Chapter 232: (I): Hidden Mission

Zhang Yuanqing's eyes landed on the top of the passage door. A strip of yellow talisman paper had been pasted somewhere along that curved three arch, three roll brickwork, with twisted script drawn across it in cinnabar.

That hadn't been in the illusory realm.

Huh… He stared at the yellow talisman a moment, then decided to leave it be. There's no need to rush this. 

He'd already put the pistol and the gauntlets away. Instead of heading for the main chamber behind him, he walked the opposite way, into the corridor connecting the two chambers.

He'd just remembered a line from one of those tomb-robbing novels he used to read. In the old days, a noble of rank would have a memorial stone placed in this corridor that recorded who was buried in the tomb, their birth date, and their deeds in life.

Zhang Yuanqing went into the corridor, searched around, and sure enough, he found a recessed groove of blue brick built into the wall with a stone tablet sitting inside it.

Most of the writing on the tablet had worn away over the years, and the details were murky. From what was left, he pieced together a rough sense of who the commandery princess had been. She was the eldest daughter of some prince from the early Ming dynasty. Her name was Yin Yao. A smart girl from her youngest years, lovely as a flower, and born with a rare gift for cultivation.

She'd once cultivated under the Three Paths Mountain Goddess in Songfu. After finishing her training, she wandered the world, lived out two sixty-year cycles, and didn't pass until the mid-to-late Ming period. She never married.

Zhang Yuanqing shook his head in disbelief. This commandery princess was the old hag's disciple?There are so many Transcendent-tier dungeons a Nocturnal Specter could enter, yet the first one I walked into was the Temple to the Three Paths Mountain Goddess, and the second contains her disciple's grave? Is there some sort of cursed karma tying me and that old hag together?

No words could describe what Zhang Yuanqing felt right then, but the closest sentiment was surely a forceful "are you kidding me??"

He left the corridor in a tangle of emotion and walked back where he'd come from. The six-meter passage opened up into the main chamber. In the center of the chamber, which was as big as the lobby of a five-star hotel, sat a stone dais, and on the dais lay a white jade coffin. There were niches in the east, west, and south walls.

All of it matched what he'd seen in the illusory realm. The one difference was that a lot of the porcelain and pottery lay smashed to pieces, and two of the black wooden chests, each half a person tall, had been opened, with their contents scattered across the floor. 

There were clothing and books strewn about, as well as the odd trinket a woman of an older era might use. None of it was worth much, and there wasn't a single large piece of gold, silver, or jade. That said, small gold and silver ornaments were aplenty, mostly the size of a thumbnail.

Someone had clearly cleaned the place out.

Now that's more like it, Zhang Yuanqing thought to himself, and that thought turned into righteous outrage. Robbing a dead person's things. Wang Xiao'er is truly despicable.

Zhang Yuanqing blanked out for a beat, and then it dawned on him. The price of the Houtu Boots was kicking in. He was supposed to be an honest and upright person.

He glanced at the coffin, but he didn't dare touch it because of the residual dread within his heart of opening coffins. 

He checked the scattered things on the floor first. Clothing, bronzeware, ceramics, ceremonial gear, gold buttons, and a warped and bent silver hairpin. He ran a hand over them one by one, but none of them were Spirit Realm items.

Next, he examined the books with their yellowed, brittle pages. A few miscellaneous volumes, a couple of geographical books and one titled Nocturnal Specter Breathing Method.

It's all low value stuff. Tch. Did Wang Xiao'er just happen to walk off with every single Spirit Realm item? Those three items all looked valuable, but could the chamber only happen to have exactly those three and nothing else? That seems a little bit convenient…

Then Zhang Yuanqing let out a "huh," his gaze locking onto the Nocturnal Specter Breathing Method. It wasn't the book that drew him. He'd spotted something tucked inside it.

He picked the manual up and found a sheet of parchment pressed between the pages. Written on it was some sort of sacrificial rite. By tracking down the materials listed on the parchment and holding the ceremony, one could pray to an unseen supreme being for power.

He held the parchment for a few seconds, and Spirit Realm text appeared.

【Name: Mass-produced Parchment 】

【Type: Hide】

【Function: Sacrifice】

【Description: Hold the sacrifice as written on the parchment to borrow power from an unseen supreme being.】

【Note: It has no price, so long as you can gather the sacrificial materials.】

That’s strange… Zhang Yuanqing thought to himself. 

It was the first time he was seeing an item like this. No, to be exact, it was his first brush with the whole idea of sacrificing something to a supreme being.

He pondered over its implications. You get some kind of boost through making a sacrifice, a lot like getting a buff in a game. However I don't know how strong the buff is. Once I’m back in the real world, I’ll gather the materials and try it out. It'll cost a bit of money at most, but if it's a powerful buff, it can be another trump card.

He tried stowing the parchment into his inventory and was pleased to find it went in.

This one sheet of parchment means I've already turned a profit, he thought with a guilty look on his face. He'd become a tomb robber.

He walked up to the jade coffin, laid both hands on the lid, and was about to shove it open when a Spirit Realm item description popped into view.

【Name: Millennium Jade Coffin】

【Type: Coffin】

【Function: Nurtures the Body】

【Description: An item left behind by the Three Paths Mountain Goddess, originally for storing her own body. After she died, her disciple commissioned a stone coffin to replace the one made out of jade.】

【Note: Truly a moving bond between master and disciple.】

"Pfft!" 

Zhang Yuanqing couldn't contain himself and laughed out loud. The old hag had indeed been laid to rest in a stone coffin, one he'd pushed open with his own hands.

No wonder, he thought, when I opened her coffin, her lips were pale, her skin was dull, and she looked completely neglected.

"No, no, how can I laugh? I shouldn't be gloating over a thing like this… Then again, the old hag woke up and found herself in a stone coffin… I’ve no idea what that must have felt like at the time. I have to ask her if I get the chance. Mm, perhaps when I hit the Sovereign tier… No, no, can't go picking at people's old scars…"

Muttering away, he put force behind both palms and eased the lid open, inch by inch.

Inside the coffin was another coffin made of jade. Zhang Yuanqing took in a deep breath and carefully lifted the lid of the jade coffin.

Inside lay a daoist in a blue robe with hair gone gray, a wrinkled face, and a ruddy complexion, as if he were only asleep.

Zhang Yuanqing quietly set the lid back in place, then slid the lid of the outer coffin back into place as well, swearing to himself he would never open another coffin as long as he lived.

That wandering daoist is really inside the coffin. He's actually here. He really is here… 

His mind was full of things to worry about. The wandering daoist turning up in this place was a surprise, but it made sense. By Wang Xiao'er's account, the wandering Daoist had gone looking for the commandery princess's tomb precisely because his time was almost up and he wanted to make one last gamble. It was unclear if he'd unearthed the secret of long life, but this body-nurturing jade coffin alone was an object the daoist couldn't refuse.

What did "time almost up" mean, if not a body decaying toward death? This coffin nurtured the flesh, and in a sense, it really did prolong life.

Zhang Yuanqing put the daoist in the coffin together with the dungeon's introductory blurb and Wang Xiao'er's account, and a lot of things became clear. He had unlocked the true sequence of events.

After finding the tomb, the daoist was thrilled to discover the coffin could slow his body's rate of decay, and thus wanted to take it for his own. However he feared the commandery princess inside it.

Therefore, while the vengeful spirits in the items slept through the day, he put Wang Xiao'er to the task of looting the items out of the chamber. That way, the commandery princess, upon finding her items gone, would furiously track down the thief. Furthermore, these items were akin to guardian spirits. He wouldn't have dared to take up residence in this chamber for long without dealing with them.

Then, once the commandery princess left, he moved into the tomb at once and claimed the coffin.

As he turned over the clues in his mind, something tugged at him. But there's a fatal hole in this story. After the commandery princess found her items stolen, why didn't she come back and kill him? Instead, she didn’t dare to set foot in the chamber ever again…

He backed out of the main chamber and returned to the front room. He stood under the curved three arch, three roll archway, tipped his head up, and studied the yellow talisman pasted to the wall.

In the realm the bronze mirror had created, the yellow talisman hadn't existed. In other words, that thing had been stuck there after the bronze mirror had been taken out of the tomb. The mirror hadn't known the talisman was there, so it hadn't shown up in the illusion.

Since it had only appeared after the mirror was stolen and the commandery princess left the tomb, it was obvious who had placed the talisman there. 

Zhang Yuanqing climbed up the steep brick wall, using the seams between the bricks as fingerholds. All his weight was riding on just a few fingers. It was a stunt no ordinary person could ever pull off.

At the top of the archway, he hooked two fingers into a seam while reaching out with the other hand. He didn't dare tear the thing straight off, and just lightly touched it instead.

【Name: Raging Flame Divine Talisman】

【Type: Talisman】

【Function: Warding a Location】

【Description: A talisman drawn in blood carrying Diurnal divine power, able to suppress evil and keep a household at peace.】

【Note: It can only be used once.】