A bloody stench assaulted the nose, and pus and blood coated the ground...
The cramped stone cage barely had room for two adults to lie on their sides with their legs drawn up. The thin, filthy blanket beneath them, its original color unrecognizable, was riddled with holes of every size.
Perhaps because blood had watered it year after year, even the originally bluish-gray stone was now covered in shaggy, dark-red moss, two fingers long and flourishing thickly.
When the wind brushed over it, it swayed with a rustling sound.
It resembled hundreds upon thousands of dark-red worms desperately writhing their bodies, a sight that involuntarily sent a faint chill through the heart.
A narrow opening in the middle of the stone cage allowed the living humans raised inside to reach out one hand and pull in their feeding bowl.
Chen Heng looked over. The bowl contained only weeds and some strange paste of unknown origin, even mixed haphazardly with a few scraps of human limbs left over from the ghosts' meals.
Waves of thick, rank stench rose from it. Together with the miserable sight inside the stone cage, they made even Chen Heng frown slightly and shake his head inwardly.
"Junior Fellow Disciple Chen..."
Inside the stone cage, Yu Wanchou's face twisted as tears rolled down one after another.
Both her arms were gone. White bone splinters and mangled flesh that had already turned gray were clearly visible at the severed ends, a ghastly sight.
"They ate Wang Ying alive, and Guan Jing and Zhou Erzhi too. My hands..."
She struggled to stand, only to pull at the wounds on her arms. Heart-rending pain shot through her, drawing a muffled groan from her throat. Veins throbbed at her temples, and sweat poured down like rain.
When she trembled and looked