One divination a day, a trainee celestial master

Holy crap!

Jiang Shou dropped the half-eaten shrimp meat he was holding on his chopsticks onto the table with a "thud." He stared dumbfounded at the chubby little cat smacking its lips in front of him, feeling as if his worldview had been utterly crushed once again.

"This works?!"

Jiang Shou immediately put down his chopsticks, put on a fawning smile, and leaned close to Fatty Tiger: "Senior Fatty Tiger, what kind of profound Taoist skill is this 'telekinesis'? Teach me!"

Fat Tiger, while devouring the delicious fish, stopped and looked at Jiang Shou with a strange expression. His gaze held a look of utter disbelief, as if to say: "Do you even need to be taught? Don't you have a brain?"

Jiang Shou was taken aback by its look of disdain, as if it were looking at an idiot. "What the hell? You fat cat, haven't you heard of the saying 'He who eats another's food is bound to do his bidding'? If you don't want to teach, at least... um...? Wait!"

Looking at Pang Hu's nonchalant attitude, Jiang Shou felt as if a bolt of lightning had struck his mind: "Could it be... true energy projection?"

He sat up straight again, closed his eyes, and his mind quickly sank into his lower abdomen.

He mobilized the true essence in his dantian and made a thought.

A wisp of solidified true essence flowed along the meridians, emerging from Jiang Shou's fingertips. Although this wisp of true essence was invisible to the naked eye, in Jiang Shou's perception, it was like an invisible yet resilient transparent thread.

Jiang Shou manipulated the "True Essence Thread" and reached towards the plate in the middle of the table, carefully wrapping and entangling a piece of salmon.

"Rise!" Jiang Shou silently chanted in his heart.

The piece of fish on the table actually started to float away!

Although it was Jiang Shou's first time controlling this "invisible hand," and his control over the force wasn't quite right, causing the fish to flutter and float in mid-air, almost falling onto the table, it ultimately managed to fly to Jiang Shou's open mouth under the strong pull of his will.

Jiang Shou took a bite of the fish.

"Holy crap! Telekinesis is this easy?!"

Jiang Shou chewed on the fish in his mouth, so excited he almost jumped up: "All I have to do is extend my true energy and use it as a physical arm? I'm fucking awesome!"

Having learned his new skill, Jiang Shou had no desire to continue eating peacefully. He quickly stood up and excitedly began trying it out in the yard.

He used his true energy to grab fallen leaves from the ground. He used his true energy to lift a broom not far away. He even tried to use his true energy to lift the wooden bucket full of water next to the well.

After a long while, Jiang Shou stopped moving, slightly out of breath.

He stroked his chin and summarized the pattern of this "True Essence Retrieving Objects from Afar" technique.

"It seems that the amount of true energy required to manipulate an object is directly proportional to its weight. The heavier the object and the farther it is lifted, the more terrifying the amount of true energy consumed."

Jiang Shou looked at the distance between himself and the well platform, which was about ten meters away: "Moreover, with my current cultivation level, my true essence can only travel a maximum of ten meters away from my body. Beyond that distance, the threads of true essence will completely lose the restraint of my will and dissipate directly into the air."

"The distance and force involved are probably related to my cultivation level. Once I have more true energy in my dantian, I might truly be able to fly a sword a hundred steps away and grasp objects from a hundred miles away!"

Jiang Shou became more and more excited as he thought about it. This true essence was indeed a panacea; it could not only be used to draw talismans and clear the meridians to cure diseases, but also be used as a form of mental power.

"I wonder if there are any other ways to use it or any other techniques." Jiang Shou recalled the record in the "Inner Landscape Chapter" about the book "Taishang Shouyi: Daoshu Chapter", which must have recorded various spells that specifically mobilize true energy. "There should be, but I don't know where the ancestors hid those good things in this Taoist temple. It seems that we will have to slowly explore them in the future."

After testing his new skill, Jiang Shou turned around with satisfaction, ready to return to the table and continue enjoying his seafood feast.

However, when he reached the square wooden table in the pavilion, he froze in astonishment.

On the table, the plate of salt and pepper shrimp that was originally more than half full, and the plate of thick-cut salmon... were all gone!

Only a few empty plates remained on the table. Moreover, those plates were shiny and clean, without a single drop of soy sauce left, obviously because a cat had eaten everything and then done a "physical licking" clean of the plates.

Holy crap!!!

Jiang Shou's eyes widened as he stared at the empty desk, feeling a surge of anger rising to his head: "Fat Tiger!!!"

He suddenly raised his head and looked around.

The large, obese perpetrator had somehow already jumped onto the roof eaves of the main hall.

Hearing the furious roar from below, the little fat cat perched on the green tile twitched its ears guiltily.

It seemed a little embarrassed. It turned halfway around on the tile, deliberately showing its furry, chubby rear end to Jiang Shou below. Then it closed its eyes, rested its head on its front paws, and continued to pretend to doze off, its main message being, "As long as I'm asleep, you can't scold me."

Looking at that orange loaf of toast that was pretending to be dead on the eaves.

Jiang Shou stood under the corridor, opened his mouth, but couldn't utter a single word for a long time.

"..."

----------------

There is no sun or moon in the mountains.

Three days after Mr. and Mrs. Liu visited Shouyi Temple, at 10:30 pm.

Jinshuiwan Villa District, south of Qiyun County.

The night wind blew through the green belt, bringing with it a chilly whistling sound.

Deep within this upscale villa district, outside the iron gate of a detached villa, Mr. Lin and his wife stood hunched over under a streetlamp, wrapped in coats, not daring to even step inside the gate.

Before them stood a "Celestial Master" dressed in a bright yellow "haute couture" gold-embroidered Taoist robe and with his hair styled in a meticulously combed bob-nose bun.

This Taoist master's name is Wang Chuanfu, and he is thirty-five years old this year.

Looking back on Wang Chuanfu's life, it has been quite eventful. After dropping out of vocational high school, he worked for several years in an electronics factory in a coastal city, making screws. Later, in a moment of impulsiveness, he tried his hand at selling face masks online, but lost everything. Finally, with no other options, he followed a childhood friend from his hometown to Hengdian World Studios, where he worked as an extra for three years. He played corpses, eunuchs, and even stood in for a company commander in a ridiculous anti-Japanese war drama, delivering a couple of lines.

Although he failed to make a name for himself in the entertainment industry, the years he spent struggling in Hengdian greatly honed Wang Chuanfu's acting skills and thick skin.

Until a couple of years ago, the platform economy and short videos exploded. One day, Wang Chuanfu stumbled upon a fortune teller in a live stream. Seeing the gift effects flying all over the screen, Wang Chuanfu's restless mind, which had been beaten down countless times by society, was instantly ignited.

"This 'mystical live streaming' market is absolutely a blue ocean!"

With the acting skills he honed as an extra in Hengdian, Wang Chuanfu immediately gave himself the title of "the 38th generation lay disciple of the Zhengyi School of Longhu Mountain".

From a novice who stammered in front of the camera and couldn't even recite his lines properly, to "Master Wang" who is now at ease in the live broadcast room and speaks fluently in Taoist terminology, his number of fans has skyrocketed with several carefully planned "haunted house adventure" scripts.

Of course, this requires the operation of a professional team.

For example, the Taoist robe he's wearing, which looks glittering and high-class, is actually made of synthetic fiber from a small commodity factory in Yiwu. It has extremely poor breathability and feels suffocating to wear, but its only advantage is that it reflects light exceptionally well under fill lights, making him look particularly ethereal.

For example, the century-old peach wood sword he was holding at the moment had its hilt hollowed out, revealing a small miniature lighter and a high-pressure rosin powder spraying device. With just a press of the concealed switch, the tip of the sword could instantly shoot out a flame half a meter long, creating an extremely stunning visual effect.

"Mr. Lin, Mrs. Lin, please wait outside patiently." Wang Chuanfu held a useless wooden compass in one hand and flicked the wide sleeves of his synthetic fiber robe with the other. His tone was low and confident. "I've already received the 30,000 yuan deposit. Tonight, I will make sure the evil spirits in this house are completely wiped out."

"Thank you so much, Master Wang. Please help me." Boss Lin rubbed his hands together, looking at the mansion that cost him more than three million, his eyes filled with fear.

Seeing the fear on the faces of the couple opposite him, Wang Chuanfu was not afraid at all.

Exorcising ghosts from haunted houses?

As a staunch swindler, he knew better than anyone that there were no ghosts in this world! The so-called "strange phenomena" encountered by Mr. and Mrs. Lin were either psychological effects caused by their own fears or natural phenomena resulting from the villa's long-term disrepair.

"Rich people are really stupid and have too much money. I don't know how they made so much money. It's really because God is blind."