Ch. 23
Chapter 23: Unorthodox Mystical Techniques
Although everyone was surprised by Shen Qingzhou suddenly taking off his clothes, none of them showed any strange expressions.
Even Jiang Xinyue, the only woman present, merely paused her gaze slightly, without the slightest trace of shyness.
She was already a married woman and a mother, not some naïve young girl unfamiliar with the world. In fact, she even secretly sized up his physique in her heart.
When Shen Qingzhou wore clothes, he looked lean, but once he removed them, his foundation was revealed—his muscles were smooth and well-defined, his waist and abdomen firm yet not exaggerated. Every inch of his contours carried a clean and decisive sharpness, his entire body exuding a cold, masculine vigor.
He calmly stripped off his outer garments as if no one else was present, even kicking his shoes aside, until only a pair of shorts remained clinging to his body.
It was best to perform techniques naked—these shorts were already the last bit of dignity he had left.
Jiang Haichao and the other two watched his actions, only feeling an inexplicable eeriness. A bone-penetrating chill surged from all directions, seeping into their pores, instantly raising goosebumps all over their bodies and sending a shiver down their spines.
Yet Shen Qingzhou, bare-chested, seemed completely unaware. He stepped around Lu Zhaozhao, who was curled up asleep on the cushion, and steadily walked to the altar. With his fingertips, he picked up three sticks of incense, lit them with an open flame, and thin wisps of smoke curled upward.
That bone-deep cold seemed to be scattered by the warmth of the incense in midair, vanishing in an instant. Instead, a faint, barely perceptible warmth spread through the room.
At that moment, Jiang Xinyue suddenly felt a small, icy hand slip into her palm.
Already in a state of high tension, she was startled and almost cried out. Lowering her head, she saw Xiao Qiu looking up at her with a small face—it was Xiao Qiu who had placed her little hand into her palm.
“Xiao…” Jiang Xinyue’s eyes flickered with joy, nearly exclaiming aloud, but she stopped herself in time.
She quickly bent down and pulled her into her arms, only to discover that her body was extremely light—almost weightless—and carried a trace of coldness.
Jiang Haichao and Lu Guohua, standing nearby, also saw this scene and could not help widening their eyes in shock.
Then, as if realizing something, they both turned to look at the incense burner on the altar, at the three strands of curling smoke rising upward.
Meanwhile, Shen Qingzhou stepped back solemnly to his original spot and knelt down on both knees.
He casually grabbed a few sheets of yellow paper from beside the brazier, flicked them lightly into the air, and the papers ignited spontaneously. He then tossed them into the brazier.
Flames leapt and flickered, their orange glow casting shifting shadows across the room. The silhouettes of the people on the walls flickered between light and dark.
As Shen Qingzhou fed more yellow paper into the brazier, he began softly chanting an unknown incantation. The rhythm was not fast, yet it carried a strange cadence—neither harsh nor piercing, but like fine sand grinding against the eardrums, unbearably grating.
After listening for a while, one would feel a tightness in the chest, waves churning in the stomach, and an inexplicable nausea rising upward.
Jiang Haichao and the others felt the urge to cover their ears, yet they did not want to miss this scene. They could only grit their teeth and endure.
On the contrary, Xiao Qiu, held in Jiang Xinyue’s arms, showed no discomfort at all. Her bright black eyes were wide open as she watched Shen Qingzhou perform the technique with great interest, completely absorbed.
As the chanting gradually deepened, a spot of ink-like darkness suddenly appeared at the center of Shen Qingzhou’s brow. Then countless tiny, tadpole-like black marks, as fine as needle tips, emerged from his forehead—densely packed, increasing in number. In the blink of an eye, they covered his entire face, layer upon layer, like a writhing layer of black scales crawling over his flesh.
The sight was eerie to the extreme—anyone with trypophobia would likely vomit on the spot upon seeing it.
Fortunately, Jiang Haichao and the others were standing to the side and not directly facing Shen Qingzhou, so they did not witness this horrifying scene.
Those ink-like tadpoles writhed across his face for a moment before flowing down along his neck, like a swarm of black ants, gradually covering every inch of his skin.
This time, the three people at the side saw everything clearly. A chill shot from the soles of their feet straight to their heads, their bodies trembling with horror. The cries in their throats nearly burst out, yet they pressed their lips tightly together, not daring to even breathe loudly.
In just a short while, Shen Qingzhou’s entire body was covered in these ink marks. From a distance, it looked as though he was draped in flowing black patterns, faintly gleaming with a dark luster under the orange firelight.
From beginning to end, his expression remained calm, his gaze steady. The chanting did not stop until his entire body was covered in black. Only then did two of the ink marks suddenly break free from the obstruction of his eyelids and dart into his pupils.
At the moment the tadpoles entered his pupils, they transformed into two peculiar symbols—like an inverted “8,” larger on top and smaller below, embedded within his pitch-black irises.
And at that very instant, Shen Qingzhou’s chanting abruptly ceased.
The flames in the room still flickered, the incense still curled upward, and everything around remained the same—but in Shen Qingzhou’s eyes, the world had completely changed.
All things in heaven and earth were covered by an invisible net. The threads forming this net were actually interconnected symbols, like written characters, floating and sinking in the darkness, constantly shifting their forms.
Some vaguely resembled Daoist talisman patterns, winding and twisting with a stern, killing intent.
Some appeared like Sanskrit incantation seals, their strokes strange and imbued with unfathomable mystery.
Others were entirely unfamiliar, twisting and merging, never maintaining a fixed form for even a moment.
These symbols wove together into an airtight net in the air, enveloping the entire room—the entire world.
Shen Qingzhou called this net the “Heavenly Net,” the net of the Heavenly Dao, also known as the “Myriad Sigil Heavenly Web.”
Because whether it was Daoist talismans, Buddhist incantations, Nestorian sacred symbols, shamanic spell sigils, or divine patterns of shamans…
At their core, they were all interpretations and understandings of the “Heavenly Net.”
The “ink marks” on Shen Qingzhou’s body were also derived from this. Thus, with his entire body covered in them, his aura easily connected with the threads of the net, and he himself merged with the Heavenly Net.
As a result, he temporarily gained a trace of authority to control this world.
He slowly raised his finger and lightly tapped it on Lu Zhaozhao’s forehead, sliding gently down along his smooth brow to his soft cheek.
Lu Zhaozhao remained asleep the entire time, completely unaware.
At the moment his fingertip reached the jaw, Shen Qingzhou suddenly pulled his hand back, extracting a thread from Lu Zhaozhao’s body.
The little boy seemed to be suddenly tugged by something—his previously curled body straightened abruptly, his eyeballs rolling violently beneath his eyelids. A look of pain appeared on his small face, yet he could not wake up no matter what.
Lu Guohua, watching from the side, felt his heart tremble violently and instinctively tried to rush forward, but Jiang Haichao, who had been keeping an eye on him, tightly grabbed his wrist.
In just a moment, all the pain on Lu Zhaozhao’s face disappeared. His brows relaxed, revealing a peaceful expression, and even a faint smile curled at the corner of his lips.
Meanwhile, Shen Qingzhou’s fingertip traced a graceful arc through the air, landing on the pile of clothes nearby, merging with the Heavenly Net covering them.
His movements did not stop. His fingers flicked rapidly through the air—sometimes forming hand seals like lotus petals blooming, sometimes forming mudras with solemn, Buddhist-like dignity. Daoist hand techniques and mysterious seals intertwined, as fast as a torrential storm, like rapid plucking on a pipa. With every rise and fall of his fingers, there was order within chaos.
Jiang Haichao and the others could not see the Heavenly Net. They only felt his movements were strange and incomprehensible, unaware that Shen Qingzhou was channeling his strength to manipulate the net threads on the clothes.
In the unseen, he selected and extracted strands of origin belonging to the owner of the clothes.
These were precisely the things Lu Zhaozhao had lacked since birth. Only by completing them could he truly rid himself of his stubborn illness.
As his finger movements grew faster and faster, the meridians across Shen Qingzhou’s body bulged like coiling dragons, twitching violently—he was clearly enduring a heart-piercing, bone-eroding pain.
Beads of sweat the size of beans rolled down from his forehead and back, striking the ground. In just a few breaths, they had already gathered into a small puddle beside him.
The three people nearby all held their breath nervously, not daring to make a sound. Even Xiao Qiu nervously covered her own small mouth.