Cultivation: Tax Evasion!

Ren Qing finally understood!

Heshan Town's clan forces had deeper influence than the yamen and had been almost completely infiltrated by the Wuwei Gate.

However, the relationship between the two was more like a collaboration.

There were certainly dealings in human trafficking behind the scenes, and the clans knew at least some of the filth involved.

The preachers died one after another, and the Dao Rhymes within their bodies were absorbed out of thin air by the Immortal Lord.

Fortunately, most of the preachers had not mastered any cultivation techniques. Otherwise, if strange entities burst out of their flesh, it would be a huge problem.

A small number of preachers who had mastered cultivation techniques entered a half-dead state after their Dao Rhymes were absorbed.

This showed that the Immortal Lord did not dare to allow a forbidden zone to form, meaning he was very likely somewhere near Heshan, possibly even around the sacrificial altar.

There was no way Ren Qing would let him have his way.

If the Immortal Lord also became a Grand Dao Officer, Ren Qing would have no advantage in the Wuwei Daoist Venue.

Since he had to prevent the ascension, killing more preachers was the simplest method, and he could also absorb Dao Rhymes through attrition.

Right now, the only thing Ren Qing didn't know was where the Immortal Lord was hiding, but he faintly had a general idea. All that remained was for the other to reveal himself.

He prepared to leave the sacrificial area, when suddenly he saw a few butchers walk out from the crowd.

The butchers were clearly puppets controlled by Wuwei Gate. They were bare-chested, and there was a fist-sized bulge on their backs.

It was probably a type of transformation.

The butchers silently grabbed two Seekers and placed them on wooden stakes.

Then they spat in their right hands, raised their axes, and chopped down, both people's bodies began to convulse, and their skulls were split in half.

The butchers removed the tops of their skulls, then each took one half of a brain. From the practiced manner, it was clear this was not their first time.

Sticky brain matter and blood dripped down and were quickly absorbed into the soil.

The two halves of the brains were swapped and then crudely stuffed into each other's heads, making the bodies foam uncontrollably at the mouth.

Ren Qing's pupils contracted.

What kind of technique was this?

Next, the butchers took out a bottle of dark red blood paste and poured a bit over the open brains before resealing the skulls.

The man began to tremble uncontrollably, but under the effect of the blood paste, his injuries quickly recovered, it was hair-raising.

Ren Qing immediately realized:

This method caused people to become mentally deranged. That's why the bandit chief appeared to have diminished intelligence; it wasn't natural.

Wuwei Gate's purpose was simple, give the Seekers memories of the Wuwei Daoist Venue, even if they became mad in the process.

And the blood paste gave off a blood scent laced with alcohol, it was the same as the blood from the bandit chief's wounds.

It must have been harvested from Seekers who had mastered fabricated techniques.

Good grief, Wuwei Gate had probably formed an entire industry chain near Heshan. Their actions couldn't just be about ascending to Grand Dao Officer.

Perhaps the Immortal Lord had, by chance, once left the Assembly Hall of the Wuwei Daoist Venue and sensed the strange creature possibly hidden in the pond?

Ren Qing immediately denied this.

The Primordial Heavenly Venerable statue's arm wasn't that easy to remove.

Maybe the Immortal Lord's crazed actions were stimulated by Ren Qing's Dao Officers, perhaps it involved the Blind Daoist.

Ren Qing didn't hesitate further and directly crushed the spider woman's head inside the prison within his abdomen using the wall.

The five-colored Dao Rhyme was absorbed, and the flesh was preserved to use as bait. As for the strange entity, it was temporarily locked inside the internal prison.

He immediately set out along the mountain path to intercept and kill incoming preachers.

Before leaving, Ren Qing glanced back.

The butchers were efficiently carrying out brain transplants, and the half-dead Seekers were being piled next to the altar's clearing, forming a low hill made of people.

Rather than a mountain god sacrifice, it looked more like a ritual for some indescribable aberration.

Ren Qing moved agilely through the tree branches without making a sound.

He quickly gained results, because whether on official roads or mountain paths, there were mountain folk with dazed expressions heading toward the altar.

All of them were preachers, rushing forward like moths to the flame under the Immortal Lord's control, destined to become his nourishment.

Ren Qing didn't hesitate and lunged at a preacher on the mountain path.

Before he even got close, he could already sense the other's aura resembled that of the spider woman, at the Half-Corpse Realm.

To ensure a swift kill, he released the Divine Leg Sutra's strange entity from its confinement.

While in midair, Ren Qing's body gradually transformed into a terrifying giant wolf, and he simultaneously withdrew his soul fragment from the Wuwei Daoist Venue, to avoid being exposed.

The Immortal Lord noticed one person missing from the venue, and his face immediately became ferocious.

The giant wolf landed, causing birds to flee in all directions and frightened monkey cries to echo through the forest.

Luckily, it was night, so Heshan Town's residents were unaffected. Those participating in the ritual were already in a frenzy.

The nearby preacher's expression was blank, his mind long gone.

His remaining instinct, stimulated by the danger of death, transformed him into a half-human, half-lizard creature. His tail whipped with a sharp sonic boom.

"Kill... kill... kill..."

The lizard man grinned grotesquely. In his nearly stagnant thoughts, Ren Qing was nothing more than a walking chunk of meat.

But clearly, that wasn't the case.

Ren Qing's legs exploded with force, the ground around him cracking like a spider web, stone fragments flying.

A wolf claw appeared next to the lizard man's head and twisted with brutal strength.

The sound of bone shattering rang out. The lizard man's expression froze, but his life visibly faded away.

Ren Qing then swallowed him into the prison within his abdomen, disappearing into the forest once more.

He began actively hunting down preachers, and the patterns on his Daoist robe grew increasingly complex.

But the drawbacks of the Divine Leg Sutra's transformation also began to manifest.

Though Ren Qing still retained his mind, he could no longer suppress his blood Lust, his heart beat wildly without control.

He immediately understood:

The Ghost Envoy stage of the Wolf-Footed Path was called "Marching Calamity Wolf."

According to the information from the aberration tree, "harboring ill intent," the mutation targeted the heart, slaughter was the best way to cultivate it.

Now, Ren Qing was already accessing some of the Divine Leg Sutra's Ghost Envoy stage abilities.

His heart pounded faster and faster, blood circulation increased, and his vision turned red-tinged.

Ren Qing could now see wild beasts over ten li away, and the preachers were like torches in the dark.

What disturbed him most was the altar, the Seeker hill emitted an indescribable scent.

And the scent had begun to spread outward, gradually expanding from Heshan.

Ren Qing gasped sharply.

It seemed Wuwei Gate had done something truly deranged, trying to use the "delicious flesh and blood" mentioned in the information flow to attract something?

Ren Qing bent his knees and burst forth, sprinting like a comet through the woods, becoming a blur to the naked eye.

At the same time, he kept stuffing eyeballs into his mouth until his entire stomach was filled.

Any preacher that so much as revealed themselves was greeted by a narrow Dragon-Snake Spine.

If that didn't kill them, he'd strike with plague-laced wolf claws, his killing methods were growing ever simpler and more brutal.

If a strange entity emerged from a corpse, he'd lock it in the internal prison.

Ren Qing was completely absorbed. By the time he came to, nearly all the preachers had been wiped out.

His actions had ruined the Immortal Lord's chances of becoming a Grand Dao Officer, destroying years of careful planning.

Ren Qing sat cross-legged on a boulder.

Now he waited for the Immortal Lord to make a move. If he gave up now, even if the Prison Enforcement Hall got involved, it wouldn't be total annihilation.

And since the preachers had all been killed between the two of them, at least the Wuwei Daoist Venue's secret could be preserved.

He figured the Immortal Lord would probably back down, so he prepared to withdraw for now and ascend to Grand Dao Officer later.

Maybe then he could completely seal off the Wuwei Daoist Venue.

After waiting a bit, the Immortal Lord's voice came from the mountain, and at the same time, white smoke billowed from the altar.

"Disciple welcomes Master Xiaochenzi."

Ren Qing looked in astonishment toward the distant mountain road. If the Blind Daoist really came from afar, he was ready to flee from Heshan immediately.

But for some reason, no movement followed for a long while.

"Disciple welcomes Master Xiaochenzi, the Nirvana ceremony is ready..."

Still no response.

Ren Qing even felt a little sorry for the Immortal Lord.

The Heavenly Dao Egg probably required vast amounts of Seeker flesh and blood to hatch, but because of Ren Qing's interference, Wuwei Gate had never fully collected it.

The Prison Enforcement Hall had already been alerted, so now they had no choice but to make a desperate attempt.

Suddenly, the earth shook violently.

Cracks spread across the giant mountain god statue, revealing a mass of deformed flesh within, composed of countless human faces.

Ren Qing drew a sharp breath.

He had suspected the Immortal Lord's real body was inside the statue, but he never imagined it would be such an indescribable monstrosity.

"Master!!!"

"Why did you enlighten me, only to leave me in torment, I'm still human!!!"

"You only needed five hundred more jin of flesh and blood, why wouldn't you save me!!!"

The Immortal Lord had already lost his mind and could no longer maintain the Wuwei Daoist Venue.

The people present snapped out of their trance and looked with disbelief at the giant mass of flesh.

Zeng Lin immediately prepared to fight back and had the reserves evacuate the crowd and carry off the critically wounded preachers—

to prevent strange entities from escaping upon their deaths.

Ren Qing looked at the distant altar and checked how much lifespan was needed to ascend Dao Begets Dao, it required fifty full years.

If he killed the Immortal Lord, the Dao Rhymes should probably be enough.

"Besides... I can't let you fall alive into the hands of the Prison Enforcement Hall. If you die, I can just pin it on a rogue cultivator..."

[Choose to ascend to Marching Calamity Wolf? Will consume ten years of lifespan]

After subtracting ten years, only about two months were left...

From Ren Qing's experience, once the brief peak of ascension passed, his body would inevitably fall into weakness.

Damn it..

If it really doesn't work out, I'll just hide in the Prison Enforcement Hall and cling to life until I can replenish my lifespan.

Confirmed. Lifespan drains.

The sound of bones shattering and reassembling rang out.

The giant wolf's body continued to grow taller.