"Kid, want your fortune told? If it isn't accurate, you don't pay."
The old man chuckled at Ye Lin, his mouthful of large yellow teeth giving off an indescribable stench. Even from a distance, Ye Lin could smell that hard-to-describe odor.
"Then, Senior, could you divine how I can leave this place?"
After a moment of silence, Ye Lin finally asked.
"Fine. This old man will cast a reading for you, kid."
Ye Lin had thought the old man would refuse, yet he agreed with startling readiness. A flicker of surprise passed through Ye Lin's eyes.
The old man picked up the broken bowl before him, fumbled in his robes for a long while, and finally produced three black copper coins. He placed them in the bowl, braced both hands against its rim, and began shaking it vigorously.
The coins repeatedly struck the bowl's sides with a clinking rattle. At last, the old man overturned the broken bowl onto the ground. When he lifted it again, three black copper coins lay there.
"Tsk. Fire, wind, earth, water. Qian forms Li; Kun forms fire."
The old man studied the three coins thoughtfully, while Ye Lin held no expectations whatsoever. If the jade butterfly had not vanished in connection with this old man, he would have left long ago.
Fortune-telling? A petty trick only mortals would believe in.
Fortune-telling involved immense karmic consequences. Virtually no cultivator was willing to touch it, for it concerned the secrets of heaven. Each reading consumed one's own blessings and fate.
And what cultivators cared about most were precisely their blessings and fate. Once either was damaged, the path of cultivation ahead would only grow more difficult.
"Kid, the way out is right before your eyes."
At last, the old man's cloudy eyes turned to Ye Lin