Twin female zombies come to the door: My lord, please have mercy!

A black-robed man wearing a ghost-gold sheep mask sat cross-legged on a giant black lotus flower.

He slowly opened his eyes, his gaze piercing through the boiling crimson blood pool and locking onto Lin Ye, who had kicked the door open and entered.

A dry, harsh laugh came from beneath the mask.

Laughter scraped against the stone walls of the underground cave, echoing in the empty space, carrying a sense of superior mockery and contempt.

"You managed to break through the outer Five Ghosts Sealing Soul Formation and kill Ma Si. You, a junior from Taiping Street, do have some skills."

The man in black robes showed no sign of panic despite the intrusion of the enemy.

He slowly raised his hands, and his wide sleeves slipped down, revealing a pair of withered, emaciated hands covered with black lividity.

He formed a strange hand seal with his ten fingers, pointing his fingertips at the eight black stone pillars standing around the blood pool.

"Unfortunately, you're a step too late."

As he moved, the dozens of living people bound to the stone pillar let out a series of mournful and tragic screams.

The intricate runes carved on the stone pillars glowed with a blinding bloody light, and more blood gushed from the cuts on the wrists of living people, flowing rapidly into the blood pool below through the grooves of the stone pillars.

The boiling of the blood pool intensified.

The ghostly mother phantom with three heads and six arms in mid-air absorbed a massive amount of living people's essence and blood, and its originally illusory body began to condense into solid dark red scales.

Six thick arms flared wildly in the air, stirring up gusts of bloody wind.

"These eight stone pillars correspond to the eight gates of rest, life, injury, block, view, death, shock, and opening."

The man in black robes pointed at the living people struggling in pain, his tone revealing a cruel fanaticism.

"They are all people whose birth charts are purely Yin. I used a secret technique of the Yinshan Sect to bind their heart meridians tightly to this [Blood Soul Symbiosis Array]."

He spread his hands, adopting a submissive posture, yet his tone was extremely arrogant.

"You are free to destroy these stone pillars. If you dare to use even a trace of lightning magic, the immense force of the formation's backlash will instantly tear their internal organs apart. Every time you break a pillar, you will personally send these people to their deaths."

"Come on, you righteous immortal! Show me your skills, which one are you going to kill first?"

The man in the black robe laughed wildly.

He was convinced that these so-called righteous people would be too afraid to gamble with dozens of lives.

If the demon mother is delayed for even half an incense stick's time, she will fully descend into the world, and everyone in this cave will become food for her.

Lin Ye stood at the gate, coldly observing this farce of moral blackmail.

His gaze swept over the bound living people.

These people were dressed in fine clothes and wore expensive watches on their wrists. They were obviously from the wealthy and powerful class of Jiangzhou City. They had been secretly abducted by the evil cultivators of the Yinshan Sect and brought here to serve as sacrificial offerings for the array's core.

A faint light flickered in front of my retina, and the system's somewhat mechanical notification sound rang out crisply.

"Ding! Your Excellency, please exercise self-respect. System notification: The Yinshan Sect's core protector has been detected using moral blackmail, attempting to buy time with hostages. Please devise a solution within three minutes to thwart this underhanded tactic!"

The light screen popped open, displaying three options:

[Option A: The Descent of the Holy Mother – Put down the peach wood sword, kneel down and plead with the other party to spare the hostage, expressing willingness to exchange one's life for another.]

[Reward: Medal for Being a Good Person Who Moved the Great Xia Dynasty. Consequence: The man in black robes will laugh as he skins you alive, then kill all the hostages. Your foolishness will become the biggest laughing stock in the world of metaphysics.]

Option B: The Capitalist's Redemption – Ignoring the threat of the heretical cultivators, offering a live auction service to the wealthy and powerful hostages to save their lives.

【By exploiting their extreme desire for survival, the pure Yang fire that ignites their survival instinct is used to dismantle the Blood Soul Symbiosis Array from within.】

Rewards: 400 Official Points, the spell "Gathering Yang Lion's Roar," and a large amount of gold.

[Option C: mutual destruction—With a cold laugh, "What do their lives have to do with me?", he directly unleashed the Taiyi Heavenly Thunder Talisman for indiscriminate bombardment.]

[Reward: Cold-Blooded Butcher title. Consequence: You will bear the immense karmic burden of dozens of lives lost, your Dao heart will be clouded, and your future cultivation will inevitably suffer divine retribution.]

"Heh! Don't you know that in the apocalypse, kill the Holy Mother first?"

Lin Ye sneered.

Trying to morally blackmail him?

These rats hiding in the gutter have no idea what "all's fair in war" means.

I choose B.

With his mind settled, Lin Ye slammed the lightning-struck peach wood sword on his back heavily onto the ground.

He took a deep breath, and the vast true energy of his Pure Yang Dao Body gathered in his chest cavity.

The [Gathering Yang Lion's Roar] skill, a reward from the system, was instantly mastered.

A sharp shout, imbued with Taoist energy, resounded throughout the vast cavern.

"All you bosses tied to the pillars, listen up!"

This roar shook the surface of the blood pool, causing ripples to spread.

Those hostages who had fallen into a semi-comatose state due to excessive blood loss were jolted awake by this powerful masculine energy and struggled to open their eyes.

"Your lives are now hanging by a thread. If you want to live, open your eyes wide and look at me!"

Lin Ye pointed to the tip of his nose, his voice piercing through the foul-smelling blood mist and clearly reaching everyone's ears.

"My name is Lin Ye, owner of a funeral parlor on Taiping Old Street. I'm here to save you today, but my appearance fee is very high—ten million for each head! If you agree, nod your head now!"

Upon hearing this, the atmosphere inside the cave momentarily froze.

The expression beneath the mask of the man in the black robe froze completely.

He had imagined that Lin Ye would be angry, compromise, or hesitate to act, but he never expected that this young man would actually engage in extortion and price gouging in the center of the S-level disaster formation!

The wealthy and powerful men tied to the stone pillars were stunned for half a second, but their instinct for survival instantly overcame their heartache over the loss of money.

Let alone ten million, they'd do anything to survive, even if it meant going bankrupt.

Dozens of heads bobbed frantically on the stone pillar, their eyes blazing with an intense desire to survive.

"very good!"

A smug, cold smile crept across Lin Ye's lips.

"Now, heed my command! Everyone, bite your tongues hard! Spit the blood onto the black stone pillars binding you! Now!"

A person has three "fires": the shoulders and the top of the head.

The blood on the tip of the tongue is where the pure yang essence of a living person gathers.

When a person faces a desperate situation and their extreme will to survive erupts, the yang energy from the blood on the tip of their tongue will rise to its peak.

The wealthy businessmen dared not hesitate.

To survive, they bit their tongues hard.

"Pfft! Pfft! Pfft!"

One mouthful of warm, pure yang blood from the tip of his tongue was spat repeatedly onto the black stone pillars engraved with sinister runes.

The moment the pure yang blood came into contact with the eye of the extreme yin formation, it emitted a piercing "sizzling" sound.

White smoke rose from the surface of the stone pillar, and the runes that shimmered with blood-red light were forcibly corroded and blocked by the yang blood.

The yin-yang balance of the Blood Soul Symbiosis Array began to be violently shaken by the survival instincts of the living within.