Chapter 399: Relief Troops

Zhao Tianhu, standing outside the house, heard Lu Xiucai's extremely miserable screams. He immediately said to Kui Sanjin, "Sigh, another one gone."

Before Kui Sanjin could speak, a short, dark, chubby man next to him interjected. "Master Kui, a buddy of mine heard he has connections with the Imperial Observatory. Maybe we could..."

"Slap!" Zhao Tianhu slapped him on the head. "Don't you know what business we're in? We're grave robbers! And you dare to involve the Imperial Observatory?! Do you want to provoke them and get us all slaughtered?"

The short, dark, chubby man, covering his mouth, retreated into the crowd, feeling wronged. "They're not constables; they don't oversee us grave robbers..."

Zhao Tianhu's eyes narrowed. "If worst comes to worst, we'll just abandon this funerary object. We've hired so many people; we've done all we can for Old Fourth."

As soon as he said this, the people around him grew anxious. "Master Zhao, we can't give up on it! That thing could transform Old Fourth like that; it must be a treasure belonging to a master!"

"Exactly! Even if we don't dare to use it, selling it to someone would fetch a fortune!"

"Hey! Master Zhao! I also heard those masters possess elixirs of immortality! We could trade this evil skin for it!"

"What nonsense! Shut up!" Zhao Tianhu's command instantly silenced the others.

"If you're so capable, go and peel off that strange, evil skin from Old Fourth! Whoever gets it off can have it! But do you dare?"

"Do you think I don't know it's a treasure? But this thing we dug up kills people! Old Fourth and Old Sixth both fell victim; how many lives do you have to spare?"

"That's it then! Seal up all the doors and windows. We'll leave at daybreak to avoid being targeted by the authorities again."

Upon hearing this, the others dared not speak further and prepared to follow his orders.

"Ahhh!!!" Lu Xiucai's screams once again echoed from inside the house.

"Oh?!" A hint of joy appeared on Zhao Tianhu's face. "He's not dead yet! It seems there's hope this time. Wait, don't rush, let's wait a bit longer!"

"Ahhh!" Lu Xiucai, clutching copper coins, frantically circled the bedroom, screaming hysterically. Behind him, a long, slender neck topped with a dishevelled head twisted and writhed like a snake, chasing him.

The sight of the contorted corpses with knotted limbs made Lu Xiucai run for his life with all his might, terrified of meeting the same fate.

Seeing himself cornered with nowhere to go, Lu Xiucai gritted his teeth. As the head flew towards him, he frantically raised the copper coins, forcing the head back half a step.

"It's okay, it's okay! This thing is afraid of copper coins!" Lu Xiucai gasped for breath, continuously reassuring himself.

Sweating profusely from running, he finally had a moment to see what that thing was.

It was a person, or rather, it might have been a person before. Its neck and limbs had become extremely long, twisting and writhing in the air like snakes.

On the creature's chest was a piece of moldy skin, seemingly stitched together from several facial and scalp skins. The neat ordination scars indicated that the original owners of these skins were monks.

The monks' facial features were sewn shut with threads, and their foreheads and cheeks were covered with ambiguous Sanskrit writings, making the already eerie skin even more unsettling.

With every movement of the creature, the monks' facial features would twist as if being stretched.

"Is that human skin? Is it this skin that allows the head to stretch so long?" In this moment of crisis, Lu Xiucai's mind raced.

He no longer cared what it was; the most important thing now was to escape this cursed place. He truly couldn't handle this.

Staring at the snake-like twisting heads and hands before him, Lu Xiucai thought for a moment, then forcefully pushed the five copper coins in his hand forward.

Seeing them suddenly recoil, Lu Xiucai quickly held the copper coins high. He slowly moved towards the window, and once he reached it, he began repeatedly striking the wooden frame with his elbows.

Just as he was about to burst through the window to escape, it was suddenly pushed inward from the outside, sending him tumbling head over heels.

When he scrambled to his feet, his own head was just inches away from the dishevelled head of the creature.

Staring at the monster before him, Lu Xiucai's breath nearly stopped.

Just as the head in front of him suddenly opened its mouth and lunged to bite him, a blinding flash of light shot from near his left shoulder, striking the head directly.

Hair and flesh melted away, leaving only a ghastly white skull that rolled onto the floor.

Without its head, the figure draped in human skin instantly went limp, appearing utterly dead.

Sensing the death of its host, the monk's scalp suddenly detached from the corpse and lunged towards Lu Xiucai like a tattered rag.

At this critical moment, with a "swoosh," a wooden pole shot forth, impaling the moving human skin to the ground.

A dumbfounded Lu Xiucai looked up along the pole and saw a white banner hanging from it. Besides the yin-yang taiji symbol at the top, there were six characters written below.

If Lu Xiucai had been literate, he would have understood that the six characters meant: fortune-telling, character analysis, and destiny reading.

"Oh, my poor luck has lasted for so many days, but today I've finally encountered something good." Blind Chen, who had previously made a deal with Li Huowang, felt his way around, reaching for the white banner that served as his signboard.

He walked over, stepped on the banner with both feet, and then pulled it out.

Lu Xiucai, who had been stunned, finally came to his senses upon seeing the blind old man with a bamboo basket on his back, bending down to caress the moving human skin with fondness. He quickly scrambled to his feet.

"Esteemed master, thank you for your help just now."

Blind Chen seemed not to hear. He first wrapped the human skin in a black cloth, then pulled out a mirror—the very Bagua mirror Li Huowang had returned to him.

Outside, Zhao Tianhu, Kui Sanjin, and the others had all gathered by the window, looking inside with surprise and curiosity.

They had witnessed what just happened and wondered about this blind man's origins, astonished by his power.

Blind Chen, with the Bagua mirror tucked under his arm, tapped the ground with the white banner as he walked towards the window. "Why are you all blocking the way? Isn't it crowded? Step back a bit."

Seeing that the blind man seemed ready to climb out the window, the people outside retreated a few steps but didn't go far. They formed a semicircle around the window, as their skins were still in his bamboo basket.

"Ah, that's better." Blind Chen, with a solemn expression, immediately took a horse stance. He held the Bagua mirror flat in his left hand, while his right hand formed a hand seal and drew something on the mirror's surface, as he began to chant softly.

Lu Xiucai, watching from the side, felt a flicker of longing in his eyes. The blind man before him exuded such an otherworldly aura; he wished he could be like that someday.

And that Bagua mirror in his hand—it clearly looked like a powerful magical artifact used for subduing demons. He wondered how much it would cost to buy one.

As Lu Xiucai was thinking this, Blind Chen's chanting intensified.

The chanting stopped, and Blind Chen immediately raised the Bagua mirror and shone it towards the people outside.

"Boundless Universe, Righteous Law of Heaven and Earth!"

An extremely dazzling light shot out from the mirror, piercing through everyone's bodies like spears.

Amidst desperate screams, everyone outside the window was reduced to a puddle of red goo by the Bagua mirror in Blind Chen's hand.