You Are the Greatest Treasure Fellow Daoist Ling Left Behind

Night lay heavy. Traces of blood lingered between the bricks, and a yellowed map half as tall as a man lay spread before Luo Fanchen.

The brush in his hand kept tracing the main routes. At last, his gaze settled on several mountains. He thought hard, then hesitated.

Cloudmist City had been built beside a branch of the Luo River. More than two hundred li beyond it stood four great peaks known as the Four Perfections Mountains.

Countless beasts, snakes, and insects lived within them. Rumor held that a Demon Serpent prowled there, making the mountains forbidden ground for low-level cultivators. Perhaps he could use that.

Before him, Ling Moxue stood stiffly, picking at her fingers.

Her eyes were lowered. The blood marks her teeth had left on her cracked lips were still visible. After a long hesitation, she pleaded in a subdued voice.

"Are you going to send me... back to the County Office? If you were my father's dear friend, please let me go. I can give you every treasure he left behind."

"Treasures? I'm afraid Fellow Daoist Ling left you nothing."

Luo Fanchen gave a soft chuckle. The little Demoness still did not know that Ling Leng's inheritance was in his hands.

Caught in her lie, Ling Moxue pressed her lips tight. She could not stop her calves from trembling.

Hatred burned in her heart. She did not want her body to become her enemy's vessel, but as a mortal, she had no power to seize hold of her fate.

The light in Ling Moxue's almond-shaped eyes faded into numbness. Knowing she could not escape death, she threw caution to the wind.

"Fine. I'll go to the County Office with you. Give me a sword. Just one sword. I'm begging you."

Ling Moxue clenched her small hands into fists. Her delicate brows drew together, lending a trace of madness to her frailty.

Even if she was a mantis raising its arms against a carriage, she would struggle until the final moment.

"Your father did leave behind a treasure, though."

Luo Fanchen studied the girl for a moment, his tone gradually softening.

His knuckles tapped lightly on the table. Each tap seemed to strike Ling Moxue's heart.

She was like someone drowning, waiting to sink. She knew the hope before her was only a straw, yet instinct still drove her to clutch at it.

"You."

"Me?"

Luo Fanchen lifted Ling Moxue's chin with one finger. The back of it brushed her slightly rough cheek, wiping away a tear.

Ling Moxue suppressed her revulsion and let him stroke her cheek, though her shoulders trembled.

She stole a glance up at him. Her upper lip curled over her lower one, her gaze both aggrieved and pleading.

Luo Fanchen's face betrayed nothing, but his heart softened a little.

After all, Ling Moxue was only a girl who had grown up lonely and helpless, not a born killer.

With the Demoness Register bound to her, she could still be guided.

Ling Moxue was already grown and had missed the best age to begin cultivating. But if she had a Superior-Grade Spiritual Root, diligence might make up for lost time.

If he could truly get her into the Dao Sect, he would gain someone to rely on. And with treasures granted by the sect and his Water Dragonwood, perhaps he could refine a batch of Foundation-Building Pills.

For a lowly Rogue Cultivator like him, Ling Moxue might be his only chance at Foundation Establishment in this life.

The risk was just as great. He rarely fought, much less against a cunning and vicious Demonic Cultivator. He could easily lose his life.

As he wavered, Luo Fanchen noticed Ling Moxue's haggard face.

Her eyes were timid, and she had pressed her lips so tight they had lost all color. It was as though she feared the blood from her gums might stain his finger and displease him.

So be it. Since they already take me for a Demonic Cultivator, I'll pull this chestnut from the fire.

Luo Fanchen's gaze steadied. The compassion he had carried from his previous life had not entirely crumbled. He decided to honor his promise to Fellow Daoist Ling Bai.

"You are the greatest treasure Fellow Daoist Ling left behind."

"Do you know why the County Magistrate will stop at nothing to get you?"

"He wants my body."

"You understand more than I thought."

Luo Fanchen was not surprised. As the person involved, Ling Moxue could naturally sense what the blood patterns inside her did.

He brushed the tip of her nose and smiled. "If that's the case, why wouldn't I want it too?"

Ling Moxue's lips moved, but she could not get a word out. She lowered her eyes and resigned herself to it.

"Help me kill Ling Youdao, and I'll offer you my body."

"Do you want to cultivate immortality?"

"Huh?"

Ling Moxue froze. Tilting her head, she stared at Luo Fanchen in confusion.

"You have fine aptitude. Though you've passed the best age to begin, your acupoints have closed and your Meridians have hardened. Your future achievements will likely be limited, but you can still be taught."

Luo Fanchen paced slowly as he took the Essence Blood Spirit Contract he had prepared from his sleeve and pushed it toward Ling Moxue.

"Sign it and accept me as your master. Cultivate with me from now on, and I'll protect you."

This was an Essence Blood Primordial Contract, a First-Rank Low-Grade artifact at the very bottom of its rank. Worth one Spirit Stone, it was something he had prepared specifically for unforeseen trouble after being entrusted with Ling Bai's orphan.

Through the blood of both parties, it formed a master-servant contract. A single thought from the master could make a disobedient servant wish for death.

The contract worked only on cultivators below Late Qi Refining who had not opened their Qi Sea.

"Once you sign, your life and death will rest on a single thought of mine. Think carefully."

With that, Luo Fanchen closed his eyes and regulated his breathing while he waited.

He had expected Ling Moxue to hesitate for a long time. Instead, after a brief daze, she took the Blood Contract in both hands.

Ling Moxue blinked. She had lived under others' roofs for years, and her birth mother had been no more than a maid. She barely knew how to read.

Embarrassed that she could not write her own name, she noticed the bloody fingerprint Luo Fanchen had left. Copying him, she stained a finger at an unscabbed wound on her forearm and timidly pressed it down.

The moment her print formed, the gold-embossed script on the Spirit Contract flickered. At last, it became two streaks of blood light that entered their foreheads.

Ling Moxue's vision blurred for an instant. When she looked at Luo Fanchen again, he seemed taller, so imposing that she almost dared not meet his eyes.

"The Spirit Contract is sealed. We may call ourselves master and disciple, but in truth, we are master and servant."

Luo Fanchen nodded. He drew Ling Moxue over with the golden rope, then released its hold on her and continued.

"From now on, you'll cultivate with me and must not defy me. If one day you open your Qi Sea and join the Dao Sect, this contract will become void on its own."

"Yes, Lo... Master Luo."

Her voice was halting. Ling Moxue lowered her eyes timidly, without a trace of the girl who had seemed ready to tear into someone when they first met.

Luo Fanchen frowned. He was about to correct her form of address, then reconsidered. With Ling Moxue's aptitude, once she began cultivating, she would surpass him within five years.

Calling himself her master would be presumptuous. He let the girl call him what she wished.

"Swallow this pill. I'll find a way to get you out of the city."

Luo Fanchen carefully took a porcelain bottle from his robe. After some effort, he shook several small pill fragments from it.

It was a First-Rank Low-Grade Breath Concealment Pill. Each pill cost two Spirit Stones and could hide the aura of a cultivator below the Sixth Level of Qi Refining for two hours. Such pills were often used to evade searches or carry out assassinations.

The price had hurt, but Luo Fanchen had bought one, crushed it into seven pieces, and preserved them by special means to save his life in an emergency.

The Paper Puppets he had placed in three houses as decoys had not been triggered. Ling Youdao's ability to find his hiding place directly meant he had some means of detection and tracking. It was most likely on Ling Moxue, though Luo Fanchen could not rule out its being on himself.

If he wanted to throw Ling Youdao off their trail for a while, he would have to pay a painful price.

"This is... a pill?"

Ling Moxue could scarcely imagine that the muddy lump before her was a legendary immortal pill.

Pulling a face, she tipped back her head and swallowed it. The fierce bitterness nearly made her retch.

Luo Fanchen said nothing. He cut a gash in Ling Moxue's wrist with a fingertip and collected half a medicine bottle of blood.

He sent a thread of spiritual power into her wound to help it close. Then he returned to the desk, took out several old sheets of yellow paper, and pasted them onto two little straw figures. He divided the blood between them and poured it over both.

The straw figures turned scarlet, yet not a drop fell. Once it had all seeped into the talisman paper, Luo Fanchen said, "Your birth date and hour."

"Yisi year, Guiwei month, Yiyou day, Bingzi hour."

Ling Moxue hesitated briefly, then gave him the details.

Luo Fanchen calculated them on his fingers. After converting them and inscribing the result on the yellow paper with True Essence, he saw the candle flame sway and flicker.

An icy wind rose. Ling Moxue grew dizzy, and another field of vision appeared before her eyes.

Through a straw figure, she seemed able to see a hazy scene beyond the window. Unable to tell which vision was her own, she nearly lost her mind to it.

"Steady your mind."

Spiritual power gathered at Luo Fanchen's fingertip. He touched Ling Moxue between the brows, and after swaying for a moment, she came to herself as if waking from a dream.

As the Breath Concealment Pill dissolved in her stomach, Ling Moxue's aura vanished. At that very instant, the straw figures began giving off her aura in its place.

"That will do. Come with me."

The technique had consumed a great deal of Luo Fanchen's spiritual power, leaving his face somewhat pale.

He put the remaining straw figure into his Storage Bag and swallowed a fragment of the Breath Concealment Pill. Then, under Ling Moxue's startled gaze, he swept her up around the waist, leaped into the tunnel, and raced toward the outskirts of the city.

The method was an obscure branch of Witchcraft. With a Spirit Talisman and the target's blood, the caster could perform a rite and inscribe the target's birth date and hour.

Activated with a large amount of spiritual power, it could briefly emit the bloodline aura of the person named in the inscription. It was often used to avert disaster or fight evil cultivators from afar.

Paired with the Breath Concealment Pill, it was just right for deceiving pursuers.

His aptitude was poor, and he had neither backing nor a good cultivation method. All he could do was spend his time studying obscure tricks like these.