Chapter 312: Too Calm (Requesting Monthly Tickets)

Today's "Old Market" was not large in scale.

The Old Market also only holds a grand gathering once every half month.

When the market is not open during the day, the area around the Small Xiao Xi Miao is actually not desolate; shops stand in close rows, selling calligraphy and paintings, ancient books, metal and stone artifacts, old objects, and so on.

Most of the temple ruins have been cleaned up, and houses have been rebuilt.

The street in front of the gate is wide.

During the grand market, stalls line the streets, so crowded that only one person can pass through.

Only the spot where the main hall of the temple once stood remains a pile of broken walls and ruins to this day.

The heavy foundation is buried beneath broken bricks and rotten tiles; the pillars have collapsed, the crossbeams are cracked and broken, and the once vermilion-painted and gilded doors and windows have long since rusted and rotted away.

The divine statues that once enjoyed flourishing incense offerings have now been reduced to mere fragments of earth, scattered among the ruins, with occasionally a trace of vibrant oil paint still visible upon them.

No one knows why the ruins of this main hall have never been cleared.

Before nightfall, the Lady and her subordinates were waiting outside the Small Xiao Xi Miao.

Today, they brought two horse-drawn carriages.

The Lady sat alone in one carriage, while the remaining five guards crowded into the other.

After night fell, a guard took out a clay jar, pinched its wide opening, and tossed some things inside.

It smelled foul and putrid.

This was a mixture of corpse water and bat flesh.

A sound of swallowing rose from within the clay jar; the guard dared not look inside, but only pressed his ear against the jar to listen.

When the swallowing sound inside ceased, he placed the clay jar over the horse's head.

Upon removing it, a toad the size of a bowl sat squarely in the center of the horse's head.

Its two slimy front paws tightly covered the carriage horse's two eyes.

The guard repeated the same process with the second carriage horse.

He then carefully said to the Lady inside the carriage: "Lady, no matter what sounds come from outside the carriage, you must absolutely not open the windows or doors to look, nor may you come out."

"Understood. Let us go in now."

For her, attending the Old Market was merely a trivial matter.

With the carriage horses' eyes embraced by the two toads, their entire bodies instantly turned icy cold.

Without making a sound, their movements stiff, the carriage creaked its way toward the main hall ruins.

Along the way, no matter what they encountered, they neither dodged nor yielded.

Just as the carriage seemed about to crash into a shop, suddenly both the carriage and the shop became illusory and distorted.

The carriage passed through the shop as if they did not even exist in the same world.

If a Spirit Cultivator were to use a secret technique to look, they would see that what sat squarely on the horse's head was not a toad at all, but a ghost covered in slime.

Its lower body, extending through the two horse eyes, had completely merged into the horse's body.

The two carriages "passed through" four houses and one stone archway along the way, entering the main hall ruins.

They then emerged from the main entrance of the main hall.

Everything before their eyes underwent a complete transformation.

The main hall, which had originally become ruins, still stood tall and imposing, radiating magnificent grandeur.

The surrounding shops were still those same shops, but their owners had changed.

Under the gloomy night, there were no lights here, yet it was still exceptionally lively.

Various ghostly voices, beastly utterances, and evil words mixed together, low and high, faint and indistinct; the moment they entered the ear, they could instantly cause an ordinary person to undergo a sinister transformation.

But the Lady and her subordinates were completely unaffected.

"Go find Zhang Laoya's shop!"

They had investigated in the city for a day, found some clues regarding Zhang Laoya, and thus tracked down this place.

Not long after the Lady's carriage entered, Xu Yuan and Miao Yan arrived.

After being treated with roughly the same method, Miao Yan quickly darted into the carriage and ordered the doors and windows to be shut tightly.

Generally, such carriages are covered entirely by a thick layer of cotton cloth.

After Miao Yan entered, he instructed Xu Yuan: "My lord, once we are inside, I can only address you by your name.

Along the way, various eerie sounds will come from outside the carriage; there may even be Nether Beasts violently crashing against the carriage body, great ghosts tossing the carriage around like a toy, or unknown things reflecting upon the inner heart... But no matter what changes occur, under no circumstances may you open the windows or doors to look outside, nor may you step out of the carriage; otherwise, death is certain!

My lord, you must remember this!"

Xu Yuan nodded: "Very well, rest assured."

Miao Yan, however, continued to chatter, repeatedly reminding him of some taboos he had suddenly remembered.

Xu Yuan then smiled: "Not many Great Fire Masters come here, do they?"

"Uh—" Miao Yan, his pretense seen through at a glance, smiled bitterly: "I have only come twice. To be honest, my lord, this place... is not the territory of the living.

Except for freaks like Zhang Laoya, no one likes to come here.

Once we go in, you will understand; those things drool just looking at us.

Even if they are negotiating a deal with you and do not intend to eat you, they will still be drooling."

Miao Yan suddenly stopped, calculating the time in his heart: "My lord, be careful; those things... are coming!"

Miao Yan's spirit grew tense.

He had come twice before; the first time, something had invaded his heart, causing him to forget everything around him, and he suddenly felt that outside the carriage there were kingdoms and beauties, endless treasures, and elixirs of immortality that would elevate him to the rank of a Third-Rate cultivator!

He had been desperate to rush out.

Fortunately, a senior beside him knocked him unconscious.

On the second attempt, the entire carriage was grabbed by something outside and slammed violently to the ground.

The carriage nearly fell apart completely.

One could even feel cold, hissing winds pouring into the carriage through the cracks!

It nearly froze Miao Yan solid; only at the last moment did he transmit himself into Old Market.

"This time, I must act as the 'senior' and take care of my lord Xu, who has no experience." Miao Yan felt immense pressure.

He seemed to hear the ticking of a water clock beside his ear, each interval feeling endlessly long.

Outside the carriage, all was calm.

The carriage moved forward steadily.

"The calmer it is, the greater the sudden catastrophe brewing!" Miao Yan grew even more nervous, secretly preparing himself mentally.

Unknowingly, unknowingly, he suddenly felt the carriage drop; the tranquility outside vanished, replaced by the eerie, sinister cries of vendors from Old Market!

"Hmm?!" Miao Yan was momentarily bewildered: We're already inside?

Where are all the things that usually cause trouble along the way? Why haven't they attacked our carriage?

"This shouldn't be happening..."

Xu Yuan had already opened the carriage door and stepped down.

Shop doors stood open; evil spirits and ghosts smiled to welcome guests.

Stalls were crowded; stall owners fought over customers, their quarrels fierce and vicious, each wishing to devour the other in a single bite.

Xu Yuan kept his head down, his gaze sweeping across the stalls.

There were many good items.

The stalls displayed fine materials; although the quality was somewhat low for Xu Yuan, merely ninth or eighth grade, they were still considered excellent within that tier.

One stall owner had nothing left of his head but a skull, with many leeches burrowing in and out of his eye sockets, nostrils, and other openings, emitting streams of black, yin energy.

It snarled viciously at Xu Yuan: "What are you looking at? Even if I sold it, you couldn't afford a single piece!"

Though its tone was very unpleasant, it spoke the absolute truth.

For on its stall, everything was clearly priced; the cheapest item cost "twelve living humans."

Beside it, a shop stood wide open, where four ghostly women smiled as they welcomed customers.

Yet their smiles alone could make children cry in terror.

One of the women sneered: "That Water Corpse Ghost doesn't know how to do business. Living human, ignore it. If you want something, come in and look; our shop has everything."

Xu Yuan stepped into the shop and asked, "I am looking for a treasure; do you have one in your shop?"

Miao Yan's face fell; it was over. He had become a fat sheep, walking straight into the hands of the Ghost Sovereign.

(End of this chapter)