I'll make you the furnace and the cauldron, so you can refine Yin and Yang and prove the Great

The sky is bright.

Five disciples arrived early at the square in front of the Hall of External Affairs.

Hua Nongying accompanied Li Hanshan to the front of the hall, where they found Wu Tianxiong standing by with his arms crossed, watching the commotion.

Not only him, but Zhao Yuan and Sun Ze also came, seemingly to witness Li Hanshan's doom.

Deacon Lu emerged from the Outer Affairs Hall, followed by two disciples carrying trays. The trays were neatly arranged with black pills, as well as a greater number of dark red pills.

"This is the Heart-Eating Pill."

Deacon Lu cut to the chase: "All disciples going out on missions must take this medicine, which is effective for one month. They must return to the sect within one month to take the antidote, or they will die from the poison."

He gestured to his disciples to distribute the pills.

Li Hanshan took the Heart-Eating Pill. The pill was pitch black, with faint blood-red patterns on its surface, and emitted a sweet, fishy smell. Without hesitation, he tilted his head back and swallowed it.

The poison pill entered his throat, and a cool sensation slid down his throat into his abdomen, then there was no further movement. But if one carefully sensed with their divine sense, they could find a wisp of gray mist in their dantian, silent and still, like a time bomb.

"Did you take them all?"

Deacon Lu glanced around and saw that everyone had taken the poison pills. He raised his hand and cast a wide-range detection spell. A white light immediately emanated from the body of an outer disciple.

Deacon Lu's face turned cold: "You dare to lie!!!"

The outer disciple turned pale and knelt down with a thud: "Steward, spare my life! I surrender now, I surrender now..."

"Too late!"

Deacon Lu coldly ordered, "Guards, strip him of his outer disciple status, demote him to a mere cultivation vessel, and put him up for auction on the black market!"

The outer disciple's face drained of color, his body went limp, and he was dragged away in utter despair.

"As expected, there will be inspections."

Thanks to Hua Nongying's reminder, Li Hanshan was glad he hadn't done anything wrong.

Deacon Lu then looked at Li Hanshan, handed him a storage bag, and said, "There are a few spirit talismans and a few Thunderbolt Pills in here. They are very effective against vengeful spirits. I'm giving them to you for protection."

Li Hanshan accepted it and said gratefully, "Thank you, senior."

As he spoke, he probed into the contents with his divine sense and found that Deacon Lu was not lying; there were indeed four spirit talismans and four black and red pills inside.

This elixir is not an ordinary elixir; it must be a battle elixir.

As for the talismans, their level was quite high. Three of them were first-tier, and the other one gave Li Hanshan the feeling of being second-tier, which corresponds to the Foundation Establishment stage.

It seems that although Wu Tianxiong managed to get Li Hanshan into this mission, the Foreign Affairs Department wasn't targeting him; on the contrary, they hoped he could complete the mission.

Deacon Lu pondered for a moment and said, "We're short one person. You can choose another one yourself; any outer disciple will do."

Upon hearing this, Sun Ze, who was standing next to Zhao Yuan, changed his expression and prepared to slip away.

"Let's choose him."

But how could this guy possibly escape?

Li Hanshan noticed Sun Ze as soon as he arrived. This guy had targeted him time and time again, and once even almost got him killed by Zhao Yuan. It was time to get revenge.

"return!"

Deacon Lu's soft shout was like a thunderclap in Sun Ze's ears, leaving him stunned and too afraid to run any further. He could only return to the square.

"Senior Zhao, help me!"

Sun Ze called out to Zhao Yuan repeatedly.

Zhao Yuan's face was gloomy. He wanted to speak, but seeing that Deacon Lu's face was ashen, he didn't dare to say anything.

They are both at the Foundation Establishment stage, yet their statuses are worlds apart.

He was a fifty-year-old early-stage Foundation Establishment cultivator, while Deacon Lu was a forty-year-old peak Foundation Establishment cultivator, whose status was far higher than his. Not to mention, the External Affairs Hall was responsible for external affairs, so how could he dare to interfere in the affairs of the External Affairs Hall for the sake of Sun Ze, a mere fifth-level Qi Refining lackey?

"thump!"

Seeing that Zhao Yuan ignored him, Sun Ze knelt down before Li Hanshan: "Brother, Brother Li, please let me go! I have elderly parents and young children to support... mmm."

He couldn't say anything more because Deacon Lu thought he was too noisy, so he put him under a gag order and had someone feed him poison pills.

"This is a Flying Crane Talisman, which can be used twice more. It can be activated by infusing spiritual power."

Deacon Lu handed Li Hanshan a paper crane. After Li Hanshan activated it, the paper crane transformed into a giant crane that looked quite lifelike.

Immediately afterwards, Deacon Lu took out a small mirror and said, "This is the Mystic Light Reflection Mirror. You must wear it on your chest and not take it off."

This must be the secret weapon used for surveillance.

Without saying a word, Li Hanshan took it and immediately hung it around his neck.

"Go."

Deacon Lu said no more.

"Let's go, let's set off!"

Li Hanshan was the first to jump onto the crane, and seeing this, the other five disciples, including Sun Ze, followed suit.

The crane let out a clear cry and carried the six people into the sky.

The protective array opened a gap, and the crane flew through it, heading towards the outside of the Hehuan Sect.

Li Hanshan looked back.

Hua Nongying was still standing in front of the Foreign Affairs Hall, her red dress standing out conspicuously in the morning mist. She did not puff away as usual, but simply watched quietly in the direction the flying boat had departed, her pipe hanging motionless at her side.

The crane flew further and further away, and her figure gradually became a small red dot before finally disappearing into the clouds.

.

Cranes fly high in the sky, while the mountains and rivers below rush past.

Its flight path is fixed; it needs to pass through a safe passage through the treacherous Monster Mountain Range to reach the mortal realm.

The crane flew for most of the day before finally leaving the Monster Mountain Range and entering the mortal realm.

Li Hanshan looked down and saw cities scattered across the land like chess pieces, with mountains and rivers crisscrossing the landscape and villages dotting the landscape like stars in the sky.

The territory under the jurisdiction of the Hehuan Sect is far more vast than imagined.

This land is inhabited by countless ordinary people who toil and farm day after day, living their mundane lives. Yet their fates are in the hands of those high and mighty cultivators, who treat them like ants, ready to crush them at any moment.

Just like the tens of thousands of people in Heyang County.

The crane flew for another day and night, until dusk the next day, when it finally arrived at its destination.

Zhao State, Heyang County.

"arrive."

Although it was Li Hanshan's first time here, he knew at a glance that it was Heyang County.

Because the entire county town has been turned into a giant tomb.

Most of the city walls had collapsed, and almost all the buildings in the city were destroyed, with charred marks everywhere among the ruins. But what was most shocking were the corpses.

Corpses were everywhere—in the streets, in the houses, and beneath the city walls. Men, women, and children alike were among them. The bodies were piled up like mountains, some already decomposing and emitting a nauseating stench.

In the central square of the county town, corpses were piled up into a small mountain. Judging from the postures of the bodies, they had been driven together by some kind of magic and then killed simultaneously. Tens of thousands of lives were thus mercilessly reaped, their souls even extracted, never to be reincarnated.

"That's terrible..."

A young outer disciple turned pale and couldn't help but gag.

The others didn't look much better. Even though they were from the Hehuan Sect and had seen countless deaths, the sight of an entire county being slaughtered was still beyond their comprehension.

Looking down at the mountain of corpses and sea of ​​blood, Li Hanshan surprisingly felt no anger.

Because he could become one of them at any time.

However, this terrible condition still caused him some physical discomfort.

Before he transmigrated, he was an ordinary person, born in a peaceful era. Where had he ever seen such a scene? These dead people were living, breathing citizens just days before, with their own families and their own lives. Now, they had all become cold corpses, materials for the Yinming Sect to refine the Ten Thousand Soul Banner.

This is the cruelty of the cultivation world.

Ordinary people are like ants, their lives as insignificant as grass.

"stop!"

He cast a spell, causing the crane to stop.

Then, Li Hanshan looked at Sun Ze and said coldly, "You, go in and investigate."

Sun Ze's face turned pale. Li Hanshan hadn't bothered him the whole way, and he had been anxious the whole time. Now all his worries had come true.

"Senior Brother Li..."

Before he could finish speaking, a flying sword was already at his throat.

"Go scout ahead, or die."

Li Hanshan was too lazy to waste words with this guy.

"I'll go, I'll go."

Sun Ze was hit in the face by a flying sword, so he had no choice but to summon his own flying sword and fly towards the county town.

Li Hanshan and the others watched from the crane.