Chapter 150 - 139: The First Tattoo

Chapter 150: Chapter 139: The First Tattoo"The ghost of the kidnapper with four incense always has to bring a few, right?" "Lin Xia was already sitting with four to five in view. If the ghost of the kidnapper didn’t have four-incense ghosts, what would they use to fight the Liao Ghost? If there were only three-incense ones, it wouldn’t be to settle old Lao He’s account but to come die instead." Zhou Xuan severed the connection with the Blood Well. He had summarized an experience: as long as it involved tattoos with divination, the sacrificial requirements were much higher, just asking about ways to accumulate incense offerings through tattoos required four incense, and the Teeth Cultivation Technique, which could help an entire Liao Ghost Hall, surprisingly also only required four incense. "Perhaps the price of the sacrifice was determined by the level of secrecy." The Teeth Cultivation Technique of the Liao Ghost, though lost in tradition, perhaps could be restored by finding some ancient books and secret manuals, albeit very troublesome. But a tattoo—there wasn’t even a single record of it in the old manuscripts of the Old Hall! ... The night was quite good, the shops on East Market Street were almost all busy, Zhou Xuan’s shop was quiet, standing out in the street. Tomorrow would be the grand opening, the shop sign was already made. To save money, it wasn’t a good sign. Now that Zhou Xuan had some gold bars, he started to feel dissatisfied with the sign, always thinking of getting a better one someday. The store’s fabrication of three Jingyi Beds could handle three corpses simultaneously, with a screen pulled in the middle of the common room, considering the store had to open every day, and there were corpses inside; passersby peeking in wouldn’t feel too pleasant. The electric lamp was replaced, originally just one, but Zhou Xuan, following the principle of shadowless lights, had more installed in a circle by a repairman on East Market Street. Of course, the principle was the principle; in practice, the precision wasn’t there, and the circle of lights didn’t achieve true shadowlessness, but the shadow appeared much lighter; Lv Mingkun did Jingyi at night, which made it more comfortable for the eyes. The other cabinet tops and the store were naturally spotless, cleaned by Little Fuzi. Everything was ready, only awaiting the east wind; in the shop, besides Zhou Xuan learning to tattoo, everyone had their own leisure. Lv Mingkun brought a stack of newspapers and went to the Old Painting Pavilion, claiming it was a combination of work and rest, meditating to absorb some evil energy, then reading some newspapers. Sigh, since the Old Painting Pavilion’s talisman was broken, Lv Mingkun no longer favored the ghost eye of "Zhou’s Purification Shop," disliking its slow production of ghost energy. Yun Ziliang carried a teapot and went to the mahjong parlor to watch people play cards. This old fellow loved the bustle and joined wherever there was excitement; he’d even get in on the action himself when Zhou Xuan gave him ten yuan. Little Fuzi just sat at the store entrance, enjoying the night breeze, dreaming of the business after tomorrow’s grand opening, suddenly, a basket of sugar pancakes was presented to Little Fuzi. Little Fuzi looked up, it was Mu Hua. Mu Hua was holding a basket of sugar pancakes in his left hand and a small wooden bucket in his right, filled with a dark brown liquid that emitted a faint aroma; it was a bucket of sour plum soup. There was a small wooden ladle inside the bucket, Little Fuzi took three glass cups, filled them with the ladle, and gave one each to Zhou Xuan and Mu Hua. Zhou Xuan, engrossed in tattoos, took the cup and placed it on the Jingyi Bed without responding, just smiling at Mu Hua and Little Fuzi. Mu Hua and Little Fuzi sat at the entrance, drinking sour plum soup and eating sweet cakes. From time to time, Mu Hua glanced at Zhou Xuan. The two looked very similar, when the sour plum soup was half gone, Mu Hua pointed at Zhou Xuan, then at himself, and with some struggle, asked Little Fuzi, "Same... same!" Little Fuzi, familiar with Mu Hua, guessed what he wanted to say. "You mean you and my young master look alike?" Mu Hua nodded stiffly. "You two indeed look very similar, the young master said it’s like looking in a mirror when seeing you." Hearing this, Mu Hua pointed at Zhou Xuan with his left hand, then at himself with his right, "Not... not... the same." "You’re saying you and my young master are not the same?" Little Fuzi laughed and said, "There’s no true identical person in this world, you look like my young master, but I can distinguish you from the young master at a glance, do you know why? Because my young master loves to smile, you see him smile no matter what he’s doing; he says although we deal with deceased businesses, our paying customers are the living, running a business is about welcoming joy at the door, my young master is well-liked because of his love for smiling. Back in our hometown, everyone in the neighborhood was fond of him." Mu Hua glanced back at Zhou Xuan again; surely, Zhou Xuan was smiling, a radiant smile. Zhou Xuan wasn’t smiling because he heard Little Fuzi’s words; in fact, he couldn’t hear the outside world at all due to his intense focus on the tattoos. He smiled because he was amused by his own tattoo work. He had learned six tattoo designs so far. Buddha’s Head, High Monk Moon Gaze, Ghost Hand, Copper Coin, Eye, Incense Burner. These six designs required three types of blood for tattoos. For example, Buddha’s Head and High Monk Moon Gaze needed blood with Buddha nature. In Jing Country, high monks received special protection, so obtaining their blood wasn’t easy. Thus, Zhou Xuan chose to start with the "Copper Coin" tattoo. The Copper Coin tattoo only required corpse blood. In East Market Street, there weren’t many things but corpses were plentiful. Some corpses delivered to the shop were already bloody, and a little touch on the wounds could fill a cup, and Zhou Xuan, though unfamiliar with other shopkeepers, had cash capability. Plus, the Copper Coin tattoo design itself was simple. How complicated could a copper coin be? It was perfect for Zhou Xuan to practice on. "Huh, it’s actually a bit complex?" Zhou Xuan looked at the "Copper Coin" tattoo he did on human skin; it didn’t resemble a copper coin, more like a flatbread. The flatbread was half oval, half wobbly, the engravings on the copper coin were hardly passable, they were more like a mess of color blocks. "Doing a tattoo is harder than I thought, the mind knows, but the hands don’t." Zhou Xuan laughed again; he couldn’t help but laugh when he saw his own poor handiwork. By then, Mu Hua had returned to the shop, and Yun Ziliang had come back from playing cards, carrying a roast chicken and a bottle of roast wine. Seeing Little Fuzi, Yun Ziliang tore half of the roast chicken and handed it to him, "Eat!" "Mr. Yun, did you win?" Little Fuzi didn’t eat the roast chicken, he packed it in a paper bag. "Ha, my ancestors, State Preceptors, could manage the nation’s affairs so easily; winning at a card table was nothing for me." "Mr. Yun, you’re amazing." After praising, Little Fuzi took the paper bag with roast chicken to find Mu Hua. Yun Ziliang hummed a tune and walked into the shop, seeing Zhou Xuan smiling at a tattoo, he asked, "What pattern is this? Flatbread? Gongpan? Grindstone?" He offered three options in a row, none matching. It was a copper coin, a copper coin! Zhou Xuan felt a bit heartbroken and mischievously asked Yun Ziliang, "Old Yun, let me test you, have you heard of—abstract art?" Yun Ziliang: "..." "Regardless of what school, your tattoo isn’t quite right." Yun Ziliang lay on another Jingyi Bed, found a pillow to hold, half lay down, opened the wine bottle, savoring chicken and wine. "You’re truly not particular; that’s a hardboard bed for corpses, and you sit on it eating roast chicken, drinking wine, claiming to be from a State Preceptor family?" After ridiculing Yun Ziliang, Zhou Xuan picked up the Bone Teeth, dipped it in corpse blood, and worked on the second piece of human skin for tattoos. These human skins were specially trimmed by Zhou Xuan, each no bigger than a palm, with a small tattoo on one piece, not wasteful. Having failed the first piece, Zhou Xuan pondered the reason for failure! "Why was it so bad?" Thinking it over, Zhou Xuan realized he hadn’t removed his mask. Zhou Xuan’s face was still covered by the storyteller’s Bi Fang Mask. The mask couldn’t be seen by others, but Zhou Xuan could sense it. He made a gesture of removing the mask, and after taking off the storyteller’s mask, he closed his eyes, recalled the "Copper Coin" tattoo’s image, and unconsciously, his Perception flowed into the Bone Teeth, he hadn’t intended to move his hand, but the Bone Teeth moved on its own, like something was guiding his hand towards making the copper coin tattoo. With Perception filling the Bone Teeth, it moved smoothly with Zhou Xuan’s intent, this time, the tattoo process was extremely smooth, until the final stitch that formed the copper coin. With one stitch, the copper coin sounded by itself. "Ding!" It was like the sound of a finger flicking a coin. Whoosh! Whoosh! Zhou Xuan’s second incense started burning, with a third of an inch of incense burned by the completion of this tattoo, it was the most robust incense fire since Zhou Xuan entered the second incense. "It worked!" The gloom Zhou Xuan accumulated during this time was swept away. The stagnation of the incense fire always gave him a deeply uneasy feeling; now, one tattoo could increase a third of an inch of incense! "I should tattoo a few more, wouldn’t that incense start soaring?" "Did you hear the copper coin sound, it was a complete tattoo." Yun Ziliang had already put down the roast chicken and wine, walked to Zhou Xuan, picked up the copper coin tattoo, and gave it a shake. The coin tattoo vibrated with a sound like clinking, as if it had a solid form. He closed his eyes, shook it a few more times, then told Zhou Xuan, "Kid, you’ve got talent. The Nu borrowed incense from nine altars to attain the Way, but it’s not the original altar’s incense, so there’s some deviation in the means’ texture compared to the original altar, but your tattoo came out almost identical in heaviness and solidity as the original one, no deviation at all; the Nuodai Temple is going to produce a master." Yun Ziliang had seen genuine tattoos, and his evaluation carried weight. "The tattoo was made, but what’s the use?" "Your Copper Coin tattoo is an entry-level design, its power is weak but still has its marvels." Yun Ziliang put the tattoo into his hand and said, "I told you, I could be half a teacher for tattoos; let me show you the wonders of this tattoo you’ve made. Come with me." "Where to?" "You’ll know when you get there." Yun Ziliang was being mysterious. The two of them walked out side by side and didn’t go far before Yun stopped at Sister Cui’s snack stand. "Sister Cui." Zhou Xuan greeted Sister Cui, sighing at the door. "Brother Zhou." "Why’s the shop without customers?" Zhou Xuan looked inside; there wasn’t a single customer, just Mu Hua and Little Fuzi gnawing on roast chicken. Sister Cui seemed even more dejected, saying, "Business has been sluggish these past two days. We’ve changed noodle chefs, the noodles, and vermicelli aren’t as chewy as the previous ones; customers find it unpalatable and stop coming." "Within half an hour, customers will come." Yun Ziliang hung the Copper Coin tattoo on a nail on the store’s wall, then made a pious bow: "Mr. Kong Fang, prosperity and wealth, may customers come flooding in, it’s all up to you." "Ding!" The copper coin tattoo seemed to respond, ringing out on its own...