Chapter 151: Nine-Tails!

Although scattered malicious ghosts still lingered in the corridor, the evil entities shrank back, seemingly terrified of the Talisman Paper on Zichou's forehead.

He stood in the middle of the grand array, surrounded by swirling yin energy. His skin was covered in black, foul-smelling wounds, and his hair was wildly disheveled, making him look neither human nor ghost.

I wanted to stop him from inviting spirits, but the moment I stepped into the array, I was blasted back by the yin energy as gashes split open across my body.

"What is he doing?" Huang Xue had yet to grasp the situation. She only saw that Zichou had undergone a drastic transformation, and it terrified her.

"Step back. Stay away from me." I peeled her hands off my clothes and stood just outside the grand array.

"Gao Jian..." My sudden rejection left Huang Xue unsettled. She stood behind me with her head lowered, unwilling to leave.

"Stay away from me!" It was probably the first time I had ever yelled at her, and she looked hurt. Frail and burdened with a congenital heart condition since childhood, she couldn't handle extreme emotional shifts. Everyone around her treated her like a hothouse rose, carefully sheltering her. Almost no one had ever spoken to her the way I just did.

She silently walked over to the wall. I knew she was upset, but there was no time to explain the truth. Zichou was inviting a spirit to possess him, and yin energy surged like a mighty river within the array. Provoked by this pure yin energy and resentment, the Nine-Tailed Blood Fox hidden in my body had awakened. I had forced Huang Xue away because I was terrified the Blood Fox would possess me and make me do something insane.

"Blood-Colored Nine-Tails." Staring at the Talisman Paper on Zichou's forehead, a wave of regret washed over me. When the livestream started, I had been so hyper-focused on entering the dream that I had completely forgotten about the Blood Fox. If only I had asked Daoist master Wan about it beforehand, I wouldn't be trapped in such a passive position now.

The yin energy converged, wrapping around Zichou like chains as thick as a man's arm. He burst into laughter, looking like an evil god wandering the mortal realm as the ugly birthmark on his face stretched at a bizarre angle.

The Blood Talisman on his forehead flared with blinding red light. Driven by his incantations, the grand array, the Blood Talisman, and the chains of yin energy all synchronized. Every preparation was complete. Now, he only needed to wait for the demonic spirit to possess his body, slaughter his enemies, and shatter the dream.

Yet a full five minutes passed, and Zichou remained perfectly still within the array.

"What's going on?"

A moment later, Zichou opened his tightly shut eyes. He squeezed out another drop of lifeblood and smeared it onto the Talisman Paper. "I invite the spirit!"

His actions were exactly the same as before, like a video tape being rewound and played back again.

He repeated the ritual two or three times, yet the spirit he tried to invite refused to possess him. Instead, the Blood Fox Tattoo on my chest radiated an astonishing heat, burning like a branding iron. I glanced down and realized the tattoo was shifting on its own. The Nine-Tailed Blood Fox looked incredibly lifelike!

"I invite the spirit!" I had lost count of how many times Zichou had screamed the phrase. His lifeblood was rapidly depleting. Despite his abundance of pure yin energy, the demonic spirit within the talisman simply refused to show itself.

"How is this possible?" Zichou rolled his eyes upward, trying to look at the Deity-Inviting Talisman on his forehead. All ten of his fingers were drenched in the lifeblood he had gouged out of his own flesh. Looking utterly miserable, his lips trembled. "The Talisman Paper, the steps, the incantations—none of it is wrong. Why won't Xue Zhuo possess me? Is this millennium first fox immortal just a fabricated legend?"

Zichou couldn't accept this reality. He had wasted twenty-seven complete sets of Talisman Paper and nine Infant Spirit Finger Bones, only for the outcome to completely shatter his hopes.

"Did the Deity-Inviting Talisman fail?"

His current condition was incredibly dangerous. Yin energy inflicted immense damage on the flesh of the living. He had surrounded himself with it, waiting for the fox immortal to possess him, consume the yin energy, and then use the spirit's power to sweep aside his enemies.

But the fox immortal never appeared, and now, his own physical body was on the verge of collapsing.

"That has to be a fake Talisman Paper," I said, standing safely outside the grand array. If Zichou's physical body collapsed and he died in the dream, he would face one of two fates. If he was lucky, his consciousness would merely dissipate, and all his previous efforts would wash down the drain. But if he was unlucky, the next time he woke up, he might find himself banished to the Deep Dream Layer.

Hearing my mockery, Zichou flew into a fit of sheer rage. His facial muscles twitched, contorting the birthmark into something even more terrifying.

"Brother!" Realizing something had gone horribly wrong, Zimao rushed over.

"Don't come any closer! The yin energy inside the array has spiraled out of control!" Zichou raised a hand to stop his younger brother from stepping into the formation. His body was visibly deformed by the chains of yin energy, making it obvious he was enduring an agonizing amount of pressure.

These twins were putting on quite the show of brotherly affection right in front of me. It looked touching, but just moments ago, this bastard had been screaming about how he was going to slaughter me. When dealing with someone this dangerous, showing sympathy was out of the question. I needed to kick him while he was down and finish him off for good.

Zichou could tell I wasn't going to play nice. He ordered his brother to stay far away and struggled to control the array alone. "Gao Jian, I've heard Lu Xing mention your name many times. You really aren't some ordinary mortal. The most meticulous plans always suffer unexpected errors the moment you're involved. You've hidden your depths incredibly well!"

"I'm flattered, but it's really just luck," I said, rubbing my nose. In truth, I had a pretty good guess as to why his ritual had failed. A fragment of that Blood-Colored Tailed Fox's soul was resting inside my spirit platform. It seemed it hadn't left those Deity-Inviting Blood Talismans behind for people to summon it. It simply wanted to use them as an opportunity to escape whatever predicament it had been trapped in.

By using a Deity-Inviting Talisman before Zichou, I had essentially stolen his opportunity, making the Blood Fox choose me first.

That was exactly why this awkward situation had occurred. Zichou had prepared everything perfectly—his setup was vastly superior to the one I had haphazardly thrown together at the Bridge No. 3 Crematorium. What a pity he was just one step too late. A single misstep, and the entire game was lost.

He was now thoroughly entangled in yin energy. This pure yin energy was a supreme tonic for demons and evil spirits, but for the living, it was a lethal poison.

If he couldn't find a way to expend that resentment, the yin energy would completely erode him until he turned into a mindless malicious ghost.

Zichou knew this perfectly well. If he wanted to live, he had to discharge all that yin energy and resentment as fast as possible.

"Luck is a form of strength in itself," Zichou said. "Moreover, even with our mastery over fate patterns and divination, we couldn't predict your whereabouts. It's almost as if the heavens themselves are helping you from the shadows."

"Now you're just spouting mystical nonsense. If you want to stall for time, I can play along all day." The longer this dragged on, the closer Zichou marched toward his own death, so I didn't mind waiting at all.

Hearing that, Zichou stared at me intensely. Gnashing his teeth, he emphasized every word. "You are dangerous. You're even more dangerous than Lu Xing claimed!"

He whipped his head around to look at Zimao. "Remember this man's face! Once you get out of here, tell Lu Xing that he is the biggest obstacle to the Buddha Project. If I fail to kill him today, you must eliminate him as quickly as possible!"

Something about his tone felt off. Was this lunatic actually planning to drag me down with him?

"Brother, stop!" Zimao cried out.

"There's no turning back now," Zichou said. He suddenly flicked out a gray talisman that instantly immobilized Zimao's body. Then, he tore the Double-Faced Buddha Pendant from his neck and crushed it in his grip. "Jade shatters and soul returns, instantly achieve Buddhahood on the spot!"

A Buddhist chant rang through the air. Fueled by a desperate final surge of vitality, Zichou managed to forcefully drive the billowing yin energy around him, commanding it like a mighty, reversed river as he charged straight at me.

"Crap! This bastard wants the fish to die and the net to break!" I spun around, grabbed Huang Xue, and sprinted for the stairs.

"You can't escape! Only by killing you today will Zimao be able to report back to Lu Xing!" The birthmark on his face twisted ferociously. Before I could get far, Zichou reversed the grand array. All twenty-seven talismans shattered at once, causing the yin energy within the formation to collide and detonate with a deafening boom!

"Boom!"

It was as if a hurricane had erupted inside the Laboratory Building. The surrounding walls rippled like water, and the Dream Realm itself began to destabilize.

I was Zichou's primary target. Ninety percent of the rampant yin energy surged directly toward me at an impossible speed. There was no way to dodge it.

"Stand behind me!"

I spun back around to face the surging tide of out-of-control yin energy, firmly shielding Huang Xue behind me. "You were forced into this dream and put in danger because of me! As long as I draw breath, I swear I'll protect you!"

Facing the tidal wave of yin energy, I ripped off my shirt, fully exposing the violently agitated Blood Fox Tattoo. "I don't care what kind of spirit you are! Whether you're an evil god or a demonic entity, help me this one time, and I swear I will repay you tenfold in the future!"

My voice resonated through my spirit platform, and a faintly familiar voice echoed in my mind. "Between you and me, such promises are unnecessary."

The moment those words faded, my eyes flushed completely red. Even my pupils brimmed with condensed killing intent and swirling hues of blood.

My lips curled into a smirk, and I softly whispered the words: "I invite the spirit!"

As I raised my arm under the shocked gazes of Zichou and Zimao, drops of fresh blood began to seep from the tailed fox tattoo on my chest. A second later, nine sky-piercing fox tails erupted from my back.

"Xue Zhuo clouds the mortal realm, Nine-Tails cleaves the heavens!"