Bronze Mirror

(Free chapter)

Despite wanting to keep it, Yu Ci still felt that carrying a head of unknown origin close to his body was truly bizarre, so he tore off a piece of cloth, wrapped the object in two layers, and finally tucked it into his sleeve.

When stashing the item, his fingertips brushed against something else, prompting another smile. After carefully putting away the monster's head, he straightened his posture and took out that other object.

This was a round bronze mirror, no larger than a palm. Its outer edge was circular and flawless, and the mirror surface was bright and clear, reflecting every hair and whisker of a person. Yet when looking at the back, there was no mirror knob; instead, a few faint, irregular incised lines were engraved there, looking as though they had been casually scratched on.

This truly was a mirror, but Yu Ci did not use it as one.

Facing the mirror surface upward, he injected true qi and shook it gently. The mirror suddenly flashed with cyan light, illuminating his hair and whiskers in shades of green.

He curled his index and middle fingers, pinching a pinch of the hazy brilliance that detached from the main body of cyan light. Following the sweep of his fingertips, clear trajectories formed in the void, drawing forth dots of spiritual light that danced like fireflies and gathered in a circle around him.

This was the true face of the so-called drawing talismans by attracting qi.

Yu Ci had ultimately not transcended the Three Mortal Gates, and he likewise needed spiritual leads to draw talismans. The only difference was that Xuanqing relied on cinnabar and talisman paper, whereas Yu Ci used the bronze mirror in his hand instead.

He drew cyan light from his sleeve and then sketched freely in the empty air. As long as his technique was deft, it was very easy to conjure the scenario of gathering spiritual light without relying on external objects.

Such god-playing, ghost-bluffing methods were already second nature to Yu Ci, primarily because he originally came from that exact background. Back then, when he was only ** years of age and had just begun meditating on qi attraction—barely qualifying as having any cultivation at all—he had already been hailed as an immortal child within the Twin Immortals Sect. Within a radius of a thousand miles, he had countless believers and was worshipped by tens of thousands of people. Compared to Xuanqing playing the deity in this ruined mountain temple, wasn't he a hundred times more brilliant?

At this thought, he could not help laughing once more, but that smile was chillingly cold, and the cyan light of the bronze mirror felt like frost, as if responding in kind.

Heading north from here for an unknown number of thousands of miles, there was a country a thousand miles wide named Chen. Chen had one hundred thousand resident households that did not believe in Buddhism or Daoism, instead devoutly believing in the so-called Twin Immortals. The Twin Immortals consisted of the male immortal Purple Thunder and the female immortal Crimson Yin, who had established a sect in Chen. They could summon wind and command thunder, churn the clouds and conjure fog, and in the eyes of the common people of Chen, they were no different from true deities.

As for Yu Ci, he was a close attendant within the Twin Immortals Sect, likewise revered by the name of immortal child and worshipped by tens of thousands. Yet his temperament differed from ordinary people, and he was not nearly as fanatical toward the so-called Twin Immortals as the common people of Chen were. After several years as a close attendant, he saw things even more clearly: the so-called Twin Immortals were also creatures of flesh and blood with the seven emotions and six desires. On certain levels, their ** were even more intense than those of ordinary mortals.

For instance, their fear of death.

The vast majority of the Twin Immortals' time was spent researching the so-called longevity arts. The ultimate goal of establishing their sect in Chen was to fulfill their wish for longevity, and for this, they were willing to sacrifice everything.

Precisely because of this, Yu Ci and the other immortal children were not as glamorous as outsiders perceived. Yu Ci knew very well that the so-called immortal children were actually just subjects used by the Twin Immortals to test the effects of various longevity arts. The Twin Immortals used youth preservation and longevity as bait, making them practice those bizarre longevity techniques while completely ignoring the potentially severe consequences.

Those a bit luckier, like Yu Ci, were assigned to study talisman arts. Although it was hard work, the safety factor was still relatively passable. As for those out of luck, they would inexplicably suffer damage to their five viscera, broken meridians, or go mad, ultimately disappearing without a trace.

Yu Ci had been by the Twin Immortals' side for over four years, and the cohort of immortal children alongside him had been replaced several times over. He understood very well that if he continued living like this, his own name would sooner or later be added to the list of those who had vanished without a trace.

Fortunately, he had some small measure of fortune. On a night when he was thirteen years old, the Twin Immortals seemed to have encountered a formidable enemy. He only heard the swords of the cosmos ringing like rolling thunder, and whenever stray shockwaves blasted down, roofs collapsed and trees snapped as if the apocalypse had arrived.

While the majority of people buried their heads beneath the covers and left their fates to the heavens, Yu Ci became convinced that this was his best opportunity to escape and survive.

Displaying boundless audacity before fleeing, he first charged into the burning bedchamber of Great Immortal Purple Thunder and swept away two treasures: the bronze mirror in his hand at this moment, and a volume of the Shangqing Juxuan Xing Shu Mi Shou Fu Jing. Only then did he take advantage of the chaos to break out, change his attire, and flee in disguise.

Perhaps heavens truly protected him, for over the next few months he hid along the way, managed to escape Chen Kingdom, and got far away from the sphere of influence of the Twin Immortals. The Twin Immortals never pursued him either. However, he no longer dared to linger around the borders of Chen Kingdom. In the years that followed, he traveled all the way south, covering ten thousand miles and increasing his knowledge day by day, only to realize the vastness of the world and how masters emerged in droves. To restrict one's gaze merely to the domain of Chen Kingdom was no different from being a frog at the bottom of a well.

He came to understand just what kind of figures fellows like the Twin Immortals truly were.

The Twin Immortals were also cultivators. The community of cultivators either sipped the rosy clouds and guided qi, ingested herbs and refined pills, sought deities and worshipped ancestors, or searched for grotto-heavens. Of course, there were also those like the Twin Immortals who accepted incense offerings from people to increase their cultivation. Their ultimate goal was singular: to gradually extend their lifespans through cultivation and ultimately reach the state of abiding in the world forever and living eternally without aging.

Among cultivators, there were also distinctions of higher and lower, strong and weak.

Spirit Access, Pill Core, Void Walking, True Person, Calamity Law, Earth Immortal.

People used these six major realms, ranging from low to high, to categorize the cultivator community.

These six realms stood parallel to the Three Mortal Gates of Qi Movement, Long Breath, and Orifice Enlightenment, combining into the nine gates of cultivation. Yet the two categories were utterly incomparable; starting from Spirit Access, every single step upward brought a heaven-quaking, earth-shattering transformation.

Yu Ci did not know the more detailed circumstances, but he did know that the two immortals Purple Thunder and Crimson Yin were masters of the Pill Core realm. The two of them could control implements to fly through the heavens, using flying swords to kill people from a hundred miles away, and possessed lifespans of several centuries alongside perpetually youthful appearances. In the eyes of ordinary people, they were already extraordinary, akin to immortals.

Yet above them lay even more profound and marvelous realms. Legend had it that the powerhouses among cultivators could even ride dragons and harness clouds, overturn mountains and drain seas, possessing all manner of unfathomable great divine abilities.

People were always like this; once they saw more, they ceased to find things strange. After wandering for a time, the shadow cast over Yu Ci's heart by the Twin Immortals was blown away, replaced by an eager and restless impulse.

So they were not unique after all. Why couldn't I achieve what they could?

Thus, Yu Ci embarked upon cultivation, right up until the present.

A crackling sound rang out from the campfire, breaking the quiet atmosphere inside the hall. Yu Ci let out a long breath, pulled himself back from the past, and gently stroked the edge of the bronze mirror. What rippled through his heart was pure gratitude.

Indeed, he could not help but be grateful for the treasure in his hands.

Back when he forcibly broke into Great Immortal Purple Thunder's bedchamber and swept away this Zhaoshen Bronze Mirror, it was truly the most valuable gamble he had ever made in his life.

For only when one truly began cultivating did one realize the difficulty of cultivation.

Since learning the methods of meditation and absorbing qi at age eight, aided further by the talismanic arts within the Shangqing Juxuan Xing Shu Mi Shou Fu Jing, over a decade of effort had only brought him to the peak of Orifice Enlightenment—still facing an insurmountable hurdle away from the basic standard of a true cultivator: the Spirit Access realm.

Catching up to or even surpassing the Twin Immortals was a very simple thought, but implementing it required, besides a consistent and unwavering conviction, extraordinary daring, matchless luck, and of course, unimaginably massive consumption.

Cultivation was merely two words, but actually doing it required cultivation methods, medicinal pills, spiritual veins, and taking the talismanic path alone, it demanded full equipment including spiritual leads like top-grade cinnabar, talisman paper, and ritual incense. As a wandering loose cultivator roaming the four directions, where was Yu Ci supposed to get these resources?

Fortunately, he still had the Zhaoshen Bronze Mirror.

Over these years, Yu Ci had not merely used it to play the deity and bluff ghosts. In fact, calling it playing the deity and bluffing ghosts was not entirely accurate, for the mirror's effects were thoroughly real.

As long as this mirror received true qi stimulation, it would project cyan light. This light was a superlative spiritual lead; drawing talismans with it yielded effects even fiercer than those produced by cinnabar and talisman paper. Moreover, it was instantly accessible, generated on demand, and consumed virtually nothing. For someone like Yu Ci whose financial situation was not affluent, this was far more practical than any miraculous pill or medicine.

The reason Yu Ci had been able to cultivate to this degree without anyone's guidance, relying on the stolen Shangqing Juxuan Xing Shu Mi Shou Fu Jing, was largely thanks to the merit of this bronze mirror.

Yet this was still not enough. The path of cultivation could not be sustained by merely one or two treasures alone. Yu Ci had journeyed entirely alone through extreme hardship, paying an unimaginable price for every tiny bit of progress he achieved. Yet he had not grown discouraged; he actively sought paths for rapid advancement, even if he gained nothing for a time.

He wondered if the Three Yang Talisman Sword used by the Bai Ri Mansion this time to trade for Shrimp Whisker Grass could serve as a reference, allowing him to make some progress in the path of talismanry.

Gradually, his thoughts scattered, finally returning to nothingness as Yu Ci entered a tranquil state resembling both sleep and wakefulness. At this moment, the primordial qi of the five viscera arrayed itself in five distinct colors—cyan, yellow, red, black, and white—taking on a misty state and gradually gathering, rolling right within the square inch of his spiritual altar.

Simultaneously, the cool qi within the Mud Pill Palace inside his head rotated as round and smooth as a pearl, resembling a bright moon that scattered its clear radiance everywhere. The light fell like rain upon the five-colored qi mist in his heart, and an attractive force generated between the two. The bright moon hung suspended in the void unmoving, while the colorful clouds rose slowly under the pull, exhausting their force at the base of the twelve-storied pagoda in his throat before slowly sinking back down, repeating this over and over.

During this process, his five viscera and six bowels, four limbs and skeletal frame, and the acupoints across his entire body seemed to be tugged by the attractive force, faintly echoing and harmonizing seamlessly with the Mud Pill Palace. Slowly, the aura throughout his entire body merged into one without any distinction, taking the primordial qi of the five viscera as its core to form a slightly sparser mist that permeated his whole body. Only in his head did the bright moon's radiance shine, taking the Mud Pill Palace as the center while the four directions and four corners—the nine palaces—remained tranquil and clear, entirely unmoved by the billowing mists below.