Chapter 43 Chapter 43 (Tomorrow)
Just as the ginseng in the victory coffin was destroyed by the purple thunder and the evil-breaking talisman, thousands of miles away in the capital, an old man who was presiding over a meeting suddenly covered his chest with his hands, and his vigorous spirit quickly weakened within just a few minutes.
The leader who was speaking and the young people who were excitedly responding to him had their heated atmosphere interrupted. They all looked towards the place where the chair had overturned in the front left with unhappy expressions.
Seeing it was him, the leader's discontent faded and he greeted him kindly, "Lao Lin, are you feeling unwell? Go backstage and rest."
The office clerk quickly asked two messengers to help the old man to the back.
The young woman sitting at the edge of the podium covered her mouth and whispered to the clerk, "Why don't you send the old leader to the infirmary?"
The clerk curled his lips in disdain: "What old leader? He's already sixty years old and should have retired long ago, but he's still clinging to his position. I don't know what he's trying to do."
"Keep your voice down! Our director treats him like a teacher and discusses everything with him. Don't you know that?"
The clerk didn't dare to say anything else, but just spat in his heart: It was this person who never keeps a low profile who messed things up. He made such a big factory into a mess. Every day you fight me and I fight you. The factory with tens of thousands of people is divided into seven or eight factions, and all production and construction are delayed!
"Oh no! The old leader is vomiting blood!" A communicator rushed in from behind and interrupted the leader's passionate speech again.
The leader in the middle threw down the manuscript and frowned. However, the voice coming from the loudspeaker was gentle: "In that case, let's adjourn the meeting today. Your Uncle Lin is a senior cadre in our factory. I'll go see him first."
After slamming the small door behind him, the leader scowled at the office clerk, "How can you not do anything right? If the mallet doesn't fit, just fix it. It's not leaving it here to cause a mess...Okay, get two boxes of malted milk and check on Lao Lin for me. Say I got stuck, and go!"
The clerk, who was in his thirties, kept his head down and didn't dare to say a word. He didn't go upstairs to look for him until the man left. He looked around the lounge but couldn't find him. When he was about to run to the infirmary, he saw the female communicator running in, wiping her tears. She immediately supported the person and asked, "What's wrong? Why are you crying?" Is the old man dead?
The female communicator sobbed and said, "Director Lin from the labor union refused to go to the infirmary and insisted on having him sent home! You didn't see him like that, blood gushing out of his mouth, and his grip was frighteningly strong..." The female communicator lifted up her clothes, and sure enough, her wrist was bruised.
He's not dead, so there's no need to worry. If you want to go home, then go home. The officer sat back in his chair and pointed to the chair opposite for the communicator to sit down as well. "You can go home in a while. It's considered field work. Hey, let me ask you, why did he suddenly vomit blood? Do you know?"
The female correspondent looked outside, moved closer, and said mysteriously, "He was holding his chest and mumbling something, and he was moving his fingers while talking."
"That's it," the female communicator said, snapping her fingers rapidly and wrinkling her nose. "I'm shorter, so he wouldn't let me help him. I happened to see him hiding his hands under his sleeves from behind."
"He had recovered a bit in the lounge, and we were about to send him home after getting some hot water. Suddenly, he screamed and started vomiting blood. It was terrifying!"
The officer felt the female correspondent's gestures looked familiar, but he couldn't place them for a moment, so he pressed the issue, "What did he say? Didn't he say during his last physical that he could still work for another twenty years?"
The female correspondent thought for a moment and said, "He seemed to be mumbling 'ancestral grave' and 'longevity' several times. I saw that his eyes were confused and I was afraid he didn't know what he was saying. But even then, when we were about to carry him to the hospital, he grabbed me, stared at me and said he wanted to go home!" He was vomiting blood while talking, which was really scary and suffocating.
However, the female correspondent still did not dare to say that Leader Lin's blood was particularly bloody.
Lin Xinghuo and the caracal had no idea that putting the wronged bones in the coffin would bring such consequences. Especially when the coffin stood up, the family members who had enjoyed happiness for several generations by stepping on the bones all suffered the consequences of their sins to varying degrees.
The person who reacted most strongly was undoubtedly the head of the Lin family, who had the final say. Although he was only in his fifties according to the household registration book, he looked twenty or thirty years older. After locking up the messy family members in their respective rooms, the old man took his eldest son to take out a scroll of silk book from the secret box under the shelf in the study. The two ends of the golden silk cloth were made of fine mutton-fat jade shafts. On the back of the silk cloth, there were nine flying dragons and clouds, which did not look like an ordinary item.
After unfolding the entire silk scroll and covering the old man from head to toe, the old man's dejected demeanor finally eased. His eldest son, rubbing his aching chest, asked, "Did something happen to the ancestral tomb? Dad, why don't we send a few of the younger generation back home to investigate? Even if we don't know the exact location, we can always find some clues by asking around in Song County. Besides, if something happens to the ancestral tomb, it's bound to make a lot of noise. Could it be that a landslide broke through the formation set up by our great grandfather? How can we not find the source of such a big commotion?"
"So many years have passed. Even if someone still remembers the old things, your age doesn't match." Lin Changzi advised: "On the contrary, if you do nothing, your appearance will change so much, which will arouse people's curiosity." He did not agree to cut off all the ties of the Qu family at once. What's the point of cutting off the tail to survive? It was all because the old man was too cautious. Now his family is far away in the capital, and his hometown has become blind and deaf. The old man waved his hand with difficulty: "No, it's not a good time. Our family has come to this day because of the dynasty's "dragon energy"! Your great-grandfather is too poor in aptitude and he holds on to this dragon scroll and refuses to let go. Otherwise, I would have gathered the dragon energy outside the Great Wall for my own use before the new dynasty was established. Why am I trapped here now, relying on the remaining dragon energy of the old palace to survive."
But now, aren't you also holding on to this dragon axis? But the eldest son of Lin didn't dare to say anything, and could only sigh and say: "If that leader had succeeded two years ago, then our family would also..." When he changed his surname to Lin, the old man said on the surface that his ancestors admired "Jin Zi Lin", but in fact, he just wanted to have something to do with that leader. He didn't expect... Alas!
"Shut up!" the old man glared at his eldest son with difficulty. "When the time is right, we'll unearth your great-grandfather's spirit, and then we'll be able to find the ancestral tomb... Set up a dragon formation, gather dragon energy, and retrace your ancestors' path to immortality, breaking through barriers and extending your life!" What a fool! What is dragon energy? Dragon energy is power and luck. As long as one holds a high position, it's possible to transform a mud snake into a dragon. Back when the Jin family was at its peak, the old man nearly succeeded, but the imaginary dragon couldn't withstand the tide of events, and it collapsed too quickly. So he learned to go with the flow, swaying wherever the wind blew from above. Over the years, he'd finally climbed to a certain position and helped his son into a key position of real power. Now that government and business are inseparable, with just a little movement, he could leave the factory and become a true 'official.'
But the eldest son was foolish and self-righteous. The old man looked at his son, who looked so much like him, through his eyes covered with silk cloth, and narrowed his eyes slightly: If I were twenty years younger...
Lin Xinghuo and the caracal walked around Liangshan and turned their attention to the neighboring Hengliangshan.
Hengliang Mountain is as its name suggests, wide and flat, like a door bolt inserted across the mountains.
This mountain is lower than the others, perhaps due to a lack of soil depth and sparse vegetation. It appears unremarkable at first glance, but a closer look reveals that its location is ideal for hiding something. Because the soil is thin, nothing can be cultivated. Even if there were a large, flat area on top, the mountain dwellers would dislike it for its lack of water, shelter, and even a single sturdy tree, and would avoid settling there. Furthermore, Hengliang Mountain's shape resembles a door bolt, and its four sides must be difficult to climb or descend. Although the mountain is not high, people prefer to take a long detour rather than cross it. Finally, with its meager vegetation, it naturally cannot support much wildlife. Given these shortcomings, it's no surprise that Hengliang Mountain is more desolate and deserted than the surrounding hills.
What's more, Hengliang Mountain happens to be seen as the boundary between the outer mountains and the old forest. Lin Xinghuo climbed up the tall trees on the nearby peaks and could clearly see that traces of human activities were easily found on the southeast slope of Hengliang Mountain, but after crossing it, the traces of human activities immediately became scarce and difficult to find.
"Could it be that the bandits have hidden their belongings in the mountains?" Lin Xinghuo speculated. Bandits were rampant in the Snow Province in the past. In places close to the main roads, as long as there was a hill, there would be a famous bandit gang that occupied the mountain and became the king. They extorted and robbed passing merchants, and oppressed and bullied the nearby villagers.
This spring, when the troops stationed in Shanglin County were reclaiming wasteland, they drained several mud puddles and wanted to fill them up. Unexpectedly, there was gold, silver and jewelry underneath one of the stinking mud pits. These were all gold, silver and jewelry that sank into the puddle when the bandits fled. The wooden boxes were all rotten, but the gold and silver were still so bright that they could blind people.
Lin Xinghuo felt that he had also fallen into the money trap. He habitually stroked the jade-white fox skull on the wooden inheritance plaque with his little fingernail-sized hand, while muttering to himself: "A box full of gold, a box full of silver, or even a box full of silver dollars!"
She was truly broke, so broke she couldn't scrape up even a scrap of gold. Cultivating oneself was a costly endeavor. Just drawing a talisman required the yellow paper pulp, which Lin Xinghuo earned from an entire small yellow croaker. Even so, Lin Xinghuo was frugal when practicing a new talisman, reluctant to use the paper from the very beginning. Other expenses were even more difficult to calculate. For example, the herbs needed for the jade paste were charged per household, and that was only if the byproducts of the jade paste could be exchanged for money. Otherwise, she would have to stop producing the jade paste, which was so effective, and it would be difficult to explain to the members where her money came from, and how could she continue to exchange it for herbs?
The alchemy technique, which occupies most of the inherited skills, is a gold-eating beast that Lin Xinghuo dare not touch.
The caracal's tail tickled his friend's nose, and he couldn't help but say, "I'll dig up some ginseng for you to exchange for money."
That was the caracal's ginseng field. More precisely, it was the pocket money the caracal gave to everyone in his family. The seeds were all saved up by the caracal, and now he's specially cleared a patch of land by Mirror Lake. With the help of the spiritual water of the lotus heart and a little light from the forest's star fire, the rice is growing beautifully. The fox cubs eagerly visit every day. Big Tiger Huahua even secretly led the little ones to bury their poop in the field, earning a beating from the caracal.
"Stop it, it's too much of a loss to exchange our ginseng for money." Lin Xinghuo once dreamed of cultivating a spiritual ginseng, but ended up draining himself dry, and the ginseng only grew into a fifty-year-old wild ginseng.
Perhaps ginseng, as long as it lives to a certain age, becomes a potent medicinal plant on its own, requiring no external help to cultivate better seeds. That ginseng root, transplanted by the caracal to the very center of the ginseng field, resembled a grandfather caring for his grandson compared to the other ginseng seedlings. Its seeds were not wasted, however; after being planted by the caracal in the field, even the wolves and moose in Da Huang's group shared in the harvest.
The mention of ginseng brought back memories of the strange blood ginseng in the victory coffin. Lin Xinghuo and the caracal exchanged glances, and suddenly the thought of stewing ginseng chicken tonight struck them as a way to calm their nerves. That blood ginseng was too disgusting. He had to eat some ginseng from home to mask the image in his head. There were plenty of good ginsengs out there, so he couldn't let his prejudices get to him!
"Huh? Does this look like ginseng?" Lin Xinghuo waved away the dust raised by the Earth Dragon Technique and saw a crooked symbol carved on the stone wall below the crooked tree on the edge of the cliff. If the tree hadn't grown so twisted, she wouldn't have noticed the cliff.
"It's hidden quite well." The symbol was covered with soil, leaving only a tree as a mark?
The soil layer of Hengliang Mountain is too thin. If the earth dragon of Mr. Caracal arches deeper, it will hit the rocks. The caracal, who attached a trace of spiritual consciousness to the earth dragon to help Lin Xinghuo find the bandits' treasure, also felt dizzy and his limbs and claws were curled up.
When Mr. Monkey got angry, his Earth Dragon Technique turned into Thunderstorm Technique, which exploded with crackling sounds.
A sharp, ear-piercing "crackling" sound pierced the ears, and seven or eight weasels, large and small, leaped out of the tree hole struck by lightning and fled in all directions. At the same time, a familiar smell filled the air, accompanied by billowing yellow smoke.
“…” The smell is so familiar.
The sable, which had vanished from sight earlier, darted like the wind into the rain shield held up by Lin Xinghuo. The caracal glanced at it disdainfully and leisurely tossed out a few lightning balls, which sizzled in the air, chasing the yellow smoke and quickly burning away the stench—the caracal's new skill, Thunder in Fire.
The sable stood up and bowed to Lin Xinghuo, its paws spread out, revealing two gleaming golden beads. The sable gestured and led Lin Xinghuo to a stone nest beneath the crooked tree roots, where they found a jumble of miscellaneous items: gold beads, silver coins, and scraps of brocade.
Is this the den of the weasel family that escaped?
Lin Xinghuo shielded her hand with spiritual energy, plucking a lightning ball from midair and rolling it briefly in the stone den. The caracal scowled at her, its claws tucked in. The young monk smiled harmlessly and pointed to a palm-sized hole on the side of the den. "I've had a taste. Will you treat me?"
Although it seemed that the size of the cave entrance was most suitable for the sable to go in and explore, neither the man nor the caracal had any intention of letting the sable take the risk. It was because the 'old friend' they remembered was too cunning and slippery, and it would be safer only if the caracal, who had the highest level of cultivation, took action personally.
Lin Xinghuo once again covered the macaque with talismans and released two thorns to clear the way.
Not long after the thorns were put down, a yellow smoke quickly spiraled up along the thorns and headed straight for Lin Xinghuo.
"It's really the Great Immortal Jianxi!" Lin Xinghuo raised his eyebrows, and gently moved the hand holding the thorns. The thorny vines turned out into a circle, and the caracal helplessly threw out many small thunder balls. The thunder balls were caught in the circle and rolled down along the channel formed by the thorns. Wherever they went, yellow smoke dissipated and explosions sounded everywhere, just like setting off a string of firecrackers.
A purple glow shone across the caracal's silver-gray fur. Small arcs of electricity converged beneath its four furry paws like swimming dragons, lifting the caracal half a finger off the ground. The caracal stretched in mid-air, and with a flash of lightning, it had already chased the retreating Huang Yan into the cave.
Putting aside his joking thoughts, Lin Xinghuo patted the backpack and let Hei Sable jump in: "Let's get started too!"
With a wave of his hand, a talisman array, similar to the one that enveloped the valley entrance behind the mountain retreat, materialized from thin air, covering half of Hengliang Mountain like an inverted bowl. Lin Xinghuo, not yet satisfied, retrieved all the wooden talismans, leaped off the ridge, and sprinted around the base of the mountain, using them to re-arrange the talisman array. The wooden talisman array was clearly far more powerful. Its spiritual light penetrated the rock and combined with the yellow talisman array to form a complete cage—except the lower bowl was even larger, enveloping the entire Hengliang Mountain.
After setting up the formation, Lin Xinghuo touched the storage bag with heartache. This time she had taken out all her family fortune. Who would have thought that all the preparations she had made for the Black Fox Heart in the past few months would be used on Huang Jianxi - beheading him, destroying his divine seat, and pushing down the God of Wealth Tower. The yellow-skinned guy was still alive. Lin Xinghuo became extremely alert.
A strange feeling came from the Purple Mansion. Lin Xinghuo could even imagine the caracal grinning in the yellow-skinned man's nest.
With a burst of spiritual energy, the aura of the formation disappeared. Using both her hands and feet, she scaled Hengliang Mountain in a matter of seconds. She drew her demonic pig tusk dagger and swiftly slashed it across the stone cave. Stone foam fell, and soon the stone at the cave entrance cracked. Then, with a flip of her hand, a gray-white spiked rake appeared in Lin Xinghuo's hand.
This spiked rake is twice as big as an ordinary one, grayish-white in color, with the tips of the teeth shining coldly like teeth - Lin Xinghuo's first successful weapon-making masterpiece was not the hoe he had envisioned, but a nine-toothed spiked rake modeled after Marshal Tianpeng!
The graceful and pretty young woman wielded the rake, which was more than half a head taller than she, with great vigor. Every strike sent countless rocks flying. The noise and the scene were comparable to the blast of a mountain.
Lin Xinghuo multitasked, collecting the rubble into her treasure bag before it even hit the ground. As she dug deeper, the bag visibly bulged, its four corners taut with the bundle opening. As she spun around like a top, digging the hole, Lin Xinghuo worried that the bag wouldn't hold enough. After all, going up to dump the rubble would be too time-consuming.
Fortunately, although the small bag had swelled into a ball, it still managed to fit into the bag.
The entrance to the cave is small and the neck is long. The yellow fox is indeed a good hole digger.
"What's wrong?" Lin Xinghuo, covered in dust, caught up with the caracal. Seeing the caracal hovering in front of him without moving, he asked.
Uncle Cat was waiting for this moment. He jumped onto Lin Xinghuo's shoulder, and the two thunder balls intertwined and flew into the belly of the mountain, rising higher and higher, and becoming brighter and brighter.
Inside the hollowed-out mountain, countless gold and silver lay scattered on the ground, piled high. Gems and pearls poured down from the decaying boxes like river sand, forming a river of shimmering gems. On one side of the mountain, rolls of cloth piled to the ceiling, exquisite brocades, with only the gold and silver threads still gleaming.
"Is this a box made of gold bricks?" Lin Xinghuo walked over to a row of golden boxes hidden inside the cloth scroll. Thorns deftly pried open the seams and rolled up the lids, revealing tightly wrapped calligraphy and paintings. These square and long boxes were surprisingly made of dark wood and nanmu. He took one out and opened it. The peacock feathers on the rhinoceros scroll, featuring flowers and birds, were still vibrant in color, exuding the opulence of precious stones used as pigments.
Wow! For a moment, it really gives people the illusion that "pearls are like dirt and gold is like iron."
"Put them away," said the caracal. "Put away these blinding things so we can find our old acquaintance."
Lin Xinghuo's lips curled up in a wicked grin. Black Sable, clinging to the backpack, watched as earth and rocks were being dumped down with incredible efficiency, while mountains of gold and silver vanished like a whale devouring a tiger. His master stood in the middle, his face half-grinning in the shimmer of jewels.
"Wow, you can actually hold it in?" The caracal, who seemed lazy but was actually on guard, retracted the black electric arc surrounding Lin Xinghuo and stood side by side with the human on the bun-shaped mountain that they had pressed solid with stones and soil.
The sable covered his eyes and squatted in the backpack: How mean! Not only did they exchange the broken stones from dismantling other people's nests for gold, silver and jewelry, they also piled them up into 'steamed buns'. Later, they will erect a piece of wood in front, and the grave will be complete.
The empty mountain belly was visible at a glance, and echoes were ringing back and forth:
"Can you bear it?"
"Can you accommodate?"
"live?"
"live?"
Hidden within the caracal's mocking voice was a subtle "cracking" sound, like a person coughing or the sound of rolling rocks.
The man and the macaque looked at each other, and vines and lightning suddenly erupted, rushing vertically towards the stone wallpaper above their heads.
Neither of them held back in this attack. The vines used by Lin Xinghuo were thicker than his waist, but the thunder ball of the caracal was compressed to the size of an eyeball, hidden in the vines, and purple to black.
With a loud bang, a deep hole was blown out of the stone wall above, and the stone mountain shook twice. As the vines carried lightning and chased a small yellow smoke beast that leaped forward quickly, large chunks of rubble fell, and the sky suddenly became bright, and the belly of the stone was actually pierced through.
Lin Xinghuo stepped on the steamed bun mountain under his feet and was a little speechless. If he had known earlier, he would have just smashed it from the top. Why bother with so much effort?
"Hiss!" Just when the yellow smoke was about to rush out of the stone wall, a snake-like and extremely piercing whistle suddenly sounded. Lin Xinghuo, who followed closely behind, saw that the extremely agile yellow smoke beast instantly became weak. After the smoke dissipated, a jade basin densely wrapped with red lines appeared?
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The author has something to say: There will be fewer updates today, but more tomorrow!
Note: "Pearls are like dirt, gold is like iron" - from the poem "Huguanfu" in "Dream of Red Mansions"
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