The Blade-Wielding Legend

It’s the brief moment of life and death hesitation!

Bang bang bang!

Li Yan moves as swiftly as a ghost, delivering a series of three strikes that shoot a person to the ground.

The entire process flows seamlessly, unnoticed by those inside.

Li Yan steps forward, the Duan Chen Blade slashes upwards.

The talisman paper-thick rune iron chain breaks with a snap.

He pushes open the heavy iron door, revealing a dark, cold and pungently foul-smelling cave entrance.

A mixture of pungent medicine and stale blood scent pours out from the entrance.

Li Yan’s eye twitches slightly, and he waves his hand to fan away the smell.

"Enter!"

With a low shout, he steps first into the darkness.

Wang Daoxuan follows closely, lighting a piece of talisman paper at his fingertip, the dim yellow light barely dispelling the darkness at the entrance.

Sha Lifei quickly loads the firearm, vigilantly guarding inside the entrance.

The cave extends downward, with obvious marks of human cutting.

Stone walls are covered in slippery moss and seep dark red stains.

Going further down, the temperature drops, and the biting Yin Sha Qi can be clearly felt.

A narrow passage bends around a corner, opening into a space transformed from a natural grotto.

The sight before them makes even Li Yan and the others’ pupils contract and their scalps tingle.

Around the grotto’s edge, a dozen giant fine steel iron cages are arranged in a row.

Most cages contain only twisted, deformed, incomplete humanoid skeletons.

The bones bear obvious bite and tear marks, displaying a sinister dark green hue.

A few cages still contain "living entities".

These are a few creatures still in slight spasms, unrecognizable from human forms.

Their limbs are twisted and swollen, skin ruptured and oozing, sprouting deformed bone spikes and tumors, producing inexplicable gasping sounds, with hollow eye sockets flickering with eerie green ghost fire.

In the center of the cave, several rows of gigantic pottery jars stand, soaked in green viscous liquid.

Inside the containers, all are naked people.

There are men and women, adults and children.

Their eyes are tightly shut, faces twisted in agony, skin covered in bizarre black patterns.

On a stone platform on one side of the cave, hundreds of pitch-black wooden boxes are densely displayed.

These boxes are only palm-sized, neither metal nor wood, with an eerie material, engraved with dizzying blood-red incantations.

Each box emits a strong, cold aura of hatred, despair, and resentment.

The faint sound of countless people’s shrill cries echoes around everyone’s ears.

Wang Daoxuan glanced at them, showing visible anger, and muttered, "Soul Extraction and Soul Refining... using Secret Technique to imprison Life Souls in Special Containers, in the Divine State this is called a Soul Nourishing Gourd, which is fundamental to refining Evil Artifacts."

"The Yin Sha Resentful Power here is so intense, the source is mostly here!"

Li Yan nodded, "Don’t waste time, search quickly."

Kong Shangzhao immediately rushes forward, joined closely by Kuai Dayou and Fatty Lin.

At the deepest part of the cave, a thick pile of records rests on a wooden table.

Kong Shangzhao flips through a few pages, finding detailed drawings of human meridian modifications, sketches of numerous struggling, twisted faces, and many records of Secret Techniques.

"This is it!" Kong Shangzhao exclaims, eyes bright.

Time is pressing, they can’t afford to peruse each page. Kuai Dayou takes out a burlap sack, stuffing all the scrolls into it to examine later.

As for Li Yan, he goes over to the soul boxes.

He walks past each one, but the Hook Paper in his arms remains unresponsive.

Li Yan’s expression turns grim, and a sense of unease rises within him.

This place, though secretive, lacks Demonic Qi, and the key to the Artificial Demon God is transforming Demonic Qi; it seems this may not be the Jianmu Organization’s core experimental area.

While they are busy, urgent Eagle Whistle alerts suddenly sound from the direction of the cave entrance, from Lv San.

Immediately followed by several muffled sounds and the noise of weapons slicing through the air!

"The Yin Yang Hall reinforcements are here! Retreat quickly!"

Without hesitation, everyone rushes out of the cave.

At the entrance of the cave, several figures dressed in formal Onmyoji hunting clothes were entangled with Lv San and Long Yan’er.

Leading them was a middle-aged Onmyoji, holding a talisman banner.

He waved it up and down, summoning several clusters of blue-white Fox Fire, cold and pressing.

"Die!"

Sha Lifei, without a second thought, raised his hand and pulled the trigger.

Pellet-like iron sand mixed with Evil-breaking Vermilion, forming a deadly barrage.

An Onmyoji at the front was caught off guard, and his chest exploded into a bloom of blood, screaming as he fell.

Li Yan’s Duan Chen Blade rang as it was unsheathed, and a blade astral as bright as a river of stars, with a faint clap of thunder, directly cleaved towards the leading Onmyoji holding the talisman banner!

Before the blade astral arrived, the chilling killing intent had already made the Onmyoji’s hair stand on end. He frantically waved the talisman banner in defense.

"Clang!"

The sound of metal clashing!

The Onmyoji’s talisman banner shattered, and his head was directly split open.

In the span of a few breaths, the reinforcements were also slaughtered completely.

Before the soldiers’ Fire Dragon arrived from afar, everyone had already vanished into the night...

......

Inside the old house divided by wooden screens, candlelight flickered.

Everyone sat around the wooden table, the atmosphere tense.

Kong Shangzhao cautiously unfolded several yellowed scrolls and pages brought back from the Yellow Springs Cave, examining them carefully.

Under the faint candlelight, the ink appeared old, interspersed with suspicious dark brown stains.

He took a deep breath and began to translate in a low voice:

"’1639 December 1st, take three fragments of ’Shuten’ remains and soak them in a Medicine Soup mixed with ’Red Nitrate’ and Bone Woman bone powder for seven days. Implant into Ashigaru Kai Taro, initially exhibiting madness and bloodthirst, strength tripled, skin gradually turns blue, horns grow..."

"The leap month of the second year of Shōho, obtain one wisp of Yumizakai after burning the fox tail demon qi, seal into ’Yin Spirit Stone’. Guide it with Secret Technique, infuse it into the long-preserved body of Pipa Mage. Its eyes emit unusual light, capable of bewitching minds, singing an enchanting melody that confuses one’s mind..."

"The first year of Qing’an, mid ninth lunar month, attach the resentment of Chongde Temple to the head of the Hundred People Slayer Samurai, place it in a Blood Pool to nurture. The head revives, spewing venomous curses, black qi entwines, capable of controlling nearby weapons to dance on their own, exceptionally vicious..."

His narrative was concise, but everyone could hear the cruelty within.

Every failed experiment either led to "mind obliteration," "body collapse," "backlash on the controller," or "loss of control and sealing."

In sum, they were brutally filling it with human lives.

"Just as Brother Li predicted."

Kong Shangzhao pushed aside the last scroll with recent records, it was densely packed with notes on improving confinement and how to pair medicines to enhance the endurance and control of ghost soldiers.

"These things in the Yellow Springs Cave were not the core workshop for creating ’Artificial Demon God.’ This place was mainly about producing ghost soldiers, piled up with countless human lives and demon ghost remnants."

"They were experimenting here, exploring how to cram the power of those suppressed Great Demons and Ghosts into living bodies, turning them into monsters on the battlefield impervious to swords and guns, only knowing slaughter."

"The ’ghost soldiers’ on Tsushima Island are the ’results’ of this place."

The cellar was eerily silent, only the faint sound of burning candle wicks could be heard.

Everyone’s disappointment was hard to conceal.

The goal of this journey was to find the key to saving the Night Crying Man and destroying the Artificial Demon God, but they only found clues about "ghost soldiers," and it would likely alert the enemy.

Li Yan’s eyes were calm, "We don’t have much time."

He looked towards the corner, where a thin coffin quietly sat, the Night Crying Man occasionally letting out unconscious low growls inside.

Kong Shangzhao did not immediately respond.

He frowned, seemingly contemplating something, then bent over again, quickly sifting through the pile of chaotic scrolls and pages with his fingers. Suddenly, his eyes lit up.

His fingertip stopped on an extremely worn-out scroll, almost forgotten in the corner.

This scroll’s material was noticeably older, made from the unique Japanese ’Rag Paper.’

The edges were severely worn, appearing dark brown, with ink that had blurred somewhat over time, and the rune patterns drawn on it seemed more primitive and fierce.

Kong Shangzhao carefully pulled it out, as if holding a hot iron.

He leaned close to the candlelight, carefully discerning the faded ink and intricate diagrams on it.

Time slowly passed, and everyone looked at the ancient scroll in Kong Shangzhao’s hand.

"This..."

Kong Shangzhao pondered aloud, "This record... the time is 1582!"

"That year, it was precisely the Incident at Honnoji Temple."

"The experiment of ’Artificial Demon God’ may have started from that time!"

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