The Fiery Buddha Cultivates Oneself, Xin Sa Mu Mo

The technique in the latter section, titled the "Incense Burner Spirit Nourishing Method," was more suited to his requirements and offered the convenience of rapid mastery.

This method was distinctly different from the "Five-Child Peach-Plucking Method," which required hunting for infant corpses to plant peach trees. The "Incense Burner Spirit Nourishing Method" required zombies—and the more ferocious the zombie, the better.

As the saying goes, when a corpse is left to rot and is not laid to rest in the earth or is buried in the wrong place, it transforms into Baleful Intent. The "Incense Burner Spirit Nourishing Method" specifically seeks out these fierce corpses, refining them through secret rituals to produce a spiritual incense from the resulting ashes, known as "Death Longevity Incense."

This spiritual incense extracts the yin-life and death-longevity of the fierce corpse. When a cultivator inhales it, they invert yin and yang, transforming death into life, thereby extending their own existence by a hundred days.

Furthermore, the more ferocious the Baleful Intent of the corpse used to refine the Death Longevity Incense, the greater the amount of yin-longevity gained.

Of course, this method does not increase one's actual yang-longevity, nor does it provide any benefit to the path of cultivation. It is merely a way to borrow yin-debt to stave off death, granting a person a little more time to linger in this world.

"Moreover, the Incense Burner Spirit Nourishing Method has its drawbacks. Once this method is employed, there are many taboos. For instance, one cannot consume the meat of the six domestic animals, nor can one eat anything that flies in the sky or swims in the water. As for daily drinking water, one cannot drink raw water; it must be boiled with gold and iron before it can be consumed. Every ten days, one must consume the blood of a Black Wind Snake at a set time..."

Refining this "Death Longevity Incense" is no easy task, and zombies are not exactly easy to come by. Fortunately, He Ping had discovered a female corpse in the ancestral hall that had already sprouted white fur. He only needed to find a site of yin-corpse ground to nurture it for a period of time to refine it into a white-furred corpse-baleful.

"If I could take it a step further and refine a white-baleful into a black-baleful, the effect of the Death Longevity Incense would be significantly stronger, capable of extending life by two hundred days."

Two hundred days of yin-longevity, even if it could not replace the blood, energy, and essence brought by his own yang-longevity, would still grant him a bit of breathing room.

He Ping set down his black umbrella, sat back in his chair, and slowly closed his eyes to contemplate.

"I'll set aside the matter of the Death Longevity Incense for now. The Black Stone Bodhisattva I found in that formation eye is more troublesome. That thing is quite eerie; I didn't expect it to nearly cause trouble after I brought it home."

He had found the Eyeless Bodhisattva statue, which served as the suppression object, within the formation eye of the ancestral hall. After he had applied seals to it and brought it back, he had hidden it in this very room.

In recent days, many of the handymen, servants, and even family members in the He Mansion had been plagued by a strange dream after falling into a deep sleep at night.

In the dream, an eyeless old monk would appear before their beds, his hands forming a strange mudra, his mouth incessantly chanting a passage of scripture.

In less than three short days, this matter had gradually stirred up a minor commotion within the He Mansion.

Many of the servants in the He Mansion felt panicked, though fortunately, the rules of the He Family had always been strict, so no major chaos had ensued.

According to the descriptions of those in the He Mansion, the dream was bizarre and eerie, and most strangely, everyone had dreamt nearly the same thing.

—It was a ragged, filthy old monk whose wrinkled face was so creased it could almost crush a fly.

This old monk gave off a feeling of extreme age, radiating a heavy, rotting aura of death. His skin was sallow and covered in age spots... In the dream, his withered face squeezed out a faint smile.

That expression, where the skin moved but the eyes did not, was filled with a deathly stillness.

Such an eerie old monk would appear at the bedside of the dreamer, his hands forming a seal, his mouth chanting.

"Fire Buddha Repairs One, Heart Bodhisattva Om Hum!!"

—Fire Buddha Repairs One, Heart Bodhisattva Om Hum.

He Ping recalled this and furrowed his brows slightly.

He had never heard of this incantation, nor did he understand its meaning, but the fact that so many people in the He Mansion had shared the same dream proved that this matter was not simple.

"This strange dream must be caused by that stone statue. I have already had a craftsman make a sealable iron box, coated the outer layer with lead, applied two layers of blood-curse seals using the secret method of the 'Eight Element Bone Locking Method,' and bound it with chains to be sunk into a deep pool outside the city. I expect that with this, there should be no further issues."

After dealing with the stone statue, he issued an order to everyone in the He Mansion, strictly forbidding them from revealing the matter to outsiders. He also commanded the steward, He Fusheng, to send men to guard the deep pool and keep a watch on whether the stone statue within would stir up any more trouble.

He knew clearly in his heart that a "suppression object" capable of serving as the formation eye for that ancestral hall could naturally not be an ordinary thing.

He Ping had made two-fold preparations to prevent any accidents. On one hand, he did this to prevent the Bodhisattva statue from playing any tricks; on the other, it was to prevent the person who had set up that formation from tracking him down.

This suppression object could not extend life or increase longevity, so it was of little use to him, and he was not greedy for it. However, since the Wandering Soul Ghost Village had been broken, he had effectively offended the person who had laid the ghost formation, and there was truly no need to invite further complications.

"Next is the servant I brought back. But ever since he was brought here, he has had a high fever and has remained in a coma, still not having woken up."

He had sent out the He Family's external eyes and ears to investigate, learning that this servant in green was named "Cheng Zhi."

This Cheng Zhi had a significant background; his ancestors were the owners of the famous Cheng Family Ranch in North Prefecture.

The Cheng family had operated the ranch for over a hundred years and was quite renowned in the region. It was a pity that two years ago, a group of horse bandits had broken into the Cheng Family Ranch, and aside from Cheng Zhi and his sister, Cheng Yujiao, who had escaped, the entire Cheng family had been wiped out.

This matter later became an unsolved case. After the horse bandits finished their slaughter and looted the valuables, they did not forget to set fire to the ranch as they fled, burning the Cheng family's legacy of many years to ashes. The government had sent people to investigate, but to no avail.

"Looking at it now, it wasn't horse bandits who did it, but the Hu Ma Gang. By the way, Cheng Zhi has an older sister. If I'm not mistaken, that would be the female corpse, right?"

He Ping rubbed his chin.

The case of the Cheng Family Ranch did not look simple. Although the Hu Ma Gang did not have clean hands, they would not rashly strike at a prominent clan like the Cheng Family Ranch. Even if they disguised themselves as horse bandits, if any slip-ups occurred, it would be difficult to resolve.

Xie San was a smart man. There was little profit in such a job, so what exactly was he plotting?

However, if this really was the handiwork of the Hu Ma Gang, there must be more to the story...

(The Cheng Family Ranch—how could a ranch offend Xie San and the Hu Ma Gang? There must be a problem here... Right, there seems to be a rumor that Xie San's Hu Ma Gang has ties to a big shot in Suian City. Could it be... that the Hu Ma Gang wiped out the Cheng Family Ranch as a blade for someone else?)

Suddenly, a "thump-thump" knocking sound came from outside the room.

"Young Master, I have something to report."

The person who had come was the He Mansion's steward, He Fusheng.

"Come in."

He Fusheng walked in respectfully.

"Speak, what is it you have to report?"

"The matter we were investigating previously has had some progress..."

He Fusheng lowered his voice and said slowly, "The one who recommended Cheng Zhi to enter the estate was indeed your uncle, Young Master, and the one who came up with the scheme was your cousin, He Xiping... I also heard something else: recently, He Xiping has been growing quite close to Sheng Qinghong, the son of Prefect Sheng."

"Oh? There is such a thing?"

He Ping's eyebrows arched, his thoughts racing through his mind.

"Prefect Sheng Qingzhi wields immense power in Suian City. The big shot that the Hu Ma Gang is cozying up to is the Prefect himself..."

This thought took root in his mind, and his gears began to turn.

In truth, He Ping had met Sheng Qinghong a few times and had some impression of him, though it was hardly a favorable one.

Sheng Qinghong was Prefect Sheng's only son, a man of arrogant, haughty, and overbearing character.

Under his father's protection, he held the status of a military graduate. He had once been sent by Sheng Qingzhi to gain experience in the ranks, but due to his wretched personality, he offended someone of great consequence.

The Prefect had no choice but to spend a fortune to bail him out.

"This Sheng Qinghong is nothing but a spoiled brat, yet he is clearly valued by his old man. Are He Jin and his son trying to win him over?"

A cold sneer tugged at the corner of He Ping's mouth.

"It goes further than that. What that father and son are doing is far from simple..."

He Fusheng also gave a cold laugh.

"Young Master, for these past few years, your uncle has appeared calm on the surface, but in private, he has been arranging for his son to befriend the scions of powerful families in Suian City. He has also been secretly courting the managers in charge of our rice shops, herbal pharmacies, and pawnshops. He even tried to bribe me."

As he spoke, the steward took a money pouch from his sleeve and opened it, revealing a stack of gleaming gold cakes inside.

"I haven't dared to touch a single one of these gold cakes, but Young Master, we cannot let this continue. Otherwise, sooner or later, it will spell disaster for the He Family."

The uncle mentioned by the steward, He Fusheng, was He Jin. He Jin was from a side branch, a half-brother to He Ping's father, though the two had never been on good terms.

After He Ping's father passed away, the position of family head fell to He Ping. He Jin had always coveted the role and harbored private grievances against He Ping for assuming the mantle at such a young age.

However, ever since He Ping became the head of the family, he had acted with swift and decisive authority. He managed the family's assets with increasing skill, and their business grew ever larger, leaving no one in the He Family with any complaints about his leadership.

Well, one could not say there were no complaints. When He Ping first took over, some short-sighted scoundrels tried to cause him trouble, but they all met with inexplicable ends—either suffering accidents or dying of strange illnesses.

Outsiders could see no flaws, but those with keen eyes suspected these were the methods of the young family head. Seeing this, He Jin had stopped speaking out and kept a much lower profile.

Yet, He Ping knew that both He Jin and his son, He Xiping, were highly ambitious. For years, they had been secretly accumulating power and harboring illicit intentions, though they had hidden it well...

If He Jin and He Xiping were smart enough to know their place, I wouldn't bother dealing with them. But if they dare to cross me, I'll just find an opportunity to finish them off.

He Ping's gaze was deep and icy; the intent to kill had already taken root in his heart.

In his previous life, he was never one to be law-abiding or submissive. After arriving in this world and ascending to the position of family head, he had been subjected to repeated assassination attempts, some even by those he trusted and held dear.

Having endured this series of events, He Ping understood deeply that in this world, one could not afford "the benevolence of a woman." When necessary, one had to be thunderous and decisive, leaving no room for others to scheme against him.

This time, the actions of He Jin and his son had triggered his murderous intent.

"By the way," He Fusheng continued, "Young Master, that person you brought back—he was clearly unconscious for the past few days, but for some reason, he woke up today."

"You mean Cheng Zhi? He's awake?"

He Ping's eyes brightened slightly; this was indeed good news.