Li Yijiu returned to her lodgings.
The room was empty.
Her roommates had all gone to class.
As for her? Her next class was Inner Alchemy Mind Method. She had no interest in listening to her disciples and grand-disciples spread rumors that she had renounced love—or “follow her example” and end up without descendants.
Skipping class was standard student practice.
Li Yijiu wasn’t worried in the least.
She set her things on the table, spread out the talisman paper, and dipped the Earth Grade wolf-hair brush—Yin Lan’s—into cinnabar. Then she began drawing talismans, her brush sweeping like a flying dragon and dancing serpent. Each one was finished in a single, fluid stroke.
In no time, she had completed several talismans.
Golden light shimmered across their simple, unrestrained patterns.
That was the mark of Heaven Grade talismans.
But Li Yijiu wasn’t satisfied. Talisman paper and cinnabar were meant to improve the odds of successfully completing a talisman, but for someone like her, who could already draw them in thin air, they were a constraint.
Unfortunately, she didn’t have enough cultivation to support that now. Even drawing a few ordinary talismans this way had drained every last bit of spiritual energy in her body.
She needed to find a way to improve her cultivation as soon as possible.
But with a Mystic spiritual root, no matter how diligently she cultivated, she couldn’t achieve a qualitative change.
She would have to find another way.
Before she did, though, she needed to get a good meal.
After tidying up, Li Yijiu stuck an Invisibility Talisman and a Disguise Talisman to her forehead, then took her talismans and headed down the mountain.
At the mountain gate, a layer of restrictions stopped her.
It was Qingxin Sect’s mountain-protecting formation.
No wonder no one skipped class.
Unfortunately, it couldn’t stop her. She was the one who had created the formation.
Li Yijiu passed through with ease.
The disciples guarding the gate didn’t notice a thing.
Once outside, she tore off the Invisibility Talisman and circulated the technique that concealed her cultivation.
Before she could eat, she needed to sell her talismans at a talisman shop.
She had no money for a meal.
Li Yijiu chose the biggest talisman shop in Qingxin City. Her disguise made her clothes and appearance utterly unremarkable, so neither the shop assistant nor the shopkeeper paid her much attention.
The assistant was busy greeting other customers.
The shopkeeper was studying a sheet of talisman paper.
Li Yijiu glanced over the shelves. Yellow Grade talismans cost one hundred high-grade spirit stones; Profound Grade talismans, one thousand; Earth Grade talismans, ten thousand.
Prices had gotten pretty steep in the later generations.
So she extrapolated the price and placed a Heaven Grade talisman in front of the shopkeeper.
“One hundred thousand high-grade spirit stones.”
The shopkeeper’s hand jerked. He nearly tore the talisman paper he was holding, then quickly set it down and smoothed it flat. “Oh, mother of mercy! If I ruin this, that old bastard will smash up my shop…”
Li Yijiu noticed the talisman paper in his hand. It was the very Immobilizing Talisman she had drawn for Qingxin Sect’s entrance examination.
How had it ended up here?
Surely Qingxin Sect, with its jade sculptures and spirit-stone beds, wouldn’t sell applicants’ work?
A foreboding feeling came over her.
Just then, the shopkeeper turned his attention to her. When he heard “one hundred thousand high-grade spirit stones,” he’d thought he must have misheard. Looking up and seeing how ordinary she seemed, he was even more baffled. “One hundred thousand high-grade spirit stones? What kind of talisman could be worth—”
He lowered his eyes to the talisman on the counter. His expression changed, and he beamed as he carefully gathered it into his hands, as if afraid she might change her mind.
“Of course! Of course it’s worth that!”
The shopkeeper knew his trade.
At a glance, he could tell it was a Heaven Grade talisman.
And one of the finest Heaven Grade talismans, at that.
Its lines were clean and flowing, its style grand and powerful—better even than the ones that old bastard Fu Yangzi drew!
The only odd thing was how ordinary the talisman paper and cinnabar were. They didn’t match the talisman’s quality at all.
He guessed she might be some reclusive master who lived simply. The people of Tianren Yue, Qingxin Sect’s equal, had that sort of style too.
Besides, even as a Nascent Soul cultivator, he couldn’t see through her cultivation. Usually, that meant either she was a mortal or her cultivation was higher than his. But how could someone who could produce a Heaven Grade talisman be a mortal?
She had to be a master!
Perhaps she was in a hurry for money, which was why she was selling it so cheaply.
Thanks to the disguise Li Yijiu had carefully put together, the shopkeeper’s imagination ran wild, and his reverence for her only grew.
He didn’t haggle. Instead, he raised the price himself, took out a Qiankun Pouch, and offered it to her with both hands. “Here are one hundred and twenty thousand high-grade spirit stones. Please count them.”
Then he had someone bring over some fine talisman paper and cinnabar as well, and gave them to Li Yijiu. “A small token of my esteem. I hope you’ll favor us with your business again!”
“Thank you.”
Li Yijiu took the items and was about to leave.
Just then, someone came in through the door.
The newcomer had a fierce, scowling face like the Thunder Lord’s, and looked like trouble. He was also cursing under his breath. “Blind! I was blind…”
He strode over to the shopkeeper as if they knew each other well. “Remember the genius I told you about last time, the one called Dadao Zhijian? I was blind!”
“She wasn’t a genius at all!”
“She’s just an ignorant, useless fool!”
“She actually said the mysterious symbols on the Patriarch’s book were—were…” He couldn’t bring himself to say it. Shaking his head, he sighed. “Forget it. That’s a grave insult to the Patriarch!”
“Ah, I was blind…”
The ignorant, useless fool Li Yijiu: “…”
To run into her teacher the very first time she skipped class—her luck was absolutely explosive, even by the standards of the whole sect.
The shopkeeper ignored Fu Yangzi’s rambling and focused on studying the newly acquired Heaven Grade talisman. Fu Yangzi snatched it away, then stared at it in astonishment.
“Where did you get this?!”
The shopkeeper snatched it back protectively. “Careful, you’ll ruin it! You clumsy old bastard!”
Li Yijiu hurried out. Behind her, she heard the shopkeeper tell Fu Yangzi, “Go on, get out of here. It’s not for you. That mysterious master who was just here sold it to me.”
Fu Yangzi’s eyes immediately lit up as he looked toward her.
“…”
She’d only just sold the talisman, and now he was selling her out?
Li Yijiu could run as fast as she liked, but she was only at the Qi Refinement stage now. She couldn’t outrun Fu Yangzi, who was determined to catch up with her.
“Please wait!”
Li Yijiu had no choice but to stop. Keeping up her aloof, mysterious-master act, she asked, “What is it?”
Fu Yangzi cupped his hands in greeting. “I was fortunate enough to glimpse your talisman just now. Even that brief look was enough to show me how far I fall short. Could I ask you a few questions?”
“No.”
Li Yijiu walked past him.
Fu Yangzi followed right on her heels.
“…”
Was he a stubborn burr that just wouldn’t come off?
Li Yijiu took a deep breath and smiled. “It’s not that I absolutely can’t. Just agree to one thing for me.”
Fu Yangzi looked eager to learn.
“Just name it!”
Li Yijiu took him to the Spirit Cuisine Restaurant and ordered a table full of delicious dishes and two pots of green plum wine.
Fu Yangzi looked puzzled. Was her request simply to treat him to a meal?
Of course not.
Li Yijiu picked up her chopsticks and prepared to dig in. Then she smiled at him. “Draw the mysterious symbols on the cover of the Patriarch’s book—the king… Draw them one hundred times, and I’ll answer your questions.”
“…”
Though he thought her request was a little odd, it was nothing difficult for Fu Yangzi. He drew those mysterious symbols every day anyway.
Thinking that this talisman master was testing him, he immediately took out paper and brush and began solemnly drawing a tortoise.
Li Yijiu didn’t know what to make of it.
Fu Yangzi finished soon enough.
Confidently, he held the talisman paper up to her. “Please take a look. I’ve studied this for hundreds of years and have long since mastered it. I’m sure no one in the world could draw it more accurately than I can!”
“…”
Studying it more only made things worse for you.
Li Yijiu looked at the simple little turtle he’d spent hundreds of years studying and wondered whether he’d taken that bottle of Brain-Boosting Pills.
She’d finished her meal, and he’d finished drawing his turtles.
Li Yijiu answered every question he asked.
The more Fu Yangzi listened, the more he admired her—and the more moved he became.
He had thought a brief exchange would be enough. He hadn’t expected that, despite their being strangers who had only just met, she would teach him everything she knew without holding anything back. He had gained so much from her.
That was the bearing of a true master!
Seeing that Fu Yangzi was only asking more and more questions, Li Yijiu rolled up the hundred turtle drawings and got to her feet.
Fu Yangzi hurriedly called out, “Master, please wait. I have one more question. Have you also studied the Patriarch’s mysterious symbols? What do you make of them?”
Li Yijiu paused, her expression inscrutable. “My conclusion is…”
Fu Yangzi listened with rapt attention.
The master said, “It’s a turtle.”