Xingyi Returning Spear Thrust, slaying the Starving Ghost! (Seven thousand words, monthly votes please)

"Hm?"

Li Xiang paused, flicked the black blood off his blade, and quickly scanned the lines of archaic script appearing on the [Book of a Hundred Trades] in his mind.

[Advancement ritual explained: knowing heaven's will is easy; defying it is hard.]

[Those who tell fortunes glimpse heaven's secrets and judge good fortune and ill. Yet a true Fortune Teller must not only see through the course of fate, but also dare to intervene in it.]

[Requirement: find a person blessed with fortune who faces a "certain death calamity" or bears an "omen of great misfortune." Without intervening directly through martial force, use only verbal guidance, feng shui arrangements, or fate-reading methods to defy heaven and alter their destiny, helping them survive their death calamity and turn heaven and earth around.]

[Current progress: 0/1]

[Notice: until the ritual is completed, the Fortune Teller level will remain locked and cannot gain experience.]

Defy heaven and alter destiny...

Li Xiang narrowed his eyes amid the fierce battle, but his Eight-Cutting Knives never stopped. A backhand slash sent a faceless lesser ghost attempting to ambush him from the side flying, its bones cracking audibly.

This advancement ritual was neither particularly difficult nor particularly easy.

In this age of chaos, where human lives were worth no more than weeds, finding someone on the brink of death was hardly difficult. Rummaging through a roadside pile of starvation victims would turn up several.

The difficult part was finding someone blessed with fortune who faced a "certain death calamity" or bore an "omen of great misfortune." Such people were not easy to find, and the conditions were stringent. He could not lend a hand directly, only rely on his tongue and mystical methods. That would test his true abilities.

Someone facing a certain death calamity...