71: Following the trail of the demon

Achan Pu suffered a severe backlash. When he fled the hotel where he was temporarily staying in a panic, it was not yet dawn.

Forcing his body, which felt like it was falling apart, he used his last bit of cash to flag down a passing freight truck. Claiming he had a sudden illness, he stuffed a few crumpled bills into the driver's hand, asking to be taken out of Lianhua County.

The truck bumped along the road and brought him to a remote small town called Shiquan Town. Achan Pu didn't dare stay in a regular hotel anymore. Enduring the intense pain, he found an abandoned brick kiln on the outskirts of the town and crawled inside.

The brick kiln was cold and damp, filled with the smell of dust and animal droppings. Achan Pu sat slumped in a corner, coughing violently. Every cough brought a tearing pain through his body, and dark red blood foam kept spilling from the corners of his mouth.

Trembling, he fumbled several small bottles of strange colors out of a pouch he kept close to his body. He haphazardly swallowed and applied the viscous or foul-smelling liquids and powders, barely suppressing some of his injuries. However, the weakness and chaos caused by his damaged Foundation were not something these mortal medicines could resolve.

"Golden Light of Merit... such overbearing Golden Light of Merit..." Achan Pu's eyes were unfocused, filled with fear and resentment. "What exactly is that Taoist's background? So young, yet where did he get such profound Karma? Could he be a seed secretly cultivated by the Central Plains Daoist Sects?"

He was completely baffled. In his understanding, the accumulation of the power of Karma was never the work of a single day. It required performing great deeds, accumulating great virtue, and having pure thoughts, manifesting as protection only after years and months. Li Muchen was only in his early twenties; even if he had started doing good from his mother's womb, it would still be too astonishing.

"I miscalculated... I've lost big this time..."

Achan Pu felt the sinister Qi in his body almost dissipating, and his heart bled. Not only did the mission fail, and he wouldn't get the huge reward promised by Release Void, but his years of cultivation were ruined. Without more than ten years of bitter cultivation and a large amount of evil resources to supplement him, recovery was simply impossible.

"Release Void... it's all that idiot's fault!" He turned his resentment toward Release Void. "Saying he was just a young Taoist who knew a bit of magic and would be easy to deal with... Bah! He's killed me!"

At this moment, he only wanted to leave China as soon as possible and return to his Nanyang lair to lick his wounds. But when he thought of the massive benefits Release Void had promised—helping him secretly spread his teachings and develop followers in Jin Province after the task was done—he felt somewhat unwilling. More importantly, he was now penniless and heavily injured; trying to escape back to Nanyang on his own would be harder than reaching the heavens.

"I must first contact Release Void, make him give me money, and arrange for my departure..."

Achan Pu made up his mind and struggled to fumble an old black phone without any brand markings from his robes. This was his encrypted device for one-way contact with Release Void.

However, when the call was made, only a cold prompt came through: "The user you have dialed is powered off."

Achan Pu's heart sank. He dialed several times in a row, but it was always the same.

"Bastard! Trying to burn the bridge after crossing it?!" He was so angry he almost threw the phone, but he forced himself to hold back. Release Void turning off his phone meant either something had happened to him, or... he had sensed the mission's failure and wanted to cut ties.

A deeper chill rose from his heart. If Release Void really abandoned him, in his current state, let alone leaving China, even hiding in this small town could lead to exposure at any time.

"No... I can't just sit and wait for death." A ruthless glint flashed in Achan Pu's eyes. "I have to find a way to get some money, at least to leave this ghost of a place first..."

He turned his gaze toward the faint lights of the distant town outside the brick kiln. A malicious thought began to sprout in his mind.

Qingfeng Temple.

Since the night of the curse counterattack, Li Muchen had strengthened his Spiritual Sense monitoring of the temple and the surrounding mountain forests. He didn't immediately set out with great fanfare to track down that Nanyang Sorcerer, but instead, like a silent hunter, he waited patiently for any traces the opponent might leave behind, or... the next move.

At the same time, he also began to work on another matter—reinforcing the earth vein protection of Yuntai Mountain.

Last time, when dealing with the Nanyang Sorcerer's curse, although the Golden Light of Merit had performed a great service, it also made Li Muchen realize that passive defense was not the best strategy when facing these treacherous and sinister long-range evil techniques.

The opponent was hidden in the shadows, with endless and unpredictable methods. He had to turn the temple and even the entire Yuntai Mountain into a more stable "Daoist Field" that was difficult for external evils to invade.

His reliance was that earth vein suppression talisman he had obtained from the sign-in System, which he had already partially refined and could resonate with the earth veins of Yuntai Mountain.

This afternoon, Li Muchen went alone to a quiet mountain hollow in the back of the mountain. This place was one of the intersections of several small Spiritual Veins on Yuntai Mountain; the terrain was hidden, and the energy field was relatively peaceful. He chose a flat green stone to sit cross-legged and took out the warm, jade-like earth vein suppression talisman.

As soon as the Talisman plate was in his hand, a heavy warmth faintly connected to the ground beneath his feet was transmitted.

Li Muchen closed his eyes slightly and slowly injected his pure True Essence into the suppression Talisman. At the same time, his Spiritual Sense sank into the ground, spreading out like tree roots, carefully sensing the direction of Yuntai Mountain's earth veins, the flow nodes of Spiritual Qi, and those places that were slightly sluggish or weak due to the passage of time or human interference.

His Peak Foundation Establishment cultivation, combined with his preliminary control over the earth vein suppression talisman, allowed him to do things he couldn't accomplish before—not simply activating the Talisman's protective power, but attempting to use the Talisman as a hub and his own True Essence and Divine Sense as fuses to preliminarily "regulate" the local earth vein Qi of Yuntai Mountain.

This process was extremely slow and mentally taxing. He needed to adjust his own Divine Thought and the fluctuations of the earth vein Spiritual Qi to the same frequency, cautiously guiding, clearing, and reinforcing them, like a skilled physician taking the pulse and performing acupuncture on the earth.

Time passed bit by bit. The setting sun moved westward, dyeing the mountain hollow with a layer of warm gold. Fine beads of sweat broke out on Li Muchen's forehead, but his expression was focused and calm, his breathing long and deep, as if he were breathing in unison with the entire mountain.

With the continuous injection of his True Essence and the detailed guidance of his Divine Sense, the earth vein suppression talisman in his hand began to emit an increasingly bright earthy-yellow light. The light was not dazzling but appeared warm and heavy. The light rippled out from him like water waves, seeping into the rocks and soil beneath his feet.

Gradually, starting from this mountain hollow, the earth vein Spiritual Qi within a few miles began to undergo subtle changes. Some originally blocked small Spiritual Vein nodes were quietly pushed open by an invisible force; several places where the flow of earth Qi had been slightly damaged due to small-scale quarrying in the early years received gentle repair and guidance; the overall flow of the earth vein Spiritual Qi became smoother and a bit thicker.

Although the changes were extremely subtle and limited in scope, far from reaching the level of "moving mountains and changing veins," they provided subtle benefits for the stability of the mountain's energy field and the nourishment of Spiritual Qi. Most importantly, through the suppression Talisman and his own True Essence, Li Muchen had left a stable "anchor" and "regulator" in the earth veins here.

If any external evil tried to attack or disturb Yuntai Mountain from the earth vein level in the future, it would first trigger this node, allowing him to sense it immediately and use the power of the earth veins for more effective defense or counterattack.

"Whew..."

After an unknown amount of time, Li Muchen slowly exhaled a breath of turbid Qi and opened his eyes. The light in his eyes showed slight fatigue, but deeper within, there was a hint of satisfaction.

He opened his palm; the light of the earth vein suppression talisman had already faded, but the Talisman's body had become warmer and more translucent, and its connection with the ground beneath his feet also seemed a bit tighter.

"I've finally finished clearing and reinforcing the first node."

He whispered to himself. Clearing all the major earth vein nodes of the entire Yuntai Mountain was definitely not a short-term task; it might take months or even longer. But the success of this first step was of great significance.

He stood up, stretched his somewhat stiff limbs, and with a slight movement of his Spiritual Sense, he could clearly feel that a more stable, thick, and faintly connected earth Qi field had formed with this mountain hollow as the center. Any sinister or chaotic Qi not belonging to Yuntai Mountain itself would find it difficult to hide upon entering this area.

This was the first "geographical advantage" defense line he had constructed for himself and the temple.

Just as he was about to return to the temple, his Spiritual Sense suddenly captured an extremely weak and intermittent "prayer" fluctuation.

That fluctuation did not come from the pilgrims on the mountain, nor from the villagers of Zhaojiaao Village, but from... the southeast, about a hundred miles away from Yuntai Mountain, a place he had no impression of. The fluctuation was filled with fear, helplessness, and a kind of prayer bordering on despair. The object was not a specific god or Buddha, but more like an instinctive cry for "possible help from the unknown."

What caught Li Muchen's attention even more was that this prayer fluctuation was faintly mixed with an extremely thin but familiar... cold, evil Qi.

It came from the same source as the curse power from that night!

"Found you?" Li Muchen's eyes narrowed. With a flash of his body, he had already glided out of the mountain hollow like a ghost, returning to Qingfeng Temple in a few leaps.

He didn't disturb anyone. Returning to his quiet room, he took out a blank yellow Talisman paper, bit his fingertip, and quickly began to draw with cinnabar mixed with True Essence. This time, he was not drawing an attack or defense Talisman, but a special "tracking talisman"—using that captured special fluctuation containing prayer and evil Qi as a guide to trace its source.

The Talisman was completed, a flash of blood light appeared, but it was not activated. It lay quietly on the tabletop, the cinnabar patterns on the Talisman paper faintly pointing toward the southeast.

Li Muchen did not hesitate. He tucked the tracking talisman into his robes, changed into a set of dark cloth clothes suitable for movement, and quietly went down the mountain.