Chapter 23

"Don't fold it, put it in the car."

Lao Ye turned around and saw Su Xiaoxiao take out the Che Gong Fu, his face tightening.

"Oh, this is similar to the talismans sold in the antique market."

Su Xiaoxiao didn't argue and put the Che Gong Fu back. The group followed Lao Ye and soon arrived at the parking spot at the village entrance.

"Xiaoxiao, our village doesn't have much to offer, just take these few talismans."

Before Su Xiaoxiao got into the car, Lao Ye held her back and handed her a large envelope, saying, "It's not very peaceful nowadays, be careful when you're out. You should carry these talismans with you at all times.

Your father said he bought a new house in the city, which has a house-protecting talisman. When you go back, stick it on the door!"

"Ah? Lao Ye, what's wrong with you today?"

Su Xiaoxiao was a bit confused by Lao Ye's words. She was a girl going to study in Yanjing, what was the point of taking these few talismans?

"Take them if I give them to you, listen to me."

Lao Ye didn't say more, but his gaze turned to Su Xiaofan, "I'm not your enemy, you should come back to the village more often. Don't just learn those messy things at the antique market, learn your own family's skills."

"Got it, Lao Ye, I'll bring my sister to Yanjing and then come to learn from you."

Su Xiaofan nodded. He thought Lao Ye was talking about the skill of making bronze artifacts. Indeed, even the top craftsmen in the country couldn't match Lao Ye in the art of replicating and restoring ancient bronze artifacts.

"Alright, go, be careful on the road." Lao Ye waved his hand in front of the car.

"Xiaofan, are you going to drive?"

Zheng Dagang looked at Su Xiaofan, "I'm not familiar with the roads here, and it's hard to see at night. Don't cause any trouble."

The Su family village was at the foot of Mang Mountain, about seven or eight kilometers of small roads away from the town, and then another five or six kilometers to the highway.

These small roads were mostly in the fields, with ditches on both sides. During the day, the view was clear, but at night, Zheng Dagang was afraid he might drive the car into the ditches.

"Sure, Brother Gang, you sit in the passenger seat."

Su Xiaofan opened the driver's door. After the car accident in high school, he got his driver's license, as he put it, to learn traffic rules and gain wisdom from experience.

He started the car smoothly, familiar with Zheng Dagong's SUV. Sometimes, when they went to buy goods together, Su Xiaofan was the one driving.

"Lao Ye, go back." Su Xiaofan rolled down the window and greeted Lao Ye as the car drove into the night.

"Xiaoxiao, what talismans did Lao Ye give you? Show them to Brother Gang."

Zheng Dagang turned around and saw Su Xiaoxiao open the envelope and take out a few yellow talismans, his curiosity piqued.

"I've never seen Lao Ye believe in this stuff before."

Su Xiaoxiao handed the talismans to Zheng Dagong.

"Who knows what's going on, I don't even know what these talismans are." Su Xiaofan, driving, couldn't turn to look.

"Actually, these talismans are much better than the ones we buy in the market."

Zheng Dagong held three talismans and immediately felt the difference.

Taoist items were common in the antique market, falling under the category of miscellaneous items and also related to ritual objects, which was within Zheng Dagong's business scope. His expertise in this area was much stronger than Su Xiaofan's.

"This yellow paper is specially made, much thicker than the wholesale ones. Wow, this is actually hard yellow paper, just the paper itself is quite valuable..."

Zheng Dagong was surprised by the talismans in his hand. The hard yellow paper he mentioned was a type of artistic paper from the Tang Dynasty, made by dyeing and waxing, known as hard yellow or yellow hard.

This paper was easy to preserve, glossy, and smooth, and the dye used to color it, huangbo juice, not only served as a yellow dye but also repelled insects. Many Tang Dynasty texts and paintings were written on this paper.

However, Zheng Dagong believed that the yellow paper used for these talismans, while using Tang Dynasty techniques, was a modern replica, otherwise, the paper itself would be considered an artifact.

Zheng Dagong started by commenting on the paper, and Su Xiaofan and Su Xiaoxiao listened with great interest.

To draw talismans, four things are needed: brush, ink, paper, and inkstone, similar to the Four Treasures of the Study, none of which can be missing. Additionally, cinnabar is required.

The brush refers to a calligraphy brush, which can be a regular one, but a higher-quality one made from wolf hair is said to have spiritual properties and perform better.

Two brushes are usually needed, one red and one black, used as needed.

The ink and inkstone are pine ink, and a regular inkstone for writing is sufficient, no special manufacturing is required.

The most important is the paper, which must be yellow, and when used with cinnabar, it becomes a red-inscribed yellow paper.

"This is a house-protecting talisman, this is a demon-dispelling talisman, and this is a healing talisman. Does this stuff really work?"

Zheng Dagong identified the three talismans. These items were common, and he would buy a batch every year to sell in the antique market, but the quality of those talismans was much worse, and they could easily be torn with a little force.

Seeing that the road ahead was not so narrow, Su Xiaofan turned his head to look at the talismans in Zheng Dagong's hand, and several pieces of information appeared in his mind.

[Repair Value: 3 points!]

[Low-grade incomplete demon-dispelling talisman, can be repaired, requires 1 repair point, repair?]

[Low-grade incomplete house-protecting talisman, can be repaired, requires 1 repair point, repair?]

[Low-grade incomplete healing talisman, can be repaired, requires 1 repair point, repair?]

"All low-grade incomplete talismans?"

Looking at the information in his mind, Su Xiaofan was speechless.

So far, except for the Han Wang Ding at the village entrance, which was a complete ritual object, all the ritual objects and talismans Su Xiaofan had encountered were incomplete, but from the surface, he couldn't tell where they were incomplete.

"Regardless of whether the talismans work, the paper is good." Zheng Dagong put the three talismans back in the envelope and gave it to Su Xiaoxiao.

"Brother Gang, you deal in ritual objects, don't you know if they work?"

Su Xiaoxiao knew that every year, her brother would get door gods, house-protecting talismans, and wealth talismans from Zheng Dagong.

Su Xiaoxiao put the envelope in her brother's bag and took out the bell to play with.

"Xiaoxiao, Brother Gang doesn't know either. I just sell them, I don't use them."

Zheng Dagong answered a bit nervously. He bought a hundred talismans for a few dozen yuan from the wholesale market; if they really worked, that would be strange.

"They should work a bit, if we encounter something unclean, they might be useful."

Su Xiaofan spoke up. He had seen many incomplete ritual objects and talismans recently, and at the very least, they were different from modern artifacts, though he didn't know what their functions were.

"Why is there fog ahead? Xiaofan, drive slowly."

Zheng Dagong saw a foggy area through the windshield and called out to Su Xiaofan.

"No problem, that place is a threshing ground, and the fog is on the side."

Su Xiaofan replied, familiar with the terrain. He often rode his bicycle back and forth, and he wouldn't get lost even with his eyes closed.

"Brother, did you jinx it? Did we encounter something unclean?"

Sitting in the back, Su Xiaoxiao changed her voice to a low, eerie tone: "I died so tragically, please save me."

"Hey, don't, Xiaoxiao, don't scare Brother Gang."

Hearing Su Xiaoxiao's voice, Zheng Dagong, sitting in the front, shivered. He was usually brave, but that depended on the time and place.

Living in Luochuan, everyone knew that Mang Mountain was a place with graves upon graves, and the ghost stories from there could fill a book.

Their car was now driving at the foot of Mang Mountain, and Zheng Dagong firmly believed that if they dug down a dozen meters from where the car was, they would find a tomb. Su Xiaoxiao scaring people in such an environment would indeed be terrifying.

"Brother Gang, don't listen to her, she's the one who gets scared easily."

Su Xiaofan, driving, smirked. He and his sister often told each other ghost stories on their bicycle rides back to the village, and Su Xiaoxiao always screamed in fear. Now she was trying to scare others.

"Hey, Brother, Brother, it... it really seems like there's a ghost..."

Suddenly, Su Xiaoxiao's trembling voice rang out.

"Don't try to scare me again."

Su Xiaofan laughed coldly, "Ghosts are just transformed humans, they don't even have bodies, what's there to be afraid of? If you find one, I'll catch it for you."

Su Xiaofan wasn't bluffing; he was genuinely brave. The road from the town to the village passed through a graveyard.

It was said that the graveyard was filled with ancient craftsmen, later becoming a burial ground for vagrants, and during the war, many bandits were also buried there.

The graves in the graveyard were shallow, and heavy rains would often wash out coffin boards. At night, the "ghost fires" caused by human bones were visible everywhere, and most people avoided passing through at night.

But Su Xiaofan didn't care. When he was studying in the town, he rode his bicycle home every day after evening classes.

One night, it was so dark that Su Xiaofan couldn't see the road, so he found two phosphorescent bones in the graveyard and tied them to the front of his bicycle.

Surprisingly, the phosphorescent bones provided some lighting when the wind blew and they rubbed against each other.

Later, the graveyard was relocated, and Su Xiaofan was disappointed because he could no longer scare his sister on that route.

When the old village chief found out, he specifically scolded Su Xiaofan, not because he was brave, but because the bones were the remains of ancestors, and Su Xiaofan's actions were disrespectful.

"Xiaofan, it... it really seems like there's something. There... there are two shadows over there."

Just as Su Xiaofan was teasing his sister, Zheng Dagong's voice rang out, his face full of fear as he looked out the window.