“I don’t have any family connections. My parents and relatives are all ordinary people. I’m an only child, and they don’t know I have special abilities,” Ling Yun said, shrugging his shoulders.
"Impossible," the Xia siblings said in unison, their faces full of disbelief.
"Ling Yun, I understand you don't want to reveal your background, but could you at least try to make it more convincing? Your parents and relatives are all ordinary people, so where did you get your special ability? Did you acquire it later?" Xia Tian said with a cynical smirk. Xia Zhen also smiled, assuming that Ling Yun was embarrassed to mention his humble origins after hearing about the Xia family.
"Yes, how did you know? I acquired it the day after tomorrow. I was just an ordinary person two months ago. By the way, do you know how to obtain superpowers?" Ling Yun suddenly became excited. He had always wanted to know how he obtained his superpowers, but unfortunately he could not find any clues. The reason he wanted to communicate with people with superpowers was to unravel the mystery surrounding him.
Xia Tian and her brother looked at him speechlessly. Did this guy really not know that all superhumans are born with superpowers, or was he pretending to be stupid?
"Let's hurry and chase after it, lest we lose sight of that corpse puppet." Xia Tian decided to stop this ridiculous topic. He hadn't expected Ling Yun, who seemed so honest, to have learned to play tricks on him. Appearances can be deceiving.
As the three of them were talking, they had already put some distance between themselves and the taxi, so they quickly quickened their pace to catch up.
Half an hour later, the taxi stopped by the roadside. The driver and the middle-aged man opened the car door, left the road, and walked into the bushes on the left. In the distance was the forest that Ling Yun had passed through when he last came to Yu Xiujie's Heaven and Earth Yin Spirit Array.
Recalling how he met Elder Yu, Ling Yun couldn't help but feel incredibly amazed. However, he dared not disturb Elder Yu at this moment, otherwise Yu Xiujie would surely give him a severe scolding, perhaps even forcing him to turn back. In any case, as long as the barrier wasn't triggered, Yu Xiujie wouldn't know what he was doing.
Without a vehicle, the corpse puppet's movement speed suddenly slowed down. After all, it was just a corpse, and if you looked closely from behind, you would find that the corpse's walking posture was still somewhat stiff and not so natural.
They walked in silence. When they passed the small cliff in front of the Yin Spirit Array, Ling Yun didn't tell Xia Tian and her brother about its existence. This array was a masterpiece set up by Yu Xiujie, a lifelong skill. Although it hadn't succeeded, Ling Yun didn't want his teacher's hard work to be disturbed. Xia Tian and her brother, despite being ability users, were completely unaware of the strangeness behind the cliff.
The corpse puppet wound its way upwards, climbing several small hills before finally stopping at a clearing covered in rubble. This place was dozens of miles deeper into the mountains than the Yin Spirit Array. It was a truly desolate wilderness, devoid of forests and vegetation, and had remained untouched for countless years.
Ling Yun and his two companions hid behind a huge pile of rocks, watching the movements of the two corpse puppets through the cracks in the rocks. By this time, it was completely dark, and the mountains loomed in the night sky like a group of huge and ferocious demons, adding to the terrifying and eerie atmosphere.
The corpse puppet stood like a statue for a quarter of an hour before stepping forward as if it had received some kind of instruction. Then, as if it had entered another world or jumped into water, its body suddenly disappeared into the air.
Chapter Twenty: The Spirit Communicator
Ling Yun was taken aback and was completely confused. Xia Zhen whispered, "They've entered the barrier, so it's as if they've disappeared. You can use your telekinetic senses to touch it and you'll know."
Ling Yun tried to use his telekinesis to touch the spot where the two corpse puppets had disappeared. Sure enough, an invisible barrier blocked his senses, like an unseen house standing there. This was another barrier he had encountered since coming into contact with Yu Xiujie's mysterious barrier.
Xia Tian also used his telekinesis to sense it, and said with narrowed eyes, "It's just an ordinary illusion barrier. It's not difficult for us to go in, but we're afraid that the person who set up the barrier will discover us."
"No need to rush in first. We can use the Clear Spirit Eye to break through the barrier. Let's see how things go first." As Xia Zhen spoke, a strange blue light flashed in her bright eyes, and her entire eyes instantly became bright.
Xia Tian nodded, a blue light flashing in her eyes. Only Ling Yun stood there dumbfounded, at a loss for what to do.
Xia Zhen glanced at him and said curiously, "Why don't you use your Clear Spirit Eyes to see?"
"I don't know any supernatural arts!" Ling Yun said helplessly. If he had known this would happen, he would have learned some simple supernatural arts from Master Yu earlier, instead of being so embarrassed now.
Xia Tian and Xia Zhen were speechless again. What was this guy's background? He didn't even know the simplest supernatural arts. Xia Zhen extended a fair finger, a small blue light emanating from the tip, and flicked it lightly into Ling Yun's eyes: "I've added the Clear Spirit Eye to your eyes."
Ling Yun's eyes lit up. When he looked at the barrier again, it was completely different from before. The barrier was like a transparent glass, through which he could clearly see the scene inside.
"Thank you." Ling Yun glanced gratefully at Xia Zhen, who smiled and gave him a cute V-sign. Ling Yun suddenly realized that Xia Zhen wasn't so unreasonable and annoying after all.
The scene inside the barrier left the three of them speechless.
A dense, dark mass of corpse puppets, numbering twenty or thirty in total, stood in three uneven rows. Most of the puppets had grotesque, rotting faces, their clothes torn and tattered into dirty shreds, revealing patches of dark, bluish-black skin stained with lividity. Many were mutilated, their bloodied skeletons and wounds exposed. The sight was utterly terrifying.
Only a very few of the corpse puppets looked like normal people, including the middle-aged man, the taxi driver, and a few thugs like Brother Ma. Ling Yun sighed inwardly. Brother Ma and the others had indeed become corpse puppets. Although he despised Brother Ma and his gang, and these social scum were no loss even in death, they were still living, breathing human beings. It was a great tragedy to see them standing here like puppets, turned into human beings. However, Ling Yun didn't know the middle-aged man or the taxi driver. If they were truly innocent people turned into puppets, then whoever did it was incredibly ruthless.
Thinking of this, Ling Yun asked in a low voice, "Are there people who use living people to make corpse puppets? I thought they always used dead people to make them."
Xia Zhen shook her head and said, "Very few, but there are indeed some corpse puppets among these corpse puppets that were made by living people. It is probably because it is inconvenient to flaunt corpse puppets made from dead bodies in the city, so they choose to make them by living people. However, those who choose to make corpse puppets by living people are generally not skilled in spirit communication and cannot make the dead bodies look like living people. Moreover, it is too cruel to do so. Even those dark superpower organizations do not dare to do this openly."
Ling Yun looked into the barrier again, his gaze passing over the layers of corpse puppets and landing on a black-robed man in front of him.
A pile of rubble formed a simple, low platform about ten meters square. In the center of the platform was a bronze incense burner blazing with flames. However, while ordinary flames are fiery red, the flames burning on the incense burner were an eerie blue. For some reason, when Ling Yun saw the blue flames, he felt not heat, but a chilling coldness.
The blue flames cast an eerie blue light in the air, flashing across the hideous faces of the corpse puppets, making them appear incredibly eerie and terrifying.
The man in black robes stood behind the incense burner, his entire body shrouded in a heavy black robe, even his head covered by a black hood. His long hair hung down, obscuring most of his face, revealing only a glimpse of his bright red lips. The blue flames roared, yet the man in black seemed to stand in darkness. Even with Ling Yun and his companions' extraordinary eyesight, they could not clearly see the man in black robes.
Ling Yun had never seen the style of the black robes worn by the man in the black robes before; they were definitely not clothes worn by modern people.
The man in black robes raised his hands high, as if performing an ancient sacrificial ritual. Above the blue flames of the furnace, an eerily intact corpse floated. Through the three's clear eyes, they could clearly see wisps of blue smoke, like dust, flowing into the corpse from the blue flames. As the blue smoke continued to flow in, the corpse's limbs began to move, as if it had come to life.
Ling Yun had never seen such a bizarre technique before. He stared at it intently, when suddenly a thought struck him.
He recalled Yu Xiujie saying that spirit communication techniques could concentrate the yin energy within a radius of several hundred miles. This place wasn't far from the Yin Spirit Array, so it was probably the yin energy concentrated by this black-robed man that catalyzed the Yin Spirit Array, causing it to generate yin spirits more quickly. Having found the reason, Ling Yun carefully used his mental energy field to probe the air.
Sure enough, the telekinetic power sensed that chilling energy was rapidly gathering from all directions, pouring down through an opening a dozen meters above the barrier, forming a stable column of chilling energy that flowed into the blue flames. The blue flames burned slowly yet intensely, gradually imbuing the corpse with the refined chilling energy.
The corner of the black-robed man's mouth twitched slightly, as if he were reciting some strange syllables.
Xia Tian whispered, "It really is a spirit communication technique. Xia Zhen, we should report this to headquarters immediately."
Xia Zhen hesitated for a moment: "So we're not going to do anything about it now? If he's just using corpses to make puppets, that's fine, but there are living people there. If we see them and don't stop them, who knows how many innocent people will suffer."
Xia Tian smiled wryly and said, "Only those with strength can uphold justice. Do you think that after being in headquarters for two days, you can deal with a superhuman who can use psychic abilities? Besides, reporting it won't take much time, and we weren't even noticed by that man in black robes."
“That’s not it…” Xia Zhen also felt that Xia Tian’s words made sense, so she nodded and said, “Okay, let’s go back. What about you, Ling Yun?”
Ling Yun naturally had no objections; he wouldn't be so arrogant as to think he could take on that mysterious man in black robes one-on-one.
The three of them tiptoed carefully from behind the pile of rocks back the way they came, silently moving away from the barrier and about to disappear into the forest.
A lifeless voice suddenly rang out: "You think you can just come and go as you please?"
With a loud bang, the pile of rocks that the three had just been dodging suddenly burst into the air, dozens of rocks the size of heads shot out like cannonballs in their direction.
Ling Yun and the other two were taken aback. How could they have been discovered by the man in black robes without leaving a trace? But the rocks were already flying right in front of them. There was no time to think. Xia Tian pointed in the air, and an invisible telekinetic force stopped the rapidly flying rocks, causing them to fall down a few meters in front of the three of them.
A faint smile appeared beneath the black-robed man's bright red lips. With a flick of his long sleeve, the barrier vanished into thin air.