The Filthy Blood Sect's Shadow

Linzhang Prefecture, Huangpi County.

It was now the Si Hour of the morning. Before a temple in a secluded street alley of South City, not a soul was in sight.

Duan Rong walked over at an unhurried pace. The open ground before the temple was littered with withered grass and fallen leaves. Looking up, he saw dusty cobwebs hanging from the edges of the Five Manifestations God Temple plaque and between the mortise-and-tenon joints beneath the eaves. The plaque itself was thick with dust.

His eyes shifted, and he stepped inside. Though the temple doors stood open, only an old woman sat at a table by the entrance, using a thimble to sew shoe soles in the light.

More than a year ago, Duan Rong had come to this temple. At that time, the one watching over it had been a middle-aged man in Daoist robes.

When the old woman saw Duan Rong enter, she merely gave him a glance with her clouded eyes, then lowered her head and continued sewing the shoe sole.

Duan Rong circled the Five Manifestations God's idol once. It was covered in dust, with rat droppings in the shadows behind its pedestal. The Incense Table was bare as well, save for a single Incense Burner full of stale ash, sitting there all alone.

"This Five Manifestations God Temple has been in Huangpi County for more than a year, yet its incense offerings are so meager."

Though the people of this world were ignorant, it was not so easy to spread the faith of a deity among them from nothing. It certainly could not be done merely by building a temple and spreading a few rumors.

Duan Rong left the Five Manifestations God Temple. Thinking of the Filthy Blood Sect's plan to spread faith among the