Chapter 214
Chapter 214
The moment I rushed out of my room, Li Qingying grabbed me in a tight embrace. It was as though she hadn’t slept at all and had been standing guard outside my door the entire time.
“Sister Qingying, let go of me!” I struggled to push her away.
Li Qingying clung to me with all her strength. “Xiao Jiu, it’s not even dawn yet. Why are you awake? Where are you going?”
“I’m going to blow up Qilin Temple!” My emotions were spiraling out of control. “I want to see exactly what’s buried under that so-called Qilin Statue!”
I even suspected that my body from my previous life might be hidden inside the Golden Phoenix beneath their feet.
The Qilin Statue, carrying a hundred children on its back and trampling the Golden Phoenix underfoot, was itself a suppressive Formation.
And beneath it should be the enormous pit I’d seen in my dream — the same one Du Chan had drawn!
They had piled up life after life to build a colossal tomb, using it to pin my body beneath the earth so I could never rise again for all eternity!
Unless that Formation was broken, as long as Tafeng Village continued to exist, I would never escape the shackles of the Symbiotic Curse.
Li Qingying held on to me and forced me back toward my room, pleading nonstop, “Xiao Jiu, you’re probably still half asleep. Let’s go back to bed. Whatever it is, we can deal with it tomorrow.”
Her reaction caught me off guard.
We had been together day and night for so long that I knew her temperament better than anyone.
She might seem easygoing, but her temper was even fiercer than mine. If this had happened under normal circumstances, she would only have been more worked up than I was.
She would have said, “Xiao Jiu, I’ll help you blow up Qilin Temple!”
But today, she was doing everything she could to stop me.
Everything Li Qingying had done since I opened the door was completely out of character. I began to sense that something was wrong.
Before I could question her, someone suddenly knocked on the Pawnshop’s front door.
Then a familiar voice called from outside, “Qingying, open the door.”
I froze.
It was Lord Xiao.
It was only four in the morning. Why had Lord Xiao suddenly come here?
Li Qingying hurried to open the door. Lord Xiao stepped inside, greeted me when he saw me, then took a small porcelain vial from inside his robe and handed it to me.
“Sister-in-law, Seventh Master asked me for this. Keep it safe.”
I accepted the vial and asked, “What’s inside? Medicine?”
Was Liu Junyan sick or injured?
“Dragon Bone Blood,” Lord Xiao replied.
Dragon Bone Blood?!
Liu Junyan and I had discussed the Ice Silkworm before. If the incense blessing of the Buddha Lamp at Great Dharma King Temple failed to hold back the Symbiotic Curse, and I reached the point where I had no choice but to use the Ice Silkworm, he would ask Lord Xiao to procure Dragon Bone Blood for me.
But Dragon Bone Blood had to be fresh.
And I had no intention of using the Ice Silkworm yet.
Besides, once the Ice Silkworm entered my body, I would still have to endure an excruciating fusion process.
Wasn’t it far too early to deliver the Dragon Bone Blood?
Combined with all of Li Qingying’s strange behavior, could it be that Liu Junyan believed we could no longer contain what Qilin Bestows Children had set in motion?
Was this his way of telling me that it was time to use the Ice Silkworm?
Seeing me standing there in a daze, Lord Xiao reminded me, “Take good care of this vial of Dragon Bone Blood. It will stay fresh for seven days, so make sure you use it soon, Sister-in-law. I have other business to attend to, so I’ll be leaving now.”
With that, Lord Xiao departed.
Clutching the porcelain vial, I fixed Li Qingying with a searching stare.
Looking guilty, Li Qingying stammered, “Maybe… maybe Seventh Master just thought it was better to be prepared. I’ll close the door first…”
The moment she turned to shut the door, I strode toward the rear of the compound.
Moving quickly, I crossed the Front Courtyard and entered the Main Hall. I pushed open the door to the West Room and froze again at what I saw.
Du Chan and Jiang Bin, who should have been inside the West Room basking in the incense offerings, were both gone.
Liu Junyan was gone too.
Li Qingying came rushing after me. I spun around and seized her by the shoulders, my voice trembling. “Where are they? What on earth happened? Sister Qingying, you can’t keep this from me!”
Li Qingying parted her lips, but no words came out. Liu Junyan had clearly ordered her not to tell me anything.
I released her and headed for the door.
She hurried after me, grabbing my arm and trying to talk me down.
But how could I possibly remain calm?
Unless something catastrophic had happened, Liu Junyan would never have hidden the truth from me and taken Du Chan and Jiang Bin away.
The only possibility I could think of was that something had happened in Tafeng Village.
If Li Qingying refused to tell me, I wouldn’t force her. I would drive to Tafeng Village myself. Once I got there, everything should become clear.
Before I could step out the door, however, Li Qingying blocked my path.
I could see the deep concern in her eyes as well.
She had never been the sort to cower when something serious happened.
Liu Junyan had put her in a difficult position by ordering her to stay behind and guard me.
Seeing that I had made up my mind, she finally gave in. “They left sometime after two in the morning. Seventh Master said that barring any surprises, you wouldn’t wake up until eight or nine. He told me all I had to do was keep an eye on you.”
I knew something was off. I’d been sleeping lightly lately, so how could I have failed to notice Liu Junyan leave?
Now it seemed Liu Junyan himself had been the reason.
He had plenty of ways to hypnotize me.
But for all his careful planning, he had failed to account for the Symbiotic Curse jolting me awake.
I asked, “What did Liu Junyan and Hui Moqiong decide behind my back?”
“It wasn’t just the two of them. Jiang Sique was involved too,” Li Qingying said. “Actually, the message Old Fifth Hui sent back contained more than the news that Tafeng Village was holding another Fertility Prayer Ritual. There was something else Seventh Master kept from you: Du Lian has been found.”
My brow twitched sharply. “Where did they find her? What condition is she in?”
“Beneath a burial mound in the area where Du Chan’s sketching was interrupted,” Li Qingying said. “But we don’t know exactly what’s under there. Almost all of the Gray Immortal’s people have been watching the Fertility Prayer Ritual in Tafeng Village for the past two days, so the search for Du Lian was temporarily neglected.
“It was only when the other side made a move that Hui Moqiong noticed. They’re preparing for Body Possession.”
So that was what had happened.
I pressed her further. “Then what are Liu Junyan and the others planning to do? Stop the Body Possession?”
Why else would they have taken Du Chan with them?
Li Qingying shook her head. “I wasn’t told the details. My only task was to keep you here.”
If they wanted to stop the Body Possession, Du Chan had to be the key.
Liu Junyan had previously decided to bring Du Chan back to the Pawnshop and use the incense offerings in the West Room to suppress the other side’s influence over her. It had indeed worked.
But that effect was clearly nowhere near strong enough to stop the Body Possession. And now Jiang Sique had become involved.
Jiang Sique was an heir to Occult Embroidery. To slow the effects of Roll Call on Jiang Bin, he had once used yin rubbing, one of the Four Schools of Occult Embroidery, to transfer the characters on the back of Jiang Bin’s neck onto his own body. He had done it in the hope of saving his son.
Jiang Sique had said that yin rubbing could only be used seven times.
And the more times he used it, the more damage he would suffer.
Now Liu Junyan had taken Jiang Sique with him. That could only mean he needed Jiang Sique’s help with an Occult Embroidery technique.
A daring possibility gradually took shape in my mind… Could Liu Junyan be planning to have Jiang Sique remove the name from the back of Du Chan’s neck?
But if they removed it, whose body would they implant it into?
Once the Body Possession began, who could endure the Calamity of Body Possession in Du Chan’s place?