Chapter 679: New Life

Forcing Wang Shi to divide his attention to help me control the Ten Directions Ghost Refining Grand Formation was born of desperation. I knew perfectly well that my position was incredibly passive. Unless the situation shifted drastically, I was already facing a slow, agonizing death.

With the grand array sealing the mountain, cultivators from the Five Great Upper Sects completely surrounded the Three Yin Sect. With the scorching sun high above, I might not be able to slip away even with the Human Skin Mask. I didn't have many options left; I could only do everything in my power to stall for time.

Deep within the earth veins, Wang Shi finally heard my voice. Inside the talisman order, previously dim points of light flared to life. Combined with the ones I had already activated, a full ninety percent of the talisman patterns were now illuminated.

I rushed out of the earth veins and stood outside the main hall. "Just ten percent more!"

Plunging my consciousness into the talisman order, I desperately urged on the points of light representing the talismans, hoping they would unleash their power. But no matter how hard I tried, the final ten percent refused to activate.

Pushing my consciousness beyond its limits left me with a splitting headache, yet the situation continued to deteriorate.

By harnessing Jiangcheng's feng shui, Ye Qingqiu had already solidified his overwhelming momentum. Fighting him was equivalent to fighting the entire ancient city.

Within the Ten Directions Ghost Refining Grand Formation, the area shrouded by malevolent yin energy steadily shrank. The vegetation on the outermost edges of the Daoist temple was already exposed to the sun. Swept by the golden light, dead trees that hadn't seen the sun in decades actually emitted sounds like wailing children. Their bark split open to reveal finger-sized wormholes beneath.

Similar scenes played out all around the Three Yin Sect. It looked like the end of the world; wherever the golden light swept past, all evil entities fled into hiding.

The array deployed by the Five Great Upper Sects held terrifying power. In comparison, the Ten Directions Ghost Refining Grand Formation, which could only muster ninety percent of its strength, paled into insignificance.

Sunlight pierced the dark clouds, directly reducing most of the outer ghosts to ash. Venomous snakes fled frantically through the mountain forest in staggering numbers. Even I, the de facto master of the Three Yin Sect, felt my scalp go numb at the sight.

Snakes were cold-blooded and preferred damp, frigid environments, which made the Three Yin Sect a massive serpent's den.

Ordinary ghosts couldn't cause any trouble for the sect cultivators, but this frenzied swarm of snakes gave me an unexpected surprise.

Ye Qingqiu's grand array could obliterate countless fierce ghosts and evil entities, but it had little effect on the venomous snakes living around Henshan.

Now completely terrified, the snakes abandoned their hiding spots and fled blindly in every direction.

The Celestial Masters of the upper sects only frowned slightly at the sight, but the sect disciples surrounding Henshan suffered miserably.

To put it bluntly, those junior disciples were still mortals of flesh and blood; a venomous snake bite would kill them just the same.

Unable to evade the surging wave of snakes, quite a few disciples suffered venomous bites.

The snakes living around the Three Yin Sect weren't ordinary venomous reptiles. They had been meticulously bred and raised by the disciples of the Snake Lord Lineage. Some possessed such bizarre toxins that a mere scratch could be fatal.

This sudden swarm of snakes was something no one had anticipated. In the blink of an eye, many sect disciples guarding the perimeter of Henshan collapsed. However, since they were merely guarding the array flags and weren't actively participating in the Ten Directions Annihilation Grand Formation, this didn't significantly impact the array. The golden light continued to illuminate the ten directions, completely unrivaled.

"The snakes are hurting people. These junior disciples might lose their lives. I'll go bring them down." For whatever reason, Elder Chen made an excuse and prepared to leave.

"With all our fellow Daoists here, there shouldn't be any issue. Let me accompany you." A scrawny old man broke into a wide grin. Without waiting to see if Elder Chen agreed, he stepped forward to join him.

"That works. The Dream Dao focuses on mental cultivation; it really isn't too effective against these snakes," Elder Chen replied naturally, walking along the foot of the mountain to help the injured disciples down. Meanwhile, the scrawny old man assisted by shaking a bell in his hand. Whenever the ringing echoed, the lurking venomous snakes and ghosts immediately steered clear.

The two men led a group of injured disciples down the mountain. Eventually, due to the sheer number of venomous snakes, the Celestial Masters made a spur-of-the-moment decision to withdraw all the sect disciples to prevent further casualties.

"Quite confident, aren't they? Do they really think they can just crush me at will?" To the Celestial Masters, as long as the Ten Directions Annihilation Grand Formation remained intact, I had absolutely no chance of escaping. Therefore, there was no need to force their junior disciples to risk their lives guarding the perimeter.

Even operating at ninety percent capacity, the Ten Directions Ghost Refining Grand Formation was still suppressed by Ye Qingqiu's array. The golden light steadily gnawed away at it, forcing the malevolent yin energy to retreat step by step until it could barely protect the edges of the Daoist temple.

Dark clouds gathered overhead. The malevolent yin energy stagnated here, with no way to unleash its power.

I was only ten percent away from fully controlling the Ten Directions Ghost Refining Grand Formation, but that ten percent made all the difference in the world.

"I need one more person to help me! Just one person to help me unleash the grand array's full power!" When I had inspected the Three Yin Sect, I saw buildings sealed with talisman strips. On the surface, they looked no different from ordinary side quarters, but for a massive Ghost Cultivator sect like the Three Yin Sect to use seals for suppression, it was certain that whatever resided inside those rooms was incredibly terrifying. And the most crucial part of the Ten Directions Ghost Refining Grand Formation was deeply connected to them.

I tried with everything I had to manipulate more talisman points. My head felt like it was splitting apart, but I still fell just short.

"You little thief, Gao Jian! You provoked the Five Great Upper Sects, murdered sect disciples, and showed blatant disregard for the law! You are completely out of your mind! Surrender at once!" The Jinshan Sect's Daoist Administrator seemed to notice my fatigue and the fact that the Ten Directions Ghost Refining Grand Formation was constantly suppressed. He forced down his fury, though his bloodshot eyes overflowed with murderous intent.

Beside him, Daoist Priest Mei shook his head when he heard Xu Yinglong's words. Stepping forward, he blocked Xu Yinglong and called out toward the Daoist temple: "Gao Jian, my disciple once tried to clear your name, claiming you weren't the murderer. But his words were ambiguous and hard to believe. If you really are being falsely accused, I hope you will step out of your own accord so we can talk."

"Yes, we can talk." The words completely changed flavor when they came out of Xu Yinglong's mouth. His tone made it painfully obvious that he was just waiting to settle the score. He probably wouldn't be satisfied until he had skinned me alive and ripped out my tendons.

"Talk? I don't see any need for that." Giving a cold sneer, I ignored the Celestial Masters and focused entirely on activating the talisman order.

In truth, the fact that I had held out this long had already exceeded everyone's expectations, including my own.

My original plan was to flee into Henshan the moment Wang Shi finished refining the Yang Talisman at noon, but it was already afternoon.

"Stubborn fool. It seems you're refusing to give up until reaching the Yellow River." Ye Qingqiu stood atop the ritual altar, looking down from on high as he began chanting the final incantation.

The moment he chanted the true mantra, the winds surged and the clouds roiled within eighteen li of the Three Yin Sect's Daoist temple, and the yang qi boiled over.

What was even more terrifying was the surging river and howling mountain winds. By drawing upon Jiangcheng's feng shui layout, the Ten Directions Annihilation Grand Formation merged the power of the mountains and rivers. Even before unleashing its full might, it was already on the verge of shattering the Three Yin Sect's Sect-Protecting Grand Formation!

Sweat beaded on my forehead as I felt immense pressure. The malevolent yin energy had already been forced entirely back into the Daoist temple.

'What do I do?'

"I'm only missing the last ten percent. I need someone to share the burden."

"Just the final ten percent!"

Gritting my teeth, I held on, standing entirely alone in front of the main hall's doors. The dark clouds above refused to scatter. The situation was critical, yet there was no one who could lend me a hand.

Looking up, everywhere I looked was an enemy, and the people beside me couldn't be trusted either.

A strange thought suddenly rose in my mind. 'Why?'

It seemed like I was always walking my path alone. I thought back to the Mirror Fragment I had brought out from the Dream Realm—a mirror capable of reflecting every person and object, yet utterly incapable of reflecting my own face.

Bitterness washed through my heart. The sheer power of the sect filled me with a deep sense of powerlessness.

This emotion was like a single drop of water falling onto a tranquil lake; the indescribable loneliness and pain suppressed at the bottom of my heart slowly welled up.

Ye Qingqiu's incantation was nearing its end. It seemed the only thing I could do was grit my teeth, hold on, and wait for the grand array to be destroyed.

Logic told me that my hopes of survival were growing slimmer by the second.

My mind was in absolute turmoil. No one could help me, but strangely enough, right at that moment, a unique sensation pulsed from somewhere inside my body.

It felt as if someone was gently stroking my back, offering me a sliver of comfort at the most critical juncture.

'That couldn't be an illusion, right?' I thought. With all my attention completely locked onto the Ten Directions Talisman Order, I couldn't afford to get distracted. I just felt like something inside me was awakening.

The Pre-Heaven True Qi nourished my internal organs. When it passed through the Kidney Aperture, I finally noticed a trace of something abnormal.

"The Kidney Aperture?" Before I could even finish my sentence, the black cloth draping the shrine inside the Three Yin Sect's main hall suddenly fell without any warning.

By the time I turned to look, the corpse of the three-eyed infant that had been sitting in the very center of the shrine crumbled to ash. As its corpse dust drifted over the oil lamp in the middle—the same lamp I hadn't been able to light with mundane fire no matter how hard I tried—a flickering cluster of ghostly flame unexpectedly flared to life on the wick!

'The lamp lit up? Has the fortune of the Three Yin Sect's Ghost Infant Lineage returned? No, that's not right.' A sudden thought struck me. 'The Three Yin Sect built the Qicun Maternity and Children’s Health Center and plotted against Ye Bing all to obtain a Shura Ghost Infant—something similar to the dried corpse they enshrined here. Now that the corpse has inexplicably turned to ash, doesn't that mean a new Shura Ghost Infant has been born into the world?'

Right alongside that thought, an incredibly concentrated aura of sinister yin energy erupted, and its source was exactly my Kidney Aperture!

"Could it be..."

From the inside out, a piercing shriek echoed from within my body, sounding as if it had torn through some sort of seal. Boundless black hair surged outward, instantly sucking in all the malevolent yin energy gathered by the entire Ten Directions Ghost Refining Grand Formation.

Ten-odd seconds later, once the malevolent energy had thinned out, I hastily looked inward, only to find my Kidney Aperture completely empty.

"It's the Fate Ghost!"

I abruptly turned around to see a gaunt boy drilling out of my shadow. His black hair trailed to the ground, and his entire body radiated the ultimate aura of absolute evil! What shocked me even more was that the newly reborn Fate Ghost now had a tightly shut vertical eye on his forehead, looking remarkably similar to the Three-Eyed Ghost Infant.

Gripping the talisman order, I stared at the Fate Ghost standing in my shadow. For a moment, I was actually flustered. I hesitated for a long time before finally uttering a single sentence: "You're finally back."