Thousand Dusts Ferry Me - Chapter 16

On this night of July 15th, the night when hundreds of ghosts roamed, Guangling City’s evening was much colder than usual. People closed their doors early, afraid they might disturb the wandering spirits on the streets.

Changming Street, where Mingyue Tower stood, was even more deserted, with few homes showing any lights.

This street was originally mostly occupied by merchants, but due to Mingyue Tower being haunted, some had moved away, others had sold their houses, and those who remained were only staying temporarily until they found somewhere else to go.

The wind was strong tonight, making the trees rustle loudly. Two or three owls hooted occasionally, their calls resembling the malicious laughter of something unclean.

Perhaps sensing tonight’s unrest, even ghosts avoided the vicinity of Changming Street.

Directly across from Mingyue Tower was a closed silk shop. On its roof, facing the direction of Mingyue Tower, four people sat in a neat row.

“Senior Sister, would you like some pine nuts?” Fu Xue pulled out a bulging pouch and shook it.

“I’ll have some,” Yun Qing reached out her hand toward her.

Cheng Suiyan, finding it amusing, also extended his hand. “Give me some too.”

Jiang Baiyu heard the continuous crackling sounds of pine nuts being cracked open around him and vaguely felt as if he had entered a rat nest.

He tugged at the corner of his mouth impatiently, yet Yun Qing insisted on tormenting him further, offering a handful of pine nuts to him, “Baiyu, have some too.”

“I don’t want any.”

His knotted brows looked rather comical, so Yun Qing teased him, “No, you must eat some.”

“Why?”

“Not eating makes you stand out from the group.”

Jiang Baiyu reluctantly accepted the pine nuts, then quickly pointed at Mingyue Tower to divert her attention. “Look, a monster!”

Yun Qing perked up and looked intently in the direction he was pointing, straining to see.

Fu Xue and Cheng Suiyan also stared in that direction with gleaming eyes. The three nearly burned a hole in the air with their intense gaze.

Only when they heard Jiang Baiyu’s muffled laughter did they realize they had been tricked—there was nothing there at all.

Yun Qing exclaimed, “How dare you! You’ve learned to play tricks on people so quickly!” She made a gesture as if drawing her sword.

Jiang Baiyu laughed as he dodged, saying, “Evil company corrupts good morals.” While dodging, he “accidentally” spilled the pine nuts onto the roof.

Fu Xue suddenly pushed Yun Qing, “They’re here, they’ve arrived.”

Zhou Shitan and Luo Shuilan walked into Mingyue Tower’s courtyard. After exchanging a few words, they began drawing symbols with cinnabar on the bluestone slabs in the yard.

First, they drew a larger symbol, then using this as the center, they drew eight smaller, different symbols in the eight directions around it.

Cheng Suiyan asked, “What are they drawing?”

Fu Xue explained, “They’re setting up a Spirit-Trapping Formation. When the nightmare demon appears, they can use this formation to trap it for a while. As for how long it can hold, that depends on the cultivators’ skill level. As for the formation these two are setting up…”

She shook her head and sighed like an old scholar, “I’m not optimistic.”

“But how do they make the nightmare demon appear?”

“Watch and you’ll see.”

Cheng Suiyan didn’t dare blink, afraid he would miss something important.

They saw Zhou Shitan take out a fist-sized jade-green porcelain bottle, remove the stopper, and wispy strands of light green smoke slowly drifted up from the bottle’s mouth.

The smoke seemed to contain thousands of tiny, scattered stars, making the smoke emit a phosphorescent glow that flowed as the smoke rose.

He asked curiously, “What is that?”

“It’s called Essence-Concentrating Dew. Similar substances include Yin-Concentrating Dew, Emotion-Concentrating Dew, and so on. The production methods vary between different sects, but the principle is the same.”

Cheng Suiyan asked, “What principle?”

Fu Xue explained, “Different spiritual beings are naturally attracted to different energies, just as cats like fish and dogs like meat. Do you understand?”

“I understand. What next?”

Fu Xue swayed her head like a student reciting a lesson, “Immortals like pure energy, demons like turbid energy, humans like vital energy, ghosts like yin energy, spirits like emotional energy, monsters like essence energy… Naturally, all beings are attracted to spiritual energy.”

“Yes, and then?”

“So, this Essence-Concentrating Dew is made by condensing essence energy, with the purpose of attracting monsters to reveal themselves.”

“I see,” Cheng Suiyan was pleased to have learned something new. His mind broaden and he asked, “If pure energy or spiritual energy were condensed into smoke, wouldn’t that attract immortals?”

Yun Qing laughed, “This little trick can only attract beings with no spiritual consciousness or very low spiritual consciousness. It can’t even fool humans, let alone immortals.”

Zhou Shitan placed the Essence-Concentrating Dew at the center of the Spirit-Trapping Formation, on top of the largest symbol, after which the two began chanting incantations together.

Under the moonlight, the Essence-Concentrating Dew gradually rose and dispersed, its glow merging with the air, forming the shape of wind.

Yun Qing found it somewhat strange and asked Jiang Baiyu, “Does your Huayang Sect need to chant incantations when releasing Essence-Concentrating Dew? Surely you’re not inferior to our Longzhou Sect?”

Jiang Baiyu shook his head, “No need.”

“Then what are they chanting?”

Cheng Suiyan guessed, “Could it be related to the Spirit-Trapping Formation?”

Yun Qing firmly denied this, “Impossible. The monster hasn’t even appeared yet; they can’t activate the formation now.”

The monster still didn’t appear.

Zhou Shitan and Luo Shuilan continued to chant with their eyes closed. Being too far away, Yun Qing couldn’t hear clearly what they were saying, but she could see their foreheads covered in sweat, clearly struggling.

Yun Qing felt increasingly that something was wrong.

Suddenly, Zhou Shitan’s figure wavered, and at the same time, Luo Shuilan violently spat out a mouthful of fresh blood!

“This is bad!” Yun Qing exclaimed in alarm, getting up and rushing toward Mingyue Tower.

The other three also stood up and followed.

The two locations were only diagonally opposite each other, and they arrived like a gust of wind.

Zhou Shitan and Luo Shuilan lay motionless on the ground, their blood vessels bulging black throughout their bodies, eyes wide open and faces filled with terror, looking as if they had died in shock.

Yun Qing crouched down to check for breath, then shook her head at the others, “They’re dead.”

Cheng Suiyan said incredulously, “So quickly?”

The night wind howled through the courtyard, sounding like ghostly wails. A loquat leaf was carried by the wind and landed on Cheng Suiyan’s shoulder. Thinking he was under attack, he jerked to the side.

This movement nearly caused him to bump into Jiang Baiyu, whose attention was focused on the corpses and didn’t notice.

Cheng Suiyan turned to apologize to him with a “sorry.” The two were quite close at this moment, and Cheng Suiyan suddenly sniffed and asked Jiang Baiyu, “What’s that smell on you?”

He leaned in, wanting to get closer.

Jiang Baiyu silently raised his steel sword, touching the hilt to Cheng Suiyan’s nose bridge, which made him stop.

Fu Xue said, “Can the monster kill them instantly without even revealing itself? How powerful must this monster be? Senior Sister, perhaps we should…” Run?

Yun Qing shook her head without speaking, pulled open Luo Shuilan’s upper garment, and thrust her sword toward his chest.

Cheng Suiyan couldn’t bear to watch and whispered, “Although they offended you before, they’re already dead. There’s no need to desecrate their bodies…”

Jiang Baiyu shook his head, “You misunderstand.”

“What do you mean?”

“She’s checking if his heart is intact.”

Yun Qing maintained a solemn expression, her sword hand extremely steady as the tip pierced the skin and slowly sank in. After probing with the sword tip for a moment, she withdrew it and nodded to the others.

Jiang Baiyu said, “His heart has shattered into bloody pieces.”

Cheng Suiyan asked, “What does that indicate?”

“Blood flowing backward, heart vessels bursting—these are symptoms of backlash. They weren’t killed directly by a monster but died from backlash.”

Fu Xue sighed with relief, “So that means there’s no monster here?”

“Not necessarily. The Essence-Concentrating Dew was opened after all.” Yun Qing stood up, made a hand sign to clean her sword, then looked around.

The silver-white full moon hung like a glass lamp in the deep blue sky. Under its light, everything was silent except for the tireless howling of the night wind.

The wind disturbed the loquat tree, causing its leaves to flip and dance wildly. One leaf, like countless people in this world swept up by fate, flew helplessly into the distance.

It flew over high walls, over layers of blue tiles, and onto a rooftop.

A small white, fluffy, round paw pressed down on it.

The paw’s owner was completely black, with only four snow-white feet. Its pure black fur almost merged with the night, and its emerald eyes were like two ghost fires in the wilderness.

The black cat sat elegantly and properly, watching everything happening at Mingyue Tower like a spectator, coldly commenting, “Fools.”

It then turned and silently jumped off the roof, disappearing into the moonlight.

At the spot it left behind remained half a piece of dried meat.