The Path to Immortality Begins with the Life-Extending Lamp

Chapter 246 Substitute Witch Puppet
"Hey!"

Upon hearing Li Qing's words, the withered corpse ghosts revealed a hint of shame, anger, and mockery in their empty, dark eye sockets. These ghosts and spirits were born in the boundless world and arose from the netherworld. They were beings that were inherently accompanied by death, so why should they weigh the pros and cons?
The old ghost's two still-movable heads slowly turned, slightly avoiding the vast sea of ​​qi and auspicious clouds. Its withered claws moved forward, breaking through Li Qing's qi technique at an extremely insidious angle, intending to kill him directly.

This old ghost was formed from a corpse buried in the ancestral temple of an ancient clan, its three heads not human in appearance, but ghostly in form. With the authority of the tomb owner in this underworld, the breath of the deceased can ward off all evil spirits, and its incorruptible body is difficult to break through by any magic.

The eerie, withered claws sliced ​​through the void. Unlike the many Yin Gods whose every move was imbued with the power of law and principles, the withered, brownish-yellow arm simply grabbed into the dark void, and that small patch of space was visibly collapsed and pierced through. The old corpse's claws disappeared into the void several feet in front of it, and then strangely tore through space from behind Li Qing to attack.

The old corpse in the underworld is connected to the netherworld, and it is said that a group of ghosts surround its tomb. This ghostly corpse that connects to the underworld has naturally established an extraordinary iron law, which is "incorruptibility". The corpse is a ghostly spirit that does not decay or incinerate. The secret power of incorruptibility is dark yellow and strong enough to shake the void. Once the yellow aura is wrapped around it, broken bones will be reborn and the skin will be renewed.

As soon as the terrifying ghost claw appeared, Li Qing felt a chill run down his spine. The Longevity Lamp hung high in the dark sky, radiating boundless starlight of immortality. The illusory images of the fifty-four luminaries of the Southern Dipper rotated around him, with the Heavenly Mansion Star as the supreme one, merging with the auspicious cloud aura, and dominating dozens of miles.

The Blood Demon Domain of Everlasting Hatred brutally squeezed into the mortal world, the overwhelming stench of blood assaulting everyone's senses. The thick, blood-stained ghost hair, born from Li Qing's Xuan Yin Qi, grew violently, billowing ghost hair and raging demonic flames.

"later!"

Li Qing's pupils widened in shock. His Yin Eyes overlapped with the Dream Curse, taking in all the unusual movements of the entire world. He immediately foresaw the ghostly claws that were tearing through the void and attacking from two feet behind him.

However, the horror of those three old corpses was actually greater than he had imagined.

The Southern Dipper Life-Extending Mysterious Light, while powerful enough as a protective technique, was far from sufficient to withstand the divine attacks of the Yin God Lord. The endless, wildly dancing Blood Demon Hair was instantly torn off by the ghost claw, and the ghost claw's momentum still passed through the obstacles without hindrance, striking Li Qing's back.

"drink!"

This sudden turn of events sent a chill down Li Qing's spine, but it also calmed her down.

How could their two trump cards be broken in the blink of an eye?

There was no time to dodge. Li Qing's face darkened, and he immediately made a hand seal to awaken the Ten Directions Fetal Life-Substitute Puppet!

The latter, a seven-inch-tall puppet, suddenly trembled. Its originally delicate and wooden face was instantly covered with gloom and hatred. The small puppet faced the terrifying ghost hand and also raised its sleeves to meet it head-on.

"Die! Die! Die! Die! Die! Die! Die!"

The substitute ghost puppet stood in front of Li Qing, resisting the attack of the three-headed corpse demon. From the sleeve of the performer's costume, two small hands touched the ghost claw, instantly halting the three-headed corpse demon's attack. The point of contact twisted strangely for a moment, and the next instant, the three-headed corpse demon's claw swiftly retracted.
The Blood Demon Domain, Southern Dipper Heavenly Light, and Qi Dao Cloud Sea in the arena seemed to have never appeared; in the dark sky, only emptiness remained.

The Nine Realms contain the Ten Directions, and the human body contains the Great Treasury. The Substitute Life Puppet, refined using the methods of the Substitute Ghost and the Witch Ghost, can serve as the first magic weapon of the Lord of Huailian Yin Mountain, "Jade Spirit God". In certain aspects, it naturally possesses extraordinary power. Even the Everlasting Regret Ghost Scissors were instantly suppressed by the Substitute Life Technique.

This left the various Daoist priests, who were dozens of miles away and residing in the carriage of the King of Rebirth, completely bewildered by the situation.

It seems that this Taoist priest Li was unable to block the old ghost's attack, but it also seems that he did manage to block it?
"No, look!"

Master Taixu wielded the Void Heaven Sword, a magical sword enshrined within the Qingxu Dao Sect. It contained a divine wheel-like restriction called "Chandao," which allowed him to keenly perceive the changes in the scene.

In that dark realm, time and space shifted, resulting in a very strange incongruity.

Before they could even investigate what was amiss, the Heaven-Covering Auspicious Cloud Technique and the Profound Yin Primordial Qi were suddenly captured by the appearing Li Qing and condensed into a Qi Dao Heavenly Blade using the Qi Gathering Technique.

A blade of energy thousands of feet long rose from the heights of the dark sky, seemingly a replica of the scene where the corpse demon attacked Li Qing from behind. The blade of energy also slashed down from behind the old ghost, striking down on his right shoulder with overwhelming force, cleaving him into the Netherworld Earth and creating a deep valley several miles long.

The attack from the Yin God Lord was not so easy to redirect, but... the substitute witch puppet altered Li Qing's own time. In the instant of the fatal attack, Li Qing returned to the state when Xun Meng invaded this Netherworld.

Li Qing lowered her gaze. The life-extending lamp was still shining with a cold white light. Although the box containing the Eternal Regret Scissors was still seeping blood from the cracks in her sleeve, it was still unsealed. Everything looked just like it did before the four incense sticks.

Only the substitute ghost puppet on his shoulder, its actor's face transformed into a gloomy substitute ghost, its overwhelming hatred and malice turning into a sky-covering black mist that entangled Li Qing.

The substitute puppet, harboring ill intentions, aimed at the malevolent ghost's aura beneath the rift. As a fellow ghost lord in the Yin God Realm, it only wanted to take the old ghost's life and make him taste the pain of being refined into a substitute puppet and enslaved for eternity!
"Pain Pain!"

The malevolent spirit of the substitute puppet is boundless. This object is extremely cruel. The five senses of the person being refined are stripped away, and the six senses are severed. Only a single soul remains in the body to be refined into a puppet, neither alive nor dead. Each time it dies in place of the other, it bears all the pain. Being in this place, its resentment is terrifying. Only the most ruthless sorcerer can create such a forbidden weapon that incurs the wrath of heaven and man.

Originally a forbidden artifact, and crafted from a substitute ghost, this witch puppet has an extremely terrifying origin. After manipulating time and substituting for a life once, its face has transformed into a young, vengeful ghost resembling Li Qing, and it is extremely aggressive!
"Is the true form of the substitute puppet the imprisoned ghost king who was meant to be a substitute for death?"

With a flick of his right sleeve, Li Qing flung the Qi Dao Heavenly Blade away. The sharp blade instantly disintegrated with the force of the dissipation, transforming into a cluster of auspicious clouds that stretched for dozens of miles and covered the sky.

He underestimated the Yin God Realm and his own trump cards!

The puppets relied upon by the lord of Yinshan are far more than just tools for escaping...

Finally, with Li Qing's permission, the small witch puppet's tiger fangs appeared, and a waterfall cascaded into the Netherworld. The black mist formed from the secret power of substitution rolled and transformed into chains as it launched its attack. Suddenly, the rapid, chaotic footsteps, like straw boots on wooden planks, began again. A surge of overwhelming soul pressure swept into the Netherworld, and the numerous Yin ghosts reaching out their ghostly hands from the darkness were swiftly broken by the Heavenly Ghost's footprints.

The wandering ghosts and accomplices were attacked from the shadows. They were immediately covered in black ghost footprints and retreated with screams and wails. Those with lower cultivation levels were instantly reduced to smoke and scattered with miserable cries the moment they touched the ghost footprints that appeared out of nowhere in the void.

"The art of substituting one thing for another? That spirit-raising technique... Soul-killing curse... Qi-based orthodox methods..." Senior Brother Chen murmured, silently reciting the supernatural powers displayed by Daoist Li. Each one was astonishingly incredible, and each one seemed to have only been recorded in legends.

"That's ancient witchcraft, and some of its techniques are still practiced in the North Sea and Lingnan!"

Lying beneath the Hunyuan Barrier, the "Half-Corpse," whose right half had vanished, weakly uttered a sound. This was a Qingxu True Disciple who had received the Qinghua Talisman. Among the talismans and scriptures he followed, there was a similar technique called "Mud Bodhisattva." Witchcraft and ghost arts were all taboo, but while they were extremely unconventional, they could also bring great benefits.

Otherwise, given his injuries, he would have died long ago.

"Senior Brother Chen, who is that?" The man, whose body was covered in crimson cracks, struggled to his feet from a paper horse and saw the battle in the distance.

The female Taoist priest, whose throat had been torn in half, had her wounds stitched up again with spiritual paper brought by the Linglong Clan Master. After her injuries were healed, she sat up cross-legged, looked at the four longevity lamps in front of the Rebirth Chariot, and then silently cast her gaze toward the battlefield.

With a variety of spells, bizarre forbidden techniques, and a combination of the insidious methods of ghosts and gods with the grandeur of the orthodox methods of Qi cultivation, this person's cultivation level seemed not high. When he encountered the three-headed corpse ghost's attack, he was repeatedly in danger. However, the old ghost always missed the mark with each attack and was instead made to look bad by Li Qing's various bizarre methods.

"call……"

"Fellow Daoist on the Immortal Path, but... we still don't know which sect's disciple you are!"

Senior Brother Chen finally breathed a sigh of relief; perhaps they really were saved now.

"Could it be the legendary Fangxian Dao from north of Tiandu?"

The Fangxian Dao of the Northern Dynasties of Tiandu was an ancient Daoist lineage that cultivated both immortals and ghosts, and its methods were extremely similar to those of this person.

As the four or five Taoist priests who had been saved from danger by the Longevity Lamp were filled with doubt and contemplation, a faint, cold laugh suddenly arose from nowhere.

"Where did this Fangxian Dao come from?"

"Isn't my master clearly a high-ranking member of the Qi Refining Dao? From the Tiannan Temple, no less!"

Linglong Changzhu emerged from the Rebirth Carriage by lifting the beaded curtain, arms crossed, looking down at the group with a hint of disdain as they spouted nonsense.

The altar of the Jiachang sect had once again gathered its strength, enough to withstand the old ghost's attack. However, it was unclear what their master's intentions were—whether he would protect the five people and retreat directly, or…

Li Qing's newly acquired puppet witch usually looked like a harmless ornament, but who knew it would have such power now? Before the Ghost Mother could even make a move, it was already able to go toe-to-toe with that old ghost.

The seven-inch-tall scapegoat puppet had its tiger fangs bared, and with a slap of its small hand, a dark blue handprint landed on the old ghost's brown skin. It was not afraid of the monster's ferocity at all, and all the attacks it suffered would be irreversibly transferred to the three-headed old ghost itself.

Furthermore, Li Qing's overwhelming soul pressure gave rise to the Black Heaven Great Curse, causing the ghosts in the underworld to flee in terror. Then, as they hunted the three-headed corpse ghost, the balance of power shifted dramatically!
Just then, the three-headed ghouls, after being torn apart by the witch puppet and slapped with five or six ghostly handprints all over their bodies, finally lost patience, turned sideways and crashed into the void, instantly disappearing before the Netherworld.

"Clang... half-human, half-ghost... clang... scapegoat."

"You... are quite the little monster!"

As if the trachea had ruptured, a faint grinding sound of the throat bones rubbing together could be heard, and the old corpse began to communicate with Li Qing for the first time.

But before the words were even finished, the ghoul smashed through the void beside Li Qing. With an absolute instinct like a wild beast to its flock of sheep, it knew that as long as Li Qing was killed, all the methods derived from him would vanish without a trace.

From afar, it looked like an old ghost with brown skin covering withered bones. Its body was sixteen feet long and thin, exuding a terrifying aura. Its emaciated chest revealed its bony frame, making it look like a yellow-skinned, white-boned demon.

The body of the corpse demon is incorruptible and indestructible. The yellow aura surrounding it can weaken all kinds of magic. Except for the head being severed by the prophetic curse, none of Li Qing's various methods have worked against it. At this moment, it leans forward, and the incorruptible yellow aura suddenly covers its entire body, crashing into it out of thin air.

Li Qing's reaction was also quick enough. Although the substitute puppet was good, he had never relied on it much before.

Li Qing put away the unopened Long-Hate Ghost Scissors, picked up the Life-Extending Lamp with one hand, made a hand seal, and the Primordial Ancestral Qi flowed from his mouth and nose, merging with the auspicious cloud above, instantly transforming into the Heavenly Palace Profound Origin Qi Shield. The dark blue protective profound qi covered more than thirty feet, and the auspicious cloud outside transformed into a sea of ​​qi, with turbulent currents.

The old ghost attacked from Li Qing's side, causing the sea of ​​clouds to churn and the Xuan Yuan Qi shield to float high into the sky. You come and I go, you chase and I retreat. You are a corpse ghost, and you can hardly move an inch in this hundred-mile sea of ​​Qi. I am a Qi cultivator, and I observe that the myriad Qi are aided by Heaven.

Behold a yellow-skinned skeleton struggling to chase after something amidst the turbulent storm, with a protective aura and sphere of light darting left and right in front of it, creating a jaw-dropping chase scene in this desolate sky.

(End of this chapter)