"Hmm? What's this?"
Inside the jade box lay a bead the size of a pigeon egg. It looked just like a drop of clear water, sparkling with a translucent glow.
Song Changsheng pinched it between his thumb and forefinger. It felt cool to the touch and was so light it seemed to not weigh at all.
"This looks familiar… could it be a Water-Avoiding Pearl?" A flash of realization hit Song Changsheng as he blurted it out.
The Water-Avoiding Pearl wasn't a magical tool, but rather a natural product of clam demons' beads formed within their shells. It had no fixed rank, but simply placing it in one's mouth allowed for easy movement underwater.
To high-level cultivators, this wasn't particularly useful, but for those below the Purple Mansion realm, it was still quite handy a decent treasure indeed.
It was a good start. Encouraged, Song Changsheng moved on to the second box, a white jade one. Inside was a shriveled, brown seed. Though he wasn't very knowledgeable about spirit plants, he could still tell that this seed had long since lost its vitality.
"What a pity… any spiritual seed worth carrying around by the owner of a cave-dwelling surely wasn't ordinary. A great opportunity lost."
He sighed in regret but still carefully stored it away, planning to bring it back to the Grand Elder who was a third-rank spirit cultivator. Perhaps he would know a way to revive it.
"Only this last one left. Hope it doesn't disappoint."
Song Changsheng opened the final box, a vermillion jade one. As soon as he glanced inside, his brows furrowed it contained nothing but a strip of paper about half a foot long.
Picking it up, he found it to be a delicately cut paper doll. Its face had simple features drawn with cinnabar, giving it a comical appearance.
Turning it over, he saw a single bright-red character written on its back: substitute.
Song Changsheng's eyes widened in surprise and delight. "Could this be the legendary Substitute Death Paper Doll?"
The Substitute Death Paper Doll was a treasure crafted by puppet masters of at least the third tier. As the name implied, each doll could take the place of its owner in death once. The one in his hands was of the first rank suitable for Qi Refining cultivators.
This was a rare item, nearly impossible to buy even with spirit stones. Even if he couldn't use it himself at his current stage, it could be given to a younger member of the clan or sold to the family it was a valuable asset either way.
"With this thing, it's like having an extra life." Song Changsheng couldn't hide his joy. He bit down on his finger, drawing a drop of glistening blood essence refined from his cultivation.
Once dropped onto the paper doll and carried close to the body, it would activate the substitute death effect.
As the blood touched the doll, it immediately turned crimson. He pressed it against his chest and felt a surprising sense of security wash over him.
"I wonder what was inside the jade box that Fellow Daoist Zhuang took in exchange. I doubt it was anything ordinary." Song Changsheng mused silently, though he didn't regret the trade.
After all, he had gained a tremendous deal from Zhuang Yuechan.
Thinking of this, he pulled out the two jade slips. He had already found time to look through the one in his left hand it contained a second-rank artifact crafting inheritance. Though different from the Song clan's tradition, it complemented theirs well. He had learned much from it.
One section in particular, detailing the crafting of gourd-type artifacts, gave him new insights and inspired a revised refinement plan for his treasure gourd.
However, this was just the icing on the cake. The real surprise was the jade slip in his right hand, which held a formation inheritance.
Back when he first glanced at it, he had already decided that no matter the cost, he had to make it his.
Previously, injuries and the need to consolidate his formation skills had delayed a deep study but now the time was finally right.
Placing the jade slip against his forehead, a faint shimmer of light appeared. In the next instant, all the contents recorded within the slip flooded into Song Changsheng's sea of consciousness.
The influx included words, images, and even sounds.
They surged into his mind like a tidal wave, eventually forming the image of a young, illusory figure. The figure was dressed in flowing white robes, a long green sword strapped to his back, and looked at Song Changsheng with a gentle smile.
In his soul form, Song Changsheng was momentarily stunned. He hadn't expected the fragments of the inheritance to form a human-like figure in his spiritual sea.
An illusion? Or a lingering remnant of a soul?
"Don't be alarmed, successor," the white-robed figure suddenly spoke. "This is just a little trick I embedded into the inheritance. It won't cause you any harm."
"You are…" Song Changsheng began, but the figure continued speaking, unfazed:
"Allow me to introduce myself. I am He Yunxuan, a former student of the Formation Path Academy.
"I reached the level of a top-grade second-rank formation master at the age of thirty, but then I hit a bottleneck. In hopes of advancing further, I left the academy and began traveling far and wide, eventually arriving in the Great Qi Cultivation Realm.
"There, I finally broke through and achieved the rank of a third-rank lower-tier formation master. Just as I was preparing to return, I had the misfortune of encountering a wounded Purple Mansion-stage demon cultivator.
"We fought for three days. In the end, I managed to kill him using formations and life-saving techniques passed down by my elders but I sustained severe injuries in the process.
"Knowing my days were numbered, I established a cave-dwelling to pass on all I had learned to a worthy successor…"
Hearing this, Song Changsheng felt a surge of excitement. Formation Path Academy? That was the holy land every formation master dreamed of entering!
Could the inheritance in this jade slip truly come from the Formation Path Academy?
Song Changsheng's gaze toward He Yunxuan grew fervent.
"However," He Yunxuan continued, "the Academy's core techniques cannot be passed down, so what I've preserved here are insights and inheritances I gathered during my travels."
At those words, Song Changsheng's excitement instantly deflated.
"But," He Yunxuan added, "by combining everything I've learned, I developed an entirely new approach to formation mastery. I named it Inscribing Formations with the Body. I believe it will offer you a pleasant surprise.
"If you ever master this technique, I ask that you make a copy and deliver it to the Formation Path Academy, specifically to someone named Gu Yiyi. This is my final wish before death.
"Lastly, about those three jade tokens, I took them from that Purple Mansion demon. They seem tied to some secrets of the Blood Demon Cult.
"Unfortunately, I was too injured to investigate further. I now leave this matter to you. It's likely dangerous don't risk your life unless you're ready.
"That's all I wanted to say. The rest, you can discover on your own."
With those words, He Yunxuan's figure gradually faded, transforming back into words, images, and sounds that lingered and swirled in Song Changsheng's sea of consciousness.
Song Changsheng stood there, silent. He had no idea how many years ago this senior had passed, and it wasn't until now that his soul fragment truly vanished.
He silently bowed with clasped hands, offering a farewell to the departed cultivator.
A long while later, he finally began to delve into the formation inheritance left behind by He Yunxuan.
Though He had said these teachings were not from the Formation Path Academy, their complexity and brilliance far surpassed the Song clan's formation techniques. Song Changsheng found himself deeply inspired.
And within it, he discovered the "surprise" He Yunxuan had left for him
"Inscribing Formations with the Body."
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