Divine Root Bone

The cultivators fought and retreated, not daring to linger for even a moment.

The roars and sounds of battle from the West City Martial Arts Hall gradually faded into the distance. The group hurriedly crossed the boundary between the old and new city areas and made a full-speed retreat towards the old alley of the East City.

The closer you get to Dongcheng Old Street, the more eerily quiet the atmosphere becomes.

Just moments ago, West City was a living hell, filled with evil spirits and where everyone was insane. But the moment you step into this old alleyway, all the riots, black fog, and roars vanish without a trace.

The entire Dongcheng Old Alley is ancient and quiet, with clean and tidy bluestone pavement. On both sides are old-fashioned blue brick houses with neatly arranged wooden doors and windows. You can even see ordinary people walking around in the alley, with slow steps and calm expressions. The neighbors are peaceful and normal, without any panic or evil spirits.

The peaceful and serene scene before us is like a completely different world from the fierce battle that just took place in the western city.

Upon seeing this, the hundreds of cultivators who were still in shock relaxed considerably, and everyone secretly breathed a sigh of relief.

"Thank goodness...it's safe here!"

"As expected, the old town is safe and sound, unaffected by the chaos over there!"

"Looks like we made the right choice; this place is absolutely safe!"

A sense of relief at surviving the ordeal spread across everyone's faces, and the pent-up fear of the past few days dissipated considerably. No one could have imagined that in the perilous Black Stone Ridge, this old alleyway of ordinary people would remain unscathed, like a haven of peace amidst the chaos.

Zhang Yang also frowned slightly, feeling a vague sense of unease. However, everyone was exhausted from the bloody battles they had fought all the way, and the evil army was hot on their heels. This was the only place where they could temporarily escape their attacks, so he suppressed his doubts and led the team to continue forward.

The old alley was calm and peaceful, and the group soon arrived at the deepest part of the alley—the Stone Lord's Mansion.

The grand lord's mansion was wide open, the entrance was clean and tidy, the stone steps were neat, and the courtyard was quiet and solemn. From the outside, there was no trace of fighting, nor was there any evil black mist covering it, as if it had been peaceful and undisturbed for a long time.

Everyone stopped and prepared to enter the mansion for temporary refuge, close the gates and hold their ground, while taking out communication jade talismans to request help from the sect.

Among the group, Su Qingyao, who was the most meticulous, stepped forward slowly, her gaze sweeping lightly over the bluestone ground in front of the mansion gate.

Her senses were sharp, unlike those of ordinary cultivators.

In this seemingly clean and odorless air, she vaguely detected a very faint, very faint scent of blood.

The scent was extremely faint and subtle, easily dispersed by the evening breeze, making it almost imperceptible. Had she not been constantly on edge and possessed keen senses, she would have completely overlooked it.

However, the smell of blood was too faint, and the entire mansion remained peaceful and tranquil, without any evil spirits, unusual movements, or traces of fighting.

Su Qingyao frowned slightly, scanned her surroundings, and found nothing unusual.

"Perhaps I'm overthinking it."

She muttered to herself, assuming it was just the blood from the recent battle and the lingering scent of blood on their bodies, and didn't think much of it, following the group as they prepared to enter the mansion.

Just as everyone's attention was focused on the mansion, preparing to take shelter and rest, a Qi Refining cultivator from a remote small sect suddenly stopped at the end of the group.

This cultivator was not highly skilled, but his five senses were far beyond those of ordinary people, especially his sensitivity to blood and filth, which far surpassed that of ordinary cultivators.

As he walked along, a sense of unease crept into his heart. The faint smell of blood, undetectable to others, pierced his nostrils like needles. The closer he got to the lord's mansion, the stronger and colder the smell became.

It wasn't the smell of living blood, but the stale, cold, and long-saturated stench of blood that had permeated the earth for so long.

He was startled and suspicious, and subconsciously squatted down.

My fingertips gently traced the smooth bluestone slabs in front of the door.

The surface of the stone slab was covered with a thin, fine white powder, neither gray nor frost, floating lightly on the ground, looking like dust accumulated by the wind, clean and harmless.

The cultivator applied slight pressure with his fingertips and gently ground the stone.

click-

The surface layer of white ash has cracked and scattered.

The next instant, his pupils suddenly contracted violently, and the hairs on his body stood on end!

Beneath the white ash, the stone slabs were not clean at all!

The cracks and surfaces of the entire bluestone ground were filled with dark red blood that had seeped in and solidified!

The bloodstains had long since dried and seeped into the stone patterns, densely covering the entire open space in front of the mansion. However, they had been deliberately covered with a layer of fake white ash, perfectly concealing the traces of the fierce fight and the bloodstains all over the place!

This is hardly a safe and sound mansion!

This place clearly witnessed a fierce and bloody battle that lasted until the very end!

Cold, bloody bits remained on my fingertips, and a chill ran straight up my head.

The cultivator's scalp tingled, and he abruptly looked up, about to roar out a warning to Zhang Yang!

"Gentlemen! Something's wrong here! The ground is full of—!!"

But before he could even finish speaking, a dramatic change occurred within the mansion!

Zhang Yang, Su Qingyao, Lin Wanqing, and twelve inner disciples, along with most of the cultivators, had already stepped into the courtyard of the mansion.

In the center of the courtyard, a middle-aged man dressed in a brocade robe, with a kind and gentle face, stood with his hands behind his back and a warm smile on his face. He was none other than the lord of this place, Shi Wanshan.

He appeared calm and composed, with a peaceful gaze, like an elder who had been waiting for a long time and was compassionate towards the people suffering from the calamity.

"Fellow Daoists of Qingyun Sect, and all cultivators undergoing trials from various regions."

Shi Wanshan's voice was gentle and mellow, and his smile was sincere, showing no sign of anything unusual.

"I was already aware of the turmoil in the West City. The fact that you all managed to escape to my old alley in the East City is a stroke of luck. My residence is safe and sound. Quickly go inside to rest and take shelter. Stay here for now and avoid the evil and calamities outside."

His tone was sincere, and his demeanor was magnanimous, befitting a lord protecting a monk.

The group, still shaken from their journey, completely let down their guard when they saw how kind and reliable the city lord was.

But just as everyone completely relaxed and stepped into the depths of the courtyard—

boom! ! !

A deafening thud!

The heavy wooden gate of the mansion suddenly closed and locked shut by itself!

The sound of the lock snapping shut was cold and piercing, completely sealing off everyone's escape route!

The next second, Shi Wanshan, who was smiling warmly in the courtyard, had his smile completely disappear from his face!

That originally kind and upright face suddenly became sinister and twisted, with a dark and lifeless look in its eyes, devoid of any living spirit!

Rumbling--

Thick, dark, malevolent energy suddenly surged wildly from his limbs and bones, surging and churning to the sky!

In an instant, a chilling wind arose and black mist enveloped the entire courtyard!

Everyone turned around in shock, their pupils shrinking sharply!

Shi Wanshan's black robe billowed, his body shrouded in endless yin and evil energy. His body was covered with many wounds, his muscles and bones were turned outwards, and he was covered with strange black festering wounds. Dark evil energy kept seeping out from the cracks!

These wounds, a mix of old and new, are extremely gruesome, clearly the result of a devastating, life-or-death battle!

The truth was revealed to the world in an instant!

This place is by no means a safe haven!

Shi Wanshan had already been invaded by evil spirits!

Earlier, he had fought a fierce and brutal battle against the evil forces that had invaded the old alley, but was ultimately defeated, corrupted, and possessed!

Afterwards, the evil spirits deliberately erased all traces of fighting in the entire old alley and the entire lord's mansion, using strange methods to cover up the blood and pretend that all was well!

They deliberately left this seemingly safe and secure trap, quietly waiting for the defeated cultivators outside to escape into this place!

The goal is to capture all the surviving, conscious cultivators, assimilate and corrupt them, and turn them into puppets of evil spirits!

Ahead lies a closed-off death camp, behind lies a city teeming with evil spirits.

They walked right into the trap!

The moment the black mist swept through the courtyard, Shi Wanshan's aura, possessed by the evil spirit, surged dramatically.

In his previous life, he was a renowned cultivator in Black Stone Ridge, possessing a genuine eighth-level Qi Refining cultivation. In the mortal realm, he was already a top-tier fighter. Now, his body was reshaped by the evil power, and his cultivation broke through the shackles, reaching the peak of Qi Refining. The surging black energy around him carried a bone-chilling and soul-corroding ferocity, and his overwhelming pressure pressed down on everyone in the courtyard.

A rogue cultivator at the front of the crowd, who was unable to dodge in time and was only at the fifth level of Qi Refining, had just thought he had found a safe haven. Now, he stood frozen in place, so frightened that his spiritual energy was stagnant and he couldn't even lift his magic weapon.

Shi Wanshan's lips curled into a sinister, dark smile. Without the slightest hesitation, he unleashed a palm strike carrying billowing black energy!

The black palm print tore through the air and instantly imprinted itself on the chest of the rogue cultivator.

"Pfft—"

A dull, cracking sound of bones breaking rang out. The rogue cultivator didn't even have time to let out a scream before his body flew backward like a kite with a broken string. His chest flesh collapsed, his internal organs shattered, and blood gushed out from his seven orifices. He was completely lifeless when he hit the ground, and dark purple evil energy rapidly spread across his body, which was about to turn into a new puppet in an instant.

Witnessing this horrific scene, all the cultivators were instantly terrified, and their panicked screams rose and fell.

"He...he's at the peak of Qi Refining! We can't beat him at all!"

"We've fallen into a trap! This mansion is a death row!"

Zhang Yang's pupils contracted sharply. He immediately shielded Su Qingyao and Lin Wanqing behind him, unleashing his full power of Foundation Establishment Level 2 spiritual energy. Pale golden divine patterns spread out a barrier, firmly blocking the scattered black energy aftershocks.

"Everyone, gather together! Form a back-to-back formation to defend against the enemy!"

With a roar, twelve inner disciples of the Qingyun Sect immediately took up their magical artifacts and lined up on both sides. The remaining surviving cultivators hurriedly gathered their formation, their spiritual power layering and intertwining to hastily build a defensive line, facing the corrupted Shi Wanshan directly.

Upon seeing this, Shi Wanshan let out a sinister laugh, and black energy condensed around him into several pitch-black claw shadows, tearing towards the crowd with overwhelming force. The courtyard floor tiles were shattered by the claw winds, and the beams, pillars, and walls were covered with dense, pitch-black claw marks. Zhang Yang stepped forward to meet them, his fists enveloped in supreme yang golden light, clashing head-on with the black energy claw shadows. Each collision stirred up a gale, the golden light and black mist violently clashing, and the deafening roar made the entire lord's mansion tremble as if it were about to collapse.

The cultivators outside the mansion gates, who had not yet stepped into the courtyard, watched helplessly as the courtyard walls trembled, black mist surged wildly from the cracks in the doors and windows, and the continuous roar of fighting echoed out. The rogue cultivator who had just discovered the bloodstains on the stone slab and hadn't even finished speaking slumped on the stone steps, his hands and feet ice-cold, and his heart filled with endless despair.

In just a few breaths, a deafening roar erupted!

Half of the lord's mansion's courtyard wall exploded with a deafening roar, and brick, stone, and wood chips mixed with thick black mist shot into the sky. Zhang Yang's golden spiritual light and Shi Wanshan's sinister black energy clashed violently in the center of the ruins, turning the entire mansion into a brutal battlefield, where cries, shattered magical artifacts, and howls of evil energy intertwined.

On the long bluestone street outside the old alley of Dongcheng, a lonely figure slowly shattered the faint shadow at the alley entrance. It was the fake senior brother who had previously harmed his fellow disciples and was completely controlled by evil energy.

He stood at the alley entrance, gazing into the distance at the Stone Lord's mansion, which had exploded with black mist. A hint of cynicism flashed in his murky, dark eyes as he muttered to himself, "They really know how to run. They escaped all the way from the West City Hall to the East City Old Alley. These cultivators certainly know how to find a way to survive."

A moment later, he scoffed and revealed the hidden layout of this old alley: "I'm afraid they'll never know until their deaths that this old alley in the East City was originally the territory that the Puppet Woman had taken control of beforehand."

All the past schemes were slowly revealed in his low whisper.

The source of it all began in the desolate graveyard outside Shou'an Village. The evil spirit lurking deep within the graveyard had already sent a message to the puppet woman who was in charge there, setting up two interconnected plans for corruption.

The first plan uses twelve inner disciples of the Qingyun Sect as a medium: first, secretly corrupt and control three of them; after the twelve gather at the Black Stone Ridge stone chamber residence, rely on these three disciples who are deeply tainted by evil energy, and take advantage of their time together as fellow disciples to gradually spread the evil and turbid energy outward, like a plague infecting the other inner disciples one by one, and then spread the chaos to the entire western new city district through the cultivators gathered for the martial arts competition.

Fearing the plan would fail, the puppet woman had prepared a backup plan, a second, foolproof strategy.

She set off from the Shou'an Village cemetery first, arriving at the old alleyway of Heishiling East City ahead of time. This area was mostly inhabited by ordinary mortals with no cultivation, their souls weak and easily corrupted and manipulated by evil energy—far easier to control than cultivators protected by spiritual power. The puppet woman lay in wait, silently assimilating all the mortals in the alleyway. She then sought out Shi Wanshan, the strongest local lord, defeated him in a fierce battle, and possessed his body. She then used evil magic to cover up the bloodstains and erase the traces of the fight, creating a facade of peace and tranquility.

Two plans were running in parallel, one overt and one covert. Even if Zhang Yang cracked the transmission line involving three inner disciples, this old alley in the East City, which had already been completely controlled by the puppet woman, could still become the ultimate prison trapping all the surviving cultivators.

The fake senior brother gazed at the churning black mist around the mansion, a cold, bloodthirsty smile curving his lips. He walked slowly and steadily toward the lord's mansion, where the fighting raged on.

"Since they've delivered themselves to our doorstep, none of them will leave Dongcheng Old Alley alive today."