Where Were Their Loved Ones?

None of these were orthodox arts.

Neither Liao Chi nor Third Lady practiced anything that had the slightest connection to the righteous path.

Only Peng Tianli had seemed somewhat credible, his entire repertoire devoted to killing. Unfortunately, he had been the first to die.

The black mist before his chest had done little to kill the worms.

"Go!"

As he climbed the mountain, Lin Feng spared a glance at the scene behind him, then ran uphill with Hundred-Household Officer Zhu. The purpose of this life was to discover the source of the danger in the stockade.

Anything he saw was a gain.

Whatever spells Third Lady and Liao Chi possessed were beyond what he had set out to learn this time.

Finding out would be an unexpected bonus.

Not finding out would be no loss.

The mountain path was not particularly rough. Slender red threadworms crawled from the small table in Hundred-Household Officer Zhu's hands toward his body, forcing him to discard it.

Lin Feng glanced over and discovered that, within that tiny distance, some of the Red-Line Worms had already turned black and appeared to have lost their vitality.

Lin Feng made a mental note of this.

A few minutes later, the two reached level ground.

Lin Feng's physical fitness had slowed them down after all!

Lin Feng panted for breath.

Hundred-Household Officer Zhu had to turn back and give him a hand.

Fortunately, nothing attacked them along the way. Large numbers of monsters emerged from the deep pool and crawled toward Third Lady and Liao Chi beside it.

The Blood Buddha behind Liao Chi was indistinct, but its power was formidable indeed.

The monsters at the front of the charge were drained of blood, and even the threadworms inside them were reduced to dried husks.

The large spiders Third Lady spat out nested in her own internal organs. When they bit the blister-skinned monsters, the creatures turned black all over and actually died!

Third Lady pulled open her sachet, and the Horsehair Worms on the ground scattered. They seemed terrified of its scent, shriveling upon contact.

Poor Peng Tianli let out two wails before becoming a breeding ground for the Red-Line Worms, dying without ever understanding why.

Taking one last look, Lin Feng and Hundred-Household Officer Zhu rushed onto more level terrain.

Before he could catch his breath, a breeze brushed past, and Lin Feng shut his mouth.

A sea of corpses.

[Clear Spring Stockade Forbidden Ground, front plaza]

Lin Feng finally learned where all the people of the stockade had gone.

They had died in front of the Clear Spring Stockade Forbidden Ground.

The stretch of level ground above the water collection point was packed with corpses.

These corpses wore traditional ethnic clothing.

The wind blew past.

Lin Feng's hair stood on end, and he glanced at Hundred-Household Officer Zhu.

Hundred-Household Officer Zhu nodded, indicating that these were the villagers of Clear Spring Stockade.

A massacre?

Who did it?

Lin Feng tightened his grip on his refined-iron sword. Hundred-Household Officer Zhu also drew his goose-quill saber, guarding against enemies that might rush out at any moment.

These people had been dead for some time, but the temperature here was unexpectedly low.

The corpses were still relatively well preserved.

The smell was foul.

The stench of urine and feces released after death mingled with the odor of rotting bodies, filling their nostrils.

As Lin Feng and Hundred-Household Officer Zhu approached the corpses slowly and warily, they heard nothing at all.

Everything was silent.

It did not seem as though someone had killed them.

If someone had killed these people to flaunt their martial prowess, they would not have dumped them so carelessly to one side.

An accident?

"Check the cause of death."

Lin Feng spoke. It was better to leave specialized work to a specialist. Hundred-Household Officer Zhu turned a body over with his saber, examined it briefly, and said, "No external injuries."

Lin Feng also lowered his head for a look. The man indeed had no external injuries, but his belly...

It was a little too large.

Although internal organs decomposed first after death and could rupture, at this temperature, his belly should not have been so swollen, nor should bacteria have multiplied so quickly.

It was as though something was gestating inside!

Lin Feng thought of this game's theme: gestation!

"His belly."

At Lin Feng's words, Hundred-Household Officer Zhu took his goose-quill saber and cut open the obviously male corpse!

With that single cut, countless red threadworms suddenly poured out of the dead man's belly! They burst through his abdomen and crawled out like a tide.

"Fall back!"

Lin Feng retreated several steps, and Hundred-Household Officer Zhu did the same. If they had encountered an enemy, Hundred-Household Officer Zhu would never have flinched, but against worms, he was helpless too.

The two withdrew, planning to find some lamp oil to burn the worms. Just then, Liao Chi and Third Lady caught up from behind.

"The Worm Thralls behind us have caught up."

Third Lady spoke for the first time. Her voice was clear as a bell and lovely to hear.

Those monsters were Worm Thralls?

Lin Feng tried hard to absorb the information around him. Looking at the others who had come up, he pointed behind him. For some reason, the Red-Line Worms had not pursued them very far.

"What are those?"

He asked Third Lady. She glanced that way and hesitated at the sight of the Red-Line Worms.

But only a short time after emerging, large numbers of the red threadworms turned black and died.

She had never seen such things either.

Still, the secret medicine in her sachet could deal with them.

"Let's go take a look."

Since they could deal with the worms, Lin Feng suggested moving on. Without objection, Third Lady dabbed a little of her secret medicine onto each of them. The four walked forward. Every corpse around them had a swollen belly; clearly, they were all filled with Red-Line Worms.

The question was, where had the Red-Line Worms come from?

Lin Feng turned his gaze toward the water.

It could only be the drinking water.

In that case, was this a parasitic infection?

They passed the corpses without incident and saw a strange site ahead.

A stone tablet half a person's height had words carved into it, bearing a curse that sent chills through them.

[Outsiders who enter this place shall doom ten clans to death]

Banyan Trees surrounded them, their trunks intertwined one after another.

They formed a doorway.

Words appeared before Lin Feng's eyes again.

[Clear Spring Stockade Forbidden Ground]

"This is the Clear Spring Stockade Forbidden Ground."

At Lin Feng's words, Liao Chi looked at the Daoist in surprise, unable to understand how he knew.

Third Lady did not dare approach.

"The worms inside me are afraid. There's something in there."

She spoke.

Hundred-Household Officer Zhu's hair was practically standing on end.

"Let's go in and look."

Lin Feng insisted and walked forward. Before he could enter, however, the Banyan Tree roots shot straight toward them like enormous pythons.

Lin Feng thrust his sword into the Banyan Tree. Pierced, the tree bled freely!

The Banyan Tree screamed!

An agonized face tumbled down from the Banyan Tree.

Corpses hung from aerial roots, but those roots had pierced the backs of their brainstems!

Here, Hundred-Household Officer Zhu saw someone familiar.

"Thousand-Household Officer."

The Thousand-Household Officer hung inside, as did the other people Hundred-Household Officer Zhu recognized. In that instant, a dense cluster of figures dropped from above like hanged ghosts, seventeen or eighteen in all. Every one of them stared at Lin Feng with an eerie smile.

"The stockade map!"

Hundred-Household Officer Zhu pointed at the Thousand-Household Officer's belt as he spoke again.

Lin Feng saw what did indeed appear to be a pouch hanging from the Thousand-Household Officer's belt.

He was just about to ask Hundred-Household Officer Zhu how he knew it was the map.

Suddenly.

Lin Feng caught a fragrance.

It bore some resemblance to the fragrance he had smelled on the [Road Ahead]. Back then, however, he had been a high-ranking ritual master, and smelling it had done him no harm. Now, the moment he inhaled it, he began to feel dizzy.

"Fuck!"

Lin Feng had never imagined he would meet his end here. This time, though, before he died, the sword in his hand had already flown out!

In a single strike, the flying sword plunged straight into the Thousand-Household Officer's body!

Green blood sprayed from the Thousand-Household Officer's body. With one strike, Lin Feng pinned the swaying figure to the banyan tree behind him!

The green blood splashed onto the Banyan Tree. Before he died, Lin Feng saw the Banyan Tree being soaked in green blood!

The corpses hanging from those Banyan Trees all let out horrifying screams in unison!