"No wonder." Gu Zhao looked at the Silk Embroideress. Magical Power was coursing through her body, slowly improving her physical condition to the point where her skin looked much better. "Is the effect of the Harmony really this obvious?"
"Of course!" Bai Ke said smugly. "I'm a Celestial Fox Descendant. Now that the Silk Embroideress is in Harmony with me, she's destined to become a Grand Mage who will shake the world!"
Gu Zhao said dryly, "A Celestial Fox Descendant who can't even speak for herself."
Bai Ke flared up in anger. "That's because I'm only sixteen!"
Gu Zhao raised an eyebrow, looking at her askance. "As I recall, foxes don't live very long. At sixteen, haven't you already surpassed the lifespan of most foxes? And you still claim you're not an old lady?"
The fur on Bai Ke's tail stood on end. "I'm not an ordinary fox, I'm a Fox Demon—no, that's not right. I've never harmed an innocent, and I have no Evil Qi. I should be called a Fox Spirit. I'm not a Fairy, I'm a Spirit Monarch!"
Gu Zhao nodded with understanding, filing away another new piece of knowledge.
"Alright, alright, you're a Spirit Monarch." Gu Zhao waved his hand. "Then allow me to ask, O Spirit Monarch, your shout knocked everyone in the village unconscious. When will they wake up?"
"I am a Spirit Monarch, but that's not my name. I have a name! I'm Bai Ke!"
After emphasizing her point, Bai Ke noticed the Silk Embroideress glance worriedly at Elder He inside the house. Only then did she add, "They're just sleeping normally. They should recover in a few hours. It won't even stop them from getting up in the night."
"So your name is really Bai?" Gu Zhao asked, surprised.
Bai Ke responded with silence. She couldn't very well admit that she hadn't had a name before and only chose 'Bai Ke' because the Silk Embroideress used to call her Xiaobai.
The Silk Embroideress let out a soft giggle but said nothing, her gaze fixed intently on Gu Zhao.
Gu Zhao took out the four bracelets and asked Bai Ke, "Will that Golden Wind Sect Leader be able to find us through the aura on these bracelets?"
"These bracelets aren't his Incense and Candle Divine Statues; they don't have his Curse Mark on them," Bai Ke said, shaking her head. "Unless he leaves Changping Prefecture and gets close to the village, he won't be able to sense the aura on them."
"That's good." Gu Zhao nodded, then a thought seemed to strike him. "You said before that you don't use the Golden Wind Sect's Incense and Candle Divine Statues, otherwise you'd become the Golden Wind Sect Leader's puppet. Is that because of the mark?"
"The faith generated by Incense must be stored in something made of special materials after it leaves the body. That old ghost isn't powerful enough to absorb his followers' Incense from hundreds of miles away, so he has to place a Divine Statue on a Divine Altar in Xiuyue County to absorb the Incense and Candle Telekinesis."
Bai Ke explained, "But he worries that the local followers might embezzle it, so he placed a Curse Seal inside the Divine Statue. If anyone dares to tamper with the Incense within the statue, he can sense it from afar and even cast techniques from a distance."
"So he can sense the Divine Statue from a great distance away?" Gu Zhao asked.
"Maybe... probably... perhaps... He can likely only sense the general direction and distance." Bai Ke wasn't sure either. She didn't follow the Divine Cultivation Dao, and her strength was far inferior to the Golden Wind Sect Leader's, so how could she possibly know the details so clearly?
So she added with a grumble, "If I had the power to block the Golden Wind Sect Leader's senses, why would I have stolen the Divine Statue from Xiuyue County? Wouldn't it have been better to go straight for the one in Changping Prefecture?"
Gu Zhao understood, and a wave of lingering fear washed over him.
'Thank goodness I brought that Incense and Candle Divine Statue back to the modern world. Otherwise, I would've been thrown into a high-level boss fight right after transmigrating. Never mind whether I could have won—if I hadn't been here then, this whole village would have been annihilated.'
'Wait. Why did I think "if I hadn't been here"?'
"So, is that Golden Wind Sect Leader strong?" Gu Zhao asked, a hopeful glimmer in his eyes.
He was a newcomer, and even though he had obliterated the Golden Wind Divine Maiden in a single move, he had remained very cautious.
Later, even after he had killed the black-robed ghost chasing Bai Ke and the Silk Embroideress with three bolts of lightning, he hadn't felt particularly accomplished because he didn't know the ghost's rank or status.
But today was different. He had used a Shangqing Divine Transformation Talisman combined with two Thunder-Expelling Curses to obliterate three Ghosts. Now, learning that this trio were the famous Dharma Guardian Ghost Gods of the Golden Wind Sect in Changping Prefecture—second only to the Sect Leader himself—his confidence began to swell.
'If I draw an analogy to the power gap between Yang Dingtian and the Four Great Kings, then maybe... probably... perhaps...'
'Am I terrifyingly strong right now?'
Gu Zhao: (◔◡◔)
"You don't actually think you're so great just because you killed three of the Golden Wind Sect's Guardians, do you?"
Bai Ke scoffed. "Those Dharma Guardian Ghost Gods merely possessed a sliver of Divinity bestowed upon them by the Golden Wind Sect Leader. They're nothing more than servants he sends out to do odd jobs. They wouldn't last a single exchange against him."
Bai Ke could finally see it clearly: Gu Zhao was completely clueless.
The Golden Wind Divine Sect was a major power that dominated Changping Prefecture, and the Golden Wind Divine King was an ancient ghost with several hundred years of cultivation. If Gu Zhao showed up at his doorstep, wouldn't he just be serving himself up on a silver platter?
Although Gu Zhao seemed quite formidable, he was absolutely no match for the Golden Wind Divine King. Bai Ke had to pour cold water on his enthusiasm. Otherwise, if he charged off to find the Golden Wind Divine King heedlessly, wouldn't she be sending him to his doom?
Hearing Bai Ke's words, Gu Zhao cooled down.
He realized he had just been making an analogy with characters from a Martial World novel, but those characters were still confined to the realm of mortals. Yang Dingtian might have been powerful, but he likely couldn't have withstood the Four Great Kings teaming up against him.
And there was nobody in the world who could defeat the Four Great Kings in just a few moves—not even Zhang Sanfeng!
And that brought him to the crucial point. The world he was in wasn't a Martial World; it was clearly a Xianxia World. There was no need to even bring up epics like *Investiture of the Gods* or *Journey to the West*. Even at the level of *Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio*, Yan Chixia could slaughter the Tree Demon Granny's subordinate Female Ghosts like dicing vegetables, but he nearly met his end when he faced their master directly.
In a world like this, the gap between each tier of power was a vast chasm. The saying "couldn't even withstand a single blow" was no exaggeration.
*PHEW—*
Calming his fervent heart and reminding himself that he was still a newcomer and that the Five Thunders Order was still helping him grow, Gu Zhao decided he was no longer in a rush.
'I've got all the time in the world!'
"Then I'll let him off the hook for now," Gu Zhao said with a solemn nod.
Bai Ke, "..."
The Silk Embroideress, however, nodded in agreement. "The Golden Wind Sect can't find us anyway, so there's no need for us to go looking for them."
At this, the Silk Embroideress couldn't help but look at Gu Zhao, her expression hesitant as if she wanted to say something.
Gu Zhao looked back at the Silk Embroideress, his expression thoughtful.
As their eyes met, the Silk Embroideress's gaze began to dart away, while Gu Zhao's own eyes grew brighter and brighter.
Bai Ke glanced back and forth between them. Her eyes twinkled, and just as she was about to speak, Gu Zhao suddenly reached into a small pouch at his waist. He pulled out a piece of yellow paper folded into a triangle and pressed it into the Silk Embroideress's hand. "Here, try this. See if you can activate this talisman paper."
"Huh?" Bai Ke was taken aback, freezing in place.
The Silk Embroideress stared at the talisman paper in her hand, her cheeks blushing crimson. She felt as if the heat radiating from her skin was enough to scorch the yellow paper.