Using the art of golden needle acupuncture to dredge and guide the blocked qi mechanism within Yang Xiuyong’s body, Lang Jiuchuan glanced at the humming needle tips, then looked over at Gong Tinglan and said: “Needle acupuncture alone cannot retain this life force. Let us set up a formation with the Seven-Star Life-Prolonging Lamps.”
Gong Tinglan understood at once. The Seven-Star Life-Prolonging Lamps could temporarily borrow the power of the celestial stars to lock down Yang Xiuyong’s last remaining thread of vitality. “I will go and make the arrangements,” he said.
The moment his words fell, his figure dissolved into a blur and vanished. Gong Qi seized the opportunity to step forward, clasped his hands in a bow to Lang Jiuchuan, and began inquiring about the subtleties of the major acupoint needling technique. Fearful that Lang Jiuchuan might misunderstand his intent, he added: “I have a great fondness for the art of medicine, and hold no intention of prying into secret techniques. This is purely for discussion. If I have caused any offense, please forgive me, Fellow Daoist.”
Lang Jiuchuan smiled. “You are far more upright than Gong Qi and Gong Shiliu. Rest assured — personally, I have no secret methods I consider unfit for others to see. Being able to save lives and benefit the world — that is the very meaning of medicine’s existence.”
Having said so, she proceeded to discuss with him the needle techniques as applied to Yang Xiuyong’s body: what manner of needles to use, whether to use tonifying or draining techniques, which needling method, matched with which Daoist true intention — she held nothing back, and incidentally they also debated the formula of medicinal herbs to be used.
By the time Gong Tinglan reappeared out of thin air carrying seven oil lamps of ancient and unadorned craftsmanship, the two had nearly stripped Yang Xiuyong bare in their enthusiasm, as though about to lay out his entire meridian system for a thorough anatomical discussion.
Gong Qi reluctantly set aside their debate, knowing well what mattered most, and took the oil lamps. Following Lang Jiuchuan’s direction, he arranged them around the bed in the positions of the seven stars of the Northern Dipper.
Lang Jiuchuan formed seals with both hands and flicked seven sparks of flame from her fingertips, landing with precision into each lamp wick.
Gong Tinglan watched with admiring wonder, then said to Lang Jiuchuan: “Your Dao is even more refined than before.”
“My spirit and soul are now complete, and I have also undergone tempering of the body — along with the merit accumulated before now returning to nourish me. My cultivation has indeed advanced, but it is still not enough. The path of cultivation is long.” Lang Jiuchuan modestly smiled, then shifted her tone: “Though the Seven-Star Life-Prolonging Lamps can borrow power to lock in his life force, this method only treats the symptom. If the root cause is not removed, when the lamps go out, he dies.”
Gong Tinglan’s expression grew somber. “Then it comes down to whether the Yang Family can seize this thread of life for themselves.”
As the golden needles cleared the meridians and reinvigorated the qi, illuminated further by the radiance of the Seven-Star Lamps, the pallid face of Yang Xiu — previously ashen — seemed to recover the faintest trace of color, and his breathing grew marginally more stable. Yet he remained deep in unconsciousness.
Gong Tinglan, seeing this, let out a small breath of relief, then furrowed his brow. “As for the root cause of this clan’s extermination — I fear it is precisely as you said, Little Nine: the problem lies in the Yang Family’s ancestral tombs and clan fortune. According to the surviving old servants, the deaths among the Qian, Li, and Yang clans have grown increasingly strange over the past few decades. Some died from cultivation deviation, some from sudden accidents, some from melancholy and grief, some simply fell into an endless sleep from which they never woke, some went mad from their studies and leapt from a city wall. And beyond Yang Xiuyong’s father drowning in shallow water — as for Yang Xiuyong himself…”
He gave a helpless sigh. “The reason he fell into this unending unconsciousness was a stumble — he knocked his head. But I examined him, and there is no injury to his brain, yet he grows weaker and weaker by the day, sinking deeper into sleep. In truth, the Yang Family’s servants have long since grown so accustomed to such misfortunes that they no longer find them strange.”
Lang Jiuchuan thought of the sense of rotting decay and desolation that had accumulated around this old estate as she walked through it, and the numbness that had shown itself in the servants’ expressions. They had simply seen too much.
“The qi fortune of all these clans is declining, entangled in ill luck. Truth be told — I once attempted to investigate the Yang Family’s ancestral tombs, but perhaps my cultivation was insufficient. I could only sense that the atmosphere there was stagnant and oppressively dark, with the feeling of a sun near setting. I could not discern any specific anomaly.” Gong Tinglan’s expression revealed a touch of shame. “I fall far short of you in so many ways.”
An ancestral tomb with the sensation of a declining sun is not, in itself, particularly unusual. After all, should an auspicious ground suffer a great disturbance — such as the ground-shaking upheaval of a natural disaster — even a minor shift can disrupt the feng shui configuration. Yet a thousand-year noble family such as the Yangs, if they truly faced such a calamity, would immediately summon someone to make repairs. After all, the ancestral tomb is the place where a clan’s fortune converges — of supreme importance, not to be taken lightly.
And so, when he perceived their aura had the feeling of a declining sun, he knew something was wrong. Clan members had been meeting with continuous misfortune — the Yang Family should have noticed long ago, yet they still could not overcome their fate. Now only a single solitary descendant remained.
And yet, he had failed to perceive what exactly was wrong with the Yang Family’s ancestral tombs.
“There is no need for shame. If the other party wished to excavate the qi fortune and replace the heavens with counterfeit skies, they would certainly not rely on mere ordinary techniques to damage the feng shui.” Lang Jiuchuan stood, her gaze sharp as blades: “Take me to see it.”
Gong Tinglan instructed Gong Qi to remain and look after Yang Xiuyong, then led Lang Jiuchuan out of the ancestral estate. Both were of considerable cultivation, employing the Divine Locomotion technique, and in an instant they arrived at the Yang Family ancestral tombs, nestled within the Huayin mountain range.
Before they had even drawn close, Lang Jiuchuan sensed an abnormal aura. The terrain here was clear and luminous, with beautiful flowing water — by all accounts, a supremely auspicious feng shui ground. Yet it was now permeated by an indescribable heaviness and deathly stillness. Birds and beasts were completely absent; even the wind seemed to grow faint and weak upon reaching this place.
She raised her gaze. It was only afternoon, yet sunlight could not reach here — the air felt cold, shadowed, and eerie.
A single glance told Lang Jiuchuan: the auspicious energy of this once-blessed ground was entirely gone. An auspicious site had become a site of death — it would be strange if nothing had gone wrong here.
The two stepped within the boundaries of the ancestral tombs, and that sensation grew all the more pronounced. She narrowed her eyes and looked about. The Yang clan’s graves — both the older burials and the ancestral tombs proper — were beyond counting, and tombstones stood solemnly in row after row. Yet rather than the reverent and solemn dignity one would expect, she felt only a pressed-down, hollowed-out sensation of weakness — as though something was being suppressed and drained.
Gong Tinglan said with surprise: “The last time I came, it was not this dim and oppressive. This…”
Lang Jiuchuan closed her eyes. One hand gripped the Dizhong Bell at her waist, and with a gentle intent, the bell tones rippled outward. Her spiritual consciousness spread wide with it. All five senses stilled as she carefully perceived the flow of the earth vein qi currents, the configuration of mountain and water, and the faint, weakened clan fortune belonging to the Yang lineage that drifted through the air.
Her brows gradually knitted together. Her chest rose and fell in rapid, urgent breaths. An expression of grief crossed her face, as though she were hearing the earth veins crying out in anguish — mountain and water drying up, qi currents congealing and stagnant — and amidst it all, countless wailing, sobbing voices.
It was the Yang Family ancestors, crying out for rescue — pleading with her to save the Yang clan from the catastrophe of annihilation.
The aura of this ancestral tomb was flooding into her spirit and soul, pulling her into it, making her feel the extremity of that grief.
A thousand-year noble family — their ruin had not come from their descendants squandering the foundations their ancestors built. They had been schemed against and destroyed. How could they accept this? How could they not hate?
Suddenly, she snapped her eyes open. Her gaze was like a bolt of lightning, shooting toward a low hill behind the great expanse of ancestral graves — seemingly ordinary, unremarkable. She raised herself on the tip of her foot, her figure sweeping forward, and arrived at the foot of that hill in an instant.
Lang Jiuchuan retrieved from the bundle on her back a purple-gold Eight Trigrams compass — also taken from Tongtian Tower. The moment it was brought out, the needle on the compass began spinning without cease.
Gong Tinglan’s expression sank. He looked toward the low hill but could perceive nothing, and so he waited quietly.
The compass needle continued to spin. Lang Jiuchuan looked carefully in all directions, then rose on her tiptoes and leapt to the top of a large boulder at the summit of the low hill. Both hands formed Daoist seals, her spiritual consciousness expanded, and with a bone-chilling cold in her expression she addressed Gong Tinglan, who had alighted at her side: “It is a Fortune-Stealing Life-Nourishing formation — one that takes the Yang Family’s clan fortune and converts it into life energy for use.”