24: If you print 100,000 copies, I will accept 10,000 wishes.

Three days later, in the early morning, as dawn was just breaking, the small town at the foot of the mountain plunged into an unprecedented frenzy and chaos.

The air no longer carried the familiar scent of soy milk and fried dough sticks, but was filled with the pungent smell of inferior cinnabar mixed with paper.

Street corners, utility poles, and even residents' door panels were plastered with crudely made yellow paper.

The yellow paper was dull in color, loose in texture, and the talismans on it were crooked and distorted, like a child's clumsy scribbles, a world apart from the naturally formed “Heart Seal Mark” in Zhang Xuanyi’s calligraphy.

Next to each piece of yellow paper, prominent large characters read: “Mount Longhu style, divine talisman replica, one hundred yuan a piece, fair deal for all!”

“Senior Brother! This is bad!” A Che rushed back to the stall like a gust of wind, his face pale, his forehead covered in sweat, and his voice trembling. “Something big has happened! The streets are full of fake lightning talismans, and they… they call them ‘replicated divine talismans’! Just now, an ability user in the south of the city wanted to test its power, but the thing didn’t obey at all and exploded on the spot! With a bang, half the street’s windows shattered, and the person was severely injured!”

In front of the stall, Zhang Xuanyi was unhurriedly wiping a piece of tattered cloth of unknown material. Hearing this, his movements didn't pause for a moment.

He looked up, meeting A Che’s anxious gaze, but a cold and mocking arc slowly formed at the corner of his mouth.

“Don’t panic,” his voice was as calm as water, yet it held a sharp insight that saw through everything. “Yan Jiuzhang, he’s been pushed to the limit.”

He stood up, his gaze sweeping over the bustling street in the distance, as if he could penetrate the layers of people to see the opponent hiding in the shadows, stirring up trouble.

“He thinks that with this overwhelming flood of inferior products, he can crush my true talisman market? Drown quality with quantity? A good idea, but unfortunately…”

Zhang Xuanyi’s smile deepened: “If he wants to play, I’ll play with him. Today, I’ll let him see with his own eyes what it means to truly ‘suppress the fake market with true will’!”

Before he finished speaking, he took out a small jade bottle from his Pregnant, containing only a thin layer of dark golden liquid—that was the “Pseudo-Three Caverns True Qi Liquid”.

He unhesitatingly tilted the bottle, precisely dripping the last few drops of liquid onto the ancient tattered cloth in the center of the stall.

The moment the liquid touched the cloth, it didn't soak in; instead, it vanished instantly like mercury falling into sand.

The next moment, the entire tattered cloth suddenly vibrated, and a visible golden halo spread out like ripples.

On the originally ordinary cloth surface, a ethereal phantom slowly emerged.

The phantom, interwoven with light and shadow, was precisely a bustling ancient market street, with people bustling about, stalls lining the street, and countless rare treasures shimmering with dazzling light.

On the archway at the end of the long street, four ancient seal characters were inscribed with vigorous strokes— “Wan Fa Dao Market”!

At the same time, a cold mechanical voice boomed in Zhang Xuanyi’s mind:

【Ding! Host detected activating market core, ‘Aspiration Resonance’ system officially activated!】

【Rule: Every ‘Heart Seal True Talisman’ personally drawn by you and genuinely believed in and used by the user will feedback a trace of pure ‘Dao Aspiration’.】

【‘Dao Aspiration’ can be accumulated and used to exchange for higher-level goods and permissions in the ‘Wan Fa Dao Market’.】

Zhang Xuanyi’s eyes shone with astonishing brilliance.

So that’s it, this was the true core gameplay of this tattered cloth, this “stall system”!

Selling talismans was just a facade; collecting “Aspiration” was the fundamental goal!

He suddenly turned to look at Su Qingzhu, who was equally stunned by the anomaly and speechless, and quickly instructed her: “Qingzhu, do me a favor. Immediately use your channels to publish an in-depth report, with the title—‘True Talismans Acknowledge Their Master, Fake Talismans Backfire’!”

Su Qingzhu quickly recovered, a shrewd glint flashing in her eyes: “A war of public opinion?”

“No,” Zhang Xuanyi’s smile held an undeniable dominance, “I want to… tax the Under Heaven Society!”

He continued: “Attach the three videos of ability users losing control of their abilities and exploding on the spot due to using fake talismans, and use the highest definition close-ups to highlight the detail of the fake talismans lacking the ‘Heart Seal Mark’. Tell everyone that the core of true Daoist talismans lies in the resonance of ‘heart’ and ‘law’, they are unique and cannot be replicated. And those inferior imitations are merely waste paper that brings death!”

Su Qingzhu’s professional instincts were instantly ignited. She nodded heavily: “I understand, this is to destroy their credibility at its root!”

That night, an in-depth report titled “Who is Selling ‘False Dao’? —Three Questions to the Under Heaven Society and the Bloody Truth Behind the ‘Hundred Yuan Divine Talisman’” exploded like a bombshell in the entire extraordinary community.

The report was richly illustrated with text and images, and the video evidence was irrefutable.

In the footage, the crooked talismans instantly collapsed upon activation, the violent energy backfired, causing grievous injuries to the users, a gruesome sight that formed a shocking contrast with another video showing a true talisman gently guiding and precisely taking effect.

And the crystal-clear close-up of the “Heart Seal Mark” was the final nail in the coffin, becoming the absolute standard for distinguishing true from false.

Public opinion was completely in an uproar!

“Damn the Under Heaven Society! I almost bought one! Is this selling talismans or selling coffins?!”

“So that golden pattern is called the ‘Heart Seal Mark’, that’s the anti-counterfeit mark!”

“My friend used one, and he’s still in the hospital, his ability core is damaged!”

Panic and anger spread rapidly, and the scorn for fake talismans and the craving for true talismans reached their peak.

Just then, a new sign was erected in front of Zhang Xuanyi’s stall, with only two lines of text:

“Distinguish true from false, the Dao Heart bears witness.”

“Those with fake talismans may come here to exchange for a ‘Heart Seal Talisman Paper’ for free, only needing to leave a sentence—‘I am willing to believe in the True Dao’.”

This move left everyone dumbfounded.

Free exchange?

No money, just one sentence?

Initially, people were skeptical.

But when the first brave person placed a crude fake talisman on the stall and devoutly said, “I am willing to believe in the True Dao,” and Zhang Xuanyi actually handed him a blank talisman paper shimmering with a faint golden Heart Seal Mark, the crowd completely erupted!

In front of the stall, a queue several hundred meters long instantly formed.

“I am willing to believe in the True Dao!”

Declarations from the heart echoed over the small town.

Whenever someone said this, the tattered cloth in front of Zhang Xuanyi would imperceptibly flash with a golden light.

In his mind, the system’s prompts sounded like a tide:

【Ding! Received ‘Dao Aspiration’ +1!】

Three days! Just three days!

The long queue in front of the stall never broke, Zhang Xuanyi almost mechanically repeated the exchange actions, and the Aspiration value in his mind soared at a terrifying speed!

Five thousand… eight thousand… ten thousand!

The moment the Aspiration value broke the ten thousand mark, the phantom of the “Wan Fa Dao Market” on the tattered cloth trembled violently, a brilliant golden light shot up into the sky, and a brand new item icon was unlocked in the system interface!

【Ding!

Aspiration value cumulative breakthrough of ten thousand, unlocking rare item: Three Caverns True Qi Guiding Lamp (Trial Version) × 1】

【Item Description: This lamp can activate the unowned True Qi between heaven and earth, briefly illuminate the blocked Qi Sea within others, helping them clarify their path forward, with a high probability of assisting cultivators in bottleneck periods to achieve breakthroughs.】

Zhang Xuanyi’s breathing suddenly hitched. This… this was simply an heaven-defying item!

His gaze swept over, landing on a young man in the queue whose face was pale and whose arm was wrapped in thick bandages.

He recognized this person; he was the first ability user in the south of the city to be injured by a fake talisman, his cultivation having been stuck at a bottleneck for a long time, he had intended to use the power of the “divine talisman” to break through, but ended up in such a state.

“You, come here,” Zhang Xuanyi said.

The young man was startled and walked up hesitantly.

Zhang Xuanyi said no more, directly handing him the palm-sized, ancient bronze lamp he had just exchanged for, and activated the live streaming equipment that Su Qingzhu had already set up.

“With this lamp, illuminate your Dao path. Now, break through.”

Under the online gaze of tens of thousands of people, the young man skeptically held the Guiding Lamp.

The wick ignited without fire, and a soft yet incredibly pure golden light instantly enveloped him.

The young man’s body trembled violently. He could clearly “see” that his Qi Sea, which had troubled him for several years and was tangled like a mess, was now illuminated with unparalleled clarity by the golden light. Every pass, every path, was clearer than ever before!

“Ah—!”

He let out a long-suppressed roar, and the energy within him surged, breaking through that seemingly impregnable bottleneck with unstoppable force!

A powerful aura erupted from him, sweeping in all directions.

He broke through!

Feeling the surging new power within him, the young man could no longer control his emotions, and with tears streaming down his face, he choked out to the camera: “This… this is the true Dao! This is the true Dao!”

The video went viral!

The entire extraordinary community was shaken.

The counterfeit market meticulously built by the Under Heaven Society, in the face of this irrefutable miracle, collapsed instantly like a sandcastle shattered by a giant wave.

Their “Hundred Talisman Plan” was completely aborted.

In a remote underground secret chamber, Yan Jiuzhang stared intently at the young man’s tear-stained face on the screen, his eyes bloodshot.

“Bang!”

He slammed his fist on the stone table in front of him. The hard stone table instantly cracked and shattered with a bang.

“He’s not selling talismans…” Yan Jiuzhang’s voice was squeezed out from between his teeth, carrying a hint of fear and disbelief, “He’s… building a temple!”

He was gathering people's hearts and accumulating faith!

Late at night, the clamor subsided, and the stall stood quietly at the empty street corner.

On the tattered cloth, which had absorbed tens of thousands of points of Aspiration, golden light shimmered faintly, and a new line of ancient seal characters slowly emerged:

“The Market is formed by Faith, the Law is born from the Heart.”

Zhang Xuanyi sat cross-legged in front of the cloth, gazing up at the starry sky, a faint smile playing on his lips as he murmured to himself: “Yan Jiuzhang, you are wrong. You sell pieces of paper that explode, while I sell the trust in the ‘True Dao’ in everyone’s hearts. What if you have a hundred thousand pieces of waste paper? I have ten thousand points of Aspiration from the hearts of the people—this game, you were destined to lose from the very beginning.”

No sooner had he finished speaking than the tattered cloth suddenly moved without wind, one corner abruptly curling up, pointing straight towards the distant north.

【Warning! Large-scale, high-purity Aspiration fluctuations detected in the northern region!】

【Fluctuation source analysis in progress… Suspected sub-node of ‘Wan Fa Dao Market’ is awakening!】

Zhang Xuanyi’s pupils suddenly contracted, and he slowly narrowed his eyes, looking towards the deep northern night sky.

“So… I’m not the only one.”

The stall was quiet in the night, golden light shimmering faintly.

Zhang Xuanyi sat cross-legged in front of the cloth, the smile on his face slowly receding, replaced by an unprecedented solemnity and contemplation.

The northern night seemed deeper than ever.