At this moment, Wang Ping was caught in a dilemma.
There was clearly something wrong with this Lin family residence, yet it was tied to the secrets of Longxing County, to the very reason the Imperial Academy, the White Lotus Sect, and the Royal Enshrinement Hall had all converged here.
*To go, or not to go?*
Even though his divine intent told Wang Ping there was "no danger," it only made him more vigilant. Not sensing a crisis could only mean the danger was extraordinarily grave!
After thinking it over for a moment, Wang Ping took a step back.
As the old saying went, the son of a wealthy house does not sit beneath the eaves. If there was danger, then he simply would not go. If you know there are tigers on the mountain, you simply stay away from that mountain.
"This Lin family residence clearly has major issues. Better to leave it to Shen Monkey and Xu Dog. Those two imperial enshriners should have more experience with this sort of thing. But I can't just report it to them like this either; otherwise, I'll seem cowardly and timid, lacking the guts even to scout it out, which would needlessly lower their impression of me."
Soon, Wang Ping made up his mind.
He was in no hurry to step inside the Lin family residence. Instead, he first found a paper shop in the county seat, bought a stack of seven-colored stationery, and picked up a piece of bluestone from the roadside.
He chipped away the excess stone, leaving a slab precisely forty-nine cun long, seven cun wide, and forty-nine fen thick.
He stacked the seven-colored paper in the order of white, yellow, red, blue, purple, green, and black, cut them into forty-nine paper figures each seven cun tall, and pressed them beneath the bluestone.
Next, he held his breath and focused his mind.
His Niwan Palace swung wide open, and surging spiritual awareness burst forth, transforming into a luminescence invisible to mortal eyes that settled gently onto the paper figures along with Wang Ping's incantation.
"Let the profound mystery swiftly appear, to shield and protect the true person."
Soul Seizing!
The moment the incantation ended, Wang Ping exhaled a breath, channeling his roiling spiritual sense to drive the paper figures. The ordinary paper instantly flared with dazzling radiance.
A moment later, the glow faded. Wang Ping looked around. The paper figures had vanished, replaced by another version of himself standing on the spot. His features were regular, calm, and lifelike. At the same time, he felt his perspective—originally born of observing the outside world with spiritual sense—transfer directly to the surrogate's body.
Wang Ping marveled in amazement.
The paper double was an application of Soul Seizing: drawing forth one of one's seven corporeal souls and attaching it to a paper figure with spiritual awareness.
*This is about the crudest method of creating a double.*
*Unfortunately, I haven't passed the mortal tribulation yet, so I possess no magic power, and I only used mundane materials. That's why this paper double has basically no combat capability.*
The first tier of Tribulation Crossing required condensing four cultivation traits: spiritual awareness, flawless true body, cosmic circuit breathing, and manifesting dharmas by borrowing qi. Among them, the fourth trait—manifesting dharmas by borrowing qi—was a transformative leap, because only after condensing it could one temper magic power and transcend mortal flesh.
Only upon reaching this stage could one truly be considered an initiate in cultivation.
Even cultivation arts like Qi Restriction and Soul Seizing had to be driven by magic power to achieve their full potency; otherwise, they would always lack that ultimate profound mystery.
"Still, for me right now, it's enough."
Wang Ping's expression was relaxed.
After all, he didn't need the paper double to have much fighting strength. It only needed to take a turn through the Lin family residence and see what was inside on his behalf.
With that in mind, Wang Ping formed a hand seal and pointed.
"Go!"
At his command, the stiff-faced paper Wang Ping stirred to life. His facial features relaxed, color flushed into his skin, and a glimmer of sentience filled his eyes.
Immediately, he strode toward the Lin family residence.
Push the door, step forward.
*Rumble!*
The next second, Wang Ping watched his paper double push open the residence's gates, only to vanish without a trace in an instant, like handwriting wiped away by an eraser.
***
A chilling wind drifted eerily.
Through the paper double, Wang Ping looked up. Before entering the residence, it had clearly been broad daylight, but once inside, dense dark clouds blotted out the sky above.
However, as he circulated his spiritual sense, the cloud-like illusion was instantly pierced and peeled away, revealing broad daylight once more. This allowed him to breathe a sigh of relief. At least his advantage as an immortal cultivator remained intact; this was still him crushing noobs, and he hadn't blundered into a high-tier match.
"Let me see..."
Wang Ping looked around and took in the residence before him. The entire compound was neatly laid out, neither too large nor too small, centered on a quaint courtyard.
In the courtyard stood a tea pavilion.
Directly across from the tea pavilion was a corridor lined with four doors corresponding to four rooms, each hanging a lantern outside its entrance.
The lanterns were wrapped entirely in white paper.
The flames within were a sickly green, shining through the paper to project four twisted, crooked characters: Jia, Yi, Bing, and Ding.
"...What in the world?"
Wang Ping frowned deeply. His spiritual awareness allowed him to see and sense many things invisible to mortal eyes, just like what lay before him now.
A mortal would only feel that the courtyard was a bit chilly, with an unprovoked draft, but he could see the thick baleful resentment pooled throughout the yard. This was an ideal breeding ground for a fiend. If Dashun's spiritual qi had not been so scarce, an estate like this would likely have already birthed one.
"People have died here..."
Wang Ping grew increasingly solemn. Not only had people died here, but for baleful resentment to accumulate enough to nurture a fiend, they must have endured immense agony before death.
*Xu Bingzheng... what on earth is he trying to do?*
Or rather, what was the Imperial Academy behind Xu Bingzheng trying to achieve? How many other residential compounds in the county had suffered the same fate as the Lin family?
These so-called bizarre arts were looking distinctly sinister.
Wang Ping walked into the tea pavilion.
Baleful resentment drifted across the entire residence, but the tea pavilion had the least of it, with only a thin layer clinging to the air. Various objects were laid out inside.
More precisely, they were dossiers.
The thick files were neatly arranged into four stacks, each facing one of the four rooms along the corridor, as though prepared specifically for anyone who entered the estate.
Wang Ping opened the first dossier.
The cover bore the character Ding, clearly corresponding to Room Ding. Soon, Wang Ping read an exhaustive overview of someone's life:
*The occupant of Room Ding is named Zhu Wu.*
*An orphan from birth, he was a street pickpocket by age five, adept at swindling and deceit by twelve, and entered a martial arts hall in the city as an apprentice at fifteen.*
*He was eventually expelled for bullying his fellow disciples. From then on, he drifted as an idler, living hand to mouth in squalor. When he learned that a neighbor had made a modest fortune in business, he broke in late at night armed with a blade and slaughtered the neighbor's family of three.*
*Even the neighbor's newborn daughter was not spared.*
*He fled the county seat, took an alias, and hid in rural villages until the county yamen's bailiffs captured him. According to the Laws of Dashun, he is sentenced to death by slicing.*
This was someone beyond forgiveness.
Having finished the dossier, Wang Ping turned his gaze to the next one beside it. Marked with Bing, it was another biographical dossier:
*The occupant of Room Bing is named Hua Yingmei.*
*A human trafficker who abducted and sold over ten children from decent families over three years, sending them either into rural areas or to county seats in other commanderies.*
*Publicly, she was a renowned philanthropist, taking in orphans at the Earth God Temple in the west of the city, providing them with food, and teaching them crafts; many called them the Beggar Gang. Behind the scenes, however, she directed the gang's orphans to lure children of good households away, seizing opportunities to kidnap and sell them.*
*Yet as the saying goes, even the most meticulous scheme has a flaw.*
*As her business expanded, her secret could no longer be concealed. She was finally exposed, investigated, and arrested by the county yamen. According to the Laws of Dashun, she is sentenced to dismemberment by chariots.*
This was someone of heinous villainy.
At this point, Wang Ping glanced toward Room Ding and Room Bing. As expected, the baleful resentment was heaviest in those two rooms.
He continued to the third dossier:
*The occupant of Room Yi is named Pang Yue.*
*An opportunistic traveling merchant who was ambushed by bandits while passing through Longxing County, losing his goods and seeing his agreed deals fall through.*
*Ashamed to return home, he remained stranded in Longxing County. To stage a comeback, he spun a web of deception, rolling interest over borrowed funds and roping in victims with promises of high returns. In the end, he absconded with the money, affecting hundreds of households across the city, several of whom were driven to suicide after losing their fortunes.*
*The county yamen took this matter very seriously.*
*They promptly reported it to the commandery yamen, and bailiffs from various counties coordinated across commanderies to capture and bring him to justice. The swindled funds are still being pursued.*
*According to the Laws of Dashun, he is sentenced to flogging.*
This was someone whose guilt was inescapable.
Three rooms, all criminals. Yet their guilt and punishments under the Laws of Dashun progressed from most severe to least: from death by slicing, to dismemberment by chariots, down to flogging.
Now came the question.
Wang Ping's gaze fell on the fourth dossier marked Jia. What met his eyes this time was an entirely different summary:
*The occupant of Room Jia is named Li An.*
*An assistant in a local blacksmith shop with a spotless record, having both a son and a daughter, living parents, and a harmonious marriage.*
*He often aids impoverished elders.*
*Due to his readiness to help others, neighbors on his street hold him in high regard, sending gifts during festivals and holidays. He is universally recognized as a virtuous and decent man.*
This was an innocent soul.
Four rooms, four kinds of people, four dossiers laid out neatly in the tea pavilion... And on the final page of the file was an intriguing line:
*Let me see how long you can last.*
"What does that mean?"
Wang Ping's brow furrowed. He had a vague guess: these four people in the four rooms might be the very source of the baleful resentment pervading the entire estate.
Did Lin Sheng kill them all?
Why?
Filled with questions, Wang Ping rummaged through the tea pavilion again. Beneath one of the dossiers, he uncovered a yellowed booklet.
"Is this... a diary?"
Wang Ping opened it. The handwriting inside was upright and forceful, clearly written by an educated young man from a respectable family.
*My name is Lin Sheng.*
*If anyone reads this diary... I am likely already dead, killed at the hands of Magistrate Xu Bingzheng. I only hope the truth will not remain buried.*
*It all began the day I was suspended pending investigation. The evening I returned home, Magistrate Xu Bingzheng... that crooked official came to see me. He brought those four people and their dossiers, then had the accompanying thaumaturge cast some bizarre art on me.*
*An accompanying thaumaturge?*
Reading this, Wang Ping's eyebrows twitched. As far as he knew, the only person in all of Longxing County worthy of being called a "thaumaturge" was Perfected Youshen.
Yet that made no sense.
*Earlier, Xu Bingzheng and Chen Haoyan used me as bait specifically to sneak into Perfected Youshen's sanctuary and steal the Heaven's Will Soul-Returning Pill.*
If so, the two sides should have been bitter enemies.
Why would Xu Bingzheng be working alongside Perfected Youshen?
What scheme lay behind all this?
Pondering this, Wang Ping continued reading the diary.
*It was a strange art that not only kept me in a state of intense, constant starvation, but also drastically increased my appetite.*
*Before leaving, he left me some food.*
*But very quickly, I finished it all.*
Reading to this point, Wang Ping had already formulated a theory. "Interesting. They're deliberately cultivating a fiend—the exact same logic immortal sects use to refine strongmen."
In short, it amplified a person's resentment before death so they could serve as better materials once dead, maximizing their value as human sacrifice.
"They deliberately forced Lin Sheng into extreme starvation, waited for him to eat his remaining food, leaving him no choice but to steal food from others. Four rooms, four kinds of people, from unforgivable sinners to the completely innocent—this was meant to erode his moral bottom line step by step, gradually degrading him into a monster."
That would also explain the baleful resentment.
"Makes sense. Having the food you need to survive snatched away, dying in hunger and despair—it's only natural that intense baleful resentment would be born."
That was why Xu Bingzheng left that note on the dossiers:
*Let me see how long you can last.*
"Lin Sheng was undoubtedly an upright, steadfast young bailiff with a heart for justice. Otherwise, he wouldn't have been suspended for defying Chen Haoyan."
And what Xu Bingzheng wanted was to shatter his convictions.
"Entry to this compound is allowed, but no one may leave. Even if Lin Sheng stooped to depravity, he would eventually starve to death. As the perpetrator, he would be swallowed by the baleful resentment."
"At that point, his life would end."
"And his existence as a human sacrifice for a fiend would begin anew."
Thinking this, Wang Ping couldn't help but shake his head. "A clever idea, but like I said, Dashun's spiritual qi is far too thin."
Without sufficient spiritual qi, this level of baleful resentment wasn't enough to birth a fiend.
The plan was doomed to fail.
*To nurture a fiend in a qi-starved environment, the baleful resentment would need to be three to five times stronger at least,* Wang Ping estimated roughly.
He turned his eyes back to the diary.
As expected, the subsequent entries should follow what he had deduced: Lin Sheng fighting for the others' food to stay alive, perhaps even resorting to murder...
Nothing.
Wang Ping's train of thought came to a screeching halt.
On the next page of the diary was only a single passage of frantic, jagged handwriting twisted into madness: *None! There is no food, nothing at all!*
"None?" Wang Ping was stunned.
Impossible. How could there be no food? If there was no food, there couldn't have been any struggle or slaughter, and it couldn't have generated such baleful resentment...
"...Ah."
The next moment, realization struck Wang Ping.
*No food?* That was a charming misunderstanding held only by people who had never lacked food and never truly experienced starvation.
Wang Ping looked at the four rooms before him, the four dossiers in his hand, and the four vibrant, living people of flesh and blood described within them.
Wasn't the food right in front of him?
Chapter 54