At the end of the dark passage, blood-red light came flooding in.
Unlike the eerie stillness of the fourth layer's Heart-Illusion Grand Formation, this place greeted anyone who drew near with a violent, bloody killing intent, thick as syrup.
It clung to skin and seeped through Vajra Force, bearing a terrifying power that corroded flesh and wore away a martial cultivator's strength.
The fifth layer of the Ninefold Demon-Concealing Maze Formation—the Blood-Devouring Vajra-Slaughter Formation.
This formation had been created specifically to slaughter martial cultivators.
The first three layers had used the earth veins' demonic power to assault the body; the fourth, the Heart-Illusion Grand Formation, had used falsehoods and inner demons to tear apart the soul.
But this fifth killing formation cast aside every sinister art, every illusion, every underhanded scheme. It held only the crudest, cruelest slaughter and imprisonment.
With the blood of countless cultivators who had died in the formation over the ages and the remains of demons as its foundation, it smelted endless blood-soaked malice into a domain that slaughtered Vajra Force.
The Vajra Force, blood, and martial bones on which cultivators relied would all be savagely torn at, devoured, and ground away by that blood-soaked malice once they entered.
The stronger their Vajra Force and the richer their blood, the more terrifying the backlash and suppression they suffered!
The Black-Robed Altar Master, who had hidden in the shadows moments earlier, retreated into the deeper formation. Blood-colored demonic flames surged around him, and the wariness in his heart had long since become utter madness and ruthlessness.
He had lived for centuries, presiding over the Southern Region's Demon Altar and crushing countless sect prodigies and righteous elites. Never had he seen an opponent of the same level so impossible to overcome.
A body as indestructible as vajra, untouched