Old Master Huang’s so-called devious stratagem had Lang Jiuchuan feeling exhilarated beyond measure. She could barely stop herself from charging straight up to the Imperial Mausoleum and thundering two bolts of heavenly lightning down upon it, blasting it to smithereens. As for whether that was sinful wrongdoing?

She was Tantai Wuji’s creditor. Whatever sin she committed would naturally fall upon that old ghost — her debt to collect. What had she to fear from karma? Tantai Wuji had stolen the vital fortune energy of countless great clans to nourish himself — now that was true wrongdoing. He treated karmic consequence as nothing. For her, his disciple, to have “inherited” this much from him was entirely natural — no fault in it at all.

But after the surge of exhilaration, Lang Jiuchuan still composed herself and thought clearly. This course of action was viable, but it could not be pursued with reckless abandon. She needed to plan carefully and deliberately — she could not let a moment of heated impulse bring harm to the innocent.

This blow must catch him completely off guard!

Lang Jiuchuan looked at Old Master Huang. “Old Master Huang’s mind works quickly, and this plan is indeed vicious and sharp. You drew on no small amount of vital fortune energy from the Tantai dynasty before attaining your current fortune, yet you show not a moment’s hesitation about stabbing it in the back. Someone like me, from whom you’ve received no kindness whatsoever — I’d imagine you could cast aside just as easily…”

Before she finished speaking, her aura surged. Cold light flashed in her eyes, and her entire bearing sharpened into that of someone who would not hesitate to kill and silence him.

She released her Pressure Aura abruptly, pressing it down upon Old Master Huang with ferocious force. His legs buckled, and he fell involuntarily to his knees, his spine bent double. Both hands pressed flat against the floor as he cried out in a high-pitched voice, begging for mercy. “Female Bodhisattva, spare this one’s life! When it comes to kindness, Benefactor’s kindness is naturally the greater. What does the Tantai Mausoleum count as? Old Huang dug that tunnel at great risk and effort — it took courage and ability. Whatever vital fortune energy I managed to steal, I earned through my own skills. All of it was hard won. It cannot be counted as any kind of favor at all!”

“Enough. What moment is this for you to be bluffing at the thing?” Feng Ya cut in, his voice cool and detached. “In any case, if this business goes wrong, all living beings under heaven are dead. If it dares betray us, it severs its own lifeline — everyone dies together. The only distinction is whether one dies at one’s own hand, or whether dying at someone else’s hands makes it more unjust.”

Lang Jiuchuan: For roundabout and indirect intimidation, you are truly unmatched.

Old Master Huang’s small eyes spun and rolled. He ventured, with great care, “All living beings under heaven will die — what does that mean exactly?”

“What is preparing to awaken beneath the main tomb is no great dragon — it is a thousand-year-old demon. Should he awaken, every living creature will suffer calamity, and all beings will find no peace.” Lang Jiuchuan looked at it blandly. “If you go and inform on us, then we all perish together.”

Old Master Huang immediately raised two fingers and swore a solemn oath. “I, Old Master Huang, though known by some as a cunning merchant, know perfectly well what is good for me. I would never dare betray you. This human world — I have not enjoyed enough of it yet! If I dare to betray you, may five thunderbolts strike me down from the heavens, may my cultivation be scattered utterly, may my soul and spirit be annihilated!”

Lang Jiuchuan said, “Since you are such a fine and good-hearted soul, there are some matters where Old Master Huang can share the burden of labor and effort. All living beings under heaven will remember your contribution to their merit. Should your merit grow great enough, people will certainly make offerings to you and you will become an earthly immortal.”

Old Master Huang: “?”

He had only sworn an oath to save his life — he had not agreed to get mixed up in this whole dangerous affair.

However, Lang Jiuchuan’s dazzlingly golden promise of merit was a little tempting.

Lang Jiuchuan, seeing that he had adopted a thoroughly compliant and at-your-disposal manner, gave him a few instructions, then departed in a leisurely and unhurried manner.

Old Master Huang gazed up at the deep black expanse of the night sky, one hand clasped behind his back, the other stroking his small goatee. He let out a long sigh. The weather is about to change.

The night was deep and dark.

Lang Jiuchuan stood atop a sheer cliff face, looking down at the vast, shadowy expanse of tomb mounds concealed within the darkness below. She felt the vital fortune energy within them, all of it sealed inside by an invisible boundary formation, and could not help but press her lips tightly together.

Her hands itched terribly.

“Don’t act rashly.” Feng Ya’s voice drifted from within the pagoda, quiet and level. “One impulsive move and you’ll alert someone first, which will only put you at a disadvantage.”

Lang Jiuchuan gave a low sound of agreement. “In other dynasties, each emperor who passes from the world has his own individual imperial mausoleum. The Tantai clan is different — after their emperors die, they are interred in the Tantai clan’s ancestral burial grounds, forming one great collective tomb complex of a true noble house. And yet no one thought this strange.” She paused. “Looking at it now, it is because they were gathering vital fortune energy. Those sons of destiny chosen to serve as emperors — even after death, they continue to toil and shine for the family, channeling into the mausoleum the meritorious virtue and faith they accumulated in life. If they knew that all those accumulated merits and virtues were converging toward their founding ancestor and none of it would ever reach themselves — I wonder if they would be furious enough to come leaping out of their graves.”

“Perhaps they would. Perhaps they wouldn’t.” Feng Ya replied, “For a clan to flourish and endure through the ages, sacrifice and offerings are necessary. And this is also done for the sake of their descendants. In truth, if this old ghost’s plan succeeded, the Tantai clan would genuinely be able to endure for ten thousand generations — and the benefits far outweigh the drawbacks. A single general’s glory is built upon a mountain of bones — it applies equally to the development of a clan. Someone will always be willing to make that wager.”

Lang Jiuchuan fell silent.

She set aside her brooding and instead opened her Heavenly Eye, her fingertips moving rapidly through calculation sequences. Then, with several swift leaps, she flew toward the position she had determined. Drawing her entire aura inward, she cloaked herself in the energy of the dragon vein and descended without the faintest sound or disturbance, coming to rest before an unassuming burial mound.

She held her breath and waited.

The great formation seemed to shudder, almost imperceptibly — and then fell back to stillness. It made no move to strike down the foreign intruder who had entered its bounds. Lang Jiuchuan felt a surge of delight in her heart. It truly was possible.

“That place you found for me to temper my body and nourish my soul within the dragon vein is truly a blessed land.” Lang Jiuchuan dug at the burial mound with delighted spirits and spoke to Feng Ya. “By absorbing the dragon breath and vein fortune from that place, I’ve gained additional power to protect myself. Now I’m using this dragon energy to conceal my presence and fuse with this ground — the dragon vein here treats me as part of its own energy flow. Does this not mean I could move through this entire great formation as though it does not exist? Perhaps in a moment I should go and probe the main tomb.”

The phrase “sharing the same vital energy, connected by the same root” had simply floated up in her mind — she and that dog Tantai were not connected, but she and the dragon vein shared vital energy. Could she not then move freely across this stretch of earth?

Feng Ya said, “That dragon vein lies at the central axis point between the Void Realm and the human realm. No one knows how long it has existed there. It has never been touched by anyone — its vital fortune energy is the purest and most hidden. I came across it entirely by chance — and you have benefited from it. But do not treat Tantai Wuji as a fool. His spirit-sense sealing restrictions will be placed on the most critical locations. The moment they are triggered, he will come immediately. Without preparation, can you defeat him?”

That was fair.

Lang Jiuchuan pressed her lips together, buried what she had brought along, and rose with some reluctance, preparing to leave.

“Is that thing truly of any use?” Feng Ya was somewhat curious. That dark, unremarkable skeletal bone stone — could it really destroy an ancestral mausoleum brimming with vast and tremendous vital fortune energy?

“A levee of a thousand li collapses from the work of a single ant’s hole. I corrupt its vital fortune, drain away its energy. As long as I tear open even the smallest gap, this ancestral mausoleum will be like a sheepskin ball pierced by a needle — it will slowly leak away.” Lang Jiuchuan laughed coldly. “And this too is karma. That skeletal bone stone was nurtured in the corpse pit he used to cultivate his corpse wraiths — saturated to the extreme with Yin energy and death energy. Using it to destroy the Tantai ancestral mausoleum’s feng shui is its own form of karmic retribution, wouldn’t you say?”

He had created such a malevolent and world-tormenting abomination as corpse wraiths. So using the skeletal bone stone nurtured in that same Yin death pit to ruin the feng shui of his ancestral mausoleum and let him taste his own bitter fruit — perfectly fitting.

She was only seeking a small measure of justice back for all living beings!

Lang Jiuchuan buried the skeletal bone stone and then pressed a seal inscription down upon it. The stone’s Yin and death energy slowly seeped outward, corrupt and defiling. The vital fortune energy that had been gathered and concentrated within seemed to recoil from the contamination, scattering and retreating — and then, gradually, seeping away through a gap as fine as a silk thread.