When Zhang Chu uttered that word, the wind suddenly stopped.
Across the entire valley, those translucent figures oozing from the rock walls and rising from the soil simultaneously paused for a fraction of a second.
It was as though something had pressed down on their shoulders from behind.
Song Li's hand gripping her short sword was clenched so tightly her knuckles turned white, the short sword held horizontally before her with its tip trembling slightly. She could feel the auras exuding from those figures; not a single one was strong, each as faint as looking at a candlelight through a thin layer of gauze.
Yet the quantity was overwhelming.
The figures converging from the edges of the valley toward the center were densely packed, numbering at least in the hundreds. They poured in from all directions, their paces slow yet resolute, resembling a silent tide rising.
"Dao Master, they... are walking toward the stone platform." Song Li's voice was pitched extremely low.
Zhang Chu nodded, his gaze fixed steadily upon those figures.
He could clearly see the trajectory of every outline, capturing the subtle fluctuations of every strand of aura.
Those figures indeed possessed no characteristics of living beings.
No breathing, no heartbeat, no fluctuations of circulating blood and Qi.
They were merely the residual, compressed emotions that had lingered too long, re-condensing into "shapes" the instant they came into contact with his Spiritual Power.
Much like water vapor freezing into frost in cold air.
"This is what a ghost is."
Zhang Chu spoke, his voice steady. "They are projections of residual emotions lingering on the array nodes. The circular disc in the center of the stone platform has shattered, and the array has lost the item that suppressed them, so they are floating out on their own."
Song Li's