Can't Hold Out Any Longer

"Maybe it means the cellar?"

The Daoist's remark gave Ye Qianfan a clue.

Hearing that, Ye Qianfan hurried into the side hall, which was packed with all kinds of clutter.

There were moldy straw meditation cushions, offerings that had long since rotted, altars, small tables, and other odds and ends, all piled up in a chaotic mess.

With the Daoist's hint in mind, Ye Qianfan ignored the clutter and focused on finding the cellar entrance.

Sure enough...

Ye Qianfan found a narrow alley outside the side hall's back door!

At the end of the alley stood a square platform, only ten feet high. It looked neither like a well platform nor a concrete stand for storing things!

Naturally, Ye Qianfan wasn't going to overlook something so strange.

He hurried over and discovered that a large wooden board covered the platform, with a big, rust-covered iron ring attached to it.

"Heave!"

Ye Qianfan pulled up on the ring, and sure enough, a flight of cellar stairs appeared.

Thankfully, he had consulted the Divination Blocks first. Otherwise, just finding this cellar would have taken ages, never mind carrying the wine!

The cellar was very dark.

But Ye Qianfan didn't dare light a torch, so he could only take out his firelighter and blow it alight!

The firelighter's glow was a little dim, but at least it wouldn't easily set his paper shell ablaze. Dim as it was, safety won out.

Soon...

Ye Qianfan found a row of wine jars in the gloomy cellar.

Perhaps the Demon-Quelling Office hadn't wanted to cut off every path to survival, so they had left a dozen or so wine jars in the cellar. Most were empty, but five were intact!

Ye Qianfan tried lifting a jar, only to hear his skeletal frame creak.

To keep his paper arms and legs from getting damaged, Ye Qianfan simply said:

"Ye Fu, carry four jars of wine!"

Whoosh, whoosh!

Ye Fu immediately extended four thick tentacles from beneath Ye Qianfan's armpits.

The tentacles were rather thick, and Ye Qianfan could feel the skin beneath his armpits stretching further. Fortunately, four jars of wine were nothing to Ye Fu!

Besides, the tentacles could coil freely, just like ropes!

And so Ye Fu's tentacles easily wrapped once around the necks of the four jars, lifting them all without letting any slip!

How convenient!

Still...

To think that his current body couldn't even lift a jar of wine!

That only strengthened Ye Qianfan's resolve to recover his flesh-and-blood body. Even a task this simple had thrown so many obstacles in his way.

If Ye Fu were gone one day, dead or vanished, what would he do then?

Bang, bang, bang!

The temple doors had already been battered into a pitiful state.

Someone outside the temple roared, "You think you can hide in there forever? Open the damned doors right now, and I might spare you my blade. If you wait until I smash them down, I'll sacrifice your heads to it!"

"Why waste words on them?" another martial artist shouted. "Work together and tear the doors off!"

"The ladder's here!"

Outside, everything was in chaos.

Shen Lang and Rich Merchant exchanged a glance, both looking exhausted!

The people trying to break into the temple weren't just those battering the doors with brute force. Those skilled in lightness arts had already leaped onto the courtyard walls, apparently hoping to break through from above!

But the two of them had to defend against people coming from every direction, knocking them down again and again!

By now...

Shen Lang and Rich Merchant must have knocked fifteen or twenty people off the walls, hadn't they?

Some weren't afraid of dying and came right back after falling, while others switched positions to break through elsewhere, making them incredibly difficult to fend off!

Especially since there were only two defenders, with four eyes between them.

They really...

Couldn't even keep track of everyone!

"When is Brother Ye coming back?"

"I can't hold out much longer!"

The beads on Rich Merchant's golden abacus were all gone. Only its empty frame remained, held forlornly in his hand.

Shen Lang wasn't doing much better!

He had overused his spiritual power, and his nose had begun to bleed. Two streams of blood flowed into the snow-white bone flute, even distorting its sound!

Yet despite both men giving it everything they had, people still popped up on the roof from time to time!

Seeing this, Rich Merchant had no choice but to explain again and again:

"Stop battering the doors! Brother Ye is trying to find a way to save everyone!"

"The key to this trial is returning the red headscarf to the evil god. If we keep fighting over it, we'll all die in the end!"

Bang!

But...

The moment Shen Lang finished speaking, the head of someone who had jumped onto the wall suddenly burst apart, as though struck by a hammer!

Blood and brains, red and white, exploded like fireworks, spraying everywhere on both sides of the wall!

At that, everyone fell silent!

Shen Lang and Rich Merchant even looked up at the sky instinctively...

Sure enough, they saw it.

A Human-Skin Lantern had gone out and was falling from the air!

And the Human-Skin Lanterns in the night sky seemed to be turning into human heads faster than anyone had imagined!

Because now...

Three human-head lanterns in the sky had already sprouted beards and eyebrows. This was the first time three lanterns had changed at once, and one of them...

"Boss Qian, doesn't that lantern look... a little like you?"

Shen Lang swallowed after saying that.

Rich Merchant's eyes were now filled with panic and despair. Although he believed Ye Qianfan would never deceive them, at this moment...

He could finally understand what those people trying to storm the temple were thinking!

Now...

Rich Merchant finally understood!

Whether they believed Ye Qianfan could deal with the evil god no longer mattered!

What mattered was that the people whose likenesses appeared on the Human-Skin Lanterns were about to die, and the thing that could save their lives was in Ye Qianfan's hands!

Everyone wanted to get hold of that death-averting red headscarf first!

As for...

Whether anyone else died, that was their problem.

Better a fellow Daoist die than this poor Daoist—that was what everyone wanted. As for anything else, who gave a damn!

"Shen Lang, what would you do if it were you?" Rich Merchant asked.

And Shen Lang knew what Rich Merchant was asking...

If the human-head lantern taking shape right now were Shen Lang's, what would he do?

Would he still trust Ye Qianfan?

Would he still wait?

"Wait!" Shen Lang gritted his teeth. "I trust Brother Ye!"

"I... ah!"

Rich Merchant looked up again at the Human-Skin Lantern in the night sky. Its appearance, its features, already bore an eighty-percent resemblance to him!

Even his eye bags and the creases beside his nose and mouth had been reproduced exactly on the Human-Skin Lantern!

To tell the truth...

Rich Merchant was utterly terrified now!

"My eyes... Aah!!!"

Bang!

Another explosion rang out outside!

The explosion made Rich Merchant's heart skip a beat. He even felt his own vision beginning to blur!

Could it be...

Was this an omen of death?