One Qi Chaoyang

Chapter 276: Settlement

Zhao Fuyun had personal experience of darkness along the way. The darkness elsewhere gave him an evil feeling, but here, it was like walking into a hunting ground of ferocious beasts.

He felt it was clean here.

Those ghosts that roam in the darkness avoided this place from afar and did not dare to set foot here. Or rather, those who dared to step into this area were swallowed up by the black flag.

This pass is not big, but it is long and narrow, and also concave, so Zhao Fuyun can clearly feel that the wind is gathering and surging towards this pass.

And in the pass there was an earthen fort, standing in the wind, and on the top of the fort, a flag was flying high.

There are many caves on the mountains on both sides of this earthen fortress.

These caves try their best to avoid being blown directly by the wind. There are things in front of the caves to block the wind, or there are openings on the side.

But in this darkness, there was a light shining through, forming a hilltop with scattered light in this area.

Zhao Fuyun was certain that these people did not want to block the wind by blocking the road, so they dug holes in the mountains on both sides.

Zhao Fuyun came to the earthen fort and saw a few words written on the plaque above the gate of the fort.

"Ghost Eater."

This name was unexpected in Zhao Fuyun's mind. It gave people a sense of power and majesty, yet also a hint of evil.

Zhao Fuyun couldn't sneak in, so he wanted to knock on the door, but a pale figure came out from the crack of the door.

Under the light, the man's human color quickly faded and he turned into a flat paper man. The facial features of the paper man were clearly drawn, especially the eyes and mouth.

The eyes were dotted with cinnabar, which was a righteous technique, but the mouth was painted thick black and was three-dimensional, as if it would open at any time, and the whole thing looked very evil.

"The castle lord said that he does not see visitors, so please leave." The paper man actually spoke.

Zhao Fuyun frowned slightly, then asked, "Even if we are from the same sect, you don't want to meet each other?"

The paper figure was silent for a while, then slowly said, "The castle owner said that he has no fellow disciples."

Zhao Fuyun was stunned for a moment, then nodded slowly and said, "Okay, I understand."

So he left.

When I left, I felt a little emotional. Was it because I was rejected? Or was it because the other party was a disciple of Tiandu Mountain but didn't think of himself as a disciple of Tiandu Mountain and said that he had no fellow disciples?

He didn't think so, but the inexplicable emotion still emerged, but soon he turned it into fuel for the fire.

Senior Brother Feng asked him to come here, but didn't tell him where to go. He just asked him to guard the place. There was no fixed fortress or camp to guard. It was entirely up to him.

Zhao Fuyun knew that, in this regard, Tiandu Mountain allowed practitioners to guard their own hearts.

Guard the form with the mind.

Some people feel that it is their own form that traps their heart, while others believe that their heart must guard their own form.

But the mind is often difficult to settle, so a nail needs to be hammered into it to fix it.

In Zhao Fuyun's view, one kind of nail is trust.

Anything you promised is a nail in the coffin.

As Zhao Fuyun walked further west, the darkness became thicker and thicker, and there were fewer and fewer earthen forts. Only occasionally could he see some flickering fires in the mountains.

When the sun came out, he saw a place with beautiful scenery.

A crescent-shaped mountain, facing the dark side, like a shield, with a peak in the middle.

This mountain wall is about five or six miles wide and about a hundred feet high.

There is a hole on the cliff, which seems to be where someone lived before, but it is pitch black inside.

Below the cliff, there is an abandoned camp, which is built against the cliff.

About ten miles in front of the cliff, there is a lake.

This is a nice place.

However, Zhao Fuyun found that this place was almost swallowed by darkness. Even during the day, it was dim here.

However, he decided to stay here.

He entered the cave on the cliff. The cave was surprisingly clean. It had three bedrooms, a meditation room, a place for guests, and a place where disciples probably practiced, as well as a place for storing books, which could be seen from the stone tables and chairs inside.

However, this cave had no name. After Zhao Fuyun took a look around inside, he decided to stay.

He didn't need to offer sacrifices to any fire pit. He just took out his Red Flame Divine Lamp and placed it in the square reception room at the outermost part of the cave.

The entire cave became bright.

After leaving Tiandu Mountain, he had vaguely felt that Master Xun wanted him to form a pill as quickly as possible.

He decided to practice here with all his heart.

Wind blew in from outside and into the cave. In the light, the wind quickly weakened and finally dissipated.

There is a wind-controlling talisman on this lamp.

However, he felt that this was not enough. Since he wanted to use this place as his place of practice, he had to build it well.

He first looked at the entire mountain range and found that it stretched very far and where he was was the end. If this mountain range was compared to a dragon, then he would be at the dragon's head.

However, if it could be connected to the lake more than ten miles away, then it would naturally be considered a perfect pattern of a spirit dragon entering the water. But now it is disconnected, revealing a bare mountain wall, which looks like a dragon with its head cut off.

Zhao Fuyun was hanging high up on the mountain wall, conceiving of the Taoist temple in his mind.

There are many ways to construct a dojo.

Everyone will construct it in the way that they are most proud of and that best suits their own practice.

You can use formations, altars, talismans and spells, as long as you can let your consciousness penetrate this area and make it easier to communicate with the power of heaven and earth, that will be enough.

Zhao Fuyun didn't know much about formations, but he had studied altar techniques and was even more knowledgeable about talismans and spells.

So the first thing he did was to use the mountain wall as paper to write the talismans and spells in his heart.

The first thing he thought of was the magic-suppressing spell.

However, before that, he decided to build his own cave.

At this time, wind blew into the cave from the south from time to time.

He took out the yellow gourd and placed it on the stone table.

Zhao Fuyun felt that the person who originally built this cave must have used this first-floor cave to block the evil wind.

He placed the yellow gourd on the table, and the wind that blew into the cave went into the gourd like a bird returning to its nest, and the whole cave became quiet. He looked at the cave wall, and thought of several altars, but none of them satisfied him. It was not that the altars were not good, but he felt that he could not use all he had learned and everything he had.

However, as long as the altar meets the construction conditions, it doesn't matter if there are more things.

In his opinion, the powerful Red Flame Divine Lamp on him is the one. If he were to build an altar, the Red Flame Divine Lamp must be the core.

The flame on the magic lamp is domineering, and its greatest characteristic is burning.

This altar will focus on smelting.

Fire refines and burns all spirits.

So the magic altar that he had known for a long time naturally emerged in his mind.

Then, he wanted to integrate the Taiyue God-Suppressing Method into it, so that the things imprisoned in the altar would be suppressed instantly and would no longer be able to struggle.

He was thinking about it in his mind, and then took out pieces of talisman paper and started to draw it.

In the distance, there were three monks who had picked some spiritual herbs and caught a few spiritual fish in the lake ahead. They were trying to leave before nightfall and looked up to see a fire coming out of a hole in the mountain wall.

The three monks wore conical hats and clothes made of tree bark. Around their necks hung spiritual jades that emitted spiritual light, but none of them carried torches or fire talismans.

One of the monks said in surprise: "There are people living there?"

"Who is so bold?" the monk next to him asked.

"Maybe it's a cultivator who doesn't know about the grudges in this cave. Let's go and remind him." Another cultivator said.

The leader nodded.

The three men came to the bottom of the mountain wall and shouted towards it.

The cave was in the upper part of the mountain wall, but they were sure that their shouts could be heard by the people in the cave.

The leader shouted, "Hey, is there anyone in the cave?"

The sound seemed to blend into the wind, and went into the cave along with the wind, but was absorbed into the yellow gourd.

If he had not cast any spell, Zhao Fuyun would have been able to hear his normal shouting, but he blended the sound into the wind and it was absorbed into the gourd as soon as he entered the cave.

Zhao Fuyun tilted his ears slightly and seemed to hear a faint sound, but it was not real.

After listening for a while, I didn't listen to it anymore.

Then he lowered his head and built his own altar.

After a while, he looked up, because he felt the fluctuation of the Dharma, so he looked up. He did not stand up, but waited for a while, and three people appeared in the void in front of the cave.

At first glance, he knew that the three people must be wearing something that could conceal the fluctuations of their magical power.

There was a small platform in front of the cave, which was only large enough for two or three people to stand on. The leader landed on the platform, while the other two were still floating in the air on the wind.

Zhao Fuyun did not stand up, but just sat beside the stone table and looked at the man.

The leader felt a little regretful when he landed on the platform in front of the cave, because the other party's gaze made him feel pressured.

But since you're here, you should explain your purpose.

"I'm Fu Yi, nice to meet you, Taoist priest." Among the three monks, the leader was named Fu Yi.

Zhao Fuyun then stood up and said, "I wonder if you have anything to do with me?"

At this moment, he was only thinking about describing his ideas completely so that he could quickly build the altar.

"Master, are you planning to settle down here?" Fu Yi asked directly.

"Yes." Zhao Fuyun said.

"Master Taoist, do you know why this cave has been abandoned?" Fu Yi asked again.

"I don't know, but I think maybe he was forced to leave by the darkness." Zhao Fuyun said.

Fu Yi thought that the other party really didn't know, so he explained: "This cave was originally opened up by a Purple Mansion cultivator named You Liuxian. When he was here, many cultivators below built a camp along the cliff."

"He also accepted two disciples of his own. He has fought off the ghosts that attacked from the darkness many times and is highly respected."

"It was just that more than 20 years ago, a water monster came to the lake ahead. He forbad people here to go there to catch magical fish unless they offered a pair of young boys and girls as sacrifices every year and built a temple on this cliff to worship him."

"No one in the camp below the cliff was willing to do so, and Taoist Master You also refused to agree, so he fought three rounds with the water monster. Even with the help of fellow Taoists in the camp, he was still defeated. In the last round, even Taoist Master You was swept into the lake."

"The fellows in the camp also suffered heavy casualties."

“So this place became deserted.”

Zhao Fuyun frowned and thought, "Twenty years ago, I was just a foundation-building cultivator, and here a Purple Mansion cultivator fell."

"Then what?" Zhao Fuyun asked.

Fu Yi was stunned and said, "The water monster later said that this cave will be used to build a temple to worship him. If anyone is willing to be a temple priest, they can go to him to report. However, who would be willing to be a temple priest for a water monster? So for all these years, no one dared to live here, for fear of offending the water monster."

"In other words, this cave actually belongs to the water monster?" Zhao Fuyun understood what he meant.

"Of course we don't admit it, but the water monster thinks it is." Fu Yi said.

"Oh, were you a member of the camp below back then?" Zhao Fuyun suddenly asked.

Fu Yi was slightly stunned, and said: "Master Fayan, I just established my foundation and practiced here. I was grateful for the protection of the seniors in the camp and Master You."

Zhao Fuyun felt the other party's good intentions and immediately smiled and said, "It's okay, I'll stay here and try it out first, and if it doesn't work, I'll leave."

Fu Yi said hurriedly: "The origin of the water monster is quite mysterious, and its magic is mysterious, with the means to imprison the void. Taoist You could have escaped at that time, but he was sucked into the whirlpool of water. Taoist You must not be careless."

When he recalled the scene from that year, he still felt shocked.

Zhao Fuyun was certainly not careless, but he felt that the owner of the cave, You Liuxian, had the cultivation level of Purple Mansion and was able to fight the water monster three times. He was also a Purple Mansion, so how could he just hide away after hearing the news?
We'll have to get through it first.

"Thank you for telling me, but I would like to meet it." Zhao Fuyun said.

When Fu Yi saw that Zhao Fuyun refused to leave, he knew that it was useless to persuade him, so he could only leave with a sigh.

After the three of them left, they came to the mountains more than a hundred miles behind and returned to their own cave. Fu Yi sighed and said, "Let's go and see him again in a few days. I hope he can escape the magic of the water monster."

He felt that Zhao Fuyun would not be a match for the water monster. He knew very well that when You Liuxian fought the water monster in the third round, he had the help of many foundation-building monks in the camp.

And there is only one Zhao Fuyun.

Zhao Fuyun used talisman paper as draft paper to construct the altar method he wanted in his mind. He revised the draft several times. Just as he was getting closer and closer to the altar in his mind, a gust of wind with a fishy and damp smell came from outside.

(End of this chapter)