The unusual inscriptions

The sun sank behind the western hills. In a dead-end alley on the south side of Golden Lake Town, the light was so dim it seemed night had fallen early.

Lin He wore the roomy black robe sewn from two old quilt covers, with the already petite Su Qiuran securely strapped to his broad back. From a distance, he looked like a strangely misshapen, hulking man.

" Hiss-go easy. Stop poking me in the small of my back," Lin He complained under his breath.

Beneath the black robe, Su Qiuran's pale fingers swiftly worked a needle and thread through the interlining of Lin He's inner robe.

"Stop talking and stand straight." Su Qiuran's muffled voice came from inside the robe. "These are two Vajra Protection Talismans. If we really run into someone with no sense later, I'll slap one on you. Pick your moment and run. Don't fight them head-on, understand?"

Feeling the two stiff cloth pockets added to his lining, along with the Spirit Stones tucked against each of their chests, Lin He felt warmth well up inside, but his words remained flippant. "Don't worry, wifey. If we have to run, this human tank will move faster than Goudan spotting his food bowl."

Once the hidden pockets were sewn, Lin He tugged his hood down, covering most of his face. They followed the alley and stopped before an old storefront with a weathered sign reading "Yongtai Pawnshop."

The shop door stood half closed, with no lamps lit inside.

Lin He pushed the door open without ceremony and entered. Behind the counter, a one-eyed man was idly tossing a copper coin.

Qi refinement fourth layer.

Lin He's muscles instinctively tensed, then relaxed. After three rounds of tempering with essence of the sun, especially after tempering his internal organs, his Qi fluctuations were now concealed to the utmost. To cultivators, he was a mortal without the slightest fluctuation of spiritual Qi. But those who knew their business would call this Qi and blood blazing like a furnace.

Without wasting words, Lin He passed the black invitation edged in gold out of his broad sleeve.

The one-eyed man took it casually, flipped his wrist, and pressed a Spiritual Light Talisman against it. A ring of dark gold spirit patterns immediately emerged along the invitation's edge.

Its authenticity was confirmed.

The one-eyed man's gaze traveled upward, lingering for a full three seconds on Lin He's black robe, where dark red chicken-blood stains were still faintly visible.

Feeling the heavy pressure coming from this black-robed oddity, like a ferocious beast lying dormant, the one-eyed man grinned, revealing yellow teeth. "A body cultivator built like a black tower... that old fellow at the Hundred Treasures Pavilion wasn't exaggerating. My friend, this way, please."

With that, he pressed something beneath the counter.

With a muffled rumble, the wall behind the counter slowly slid apart, revealing stone steps leading underground. Oil lamps giving off a faint, eerie green glow stood every few paces along both sides, making the passage look exactly like a grave robber's tunnel.

Without a word, Lin He descended with steady steps.

The underground hall was far more spacious than he had imagined. The air carried a mixture of moldy earth and cheap incense.

Thirty or forty people were already scattered around the hall. Over ninety percent were dressed like Lin He, wearing black clothes with bamboo hats or masks, wrapped up tightly.

Lin He chose a secluded corner toward the back and sat down. He appeared to lower his head to rest, but his peripheral vision had already swept the entire room.

In the corner ahead to his left sat a young cultivator in a brocade robe. Although he wore a half mask, Lin He would have recognized that familiar cloud embroidery on his cuffs even if it had turned to ash-a member of the Lin Household. At the Qi refinement third layer, he carried himself arrogantly. Even his sitting posture radiated an "everyone here is trash" air that begged for a beating.

Heh, my own clan's here to stock up too, Lin He sneered inwardly.

At the very center of the hall was an absolute vacuum.

A stooped old man in gray robes sat there. Though he was as thin as a dry stick, the people around him had left a clear circle two meters across, even deliberately slowing their breathing.

Qi refinement ninth layer!

This was the person with the highest cultivation Lin He had encountered so far. Even from more than ten meters away, the spiritual pressure the old man unconsciously emitted still made Lin He's heart pound with alarm.

The three rogue cultivators by the wall on the right looked much shabbier. They huddled together, whispering. The bulging Storage Bags hanging from their waists were stained with dried mud and dark red blood. There was no need to ask: these were scavengers who had picked things out of piles of corpses on the outskirts of the Mass Grave on Green Mountain.

As he observed, Su Qiuran suddenly poked his lower back twice.

This was a signal they had agreed on at home: something was happening; look carefully.

Following the direction Su Qiuran had been able to glimpse, Lin He discreetly swept his gaze over the stone wall to the right. Under the dim green light, an extremely inconspicuous dark red triangle marked a joint in the stonework.

A secret mark of the Pacification Bureau!

When Su Qiuran had studied the local gazetteer before, this official mark had been illustrated in it.

He scanned the crowd again and, sure enough, noticed three black-clad figures in bamboo hats who appeared to be strangers to one another. Their positions were carefully chosen, sealing off precisely three blind corners in the hall. At the bottom edges of their boots, he could faintly make out the shape of government-issue black boots.

Well, damn. The authorities are running a sting here? Lin He grumbled inwardly. No wonder this underground bank dared to hold a black market amid the chaos. The Pacification Bureau had already planted its eyes here, waiting to see which lineages or bandit cultivators would unload stolen goods, while getting a read on their backgrounds.

Clang-

The clear ring of a bronze gong interrupted Lin He's thoughts.

The red curtain on the auction platform was drawn aside, and a shopkeeper as fat as Maitreya stepped out, beaming.

"Thank you, fellow Daoists, for honoring us with your presence. At today's Yongtai Black Market, the rules remain unchanged: we ask no questions about origins and recognize only Spirit Stones!" The fat shopkeeper was direct. With a wave of his hand, an attendant beside him brought out a tray covered in red cloth.

"Our first lot, to warm things up. One stalk of century-old blood coagulation grass, freshly harvested from deep within Green Mountain, with intact roots and full medicinal potency. A superb primary ingredient for refining a supreme healing medicine! The opening bid is fifteen Low-Grade Spirit Stones!"

The moment he finished, the eyes of those scavenger rogue cultivators turned red. With Green Mountain now a boiling pot of slaughter, life-saving materials like this could scarcely be bought at any price.

"Twenty!"

"Twenty-five!"

The price soared until the young Lin Household cultivator in the corner impatiently raised his hand, his voice arrogant. "Fifty."

The hall fell silent. Fifty stones for one stalk of blood coagulation grass was far too inflated a price. He was a sucker, pure and simple.

Lin He did not move a muscle. At his lower back, Su Qiuran poked him three times in succession.

The signal: too expensive, not worth it, complete fucking idiot.

Chuckling, the fat shopkeeper brought down the hammer to seal the sale, then had the second tray brought up.

"Second lot: one bundle of green vine talisman paper, fifty sheets in all, with three Spirituality Detection Talismans included. The unrivaled choice for fellow talisman makers. Opening bid: eight Low-Grade Spirit Stones!"

At his lower back, Su Qiuran poked him once.

The signal: worth buying.

Lin He understood immediately. He still had eighty-seven Spirit Stones on him, and fifty sheets of green vine paper were an absolute necessity for Su Qiuran's grand Vajra Protection Talisman undertaking.

"Ten," called a rogue cultivator in the front row.

Lin He slowly raised his broad right hand and spoke in a deliberately lowered, gravelly voice. "Twelve."

His voice was not loud, but it was full and resonant, humming through the somewhat stifling underground hall.

The fat shopkeeper onstage looked toward the voice. His sharp gaze lingered on Lin He's iron-tower frame for a moment, and a flicker of understanding crossed his eyes.

He had heard the old shopkeeper at the Hundred Treasures Pavilion mention that an extremely skilled, mysterious talisman maker had recently appeared in the market, with an unfathomable, formidable body cultivator running errands for them. He had put the talisman paper up today to test the waters, never expecting to actually flush out this "black tower."

"Twelve, sold!" Afraid someone else would cut in, the fat shopkeeper swiftly brought down the hammer.

The next two lots were a Low-Grade Law Artifact flying sword and an incomplete earth-element cultivation method. Lin He had no interest in either, and Su Qiuran remained as quiet as a chicken.

Then the attendants carefully carried up the fifth lot.

It was a long wooden case that looked quite heavy.

The fat shopkeeper put away his Maitreya-like smile, his expression turning solemn. He personally lifted the red cloth and opened the case.

Inside lay a black iron sword broken in two.

The blade was covered in rust and even riddled with chips, but beneath the faint lamplight, incredibly intricate dark gold patterns could vaguely be seen flowing within it.

"Everyone, here comes the real thing." The fat shopkeeper lowered his voice, yet it carried throughout the hall. "Three days ago, this item was unearthed from beneath the formation core of that newly ruptured formation in the central region of the Immortals' Mass Grave on Green Mountain!"

Gasps immediately rose throughout the hall. The central region? That was the meat grinder the three great lineages were currently fighting over with their lives!

"Our appraisal suggests this is a fragment of a High-Grade Law Artifact left behind by that great battle between immortals decades ago!" The fat shopkeeper abruptly raised his voice. "Although it has lost seventy percent of its spirituality after being buried underground for so long and can no longer be activated, the inscriptions remaining on this blade have tremendous value for study! A high-level artifact refiner could even extract and reforge it!"

"Without further ado, the opening bid for these sword fragments is three hundred Low-Grade Spirit Stones!"

Whoosh-

The hall instantly erupted. Three hundred Low-Grade Spirit Stones for a broken sword useful for nothing but research?

"Three hundred and ten!" The young Lin Household cultivator raised his bidding paddle without hesitation.

The price might be high, but disciples of great lineages like them had no shortage of money. They loved buying this kind of unremarkable yet slightly mysterious junk.

What if they picked up a hidden treasure?

"Three hundred and fifty." The Qi refinement ninth layer elder at the center of the hall, who had been resting with his eyes closed all this time, suddenly spoke in a raspy voice.

A big shot had entered the fray.

But at that very moment, Lin He, seated in the corner, could no longer hear any of the bidding around him.

He stared fixedly at the broken sword onstage. The hairs on the back of his neck rose one by one, and a buzz rang through his mind, as though something had exploded inside it.

Others might have been too far away to see clearly, but after three rounds of body tempering, his eyesight was astonishing. He could even make out the roots of aquatic plants more than ten meters down at the bottom of Golden Lake.

He saw it perfectly clearly.

On that broken sword supposedly "left behind by the great battle between immortals" and "dug out of the formation core in Green Mountain's central region," those intricate, ancient dark gold patterns...

Fuck, compared to the inscriptions that had appeared on his own Ingot's turtle shell, he couldn't say they were completely unrelated. He could only say...

They! Were! Exactly! The! Same!