I have a weird dynasty

Chapter 7 Ming Zhang Notes
【March 9th】

There are 112 people in Heishan Village, three black dogs, and 21 morning roosters.

It’s really troublesome to record these numbers every day!

Spring ploughing is approaching, and today the master wants to open an altar and draw talismans.

You need to prepare the shrine, incense burner, offerings, ritual instruments, talisman paper, cinnabar, dawn chicken, black dog blood, glutinous rice, etc. Don't forget!
To draw talismans, one must be ordained by a Taoist priest. I wanted to watch but was rejected by my master. Is asking the Taoist priest to draw talismans, is that more terrifying than having evil spirits take your life?
Today, I was reminded again that I should handle the villagers' requests with my whole heart and not take them lightly, saying that this is something that must be learned in order to open the Ghost Gate and enter the Nine Netherworlds.

The skinny monkey came to the house again today and told his mother that he heard singing in the middle of the night again, but no one else in the family heard it. The situation has lasted for five days and previous methods were useless.

When she woke up this morning, the old woman was in a daze, humming a strange tune, as if she was crying in front of a grave, with the tone sometimes high and sometimes low, which was extremely creepy.

The skinny monkey knew nothing about music, but he remembered the whole thing after listening to it only once. The strange tune was in his mind all day and he couldn't get it out of his mind.

I went home with the skinny monkey to investigate again, but still found nothing. The eye-opening talisman still couldn't see clearly after opening the ghost gate.

This kind of situation where the source is unknown is not difficult to deal with.

Take glutinous rice and mix it with coarse salt, then sprinkle it along the corners of the house. At night, tie a broom with a red rope and place it upside down behind the door.

If there is no evil spirit in the house, this method can make the house impregnable, and the evil spirit will not invade within seven days, and the evil spirits in the three upper layers of the Nine Netherworlds cannot be broken.

If there is an evil spirit in the house, it will flee when it sees this scene. The next day, the blackened places of the glutinous rice are where the evil spirit is trapped. Use a broom to sweep the glutinous rice and coarse salt out of the door to drive it away.

However, glutinous rice is only produced in the south, and 90% of it is supplied to the imperial court. It may not be available in the northwest even if you have money. My master only has half a bushel of glutinous rice in stock throughout the year.

The method tells the skinny monkey that whether he can buy back the glutinous rice depends on his filial piety and ability.

……

【March 12】

There are 109 people in Heishan Village, two black dogs, and twenty morning roosters.

That bastard Kou Yushan actually dared to attack me. What if I just watched him die without helping him? How can someone not die when driving away evil spirits?

Do you really think that corpse mud is easy to deal with? It's lucky that only three died!
If it weren't for my support, Kou Yushan would not be able to come back today, and the land in Heishan Village would not be reclaimed this year.

A widower with no family left, dares to mess with me!

If he wasn't the captain of the village guard, and all the villagers respected him, I would kill him!

However, after being hit by the corpse mud ghost, my ghost gate was opened. But after I entered a state of meditation, I saw a mass grave in my dream. There was no one and no evil spirits. There was a blood moon above my head and thick fog all around.

Where is Jiuyou? I didn't see any cliffs, abysses, stairs or anything like that.

I asked my master, and he said that I have a special talent and there is no need to rush for success. I just need to continue to practice Yin every night.

Back then, it took him five days to open the Ghost Gate, and two months to reach the first level of the Nine Netherworlds. It only took me three days from the beginning of my passage through the Yin to the official opening of the Ghost Gate. It is commendable. If it weren't for this talent, he would not have let me become his disciple.

The master also said that from now on, I can start paying attention to the evil spirits that appear after people die. If I am lucky enough to meet one that suits me, I will be able to perform a ritual to control it directly when I go down to the second level of the Nine Netherworlds, and officially become a ghost-walking person.

Ordinary people live their whole lives in fear, trying to avoid evil spirits and barely survive. They are powerless to fight back against evil spirits, and ordinary weapons cannot kill them.

Even if a Taoist priest or a monk who has been ordained as a monk has converted to Buddhism, they can only temporarily drive away and detain the upper three levels of evil spirits with the help of external objects, and cannot eliminate them directly.

People with good luck may have a chance of survival if they encounter evil spirits and can understand the laws of nature, but such people are rare.

Most people who encounter evil spirits are doomed to die and become the evil spirits' food.

You can only go out during clear daytime, but you still need to be careful of the horrors lurking in the dark.

Once it is dark or rainy without sunlight, people can only hide in their houses, watching over the lamps and waiting for dawn.

The Yin-walkers have to control the evil spirits and risk their lives, and the conditions for choosing the evil spirits are also very harsh.

Once you succeed in controlling it, you can use the power of evil spirits to kill other evil spirits, absorb the power of evil spirits, and improve your own Taoism.

By then, even on cloudy days and in the dark of night, one will be able to fight against evil spirits, or at the very least, be able to save one's life and escape.

When facing ordinary people, they have the power of life and death, just like evil spirits, but even worse than evil spirits.

It’s just that those who go to the underworld are short-lived creatures who have lost all their relatives and friends and have a bad end. Most of them do not live more than half a year, and after death they may become even more powerful and strange evil spirits.

The master has been controlling evil spirits for more than a year, and he has already mastered the key secrets to controlling evil spirits.

I heard that the evil-suppressing bureau's ghost-walking generals who guard various prefectures relied on this method to survive for more than ten years without any signs of backlash from evil spirits.

I listened to a lot from Master today, and my heart was moved. I picked up the pen to express myself, but I still feel unsatisfied.

I don’t know what kind of evil spirit I will be able to control in the future. When I go to the Evil Suppression Division to take charge, maybe I can also be a ghost-walking general guarding a provincial capital, bring honor to my family, and leave my name in history.

……

【March 15】

There are 108 people in Heishan Village? Three days ago, the record was 109.

There was no exorcism, no deaths, and no one traveling far away during these three days. Why was Liu Jia Sanlang missing from the list?

I asked everyone in the village, and they all said that there was no such person in Heishan Village. I don't seem to have ever seen this person either. My impression is that the Liu couple lost two sons in their early years, had a daughter in their old age, and now have only one daughter, Liu Caifeng.

But the list I wrote in my own handwriting cannot be wrong. Liu Tianyou, sixteen years old, the only person from Heishan Village who attends a private school in the county, has returned from Tangyuan County, so this person is definitely on the list!

I asked my master, and he told me not to investigate further.

In this world, there are many things that cannot be recorded, are not allowed to be named or described, and cannot even be mentioned. They are beyond human control. Even the ghost generals guarding the provincial capital have to retreat.

Fortunately, few people know about this kind of existence. They stay away from the human world, only appear occasionally, and rarely cause disasters. As long as you are not unlucky enough to trigger their laws, nothing will happen.

No one, including the master, remembers Liu Jia Sanlang. How on earth did he get involved with such a terrifying thing? It’s terrible!
My master took the opportunity to teach me a lesson, telling me that only by putting away my curiosity can I live longer. In this world, knowing more about evil things is not necessarily better.

In addition, the number of people in the village must be counted every day, and important matters must be recorded with ink mixed with cinnabar, so that if there is anything strange, it can be checked at any time.

Some evil spirits can tamper with people's memories, but they cannot change cinnabar ink. The purer and thicker the cinnabar is, the more difficult it is to be affected by evil spirits.

Come to think of it, Wangshan City is safer, with the Day and Night Patrolmen of the Evil Suppression Bureau taking turns on duty. I really don't know why Master quit his job at the Evil Suppression Bureau and came to this broken place.

There is not much cinnabar in stock. I will go to Tangyuan County to buy some tomorrow morning and deliver a letter to Master on the way.

Drive a black donkey cart, and carry an inkstone, talismans and an iron sword for self-defense, don’t forget!
……

[April 8th]

There are 109 people in Heishan Village, five black dogs, and 19 morning roosters.

It was rainy the day before yesterday and the Zhao family's child went missing. We have searched for him till today but to no avail. It is likely that the child was naughty and stepped into a puddle during the rain and disappeared.

Today, Mrs. Li gave birth to two big fat boys, and his black dog also gave birth to a litter of puppies, three black and two spotted.

Kill a rooster to wake up the baby in the morning and offer sacrifice to the gods. Use chicken blood, cinnabar and yellow paper to record the baby's birth date and time to stabilize its soul and protect it from evil spirits for three years.

What kind of Feng Shui is this for the Li family? Why are they so blessed with so many children?

Li Weiming was not afraid that he would be too blessed and die in the wild, leaving behind his young and beautiful wife as a widow.

Speaking of beauty, the crazy woman in the village and her silly daughter Shui Ling are the prettiest. Unfortunately, the mother and daughter are the guardians of Heishan Village, and are protected by Kou Yushan and the villagers.

Kou Yushan, a widower with no descendants, actually hid a lot of glutinous rice to exorcise evil spirits for Shouhou's family. He really knows how to win people's hearts.

It is not worth it for a skinny old woman with half her body buried in the ground to waste something as precious as glutinous rice. It is a waste of resources!

The ghost gate has been opened for nearly a month, and I still can't see Jiuyou in my dreams every night. My master told me not to worry, to serve the villagers first, and then to go to Jiuyou and light the lamps, and I will have to rely on the incense of these peasants.

Without a heart lamp, one will go to hell, which is like a sheep walking into a tiger's mouth. One will attract evil spirits and die quickly.

……

【April 27】

There are 108 people in Heishan Village, five black dogs, and 19 morning roosters.

Li Weiming is dead.

His wife suffered from postpartum blood loss, so he went to Tangyuan County to buy medicine for her yesterday and did not return all night.

At dawn today, the old man from the Liu family next door stayed up all night in the main hall because there were often strange noises in his home at night.

Just through the crack in the door, he saw Li Weiming, like a zombie, returning from the night, covered in dirt, standing in the Li family yard, looking into the house.

As soon as the cock crowed in the morning, Li Weiming turned into a handful of earth, leaving only a few packets of medicine and a rattle buried in the soil. The Li family members cried and wailed incessantly, alarming the whole village.

Let’s just say that Li Weiming is a short-lived ghost!

If a person does not return home at night and still comes back after encountering evil spirits, he must have worshipped a ghost from the mountains and the earth.

It is easy to invite the earth ghost, but difficult to send it away!
It's crazy to go home just to see my wife and children.

Poor Mrs. Li has to be widowed at such a young age. If she can’t help Li Weiming fulfill his wish, there will be no peace in the family.

My master is powerless to do anything about this matter. Let's see how she fulfills her vow and sends the ghost away.

……

【May 12】

There are ninety-nine people in Heishan Village, five black dogs, and ten roosters to crow at dawn.

Kou Yushan is crazy. How dare he offend my master!
The corpse nest passed through, which meant that Black Mountain Village had bad luck. If it weren’t for my master who ignored the backlash of the evil spirits and forcibly controlled the evil spirits to force the corpse nest back, all the more than one hundred people in Black Mountain Village would have surely died.

Nine people were sacrificed to save so many people in Heishan Village. Where in the world can you find such a good deal?
It's better than him inviting the village ghost out and ending up with both sides dead, right?
But the master is indeed abnormal. He used to be in charge of the Suppression of Evils Division. Whenever he encountered evil spirits, he would try to hide from them. He does not have the heart of a bodhisattva.

Why is he so concerned about Heishan Village now that he is willing to protect the lives of these villagers even at the risk of getting injured?
There are still many behavioral habits that are not the same as when I first followed him. Instead, they are becoming more and more like the evil spirit he controlled when it was alive.

I asked my master and he said it was okay, so I didn't know what to say.

Fortunately, this time we did gain something, as we found a sinister object at the border of the corpse nest.

This is a rare and valuable item that ordinary people can use.

I just don't know what kind of evil spirit left this spell, how many times it can be used, what effect it has, and what the cost is. My master even prevented me from seeing it.

If a Yin object is placed on a Yin person, it can suppress the evil spirits controlled by the Yin person to a certain extent, making the evil spirits more obedient. When can I get a good Yin object?

To keep Yin objects, they need to be wrapped with red cloth and then wrapped nine times with a red rope soaked in chicken blood. When using them, use the blood as a guide and throw them away. Remember!

……

【May 29】

There are ninety-nine people in Heishan Village, five black dogs, and twenty morning roosters.

The villagers pooled their money and bought ten morning chickens.

Do you want me to do something as simple as calling back the soul of a child? As long as you remember "don't look back when you lead the soul back", anyone can do it.

Also, the Liu family lost something a few days ago, and recently, old books stained with blood appeared in the house for no reason. Do you want me to investigate the source?
The first level of stone stairs to the Nine Netherworld has been found recently. We need to hurry through the Yin and get down to the second level of the Nine Netherworld as soon as possible.

My master has been looking for an evil spirit that I can control, but there is still no news. It is really not easy to become a ghost. It depends on fate.

I heard that his master accidentally controlled an evil spirit and became a ghost walker, but he didn't want to follow this path.

I returned from Tangyuan County today and brought back a letter from an old friend of Master. After reading it, Master looked unhappy. He said that an old friend of his in the Evil Suppression Bureau died suddenly in a tragic way, and it was done by some evil boy.

Working in the Evil Suppression Bureau, one has to deal with evil spirits every day. Dying of old age is a luxury. It is a blessing to have an intact body.

After reading the letter, the master’s attitude changed. He promised to do his best to teach me how to exorcise evil spirits. After the matter in Heishan Village was settled, he would take me back to the sect and ordain me into Taoism.

There is another thing. The master was injured before and needs to perform a blood sacrifice to suppress the evil backlash from within himself.

The disaster of the corpse nest has made the villagers of Heishan Village panic-stricken. The master is reluctant to ask the villagers to offer blood sacrifices, so the only solution now is to capture the mother and daughter who are guarding the village.

The two were crazy and often disappeared, and no one would notice if they died.

When Master's injuries are healed and the blood sacrifice is successful, his cultivation will surely be further improved. By then, who in Heishan Village dares not obey Master's orders?

……

[June 6th]

There are ninety-nine people in Heishan Village, five black dogs, and seventeen morning roosters.

The village guard's silly daughter ran away, and the master's blood sacrifice was only half complete, and he still needed a tribute with good appearance.

The master instructed that the little fool must be captured alive. Is there something special about the little fool? The master seemed to be hurt by the little fool?

……

【June 25】

There are ninety-nine people in Heishan Village, five black dogs, and fifteen roosters to crow at dawn.

We still can't catch that little fool. Many people saw her hanging around the village. It must be Kou Yushan who is secretly helping her.

Kou Yushan opposed my master and me at every turn, but unfortunately, he was no match for my master.

The summer harvest is approaching, and a wheat monster has appeared in the wheat fields. Without my master’s help, Heishan Village will have no harvest this year and will no longer be able to farm.

Without food to survive the winter and having lost the fields on which they depend for survival, there will be no Heishan Village here next year.

My master publicly selected Liu Caifeng as a tribute and ordered the Liu family to send him to his residence before nightfall three days later, otherwise his injuries would be difficult to heal and he would be unable to fight against the wheat monster.

During the summer harvest season, the Suppression of Evils Bureau was very busy, and there was simply no staff to take care of a small mountain village like Heishan Village.

Kou Yushan asked the village chief to deliver three letters for help to the Tangyuan County Government, but there was no response, so he could only rely on my master.

When I think of Kou Yushan’s ugly face today, I feel happy!
He didn't even consider which peasant dared to oppose. Whoever opposed would destroy the entire village and make things difficult for the entire village.

He saved the little fool out of selfishness, but forced Liu Caifeng to become a tribute. It's cause and effect!

What a pleasure! What a pleasure!

……

【June 28】

There are ninety-nine people in Heishan Village, five black dogs, and fifteen roosters to crow at dawn.

Today I went to Tangyuan County to get my master's trust. Who knows, there might be some news about my ability to control evil spirits.

Come back before dusk and pick up the Liu family, don’t forget!
A long chapter of 4,000 words. Thank you again for your support!
Does this chapter bring back the familiar feeling?

There will still be some diary-style and letter-style things in the back. I feel that using this to write a horror story is very similar to collecting clues in a game~
Also, I almost forgot that I registered a Weibo account, just a pen name without any symbols. I didn’t use Weibo before, but I will try hard to remember that I still have a Weibo account!