Corpse Incense Offering

The Fragrant Blood Offering, secretly prepared using Zhuo Jie's fresh blood as a catalyst, actually exerted such powerful suppression over the ghosts inside the two monks?!

Did it suppress other ghosts like that too?!

The firelight pouring out of the temple gradually contracted, drawing the chaotic lights and shadows produced by the two supernatural entities back inside with it.

The Little Temple in the darkness fell silent once more.

Su Wu gazed at the temple, momentarily lost in thought.

Just then, Guangfa released Su Wu's hand and walked straight into the darkness.

The wind carried his voice to Su Wu's ears. "Now that we've left the temple, Narrow-Sleeved Guanyin will soon be able to sense your location. Why aren't you moving?

"In two hours, those two ghosts will finish eating the Fragrant Blood Offering. After the tongue-lashing I gave my two senior brothers, they certainly won't be content to let me leave just like that.

"Are you sure you want to stay here?"

If you knew perfectly well that cursing someone out would make an enemy of them, why did you do it?

Su Wu's head was full of questions, but he knew what mattered most. He hurried after Guangfa, asking as they walked, "Master, you said earlier that you'd been forced to come guard this temple and keep the two ghosts' resurgence in check.

"Were those two senior brothers of yours the ones who forced you here?"

With how arrogant you were just now, you certainly didn't look like someone who would willingly let them force you into anything.

Guangfa turned his head and glanced at Su Wu, as though he had seen through his true thoughts.

He grinned. "I can suppress the resurgence of the Vicious Ghosts inside them. If they want to live, they don't dare offend me lightly.

"The real reason those two senior brothers forced me here was that someone instructed them to do it and promised them substantial rewards."

"Who?"

"The two great elders of the No-Thought Venerable Power Temple." Guangfa's eyes were cold.

"Are we still going to the No-Thought Venerable Power Temple, then?" Su Wu asked with a frown.

Wouldn't returning to the temple mean confronting those two elders directly?

"Of course we're going back. Why wouldn't we?!" Guangfa said coldly. "The Venerable One's reincarnation is imminent. I want to see just who they've chosen as the reincarnated Buddha Son!"

Reincarnation?

People could actually be reborn?

Su Wu was deeply shocked for a moment, but he soon realized that many religious temples in the Secret Treasury Domain had a tradition of finding their successors under the pretext of reincarnation.

Reincarnation was merely what they called it.

"If we don't return to the temple, I can't perform your Fate Reading and Empowerment, or your Body Purification and Precept Reception. You can forget about the Binding Practice that comes afterward, too." Seeing that Su Wu was still somewhat hesitant, Guangfa added a few more words.

Hearing that this concerned cultivation, Su Wu quickly followed him. "You told me earlier that if I became your disciple, you'd explain cultivation to me.

"What are Fate Reading and Empowerment?

"What is Binding Practice?"

"Weighing one's Fate Pattern, then making various judgments about it, is called Fate Reading.

"Afterward, the words of the Fate Reading are turned into a Prophetic Verse. Following that verse for the rest of one's life is called Precept Reception.

"Once the period of cultivation under those precepts is complete, you can turn yourself into a vessel capable of containing a certain kind of supernatural entity corresponding to your Fate Pattern.

"If you successfully contain one, you enter the stage of Binding Practice. The first part means entwining and connecting-establishing a link between yourself and the entity.

"The second part means binding and fixing it in place. Using yourself as the vessel, together with various Binding Fate Artifacts, you continually bind the entity, harnessing its power and fixing it in the state you desire!

"Once you've completed the binding step, you can command the Vicious Ghost for your own use.

"After that come Ghost Medicine Body Nourishment and various other stages, but those are far too distant for you. Many monks spend their entire lives stuck at the Precept Reception stage.

"After all, finding a ghost that matches your Fate Pattern and Prophetic Verse is no easy task."

As Guangfa slowly revealed the secrets of Binding Practice, Su Wu felt as though a door to a new world had opened before him.

So what the Secret Treasury Domain called cultivation was containing a ghost within oneself to gain its aid?

He frowned and asked again, "Isn't there a hidden danger in containing a ghost inside your body?

"The Vicious Ghosts inside those two senior brothers of yours are on the verge of resurgence..."

Guangfa scoffed. "How could there not be any danger?

"Even someone like me, who has successfully completed Binding Practice, can only temporarily suppress the ghost within. It merely means I won't have to worry about a Vicious Ghost's resurgence for a dozen years or so.

"Those two useless fools in the temple contained ghosts but never fully completed Binding Practice. They've only had two or three years to throw their weight around, and now they're already facing a Vicious Ghost's resurgence!

"But if you refuse to contain a ghost, will you willingly let one kill you when it comes for you?"

Of course Su Wu would never willingly submit to slaughter.

Su Wu shook his head.

When pursued by supernatural entities, ordinary people had very few choices.

The entities themselves could not be killed. Their very existence defied any solution.

Once they targeted you, you could either flee for your life, only to meet an inevitable death in the end;

Or you could become something similar to them and use their power to fight them.

But wasn't containing a ghost within yourself also a road of no return?

"The incomplete Tiger God Spellmark I planted on you has already allowed you to surpass ordinary people, but that kind of power is still utterly helpless against a true supernatural entity." Guangfa led Su Wu over a mountain ridge, then suddenly stopped as he spoke.

"The Tiger God Spellmark is merely the equivalent of a casual breath from the Vicious Ghost inside me."

Su Wu fell silent for a moment.

He had thought Guangfa's ability to plant a spellmark on him came from wielding some mysterious power.

Only now did he realize that Guangfa had indeed used a mysterious power.

That power came from a Vicious Ghost.

That was why the Tiger Demon Curse Mark seemed so sinister and malevolent.

"Are all spellmarks in this world manifestations of supernatural power lodged in human bodies?"

"They are." Guangfa nodded. "At least, I've never seen a spellmark that was any different."

Then you definitely don't know the simulator exists.

Su Wu felt a little heartened.

His Strongman Spellmark had come from the simulator. It was nothing like the sinister Tiger Demon Curse Mark.

Rather than continue walking, Guangfa took a dried-up doll from inside his robes.

The doll gave off a faint stench of decay.

He handed it to Su Wu and said, "Narrow-Sleeved Guanyin is catching up. When she gets close, throw this Corpse Incense Offering to her."

Su Wu's heart tightened. He looked at the doll in his hand, which stood about a foot tall.

He found that it closely resembled the desiccated corpse of an infant, except an infant wouldn't have the thick hair covering the doll's head.

Corpse Incense Offering?

Something like the Fragrant Blood Offering?

The Secret Treasury Domain seemed particularly adept at making various "offerings" to attract supernatural entities' attention and divert their pursuit.

While I'm following this readily acquired master, I'd better learn all this useful knowledge.

Thoughts turned over in Su Wu's mind.

Just then, he noticed a faint white glow on the horizon.

With her narrow sleeve cuffs tied in knots, her peach-heart-shaped face, and her bulging belly, Narrow-Sleeved Guanyin drifted through the darkness like a kite, approaching Su Wu.

"Where are you going?

"Won't you take me with you?"

As she drifted steadily onward, the distance of several hundred yards gradually closed.

Su Wu steadied his mind. With his master watching beside him, he gauged the distance between himself and Narrow-Sleeved Guanyin. Only when she drifted within five paces did he suddenly hurl the Corpse Incense Offering in his hand!

He threw the dried-up doll straight at Narrow-Sleeved Guanyin!

The instant they touched, arms of luminous white sprouted from the dried-up doll's collar and cuffs, wrapping around it layer upon layer!

Guangfa gave a slight nod, a flash of approval passing through his eyes.

He turned and walked into the darkness.

The wind carried his voice to Su Wu's ears. "Follow me."