Chapter 28: The Way of the Talisman Arrow

It is not uncommon for Daoists to marry and start businesses, developing into clans, like the Jiang family. The most famous is the Zhang family of the Ancestral Ancestral Tian Shi's Mansion, where the position of Ancestral Ancestral Tian Shi is hereditary.

Cheng Yunqi was treated as an honored guest here and was arranged into a unique small courtyard.

It was called the Wind Lotus Abode.

The abode was right next to a lotus forest.

Cheng Yunqi could only call it a lotus forest.

He dared to say that the largest lotus pond in the mortal world was not as large as this one, and the lotus leaves were each the size of paper umbrellas, emerald green like jade. The line "the lotus leaves reaching the sky are infinitely green" finally fell into place here.

The small courtyard was on the edge of the lotus forest, where one could see the lotus leaves swaying. If one truly felt it obstructed the view, turning one's head slightly, there was the vast lake with frost filling the sky.

The most delightful thing was that it was currently the sixth month, the season when lotus flowers were in full bloom. The lotus flowers here were exceptionally bright red, as large as Buddha platforms, which matched the line "the lotus flowers reflecting the sun are exceptionally red."

The servants who led Cheng Yunqi into the courtyard thanked him profusely, saying that their Young Master was a great person, and Cheng Yunqi, who could save him, was naturally a great person too.

They also said that this abode arranged by the Family Head was the most suitable for a short stay in the current season, and if it were rented out, it would cost quite a bit of money per day.

Cheng Yunqi also thanked them. He was indeed very satisfied with this courtyard; the scenery was boundless, the spiritual energy was abundant, and he had never had the experience of living on the water, so he felt it was novel.

After the servants left, Cheng Yunqi put his pack in the room but did not rest. He immediately came to the wooden corridor outside the courtyard and sat cross-legged, smelling the elegant lotus fragrance and looking at the vast great lake. This was a different scene from the one on the southern shore before.

He closed his eyes and emptied his mind, and after about the time it takes to drink a cup of tea, he slowly opened his eyes.

At this moment, he took something out of his bosom. It was about half a foot long, pitch black like ink, looking like an arrow but short, with a head but no feathers. It was the talisman arrow he had captured from the Thin Daoist just now.

He had heard of talisman arrows before and had seen them in the mountains, but it was not until today that he had encountered someone using them to commit murder.

For practitioners, when fighting or protecting themselves, external objects like talismans and magic treasures were extremely common.

Magic treasures had high refining costs and took a long time, but once refined, they were extremely convenient to use.

Talismans had low drawing costs and took a short time, and their power could not be underestimated, but they were one-time items. The most criticized aspect was that talismans relied on mental power to guide and mantras to trigger.

For some low-level cultivators, their mental power was shallow and difficult to project far. Some talismans that required close range to demonstrate their power were difficult to take effect, such as the Bone-Attached Erosion Talisman of the fire element, the Blade-Axe-Falling Talisman of the gold element, as well as poison talismans and immobilization talismans.

If mental power was insufficient, one was that it couldn't fly far, and the other was that it flew slowly.

If an attack-type talisman paper drifted over lightly, it would just be a laughingstock.

Another point was difficult to speak of, which was sneak attacks. Unless it was close at hand, even if your mental power was strong, using a talisman for a sneak attack was a joke. After all, the mantra was spoken, so who wouldn't know what was going on?

Of course, these two drawbacks only applied to low-level cultivators. If a great talisman master was fighting, there was no need to consider these.

Like the Three Mountains of Talismans—Longhu Mountain, Gezao Mountain, and Mao Mountain—no matter which master of which sect, a thunder talisman hit the sky, and with a decree, heavenly thunder fell like rain. There would be no talk of insufficient thoughts or unfavorable sneak attacks.

But in the end, there were more low-level cultivators under heaven, and great masters were all practiced up from small cultivators step by step.

Thus, some talented people took a shortcut and thought of a method: put a shell on the outside. This shell had to be made with the technique of refining tools, and forbidden techniques such as hiding spirit, riding the wind, hiding traces, and covering sound were applied.

After refining, the attack talisman was put inside. In addition, a sound-recording snail that could hide magic essence had to be put in.

At that time, a simple trigger prohibition was left on the outer shell. If it hit something, it would trigger the sound-recording snail, the sound-recording snail would emit the pre-recorded mantra sound, and then the talisman would be activated.

To facilitate throwing and shooting, this shell was made into the shape of an arrow, which was the talisman arrow.

Even more, not only was a talisman stuffed into the arrow shaft, but it was also matched with the five elements, the intersection of Kan and Li, and the combination of wind and thunder, one ring after another, playing with all kinds of tricks—anyway, it was far away, so even if it played until the spiritual essence was extinguished and the void vibrated, it wouldn't hurt itself. In view of this, the way of using talisman arrows developed from throwing to drawing bows and crossbows, and the range became farther and farther. It could be said that everything was used, and some people said that when the talisman arrow was played to the end, it was a self-destructing flying sword that did not need mental power to guide.

The Thin Daoist before was pretending to flee, attracting the young hero's attention during the conversation, holding this talisman arrow in his hand. He didn't know if the Thin Daoist didn't have a hand crossbow or if he was avoiding being discovered. He was preparing to throw it to sneak attack the young hero, and then he was broken by Cheng Yunqi.

Cheng Yunqi intended to study the talisman arrow carefully.

First of all, Cheng Yunqi believed that there was no problem with his talent. Magic, talismans, and mantras were always connected, but one fell on magic power, one fell on patterns, and one fell on syllables. The essence was the summoning and controlling of heaven and earth spiritual energy.

He was very good at these.

Alchemy and tool refining were also great avenues, but these two were too wasteful of money and time. Refining a furnace of good pills or a magic treasure was calculated by the year. Cheng Yunqi felt that he didn't have so much time currently; he had too many things to learn.

At the beginning of cultivation, he believed that it was better to practice more and ponder the Dao that pointed directly to the origin of the five elements and yin and yang. At least in the first two realms, it was like this. It was said that breaking through the third and fourth realms was difficult but had a long lifespan. At that time, it would not be too late to ponder the way of alchemy and tools, and he could touch the class and bypass it.

If he couldn't live that long, he didn't need to think about it more.

This was Cheng Yunqi's view.

Focusing on the present, talisman drawing was simple, saving materials and time, and could better comprehend magic essence, communicate with spiritual energy, and correct mantras. As for the lack of power, he would win by quantity and trigger by talisman arrow, which was most suitable.

And the refining of the talisman arrow shell was not difficult. This step didn't even need a tripod furnace.

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Just hammer the gold and iron finely into skin, roll it into an arrow tube, grind out an arrowhead, and then calcine it into one body with fire.

If he really didn't want to be troublesome, pinch a mold, hollow it out into the shape of an arrow shell, and pour it directly with molten gold and iron. After it was formed, hollow out the arrow shaft, which was also fine.

Of course, even if it was simple, this arrow shaft couldn't really be made of broken copper and iron from the mortal world. How could it be spiritual? At least it had to be able to make the prohibition on it take effect, right?

The slightly troublesome thing was this—the prohibition on the arrow shaft.

Although talismans, prohibitions, and arrays were of the same origin, the difference lay in where the pen fell. Talismans were on paper, prohibitions were on tools, and arrays were between heaven and earth.

Falling the pen on the tool used not a brush, but a knife pen. The strength and the magic intent injected into it were also different. Moreover, the arrow shaft was hollow, and it was even more difficult to perform the prohibition with a knife on a layer of iron skin.

As for the prohibition itself, there were only a few types, and the true meaning was no different from talisman methods.

What was truly tricky was the magic snail that could record mantra sounds, which had to be able to retain the magic essence carried in the mantra sounds. This was different from the one Cheng Yunqi gave to Green Chi.

The magic snail couldn't be too big either. Too big was for siege crossbows.

There was a magic snail called the "Small Curled Ear Nail Snail" that was very suitable.

If you say it's hard to find, it is. This thing only grows in the deepest part of water veins where water vapor is rich, deep enough to be pitch black without seeing the sun.

In such an extremely deep place, just catching it was very troublesome, and after catching it, it had to be de-fleshed and kept in the shell, refined with secret methods.

But how hard is it to get? According to Cheng Yunqi, three of the five great lakes were its production areas, and Poyang Lake happened to be one of them.

It is said that there is more than one family doing this business on this lake, and there is friction between them. I just don't know if the Jiang family has ever been involved.

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(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 29 =====