The sun was setting outside Huaiyuan Town.
Few people remained on the country road at this hour. Yet at the end of the road stood a group of children, divided into two clearly separated camps.
One child stood half a head taller than his companions and had sharply defined features. He was currently shouting at someone in the opposing group.
“Zhang Daniu, a bet’s a bet, and a loss is a loss. You already lost the last round. If we win this round too, then from now on, whenever you see me in town, all of you have to call me Big Brother! And you’re not allowed to pester Xiaocui anymore!”
The child called Daniu was already broad and powerfully built despite his young age. He snorted upon hearing this.
“Fine, Liang Xiaogou. You only won the last round because you played a trick and got lucky. I won’t go easy on you this time!”
The Liang child’s eyes darted around, and he immediately said, “Your side chose the contest for the last round, so I get to decide this one.”
“How are we competing?”
“We’ll see who can reach the top of Wenliang Mountain first!”
“Deal!”
The moment the words left his mouth, the Liang child shot forward. Daniu stood frozen for a moment before chasing after him while cursing under his breath.
The sky gradually darkened, making the mountain path seem even more secluded.
A child hurried through the forest. He had a straight nose, thin lips, sword-shaped eyebrows, and bright, starry eyes. Despite his young age, he possessed a distinctly clever and mischievous air. He was the child who had made the bet with Daniu earlier, and his name was Liang Yan.
He suddenly stopped and looked at the sky.
“I didn’t expect the contest with Daniu and the others to drag on until this late. If I don’t go back now, Dad will probably start nagging me again.”
Then another thought occurred to him.
“I don’t know when someone tampered with the area around the summit, but anyone who charges up there blindly can only wander in circles. This must be the kind of formation the town teacher once mentioned. I happened to discover a hidden passage that leads directly to the summit, but Daniu doesn’t know the secret. He’s certain to lose to me this time!”
The thought of finally cementing his position as the leader of the town’s children filled Liang Yan with excitement.
“Forget it. I’ll make this quick. Once I reach the summit and give Daniu a good taunting, I’ll hurry home. It shouldn’t delay me for too long. At worst, I’ll just receive a little punishment!”
Having made up his mind, Liang Yan pushed off forcefully and sprinted with his head lowered. He already knew the mountain paths like the back of his hand.
As he ran, he suddenly felt a gentle force meet him. Caught off guard, his foot slipped, and he fell backward onto the ground. When he looked up, a tall figure was already standing before him.
The newcomer wore a tall, stately cap, a long hemp robe, and boots. A hemp rope was tied around his waist, with a shabby cloth pouch hanging from it. His eyes were tightly shut, and his right hand rested upon a tree branch.
He was actually a blind old man.
Liang Yan regained his composure and climbed to his feet.
“I’m sorry, sir. I was careless and accidentally ran into you.”
The old man smiled faintly without becoming angry. Instead, he spoke gently.
“Huaiyuan Town should be just ahead. Are you a child from the town?”
Although his voice was soft, for some reason it gave Liang Yan a reassuring feeling. Liang Yan respectfully answered, “You guessed correctly, sir. I live in the town.”
The old man stroked his chin.
“It’s already so late, yet you’re still running up the mountain. You must have something important to do. There’s no need for a young man like you to worry about an old man like me. Go take care of your own business.”
Liang Yan hesitantly looked at the branch in the old man’s hand.
As if sensing this, the old man continued, “There’s no need to worry, little one. I’ve spent many years traveling with only this branch to guide me. I certainly won’t lose my way.”
Liang Yan looked at him in astonishment.
From the moment they met, Liang Yan had felt that although the old man’s eyes had remained tightly shut, it was as though he could see through every part of him. The feeling was truly strange, and it caused Liang Yan to become wary.
“In that case, I’ll be going ahead. The mountain path is rugged, so please be careful.”
Imitating the traveling merchants in town, Liang Yan cupped his hands in salute before turning and hurrying toward the summit.
Wenliang Mountain was not particularly tall. At most, it could only be considered a small hill. However, the old man had delayed Liang Yan halfway up, and the inexplicable unease in his heart had slowed him further. By the time he reached the entrance of the hidden passage he remembered, the moon was already high in the sky.
“This should be the place.”
Liang Yan pulled aside the plants covering the entrance, only to freeze.
The passage had been completely blocked by a pile of rubble.
“What happened here? This is terrible! Doesn’t this mean all my effort was for nothing?”
After all, he was only around ten years old. He had spent the entire day thinking about this contest and had believed victory was already within his grasp. Yet now, he could no longer win.
An immense sense of disappointment welled up inside him. He wandered around in a daze, unaware of how much time had passed. By the time he came back to his senses, he had somehow reached the summit.
“Huh? Why didn’t the formation obstruct me today? How did I somehow walk all the way up here?”
Filled with doubts, Liang Yan made a circuit around the summit before looking up at the sky.
“Daniu still hasn’t arrived, even though it’s this late. He must have given up. It looks like I won after all! Hmm, I’d better hurry home too, or Dad will definitely nag me for ages.”
When he realized that he had ultimately emerged victorious from today’s contest, the frustration in his heart immediately disappeared. He took long strides down the mountain.
The moon was bright, and only a few stars dotted the night sky. Beneath it, Huaiyuan Town seemed especially quiet tonight.
Not a single sound could be heard from the empty streets. Normally, the residents of Huaiyuan Town would not have gone to sleep this early. Yet now, not only were there no residents to be seen, but there was not even a single horse or farm animal anywhere.
A quiet sigh suddenly came from the roof of an ordinary house.
“Hmph. We haven’t met in many years, but I never expected Junior Brother He’s methods to have grown even more despicable.”
The remark came without warning, and no one responded.
The speaker was an old man wearing a tall cap. He sat cross-legged on the roof with his eyes tightly closed, looking like an old monk deep in meditation. If Liang Yan had been there, he would have immediately recognized him as the old man he had encountered on the mountain path.
At that moment, a burly man rushed out from the end of the street. He was tall and powerfully built, dressed in a short hemp shirt, with a shovel strapped across his back. He looked like an ordinary farmer.
The strangest thing was that his eyes were vacant, his pupils rolled upward, and the corner of his mouth hung crookedly. He wore the unmistakable expression of someone without his wits.
Although the man appeared mindless, his steps were remarkably fast. In the blink of an eye, he had reached the house where the old man sat. He leaped into the air, pulled the shovel from his back, and swung it directly at the old man’s face.
Despite the man’s ferocious charge, the old man neither dodged nor retreated. He remained seated cross-legged and merely flicked the middle finger of his right hand.
A spark of fire shot through the night toward the burly man.
There was a muffled pop as the spark entered his body. The man continued advancing, but several muffled explosions suddenly sounded from within him. In the blink of an eye, three holes had been blasted open across his body.
Strangely, not a single drop of blood sprayed from those holes.
Instead, the man shriveled like a ball losing its air. An emerald-green vine grew from each of the three holes, creeping along the wall of the house and extending toward the roof.
The old man frowned slightly and swept his left sleeve outward.
A faint wall of fire spread in all directions. The vines immediately began sizzling upon touching it before dissolving into a thin mist.
Just then, another unexpected change occurred.
The roof beneath the old man suddenly exploded, and two streaks of sword light shot upward at him. At the same time, several farmers rushed out of the nearby houses. Some wielded swords, while others carried iron staves.
Without exception, they all wore vacant, witless expressions. Yet their movements were so fast that they could barely be seen.
The old man’s frown deepened. His entire body soared into the sky as his right hand rapidly formed seals and he muttered an incantation.
Dozens of short blades shot from his sleeve, striking the surrounding farmers with flawless accuracy.
Just like the first man, these farmers were struck by several blades while in midair, yet no ordinary blood flowed from their wounds. Instead, several vines shot from their injuries and raced toward the old man.
The old man appeared quite wary. His expression became solemn as he drew a circle before himself with his left hand while his right continued forming seals.
A great bell of flame materialized around his body. All manner of ancient inscriptions had been carved across the bell in fire, and a vast, majestic aura radiated from it.
The moment the great bell appeared, it descended around the old man and enclosed him inside. As soon as the incoming vines touched the flaming bell, they dissolved into thick black smoke and vanished.
A quiet laugh suddenly sounded.
“The Fire God Bell is one of our sect’s Eight Secret Arts. Once cultivated to Great Completion, all evil retreats before it and demons scatter. I wonder how far Senior Brother Yan has cultivated it?”
“Hmph! If Junior Brother He wishes to know what level this Yan’s divine abilities have reached, you need only experience them yourself. However, I never expected that you, the distinguished He Muqing, would set up this Yi Wood Soul-Binding Grand Formation merely to evade my pursuit. Although this formation was created by an illustrious senior of our sect, it requires living people to serve as its catalysts and incurs grave karmic sin. The newly appointed Sect Master has explicitly forbidden its use and classified it as one of the sect’s forbidden arts. I never imagined you would become so utterly deranged. Now that the Yi Wood Soul-Binding Formation is complete, the more than three hundred innocent mortals in this town must have already fallen victim to you!”
His words were righteous and forceful, but the hidden man burst into laughter.
His laughter was wild and deranged, as though he had just heard the funniest joke in the world.
“Blind Yan! You’re still putting on that act in front of me? Let’s not mince words. If I died and my Dao was extinguished today, and the item fell into your hands, not a single person in this town would survive. With your methods, would you ever let a mortal who might leak the news escape? Since that’s the case, they might as well be put to use by me.”
Blind Yan frowned slightly, but his divine sense had already spread out silently, seemingly searching for something.
“Junior Brother, stop spouting nonsense. Surrender obediently and return to the sect with me to confess your crimes. Perhaps you may still obtain the Sect Master’s mercy and be granted a slim chance to live.”
“Hmph. Others might not know what sort of man you are, but how could I not know?” the hidden man said coldly. “Back then, Eldest Senior Brother and Senior Sister Liu were both extraordinary prodigies, yet you forced both of them to their deaths!”
Blind Yan snorted.
“They were arrogant and reckless, and they chose their friends poorly. In the end, they fell into the demonic path! I acted only because I had no other choice.”
“Hahaha! What a fine ‘no other choice.’ It sounds pleasant enough, but it was nothing more than murdering others and seizing their treasures, just like what you’re doing now! You’ve been lingering around the summit of Wenliang Mountain for days. You secretly used the sect’s treasured Heart-Inquiring Mirror to plant a trace of qi on my body so I couldn’t slip away. Did you truly think I didn’t know? But you never imagined that not only would I refuse to flee, but I would instead set up the Yi Wood Soul-Binding Formation in this town and kill you here! Hahaha!”
Blind Yan sighed.
“So there is truly nothing left to discuss.”
The final word had only just left his mouth when Blind Yan suddenly attacked with lightning speed.
A streak of fiery-red light shot toward a large water vat inside an old house at the corner of the street. With a resounding clang, a green-robed, middle-aged man tumbled awkwardly out of the vat.
This man was naturally the so-called “Junior Brother He,” He Muqing.
He was tall and thin, with hawkish eyes and a broad nose. Flames covered his body, and his face was filled with alarm.
His hands repeatedly formed seals as green light coursed around his body. His skin turned the blue-green color of wood, and ancient inscriptions faintly appeared across it as he attempted to resist the flames surrounding him.
Unfortunately, the flames clung to him like maggots burrowing into bone. No matter what the middle-aged man tried, he could not extinguish them.
Blind Yan had already flown above He Muqing. He muttered an incantation before opening his mouth and spitting.
Four ancient fire nails shot from his mouth, firmly pinning He Muqing’s limbs to the ground.
Only then did Blind Yan smile faintly.
“Junior Brother, you were too overconfident. Your Qiuniu Wooden Armor has only reached Lesser Mastery. How could it possibly withstand my Fire Wolf Venom?”
As he spoke, he stroked his chin and revealed a trace of smugness.
Victory was now within his grasp. He was about to descend and search He Muqing’s soul for the sect’s supreme treasure when another unexpected change suddenly occurred.
He Muqing’s body, which lay on the ground, rapidly collapsed like a deflating ball. In the blink of an eye, nothing remained but a layer of skin lying flat against the ground.
Large numbers of vines grew from his body. Each was as thick as a child’s arm. They surged into the sky and formed a wooden cage, trapping Blind Yan securely inside.
Blind Yan felt the spiritual power within him become as sluggish as though it were moving through a swamp. He could not bring out even five percent of his magical abilities!
At the same time, a deafening rumble came from beneath the ground.
The earth collapsed at eight points throughout the town. Eight wooden pillars as thick as water vats rose from below, vaguely forming a profound restriction.
Immediately afterward, the roofs of the houses throughout the town exploded one after another. More than three hundred townspeople all flew into the sky.
Every one of them wore a vacant expression. Their hands formed strange seals before they opened their mouths and spat.
More than three hundred vines shot toward Blind Yan, who was trapped within the wooden cage.
The vines were as black as ink and emitted waves of nauseating stench. After expelling them, the townspeople’s bodies rapidly withered. They became like dried corpses and fell from the sky, not a trace of life remaining within them.
Trapped within the formation, Blind Yan felt an overwhelming corrosive force surround him. It devoured his flesh bit by bit, and even with his cultivation, he could not withstand it.
Even worse, his divine sense also seemed to have been affected. His thoughts grew slower and slower.
Just before he completely lost consciousness, his left hand discreetly brushed against the shabby cloth pouch at his waist.
A moment later, he went completely still and plummeted toward the ground.
Green light flashed below, and a green-robed, middle-aged man emerged from beneath the earth. He looked at Blind Yan’s corpse and chuckled.
“Senior Brother, you repeatedly spoke to me only because you wanted to determine where I was hiding within the grand formation, didn’t you? Unfortunately, despite all your calculations, you never discovered that I had already refined an external incarnation. I hid it here precisely to lure you into the grand formation’s certain-death position! Hahaha!”
The thought that Blind Yan was now dead and that the sect had lost the trail it needed to investigate him filled He Muqing with delight.
From this moment onward, the world would be wide open to him.
He raised a hand to take Blind Yan’s storage pouch, but suddenly felt all the spiritual power in his body constrict. It then poured uncontrollably into the ground beneath his feet.
He Muqing was horrified. His instincts told him to execute an escape art and shoot into the sky, but his feet felt as though they had been filled with lead. He could not lift them from the ground at all.
His divine sense swept downward.
Beneath the soles of his feet, several fiery-red spiders had burrowed half their heads into his flesh. The spiders were linked from head to tail, forming a single line. At the other end of that line lay Blind Yan.
He Muqing’s spiritual power drained away in an instant. Immediately afterward, his vitality also began disappearing at a terrifying speed.
His eyes bulged as he muttered only a single phrase.
“Netherworld Fire Spiders…”
He then toppled to the ground.
As He Muqing’s vitality rapidly disappeared, Blind Yan’s deathly pale face gradually regained a healthy color. His life force slowly returned, and at last, he climbed unsteadily to his feet.
Although the magical battle between the two had lasted only a few moments, it had been filled with deception and deadly danger. Yet in the end, the blind old man was the one who had the last laugh.
He brushed the dust from his body and lowered his head to look at He Muqing’s corpse.
“Ever since I obtained these Netherworld Fire Spiders, I have always regarded them as my greatest trump card. I never imagined the first person I would use them on would be my own Junior Brother. Fate truly toys with men.”
He then placed one hand on He Muqing’s head.
Black light appeared as he performed a soul-searching technique.
A moment later, his expression shifted. He turned toward an utterly ordinary house near the entrance to the town and muttered to himself.
“So that’s where it was.”