Republic of China Era: Entering the Dao through Divine Strike.

Wang Jingya saw it all clearly from the side; his knuckles were white from gripping the gun so tightly.

“These villagers,” Li Xin’s voice was also calm, “were all killed by you.”

Ku Yun grinned, revealing a set of uneven black teeth. "This village has excellent feng shui, surrounded by mountains on all sides, where vital energy gathers, making it an ideal location to set up the Blood Sea Immortal Locking Array."

"I have been waiting here for you for two days and two nights, benefactor. I cannot simply wait empty-handed."

He said this in a nonchalant tone.

There was even a hint of smugness in those will-o'-the-wisps of eyes, as if showing off their achievements.

Li Xin withdrew his gaze.

Take a step forward.

Wang Jingya held her goose-feather saber horizontally, shielding Zhang Yourong and A Li behind her.

Ku Yun stopped talking nonsense, sat down cross-legged, turned the purple-red gourd upside down, and untied the talisman sealing the opening.

The gourd's mouth was facing downwards, and no liquid flowed out; only a very thin wisp of blood-red smoke drifted out.

The blood mist condensed in the air and did not dissipate, transforming into distorted human faces that emitted silent wails.

More and more faces appeared, growing denser and denser, overlapping each other and emitting heart-wrenching screams.

That wasn't an illusion; it was a real vengeful spirit, the unresolved hatred of forty-nine villagers who died with their eyes wide open, forcibly sealed inside the gourd and used as fuel for the formation.

He made a hand seal with his left hand and slammed his right hand on the ground. Suddenly, countless red lights lit up on the hillsides on both sides of the official road, densely packed, like countless blood-red eyes opening in the mist.

The soil began to churn, and withered, rotting hands emerged from the ground, frantically grabbing at Li Xin's ankles.

The vengeful spirits surged in from all directions, turning the white mist blood red and the air thick as paste.

"I have set up the Blood Sea Immortal Locking Formation here, and all the villagers within a three-mile radius will be sacrifices."

Using white mist as a guide and human blood as a medium, the lives of forty-nine people were forged into the shackles that bind immortals.

Kuyun's voice came from the mist, "I heard that you have refined a protective fire that can burn through human blood and resentment?"

The fear, pain, and despair these people felt before their deaths have all been sealed inside this gourd by this humble Taoist priest.

Your fire can burn the physical body, but it cannot burn away the intangible resentment.

As he spoke, the black, withered bones on the ground shot out like bamboo shoots after the rain, whistling through the air as they attacked.

Wang Jingya severed a withered hand that was reaching for the carriage with a single stroke, sparks flying as the blade collided with the bone.

The withered hand lay on the ground, still twitching, its five fingers opening and closing like a spider whose half had been stepped on.

She flicked the bone fragments off her knife and stood in front of the carriage.

Zhang Yourong held Ali tightly in her arms, one hand covering Ali's eyes, the other clutching the life-saving character Li Xin had left her, her lips pressed together until they turned white.

She didn't gasp, but simply looked at the broad, sturdy figure in front of her.

She believes...

No matter what kind of enemy he is, nothing can stop him.

Just then, a small figure suddenly turned in the direction of the horde of vengeful spirits.

It's that little girl in the floral jacket.

Her soul was fainter than anyone else's, as faint as a wisp of smoke about to dissipate, but she moved faster than any other vengeful spirit.

They didn't pounce on Li Xin, they pounced on Ku Yun.

Her once chubby little face was twisted into a blurry shadow, and her two small hands turned into sharp claws, viciously scratching at Ku Yun's face.

Ku Yun was urging the formation on when he was completely caught off guard by the vengeful spirit. He groaned as a thin bloody gash appeared on his cheek, and dark red blood trickled down his cheek.

He touched the wound on his face, glanced down at the blood on his fingertips, and coldly rebuked:

"Even in death, you're still so disobedient." He said it like he was scolding his own dog.

The gourd suddenly trembled, and an invisible force forcibly pulled the little girl's soul back.

Her figure was torn in two in mid-air, then barely reassembled, drifting back into the horde of vengeful spirits, until it faded into almost invisible.

Her mouth was open, as if she were crying, but no sound came out.

Ali peeked out through Zhang Yourong's fingers, her gaze following the tiny wisp of soul, her lips moving slightly.

She recognized the little floral jacket...it was exactly the same as the one her mother had sewn for her during the Chinese New Year.

Li Xin glanced down at the withered hands he had grabbed, raised his right foot, and stomped down.

Golden flames erupted from beneath his feet, sending ripples across the ground visible to the naked eye.

As the ripples passed, the withered hand curled up and retreated to the ground as if burned, and the vengeful spirit let out a hissing scream under the gaze of the golden flames.

But after the vengeful spirits were burned away, they quickly gathered again...

Kuyun burst into laughter. "Can it burn out completely?!" His laughter echoed through the valley, startling a few oblivious crows.

Li Xin closed his eyes, then opened them.

The golden flames of heaven and earth surged from every pore of his body, enveloping him like a golden torch.

The soil beneath their feet began to turn red and soften under the intense heat of the golden flames, slowly transforming into a pool of boiling magma.

He didn't burn those vengeful spirits...

He poured golden flames into the earth beneath his feet.

Forty-nine array flags on the hillside ignited simultaneously, and the Karmic Fire Talisman turned to ashes in the golden flames.

The vengeful spirits that had been sealed inside the gourds were freed from the constraints of the formation and were no longer controlled by the withered clouds. They hung in mid-air, and their faces slowly returned to their former appearance.

There were elderly people, women, and a little girl in a floral jacket.

She regained her round face from when she was alive, looked down at her hands, then looked up at the withered clouds not far away, then turned around and floated towards the small corpse on the hillside.

She crouched down beside his curled-up body, reaching out to touch the ashen face, but her fingers pierced through the flesh and she felt nothing.

Seeing this scene, Ku Yun suddenly grinned and said, "Dead is dead. It's your good fortune that I'm seeing you off."

Li Xin clenched his fist suddenly.

Golden flames burst forth.

boom……

A ring of golden ripples spread outwards in all directions, and all the images collapsed like sand.

A faint, almost imperceptible sigh echoed from the horde of vengeful spirits…

It wasn't a scream of agony, it was a release.

All the vengeful spirits turned into specks of light at the same moment, scattered by the mountain wind, and drifted into the broken corpses on the hillside.

The dark red blood mist began to dissipate, and the rotten sweetness in the air was gradually diluted by the mountain wind, turning back into the bitter scent of soil and pine resin.

Ku Yun suddenly spat out a mouthful of blood.

The battle flags were destroyed, and the Blood Sea Immortal Locking Formation was broken.

He looked down at his hands, which were forming a hand seal; all ten fingers were trembling.

He looked up at Li Xin, his eyes filled with disbelief, and roared through gritted teeth.

"rise."

Ku Yun's ten fingers flew, forming hand seals, and he suddenly lifted the ground towards the sky.

A muffled, loud thud echoed down the hillside as a rock shattered from the mountainside and was forcefully pulled into the air by an invisible force.

The rock was as big as a small hill, weighing at least fifty or sixty thousand kilograms.

Gravel tumbled down from the edge of the rock face, splashing up clouds of dust as it hit the ground, creating a muffled, humming sound.

"Move mountains and overturn peaks..." Ku Yun waved his arms wildly, and tens of thousands of pounds of giant rocks slowly rose into the air, hanging above Li Xin's head, casting shadows that covered the entire section of the official road.

He roared hoarsely, "I have spent forty years in arduous cultivation, and have only mastered this one move. Today, I invite you to judge it..."

With a sudden downward slam of both hands, the giant rock crashed down.

Li Xin looked up at the giant rock and planted the Panlong Spear into the ground.

Then he assumed a horse stance, tucking his right fist to his side.

Golden flames gathered at the edge of the fist, like a small sun, the light so bright it was blinding.

When Wang Jingya saw his action, her heart skipped a beat.

Is this person going to use their fists to catch a boulder weighing 10,000 jin?

She knew Li Xin was strong, but to take a mountain with one's fist wasn't a question of strength, it was a question of madness.

Zhang Yourong gripped the life-giving talisman tightly, the paper burning hot from her grip.

Ali peeked out from between Zhang Yourong's fingers, her little mouth agape.

Li Xin's muscles and bones creaked and hummed, like a hundred or so large bows being strung together.

boom……

One punch.

Golden flames streaked across the sky.

The moment the fist struck the base of the giant rock, the massive rock came to a stop.

It was like crashing into a mountain even bigger than itself.

Starting from the point of impact, cracks spread in all directions like a spider web, each crack spewing out golden light.

Golden light pierced through the entire giant rock, shooting straight from the bottom to the top.

The massive boulder exploded in mid-air, shattering into countless fist-sized pieces that rained down like a storm.

The gravel hit the trees on both sides of the official road with a loud crackling sound, and splashed into the mud, creating countless craters.

Wang Jingya cleaved the largest piece of stone with her blade, sparks flying as the blade struck the rock, and a chip appeared on the edge of the blade.

The piece of debris was larger than her knife, and the force was incredibly strong...

She struck with her sword, and her arm immediately went numb. She was knocked back three steps, and her tiger's mouth was covered in blood.

The stone veered off course and flew past the carriage.

It crashed into a pine tree by the roadside, breaking the trunk in half.

She flicked the blood off her knife and yelled at Li Xin, "Next time, break the stone into smaller pieces! Senior Sister almost got crushed to death..."

Li Xin didn't turn around, but the corner of his mouth twitched slightly.

Ku Yun's face was deathly pale, and his eyes were filled with confusion.

He had never seen anyone withstand an attack from a boulder weighing tens of thousands of pounds without flinching or dodging, nor had he ever imagined that there were people of such immense strength in the world.

He suddenly realized something... the ichthyosaur wasn't careless, and the mosasaur wasn't just unlucky.

This person is simply beyond his ability to handle.

The opponent's aura grew stronger and stronger, and a killing intent, like a mountain or a sea, pressed heavily on him.

It almost suffocated him.

At the same time, there is a feeling deep in my heart.

It seemed that no matter where they fled, they could not escape the opponent's concentrated attack.

Ku Yun's expression hardened, and he bit his tongue, spitting out a mouthful of blood.

This time, he sprayed more than ever before, his face was deathly pale, and his body was hunched over.

The blood essence fell to the ground and did not seep into the mud. Instead, it turned into a layer of bloody light that spread upwards from his feet, instantly enveloping him in a thick, bloody shell.

Blood Sea Protection Technique.

Using one's own life essence as a guide, one transforms the body's vital energy into an indestructible blood armor.

This is a trump card for survival; using it will cause your cultivation to regress by ten years.

As long as I can survive this blow, as long as I live, my cultivation can be restored.

Li Xin drew his Panlong Spear and glanced at the humanoid hard shell wrapped in blood-red light.