Yellow Emperor? King in Yellow!

"I feel a long-lost sense of excitement and thrill. My past life was truly too boring, repeating almost the same things every day. Even when there were changes, they were just another form of repetition! Repeating school, repeating classes, I could even foresee the future being the same—repeating work! That kind of life was just too dull!" Lu Li's expression was agitated, then seeing the silent Puppet, he shook his head and said, "You are not me; you wouldn't understand."

"You could have clearly hidden inside the temple and waited for me to arrive. Do you know you almost... you almost threw away your own life and the hope of my Master?" the Puppet suddenly said with agitation, looking at Lu Li as if he were a madman.

"Yes, I could have hidden, but for one, I was delayed by something, and for two, why should I hide? Isn't this matter very interesting?" Lu Li didn't care about the Puppet's accusations and said earnestly, "I will not refuse any interesting thing, just like how I knew you were calculating against me all along, yet I still followed your arrangements!"

"...Fine, regardless, as long as you can return to reality and give this to my Master, I will be grateful for your great kindness." This time, the Puppet had completely dropped the honorifics, her tone filled with coldness; she suddenly felt that this person, Lu Li, was truly too dangerous!

With the Puppet's support, Lu Li stood up and limped toward the temple. Because his left hand was gone and the bones in his right hand were broken, Lu Li had to use his head to push open the temple door. As he stepped inside, he felt the temptation emanating from the so-called treasure ahead.

The Puppet immediately walked into the temple, the teardrops on her face a bewitching red. She hurried to the altar, opened a secret compartment, and took out a box. Her wooden face full of joy, she opened it and took out a piece of cinnabar missing a corner. This cinnabar was cut into a rectangular strip, with several large characters carved on one side: [Cinnabar Talisman of Soul Return].

On the back of this cinnabar, there was also a row of small characters carved: [A single spark can burn all things; if the object perishes, where does the fire remain? A single breath of the Dao can extinguish all things; if the object perishes, where does the Dao reside? ...]

"It's wonderful, this thing is still here, Master..." The Puppet cheered, her small wooden hands clutching the Cinnabar Talisman of Soul Return tightly. Strange fluctuations spread throughout the temple, and the Puppet's actions became increasingly abnormal. Clutching the Cinnabar Talisman of Soul Return, she was full of fantasies, relying on it to become human, to revive her Master, and for the two of them to live a happy life. Yet, in this happy dream, she failed to notice that the revived Old Man had already turned into a living Corpse Ghost, suffering in agony every day...

The next moment, the Puppet stopped her fantasies, casting all those strange matters to the back of her mind. She turned to look at Lu Li, who was smiling indifferently and leaning against the doorframe to keep from falling: "I need you to take this thing into reality!"

The teardrops at the corners of the Puppet's eyes were terrifyingly red, yet increasingly beautiful. This beauty was like a poison, alluring and dangerous. A strange atmosphere surged here, yet all this movement lurked in places invisible to human observation.

The Puppet placed the cinnabar block into Lu Li's pocket, and a new notification appeared in the prompt box:

[Side Quest: Source of Corpse Ghosts completed, obtained 500 Game Points!]

[Obtained Seven Chapters of the Mysterious Monarch: Cinnabar Talisman of Soul Return (Fragmented)]

[Item Description: From the secret manual Seven Chapters of the Mysterious Monarch. There are seven volumes in total, each recording one or more types of incantations. The Cinnabar Talisman of Soul Return comes from the first volume, which describes the achievements of the Yellow Emperor and the resurrection technique he invented—the Cinnabar Talisman of Soul Return!]

[Ability Description: Capable of resurrecting corpses into complete biological entities. Holding this talisman allows one to control them. Cinnabar stripped from the talisman can awaken the life of dead objects...]

[Usage Method: Holding, consuming, or using as pigment, etc...]

[Item Evaluation: This thing can truly resurrect the dead. As for the effect... well, whoever uses it will know! Or perhaps you should go ask the Corpse Ghost?]

"Are you really that confident in handing it to me?" Lu Li asked the Puppet, his whole body leaning against the doorframe in a lazy posture.

"Young Master will do as I say, won't you? Didn't you just say you wouldn't refuse any interesting thing?" The Puppet looked indifferent. Perhaps to her, as long as she could save the Old Man, everything was worth it.

"Perhaps!" Lu Li shook his head nonchalantly and continued to ask: "This was all planned, wasn't it? Ever since I appeared, you had this plan!"

"Yes, that's right!" The Puppet nodded in admission: "Even though this temple's defensive power was greatly reduced because the Buddha Head was stolen, it was still not something I could reach. That Buddha statue is actually the hub of this place. Even though it was turned into a demon by the talisman, as long as the statue exists, even if the Buddha Head is lost, the temple's defensive power would be greatly enhanced, and we wouldn't even be able to discover it."

"So you led me to the Headless Buddha, using my trait of being able to use fire to destroy it! Only then did you discover the location of this temple?" Although Lu Li's words were a question, his tone was entirely certain.

"Correct. Although I am not very afraid of fire due to special reasons, I also cannot get too close because of my own material composition. You came just in time!" The Puppet acted as if she would answer whatever he asked.

"Furthermore, a temple is a building, symbolizing protection and warding off all ghosts and monsters, so I didn't have much confidence in being able to enter. The original plan was to connect with the talisman inside the temple to force an attack, but with you, everything was no problem, and even the best method to take the talisman out was found!"

"Then how were you originally planning to take it out?" Lu Li let his curiosity run wild, inquiring about all the suspicious points.

"By using a Corpse Ghost, implanting the talisman into the body of the Corpse Ghost. Although some of it would be absorbed, and retrieving it would be dangerous and uncontrollable, I truly had no other way at the time!" the Puppet replied. The teardrops at the corners of her eyes were made from the missing piece of the talisman. In the original plan, to complete herself, the talisman implanted in the Corpse Ghost would instinctively drive the Corpse Ghost to search for the Puppet. Whether she could obtain the talisman afterward would depend on fate. This plan was full of loopholes, but at that time, she truly had no other way.

As the two talked, that eerie atmosphere continued to surge. Lu Li acted as if he had noticed nothing, as if he didn't know what the Puppet was doing.

"One last question!" Lu Li said: "Why do you know so much?"

"Because I have come into contact with the source of this talisman and obtained a lot of information about it!" Because of the teardrops at the corners of her eyes, the Puppet had once had a distant contact with that existence and obtained quite a bit of information.

"The source existence?" Lu Li's heart stirred, thinking of the talisman's information. It said the Cinnabar Talisman of Soul Return was invented by the Yellow Emperor. Could the Yellow Emperor still be alive? That would be too subversive to history!

"That's right, that existence said, He is known as: The King in Yellow!"