Chapter 113: The First Upper Vehicle Talisman

Even during the day, the Laboratory Building was eerie and terrifying. I picked up the model head that had rolled into the corner and turned it around. The vicious curses and insults on the back were glaring.

I often wondered if those kids from Xinhu High School really deserved any sympathy. The Primal Destiny Divine Fiends were certainly detestable, but weren't the children who had forced Guo Junjie step by step into the abyss getting exactly what they deserved?

My fingers traced the cross-section of the model's neck. The rough, splintered edges made it obvious that the head had been forcefully snapped off.

"What happened here last night?"

Tossing the model head aside, I left the art classroom and headed straight up the central stairs to the top floor.

This was the biology laboratory. Several rooms still contained specimens and tools for biological sectioning.

"Sakurako!" I shouted down the corridor, but no one answered. "Strange, Daoist Priest Xianqing shouldn't have lied to me."

I checked the rooms one by one to no avail. It wasn't until Bai Qi bit my pant leg and tugged me toward the lower floor that I noticed something amiss. "There's someone on the stairs!"

Aside from the central staircase, the Laboratory Building had two emergency stairwells, one on the left and one on the right.

Bai Qi led me to the left one. Pushing open the fire door, I could faintly hear footsteps. The person was wearing leather shoes; even though they were deliberately slowing their pace, they couldn't completely muffle the sound.

"Quick, after them!"

Bai Qi and I rushed down and finally cornered the person at the second-floor landing. The man standing before us was an acquaintance.

Between the Hibiscus Profound Crown, the Moon-Breaking Star Headscarf, and the Rainbow Robes and Cloud Sleeves, I would have had a hard time pretending not to recognize such extravagant attire.

"Why is it you again?" Standing at the corner of the stairs, the Brocade-Robed Daoist Priest frowned for the first time. "Are you following me?"

"Don't flatter yourself. I don't have time to play hide-and-seek with you." This young Daoist priest named Lu Jin had a formidable background. His presence at Xinhu High School gave me a very bad premonition.

"Then what are your intentions?" Lu Jin's expression returned to calm, as if he held everything beneath his notice. That slight frown just now had been the greatest fluctuation in his emotions. "Could it be that you've changed your mind and decided to gift this dog to this poor Daoist?"

"I seriously doubt whether you're a cultivator at all. Didn't your master teach you that cultivation requires purifying the heart, minimizing desires, and keeping your mind as still as standing water?" I pressed down on Bai Qi's head. For some unknown reason, the dog grew restless the moment he saw this Brocade-Robed Daoist Priest.

"What a joke. You call purifying the heart and minimizing desires cultivation? Seizing the fortunes of heaven and earth, fighting for opportunities against myriad living beings—that is the true joy of cultivation."

He smiled faintly and clapped his hands lightly. Two burly men in suits emerged from a room behind him. One of them was gripping a girl as petite as a doll.

"Sakurako!" I didn't act on impulse, but my eyes slowly narrowed. "Hand that child over to me!"

"You really did come to fight me for this opportunity. Purifying the heart, minimizing desires, a mind as still as standing water... you make it sound so pleasant." Lu Jin slipped the folding fan from his waist and waved it to the side. The burly man in the suit understood the gesture, turned around, and brought a wooden chair out from the classroom. He then took off his suit jacket, draped it over the chair as a cushion, and respectfully placed it behind Lu Jin.

"This school has been ravaged by the Primal Destiny Divine Fiends for five years. While the living must enter with extreme caution, it has become a favorite haunting ground for yin souls and fierce ghosts. It has practically transformed into a perfect, naturally formed Post-Heaven yin locus. For ghost-raisers, this is the ultimate blessed haven." Lu Jin sat in the chair, unhurried, lightly fanning himself. He looked entirely confident, as if he had already completely figured me out.

"I don't care what you're trying to do in this school, and I have no interest in caring. Just hand over that child."

"Don't be in such a rush. You and I both know quite well that this little girl is by no means an ignorant child. Her constitution is special—so special that even I couldn't fully see through it. How could I ever hand over such a treasure?"

"What exactly do you want?" My tone turned cold. Lu Jin treating Sakurako as a rare treasure revealed a twisted set of values that thoroughly disgusted me.

Lu Jin studied Sakurako's face. "She's been a beauty in the making since she was little. I really want to raise her with my own two hands."

He poked Sakurako's delicate cheek with his folding fan, then said without looking back, "The yuan chen couldn't turn this place into an absolute domain of yin malevolence all on his own. He relied on a single Talisman Paper to transform the entire school into a ghost realm."

"What kind of Talisman Paper has that kind of capability?" I was deeply suspicious. The most powerful Thunder Talisman Embryo I had seen before fell far short of such might.

"Cut the act. The Tongsang Art, the Paulownia Mulberry Talisman—the local Daoists in Jiangcheng should be far more familiar with them than I am. Five years ago, the first place that talisman appeared was Jiangcheng. Then it suddenly vanished, and immediately after, all sorts of bizarre rumors sprang up around Xinhu High School."

"The Paulownia Mulberry Talisman?" This was my first time hearing the name. To think that for the sake of a mere Talisman Paper, the Brocade-Robed Daoist Priest would throw away his dignity and kidnap a child.

The Brocade-Robed Daoist Priest raised his hand, and the Man in the Suit beside him pulled out an ancient tome, presenting it with both hands. "During the Han dynasty, Li Xingxiu lost his wife. His grief was profound; awake or asleep, he could not forget her. He hoped to catch a glimpse of his deceased wife's face in a dream, but to no avail. Soon after, while passing through Tongsang, he met an old man who taught him a dream-making art. When night fell, he tried the method as instructed and indeed managed to meet his wife in his dreams, where they shared the sorrows of their separation. Upon waking, he marveled at the miraculous technique and named it the Tongsang Art."

"And this Paulownia Mulberry Talisman contains the Secret Dream-Making Art. It is an Upper Vehicle Talisman drawn by a hidden master of the Xiao Zhuang Taoist Temple who had stepped through the gates of the Pre-Heaven Stage, combining the Tongsang Art with an awakening to the six dreams."

"Though it cannot vanquish demons and eradicate evils, nor bring in wealth and treasures, it can draw people into a shared dream, allowing one to seize Pre-Heaven opportunities within the Dream Realm." Lu Jin spoke in highly mystical terms, but to put it simply, this talisman was incredibly rare. A wielder could use it to enter and exit the dreams of others, or rely on it to create something out of nothing with limitless variations.

Although I didn't completely understand just how profoundly mystical this talisman was, the mere words 'Upper Vehicle Talisman' were enough to make my eyes gleam.

The ancestral Talisman Paper that Blind Liu used to suppress his family's fate was merely an incomplete Upper Vehicle Talisman. The thunder talisman, which was only a Thunder Talisman Embryo, could unleash tremendous power even in the hands of an ordinary person. From this, one could only imagine just how terrifying a true Upper Vehicle Talisman must be.

"Since you've seen this much, there is no need for me to keep hiding it. The task my master assigned me upon coming down the mountain was to retrieve the Paulownia Mulberry Talisman. As for helping you all dispel the thick fog in the mountains, that was just something I did in passing." Lu Jin fanned his folding fan, revealing a masterfully painted Hundred Birds Paying Homage to the Phoenix Painting.

His expression was arrogant. "I will now give you two choices. First, hand over the Paulownia Mulberry Talisman. Second, leave the dog, and you can get lost."

After revealing his true objective, Lu Jin tore away his disguise. The immortal aura of an enlightened master vanished, leaving me with the distinct impression of a bully throwing his weight around.

"This is the first time I've even heard the words 'Paulownia Mulberry Talisman.' What exactly do you expect me to give you?" I claimed ignorance out loud, but certain things were already clicking into place in my mind.

After the great battle with the Primal Destiny Divine Fiends ended, the human skin pasted on the thirteenth step of the stairs had vanished along with Sakurako. At the time, I had been too busy marveling at surviving the ordeal to pay it much attention. But thinking back on it now, that human skin was very likely on Sakurako!

"It seems you won't shed a tear until you see the coffin. Zhong Jiu, go help him jog his memory." Lu Jin waved at the burly man next to him. Taking the order, the man stripped off his shirt to reveal rock-solid muscles.

"Do you really think I'm afraid of you?" Forced by the Underworld Live Show to undertake one dangerous broadcast after another, I could meet a gruesome end at any moment. At this point, I was essentially a cornered rat with nothing to lose. I didn't even fear death, let alone the power backing this young Daoist priest.

Bai Qi and I took up positions on either side. If this brute dared to rush over recklessly, we would definitely make him pay. "I don't care what kind of Daoist priest or immortal you are. You're suspected of kidnapping a minor, which is already a crime. If you don't want to end up on the front page of tomorrow's newspaper, release her right now!"

"Sharp-tongued bastard. Teach him a good lesson for me!" The burly man stepped out, clearing three or four steps in a single bound. He moved incredibly fast, clearly a trained martial artist.

"Bai Qi!" Having lost his patience long ago, Bai Qi unleashed his ferocious nature. Baring his sharp fangs, he lunged straight for the brute's neck.

"What a fierce dog. It's just a pity you followed the wrong master!" The young Daoist priest snapped his folding fan shut and pulled a golden Talisman Paper from his sleeve. "Did you really think I would come completely unprepared?"

With a flick of his wrist, he tossed out the Talisman Paper. Stepping in the pattern of the seven-star footwork, he rapidly chanted, "Myriad laws of the universe, grasped within the heart; using this as the boundary, Draw the Ground as a Prison Curse, confine!"

A flash of golden light streaked by like an invisible rope, yanking Bai Qi out of the air and binding him to the ground, leaving him completely immobilized.

Hearing Lu Jin chant the spell, I was taken aback. 'Isn't this the Draw the Ground as a Prison Curse I just read about a few days ago? Could this young Daoist priest be from Profound Truth Dao?!'