Chapter 21: Great Blood Pills

  An Jing naturally harbored doubts about the mysterious voice. Although the other party had helped him, it ossible it had its own agenda.

  Yet at this juncture, there was no room for such suspis. At this fork in the road, if An Jing did not trust that voice, he would have to submit to the Demonic Sect.

  That choice was simple.

  【Mm… so you really do uand well】

  Hearing An Jing’s calm expnation, the mysterious voice paused before saying:

  【Since you know you’ve already been discovered, why you still remain this posed? This ’t be expined by mere innate wisdom.】

  “He wants me to go.”

  Evehe mysterious voice easily perceived his innate wisdom, An Jing stayed unruffled. He spoke coolly: “He’s already given many clues. That time he taught me the ‘proper methods,’ he did not attempt to hide the identity of ‘Heavenly Will Demo.’”

  “Aside from not calling themselves a demo directly, they never really cealed it from start to finish.”

  “This is also a test—if reizing that the Imperial Heavehod directly opens the Martial Veins ts as ‘passing,’ and disc the Later Earth Method indicates exceptional brilliahen perceiving the Son of Heaven Teique is what Hanging Fate Manor—or rather, the Demonic Sect—truly wants to see in a ‘genius.’”

  “You think it was mere ce that I saw those beast bones when I waited at the door?”

  “You think it was a ce that, when I left the entrance carrying those elixirs, I happeo run into that pharmacist heading toward the Eastern Mountain Farmnds?”

  “It wasn’t so tal at all…”

  “This is the final test—a test of ‘where you stand.’ There’s a truth waiting for me there.”

  “The Medie Manor Lord wants me to go, and I do want to go.”

  【You’re not surprised in the slightest】

  The mysterious voice spoke softly. An Jing was unsure whether to smile h. He could only reply in a voice tinged with bitterness: “Because I’ve already been suspicious for a long time.”

  “Who would really spend real gold and silver to buy disaster victims from the northern frontier and even cure their illnesses?”

  “Only those who truly needed ‘life’ itself.”

  “They checked people’s iitudes, asked for their birth dates and times because what they actually wanted were living beings; if someone’s birth chart was suitable, they were willing to pay the price to save them and take them away.”

  “Then there’s the brainwashing by that evil se Hanging Fate Manor, the traini to cultivate obedience—I already knew of such methods from my innate wisdom, so I was extra vigint. Let alohose strange pieces of savage beast meat and those potions.”

  【That was demonic-beast flesh. Demonic beasts delight in dev se beings; in turn, wheient creatures e their flesh, it imparts demonic ferocity】

  The mysterious voice listened calmly to An Jing’s expnation, occasionally crifying:

  【They use demonic-beast meat to stir up a bloodthirsty nature and boost physical potential, bined with ‘Heartless Water’ to suppress demoniergies and sharpen the soul’s endurahe two effects reinfore another】

  【The only side effect—quietly ging a person’s temperament— poses no problem to them.】

  【Since you dised so much, why didn’t you suspect earlier that they were the Demonic Sect?】

  “As expected.”

  An Jing nodded slightly as he strode past the road between the main manor and the Eastern Mountain Farmnds. “I was saying— the attitudes of most of the mounted riders and instructors here seemed off, too g in human warmth.”

  With the rain p down is, An Jing instinctively wiped the water from his fad vaulted over a wall, entering a shed in the manor: “As for why I didn’t figure it out…”

  He fell silent for a moment, then said bitterly, “Perhaps it’s because, on the surface, they treated us children fairly detly.”

  “At least, they treated those of us who’re still alive detly.”

  “If I’d been just an ordinary person, I likely would have been pletely indoated. They really were good to me.”

  “But I still uand why a Demonic Sect is called a Demonic Sect.”

  Letting out a breath, An Jing’s voice carried a rare weariness and a near-fearful sigh: “I just didn’t want to know certain truths.”

  “But I have to know.”

  Within the Eastern Mountain Farmnds stood many sheds, shelter from the rain. Ihem were numere, brownish water vats that nearly covered every inch of the yard’s ground.

  “What are so many vats doing here?”

  Steadying his emotions, An Jing surveyed the area and saw at least fifty vats. Each vat was covered by a ft stone lid and sheltered by the sheds. He felt perplexed. “Colleg ‘rootless water’? But why bother c them with lids and sheds?”

  “Could it be they tain medie that needs fermenting?”

  But as An Jing drew closer, he caught a faintly sweet, fishy medial odor.

  He khat smell well—it was very simir to the strange odor he had once caught drifting from the Medie Pavilion.

  Frowning, An Jing circled around o.

  Up close, he noticed there was a bel o.

  It bore a person’s name, plus birth date and time.

  【Gu Jinghai, Digu Yan Fate, miseous, aptitude: lower-mid】

  A name he reized.

  An Jing remembered the child behind that name.

  He was rather quiet and quite young, someone who liked being by himself. An Jing had oalked with him about their hometowns. The boy missed the riverbank teeming with fish, missed the summer days chasing dragonflies with his older brother.

  The Frost Camity destroyed everything, leaving him without his brother and parents. His uncle sold him, casting him aloo this pce.

  Each vat was rge enough for a person to fit inside.

  Realizing that, An Jing suddenly uood something.

  His hand shook.

  “Impossible…”

  An Jing knew how foolish it was to mutter that. Of course, he knew.

  He could, at any moment, run the Imperial Heaven’s Unified Spirit One-in Qi Cultivatiohod and slip into that detached, bird’s-eye mi. He certainly could do that.

  He could face the truth with a dispassioitude and a serene mind.

  But he didn’t want to. He uood clearly:

  If he avoided reality now, he would lose something important—something fual to being human.

  Thus, even though he had calmly weathered the Medie Manor Lord’s multiple probes without so much as a break in his breathing, An Jing now trembled as he searched.

  He went from vat to vat.

  【Zhan Feng, Juling Fate, miseous, aptitude: mid-lower】

  【Ye Xiuyuan, Lun Yan Schor Fate, miseous, aptitude: mid-lower】

  【Zhang Ying, Geng-Lang Fate, miseous, aptitude: mid-mid】

  At st, he found those names.

  “Ha… I finally found you.”

  Taking a step forward, An Ji out a brief, subdued ugh. “So…”

  He stretched out his hand to touch the vat in front of him, murmuring in a low voice: “You were here.”

  His voice grew softer and softer, until he fell silent.

  For a long time, he stood there wordless. A fsh of lightning cut through the bck of the stormy night, illuminating his pale face.

  An Jing closed his eyes.

  When he opehem again, they gleamed with a deep and sht. He raised his hand aed strength to move the lid on top of the vat.

  The solid stone cover was heavy—an ordinary adult would have found it extremely difficult to shift. But for An Jing, who was close to advang into Internal Energy and who had ed a lot of demonic beast flesh, it posed no issue.

  Ihe vat was a thick, pale pink paste. One could dimly see traedial herbs within it, emitting a powerful sweet and fishy odor—exactly the strange, sweet reek An Jing had smelled before, making his mind waver.

  But the truly shog sight was the white bohat surfaced amid the medial paste.

  A small skull.

  Children who left and never returhose who had been “eliminated”… Their fate was now painfully clear.

  【Great Blood Pills】

  The mysterious voice spoke with chilling calm:

  【They use those who possess life yet have not awakened—breathing lives—as ‘medie’ to nourish flesh and soul, prolong life, and strehe body…】

  【Such demonic as deserve execution!】

  (End of Chapter)