11 Heads

"This place is truly perilous!"

He pressed his hand against the Nine-Death Substitute Puppet hidden in his robes, thinking that he still held this trump card. Even if he encountered the worst-case scenario, he could rely on the secret arts of the Immortal Puppet Sect to use the puppet to fake his death and take his place, thereby seizing the chance to escape.

"With this Nine-Death Substitute Puppet, this place is not entirely impossible to brave!"

The sedan chair came to a halt, and he lifted the curtain to look outside. Before him lay a chaotic and dilapidated village of earthen houses.

Through the entrance of the street on the east side, one could see a stretch of earthen walls, grey tiles, and dwellings; yet, this gloomy village was devoid of life, lacking even the slightest glimmer of light or vitality.

The end of the long street was also pitch black, impossible to see clearly. He looked around; outside the village were quiet grasses and mountain forests, exuding a soul-chilling darkness. Although there appeared to be many houses on both sides, these structures all carried a sense of illusion, as if they were not real.

He Ping felt a slight chill in his heart.

He knew well that this village was extraordinary. If one remained in such an environment for too long, it would induce a hallucination—the feeling that the darkness of the night was wrapping around the surroundings, layer upon layer.

The night wind made the weeds dance wildly; this was the sound of the sedan chair procession brushing against them.

The paper puppet leading the procession held a paper lantern, but its light could not illuminate more than a few yards ahead.

For some unknown reason, the air within the village in the dead of night was abnormally cold, as if covered by a thin, soft veil that even firelight could not easily pierce.

Upon arriving here, He Ping realized a sense of discordance. Pondering this for a moment, he muttered the reason to himself.

"...It's the sound."

He could not hear the chirping of insects.

Although he could hear the wind and the clattering of doors and windows, he could never hear the sound of insects, nor the cries of animals from the mountain forests...

Sensing something amiss, He Ping steadied his breathing and pressed his fingers to his brow. A moment later, a faint light emanated from his Niwan Palace, and the space between his brows suddenly split open, reflecting the scenery outside.

In an instant, his consciousness and five senses were rapidly magnified, and everything around him became crystal clear. This was the "Heavenly Peering Technique" from the Formless Secret Treasury, using the soul to illuminate the void, reaching in all directions, responding to everything.

"Good heavens!"

He Ping's body stiffened.

This desolate and ruined village was actually filled with thick death energy, yin energy, and ghost energy... Beyond the long street illuminated by the green flames of the lanterns, behind those earthen walls, and within the thatched huts and broken houses, vague, shadowy ghost entities were lurking...

—From this, it was clear: this was no deserted village, but a domain of ghosts!!!

"Come to think of it, I seem to have heard a rumor that there is a ghost village within the borders of North Prefecture that can move on its own. Over the past hundred years, it has devoured many lives. Could it be... that this is the place?"

He Ping wore a thoughtful expression.

In the past, legends of the Wandering Soul Ghost Village had circulated in North Prefecture from time to time. He had tried to investigate, but found nothing; he had not expected to encounter it today.

"No wonder the signs from the tracking spell were so strange; it was because of this ghost village."

He had an estimation in his heart.

"Then, where are the green-clad servant and the person who abducted him?"

In truth, he had an inkling about this. His naked eyes were looking through the lifted curtain toward the end of the long street.

The ghost village was filled with bewildering illusions. Ordinary people who arrived here would fall into confusion. The long street appeared to be a straight line, but once one mistakenly entered it, they might lose their way and fall into danger.

Just now, he had used the Heavenly Peering Technique to search for energy signatures and track the other party's whereabouts, but he had found nothing. It seemed the person was not within the village.

"Let me try again..."

He Ping activated the technique once more. Immediately, his soul palace blossomed with light, illuminating the four corners, and his essence and blood energy surged into it.

Following the chanting of a spell, his eyes seemed neither fully closed nor fully open, and a white light shot out from between his brows.

Hum...

His soul palace fluctuated, and his sensory perception increased significantly. However, due to the exertion of this technique, his face gradually turned pale, and his lips lost their color.

"The probability of the tracking spell failing is extremely low. If that's the case, they should be in that direction, right?"

This time, he locked onto a house at the end of the long street in this ghost village.

"An ancestral hall... It looks like an ancestral hall. This should be the largest building in the entire village!"

He used the Heavenly Peering Technique to spy secretly, his soul's mental power whipping up a gale as his consciousness magnified several times over.

Suddenly, He Ping felt that this ancient ancestral hall was like a giant beast, coiled in the deepest part of the village, exuding a strange and unfathomable aura.

"Could it be... that the other party is hiding inside? That makes things a bit troublesome."

He Ping began to suspect that perhaps the other party was hiding in the building, and the various energy signatures were so jumbled together that he could not detect them.

Suddenly, a sharp, piercing sound echoed in his ears.

He Ping frowned. He could tell it was the sound of a musical instrument. It seemed someone was playing a reed pipe; the sound of the pipe shrieked like a ghost's wail and howled like a wolf.

Upon hearing it, it felt like the trembling sound made when pulling a massive, powerful bowstring, yet no ordinary bowstring could ever be this loud—it was so sharp that it was almost uncomfortable.

"Is this the sound of a reed pipe? Could it be the 'Ghost Wolf Reed Pipe' of the Hu Ma Gang?"

He Ping knew this was a signaling method of the Hu Ma Gang. It was likely that members of the Hu Ma Gang had mistakenly fallen into this place and were playing the pipe to call for help.

"Foolish."

He shook his head.

These people didn't even look at what kind of place this was... If this were the outside world, using the "Ghost Wolf Reed Pipe" would be a good way to call for help and transmit a message. But in this ghost domain occupied by countless spirits, who knew how many ghostly things were lurking about.

"Help... help me!"

In the darkness, someone screamed, scrambling and tumbling as they fled from the village. He Ping swept a glance over the man and saw clearly that his attire was that of a swordsman from the Hu Ma Gang.

The swordsman's face was twisted in terror. As he scrambled up from the ground and caught sight of the sedan chair stopped ahead, he cried out desperately for rescue.

"I beg you, save me! There are ghosts here... there are so many ghosts!"

No sooner had his voice fallen than the curtain of the paper sedan chair lifted slightly at one corner. With a sharp snap—as if the air had been compressed to its limit—dozens of invisible gray threads whistled through the air, sweeping across the swordsman's body in their wake.

Suddenly, red lines appeared all over the man's body. With a series of wet squelch sounds, blood sprayed out. One moment he had been whole, and the next, the crimson lines collapsed; the swordsman's body fell apart, his head, torso, arms, and abdomen sliced into dice-sized chunks that tumbled to the ground.

Just like that, he was torn to pieces, collapsing powerlessly into a pool of blood.

"Seeking your own death."

He Ping withdrew his hand, his gaze icy.

In the cold, silent night, a bizarre scene unfolded...

"...What a ruthless man!"

A voice rang out.

The head that had rolled onto the ground was not yet dead. The swordsman's eyes were wide open, his face drenched in blood, his teeth grinding together with a harsh, grating sound.

With blood dripping from his severed neck, the head—eyebrows bristling and eyes bulging with rage—began to float upward from the ground.

His expression was hideous and terrifying, his gaze locked onto the sedan chair, his eyes filled with nothing but venomous resentment.