His Spirit Body moved through the divine kingdom's domain, shifting through the void once again.
Within moments, Li Ling appeared dozens of li away.
"Grandfather River God, please stop the rain..."
"Let the floodwaters recede quickly..."
"Keep my whole family safe, young and old..."
Surging prayer power swept toward him like vast, rolling waves. Amid countless murmurs, threads of golden light shone forth, ceaselessly grinding against his spirit and will.
Even with Evil-Repelling Incense protecting him, Li Ling still felt immense pressure.
The incense essence within this prayer power was growing purer and more concentrated.
"What a shame. They're still just a disorderly mob..."
Li Ling sighed softly. While resisting the interference of this incense and fire prayer power with his own mind, he surveyed his surroundings and discovered that he was at a gathering place for disaster victims on the outermost edge of the Royal City's southern outskirts.
The mingled odors of the masses hung like smoke, filled with an indescribably sour pungency.
Fortunately, prolonged exposure dulled the stink. He was already growing accustomed to it, and could even distinguish subtler differences within the jumble of odors.
This, too, was a form of tempering and growth.
After searching for a while, Li Ling suddenly spotted a group from the Unusual Events Bureau riding south.
They had mustered few men in their haste: only one Hundred-Man Company, with just a single accompanying Attendant. He appeared to be a newly appointed steward in early Qi Refining, with a very youthful face.
Floating within the divine kingdom's domain, Li Ling watched them through its mistlike barrier and followed closely all the way to the Ten-Mile Pavilion.
This was a deserted stretch of wilderness, all the more desolate amid the wind and rain. A small pavilion stood beside the road, called the Ten-Mile Pavilion, where travelers could rest and gauge the distance they had covered.
A mounted scout from the Unusual Events Bureau returned from ahead and reported, "There are several villagers' thatched cottages below the slope up ahead. Water is boiling on the stoves inside, but the people are nowhere to be found."
The company commander considered this and said, "The Devil Dao must have noticed our approach. After them!"
They immediately quickened their pace again. Sure enough, several li farther on, they encountered Devil Dao lackeys and engaged them in battle.
Most of these lackeys left behind to cover the retreat were merely half-baked practitioners of evil arts.
They lacked the aptitude for cultivation and had only learned a few methods of Corpse Control or manipulating poisonous creatures. They used zombies and monsters refined by others to set ambushes in the woods, only to be blasted off their feet by the Unusual Events Bureau's Thunderclap Bombs.
As the Attendant's flying sword swept back and forth, zombies were beheaded one after another, and Gu Worms and poisonous creatures were cut down.
But no one was pleased, for the enemy was far too weak. These were plainly discarded pawns.
They captured a survivor and questioned him briefly. Sure enough, their suspicions proved correct.
"Miss Lin and Granny Wu were indeed here, but half an hour ago, they suddenly ordered everyone to withdraw. We lost contact with several special envoys and have no idea where they went."
The Unusual Events Bureau's company commander asked, "Besides the Blood Lady and Old Witch Wu, how many special envoys were there?"
The lackey confessed, "Ten in all."
Everyone felt a mixture of relief and worry at this news.
The special envoys he mentioned were all disciples of Devil Dao Sects in middle or late Qi Refining. They had traveled from distant foreign lands to spread their teachings and recruit followers, and were the true backbone of the operation.
Normally, they were scattered across different regions, each recruiting promising newcomers, rogue cultivators, and even ordinary lackeys. For them to gather so unusually could only mean that they were planning something major.
All ten were cultivators. With Lin Rouniang and Granny Wu added to their number, they were even more impossible to defeat.
Perhaps the company's only purpose would be to delay the enemy with their lives, just like the lackeys they had slain earlier, giving the immortal masters serving as Attendants an opportunity to strike.
But the company commander did not hesitate long. He decisively ordered, "Pursue them!"
Everyone's spirits rose, and they answered as one, "Yes!"
At that instant, their vitality, spirit, and intent blazed so fiercely that they seemed about to burst from their bodies. Even in Li Ling's perception, they shone with a radiance resembling spiritual energy.
Threads of golden light drifted from the crowns of their heads, like burning incense sticks.
Floating above them, Li Ling tried drawing a little toward himself to taste.
Unsurprisingly, it was exactly the same as that incense and fire prayer power!
Its destination differed from ordinary prayer power, however. Before long, it vanished without a trace.
Faith in the River God flows into his divine kingdom's domain. The incense essence of Spirit-Communing Incense and these people's mental impulses naturally disperse into some mysterious, unknown void, yet my gift for smelling incense can intercept all of them...
Li Ling suddenly realized this and sank into thoughtful contemplation.
But despite their readiness to face death as though returning home, these men still failed to achieve their wish.
They did not even catch a glimpse of those Devil Dao cultivators. Their pursuit led to nothing.
Stopping their opponents successfully would take more than hot blood alone.
Li Ling glanced down at the Unusual Events Bureau's cultivators, then drifted into a dense forest on his own, following the scent of Lin Rouniang he had detected.
Yet after crossing mountains and ridges and repeatedly picking up the trail, he discovered that it had abruptly vanished.
This might have resulted from the dissolution of a double like her paper figures, or some Divine Ability for concealing her presence, or a method of short-range spatial transportation.
Ever since she had nearly come to grief last time, Lin Rouniang had become increasingly cautious.
Li Ling could only retrace his route. Following another scent trail, he found a secluded riverbank deep in the wilderness.
Someone had built a crude raised platform of earth and stone here. From time to time, corpses washed down by the mountain floods approached, drawn over by a mysterious force.
Those corpses crawled ashore by themselves, dripping muddy water, then staggered toward the platform.
Below the platform stood a crude stone bridge and a water channel, seemingly symbolizing certain things associated with the Nether Path. At the far end stood a small stone city a little over a zhang high.
Hazy mist shrouded it. The corpses filed through the gate of this stone city, where human silhouettes immediately emerged, as though some mysterious force had drawn out their souls. Their bodies then fell with a thud.
Two Corpse Immortal Sect disciples wearing identical sect attire, their stench of rotting corpses as thick as black smoke, inspected them one by one. Whenever they said something, their lackey-like subordinates used the Corpse-Driving Spell to raise the bodies and guide them to different places.
Some corpses would not rise, so they simply lifted them and tossed them down the slope.
The slope, resembling an earthen hill, was covered with corpses of men and women, young and old, arranged at different heights. Most of the bloated, rotten bodies and those that could not be driven lay at the bottom, while better-preserved specimens were placed progressively higher.
But this pattern was not absolute. Li Ling vaguely sensed that root bone and natural aptitude were also among the criteria.
"Is this a Corpse-Refining Formation?"
After watching for a while, Li Ling understood.
The Unusual Events Bureau's files had mentioned such things many times.
That little city gate was a symbol used by the Netherworld Sect's Yellow Springs Path, representing the Ghost Gate. After passing through it, souls would be guided toward a predetermined destination, while their bodies remained behind.
This could not compare with the usual methods of processing corpses using magical artifacts such as Corpse-Refining Jars, but it was far more efficient and intended for mass production.
Li Ling watched for a while, secretly searching for his targets. He discovered that only one Ghost Soul Sect disciple and two Corpse Immortal Sect disciples were overseeing this place. Everyone else was a newcomer with impure energy, a rogue cultivator, or even a mortal lackey who plainly had yet to cultivate Spirit Essence.
Li Ling's gaze grew grave. He immediately transported himself through the divine kingdom's domain to a duty room in the Unusual Events Bureau.
At such a critical moment, in broad daylight, several Laborer Hall men were actually snoring away without a care, and no one around them interfered.
Li Ling froze briefly, then seemed to understand something. Using Divided Spirit Manifestation, he entered their dreams simultaneously.
Moments later, everyone jolted awake and stared at one another in astonishment.
"Someone really did come to us in our dreams!"
"The Corpse-Raising Ground in the southern outskirts has been wiped out."
Several hours later, the sky began to darken.
Inside a cavern deep in the mountains stood a broad, elevated slope. The rock there had been hewn by hand into a clean, orderly platform.
Lin Rouniang sat in a chair carved from natural rock, listening to her subordinate report the results of their communications.
"The Unusual Events Bureau's running dogs are pressing us harder and harder. We've scattered our people to interfere with them, but it doesn't seem to be helping much. Progress everywhere keeps meeting setbacks. If this goes on, I'm afraid we'll have no choice but to give up."
Granny Wu, her hair silver-white and a walking stick in her hand, dismissed the subordinate. With a casual wave, she sent spiritual light circling the platform, shutting out light, images, and air, then offered Lin Rouniang her advice.
"It seems we'll have to abandon these people too, keeping only the best to remain hidden or find opportunities to return to the sect themselves."
"But with us here drawing attention, the harvesting in the towns and villages elsewhere has proceeded smoothly. Those inconspicuous places alone can turn many little gains into a great harvest, accumulating hundreds of thousands of departed souls. That's already enough to fulfill our assignment."
Lin Rouniang said, "Actually, we've already accumulated enough water essence. If we unleash it with our full strength..."
Granny Wu shook her head. "It isn't that simple. Our control over the divine kingdom's domain has been weakening lately. Unless we can stir the disaster victims into offering their prayer power, we won't have enough to direct it. And to stir the disaster victims, we need more manpower."
"Whether it's a grand Mystic Xin Kingdom celebration like the Boat-Racing Festival or the River God Wedding we organized, both require people to run errands and handle things."
"Yet our people keep being wiped out, and we're already beginning to run short."
"But I still haven't found my final blood spirit..." Lin Rouniang rested her hands on the stone chair's armrests, revealing a barely perceptible trace of exhaustion and reluctance.
Granny Wu said, "Young miss, if it doesn't work this time, we can wait for the plague in a month or so. If the plague doesn't work, there will be famine next spring, when the old grain runs out before the new harvest. If the famine doesn't work, there's still the anticipated war..."
"Our seniors have planned far ahead and already laid out all the procedures. We only need to carry them out step by step."
Lin Rouniang screamed inwardly, But that person is hunting me down!
Yet she had no way to explain this predicament. Granny would certainly inform her parents at once, and her parents would certainly order Granny to force her to return.
Lin Rouniang did not want to slink back in disgrace like that.
To this day, no one else knew that her dream spirit was being held captive, or that a terrifying, mysterious expert might come to inspect her sleeping quarters at any moment.
The pressure on her was simply too great.
Granny Wu comforted her. "There's no need to worry, young miss. We can still remain here for a few more hours. Take the chance to get a little sleep first, and we'll see how things stand afterward."
"Quite a few souls from different regions have already been sent into the Nether River, and there are plenty of high-quality ones among them. Who knows? With some luck, we might find the Heaven-Mandated Yin Maiden among them."
Lin Rouniang nodded and smiled faintly. "May your kind words come true."
Once Granny Wu left, her smile immediately vanished, replaced by distress.
"I hope I really can be lucky, just as Granny said..."
A moment of weakness had left her pinning her hopes on something as elusive as luck.
But after staring blankly for a while, Lin Rouniang came back to her senses.
No. I can't put my hopes in luck!
Lin Rouniang looked down at the disciples and lackeys busy arranging the formation and finally made up her mind.
From the pouch she carried, she took out a palm-sized scale. Within its metallic texture, traces of blood seemed to emerge. As she infused it with Spirit Essence, thick, ghostly white mist billowed out like smoke, instantly transforming the entire cavern.
Noticing the change, all the lackeys and disciples looked up in surprise and glanced around. Granny Wu also returned to ask what had happened.
Putting away the scale, Lin Rouniang said, "Granny, new instructions have come from the sect. We must carry out the original plan!"
"The original plan? That means tomorrow?" Granny Wu did not doubt her at all, for Lin Rouniang was of noble birth and truly belonged to the sect's upper ranks.
The higher-ups might have deeper, more far-reaching plans that her own wisdom could never fathom. She needed only to obey.
Still, she dutifully reminded her, "With our current preparations, I'm afraid the final results won't amount to much."
Lin Rouniang said, "I reported that as well, but the instructions from Ten Thousand Spirits Mountain are still to proceed according to the original plan. We'll take whatever we can get."
Granny Wu said, "Understood. We'll make up any shortfall in the sacrifices with those new recruits. If necessary, we can abandon most of the disciples as well."
"As long as we can ritually refine a few rough blanks for Ten Thousand Souls Banners, we won't have lost out..."
Truly shrewd planning never hinged entirely on the gains or losses of a single person or place. In a certain sense, it even guaranteed profit without loss.
But the principle of the world was that every loss brought a gain. Taken as a whole, everything had to balance.
How, then, could one guarantee profit without loss? The answer was self-evident.
Lin Rouniang said, "You can decide the details, Granny. But to begin the sacrifice, we must invoke the divine kingdom's domain again. That may attract the attention of that mysterious expert."
Granny Wu said, "We can seal this place off first, then connect to it when we're nearly finished, striving for a swift conclusion."
After considering it, she added, "Even a Nascent Soul expert may not necessarily be capable of day wandering. When he harassed us before, the strength he displayed wasn't great. It was quite likely a strand of divine sense or a double. We can begin preparing tonight, but only build up our power, leaving the final step for dawn the day after tomorrow. Still, to ensure nothing goes wrong, young miss, please hide somewhere out of sight first. I'll meet up with you once I'm finished."
Lin Rouniang said, "That works too."
The two immediately agreed on a time and place to meet, then found excuses to send away several elite disciples and capable personnel, preserving seeds of their strength to continue operating in hiding and expanding their forces.
That night, a simple ritual altar built from earth, stone, and wood was completed inside the cavern.
The altar stood about three zhang high, with sloping sides like a pyramid-shaped mound of earth. Steps had been built into one side, eighty-one in all, leading up to a flat platform a little over a zhang square, like climbing a mountain to reach the heavens.
Granny Wu personally ascended the altar to perform the rite. Powerful energy swirled throughout the cavern, neatly contained by the formation's restrictions, secretly and rapidly brewing.
There will be another chapter shortly.