The Taoist master's words made Dai Lao Ye grow even more anxious. If even the Taoist master couldn't break the formation, things seemed grim.

"Why not?" Dai Lao Ye asked, his voice tinged with desperation. "Is this formation so powerful that even you cannot break it?"

The Taoist master shook his head. "No, I cannot. This is a death loop. It cannot be undone."

"A death loop? What do you mean?" Dai Lao Ye pressed.

The Taoist master pointed toward the coffin. "First, there’s the matter of the corpse. This coffin cannot be moved; if it is, the corpse will undergo a transformation into a zombie. The moment the body shifts, the corpse qi will spill out, causing the entire graveyard of corpses to rise as zombies. At that point, even with all of us here, we wouldn't be able to capture them all in time."

Dai Lao Ye’s face paled. He wasn’t sure if he was more scared of the rising zombies or the fact that there was no way to fix the situation.

The Taoist master continued, "Even if we could somehow control the zombies, the body still cannot be properly buried again. It would need to be cremated, and that would serve no purpose. However, if we don't move the coffin, the Feng Shui cannot be restructured. The dragon vein has already been destroyed, and without fixing it, the Seven Killing Formation cannot be broken. It’s a vicious cycle."

Chen Bing, the blind fortune-teller, nodded his agreement. The other practitioners exchanged murmurs, but none of them had a solution. They were all stumped.

At that moment, I couldn't resist speaking up. "This is nothing. A few tattoos will solve it."

Everyone turned to look at me, their expressions ranging from skepticism to outright mockery. They obviously thought I was joking. After all, if the Taoist master and everyone else were stumped, what could I—a mere youngster—possibly know? I was clearly just here for the spectacle, not to offer solutions.

I kept quiet for a while. There was no rush to reveal my thoughts, and I wasn’t about to start explaining tattoo magic to a room full of seasoned practitioners.

Dai Lao Ye turned to another figure—a small, elderly man dressed in black, his face partially obscured by a conical hat. The man had been silent throughout the discussion. Dai Lao Ye called him Han Lao Han and asked, "Can your corpse-driving technique help us safely remove the bodies without causing a zombie transformation?"

Corpse-driving technique? Was this old man a corpse driver? I’d only ever heard of such people in novels or movies, but surely this was just folklore. In modern society, with all the advanced transportation, who would still rely on a corpse driver? It seemed outdated.

Su Qing, however, had heard of such things. She explained that corpse drivers were rare nowadays, but some old and prestigious families still carried on the tradition. These families could handle the transportation of regular bodies, but it was a different story when dealing with special corpses—those with curses, resentment, or powerful death energy. For such bodies, only a skilled corpse driver would dare to intervene.

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Su Qing recalled a story about a corpse that had been left to rot in the mountains. It was the body of someone who had been killed by a close acquaintance and had a powerful grudge. The corpse had been left to decay for over a month before it was discovered. The body had so much resentment that anyone who tried to transport it would face misfortune. One man, unable to resist the high fee, accepted the job. However, once he loaded the body into his vehicle, the car refused to start. When it finally did, the car seemed unbearably heavy, as though carrying dozens of tons of weight. After several failed attempts with different vehicles, the driver eventually managed to get the car on the road. But soon after, the car crashed, and to his horror, the body in the trunk had sat up during the accident. The driver, terrified, abandoned the body and refused to touch it again. It was only then that a skilled corpse driver was called to properly transport the corpse.

Hearing this, I was intrigued by the old man, Han Lao Han. If he was indeed a skilled corpse driver, he might be able to move the Dai family's ancestor’s body without triggering a transformation into a zombie. If so, the Seven Killing Formation could be broken.

But Han Lao Han shook his head, his expression grave. "It’s no use. This body is not only problematic, but the coffin itself is in the wrong position. It’s upside down."

"Upside down?" Dai Lao Ye was confused.

"Yes," Han Lao Han explained. "Normally, the head of the coffin should face southeast, and the feet should point northwest. But this coffin has been placed with the head facing northwest and the feet facing southeast. On top of that, the corpse itself is already in the early stages of transformation. I cannot move it without triggering the change. This is a cursed body, not a normal one. I cannot perform my technique on it."

Dai Lao Ye, already desperate, seemed even more frustrated. Every option was being shot down. The fate of the entire Dai family was tied to whether or not the Seven Killing Formation could be broken, and without a solution, the family’s future looked bleak.

"I refuse to believe it’s this cursed!" Dai Lao Ye snapped, his frustration mounting. His calm, dignified demeanor was gone, replaced by panic. He motioned for several people to come forward. "Bring the coffin up! I want to see if this is really as bad as you say!"

Against the warnings of the Taoist master and others, Dai Lao Ye ordered the coffin to be moved. He was too desperate to think rationally at that moment.

Eight burly men in suits entered the tomb. Each of them took one side of the coffin and tried to lift it. But as they did, a foul wind filled the air, and the lid of the coffin cracked open slightly.

To everyone’s horror, the ancestor’s eyes snapped open. They were bloodshot, and his long, sharp teeth seemed to breathe out in a ghastly manner. His long, bony fingers twitched slightly.

The eight men froze in place, their faces turning pale as they saw the terrifying sight. They were so scared that they immediately dropped the coffin and took a step back, not daring to continue.

"Master... this... this..." One of the men stammered, his voice shaking.

Dai Lao Ye, now fully aware of the horror before him, was also paralyzed with fear. He could only raise his hand in a helpless gesture. "Let it be," he muttered.

The men, wide-eyed and trembling, scrambled to get away from the coffin. It was clear that the sight of the corpse coming to life had terrified them into submission.

"See, now you believe me," the Taoist master said, his voice cold. "There is nothing that can be done for this body. If it’s not cremated, we will all be in grave danger."

Dai Lao Ye, now pale and defeated, could only nod. "I believe you… but is there no other way? We can’t just burn our ancestors."

The Taoist master sighed, shaking his head. "It’s the only way. If you don’t, the entire family is at risk."

But before anyone could respond, a man dressed in traditional witchcraft attire stepped forward from the back of the room. His presence was quiet but imposing. He looked around, and then spoke.

"I have a way to break this Seven Killing Formation," he said calmly.