"What exactly happened here?"
Ice Daoist surveyed the damaged temples all around him, left without anyone to maintain them.
His expression was unusually grave.
Then he lowered his head slightly and looked at the human skin clutched in his hand, his expression darkening despite himself.
"A monk from Xituo Continent... all his flesh and blood have been drained away."
Although only human skin remained, a careful examination still allowed him to identify who these skins had belonged to.
These were all remnants of third- and fourth-tier cultivators from Xituo Continent.
He saw none from the first or second tier. Perhaps their Law Power had been insufficient to temper their physical bodies completely, leaving them unable to be preserved.
"But what exactly did these monks encounter?"
The question arose unbidden in Ice Daoist's mind.
He turned slightly, pushed open a door, and stepped into a temple that remained intact.
The Buddha statues enshrined within stood undisturbed, with the ashes of burned-out incense still lingering in the incense burners before them.
He could faintly smell the sandalwood incense permeating the air.
He could even hear barely perceptible strains of Brahma Sound echoing.
The kneeling mats before the Buddha statues had not been tidied up and looked somewhat disordered.
The meditation cushions on either side of the Buddha hall, used by the monks to worship and chant sutras, were also scattered haphazardly.
It was as though the monks had merely gone out for their morning devotions and would soon return.
Or as though some emergency had arisen, forcing them to leave the temple so hastily that they had not even had time to tidy up.
Everything seemed so hurried, carrying a trace of urgency whose cause was unknown.
Yet these temples had ultimately failed to welcome their masters home.
They stood silently in