I have a weird dynasty

Chapter 31 Mountain God
"Pretty girl, what did you see in grandma's room that scared you so much?"

Sang Que looked up and saw the man in the suit lying on the wall, looking at her curiously.

Sang Que said nothing, and the man in the suit continued to talk.

"I'm telling you, this old lady is definitely a master. If it weren't for her, our boss would have died a few days ago. There are many ghosts in Xujiawan Village, and only the old lady can calm them down. You should find the old lady!"

There were footsteps behind him, and Xu Shufen came out holding an antique wooden box. The man in the suit immediately shrank his head.

"What were you doing outside? Why do you look so bad?"

Sang Que shook her head to indicate that she was fine. The yard suddenly became "clean", and she didn't know whether it was because of the wild god inside or because of her Yin Tong's restlessness just now.

Xu Shufen showed her the wooden box in her arms. "This talisman carries the power of the mountain god. It was drawn by my mother before she passed away. Her Taoism was much more profound than mine. Unfortunately, there were only three talismans left, and I used two. I have limited energy now, and I have other things to deal with. I don't have the time or the energy to do complicated rituals, so I'll just use this talisman to be straightforward."

Xu Shufen opened the wooden box, took out an old yellow paper talisman from it, and handed it to Sang Que.

"When you go back, put this talisman in a red lucky bag and carry it with you. If the talisman turns into ashes after seven days, the evil in your body will be eliminated. If not, it means that the evil in your body is not very strong. You can return the talisman to me."

Xu Shufen was very confident in the talisman in her hand. A naughty kid in the village once broke into a house of the dead and had his soul taken away. During the process of calling the soul back, he turned back and broke a taboo, and was almost left in the underworld as a virgin. He was saved by this talisman.

Sang Que felt that the talisman Xu Shufen was talking about was very similar to the ghost soldier talisman that Yan Daozi had. She raised her hand to take it. Just as her fingers pinched the yellow talisman, a green flame suddenly shot out from the talisman, and it caught fire!
"this!!"

Xu Shufen widened her eyes in horror. She had not expected the evil in Sang Que to be so vicious. She reacted quickly, chanting a strange spell, clenching her left hand into a fist, hanging over the burning talisman paper, blood dripping from between her fingers.

At this moment, Sang Que's two fingers were firmly attached to the talisman paper. She saw streams of black water surging out of the shrine and rushing into Xu Shufen's back.

Black tree-like lines appeared on Xu Shufen's exposed skin and spread towards the talisman paper like a living thing.

The strong sense of crisis forced Sang Que to struggle, and she suddenly loosened her fingers.

Click!

With a cracking sound, the surging black stream instantly disappeared into ashes, and the talisman paper in Xu Shufen's hand was burned out.

Xu Shufen turned pale and turned around in shock, then rushed into the house and found that the statue of the mountain god in the shrine was cracked.

The man in a suit who had been watching from the top of the wall did not see the black stream coming from the mountain god statue. The other scenes alone were enough to scare him to death.

Sang Que didn't notice the man in the suit at all. She was just still frightened by what had just happened. She suddenly realized that there might be no God in the modern world.

Just like the ghosts and gods she learned about from the weird world, there were ghosts first and gods later, and gods were ghosts, ghosts that were worshipped with incense and offerings.

Borrowing the power of ghosts and gods to exorcise evil spirits is no different from using evil spirits to kill evil spirits. The mountain god worshipped by Xu Shufen looks terrifying, and his strength is probably only about the same as Yin Tong.

Xu Shufen walked out of the house with a heavy face, looked at Sang Que with complicated eyes for a long time, and sighed.

"My girl, I can't do anything about what's on your body. Ever since the original mountain god temple disappeared, the power of the mountain god has been weakening. Now, Xujiawan Village, which has always worshipped the mountain god, has also dispersed. Without the incense, the mountain god is no longer the same as before."

Sangque was not overly surprised by this result, which could be said to be within expectations.

"It's okay. Thank you for today. I wasted a talisman of yours for nothing. If you need anything, I can compensate you."

Xu Shufen squinted at Sang Que and could see that her face was dark and her head was bloody. It was a very bad omen and a sign that she would not live long.

It's such a pity for such a young girl.

Xu Shufen shook her head. "It's okay. I feel bad for not being able to help you. Why don't you try going to those orthodox Taoist temples in the south? I do know a few people there, but I don't think they are very skilled."

"Young people nowadays are not even willing to learn the intangible cultural heritage passed down by their ancestors, let alone these 'feudal superstitions'? A lot of these feudal superstitions were destroyed in that era, and there are not many that can be passed down now. If there is no money to make, no one is willing to study it. If it comes to me, my Xu family will also be wiped out."

Sang Que could see Xu Shufen's sadness. She paused and asked, "Grandma, can I ask you some questions?"

"Just ask."

Sang Que took out his cell phone, opened the photo album, and held the screenshot of Xu Yichao's video in front of Xu Shufen.

“Can you…see?”

"Is this Xu Qingshuang's eldest grandson, Xu Yichao?"

"Please take a closer look here."

Sang Que spread out two fingers and zoomed in on the back of Xu Yichao's right shoulder. Xu Shufen put on her reading glasses, took the phone, squinted and looked at it carefully, and suddenly her whole body trembled.

"This...this...this...didn't I clean it up for him back then? How could he still..."

Sang Que found Xu Yichao's video and watched it with Xu Shufen while sitting at the table in the yard.

After reading it, Xu Shufen silently fanned herself with a palm-leaf fan. Her face looked even older, and she spoke only after a long while.

"What happened back then was pretty much the same as what this kid said. He went into the house of the dead and became a burial object. His soul was possessed, and when his grandparents found him in the paper-making shop, he was unconscious." "I asked his grandma to call his soul back from the rooftop, and I personally carried a lantern to the underworld... um... it's pretty much the other world you young people often talk about, and I went there to bring him back."

"Everything was fine along the way, but who knew something would go wrong at the last moment. I used a mountain god talisman to scatter the owner and rescue him. I changed his name afterwards so that the owner would never find him again and he would grow up safely."

"Is there any solution now?" Sang Que asked.

Xu Shufen looked at Sang Que for a moment, thinking that Sang Que herself was possessed by evil spirits and would not live long, yet she still cared about her classmates. She was such a kind-hearted girl, which made people feel sorry for her.

Little did people know that on the one hand, Sang Que cared about his classmates, but on the other hand, it was out of self-protection and he didn't want to expose his own secrets, so he used Xu Yichao's story to hint at things.

"I saw some folk methods of exorcising evil spirits on the Internet before..."

"it's useless."

Before Sang Que could finish her words, Xu Shufen interrupted her.

"If it was seventy or eighty years ago, in the era of my mother or my grandmother, those methods would have been more or less useful. But now, most folk exorcism methods can only deal with wandering spirits that can be driven away by one's own yang energy. They are of limited effect on evil spirits with evil intentions."

"Why?" Sangque asked.

"When ordinary people worship gods and offer incense, the gods will appear. The same is true for folk exorcism. It takes the majority of people to believe in it before it has divine power. Nowadays, people believe in science, so these things naturally have no effect. It's normal."

"Actually, if you think about it carefully, this era is pretty good. There are fewer evil spirits than in the past. Although our roots have gradually been cut off and many things have been lost, the reason we exist is to create a peaceful and prosperous world, which is pretty good."

"Then what about the talisman you gave me just now?" Sang Que continued to ask.

"That is relying on the spiritual practice of us believers, or the practitioners, to invoke the power of the gods through rituals."

Sang Que pursed her lips. It was indeed similar to Yan Daozi's Ghost Soldier Talisman, but the power was far less.

"Grandma, if Xu Yichao gets rid of this paper man on his body in the future, can he return to his previous life?"

Xu Shufen sighed repeatedly, "In fact, some people may never encounter evil spirits in their entire lives. They don't even know that there are evil spirits in this world. They just go through life in a muddle-headed way."

"But for some people, once they encounter evil, they believe in these things and it is difficult for them to go back to the time when they did not believe in them. As the saying goes, if you believe, then there is truth. As long as you believe in evil, you will attract evil. So for those who have encountered evil, the final result will not be good."

Just like what Yan Daozi said, once you experience it once, you will encounter it again and again until you die suddenly.

Sang Que suddenly regretted that he should not have told his mother about these things. Now his mother began to believe it, and there was no way things would be peaceful in the future.

Therefore, she cannot drive away the evil spirits in her body, but should suppress and control them and use them for her own benefit.

"I will think of a way to deal with the Xu family kid's matter." Xu Shufen thought Sang Que was worried about Xu Yichao. "In fact, I told his parents that year that he has become the virgin recognized by the owner of the house. As long as he doesn't get married in the future, he will have no problem dying of old age. But if..."

Before Xu Shufen finished her words, Sang Que understood that Xu Yichao had become the evil spirit's destined partner, which was why any woman who got close to Xu Yichao would always be unlucky.

It seems that the evil spirit has a good personality. It does not kill people casually. It is also very patient and willing to wait for Xu Yichao to die of old age.

I just don't know what will happen if Xu Yichao falls in love with a guy in the future? Is it considered a bug?

Is Xu Yichao's behavior another form of controlling evil spirits?

"Grandma, can people order ghosts to do things for them?"

"You mean to control evil spirits for your own use? I heard that there were people like this in ancient times. They became living ghosts after being possessed by ghosts. There should have been such people in my grandmother's time, but I haven't heard of them now. These are all evil methods. No one knows how to do them specifically. People who are possessed by ghosts don't live long. Their final fate is also miserable, and their relatives will also suffer."

Sang Que stood up and asked this question. She basically didn't have much hope for the power of this world.

Instead of wasting time traveling all over the world looking for an unknown master, or worshiping a god who you don’t know if he will show up, it is better to face your fear and go directly to the strange world to get what you want.

It is better to rely on yourself than to ask God!
"Grandma, thank you for today. I won't bother you anymore."

Sangque bowed and prepared to leave.

"Wait, girl."

Xu Shufen looked back at the location of the shrine in the house.

"You are a good girl. I can't bear to see you being harmed by evil spirits. Do you want to join my Xu family's temple and serve the mountain god with me? As long as you are pious enough, the mountain god will definitely do his best to help you suppress the evil spirits. At the very least, he can help you live a few more years."

Before Sangque could answer, a clanging sound came from the inner room.

Xu Shufen looked back and saw that the mountain god statue had fallen from the shrine, but the red cloth was still covering it.

Xu Shufen was dumbfounded, and Sang Que gave a bitter smile.

"It seems that the mountain god has given his answer."