Chapter 179: Zombie Replaces Empress

The seventeenth day of the first lunar month: suitable for travel, marriage, and cleaning; avoid breaking houses and moving earth.

Xu Qing packed his bags early. By the time the sky was bright, he had already left the Xinfu Ward ferry terminal by passenger boat.

The river mist was hazy. At the shipyard, one could vaguely see the shadow of a cat standing and looking into the distance.

As the passenger boat drifted further and further away, only a black dot that couldn't be seen clearly remained at the shipyard pier.

When leaving Linjiang County, Xu Qing specially visited his acquaintances. These procedures were exactly the same as when he was in seclusion to break through to the Silver Armor Zombie.

To Wang Lingyuan, Second Master Feng, and others, Xu Qing still used studying as an excuse. As for those immortal friends, he told them he was traveling and the return date was uncertain.

These things should have been told in advance, but because he had been in the New Year, Xu Qing had been dragging it out. After all, for someone in the funeral business, visiting people to pay New Year's greetings during the New Year was more or less unlucky.

When people gather together for the New Year, you, a funeral gentleman who often does funerals and burials, suddenly visit. Do you still want people to live?

If you are driven out, those who don't know will say you are quite polite, and that the host who drove you out is really unreasonable.

But if they know you are in this business, everyone will say you are not a thing!

Even after the fifteenth day, when Xu Qing visited acquaintances, he didn't enter the door, but stood outside to chat and talk about some idle things.

It was cold at this time, and people couldn't stand at the door. After saying a few words, he had to say goodbye and leave.

Xu Qing had the experience of the first seclusion, so he was familiar with how to say goodbye to people. After leaving Linjiang County along the waterway, he became a red-dust guest all alone again.

But he was a red-dust guest with a cat at home.

The passenger boat went all the way north. Xu Qing met many scholars going to the capital for the exam on the way.

After the first lunar month, it would be the big day of the spring exam in less than two months.

The Yong Dynasty's metropolitan exam is held in the third lunar month, and the palace exam is held in the fourth month of the same year.

Xu Qing looked at those who were traveling and chanting poems along the way, and didn't know how many of the scholars on the same boat would be the parents' officials of the future.

During this time, someone came to ask Xu Qing if he was also a student going to the capital for the exam. He wanted to shake his head and deny it, but thinking that the disaster on the path of cultivation was not an exam paper issued by God, he changed his mind.

"I am indeed a student going to the exam, but as a student with a humble background like me, I think it will be much harder to take the exam than those from famous families."

It is easier for people to cross the tribulation than for demons, and it is easier for demons to cross the tribulation than for evil spirits, and zombies happen to be the evil spirits among evil spirits.

If a scholar taking the exam can pass the provincial exam, the metropolitan exam, and the palace exam, and win first place in every field, he will be crowned as a rare talent who "wins three firsts in a row." In the eyes of secular people, this is no different from attaining the Dao and ascending.

As for cultivators, they must endure the three trials of the lightning disaster, heavenly fire, and the wind of suffering.

Scholars are like ox hair, and those who succeed are like unicorn horns.

From ancient times to the present, there are very few practitioners who can pass these three tests under God's invigilation.

And among them, those who attain the Dao as zombies are even rarer.

Zombies, this kind of alien, are not favored by heaven and earth at birth, so they are naturally not favored by heaven.

Beside, a scholar heard Xu Qing's words and felt quite empathetic: "Brother's words are very true. Those wealthy children from famous families have books to read at birth, and even if they take the exam, they don't have to worry about travel expenses. Some even have servants and maids to accompany them all the way. Unlike us, who have to rely on relatives and friends for travel expenses to take the exam..."

Most of the people who shared a passenger boat with Xu Qing were poor scholars, and they couldn't pack the whole boat. At this time, when talking about their backgrounds, it was inevitable to sigh.

"What's more hateful is that some people sell offices and buy titles, without ten years of cold window study, they achieve success!"

"I heard people say that some people don't understand the classics, and their articles are not as good as children with hair, but they can also pass the metropolitan exam and obtain an official position."

"Brother, be careful."

Some were filled with righteous indignation, and some were as timid as tigers, not daring to speak, for fear of being heard by those with intentions and affecting their future.

Only Xu Qing felt something and said: "You all say that those who have no talent and no virtue and buy official positions with money are hateful, but you don't know that some people who are proficient in hundreds of arts, do good deeds diligently, and have talent and virtue also need to spend a considerable amount of silver to obtain fame."

Hearing this, several scholars looked at each other, all feeling panicked in their hearts. If the Great Yong Dynasty had really become like this, then what did their ten years of cold window study count for?

How could they know that what Xu Qing said and what they heard were not the same thing at all.

The silver Xu Qing mentioned refers to incense, and buying official positions with money refers to bribing the way of heaven with incense to buy the path to his own cultivation.

The passenger boat didn't stop. As time passed, the zombie energy hidden in Xu Qing's body had signs of being uncontrollable.

When the boat reached the river of the capital, Xu Qing's expression became visibly anxious.

He grabbed the boatman's wrist and asked in which direction the imperial mausoleum was. The boatman didn't understand, thinking why this person was so anxious, as if he couldn't hold it and wanted to relieve himself.

But why do you ask where the imperial mausoleum is? The imperial mausoleum is not your home.

Seeing the boatman's strange expression, Xu Qing followed up: "I am a student going to the exam, and I want to worship outside the imperial mausoleum so that the late emperor can bless me to be on the gold list."

So that's how it is!

The boatman felt it was reasonable, so he pointed to the northwest and said: "The imperial mausoleum is two hundred miles northwest of the capital, on Mount Zhaoshi. I heard that there are flag camp troops guarding it. If you really want to go, just worship in the wild outside, don't enter the mountain."

Getting the accurate answer, Xu Qing turned and left. The boatman looked at the broken silver in his hand and couldn't stop being happy.

There were horse and donkey merchants selling horses on the river bank. To avoid attracting attention, Xu Qing didn't choose to ride the five-colored horse, but used the horse-judging technique to pick the best horse from a group of horses.

The horse looked ordinary, but Xu Qing saw at a glance that it was a good horse with abundant strength.

Feeding the horse two strength pills and a Grain Grain Bigu Pill, Xu Qing rode away, rushing straight to the imperial mausoleum.

Cultivating a Golden Armor Zombie requires a large amount of yin-gold objects. The higher the quality of the yin-gold, the higher the quality of the Golden Armor Zombie cultivated.

Although Xu Qing used the burial money found by Second Master Feng to refine a yin-gold coffin, the yin-gold energy of that coffin might not be enough for him to use.

This is also why most of the recorded Golden Armor Zombies appear in ancient tombs.

Because in the old coffins of those tombs, there is a large amount of high-quality burial money.

It's just that many Golden Armor Zombies face thunder disaster punishment not long after leaving the tomb.

Like when Xu Qing asked Fairy Bai for advice on Mount Yuehua, the other party mentioned the Golden Armor Zombie that had appeared in Xiangyin.

Practitioners watched from afar, and by looking at the intensity of the thunder disaster and the geographical location, they could roughly infer what kind of demon was crossing the tribulation.

Secular people didn't know the inside story and could only speculate whether the tomb owner had done many evil deeds in his life, so he attracted thunder to strike the tomb.

It is said that the tomb struck by thunder in Xiangyin County was the burial place of King Chu Liu.

This King Chu Liu was once obsessed with refining poison, using the people of a county as containers for poison, human heads as insect jars, and human skin sewn into drums to control insects.

King Chu Liu's evil deeds were countless. The evaluation of him in the history books was only eight characters: his crimes were full, and heaven's mandate punished him!

The thunder striking King Chu Liu's tomb in Xiangyin County just happened to fulfill this sentence in the history books.

Later, Xu Qing specially inquired about King Chu Liu in Xiangyin, such as why no one dug his grave for such an evil person, and instead, a zombie had to be used to attract thunder to strike his tomb in the end.

After checking, Xu Qing finally came to a conclusion: there were a large number of poison insects stored in King Chu Liu's tomb. With these insects, tomb robbers didn't dare to set foot there.

Xu Qing had no interest in the gold and silver treasures in King Chu Liu's tomb. The only thing he might be interested in was the yin-gold used for burial in the tomb.

It's a pity that a zombie predecessor had already looted King Chu Liu's tomb a thousand years ago. Now that he thought about it, the yin-gold energy inside was probably not much left, so even if he went, it would be a wasted trip.

Besides King Chu Liu's tomb, Xu Qing didn't want to go to the well-preserved tombs of the former dynasty, because that place was in the southern province, which was much further from Jinmen than Luojing.

Based on the principle of proximity, Xu Qing chose the imperial mausoleum of the Great Yong Dynasty.

The thousand-mile good horse galloped all the way. No one who saw this horse on the road didn't exclaim.

"Whoa! What kind of horse is this, so vigorous? I'm afraid a thousand-mile horse is nothing more than this!"

A carriage team from Jiangnan going to the capital for the exam was resting by the tea shop. When Xu Qing's date-red horse swept past, many people thought it was a red wind blowing past.

In the crowd, a scholar in a green shirt glanced at the direction Xu Qing left, and then continued to read the book.

Not long after, a guard said: "Young Master, it's time to set off. By noon, I think we can reach the city and meet the old master."

Wu Wencai put away the book. Compared to the high-spirited candidates around him, he seemed a bit dull.

"If my brother were still alive, I think he should be able to come to the exam with me..."

Wu Wencai reached out and touched the broken crane bone flute at his waist, feeling more and more melancholy in his heart.

Mount Zhaoshi, outside the Great Yong Fuyong Mausoleum.

Xu Qing turned over and dismounted, saying: "My destination has arrived. I think there are wild beasts hiding in this mountain. You can return along the original road, find another place, and don't have to wait for me here."

After speaking, Xu Qing slapped its thigh, and the horse neighed. When it ran to the dirt hill, it still looked back reluctantly.

However, Xu Qing's figure was already gone from the spot.

Inside the Fuyong Mausoleum, Xu Qing suppressed the restlessness in his heart and went deep into the place where the yin-gold energy was most concentrated.

When he came to a tomb chamber, Xu Qing glanced at the tombstone inscription standing in front of the tomb chamber door.

He only saw the words "Duanrong Zunyou" and so on, and the posthumous title alone had nearly twenty characters.

Xu Qing was too lazy to look elsewhere, thinking that he would choose you!

In the tomb chamber, Xu Qing first took off his clothes, then used the Mountain Forest Method of the Mountain-Moving Technique to wrap a leopard skin full of strange patterns on his body.

A Golden Armor Zombie crossing the thunder disaster is a corpse.

A corpse has three changes, called Hair Zombie, Fire Zombie, and Black Zombie.

If a zombie wishes to evolve into a Kui-Ba, it must consciously choose its path of evolution once it has cultivated to the level of a Prostrate Corpse.

The Hair Zombie belongs to the mountain forest, and its cultivation can become a Hair Hou.

The Fire Zombie is the master of fire, and its cultivation can become a Drought Demon.

The Black Zombie is the master of water, and its cultivation can become a Water Demon.

When the Drought Demon comes out, the land is red for a thousand miles; when the Water Demon comes out, the land is flooded for a thousand miles; when the Hair Hou comes out, the mountain forest submits.

At this moment, Xu Qing used the Mountain-Moving Technique to refine Guan Xiaohu's skin into a mountain forest tiger master, and then took out the Indefinite Black Water, dividing a portion and swallowing it.

The Indefinite Black Water has a very strong resentment and evil spirit. If taken rashly, it will inevitably be affected in mind and become a true bloodthirsty zombie.

Fortunately, there is a pure white lotus floating above the black river in the Mountain and River Map.

The white lotus has twelve petals. Xu Qing picked one petal and held it in his mouth, just like the jade held in the mouth of a dead person lying in a coffin.

After swallowing the high mountain lotus that emitted a moist luster, Xu Qing opened his yin pupils again and looked inward at the yin-burning fire he had nurtured in his body.

The yin-burning fire was only a small cluster, but with the help of the yin-gold energy in the imperial mausoleum, he thought it could grow stronger.

The corpse is the watershed of zombies, and the Golden Armor Zombie is the key node for young zombies to grab and choose the direction of growth.

At this time, Xu Qing finished grabbing, which was equivalent to choosing the evolutionary path in the future.

Similarly, he also had to accept the price of grabbing.

The three changes of the corpse and the three kinds of demons each represent a considerable length of cultivation time.

If all three paths are chosen, it will take several times or even more time to evolve in the future.

The Indefinite Black Water and the mountain forest energy gathered behind him. Xu Qing felt the interaction with heaven and earth in the dark, as if he saw the road ahead.

That road is extremely long, perhaps a thousand years, ten thousand years, or even longer.

How many practitioners in the world can survive ten thousand years?

Sensing the omen in the dark, Xu Qing's Dao heart did not waver at all.

Time will not wear him down at all. If he really has to practice for ten thousand years, it means he can continue his funeral business and transcend more corpses.

This is a great thing, it should be celebrated, so why would his Dao heart be unstable because of this?

In the dark tomb chamber, Xu Qing's Dao heart became more and more firm.

Reaching out and pulling the Empress, whose name was longer than her life, out of the coffin, he threw her into the box garden along with the inner coffin.

Then Xu Qing used the method of replacing the prince with a civet cat, replaced the zombie with the Empress, and stuffed his own yin-gold coffin, which was obviously a circle larger, into Empress Duanrong's coffin.

Closing the coffin, the mausoleum became silent.

Inside the coffin, Xu Qing slept very peacefully, as if he had been lying here for hundreds or thousands of years...

Jingxia Street.

The coffin shop was still closed. At the door, the sign "Please go to the mortician's shop for funeral materials" was already a bit old. The young lady Zhang Wan continued to run the burial clothes shop. In the mortician's shop, a tall woman with a cold face sometimes counted the accounts, and sometimes a black cat sat on the threshold and was in a daze.

During this time, Second Master Feng, who was carrying his uncle and playing with walnuts, came once. Wang Lingyuan from the government office and the new storyteller hired by the Lai Fu Inn had also appeared outside the shop.

In March, when the peach blossoms were in full bloom, Daoist Yizhen came to the coffin shop and sat for a long time. A little girl pointed to the peach tree in the courtyard and told her that it was her godmother.

The breeze blew, and on the branches of the peach tree, a red silk ribbon was swaying slightly.

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 180 =====