The Red Pill Scheme Fails, a Meteor Falls

Compared with Liu Futong and Zhang Shicheng, Zhu Hongwu was still in the early stages of building his power. Though he had already received investments from many Divine Spirits and Dharma Lineages, his family's reserves were truly meager.

If even the leader was in such a state, then Yang Bi, his subordinate, was no exception. He was practically stone broke.

He had no treasures or strange artifacts to reward Ge Xian for his service, so he could only fob him off with the Factions Secret Manual and a provincial map.

After seeing the shocking scenes caused by Monk Faxian and Shi Er, Ge Xian had assumed Yang Bi wouldn't be able to make much of a stir. At most, he might quietly rescue a few Ming Cult disciples and elders.

But in the next instant, he realized he had underestimated the man.

A procession made up unmistakably of strange cultivators came racing toward them. Carriages and banners, ritual drums and divine bells—amid the music and singing, they formed a strange melody no less captivating than the Spirit Desire song Ge Xian had heard in Qiantang County. Its murmuring chant drew people's minds and souls toward it against their will.

Yang Bi stood atop one of the carriages, hair disheveled, chanting without pause. As they neared Sunset Mountain, he suddenly roared:

"Wusheng Laomu, the Pure Land of True Emptiness!"

"I beseech the might of the Great Venerable White Lotus to descend! Your disciple, Yang Bi, is willing to offer up his Dharma Body to serve as a divine womb!"

As he roared, the White Lotus Cultist fanatics racing alongside him shouted along.

There was no doubt about it: this was a "god-inviting" ritual.

In the eyes of onlookers, it was rather comical.

But what happened next was not funny in the least. As the chanting continued, more than a dozen fanatical cultivators dressed in White Lotus Cult robes suddenly began to burst apart.

Flesh and blood erupted from within them, sending chunks of corpses flying in every direction.

One after another.

Like a vivid streak of blood, it spread across the land and reached the foot of Sunset Mountain.

When the last fanatic beside Yang Bi exploded, a vast white divine radiance seemed to come from beyond the heavens and poured straight into his body.

In an instant, he changed.

Though he still had a man's body, his face took on feminine features.

The Dao Qi surging from within him was even more intense than that of "Monk Faxian" and "Shi Er."

Whatever price he had paid besides the self-destruction of those dozen or so fanatics, Yang Bi's cultivation had now surpassed the threshold of Mortal Transformation Perfection.

He had not reached the Spirit Connection Realm, but with a casual White Lotus Grand Hand Seal, he once again swept away Li Wa, who had previously overwhelmed everyone with her unmatched might.

When he returned, he did indeed rescue the Ming Cult and the remaining Guǐ Wǔ Sects.

But those were mere side matters. What truly astonished everyone came next—and made Ge Xian instantly understand why Yang Bi was willing to sacrifice more than a dozen fanatical subordinates to use such a forbidden divine art.

Yang Bi suddenly smiled as he plucked a flower, conjuring a snow-white lotus that shimmered with holy light from thin air.

Without a word, he raised his hand and hurled the "White Lotus" toward Sunset Mountain.

As luck would have it, Monk Faxian had earlier swept away part of the mountain peak, leaving an opening in the altar. The White Lotus was about to pass through the gap and descend into the mountain's altar, brimming with endless flesh and blood.

Just as it reached the summit, the roots of the enormous, pristine White Lotus suddenly burst open. Tens of thousands of tender white roots shot out, probing toward the lake of flesh and blood below.

Anyone with even a little knowledge of cultivation could see what Yang Bi intended.

Ge Xian marveled again.

"Zhu Hongwu knows how to pick his subordinates. Chief Spy Yang Bi knows how to make every copper count."

"Sacrificing a dozen fanatical subordinates was just his initial investment. Rescuing the Ming Cult and the other Guǐ Wǔ Sects was only a side benefit."

"That bastard's real target is the Flesh Altar, piled high with the Eternal Life Cult's precious resources and treasures. He wants that ridiculous World-Descending White Lotus to suck it completely dry, doesn't he?"

"Comparing the three factions, Yang Bi's clearly the brains of the operation."

If Ge Xian could see it, Li Wa could too.

This powerhouse of the Eternal Life Cult could no longer afford to hold back.

Her jade body swelled once more, and she spat out mouthful after mouthful of "Immortal Qi" from afar. The relentless torrent whipped up a storm that shook the mountain. Blood flowers surged, ice crystals formed, and the World-Descending White Lotus was held back for several breaths.

As she attacked, a stunning upheaval suddenly erupted throughout Jiangzhe Province.

Were those wolf-smoke signals?

No. Seventeen pillars of cloud and mist, each incomparably thick, burst forth from hidden mountain peaks across the province and soared into the sky.

They were a scarlet red. Even from far away, the sight of them stirred the desires of anyone who looked, rousing the soul within their bodies.

Ordinary people were the least able to resist. They stood frozen, staring at the spectacle, with no thought of fleeing.

They watched as the pillars of Qi shot into the sky and spread out, turning into clouds of scarlet blood that began to merge.

In the places where they gathered most thickly, rain began to fall.

Blood Rain!

A torrential Blood Rain mixed with all kinds of chunks of flesh.

The moment the Blood Rain touched someone, their body began to undergo a forced transformation, turning them into a powerful, pain-insensitive Red Pill Blood Soldier.

The people at Sunset Mountain couldn't see all seventeen pillars, but they could make out five or six in the surrounding directions. They could also see the scarlet sea of clouds spreading and churning violently.

Thanks to Ge Xian's earlier "leak," the three great factions all knew what was happening at that moment.

"Spirit Desire Blood Cloud!"

"What a deal Yelü Tianzheng struck. He sold off all of Jiangzhe Province, letting the Eternal Life Cult quietly set up every last Flesh Altar!"

"Fellow Daoists, though we serve different masters, I doubt any of us wants to see Jiangzhe Province fall into the hands of the Evil God Dharma Lineage. If they refine a Red Pill Army, none of us will have an easy time dealing with them... Why don't we join forces and destroy this most crucial altar, the core of the formation? That way, the Eternal Life Cult will end up with nothing. What do you say?"

"Agreed!"

"Good!"

Though Monk Faxian and Shi Er could both see that Yang Bi was trying to take advantage of the situation, they had to admit it served their shared interests. So they both agreed.

The three Rebel Armies joined forces, putting Li Wa in dire straits.

Without using her "spirit embryo," she could only hold off one of the three in a one-on-one fight.

But in the next moment, Li Wa made her move too.

She suddenly turned toward Qiantang County and called out:

"Little Sister Yelü! County Magistrate Lu!"

"Virtuous Couple, if you still refuse to act, you'll ruin Uncle Yelü's grand plan. I'm afraid you won't like what happens to you then."

Before her words had even faded, two great disturbances erupted in the county city.

Demonic Qi surged into the sky as two enormous, terrifying demons appeared. In the blink of an eye, they had raced to Sunset Mountain.

It seemed the two of them had been about to act even without Li Wa's prompting.

The Gu-Eating Spirit Monster!

The Heart Devouring Fox!

The estranged couple attacked in perfect coordination. One chose Monk Faxian, the other Shi Er, leaving the most troublesome opponent—the "Yang Bi" possessed by the Evil God Will—for Li Wa.

The three sides each paired off to fight. Ge Xian had already been curious about the Perverted Couple, so he turned his attention to them.

In the next instant, his curiosity was rewarded: he caught a glimpse of each of their Innate Divine Abilities.

Lu Hualong was the more treacherous of the two. He first used a multitude of ghostly minions and a piercing shriek that could disrupt Divine Sense to harass Shi Er. Then, while Shi Er was off guard, he suddenly opened his mouth and spewed a flood of Gu worms. It contained every kind of Gu imaginable. If Shi Er hadn't been protected by his Star Fiend, that single surprise attack would have gnawed him down to bare bones.

Clearly, the Innate Divine Ability he'd acquired in the Mortal Transformation Realm was [Gu Raising].

Yelü Yuyan's divine art was simple and brutal. She chose Monk Faxian, knowing he was a lecherous monk, and first unleashed the Fox Clan's Charm Talent, which could entrance the soul. Seeing that Faxian had fallen for it, she suddenly shook her enormous demonic body. The "Fox Fur" covering her body fell away of its own accord, transforming into hundreds of thousands of terrifying poisonous needles that shot toward him, intent on pounding him into mincemeat.

But Faxian had been pretending too. At the critical moment, he summoned a Maitreya Golden Bell to protect himself and save his life.

"How hideous!"

"Too bad I don't have anything like an Image Stone right now. Otherwise, I'd have saved an image of Yelü Yuyan transformed into a 'Hairless Fox' as a keepsake."

Ge Xian said this because after using her Innate Divine Ability, Yelü Yuyan looked astonishingly ugly.

In the sky, a scrawny, terrifying, hairless fox writhed and moaned.

Her fur grew back quickly, but for those few breaths, Yelü Yuyan had been truly ugly. Monk Faxian even mocked her, sending her into a rage. Her demonic fox body swelled, and she charged at him, beating him until he was in constant peril. Several times, he had almost failed to protect his heart.

While the two sides struggled against each other, Li Wa was finally driven into a fury by Yang Bi.

By then, her Jade Transformation Dharma Body had grown to two zhang tall, with every part of her body swollen to an excessive size.

Her skin gradually turned red, and her expression grew more and more dangerous.

She looked around. Spirit Desire Blood Clouds had appeared all across Jiangzhe Province, but without the formation's most crucial core, they still couldn't ignite the Spirit Desire or connect into one vast mass, colliding to unleash a torrential Blood Rain that could blanket the entire province.

She maintained a calm face, but Li Wa was already frantic with worry.

She had come here to claim the greatest credit and, along the way, amass resources, cultivate secret arts, and break through to the Spirit Connection Realm.

Who could have expected things to go so wrong?

If the Eternal Life Cult's plan failed because of her, then Yelü Tianzheng, the other powerhouses in the cult, and even her mother, the Spirit Desire Great Priest, would never forgive her. She would not escape a terrible fate.

"You rats nearly ruined my great undertaking. When I find the chance, I'll grind your bones to dust!"

"I know who your masters are—Liu Futong, Zhang Shicheng, Zhu Hongwu... None of you will get away!"

As she shouted, a powerful summons began to emanate from within her.

She abruptly turned and called into the mountainside:

"Spirit embryo, return at once!"

As soon as the words left her lips,

strange sounds immediately arose from the depths of Sunset Mountain. Amid a rustling and skittering, a monster that made the brain ache and the soul writhe crawled out through the opening in the mountainside.

Its demonic body seemed like a lump of constantly shifting, fishy bloody mud.

The gemstones that had once imprisoned the souls of so many young heroes and prodigies were now empty, all transformed into soul-stealing Evil Eyes.

Looking higher, one could see a maiden's head, serene as an immortal and naturally graceful.

As she crawled out and rushed wildly toward Li Wa,

the young heroes and prodigies who had been rescued, but left with nothing but their bodies, began to wake.

Every one of them was weak and exhausted, as if they'd indulged in countless rounds of lovemaking. This was true even of some of the heroines.

Beside the mountain waterfall, Ge Xian had been waiting for a chance to escape. The moment he saw this, he reached a conclusion:

"Li Wa's going all out!"

"She was supposed to claim the greatest credit, but now the other altars have all been activated while she's still being held up. If she fails, she might lose her life."

"She had no choice but to call back the spirit embryo before it had finished devouring every last young hero's soul. She's going to merge Spirit and Desire, drive Yang Bi back, and then ignite the blood clouds. In short, she'll blanket Jiangzhe Province in Blood Rain and raise that Red Pill Blood Soldier army."

Sure enough, before those two thoughts had even fully formed,

Li Wa and Li Su, the pair of "mother and daughter," began to merge. The sight was truly horrifying.

As all kinds of flesh and blood, Jade Demonic Bodies, blood flowers, and ice crystals crushed and ground against each other, each blending into the other until there was no telling one from the next, intense Demonic Qi spilled out in every direction. Anyone with insufficient cultivation who so much as glanced at them would have their soul wounded.

Even the Perverted Couple, Monk Faxian, and Shi Er couldn't help but retreat.

With his Supernatural Perception and Outer Sky Gray Eye, Ge Xian took only one glance before cursing under his breath:

"No wonder the Myriad Laws Sect wouldn't accept the Evil God behind the Eternal Life Cult. What kind of cultivation method is this?"

"First they refine the most beautiful, holiest Skin Sac, then they crush it and mix it into a filthy, stinking slurry of flesh and blood... This sickening scene looks just like that thing from my past life that disgusted me too: something called Song of Saya."

Ge Xian's complaint couldn't stop the mother and daughter from merging.

Yang Bi, that treacherous, sinister, penniless yet greedy and shameless Chief Spy, finally experienced the power of an information advantage. He had no idea Li Wa had already mastered the Eternal Life Cult's secret art. He had carefully calculated the strength of the "Great Venerable White Lotus" he'd summoned—and had even deliberately summoned more power, at the cost of sacrificing a few more fanatical White Lotus Cultists.

It should have been just enough to suppress Li Wa and seize the Flesh Altar.

But now that Li Wa and Li Su had merged into a flesh-and-blood monster that nearly covered all of Sunset Mountain, his plan fell apart.

The World-Descending White Lotus, which could devour all filth in the world, was covered by the mother and daughter's flesh. They chewed it to pieces and swallowed it whole.

Yang Bi could only sigh and retreat, avoiding their full force.

He watched helplessly as mother and daughter smiled together, both stunningly beautiful. Their bodies caught fire from within, the flames of Spirit Desire reappeared, and they sank toward the altar.

But at that very moment!

Sudden upheavals erupted throughout Jiangzhe Province.

Visible displays of divine arts and spells—thunderclaps, Skyfire, Yin Thunder, and more—burst into action all at once.

In an instant, they destroyed nearly half the pillars of cloud and mist. The Spirit Desire Blood Clouds, already spreading and fusing violently, were burned away in patches, and the torrential Blood Rain falling across the various regions was intercepted and stopped.

This sight drove Li Wa mad.

It also shocked the three Rebel Armies and the Perverted Couple.

None of them were fools. The spectacle clearly showed that the Imperial Court had taken action. And from the way everything had struck at once, they had obviously received the news well in advance, enabling them to destroy most of the Flesh Altars in a single move.

Even if Li Wa ignited the formation's core now, it would be of little use.

The Eternal Life Cult's plan to refine the Red Pill Army could practically be declared a failure.

"No!"

The two maiden's heads belonging to Li Wa and her daughter, both serene as immortals, simultaneously revealed expressions of disbelief as they wailed.

"This is impossible!"

"Who leaked the secret? How could the Imperial Court have found out? How could they have destroyed the altars in time?"

"That bitch from the Yelü Family! Speak! Was it your family...?"

Badly wounded, Li Wa turned her accusations toward Yelü Yuyan.

Just as the two powerful female cultivators were about to tear into each other, two figures, one large and one small, suddenly flew over from the distance.

The smaller one was none other than Bai Fugui, the milk-white ox spirit monster who had left a deep impression on Ge Xian.

The larger one's body was also that of an ox, but it was covered in black scales and had a blue mane. A single horn grew from its forehead, and its four bear-like feet trampled upon a strange flame.

As it flew through the air, everyone, including Ge Xian, couldn't help being drawn to its pair of wrathful eyes, which seemed forever wide open.

Ge Xian had seen Lu Hualong's fallen eyes, which confused good and evil. What he saw now was the complete opposite.

Right and wrong!

Good and evil, loyalty and treachery!

It seemed that everything was reflected in those eyes.

And when the creature spoke, its voice was indeed bright and clear:

"Yelü Tianzheng of Jiangzhe Province, together with his daughter, son-in-law, and their accomplices, sold the province to the Eternal Life Cult. They sought to build eighteen altars and refine an army of Red Pill demons."

"Now most of the altars have been destroyed, and their evil scheme has failed."

"You monsters of the Eternal Life Cult, Yelü Yuyan and Lu Hualong! Get on your knees and surrender at once. Await your sentence!"

If all one heard were those three stiff sentences,

anyone would have thought this expert of the Mortal Transformation Realm, who had cultivated the Righteous Spirit Demon Dharma Body, was a fool. Who would obediently follow his orders to kneel and surrender?

But the people soon realized they'd been wrong.

This man was quite cunning too.

As he spoke, Ge Xian suddenly sensed something and whipped his gaze toward the sky.

The instant the final word fell, the thick clouds exploded apart with a thunderous boom. A colossal "meteor," wrapped in Skyfire, came hurtling down from the heavens, straight toward Sunset Mountain.

It struck with incredible precision, aimed right at the altar's breach. Its size was almost a perfect fit.

Everyone present gaped in stunned silence. Ge Xian, meanwhile, was cursing inwardly all over again.

"So much for the Son of Bao Hanzhang being fair and impartial?"

"Distracting us on one hand, while casting [Meteorite Spell] to crush us on the other?"