Leaving the City to Bury

Unexpectedly, there really was something good—and a rare treasure at that...

Qin Yang rubbed the Blood Jade, a faint smile involuntarily curling at the corners of his mouth.

The Blood Jade was warm and smooth to the touch, not highly translucent, but upon closer inspection, one could see fine, vein-like patterns crisscrossing within, much like capillaries threading through the human body. Held in the hand, a trace of warmth flowed through the entire body, bringing a pleasant sensation.

Those in the know would recognize this item as a Jade Plug, placed in the mouth of the deceased during burial. Some also called it a Jade Cicada, drawing from the cicada's hibernation underground, emerging with the changing seasons to live another life—a symbolic meaning, of course...

Jade Plugs were considered inauspicious, as they sealed the corpse's final breath, and such items were not valuable. But the one in hand, though still a Jade Plug, was vastly different—it was Auspicious Jade, the finest of the finest...

Qin Yang couldn't help but beam with joy. He took out a Sandalwood Box, placed the jade inside, and stowed it away.

When the Ghost Market opened in a few days, he could sell it for a good price—enough to live on for three years from a single sale.

Rubbing his hands, Qin Yang then pulled out the Skill Book he had just obtained.

A blue-covered Skill Book, a low-grade item. He hadn't paid it much attention before, having already opened many like it, but they were all worthless junk.

Things like lock-picking, playing the suona, the Nine Shallow One Deep technique, or even identifying the Eighteen Famous Instruments—strange skills. If this were a historical world, becoming a top-tier brothel manager, scouting talent, and building a world-class pleasure house would be a breeze...

Unfortunately, this was a world of immortal cultivation...

Long ago, Qin Yang had lost interest in white and blue Skill Books. Blue and white never held anything good...

But now, he was starting to reconsider. Those two were cultivators who had built their Dao Foundation—surely they wouldn't drop something as trivial as lock-picking skills...

He took a closer look. On the cover were four large characters: Introduction to Talismans.

After another careful inspection, he confirmed it was indeed about talismans, not talismanic seals.

After a moment's thought, Qin Yang slapped the blue book against his head. With a crisp pop, the book shattered into specks of light that seeped into his mind.

A few moments later, Qin Yang opened his eyes, a hint of joy and surprise on his face.

It really was about talismans. Talismans were divided into talismanic seals, ink talismans, and Cinnabar Talismans. The common kind were talismanic seals, while ink talismans were rare—in Green Forest City, no one had even heard of them. As for the even rarer Cinnabar Talismans, this Introduction to Talismans only mentioned the name without any content.

Thirty-six types of talismanic seals and nine types of ink talismans—all fairly basic...

But the fact that he could access this knowledge was enough to show that old man was no ordinary figure...

After the initial excitement, Qin Yang sighed inwardly. This deal was probably going to be troublesome...

As expected, Foundation Establishment cultivators were never simple...

Though he was still a level-one noob, he had skills. The most basic one was the pickup skill, commonly known as Corpse Touching. Over the past year, he had developed many uses for it.

Corpse Touching to trigger drops was its most basic function. Later, he discovered that any corpse that had been looted—even those who died of plague—would have all resentment dispelled after being touched, becoming an ordinary corpse with no chance of turning into a zombie.

He had also secretly tested it and found that even if the deceased had left behind some means for others to track them, it would be erased. This was why his trouble-relieving business had been able to continue for a year.

But now, having obtained a Skill Book and a Blood Jade, Qin Yang knew that even if these two became the most ordinary corpses, untraceable by secret methods, the people behind them might still use basic tracking clues to investigate...

"Ah, this money won't be easy to earn, and neither will this Skill Book..." Shaking his head with a sigh, Qin Yang dragged two Golden Phoebe coffins out from the adjacent room. The coffin surfaces gleamed with golden light under the sun, golden threads visible, and a faint, elegant fragrance emanated—definitely made from the finest wood...

In his past life, turning one coffin entirely into prayer beads would have set him up for life. But here, one coffin cost at most two First Grade Spirit Stones, and one of those went to the old craftsman for labor...

He bent down and moved the two bodies into the coffins. After being touched, the slightly ferocious expressions on their faces had softened, the smell of blood had vanished, and there was no sign of deathly aura—as if they had been purified by a high monk, leaving only empty shells.

Nailing the coffin lids shut, he stored the coffins in his Storage Bag. Qin Yang turned back into the room, applied mud glue to his face, dripped spirit liquid into his eyes, changed clothes, and put on a wig. With a shake, his stature shrank by three inches, and in the blink of an eye, he looked like a completely different person.

His face was sallow, his eyes cloudy, his body slightly hunched, and his dry white hair exuded a stagnant aura. Anyone would see a short, old man with one foot in the grave, with no connection to Qin Yang.

This was the use of the skills he had unlocked over the past year: disguise, bone shrinking, and Incense Making to mask his aura. Combined, cultivators below Foundation Establishment—even those who knew him well—would never recognize him.

He slipped out through a hidden side door and, in a few steps, merged into the bustling, mixed crowd on the west side of the city. In this place where all walks of life mingled, Qin Yang's appearance was utterly unremarkable.

Following the main road out of the city, the gate guards leaned against the wall, yawning, without sparing Qin Yang a second glance.

Once outside Green Forest City, the land was flat and barren. Gazing into the distance, he could see a chain of mountains shrouded in thin mist. Qin Yang walked along the main road for a short distance before veering off onto a wild path. After about half an hour, a pitch-black forest covered the ridge ahead, deathly silent. On a withered tree beside the path, rows of Black Crows perched, staring at Qin Yang with cold eyes.

These were the Black Crows living in the Green Forest City West Outer Burial Mounds, scavengers that were half-alive, half-dead. They rarely attacked people. Seeing them staring today, Qin Yang chuckled inwardly.

His Incense Making skills had improved significantly—the deathly aura disguised by the fragrance had even fooled these Black Crows...

"I've come to bury the dead, do not disturb." Muttering casually, Qin Yang lit an incense stick and held it before him. Immediately, the Black Crows turned their heads away.

Following the path deeper, he saw a dense forest shrouded in thin mist, dotted with countless graves, faint wails of ghosts echoing from within. Qin Yang walked forward with the incense, and though ghostly shadows flickered in the distance, none paid him any mind.

But halfway there, Qin Yang suddenly stopped in his tracks.