The Invincible Female Ghost Is A Bit Of A Hopeless Romantic Chapter 253: Now It’s My Turn to Collect You

The ritual spirit’s shrill scream hadn’t yet dissipated when the paper banners on both sides of the stone path suddenly bent inward, as if yanked by an invisible gale.

Those white paper faces, which had been pressed half-dead by salt circles, residual thunder, and sealing plates, all twitched in that instant.

The black dots inside their eye sockets contracted sharply, as if living things had woken up inside the paper shells.

Lu Yuan stood at the center of the formation, the Town Pass Seven Stars Sword pressed diagonally beneath his palm. The sixth star on the sword’s spine had brightened to an icy pearl.

But he showed no sign of relief. Instead, the mont that wave of seat-annihilation surged back, his pupils sank sharply.

He caught the scent of sothing wrong.

It wasn’t the yin wind. It wasn’t the corpse qi. It wasn’t the sll of paper ash.

It was the sll of “exchanging altars.”

Among the old-tirs beyond the Great Wall, it was often said that when evil beings were cornered, killing them head-on wouldn’t always finish the job. If you hadn’t severed their altar’s root, they would shed their dirtiest, darkest, most human-like layer of skin and shift elsewhere to continue their mischief.

The common folk called it “borrowing skin to exchange altars.” Within Daoist thods, it was more strict: “borrowing malevolence to shift fate.”

That was exactly what the ritual spirit was doing now.

It wasn’t trying to counterattack Lu Yuan imdiately. Instead, it used that roar just now to push its remaining seat roots, lamp shadows, paper faces, and old paper scraps beneath the old altar. It was preparing, in the shortest possible ti, to claim a new place to “sit in the seat.”

If it succeeded, most of the earlier altar-breaking formation would lose effect.

Lu Yuan’s gaze turned cold.

“Trying to shift fate?”

“Did you ask ?”

His right hand abruptly lifted the sword, the blade rising half an inch from the ground. But instead of pursuing forward, he planted his heel and suddenly stepped backward three paces, landing with perfect precision.

Those three steps weren’t a retreat—they were a “sealing return.”

He tightened the salt-line that had been disrupted by the ritual spirit’s charge, locking the small circle inward another layer.

Lin Zhaoxuan felt a jolt in his heart and murmured, “He’s closing the gap… He’s going to block the ritual spirit’s path for exchanging altars first.”

Song Qinghe’s face was now as pale as paper. The sealing plate was covered in dense cracks, nearly shattered into fragnts.

But she still forced herself to press the plate against her chest and said hoarsely, “I can hold the northern position for one more breath.”

“Lu Yuan, how do you want to cooperate?”

Lu Yuan didn’t look back. He only said deeply, “You just hold the north. Don’t let the lamp shadows fall to the ground.”

“Zhou Heng, go break those two paper banner bones.”

“Lin Zhaoxuan, press the residual thunder beneath the altar’s base. Don’t let it explode. Change it to ‘nailing.’”

“Cheng’an, Erxiao, don’t scatter the salt too far. Follow the white line beneath my feet and patch it back.”

Everyone moved imdiately.

Zhou Heng gritted his teeth. His short blade skimd past the stone wall in a flash, stabbing twice in succession, cracking the banner bones that had been covered by paper faces. The banner body loosened, and the paper faces let out a piercing shriek, as if their mouths were being torn open.

Lin Zhaoxuan, on the other hand, drove the Thunderclap Token upside down into the ground, forcibly suppressing the thunder intent that should have exploded outward into a sinking, fine force. Green-white threads of electricity burrowed down along the cracks in the earth, like countless tiny nails, silently biting deep into the altar’s base.

This was exactly the “altar-nailing” technique Lu Yuan had in mind.

Not using thunder to blast, but letting it follow the earth’s montum and the yin ridians, inch by inch, nailing the altar’s root in place.

This thod consud the most mind and spirit, and drained life-fire the fastest. But once it was nailed down, it would be extrely difficult for the ritual spirit to shift positions through the ground.

The ritual spirit seed to sense its escape routes being sealed off bit by bit. The black qi surged violently.

The shadowy layers covering its body, like overturned seats, extended outward in all directions like long tongues, trying to reconnect with the old altar and old seat.

Lu Yuan’s gaze shifted, and he imdiately saw the rusty copper nail half-buried in the black soil at the end of the stone path.

The nail’s head was blackened, its body tilted askew, and around it were stuck brittle, gray paper scraps. Everyone had overlooked it before. But now that the ritual spirit moved, it faintly glowed, as if sothing was dragging it upward from beneath.

“A seat nail!”

Lu Yuan’s gaze turned icy.

“Its altar’s heart is still connected to that thing!”

Only at this mont did he fully understand.

The ritual spirit had seed to be brandishing its claws right in front of them, but that was just its outer altar. The real “altar’s heart”—that deepest, most venomous, hardest-to-sever root—had been hidden inside this old seat nail all along. As long as the seat nail remained unbroken, it could use that yin malevolence to keep collecting seats, shifting positions, and moving altars.

Everyone was shocked by this revelation.

Wang Cheng’an’s face turned white. “Th-that thing is buried so deep. How do we break it?”

Lu Yuan didn’t answer. He only slowly lifted the Town Pass Seven Stars Sword, its tip pointing diagonally toward the sky.

In that instant, his entire aura suddenly changed.

If before he had been focused on “suppressing,” forcing the ritual spirit into submission through the situation, now there rose in him a stillness that was almost murderous.

That stillness wasn’t retreat, nor was it a pause. It was like the deepest, coldest stretch of an ice river beyond the Great Wall—calm on the surface, but underneath, it had already sealed off all paths.

He stared at that seat nail and murmured a very short incantation. His voice wasn’t fast, but every word landed like iron hitting wood:

“An altar without a master, the seat becos chaotic bone.”

“Malevolence without a root, the lamp becos a withered soul.”

“I now borrow the righteous qi of the Big Dipper, to suppress your old seat’s lingering life.”

“Borrow the old fire of the mountain gate, borrow the cold wind’s sharp blade, borrow this sword’s one-breath, town-pass soul.”

“Breath!”

The mont the last word left his mouth, the seventh star on the Town Pass Seven Stars Sword blazed brightly.

That light wasn’t a blinding white. It was an extrely deep, cold radiance, as if reflected from deep within a snowy field.

The seven starlight points on the sword’s spine faintly connected in that instant, as if an invisible Big Dipper pressed down from the sky, directly enveloping that seat nail.

The ritual spirit finally exploded with rage.

It madly lunged at Lu Yuan. The black qi under its sleeves churned into a sheet of seat surface, attempting to swallow him whole from the front. Its aura was so ferocious that even the crushed sand on both sides of the stone path was swept upward. Everyone felt as if a black wall was pressing down on them, and even their breathing stalled.

“Lu Yuan!”

Song Qinghe scread in alarm.

But Lu Yuan didn’t dodge at all.

Instead, in that instant when the black seat was about to hit him, he fiercely swung the Town Pass Seven Stars Sword horizontally before him. The white salt-line beneath his feet and the starlight on the sword’s spine vibrated simultaneously.

“Suppress!”

As this shout fell, that black seat slamd into an invisible bronze wall and violently rebounded outward.

The ritual spirit itself was knocked off-balance by the backlash. The crack on its forehead suddenly widened, revealing the surging black-red malevolent qi beneath.

It had thought Lu Yuan was going to break the seat nail this round. But Lu Yuan first used the sword’s montum to protect himself, then used the salt-line to suppress the counterattack, turning himself into a “cannot-approach” suppression position. As long as the ritual spirit couldn’t shatter this suppression, it couldn’t interfere with Lu Yuan breaking the altar.

Seizing this gap, Lu Yuan’s left hand abruptly reached into his chest, pulling out another neatly folded yellow talisman.

This talisman paper was older than the previous one. The paper was darkened, its edges even showed traces of being blackened by incense fire. It looked like an old talisman that had been buried at the bottom of a chest for years, never used.

He quickly tapped his index finger on the talisman’s surface, seemingly drawing only a very short horizontal line. But the mont that line landed, the entire talisman stood upright without wind.

“A Heavenly Principle Malevolence-Suppressing Talisman!”

Lin Zhaoxuan gasped.

Beyond the Great Wall, the old-tirs’ talisman thods were extrely strict. A talisman like this wouldn’t work just by drawing a few strokes. It had to have been refined through altar destruction, ancestral incense, and multiple suppressions to accumulate that bit of “old qi.” Such talismans weren’t afraid of being old—they were afraid of not being heavy enough. The older they were, the heavier, the better they could suppress evil formations.

Without hesitation, Lu Yuan pressed the talisman onto the Town Pass Seven Stars Sword.

Instantly, the black pattern on the talisman’s surface flashed, as if countless tiny starlike grains of sand were rolling down the sword’s spine. The seventh star rged with that talisman qi, and the sword’s montum suddenly grew three points heavier.

“Borrow the talisman, borrow the stars, borrow the sword.”

Lu Yuan said in a low voice, his tone hoarse as if it carried blood.

“Heavenly Principle suppresses malevolence. The old altar returns to the earth.”

He stepped forward, the sword tip pointing directly at that seat nail.

The ritual spirit frantically tried to protect it. Several paper faces simultaneously detached from the banner faces, shrieking as they lunged at Lu Yuan’s arms and face. Those paper faces were terrifyingly fast, almost like a flash of white light before they would attach to him and devour his yang qi.

But this ti, Lu Yuan was prepared.

He pressed his left hand’s index and middle fingers together, turned the back of his hand, and drew a very simple but extrely steady gesture in midair. His thumb pressed down on his pinky, the remaining three fingers slightly spread, his wrist center sinking, his posture like pressing down a seal.

It wasn’t so flashy hand seal, but it carried a heavy, “mouth-sealing” implication.

He shouted, “Paper cos but doesn’t enter the eyes. Malevolence cos but doesn’t enter the door.”

“My hand is the door gate. My heart is the door closure.”

“Return!”

As the word “return” fell, those approaching paper faces slamd into an invisible doorfra and collectively froze. Then they were swept aside by the cold wind at the edge of the sword’s montum, grazing past Lu Yuan’s shoulder, and smashed heavily against the stone wall, shattering into a few paper scraps.

Seeing this, everyone felt their spirits shake.

The ritual spirit was enraged to the extre. It let out an extrely sharp shriek, ignoring everything to break through the suppression. The black soil beneath its feet suddenly exploded. Several decayed black paper ropes shot out from the ground crevices, like living snakes, winding toward Lu Yuan’s legs.

Lu Yuan’s brows pressed down. He smoothly lifted his foot, using the top of his foot to step on one of the paper ropes, then drove the sword blade downward, precisely cutting into the circle of yinnest paper ash around that seat nail.

“Sever the root!”

He shouted.

This sword wasn’t grand. It wasn’t accompanied by thunder cracking stone. But it was like the steadiest, cruelest old hunter beyond the Great Wall plunging a knife into a wolf’s spine.

Where the blade passed, old paper scraps and black mud rolled outward. That rusty seat nail let out an extrely fine, extrely fine “ding.”

Like an iron needle that had been pressed for a long ti finally loosening by a hair.

Just a hair.

But for the ritual spirit, that one hair was already fatal.

Its seat-annihilation suddenly dispersed. The lamp shadows dimd. The paper faces lost their main qi, collectively freezing in midair, like a group of kites with severed strings.

“Not enough!”

The ritual spirit roared in fury. Within the black qi, faint outlines of human arms appeared, as if many remnant souls it had devoured were struggling and clawing inside.

“I won’t fall!”

The veins on Lu Yuan’s forehead were clearly bulging. He had obviously reached his limit too.

He knew that just one sword stroke wasn’t enough to finish it cleanly. Since the ritual spirit could use the seat nail to set up its altar, it had already buried its malevolent root very deep. One layer broken, another layer was still pressing down. If he didn’t force it to reveal its true altar bone, it would rise again sooner or later.

So he suddenly stepped back half a step.

That step was incredibly fast, and incredibly steady, as if deliberately giving the ritual spirit an illusion.

The ritual spirit was indeed stunned.

Just when it thought Lu Yuan’s strength was nearly spent and his suppression was about to loosen, Lu Yuan abruptly raised his head. A cold light flashed in his eyes, and he spat out an extrely cold assertion:

“You weren’t waiting for to retreat.”

“You were waiting for the altar bone to lift its head.”

“Then I’ll force your altar bone out with my own hands.”

He raised his sword. The sword’s ring turned in the air, no longer aid at the seat nail, but directly at the overturned-seat lamp at the end of the stone path.

The lamp was the eye.

If the eye was chaotic, the altar would be chaotic.

What the ritual spirit feared most wasn’t the seat nail being broken. It was the overturned-seat lamp losing its main guide. If the lamp went out, the seat surface would beco like a dead man’s burial cloth, losing its most crucial breath of soul qi.

Lu Yuan deliberately chose this mont to attack its eye in reverse.

Lin Zhaoxuan understood imdiately. He forced himself to push the Thunderclap Token forward and shouted in a low voice, “Thunder nails below. Lamp shadows return to yin!”

Zhou Heng also imdiately flipped his strength, blocking two paper shadows that rushed toward Lu Yuan from the right side.

Song Qinghe bit the tip of her tongue, spraying a mouthful of blood qi onto the sealing plate. The plate’s surface instantly emitted a faint cold light, firmly covering the northern position.

Borrowing everyone’s qi at that mont, Lu Yuan stamped his foot. His entire body seed to be carried by the Town Pass Seven Stars Sword as it flew forward, so fast that only a gray shadow remained.

Seeing the danger, the ritual spirit madly raised its hand to protect the lamp.

But it was already too late.

Lu Yuan didn’t cleave the overturned-seat lamp in two. Instead, he lifted the sword tip, accurately piercing the finest paper seam at the bottom of the lamp.

That sword stroke wasn’t heavy, but it was vicious to the extre.

The upturned paper palm inside the lamp wick was caught at that point, its originally rising motion abruptly stopped. It was like soone about to flip a table with their hand, only to have their wrist bone nailed in place.

Then Lu Yuan rapidly chanted:

“If the lamp doesn’t overturn, the seat doesn’t live.”

“If the lamp is nailed, the malevolence self-collapses.”

“The Big Dipper returns to position. The gate closes and locks.”

“Urgently, urgently, as by the law’s command—suppress!”

As the final word “suppress” left his mouth, the seventh star on the Town Pass Seven Stars Sword blazed bright. The sword light followed the paper seam at the lamp’s bottom and pierced through in one go.

There was a crisp, light crack—like gas being drawn out of the overturned-seat lamp from its root. The lamp fla suddenly shrank.

Simultaneously, the black shadow surrounding the ritual spirit shook three tis violently.

Its true altar bone had finally been forced out.

It wasn’t human bone, nor beast bone. It was a pitch-black, oiled wooden wedge, wrapped in burnt red threads. The threads were densely detailed, like the sealing threads left behind when old mourning families tied up their mats.

The wooden wedge slowly rose from beneath the overturned-seat lamp, its surface covered in fine cracks. Inside those cracks, faint outlines of pale human faces could be seen.

“So that’s it…”

Lu Yuan stared at that thing, killing intent thick in his eyes.

“You’re not a ritual spirit.”

“You’re an altar life cobbled together from old seat bones, lamp bones, and paper bones.”

The ritual spirit was stunned.

It probably never imagined that its true nature would be seen through at a mont like this.

But Lu Yuan didn’t give it a chance to speak.

He fiercely bit the tip of his tongue, spraying a mouthful of blood onto the Town Pass Seven Stars Sword. The sword blade imdiately glowed with a cold red.

Then his left hand rapidly ford a hand seal. Five fingers clenched together, thumb hidden in the center, index finger slightly raised. His gesture was steady, like pressing down a coffin lid—fast but not chaotic.

He chanted a short, heavy incantation:

“Stars press the wooden wedge. The wooden wedge presses the soul.”

“The soul doesn’t erge. The malevolence doesn’t grow.”

“The malevolence doesn’t grow. The altar doesn’t form.”

“I use the old fire of the pass, to seal your three yin mouths!”

“Decree, decree, decree!”

Three shouts of “decree,” like three nails, were driven one after another into the ritual spirit’s deepest vital point.

In that instant, the wind on the stone path suddenly stilled.

It was terrifyingly still.

All the black qi, paper faces, seat shadows, and lamp smoke of the ritual spirit were pressed down by an invisible giant hand. It froze in place, a look of near-panic appearing in its eyes for the first ti.

It wanted to struggle, to retreat, to flip over using the black soil. But Lu Yuan had suppressed its altar bone, and also suppressed its shifting path.

This round had reached its most critical mont.

Whoever relaxed first would die.

The blood on Lu Yuan’s arm had already flowed to the sword’s guard, dripping drop by drop into the salt circle, like red plum blossoms blooming on a snowy field.

But he stood completely straight, like an iron post growing out of the frozen earth beyond the Great Wall.

“Now.”

He said in a low voice, a cold light like a blade in his eyes.

“It’s my turn to collect you.”

On the ritual spirit’s face, twisted beyond recognition by black qi, true fear finally appeared.

And the next instant, Lu Yuan raised his sword and pressed down. The Town Pass Seven Stars Sword, carrying the cold radiance of the seventh star, viciously chopped toward that exposed black wooden wedge.