Chapter 14: The Novice Head-Descending Sorcerer
The candlelight flickered, and with it, the shadow of the demon wavered as well.
The basent grew even more sinister.
The offerings already arranged included a large amount of betel nuts and jasmine flowers, as well as rice. Only the main offering was missing.
When offering sacrifice to a demon, the one thing that could never be absent was sothing bloody.
Li Zhen took out a red plastic bag from his tote. Inside was a large slab of raw, bloody beef that Fatty Wong had prepared.
The beef was extrely fresh, its muscle fibers still twitching.
After placing the beef on the altar, Li Zhen retrieved a palm-sized incense burner and several sticks of incense of an unknown scent from the sa bag.
He lit the incense and inserted them into the burner.
Setting up an altar required attention to countless details.
First, the types of offerings must be correct, and not a single implent could be missing.
Second, the finer points required equal care—
The location, direction, the choice of ritual implents, even the height of those implents, and the precise ti the ritual began.
It was an extrely tedious process.
Without those inherited mories, it would have been impossible for Li Zhen to prepare the altar so smoothly.
That said, what he had arranged was rely a simplified version of a full altar. Many items were substitutes, and so components had been omitted so long as they did not affect the ritual’s overall efficacy.
With limited conditions and little ti, he could only afford to ignore certain details.
After resting for a mont, Li Zhen took out a sheet of white paper and a writing brush. Dipping the brush into the fresh blood from a blood bag, he began to draw the incantations required for the ritual.
It was said the incantations were written in Javanese. They were ant to be written, yet for Li Zhen—who could not recognize a single character—they beca drawn.
Roughly half an hour later, Li Zhen completed over a dozen talismans and affixed them in their proper positions.
Wiping the sweat from his forehead, Li Zhen began to steady his mind.
Another half hour passed; the ti was now past two o’clock.
Without the slightest hesitation, Li Zhen took the embroidery needle he had prepared and pricked the middle finger of his left hand, saring the blood that welled up onto the eyes of the demonic statue.
In the small booklet, this step was called “Opening the Eyes,” the first stage of the ritual.
When the pain from his fingertip had slightly subsided, Li Zhen poured the blood from the opened blood bag onto the bat.
Then he pulled several strands of his own hair and threw them into the blood that covered the bat.
The stench of blood quickly filled the air.
“With blood as the guide, with hair as the dium, black rope binds the demon—aid in casting the curse…”
Li Zhen sat cross-legged before the altar, head lowered, hands forming strange gestures placed upon his knees, and began chanting the incantations in a peculiar rhythm.
He was chanting in a Nanyang tongue.
In truth, other languages would have sufficed.
What mattered was not the language of the incantation, but the rhythm of the chanting itself.
That was the most crucial elent—and one that could never be written down.
Without firsthand experience in Head-Descending Sorcery, this step could not have been completed.
And among the mories Li Zhen had acquired, this very aspect was the most abundant.
In those fragnted recollections, nearly every scene involved chanting.
The unlucky soul whom Ma Gusu had refined into a Little Ghost was most likely from the sa sect as Ma Gusu himself…
During the first recitation, Li Zhen’s chanting was halting.
By the second, the words flowed faster, smoother, as if the incantations had been etched into his very bones.
After seven repetitions, Li Zhen rose, picked up the thin black string he had prepared, looped it around the bat’s neck, and was about to tie a dead knot—
“Whoosh…”
A sudden gust of wind swept through the windowless basent, making the talismans rustle wildly.
A chill crept up Li Zhen’s neck—as though sothing behind him had exhaled a cold breath against his skin, sending shivers down his spine.
Recalling the taboos written in the booklet, Li Zhen dared not look back. He instead tightened his grip and firmly tied the black rope around the bat’s neck.
“Chit—chit!”
The bat suddenly emitted a strange cry.
Its fur bristled like needles, standing straight up all at once.
Its body began to swell, then contract, as though gasping for air.
The blood covering the bat and pooled within the box beneath it began to diminish visibly before his eyes.
The bat was feeding on the blood.
Halfway there…
Li Zhen did not relax.
Reaching out, he swiftly pulled the needle from the bat’s ear.
“Chit—chit—chit!”
The bat opened its eyes, revealing a pair of eerie, blood-red pupils.
At that very mont, the demonic statue behind it seed to flicker in its eyes as well.
Li Zhen did not see this change.
The instant the bat’s eyes opened, he felt as if plunged into an icy abyss, and his consciousness vanished in an instant.
It might have been a mont—or an eternity—when the bat’s shrill screeching “chit-chit” echoed again, jarring Li Zhen awake.
An indescribable pain flooded his senses.
It was as if it ca from deep within his marrow, radiating outward until it consud every part of him.
Li Zhen collapsed to the ground, his fingers digging into the cracks between the floorboards.
Fluid dripped continuously from his nostrils, tracing down his face and splattering onto the floor.
He did not know what expression he wore—only that he clenched his teeth to stop himself from making a sound.
The pain was far worse than any illness he had ever suffered, almost making death seem like a release.
A faint gnawing echoed in his skull, as though sothing within him was devouring his flesh without restraint.
Struggling, Li Zhen clawed his way up, reached for the blood bag beside him, and toppled it over.
A gush of blood spilled out, dyeing the altar a deep crimson.
Both skull and offerings were splattered with red.
Though it seed brief, several minutes had passed.
Once the blood flowed, the pain began to subside.
Taking advantage of the mont, Li Zhen sat cross-legged before the altar and began chanting rapidly once more.
After the intense agony, his body had grown numb; his voice was slurred, nearly incomprehensible.
He did not know how many tis he chanted before suddenly rising, seizing the monkey skull upon the altar, and smashing it down.
With a sharp crack, fragnts of bone scattered in every direction.
The lingering pain ebbed away like a receding tide, leaving not a trace behind.
The faint gnawing faded, then vanished entirely.
Li Zhen’s body slackened; he swayed twice and nearly fell.
It should have succeeded…
After catching his breath, Li Zhen extended his numb right hand, trembling as he took a small mirror from the bag beside him.
In the mirror, he saw his blurred, weary face—and a pair of bloodshot eyes.
That gaunt face was slightly different from before; beneath its sickly yellow hue was a faint bluish tint, and between his brows, a thin vertical mark of blue and purple had appeared.
It was the sign of success.
Was he now a Head-Descending Sorcerer?
Wiping the blood from beneath his nose, Li Zhen could only muster that one dull, aningless thought.
Reviews
All reviews (0)