it turned out that the senior sister could hear it too."
After saying that, he pointed to the other side of the corridor with a trembling voice: "Master Sister and Master Shi both said there are monks there, I-I-I can't see anything-"
Yin Ci lied, "I could only see a shadow... Judging from everyone's reactions, most people probably couldn't see it."
Shi Jingzhi glanced at his disciple and sighed. He took two steps forward with the flag in his hand and saluted the faceless monk: "Master, the sea of Buddha is boundless, it is better to turn back."
Yin Ci stood in awe again - what the hell are you talking about? If he was a real monk, it would be a sign of good manners if he didn't beat people.
The faceless monk didn't understand or heard anything, so he didn't make any extreme moves. He just took two steps forward and it took two steps back, always maintaining a fixed distance.
Shi Jingzhi saw that this thing was walking strangely, his scalp tingled, and he took two steps back. Unexpectedly, the faceless monk moved again and followed him forward two steps.
Shi Jingzhi: “…”
He jumped back and forth, left and right on the spot. The monk did not hesitate at all, as if he was a mirror, copying Shi Jingzhi's movements perfectly. The distance between them remained the same throughout.
The rest of the people watched the two people fighting, and the terrifying atmosphere was almost gone. Shi Zhongyu coughed lightly and said, "Master Shi, stop for a moment, stop for a moment."
Shi Jingzhi then stopped and spat out a large mouthful of blood, not sure if it was from exhaustion or fear. Blind Yan Qing was confused, and Yin Ci was trying very hard to hold back his laughter, almost breaking his act.
Only Jin Lan trembled and said, "Big Sister, it turns out that he is not possessed?"
Shi Zhongyu shook his head, pulled up his sleeves, revealing a white bracelet.
"This is one of the treasures of my sect. If there is an evil creature within three feet, the blood bone bead will immediately turn from white to red. Right now, it has no reaction. The one in front of it is neither a ghost nor a monster."
Yin Ci deliberately guided: "Hey, it's not a ghost or a monster, so it must be an illusion?"
Shi Zhongyu affirmed: "Yes, this is a spell set by humans. Master Shi was the first one to talk to it, so it is very likely that he was locked onto it."
Shi Jingzhi heaved a sigh of relief: "It's good that it's not a ghost, just an illusion—"
Shi Zhongyu: "... But this spell is complicated, I can't see through it. If it is a curse, it may still be life-threatening. Master Shi must be careful."
Shi Jingzhi silently took a breath back.
"Yan Budu wouldn't be so kind as to create a spell to relieve boredom." Yan Qing, who had been silent for a long time, suddenly spoke up. "Could this be a bait, designed to lure the prey away?"
Yin Ci deliberately took over the conversation: "If that's the case, wouldn't it be better to change to a more ordinary image? A monk visiting a brothel looks suspicious."
Shi Jingzhi hummed and gradually calmed down: "Let's go and take a look."
It was rare to see this man being serious, Yin Ci raised his eyebrows.
"There may be some mystery behind this. Yan Budu is extremely picky and hates monks the most. He restored the brothel to this state. If he really wants to kill people, he should have sent a beauty."
He even smiled.
"We've been targeted anyway, so it's boring to passively wait for death. Ah Ci, go wake up the people in Yueshui Pavilion, and we'll leave now."
After saying that, Shi Jingzhi put a hand on his apprentice's shoulder, and his lips almost touched Yin Ci's ear—
"If I were Yan Budu, I would deliberately expose some treasures. Two peaches kill three warriors, isn't that a pleasure?... If that's the case, given Yan Budu's malicious intent, it's not surprising that he uses a monk to lead the way."
"When everyone is fighting to death, they will definitely think - how good it would be if they had never seen that hateful monk."