Chapter 133 The Ghost Soldiers, Part 4: There are actually people hiding here?
There are people hiding here?
Upon closer inspection, Shinju and the others discovered that there was indeed someone in the corner. It appeared to be a young girl who had just reached marriageable age. Her simply styled hair was now loose, with many strands falling out. Her gaze was fixed on the ground, and her slender body trembled slightly.
Ox-Head and Horse-Face were the first to sense something was wrong, and said in a deep voice, "It's a ghost."
Shinju's pupils contracted sharply upon hearing this. It's no wonder he was shocked; he had never considered himself a true ghost soldier, or rather, he never thought of himself as a ghost. Therefore, he hadn't noticed anything unusual about the villagers being able to see him, and thus didn't react for a moment.
The fact that she could see them meant that the girl was already dead and knew they had come to collect her soul, which was why she looked so pitiful.
Shinju shifted his gaze, then looked again and realized that the female corpse they had just pulled from the erupting ice shards looked exactly like the girl, except that her expression was not so panicked and uncertain, but rather somewhat empty and melancholy.
No wonder she thanked them. That was her body.
The ox-headed and horse-faced demons used their soul-snatching ropes to encircle the girl's waist. She offered no resistance and obediently followed them.
"You must not mention the matter of us touching the corpse after we go to the underworld," Ox-Head and Horse-Face instructed before leaving.
The girl mumbled an agreement without asking any further questions.
Instead, Masamune wore his doubts on his face, and Horse-Face had to remind him, "If it weren't for you advocating for saving people earlier, Ox-Head and I would never interfere in the affairs of the mortal world. I didn't expect that this time, there are still some lingering spirits, and we don't know how many there are. Let's not worry about the villagers' corpses for now; it's more important to bring all the spirits back first."
"Alright." Shinjuku gazed at the hellish scene in the village and slowly nodded.
Later, they took many souls along the way, but the remaining ones were not peaceful and even hostile. Some hid themselves, while others took the initiative to attack them.
Their reckless and mad appearance clearly showed that this violent death had filled them with extreme hatred. They went berserk, refusing to accept reincarnation even in death, and insisted on clashing with the underworld officials.
Without a word, Ox-Head and Horse-Face charged forward and engaged in battle. Zhen Su didn't know whether it was because Ox-Head and Horse-Face were too powerful or because the Yin spirits were too weak, but the two sides couldn't even go back and forth for long before the Soul-Hooking Ropes were followed by about a hundred souls.
They were all dissatisfied and full of complaints.
"What kind of heroes are you, only good at dealing with us shrimp soldiers and crab generals! You left the evil mother who was wreaking havoc on the world unattended, and she slaughtered the entire village!! Our family of twelve, not a single one survived! Where were you then?! If it weren't for the fact that you left her alone for three hundred years, oh no, it's that you couldn't manage her! You could only capture us innocent, weak, old, sick and disabled people to rack up your merits!"
"That's right! I'm not a true Lian Village resident if I don't avenge this! Going to the underworld? What a load of rubbish!! Even if my soul is scattered, I'll still fight that old hag!! If you have the guts, let me go!"
"Stop cursing! Don't anger the master! Your Honor, please be magnanimous and don't hold it against this old man! Waaah..."
The insults and weeping continued unabated. Shinju caught a glimpse of the key words and stepped forward to ask, "The ghost mother you speak of, could it be Lou Lan?"
The old man who had been cursing the loudest earlier, without stopping his incessant chatter, immediately glared at Zhen Su, his eyes almost popping out of their sockets. "You know her real name?! I knew it! You useless lackeys must know how many Lian Village people she killed, but you all just stood by and watched, completely unable to deal with her!"
Ox-Head and Horse-Face frowned as they listened, raising their hands to shut the old man's foul mouth.
Shinju glanced at them, then turned back to continue asking the old man questions, at which point Ox-Head and Horse-Face withdrew their hands.
Although the old man spoke rudely, Shinjuku still managed to extract important information about the Demon Mother from his numerous taunts and vicious curses.
To Shinju's surprise, the nickname "Demon Mother" has been passed down for three hundred years.
The old man mocked with malice, saying that Lou Lan was called the Ghost Mother because she had lost three children in a row and could not bear the fact that she could not be a mother. She went mad and was imprisoned in the backyard by her husband's family.
Later, her husband's family, a prominent clan that had dominated the village for many years, was brutally massacred overnight, with no one surviving. Everyone said that she must have come to claim their lives.
It is said that she may have died in the backyard long ago due to resentment and loss of favor, becoming a bound evil spirit. Even after slaughtering her husband's family, her ghost lingered, causing murders from time to time. However, even after inviting celestial masters and cultivators, no one has been able to drive her away.
Thus, this derogatory term gradually spread. Whenever a strange case occurred in the village, no matter how small, everyone initially tended to believe it was the work of the Ghost Mother. But three hundred years is not a short time, and gradually, few of the younger generation believed it. Moreover, no one could clearly say which of those murders were committed by the Ghost Mother and which were committed by other evil people.
The shadow of a vengeful ghost hung over Yilian Village for years, but life had to go on. Many years passed, and Yilian Village slowly began to develop again, with considerable momentum. The spiritual spring business, in particular, was thriving. Just when everyone thought they were living in peace with the Ghost Mother, another major incident befell the village's wealthy and influential families.
That was the case of the missing Hundred Souls that Shinju and his group were investigating.
That said, why would Lou Lan suddenly turn on the entire village? Zhen Su pondered this carefully. Could it be that something had enraged her, something she could no longer tolerate? But the method didn't seem like a revenge killing. Such a large-scale, almost simultaneous massacre was not something Lou Lan and her few remaining subordinates could have carried out.
No, suddenly it dawned on me that there was something that could achieve this, and it was exactly the method that Lou Lan was proficient in!
Zhen Su immediately said to Ox-Head and Horse-Face, "It's a magic array! This was most likely caused by a magic array. There must be a huge magic array hidden in Yi Lian Village!"
"Another magic array?!" Ox-Head and Horse-Face suddenly remembered the forbidden magic array from before. "Is it a sacrifice?! What is she planning to do this time..."
But as soon as they finished speaking, they immediately realized that this was highly likely.
So they immediately began searching for traces of the magic array in Yilian Village.
According to the villagers' spirits, this inhuman massacre had not even lasted three hours. Although this is not a short time, perhaps enough for the mastermind to destroy the magic array, it would be better to use that time to escape, unless the perpetrator had no intention of escaping and was afraid of being caught.
Fortunately, Shinjuku and his group didn't spend too much effort before finding some clues.
A magic array does indeed exist! And this magic array is truly enormous. Judging from its scale, if one were to trace the true boundary from a few points on its edge, and then estimate the location of the array's core, as well as pinpoint the specific object that might be the core, it might take all night to solve.
Unless someone can fly up into the air and stay there long enough...
Shinju's golden eyes glanced at the silver bracelet on his wrist, then he narrowed his eyes and lifted it upwards. The silver bracelet transformed into a silver jellyfish and slowly floated into the sky.
"Go." After releasing Oni-Gin, Shinjuku explained to Ox-Head and Horse-Face, "This is one of my magical artifacts."
Ox-Head was about to reprimand him on the spot. Since the Yin soldiers had to apply for permission before setting off to carry magical artifacts, and the use of unauthorized artifacts was strictly forbidden, he hesitated. But then he remembered the newly appointed King Yama's protective attitude towards Zhen Su before their departure, and he had to keep quiet and turn a blind eye.
Horse-faced remained silent.
Shinju and the others were responsible for adding Yin Fire to the places on the ground where traces of the magic circle's spiritual energy were found, so that Kigami could use these as connection points until the complete outline of the magic circle's circular edge could be drawn.
Not long after, the silver jellyfish fell back into Shinju's hand.
"Well, have you figured out the location of the formation's core?"
Silver Jellyfish danced its tentacles joyfully, about to speak, when Shinju covered its mouth, which was somewhere unknown. It quickly switched to telepathy and said, "Of course! Having been immersed in the market for so many years, my arithmetic skills are pretty good! Isn't it a coincidence? The location of the array's core perfectly encompasses the three mountains in the village, and the mountain peaks can be connected in a straight line."
"You are the Daoist, and the core of the formation is very likely located on these three mountains?" Zhen Su asked telepathically.
“There are no traces of ice or snow on those three mountains,” Guiyin said.
“Most formations are created by borrowing momentum, especially the momentum of heaven and earth. The waterfalls in the village are frozen, but the mountains are not covered by any ice or snow…” Before practicing dual cultivation, Zhen Su had also studied formations with the Zhen King for half a night. Now, following these clues, he made his own judgment.
At the same time, Shinju humbly asked Ox-Head and Horse-Face, whose research on magic arrays was far superior to his. It was Horse-Face who had identified the Eight Rings Magic Array.
Horse-face was naturally quite surprised. Hearing Shinju's detailed assessment, which was almost exactly what he had thought, he concluded, "That's right, I also estimated that there were three key points in the formation, so I placed them on three different mountains."
Immediately afterwards, they continued their search for the true core of the formation.
Shinjuku and Oni-Gin went to the westernmost mountain. The scenery on the mountain was very familiar; the first time Shinjuku visited Yilian Village, it was here that he encountered the faceless gravedigger.
They never encountered that person again.
Now, under the lonely moon and the bleak night wind, the empty coffins that should have been buried underground in the vast cemetery have been dug up and are lying haphazardly on the ground. The chirping of insects can be heard intermittently all around, which is quite eerie.
Mayu felt the silver bracelet on his wrist suddenly tighten.
However, Shinju still stepped forward and, with the help of his divine sense, he discovered that there was indeed no corpse inside the coffin, only a large number of maggots wriggling on the bottom of the coffin.
"Something just doesn't feel right..." If the coffins were empty, why dig them up?
He vividly remembered that these coffins were all empty when they were first built.
Shinjuku picked out a coffin and lay down inside. Oni-Gin immediately wanted to fly away, but he held back and only yelled, "Why did you lie down here?!"
"Sorry." Shinjuku not only lay down inside, but also banged on the coffin walls, disturbing the maggots inside and causing them to frantically try to escape. As he banged, Shinjuku could faintly sense some unusual vibrations, which were quite weak.
“There’s something.” Shinju bit his fingertip and smeared his immortal blood on the coffin wall. Immediately, a red light shone brightly, and Shinju saw with his own eyes that a circle of runes appeared on the outer wall of the coffin between the two coffins.
"It's a magic array!"
The magic array protected the coffin, which is why a large part of his striking motion was absorbed, making the sound very strange.
Although Shinju couldn't understand the patterns and characters on the magic circle, he could roughly guess what had happened to these empty coffins before.
Someone must have lain down there!
But what are the identities of these people? If he could find out, Masaya's intuition would be very close to the truth.
The situation on Shinju's side went quite smoothly, but on Ox-Head and Horse-Face's side, they hit a wall.
Not only could they not find any clues about the array's core, but the ghosts of the hundreds of villagers also began to stir, seemingly out of fear. One of them went berserk, and the others were inexplicably infected as well, their eyes turning red and their malevolent energy surging.
There was still some time before sunrise, and as a result, their search could not proceed normally at all.
"Let's go back to the underworld first!" The bull-headed man who was maintaining order was so annoyed that his tone became unfriendly.
With the truth about to be revealed, leaving now might lead to unforeseen circumstances. Shinju was caught in a dilemma.
However, at this moment, Horse-Face patted True Monk on the shoulder and said, "Ox-Head and I will first guide the soul back, and then send more Yin soldiers over as soon as possible. True Monk, you stay here and continue the investigation, and wait for us."
Ox-Head hesitated, but after receiving a hint from Horse-Face, he finally nodded.
Mayuki smiled gratefully, his eyes crinkling, "Thank you both."
After watching Ox-Head and Horse-Face lead a large group of ghosts into the black coffin, Zhen Su decisively turned around, took Gui Yin, and hurried towards the cave of the Cave Maiden.
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