Chapter 27: The Huaijiang Witch

Just as Li Boyang had guessed.

The Huaijiang Witch of a thousand years ago was born with the ability to know destiny.

Predicting celestial phenomena, mapping ley lines, divining fortune and misfortune, and most importantly, defying the heavens to change fate...

The Huaijiang Witch could do all of this with ease, and for this reason, she was revered as the "Huaijiang Witch."

But the Huaijiang Witch was not satisfied with this.

She attempted to summarize and categorize the celestial laws and myriad phenomena she observed, to derive a path of divination that ordinary people could understand and even use.

For ordinary people, the "Nine Chapters of Divination Secrets" said many things, but it could be summarized in four words—seeking good fortune and avoiding calamity.

The trends of Qi and luck, fortune and misfortune, celestial laws and destiny, the interaction of the five elements and zodiac signs...

As long as they understood these most basic principles, even if they could not use those mantras, they could still do things that aligned with the laws of heaven.

Reading through "Celestial Time" allowed one to divide the four seasons and solar terms...

Reading through "Clouds and Rain" allowed one to predict wind directions and rainfall...

Reading through "Mountain Formations" allowed one to navigate mountains, forests, and wilderness...

Reading through "Ley Lines" allowed one to distinguish fertile soil and water systems...

Reading through "Destiny Principles" allowed one to judge the inclinations of the human heart...

Reading through "Physiognomy" allowed one to understand the good and evil in human nature...

Reading through "Auspicious Omens" allowed one to know of spirits and mountain gods...

Reading through "Malevolent Spirits" allowed one to identify evil ghosts and deities...

This was the specific content of the eight subsequent chapters of the "Nine Chapters of Divination Secrets," and it was the crystallization of wisdom from that Huaijiang Witch of a thousand years ago.

As long as one knew the essence of all phenomena, one could naturally derive the corresponding methods to deal with them.

Take, for example, the Ruifu that cursed Li Boyang before it died.

The Huaijiang Witch believed this was a ghost-deity born from the accumulation of the earth's malevolent Qi, naturally perverse and violent.

If it were not tamed or if a temple were not built to worship it, it would sooner or later bring disaster to the region.

According to the classification in "Malevolent Spirits," that Ruifu's earth-malevolence belonged to the Yang attribute.

Therefore, to completely eliminate it and prevent it from being reborn using the earth's malevolent Qi, one could only seal it with Yin-attribute methods or slay it with an extreme Yang count.

The Huaijiang Witch used the former, while Li Boyang's golden sword pellet belonged to the latter.

This was the simplest form of divination, and also the most basic method of seeking good fortune and avoiding calamity.

In Li Boyang's own understanding, that Huaijiang Witch was actually using "big data" to summarize and perform fortune-telling.

It was just that her "big data" all came from her personal observation and understanding of all phenomena.

Or to speculate further, perhaps the Huaijiang Witch did not need to perform any divination at all; her destiny-related supernatural ability allowed her to see the final result.

It was only so that ordinary people could also predict and divine.

That was why the Huaijiang Witch compiled the phenomena she observed and the destiny she knew, ultimately summarizing the entire content of this volume, the "Nine Chapters of Divination Secrets."

For an ordinary person to reach her level was simply an impossible task.

In fact, even Li Boyang, who came from another world and possessed dialectical thinking and logical reasoning abilities, felt a massive headache while reading the "Nine Chapters of Divination Secrets."

Not to mention that the Huaijiang Witch was still an ancient person from a thousand years ago in this world.

Just like those ancients from Li Boyang's past life.

When dealing with things she could not see or understand, she often used various theories of ghosts, gods, and destiny to force an explanation.

This was like someone who had seen the correct answer and was forcing the process to fit that answer.

One could only say the result was indeed correct, but whether the process was correct was unknown.

If later generations tried to re-derive the results according to her calculation process, whether the answer was correct depended entirely on luck.

Moreover, this world was not the world of Li Boyang's past life.

This world had mysterious supernatural powers that constituted and influenced the operation of all things.

It was fortunate that the Huaijiang Witch's destiny-related supernatural ability was extremely absurd, allowing her to directly perceive the essence of all things and reach the final conclusion.

Otherwise, a classic of the level of the "Nine Chapters of Divination Secrets" would usually be a crystallization of civilization that could only be obtained through the long-term observation and thinking of several generations.

………………………………………………………………………………………………

[Is it really big data fortune-telling?]

The more he read the "Nine Chapters of Divination Secrets," the more Li Boyang felt a sense of familiarity.

Setting aside those mysterious theories of ghosts and gods, wasn't this just the AI big data algorithms of the twenty-first century?

As long as the amount of information known was sufficient, it could even dig up your ancestors eight generations back that you didn't even remember yourself.

The only problem now was that compared to the internet big data of the twenty-first century, the amount of information recorded in the eight subsequent chapters of the "Nine Chapters of Divination Secrets" was simply too small.

Without the blessing of a destiny-related supernatural ability, if one were to force a deduction based on such a small amount of data, the result would often be a wrong conclusion that was a miss by a hair but a thousand miles off.

[Could that witch who knew destiny not have considered this difficulty for beginners?]

[Or perhaps, in the end, everything still has to circle back to the mantras in the "Myriad Phenomena Chapter"?]

Under normal circumstances, a diviner must rely on various details they see to fill in and calculate the specific situation themselves.

This led to different diviners getting different results, which greatly affected the accuracy of the divination.

But what if a prophet or diviner could cheat?

Even if they couldn't see the result directly like the Huaijiang Witch and then reverse-engineer the process.

At the very least, they should know the accuracy rate of their divination results, right?

Otherwise, wouldn't that be the same as those blind fortune-tellers from his past life, where whether it was accurate or not depended entirely on personal interpretation?

[Besides this, your sister must have left something else behind!]

When he looked up at Xi Luo again, Li Boyang's expression appeared very determined.

"Hell! You actually understood it!?"

This time, Xi Luo was truly shocked; her eyes almost popped out.

In a state of illiteracy, relying only on the big girl's error-ridden and stuttering reading, he could realize that the sister had left behind more than just this volume of the "Nine Chapters of Divination Secrets."

To be honest, although Xi Luo had repeatedly overestimated Li Boyang's talent, she was still inevitably given a huge fright by him.

[You mentioned that your sister possessed a destiny-related supernatural ability...]

[And the opening of this "Nine Chapters of Divination Secrets" mentioned the wonderful use of mantras; isn't it normal to guess this?]

Hearing Li Boyang say this, Xi Luo finally confirmed that he had indeed truly understood this volume of the "Nine Chapters of Divination Secrets."

However, looking at Li Boyang in his swaddling clothes, Xi Luo was uncharacteristically hesitant.

"Little one, you are very talented and also very smart."

"But you must know, if you only understand or even learn the 'Nine Chapters of Divination Secrets,' that is not a big deal."

"But if you accept the other thing my sister left behind, the responsibility and mission on your shoulders will be different."

"Are you truly prepared?"

Upon hearing this, Li Boyang only slightly raised his eyebrows, making that baby face look quite intriguing.

[Since you chose to bring me to this Mountain God Temple, didn't you already prepare to have me inherit your sister's legacy?]

[How is it that when things have come to a head, and I am already prepared, you yourself are hesitating?]

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(End of chapter)