After studying the Formless Secret Treasury for several years, He Ping gradually noticed something strange: his constitution was growing weaker and weaker.
As it turned out, the arts recorded in the Formless Secret Treasury had their drawbacks. Practitioners had to guard against impatience and trying to advance too quickly.
The Puppet Immortal Cult's methods required practitioners to expend their own vital essence and blood qi when making or controlling puppets. On top of that, some of the arts were so sinister that practicing them cost him a great deal of his lifespan.
Over the past few years, he had also stopped dreaming of Wu Yousheng and could no longer seek help from this "Yin Master."
And now that things had come to this, He Ping had realized that the arts passed down in the Formless Secret Treasury were seriously flawed.
Unfortunately, he had come to his senses too late.
His constitution had been depleted, and he had only a few years left to live.
Naturally, He Ping was unwilling to accept this. He thought of many ways to make up for it, such as seeking out eccentric experts and people who cultivated the arts, but he came up empty every time.
He had also secretly consulted many renowned doctors, but their conclusions were all grim.
One doctor told him that he suffered from "Blood Wither." It was as if there were a funnel inside his body, sucking in his vital essence and blood qi. No matter what remedies or miraculous treatments he tried, nothing could cure this terminal illness.
Later, He Ping secretly asked around about the "Immortal Puppet Sect" and was shocked to discover that it was a secret cult that had vanished without a trace nearly a century ago. The authorities had outlawed it as an evil sect, and supposedly sent an army to wipe it out.
After learning this, He Ping didn't dare let a word slip about his own situation, afraid of attracting the authorities' attention.
Even though the He Family had some influence in Suian City, it couldn't compare with the Great You court. If word got out and the authorities arrested him as a heretic, he'd have a real problem on his hands.
"Perhaps Wu Yousheng was a successor of the Immortal Puppet Sect. It's strange. If he really had such abilities, how did he end up in that state?"
He Ping was deeply puzzled by what had happened to Wu Yousheng. At the same time, he felt lost and uneasy about his own future.
"Could it be that I have no choice but to pick the forbidden art in the final chapter of the Formless Secret Treasury? If I want to survive, do I have to use puppet arts to remake myself, replace all my flesh and blood, and become a living puppet?"
He flipped to the final page of the Formless Secret Treasury. The scroll contained an extraordinary secret art, one dubbed "forbidden," that could turn a person into an ageless, deathless living puppet.
A living puppet was a puppet made from a human being. The practitioner had to use magic to replace their flesh and blood with puppet limbs, even down to their internal organs and other parts. This had one advantage: since the body itself was a puppet, the practitioner would effectively live forever.
The second advantage was that no matter what injuries they suffered afterward, they could simply replace the damaged parts and carry on as before.
"If this secret art succeeds, I won't be human anymore. I'll become a living puppet, something beyond human. I'll never again be able to enjoy some of life's pleasures." He Ping sighed inwardly.
Still, he knew he didn't have many options. This forbidden art might be his last way out.
"If I'm not human, then so be it!"
He made up his mind.
"After all, my short life has taught me that human abilities have limits... unless you transcend humanity."
—That's right. Those words are the absolute truth!
But he would need to make thorough preparations before practicing the forbidden art.
The Immortal Puppet Sect's methods of making puppets were especially demanding in terms of time, money, and materials.
Over the past two years, he had spent a great deal of manpower and resources tracking down Millennium Camphor Wood, a kind found only in the Southern Frontier. He had used it to make this Nine-Death Substitute Witch Puppet as preparation for what lay ahead.
"But before that, there's something I have to get to the bottom of."
He thought again of the old man named Wu Yousheng, who had taught him the Formless Secret Treasury. Looking back on what had happened all those years ago, he couldn't help feeling suspicious.
"My encounter with Wu Yousheng back then, and what happened in the Mountain God Temple... Could there have been more to it than meets the eye?"
He felt he had to return to that Mountain God Temple and uncover the mystery hidden in what had happened.
"Dig! Hurry up and dig! Put your backs into it!"
He Fusheng, steward of the He Family, shouted furiously.
"Have you all skipped dinner? Put some muscle into it!"
Night had fallen, and there was no moon or stars. At a desolate graveyard not far from the Mountain God Temple, guards hired by the He Family, clad in black outfits, ringed the area with torches.
Dozens of He Family servants in plain, short work clothes were digging furiously with hoes, opening a large pit in front of a grave.
He Ping sat beside a makeshift bamboo shelter. His complexion was slightly sickly, and a spotless white fox-fur coat draped over his shoulders. He held a cup of ginseng tea in both hands, his expression cold.
A little while later, the steward, He Fusheng, came running over excitedly with a lantern.
"Young Master, we've uncovered the coffin. Should we pull it out, or would you like to take a look yourself?"
He Ping's eyes lit up at He Fusheng's words.
"I'll look myself."
"Very well, Young Master. Watch your step." The steward, He Fusheng, raised his lantern and led him to the pit they had dug.
He Ping approached the lonely grave. A deep pit had been dug in front of it, and from where he stood, he could see a thin coffin, barely three inches thick.
It was made of cypress, a cheap coffin favored by the poor. It had the vulgar nickname "dog-bumper," since a stray dog foraging in a burial ground could smash through it with a few blows of its head.
"Open it."
He gave the order from outside the pit, and several servants pried open the coffin lid. The moment it came off, a rotten, moldy stench filled the air, and everyone instinctively backed away.
At that moment, He Ping jumped into the pit. He held the lantern in one hand and covered his nose and mouth with a medicated cloth in the other as he moved closer.
To everyone's surprise, the coffin did not contain a skeleton. Instead, it held the corpse of a ragged old man with white hair.
"...Wu Yousheng."
He Ping stared hard at the uncorrupted corpse, his gaze deep and shadowy.
He lowered the cloth covering his nose and mouth, reached out with his right hand, and felt the old man's corpse. He pressed down on its chest, finding the skin soft and the bones firm, just as if the man had died not long ago.
"So that's how it is."
He grabbed one of the corpse's hands and bent it sharply at the joint. With a crack, the arm snapped off.
He Ping raised his lantern and picked up the severed hand. After studying the break, he couldn't help laughing in disbelief.
"The bones were faked with Soro Ghost Wood, and the muscles and skin were made of Glue Skin and tree resin. Wu Yousheng, Wu Yousheng, you really made a fool of me..."
He knew perfectly well that the chance encounter ten years ago, and that so-called "Yin Master Dharma Transmission," had all been part of a carefully planned scam.
—The old man who had frozen to death in the Mountain God Temple was nothing more than a fake corpse. In fact, he should have realized it long ago. If the Wu Yousheng he had met back then really had mastered the strange arts of the Formless Secret Treasury, how could a man of such ability have ended up in that state?
"This might have been a trap. I was set up from the very beginning."
The more He Ping thought about it, the more chilled he felt, and the more his heart quaked.
"My health has been getting worse and worse. Could that have been planned, too? Was the other party's ultimate goal to make me practice the forbidden art in the final chapter, so that I'd refine myself into a living puppet?"
Suddenly, a flash of insight crossed his mind, and his heart sank.
Only after investigating through various channels did He Ping discover that the Immortal Puppet Sect had been branded an evil sect by the Great You court. This cult excelled at making all kinds of bizarre puppets.
He had no idea what the cult had done to offend the authorities, but the Great You court had sent an army to exterminate it.
"The court... The court of this world isn't simple either. The Immortal Puppet Sect's inheritance shouldn't have been weak. So how did the Great You court wipe them out?"
He Ping also discovered that ordinary people in this world knew very little about the supernatural. The authorities seemed to control and regulate information behind the scenes, strictly forbidding ordinary people from looking into it. As for how they managed this, they seemed to start with the simplest of books.
The Great You authorities restricted papermaking and printing, regulating and controlling all kinds of books circulating among the people. Most historical records and documents related to previous dynasties had been confiscated.
Under these circumstances, keeping books in private was a crime. The authorities expressly forbade ordinary people from printing books on their own. All books on diagrams, divination, prognostication, fortune-telling, and esoteric arts were banned and forbidden from being passed down. The court had even issued edicts and launched several major crackdowns over the banned books, arresting many people and beheading plenty.
As a transmigrator, He Ping had a unique perspective. Combined with his keen mind, it let him sense that something was off. It seemed to him that the authorities were deliberately keeping the people ignorant, all to stop knowledge from spreading.