Even as Gu Yuze murmured and scolded the young ghost king over his early romance, he could not help but swing his legs as he jumped onto the bed, ready to begin reading the secret love letters.
He told himself that he was not excited, just curious. As the heir of the Gu family, he should have been betrothed to a person from a similar familial background as his but knowing the kind of destiny that accompanied him, no family hated their child enough to throw him or her into that pit.
Gu Yuze was also self-aware and forget dating, he had not even held hands with anyone, he had died an old virgin. That thought made him grit his teeth as he looked at the first letter.
"My dear Gu Yuze"
Not even Yuyu or Yu'er or Xiao Ze or Zeze, Gu Yuze could think of a thousand nicknames that he could think of. Even Bao Bei or Lao Gong—while those names had always grated on his ears—at least they were better than "My dear Gu Yuze." He was sure that the national university also addressed its successful applicants in this manner.
After Gu Yuze had finished critiquing everything about this address in his mind, he finally began to read the letter.
"I received the money."
Gu Yuze instantly sat up and reread that sentence. This pauper ghost king, who had only twenty-four dollars in his bank account, had the guts to send someone money? After puffing for a minute, Gu Yuze calmed himself down. He was not a stranger to the power of love, after his mother died, his father refused to take a companion or even a mistress, dooming the main line of the Gu family to die out.
Refusing to think about his late parents, he continued to read the letters. The first letter was to thank Gu Yuze for the money that he had sent and the talisman papers as well. He talked extensively about the classes he took and that he had already started hunting malevolent ghosts. Every line was either filled with accomplishment or barely disguised complaint.
Gu Yuze could almost see the person who was writing the letter, young, bold and arrogant.
'Gu Yuze, wait for me to pass my Taoist Master's examination and I will fulfil my promises to you. We would perform the Taoist ceremony in front of the Suzhou Lake and receive the blessings of everyone. I think about it every day. You do not need to send me any more money, I have accepted more missions, it is just a pity that because of the countless missions, I barely have any time to study. Hope you are well. Shu.'
Gu Yuze paused and went to the messaging app on his phone. Sure enough, just three days ago, there was a bank notification that the little ghost king had sent 2000 dollars to someone.
Gu Yuze had scolded him enough, he did not have any strength to scold the missing ghost king again. He loved reading love stories, but nothing about these letters moved his drawstrings the way that love stories normally did.
He rubbed his head, maybe he should not judge the 'Shu' so badly, maybe he was shy and bad at communicating. It was still crazy, 7 letters and none of them asked about the little ghost king, whether he had eaten or how he was doing.
Gu Yuze's little finger traced the word, 'Taoist ceremony'. He recalled a scene from the historical drama he was watching last week. The poor scholar and the noble lady had eloped to get married, the noble lady's parents had found them, and they had killed the poor scholar in front of the lady. With tears in her eyes, she smacked her head on the pillar dying with her lover.
But that resentment would not be enough to make a ghost king, it could barely make one a malovent spirit.
Finding out what had made this Gu Yuze turn into a ghost spirit was not something that could be done in a hurry or without enough information. In the meantime, he needed to survive well.
This was a relationship with promises of marriage in the future. He should probably avoid this Shu as much as possible. No one knew a person more than his lover, even though his soul fit into the little ghost king perfectly, this Shu might be able to tell something was off.
How about friends? At that thought, Gu Yuze lowered his head. Friends? That Zhang Jinyu, when he comes out of closed-door cultivation and discovered he was dead, what was he going to do? Would he cry? Probably not.
He scrolled through the phone. There were just two contacts in the phone book. No messages on social media platforms, which was not unusual for a Taoist student. But even on the popular Taoist community app, 'Ghosts,' he had not exchanged any messages with anyone.
Even as a person born under the Xuanshi star, he knew that a person couldn't live and survive alone.
'Trust me. I have tried.' Gu Yuze muttered to himself as he placed the phone on the table.
Relationships, check. Next, Constitution and Cultivation.
The memories might belong to the soul, but the cultivation belonged to the body. He needed to read this body's sea of consciousness completely and understand the way spiritual energy flowed within him.
Cultivation techniques differed from scriptures and meditation, which were used to attain a natural state of being and unity with the universe. Cultivation Techniques were techniques for gathering and using spiritual energy.
Every one's fate and destiny is different and hence, your cultivation technique must be tailored to your constitution.
Gu Yuze crossed his legs, facing his palm up on his laps. He crossed his eyes and calmed his mind down.
Humming a chant under his breath, Gu Yuze soon appeared in a space in his mind. The space seemed completely otherworldly, with clear waters everywhere, gently rippling with a warm breeze. But just like the money in the account, the space was small.
It was more like a small pond compared to the gushing sea that Gu Yuze had been more familiar with. In the middle of the pond, a young naked man with an expression that was neither joyful nor sorrowful sat cross-legged, golden lines all over his body. Breathing in and out.
Gu Yuze frowned, his eyes narrowing as he floated down.
On the back of the naked young man was a litany of purple markings. Lines and lines of talismans intricately drawn on the back of the young man formed a spider lily.
This was a seal.
Why would there be such a seal in the sea of consciousness of the little ghost king? He had never seen a seal like this before. Did someone anticipate that Gu Yuze would turn into a Ghost King and decide to seal him to prevent the disaster? But would it not have been better to just kill him?
There was something about this seal that rubbed him off in a bad way. Gu Yuze watched quietly, seeing the beat and flow of the energy. Nobody ever believed him when he said it was that easy to learn another person's cultivation. If he could enter the sea of consciousness, he could learn it. Cultivation was just a breathing sutra. Follow the breath, the beat of the heart and the flow of the energy.
He sat still for over three hours before he concentrated on the sea of consciousness again. The bad feeling in his mind had grown worse with each passing minute.
This cultivation method was wrong. Rather than spreading the energy around the meridians of the body, ninety percent of the spiritual energy went to the seal, feeding it and letting it grow even more powerful.
"Did you feel it?" The feeling of being incomplete. Cultivation should bring a feeling of completeness and oneness with the world, but with 90% of the energy not completely the rotation round the meridians, it would be like drinking a cup of water and yet still feeling thirsty.
It was maddening.
Not to mention, With this rate of ten percent absorption, Gu Yuze can forget about having enough spiritual energy to contact the underworld in this lifetime.
Gu Yuze had never wronged himself. From the moment he was born, he had been one with the heavens and the earth. This kind of sea of consciousness, he could not bear it.
"Plucking the flower, I smile because it has blossomed. The earth and the heavens are connected to my heart, my heart to the earth and the heaven. If I do not smile, the flowers will not blossom; if my heart does not move, neither would the wind nor the flower"
His ashen eyes gleamed, turning molten silver. They looked like electrical current was coursing through his irises. He raised his left hand, swiftly pulling the spiritual energy from the pond.
A golden leaf appeared on his forehead for a brief second. With a ferocious expression, Gu Yuze slammed the spiritual energy onto the seal at the young avatar's back