Quadruple split.

Chapter 2724 Interlude: Mood
As is widely known, spiritual mediums and Onmyoji are essentially the same thing. In fact, the most powerful Onmyoji family in the modern era, the Gu family, was originally a spiritual medium family that couldn't make a living in the country back then.

As for the Yi family, to which Yi Dong belongs, they have always insisted on making a living in China, but they haven't been able to do it for long. As a result, by the time of his parents' generation, compared to the Gu family, who became rich and powerful after "going into business" as Onmyoji and built high-rise buildings all over Japan, the Yi family only had Yi Dong's father and Yi Dong's great-grandfather left.

Given that the upstream market is dominated by a bunch of marginalized people, and he himself is too embarrassed to admit his grudges against them, and that there are a lot of professional teams in the downstream market who know nothing but are actually more reliable than him when it comes to funerals, and that his family is so poor that they can hardly afford to raise their grandson, Yi Dong's great-grandfather, as soon as he heard that there was a girl in the Gu family who was quite ugly when she was young but grew up to be a beautiful young lady, decided to find a good match for his grandson... that is, Yi Dong's father.

After all, these two seem like a match made in heaven!

On the bright side, they are well-matched (?), both being prominent families in the spiritual medium world back then. If the two children can get along well and grow old together, then their grandson will have a long-term meal ticket. After all, judging from the Gu family's foundation, even if Yi Dong's father squandered the family fortune to death, it probably wouldn't be enough to cripple them.

Moreover, in the old man's eyes, his silly grandson who was obsessed with anime girls was not worthy of being called a "spendthrift," and no one would even bother to scam him.

On the other hand, if the two children don't get along, the old man hopes they can date for a while. In that case, the breakup fee from the Gu family alone would probably be enough for the two of them to live comfortably for the rest of their lives. If they go a step further and get married first and then divorced, the benefits would be even greater!

However, as a young person of the new era, especially one who was obsessed with ANGC culture, Yi Dong's father was very dissatisfied with this idea. However, firstly, because the other party was his grandfather who had raised him since childhood, and secondly, because his grandfather threatened him with his collection of figurines in his hometown, he finally had no choice but to agree to meet Miss Gu during the school trip, complete his grandfather's task as soon as possible, and then never see her again.

To prevent any unforeseen circumstances (that ugly little girl he remembered actually fell for him), Yi's father, who was handsome back then and still is now, even made extra preparations. He bribed a classmate with unfathomable morals to become his accomplice, determined to disrupt that ridiculous "forced marriage," even at the risk of offending the Gu family.

Then, on the afternoon of the first day of his school trip, just a few hours before he was to meet that young lady, Yi's father took a break from his busy schedule to visit an exhibition and met a cosplayer who played a rather obscure character, but whom Yi's father himself really liked.

What happened next was rather predictable. In short, when Yi's father reluctantly parted ways with the other person and returned to the hotel to drop off his luggage before heading to the appointment, he discovered that the young lady he was supposed to meet was the same cosplayer he had met at the convention that day.

Then, he immediately killed the friend who had come to cause trouble as promised, and then had dinner with him rather shyly. The conversation continued from the daytime topic to the school's late return time, until he was finally dragged back by his class monitor, who is also the current largest board member of Tanhua University.

And then... there was an accident, fighting monsters, a damsel in distress rescuing a hero, a hero rescuing a damsel in distress, fighting monsters again, returning home, falling in love, transferring schools, dating again, saving the world, having a baby, sending the baby to an orphanage, and the baby meeting Mo Tan and going astray from then on.

Getting back to the main point, as we just mentioned, spiritual mediums and Onmyoji are actually the same thing.

Admittedly, after a long period of time, Onmyoji, which has been localized overseas, has developed a new school of thought based on spirit mediums, but different from spirit mediums. However, in the final analysis, the underlying logic of the two is still very similar, and the method of "possession and fusion" is very basic and important for both spirit mediums and Onmyoji.

The core concept of [Possession and Fusion] is to attach a 'spirit' to oneself. However, due to the great differences between the existence of humans and spirits, in most cases, this ability must be used in conjunction with the method of [Super Spirit].

The so-called "super spirit body" is the transformation of a "spirit body" into a more stable, more suitable for the present world, and more compatible with the caster's existence. Whether it is a "spirit body" summoned by a medium or a "shikigami" controlled by an onmyoji, they can usually complete the super spirit body transformation instantly.

However, there are exceptions. The "spirit spirit" mentioned by mediums and the "servant spirit" mentioned by Onmyoji are special beings that originate entirely from the user and do not require a transformation process. They are always in a "super spirit" state. However, despite having such a convenient form of existence, the difficulty and risk of the caster to "possess and merge" with their own spirit spirit/shikigami are the greatest.

The reason is simple—the controllability is too low.

It's important to understand that, under normal circumstances, whether it's a medium and a spirit, or an onmyoji and a shikigami, they would all use methods to ensure safety when establishing a connection. No matter how much trust they have in each other, this process is unavoidable.

After all, in many cases, even if those spirits and shikigami do not have any intention to harm, their various characteristics can still put a great burden on the human body. Therefore, when they establish a connection with the caster, they will also establish a kind of insurance contract, which can be long-term, short-term, or one-time.

However, the natal spirit and the servant spirit are different. Because their existence is a reflection of the caster in some form, not only is the compatibility at its maximum, but the authority is also at its maximum. And the words 'self-restraint' and 'no restraint' often mean the same thing.

On this basis, there is another troublesome problem: although there is no clear data to support it, in general, the initial affinity between the spirit medium and the servant spirit and the onmyoji is very low, or even... negative.

To put it more bluntly, the witch's vicious attitude towards Gu Xiaole, who kept telling him to "go to hell," was not an isolated case, but rather a very common one.

The reason is simple: whether it's a samurai spirit or a spirit of one's own destiny, they can all be regarded as the 'other side' of the original body. As we all know, this so-called 'other side' is generally not very compatible with the original body. After all, if it is a side recognized by the original body, it would not be the 'other' side that is usually hidden away.

For example, imagine a gentleman with impeccable character who has a strong liking for beautiful young women. Out of politeness and morality, he would naturally suppress his lust, one of the seven deadly sins, and always remain polite, restrained, and avoid eye contact. He would not only refrain from actively trying to strike up a conversation with beautiful young women, but he would also avoid browsing websites with age restrictions.

Clearly, based on his moral standards, neither casually striking up conversations with pretty girls nor browsing certain websites is right.

To put it simply, he clearly 'disagrees' with certain of his own traits.

The so-called natal spirits and servant spirits have a large number of elements that are not recognized by the original body, and correspondingly, they do not recognize their own original body.

It is worth mentioning here that mutual disagreement does not mean that the two are "opposite". In fact, whether it is the natal spirit or the servant spirit, the compatibility and affinity with the original body is actually ridiculously high. After all, they are just "the other side", not "the opposite side".

However, in any case, the fact that the spirits and natal spirits are too strong and they are very unhappy with you is an obstacle that almost every medium and onmyoji cannot avoid. As far as Gu Xiaole knows, in the past few hundred years, only his own aunt, Gu Yanyue, Yi Dong's biological mother, has been able to get along well with his own spirits from the start.

Gu Xiaole was clearly not so lucky. His relationship with Samurai Soul was very strained from beginning to end. Although it was a one-sided strain, it was still quite strained.

So, given this strained relationship, what consequences would the [Possession and Fusion] ability lead to?

The answer is actually very simple, very straightforward—death. Yes, death.

Whether in reality or in a game, completely merging one's body and mind with a spirit that harbors immense hostility towards oneself, whose power is both bizarre and compatible with oneself, basically only leads to two possible outcomes: either being played to death or being played to death after being broken.

Remember the last time Gu Xiaole possessed and merged with Samurai Spirit? It was during the "Debate on Guilt - Individual Battle" when he encountered that fringe person named Bai Mo who was good at feng shui. At that time, the location where the two met was an environment that was extremely unfriendly to Gu Xiaole in terms of feng shui, such as "no mountains and marshes, reverse thunder and wind, water overcoming fire, and nine yang shining together". In addition, Bai Mo himself was the kind of person who was good at "sealing" and "suppressing". Gu Xiaole dared to play the possession and fusion game with Samurai Spirit.

It must be said that merging with her own spirit did allow Gu Xiaole to reach a higher level while fully unleashing her own strength, making it her strongest combat state. However, the consequences were indeed disastrous. Even in that extreme environment, Gu Xiaole was unable to regain control of her body for even a second.

After that, although Gu Xiaole, who was forcibly transformed into a ghost witch, defeated her opponent in just two moves, she almost lost her life due to the excessive use of her body by the spirit... such as trying to tilt her head 180 degrees. In fact, if that young feng shui master had been able to withstand a few more moves, the spirit might have broken Gu Xiaole's neck.

Without a doubt, it was a failed experiment.

Gu Xiaole's biggest gain was confirming that even when suppressed and weakened, the reckless spirit could still maintain dominance throughout the [possession and fusion] process. Since Gu Xiaole had actively released his body and mind, it was almost impossible for him to regain control of himself under the resistance of the spirit.

Therefore, any idea of ​​ignoring the spirit's wishes and forcing her to cooperate can be completely ruled out. Although Gu Xiaole didn't think it would work in the first place, it's actually quite good to be able to give up completely.

Thinking about it carefully, Gu Xiaole didn't die in reality or in the game. In fact, he even won the game, which paved the way for him to get the limited edition figurine that Da Hua Qian Niu bought. Although he might have died if he had played a little longer, he was still fine in the end.

For a long time after that, Gu Xiaole almost gave up the idea of ​​getting rid of his own servant spirit as soon as possible. After all, getting along well with the latter was a bonus for an Onmyoji, and even if the risk of [possession and fusion] was a bit high, he could still call it out to help in daily battles.

After all, while the Samurai Spirits at that stage harbored hostility towards Gu Xiaole, they also held the same hostility towards all beings equally.

But then things changed.

Just when Gu Xiaole's appeasement tactics were making almost no progress, Samurai Spirits intervened without warning in the sparring match between Mo Tan and Jadka, and showed a very, very, very obvious liking for the former!

After that, when Gu Xiaole herself realized certain things, she and the servant spirit became more and more compatible. Most importantly, although it was a bit embarrassing to say, when she realized that she could use Mo Tan to control her servant spirit... the positions of both sides suddenly reversed dramatically!

So this time, Gu Xiaole made a very bold decision.

Even though she could be killed if things went wrong, she still resolutely decided to possess and merge with Samurai Spirit in this competition!
On the one hand, she only has a chance of winning when she is at her strongest.

On the other hand, she is very clear that only by becoming stronger can she do what she wants to do, and she also knows that what she wants to do now is what Samurai wants to do as well, and Samurai himself is also well aware of this.

and so--

Even if it's just to make him happy~

Gu Xiaole took a deep breath, pulled out a paper figure from her sleeve—it was jet black, wrapped with numerous red ropes, and exuded an ominous aura—and slowly pressed it to her forehead, murmuring softly, "You have to help me too."

Go to hell.

Just as that cold yet not unpleasant aura instantly seeped into his limbs and bones, making Gu Xiaole feel as if he were in the deepest part of a boundless cold pool, the icy voice of the servant spirit resounded in his mind at the same time.

That wasn't for you, it was for...

After a brief silence, Samurai Spirits' voice rang out again, but it was interrupted by Gu Xiaole's light laughter, whose eyes had turned a deep blue.

"Don't be so arrogant."

The girl slowly raised her head, her free left hand gently clenching, summoning the signature black gohei of the samurai spirit, the "Image Matsuri," from the void. However, unlike her previous possession and fusion, her attire did not transform into a shrine maiden's robes; her expression was serene, her tone peaceful—

"You don't actually think that my feelings are inferior to anyone else's, including yours, do you?"

The next instant, countless eerie blue fireflies silently emerged from the air—

【Ghostly Technique: Wabi-sabi - Death Binding Killing Formation】

Chapter 2715: The End

(End of this chapter)