After making her entrance, He Xiangu wore a solemn, austere expression, like a divine statue carved from jade, apparently finding nothing at all abrupt about her entrance with "lotuses blooming beneath each step."
Her gaze was tranquil, as though the fervent worshippers around her did not exist. Holding her Magical Sword point down, she first bowed respectfully toward the sanctuary behind her, where the divine statues were enshrined.
After bowing, she slowly turned around and lightly touched the sword tip precisely to the stack of yellow paper talismans.
Then, with a slight flick of her wrist, she pointed the Magical Sword skyward.
In an instant, paper talismans leaped out one after another, linking end to end into a long chain that floated leisurely into the sky.
The chain of talismans wheeled and danced through the air, spiraling upward. In that clamorous courtyard, it seemed to form a lifelike dragon of talisman paper, drawing a murmur of amazement from the worshippers below.
Next, He Xiangu set down the coin Magical Sword and picked up the antique bronze bell on the incense altar.
Holding two fingers together, she dipped them lightly into the cinnabar inkstone, then swiftly traced across the bell's smooth surface. A cinnabar talisman as red as blood quietly took shape.
Cui Jiuyang narrowed his eyes and studied it intently. This was indeed an authentic Daoist talisman, intended specifically to repel evil and avert calamity.
From the looks of it, He Xiangu really did possess some grounding in a genuine Daoist lineage.
Then He Xiangu half closed her eyes and parted her lips, slowly uttering an obscure, incomprehensible incantation.
She held the inscribed bronze bell high above the large bronze basin on the incense altar. With a gentle turn of her wrist, the bell began ringing in clear, pleasing chimes