Day and night tour

Chapter 377 Watcher

The image of "Bifang" was in the painting. After Zhou Xuan remembered all the details in the painting very clearly, he lit eight candles.

Candlelight implies the offering of incense.

According to the rules of the Jing Kingdom's martial arts world, two sticks are used to worship the portraits of the ancestors of the temple, four sticks are used to worship the most prestigious person in the temple, and only eight sticks are used to worship the deities that the temple is linked to.

The candlelight was positioned in eight directions. Zhou Xuan placed the portrait in one of them, then gently waved his hand, causing the candlelight to fall and ignite the portrait.

The blue flames flickered, and in just a few moments, the portrait was burned to ashes.

“Bifang, I will impersonate you and, through the entanglement of cause and effect, ask you to descend to the human world.”

After leaving the house, Zhou Xuan first used his spirit to travel to the storytelling venue. After checking that there were no problems with the venue, he asked the painter for a domino and went to Little Turtle Mountain.

……

Huifeng Medical College, Xiaoguishan.

Inside the Guishan Taoist Temple, there was no one, but on the ground, there would always be some deer antlers that had been drained of their vital energy.

These deer antlers have lost their pinkish color and are dry, like a piece of burnt mud.

"Old Turtle, come out."

"Mr. Big."

Guishan Daoist emerged from the wall where he was hiding and greeted Zhou Xuan.

Having consumed several deer antlers, the Taoist priest of Guishan was now much stronger, and his overall energy was incomparable to when he first met Zhou Xuan.

"You look good."

"The main thing is that the mountain delicacies from the master are truly nourishing."

"I need your help with something." Zhou Xuan stretched out his hand, and a ginseng from the Western Regions slid out from his sleeve.

The ginseng resembled a palm, seemingly alive, trembling slightly, emanating a rich Buddhist aura that made the Taoist priest of Guishan extremely envious.

"This... I have done nothing to deserve this reward!" The Taoist priest of Guishan declined verbally, but his body was extremely obedient, and his eyes could not be taken off the palm ginseng.

"Once the matter is settled, this ginseng is yours."

Zhou Xuan said.

"What a big deal! The reward is so high!" The Taoist priest from Guishan was greedy for the ginseng, but he didn't want to take on the hard and dangerous work.

Zhou Xuan asked, "How many sticks of incense do you have?"

"Four sticks..." Seeing Zhou Xuan's disbelieving look, the Taoist priest from Guishan finally lowered his head and said, "Never mind, never mind, three sticks."

"..." Zhou Xuan.

What's the difference between three and four sticks of incense? Why are you even bragging about this?

Zhou Xuan said, "Your cultivation level is low. A single palm ginseng is enough for you to raise the price of an incense stick. I ask you, are you good at hearing things?"

“Master Ling, this is not bragging. Don’t look down on my low donations. It’s because my cultivation talent is not good enough. In addition, there are some problems with the temple’s incense offerings. In the words of you mortal merchants, the cash flow has broken down.”

The Taoist priest from Guishan patted his chest and said smugly, "However, I have been cultivating in this Taoist temple for a long time. This temple is very powerful. It is connected to this Little Guishan. As long as someone enters Little Guishan, I can sense him through the temple."

"So well-informed?"

“How dare I speak so arrogantly in front of you, Master? I sensed your presence the first time you entered the Taoist temple.”

"That's what the Taoist priest Guishan said."

Zhou Xuan nodded and said, "That's excellent."

Before he came to see the Taoist priest of Guishan, he already thought that he was a remnant soul in this land, a kind of local deity. Such people are not good at anything else, but they are very perceptive. Now, the Taoist priest of Guishan's perceptiveness has exceeded his expectations, which is an unexpected surprise.

"May I ask, sir, what do you need me to do?" The Taoist priest from Guishan rubbed his hands together, looking at the ginseng master with great anticipation.

He's just lazy and wants to lie down, but that doesn't mean he's truly without desires.

Zhou Xuan said, "It's simple, you just impersonate someone."

"Who?"

"The Way".

"..." The Taoist priest of Guishan immediately jumped into the wall where he was hiding: "See you later, Master."

Zhou Xuan grabbed him and asked, "Don't you want the ginseng anymore?"

"That would require a life. A Daoist? Those are celestial beings. How could a nobody like me impersonate one?"

"What are you afraid of?" Zhou Xuan thought this Taoist priest from Guishan was too cowardly—you're not a magician, impersonating someone else's identity will only bring you karma, what's there to be afraid of?

"Of course I'm afraid. What if the celestial beings find out that I'm impersonating a Daoist? They'll crush me..."

"I am here to lure them down to the mortal realm. If they come, that will suit my purposes perfectly."

“Your great master possesses supernatural powers, and your soul can travel around as easily as eating and drinking. I…” Guishan Taoist pointed at his nose and said, “I am only three incense sticks long. For someone to crush me is no different from crushing an ant… No, there is a difference. Crushing an ant is much harder than crushing me.”

"The Golden Bell in Mingjiang Prefecture is now under 24-hour surveillance. My divine eagles patrol the sky, and the tattoo artists from Pengjia Town inspect the medical school. I am the eye of the world, both above and below."

Zhou Xuan sat on the incense table and said solemnly, "If a Daoist descends to the mortal realm, he will not escape my sight. You need not fear retaliation."

"real……"

"Really! Even if a fly flies into Mingjiang Prefecture, it has to get my permission."

Zhou Xuan couldn't catch the invisible and formless Abyss Rat, but guarding against a Daoist was a piece of cake, and victory was assured.

"If there's no danger... this job sounds good... but I can't pull it off."

The Taoist priest from Guishan said, "I know the Taoists in the sky very well. They are all figures of eight incense sticks or more. I can change my appearance, but how can I change the incense? I can't release the aura of eight incense sticks."

"Who told you that a Taoist must burn eight incense sticks?"

Zhou Xuan countered with a question.

"Isn't that so?" The Taoist priest of Guishan felt that he had been wandering around Huifeng Medical College for many years and had become quite familiar with certain secrets.

"The Daoist is one who has neither incense nor fire."

Zhou Xuan explained to him, "Daoists descend to the mortal realm via sixteen divine threads, but there is no incense offering at the moment of their descent."

After they arrive, they will randomly select a stick of incense and then feed on living people to quickly raise the level of the incense, raising it to seven, eight, or nine sticks of incense in a short period of time.

"The superior scholar ascends to immortality in seven days, the middle scholar in thirty days, and the inferior scholar in three months. This refers to the speed at which Daoists of different talents ascend in rank."

Zhou Xuan's secrets were all obtained through the intuition of the Book of Documents during the cleansing of grievances. Not to mention the Taoist priest of Guishan, even painters, musicians, and figures like Li Chengfeng did not know these tricks.

"Understood. It doesn't matter if my incense offerings are low, as long as I can prove that my incense offerings are rising extremely quickly, I can then project the aura of a 'Taoist'."

"You old rascal, you do have some understanding."

Zhou Xuan said, "What I want you to do is very simple. As long as you sense that a ghost is coming up the mountain, you secretly take the ginseng and the incense will rise, making the ghost think that you are a Taoist. That will be a great achievement."

"What if that sneaky person tries to harm me?"

"Take the dominoes; if you encounter danger, crush the dominoes."

Zhou Xuan threw the dominoes he had asked the painter to the Taoist priest of Guishan.

When the Taoist priest from Guishan saw the printed image on the back of the dominoes—which turned out to be a scroll painting—he immediately understood the origin of the dominoes.

He was a man who valued his life, so he hid the dominoes in his inner pocket and said with a smile, "These dominoes are good, they're a life-saving charm."

"Remember what I told you: if you do things well, you'll have plenty of opportunities to contribute in the future."

After Zhou Xuan finished speaking, he walked to the front of the Guishan Taoist Temple, and with a light wave of his right arm, he stirred up a mountain breeze.

Several gusts of mountain wind, carrying fresh tree sap, swept towards the Taoist temple.

Thanks to Zhou Xuan's perception and manipulation, he controlled the mountain wind like a calligrapher's wolf-hair brush. On the Taoist temple's plaque, he first used the force of the wind to erase the old "Guishan Temple" characters, and then used tree sap to write three large characters on it: "Bi Shutang".

Bi Shutang is the name of the "Bi Fang" divine kingdom.

After completing these tasks, Zhou Xuan once again used his divine soul to travel and shift his form, appearing inside Huifeng Medical College.

"Imagine what Bifang looks like."

After carefully recalling the appearance of "Bifang" in his mind, Zhou Xuan immediately used "mind control" to imagine himself as "Bifang" in his mind.

"The world is vast and full of wonders; new tales of the world and strange stories all flow from my three-inch tongue."

Zhou Xuan gently opened his folding fan, swaying it slowly, and moved through the crowd with light and graceful steps.

"A disciple of storytelling, why do you need to tell stories?"

“If one’s skills are not refined, it will be a disgrace to the family if those who have seen the true skill see them.”

Zhou Xuan made a grand entrance, reciting various slang terms and phrases. Firstly, he wanted to show off his status as a senior storyteller; secondly, everyone in Mingjiang knew that Zhou Xuan would be giving a lecture that evening, and his words seemed to be a direct challenge to Zhou Xuan. His actions immediately drew discussion among the people of Mingjiang.

"Who is that? He sounds very arrogant."

"He spoke in a very formal, literary style. By the way, what did he say?"

"Judging from his words, he's just a storyteller himself, and he looks down on the stories told by our great master."

In everyone's eyes, after they were tricked by the magic trick, Zhou Xuan was no longer Zhou Xuan, but an old man with a crane-like figure and flames flowing between his brows.

"How dare they talk about our great master like that? I can't stand it, let's beat him up."

"Don't make a move rashly. This person is so arrogant, he must be a senior of the Great Master. Who is the Great Master? How could we mere mortals deal with his seniors?"

"Who cares who he is, I'll just roll up my sleeves and take him down."

Some of the people from Mingjiang Prefecture, who seemed to have ill intentions, rolled up their sleeves, ready to attack Zhou Xuan.

Zhou Xuan, however, was not afraid. With minimal movement, he put on the "Bifang" mask and used "Storyteller's Dream" to create a dream out of nowhere.

In his dream, the people of Mingjiang Prefecture felt as if their feet were stuck in a quagmire, unable to pull their legs out and unable to take another step.

Zhou Xuan looked around at the crowd and said, "Bi Shutang is located on Little Turtle Mountain. If you happen to meet any old friends, please come to Bi Shutang to reminisce. The storytelling profession cannot bear such humiliation, and we do not wish to tarnish the reputation of our school because of some unworthy disciple."

His words were actually addressed to the "rat-turned-people" among the crowd.

Those who have transformed into rats will only be detected and exposed by the inescapable net laid out by Zhou Xuan and the Wandering Gods when they fall ill.

However, some people who do not show symptoms already have the consciousness of "evil rats from the abyss" in their bodies. These people have no symptoms, but their minds have already been controlled by the evil rats.

Zhou Xuan wandered around several more times, repeating the words he had just spoken a few times, before finally swimming to the outside of a tent.

He lifted the curtain and entered the tent. There was no one inside. He immediately went on a spiritual journey and disappeared into the tent.

His bluffing tactics are about to come to an end.

"You wicked rat from the abyss, someone as shady as you, hiding in the shadows, must desperately need a helper, right?"

“Bifang is qualified to be your helper.”

This was the beginning of Zhou Xuan's scheme—he disguised himself as "Bi Fang" to lure the evil rat into joining forces with Bi Fang, thus drawing the snake out of its hole.

This approach, besides setting up a deception to fool the Abyssal Rats, has another advantage.
The disguise method used by the Caixi Hall will trigger cause and effect. He disguised himself as "Turtle Mountain Taoist Priest", and Turtle Mountain Taoist Priest appeared.

If he were to impersonate "Bifang" on such a grand scale, "Bifang" would likely be unable to escape the law of cause and effect, and would also be implicated and fall to earth.

This strategy is a double-edged sword.

“This time, I’m not afraid of getting into big karma; I’m just afraid that the karma won’t be drawn fast enough.”

……

Medical School, Zone C, Tent No. 46.

Inside the tent, the lacquerer Li Dazhu stood silently, his brow furrowed in worry.

But he wasn't silent; in fact, his consciousness was communicating with the Abyssal Rat.

The Abyssal Rat has divided its consciousness into dust particles, which are scattered throughout the medical school. However, these scattered consciousnesses also have a primary and secondary distinction.

The most powerful consciousness is the main consciousness of the evil rat; the other consciousnesses—those rat-turned patients—are all his puppets.

Li Dazhu was such a puppet.

Among the many consciousnesses of the Abyssal Rats, they also have their own names: the main consciousness is called the Rat King, and the puppets are called Little Rats.

"Li Dazhu, the Little Mouse, and Bifang, a celestial-level deity, seem to have descended to the mortal realm."

“Rat King, I have heard about him, and I have even seen that old man with my own eyes.”

"How skilled is that old man?" the Rat King asked.

"It's still unclear. All I know is that the old storyteller's ability to conjure dreams is extremely high; his method of creating dreams from nothing is truly masterful," Li Dazhu replied.

After a moment of silence, the Rat King said with some suspicion, "Two celestial books have appeared in the world, but only one person who possesses them can continue to live. This is the fate of storytellers."

Bi Fang, who had always wanted to kill Zhou Xuan, who also possessed the Heavenly Book, chose this time to descend to the mortal realm, which is somewhat reasonable..."

Li Dazhu also said, "Bifang seems to be trying to win us over? Otherwise, if we join forces, our chances of defeating Zhou Xuan will be quite high."

"To join forces with a celestial-level deity? It's not impossible, but... we still need to verify their identities."

The Rat King said, "Then Bi Fang has made it known that Bi Shutang has settled in Little Turtle Mountain. You, Li Dazhu, were a lacquerer in your previous life. The Turtle Mountain Temple in Little Turtle Mountain was renovated a few years ago, and you were the lacquerer there. You are more familiar with that place... So go to Little Turtle Mountain and check on Bi Fang's whereabouts."

"As ordered."

Li Dazhu immediately raised his head, severing his connection with the Rat King. His eyes were somewhat bloodshot; his rat-like illness was already on the verge of manifesting.

To avoid being discovered, Li Dazhu lowered his head and quickly left the medical school's living area, heading towards Guishan Temple.

……

Inside Guishan Temple, a Taoist priest was holding a palm-sized ginseng root, his mouth practically watering.

"Before, without incense offerings, we would go hungry nine times in three days. Now that we've followed the Master, we have more incense offerings than we can ever eat."

"If you keep feeding me incense like this, I'm afraid I'll reach the level of a six-stick incense stick in less than a month..."

"I have a Taoist temple as my natal temple, and all I need to advance in my cultivation level is incense offerings... Does this mean... I'm destined to never achieve anything in this life?"

As the Taoist priest on Guishan Mountain was caught in a blissful dilemma, suddenly, his ears twitched, and he felt a resonance in the walls of the Taoist temple.

“A sinister person has come up the mountain.”

After listening for a while, the Taoist priest from Guishan noticed that the newcomer's footsteps were not as decisive and relaxed as those of the other tourists, but rather hesitant. He became even more certain that his guess was correct, and immediately began to devour the Snow Mountain Ginseng.

The snow mountain palm ginseng possesses an inner Buddhist aura.

The divine beings in the Well Kingdom can directly transform Buddhist energy into their own incense offerings.

Although the Taoist priest of Guishan is now just a spirit, the methods and practices he cultivated in his previous life were orthodox and legitimate, making him a true and virtuous deity.

As the Buddhist energy entered his body, the Taoist priest of Guishan's level of worship rapidly increased.

To say that the Taoist priest of Guishan is not a person of the mortal world, but a person whose soul is attached to the Taoist temple and cannot be dispersed, from a certain perspective, he is the real temple keeper.

Such figures exist in many Taoist temples in the Jing Kingdom—they are called temple guardians.

The guardians of the temple and the Taoist temple are one entity. They do not offer incense, but the physical Taoist temple serves as their incense offering.

Therefore, the incense offerings of the guardians of the temple, like those of the fox clan, are outwardly visible.

However, most of the guardians of the temples live in seclusion in small temples deep in the mountains, taking the temple as their home and having a limited range of movement, and do not appear in the martial arts world.

Unless one is extremely experienced and knowledgeable, it is difficult to distinguish the level of worshippers by observing the signs of a Taoist temple.

"After three incense sticks burned, a mountain breeze echoed within the Taoist temple; after four incense sticks burned, golden light suddenly appeared in the temple."

The Taoist priest of Guishan gazed at his small Taoist temple and noticed that although the walls of the temple were still covered in mottled paint, golden light was flowing through the old cracks.

The most striking feature is the plaque of the Taoist temple, where the three characters "Bi Shu Tang" left by Zhou Xuan have flowing gold light at the edges, as if they were gilded, and they even show an aura.

"It actually leveled up! That Snow Mountain Ginseng really does have amazing uses..."

Although the Taoist priest of Guishan was lying down, he received incense offerings effortlessly, which still made him extremely happy, and he was secretly delighted.

Meanwhile, Li Dazhu was already hiding in the woods outside the temple, secretly eyeing the small temple.

"How is Li Dazhu, the little mouse, doing?"

"When I first arrived at the Taoist temple, only the mountain wind echoed, making the wooden door rattle. But after I looked around for a while, a light rain began to fall outside. At the same time, inside the temple, I saw a gilded color, and the name on the plaque was changed to Bi Shutang."

"There is a keeper inside the temple who has risen from three incense sticks to four incense sticks."

“With only four incense sticks burning, the person in that temple must not be Bifang,” Li Dazhu said.

Among the celestial deities, who isn't above the level of nine incense sticks? The difference between four and nine incense sticks is like heaven and earth. Could it be Bifang?

"No, the fact that four incense sticks can burn in such a short time means that... the person in the temple is very likely a Daoist—a Daoist of Bifang."

The Rat King sneered, "The Daoist has a secret: when he descends to the mortal realm, he has neither incense nor fire, yet he can ascend to higher levels in an extremely short time."
"The superior scholar ascends to immortality in seven days, the middle scholar in thirty days, and the inferior scholar in three months. It is perfectly reasonable that Bifang descends to the mortal realm, inevitably risking his life against Zhou Xuan, and bringing with him the most outstanding Daoists."

The Rat King then said, "The person in the temple is a Daoist, and Bi Fang is the person behind that Daoist."

"Now that the Rat King has confirmed Bi Fang's identity, I will enter the temple to discuss with Bi Fang a plan of alliances and counter-alliances, so that we can join forces to eliminate Zhou Xuan."

"Wait a minute."

The Rat King shouted, stopping Li Dazhu...

(End of this chapter)