114: Evil thoughts manifest in the blood pool; a single palm strike suppresses the evil aura.

The old Daoist also struggled to stand up. Though unsteady, he bowed deeply to Li Muchen. "This humble Daoist is Xuangu, a steward of Changchun Temple. I offer my deepest gratitude for your life-saving grace, Fellow Daoist! May I ask for your esteemed name? How did you come to find this perilous place?"

"Li Muchen, of Qingfeng Temple on Yuntai Mountain," Li Muchen replied simply, offering a brief salute without any intention for pleasantries. "Daoist Master Xuangu, do you know the true nature of this place? What is the purpose of those people imprisoning you here? Also, besides this altar, does this 'Snow Nest' have another, more important core location?"

Upon hearing this, Daoist Master Xuangu's expression grew even more grave, a flash of grief and anger in his eyes. "Daoist Master Li, this matter is a long story, with deep and tangled roots! It was only last month that this humble Daoist gradually began to notice clues... no, not just within my temple, but that some people among the Daoist sects of the Northeast were colluding with that 'Five Immortals Alliance' to carry out such heinous acts. I intended to investigate secretly, but was unfortunately exposed, captured by their scheme, and imprisoned here."

He caught his breath a few times before continuing, "They imprisoned me together with these pitiful children, taking blood from us daily to irrigate the blood pool outside and inscribe the altar's runes. They called it 'nourishing the sacred altar, awaiting the auspicious time'."

"This humble Daoist overheard the conversations of those gray-robed cultists. I learned they are preparing for a 'Centennial Grand Sacrifice'. On the night of the full moon, they intend to use this place as a conduit to communicate with the Five Immortals Ancestors and re-establish some sort of 'covenant'. And these children... they are all 'Spirit Mediums' they searched for from various places, ones with special birth dates and pure souls. They are to be... live sacrifices during the ritual!"

Although he had anticipated it, hearing the words "live sacrifice" confirmed from Daoist Master Xuangu's mouth still caused Chen Feng's body to tremble, a cold sweat breaking out.

"As for a more core location..." Daoist Master Xuangu frowned in thought. "This humble Daoist vaguely heard them mention fragments like 'covenant stone', 'dragon vein convergence', and 'the Old Ancestor's true body descends'. It seems the true core of the sacrifice is not here, but at a certain 'dragon vein node' deeper within Changbai Mountain. This place... seems more like a preliminary 'relay station' or a 'blood offering storage point'. Ah, right!"

He suddenly remembered something and, with great difficulty, fumbled inside the inner lining of his tattered Daoist robe, retrieving an object. It was an ancient talismanic seal, about the size of a thumb, irregularly polyhedral, made of a material neither metal nor jade, presenting a dull iron-gray color. On its surface was carved an extremely complex, bizarre symbol that seemed to be a twisted Fusion of several animal totems.

"This was torn from a minor gray-robed leader who tried to search me when I was captured. That wretch was extremely anxious about this item and fought desperately to get it back. I endured a palm strike to hide it. This object has a strange aura, like a key but not a key, like a seal but not a seal. After studying it for many days, I couldn't understand its purpose. Perhaps... it's related to the core of this matter?"

Li Muchen took the iron-gray talismanic seal. It felt icy and heavy to the touch. When he probed it with his Divine Sense, he immediately sensed an extremely ancient, primordial residual consciousness, mixed with various impure strands of Demonic Qi and a trace of faint divinity.

The internal structure of the seal was even more intricate and complex, seeming to be a multi-layered 'Spiritual Key' requiring specific conditions or energy to activate.

When he attempted to inject an extremely faint strand of Huangting True Qi into it, the bizarre Fusion totem symbol on the seal's surface suddenly glowed with a barely perceptible dark red light.

Immediately, a tiny structure within the seal seemed to be triggered, feeding back a fragment of extremely vague, intermittent directional information—not a specific place name or coordinates, but a pure sense of guidance based on the spiritual veins of the earth, faintly pointing towards a deep direction within the main range of Changbai Mountain.

"This seems to be a kind of... directional 'Secret Key'," Li Muchen mused. "It might guide the holder to find the true 'covenant stone' or the core location of the sacrifice."

He put the seal away and looked again at Daoist Master Xuangu and the five severely weakened young men. "This is no place to linger. We must leave immediately and get you to a safe place."

"But... there are many layers of the great Formation outside, and those cultists might patrol at any time..." Daoist Master Xuangu worried anxiously.

"No matter," Li Muchen's tone was calm, yet brimming with powerful confidence. Having cracked the stone door's Restriction earlier, he had gained a deeper understanding of the local operation patterns of this place's Formations. As long as he didn't trigger the core altar and those eight stone pillars, quietly leading people out would not be difficult.

He instructed Chen Feng and the slightly recovered Daoist Master Xuangu to help support the five weak youths. He himself took the lead, his Divine Sense fully extended, enveloping the group. Each step he took landed in the blind spots of the Formation's alert (warning/alert) or the low points of its energy flow.

However, just as they were about to leave the altar clearing and step into the outer snow-covered area, a sudden change occurred!

It wasn't that they had triggered the Formation, but the blood pool at the very center of the altar, originally calm, began to violently boil without warning!

"Gurgle, gurgle..."

The viscous dark red blood churned, bubbles rising one after another. An intense, nauseating Bloody smell (stench of blood) and a sinister, violent will abruptly erupted from the depths of the blood pool!

Immediately after, a distorted, blurry, enormous face formed from blood coagulated on the pool's surface! The face was neither fully human nor fully beast, as if combining the cunning of a fox, the slyness of a weasel, the coldness of a hedgehog, the venom of a snake, and the wretchedness of a rat—ghastly and terrifying!

"Who... dares trespass upon the sacred altar... and steal the sacrificial offerings?!"

A hoarse, overlapping, and endlessly malicious mental roar, like an invisible spike, viciously stabbed into the minds of everyone present!

Apart from Li Muchen, whose expression remained unchanged, Chen Feng, Daoist Master Xuangu, and the five youths all trembled violently, their heads splitting with pain, their vision darkening, almost unable to stand steady!

This was clearly a alert意念 (warning/alert consciousness) left in advance within the blood pool! Perhaps left by a certain 'Elder', or perhaps a faint projection of the Five Immortals Ancestors. Sensing the sacrificial offerings escaping their cage and the Restriction being broken, it automatically activated!

The blood-colored face roared. The blood in the pool rose into the air like a living thing, transforming into several thick blood pythons. Carrying a pungent Blood Wind (stench-filled wind) and corrosive Yin-evil power, they pounced fiercely towards Li Muchen and the others! Simultaneously, the entire Snow Nest's ' Gathering Yin and Locking Spirit' (Gather Yin, Lock Spirit) great Formation seemed to be activated as well. The Yin-cold energy suddenly intensified, countless ice crystals condensing in the air like sharp blades, sweeping towards them!

The path ahead was blocked, blood pythons behind!

Daoist Master Xuangu's face turned ashen, and Chen Feng was also horrified.

Li Muchen merely snorted coldly, a flash of golden light in his eyes.

"A mere remnant of evil thought dares to be insolent!"

He did not draw his sword, merely raising his right hand, palm outward, and pressed it gently towards the oncoming blood pythons, the Ice crystals everywhere (sky full of ice crystals), and that distorted blood-colored face.

"Suppress."

A single word softly uttered, words becoming law!

A vast, majestic, and Magnificent (overwhelming) dao rhyme, as if capable of suppressing all evil in heaven and earth and cleansing the filth of the universe, erupted with Li Muchen at its center!

Ten thousand beams of golden light, not blindingly hot but warm and immense, like the rising morning sun, dispelling all gloom and shadow!

Wherever the golden light passed, the ferocious (ferocious) blood pythons pouncing forward, as if meeting their nemesis, emitted a "hiss" of shrill, shrill (miserable) shrieks, instantly vaporizing and dissipating without leaving even a trace of blood energy! The Ice crystals everywhere刀片 (sky full of ice crystal blades) directly melted, turning into harmless water vapor.

That distorted face condensed from the blood pool, under the illumination of the golden light, let out a roar of pain and unwillingness, violently Distortion fluctuation (twisting and fluctuating), trying to struggle. But like snow under sunlight, it rapidly blurred, faded, and finally with a soft "poof" sound, completely disintegrated, reverting to ordinary Blood (filthy blood) that fell back into the pool, devoid of any further spiritual anomaly.

The boiling blood pool abruptly calmed.

The swirling Yin-cold ice crystals instantly vanished.

The bottom of the Snow Nest returned to deathly silence, with only the mournful howl of the cold wind sweeping over the snow.

Daoist Master Xuangu, Chen Feng, and the others stared dumbfounded at the figure standing with hands behind his back, his cyan robes slightly fluttering, as if in a dream.

Li Muchen withdrew his hand, the golden light convergence (retracted), as if the earth-shaking palm strike from moments ago was just an illusion.

"Let's go."

He said no more, taking the lead. This time, no further anomalies occurred.

The group followed the path they came by, quickly leaving this Snow Nest filled with evil and the aura of death.

As their figures disappeared beyond the mountain ridge, the five immortals tokens and the other three evil things (evil objects) atop the eight black stone pillars around the altar seemed to tremble slightly, emitting even more obscure (inscrutable) fluctuations, as if transmitting everything that had happened here through some Hidden channels (hidden channel) to an unknown existence deep within the mountains.

The mountain wind howled, whipping up snow mist, gradually covering the altar and blood pool at the bottom of the Snow Nest, also covering all that had just transpired.

But the fuse of the storm had already been lit.