Chapter 442: Behind the Scenes
Chapter 442: Behind the Scenes
Mo Hua slid along the rooftops, avoiding the Corpse Refiners and exiting the main gates of the Walking Corpse Village. He met up with Bai Zisheng and Bai Zixi under a large boulder.
Bai Zisheng asked, "Why did it take you so long?"
Mo Hua smiled and replied, "I found Yan Jiaoxi!"
"Is Instructor Yan alright?"
"Mhm," Mo Hua nodded. "We'll rescue him in a few days."
Bai Zisheng frowned, "Why wait? Let's go rescue him now! I'll charge in and slaughter all those Corpse Refiners!"
Mo Hua shrugged, "Go ahead if you want to."
Bai Zisheng paused, scratching his head. "Never mind, I guess. I'll listen to you, you're the crafty one."
Mo Hua scowled, "You're the crafty one."
Bai Zisheng sighed, "I wish I was more cunning, but alas, I'm too honest and upright to think of devious plans."
Mo Hua muttered, "I think it's more like you're just slow..."
Bai Zisheng reached out to ruffle Mo Hua's hair, "And who are you calling slow, huh?"
...
The two bickered playfully, their voices filled with camaraderie.
Bai Zixi picked up a twig and tapped each of them on the head, "Enough! Let's get down to business."
"Oh, alright," the two replied sheepishly.
The trio then began to discuss their next course of action.
Bai Zisheng suggested, "We can set up an ambush on the road that Zhang Quan must take. Then we capture him, and with the Walking Corpse Village leaderless, we can take advantage of the chaos to destroy the village..."
Mo Hua was about to agree when he suddenly shook his head, "That won't work."
"Why not?" Bai Zisheng asked, confused.
Mo Hua explained, "There's likely someone else behind Zhang Quan."
"Who?"
"Someone who's drawing the arrays for him."
Mo Hua's expression grew solemn, "The arrays that Instructor Yan drew for the Walking Corpse Village were all standard Five Elements arrays, the kind typically used for construction."
"But the ones used for refining corpses are completely different, they're sinister arrays."
"Zhang Quan doesn't know how to draw those, and from what I saw, no one in the village seems to be able to either."
"At least, none of the Corpse Refiners I saw could draw such arrays."
"Moreover, this is the Lingxu Array of the Lingyin Sect. It's not something that an ordinary array master could create."
"Unless we find out who this person is, capturing Zhang Quan and destroying the village won't solve the problem."
"The arrays are the key. As long as this person knows how to draw them, they can continue to kill, buy corpses, and refine them..."
"And," Mo Hua paused, letting out a sigh, "this is the ultimate array of Instructor Yan's sect. I don't want to see it being used for evil purposes..."
Hearing this, Bai Zisheng nodded, "Alright, we'll do as you say."
Bai Zixi also gave a slight nod, and asked Mo Hua, "Do you have a plan?"
"Mhm." Mo Hua nodded. "We'll let Zhang Quan return to the Walking Corpse Village, then we'll spy on him and see who he meets with, who's helping him with the arrays..."
"Once we find out, we'll inform Sister Situ and work with the Court to take down the village."
"We'll capture Zhang Quan, take back the corpse controlling bell, and restore the Lingxu Array."
"Ideally, we'd also expose the cultivator behind all this..."
"We need to cut the weed at its root to prevent future troubles."
...
Mo Hua laid out his plan with a serious demeanor.
Bai Zisheng nodded in agreement, but still had his concerns, "I doubt it'll go that smoothly..."
"Master always said to plan ahead and prepare for the unexpected," Mo Hua replied. "But plans rarely survive first contact, so we'll have to adapt as we go."
"Good!"
With their strategy decided, the trio set out to execute their plan.
The first step was to wait for Zhang Quan to return to the village.
However, this initial step didn't go as expected.
Zhang Quan seemed to be overly cautious...
He was still wandering in the desolate mountains, crawling through caves, hiding in forests, and setting up traps, playing a game of wits with an invisible, non-existent pursuer. He refused to return to the village.
Zhang Quan thought he was being thorough and cautious, unaware that Mo Hua was watching his every move.
Even Mo Hua was starting to feel bewildered.
Was he really that paranoid?
And it seemed like he could keep this up indefinitely.
Mo Hua was starting to feel exhausted just watching him.
Even with Mo Hua's patience, he was getting tired of waiting.
So, the three decided to split up and take different approaches.
Mo Hua would return to the Walking Corpse Village to figure out its layout, draw a map of the buildings, and chat with Instructor Yan to see if there were any loopholes in their plan.
Bai Zixi would stay outside the village to support Mo Hua.
Bai Zisheng would find Situ Fang and discuss the mobilization of forces in advance, preparing for the eradication of the Walking Corpse Village.
After another five days, Zhang Quan finally returned to the village.
He looked disheveled and haggard, but his heart felt relieved.
After a lengthy mental battle with an invisible, non-existent tracker, Zhang Quan had finally convinced himself that he had shaken off Mo Hua's pursuit. Only then did he dare return to his secret lair of corpse refinement.
Occasionally, he still felt a subtle sensation.
It was as if something was clinging to him like a bone-boring maggot.
But after all this time and effort, even if something was following him, it would surely have been shaken off by now.
Zhang Quan let out a cold laugh.
With his years of cultivation experience, he was far more knowledgeable than that novice ghost of a boy.
There was no way that sneaky little brat could ever track him again!
Zhang Quan's heart was now at ease, and he returned to his hidden, unknown, and unspeakable Walking Corpse Village with a sense of triumph.
After staying in the Walking Corpse Village for a few days, Mo Hua had hidden himself and secretly surveyed the village, figuring out its layout and growing bored. He started to look for something to do.
He even counted the number of coffins in the village...
Zhang Quan strode arrogantly into the main gates of the Walking Corpse Village.
Mo Hua's eyes lit up, and he swiftly employed the Flowing Water Step, leaping gracefully across the rooftops before entering the deepest room in the village. He climbed onto a beam and sat cross-legged, patiently waiting.
The room was spacious, hidden, and equipped with complete formations. Moreover, it was filled with corpse-refining tools.
He guessed that this was Zhang Quan's secret chamber.
As expected, after a while, Zhang Quan entered the room and right under Mo Hua's watchful eyes.
Mo Hua remained hidden, having even set up a concealment formation nearby in advance.
Zhang Quan was completely unaware.
The room was quiet, and on the surface, Zhang Quan was alone.
Zhang Quan heaved a long sigh of relief. Then, he burned incense, took a bath, changed into more presentable clothes, and began to meditate to adjust his condition. Soon after, corpse refiners started arriving one by one to report on the village's affairs.
The corpse refiners respectfully reported, and Zhang Quan listened from his high seat, while Mo Hua sat above him, eavesdropping intently.
Most of the reports concerned trivial matters within the village.
This month, they had ambushed several traveling merchants, killed a few cultivators, and bought several corpses...
They had refined so many Walking Corpses, with some successes and some failures...
They had spent so many spirit stones and used so many materials...
Some refining materials were running low and needed to be purchased, and some zombies had gone out of control and needed to be dealt with...
These reports were fragmented and scattered.
As Mo Hua listened from his perch, he gradually gained a better understanding of how the Walking Corpse Village operated.
The Walking Corpse Village had two types of members: bandits and corpse refiners.
Any bandit who dared to kill, was willing to kill, and had killed before could join the Walking Corpse Village.
However, joining the village did not guarantee that one would be taught the art of corpse refining.
One had to undergo an assessment, accumulate some seniority, and gain Zhang Quan's trust before becoming an official corpse refiner.
Corpse refiners were corpse-controlling demon cultivators who specialized in corpse refining.
To refine corpses, they needed the bodies of cultivators.
There were several sources for these corpses.
One was ambushing and killing.
The cultivators within the village were either criminal cultivators or bandits before joining. They often ambushed travelers, killing and robbing them.
However, the "goods" they robbed included not only spirit stones and spiritual tools but also the corpses of cultivators.
The bandits of the Walking Corpse Village would kill people and bring the corpses back to the village for refining.
The second source was purchasing corpses.
They hired people like Wang Lai to kill miner cultivators and buy their corpses.
Alternatively, they would buy corpses from tomb robbers and grave diggers.
Of course, the primary source was still the miner cultivators.
After all, there were many mines and miner cultivators in Nan Yue City, and in the eyes of these people, the lives of miner cultivators were cheap, not worth much in spirit stones.
After buying the corpses, the next step was corpse refining.
Mo Hua had briefly observed this process before.
As Little Sister had said, the process indeed required the use of herbs, corpse-nourishing coffins, and corpse-controlling bells.
However, the specific methods were quite complex.
Which herbs to use and in what proportions to create a putrid herbal juice?
Then, the corpses would be soaked in this juice.
After soaking for a sufficient period, the corpses would be placed into the corpse-nourishing coffins for refining.
During the refining process, the corpse refiners would walk around the coffins while ringing the corpse-controlling bells.
This process was tedious and intricate, but the division of labor was clear.
Just as alchemists used herbs and blacksmiths used fine iron, the corpse refiners of the Walking Corpse Village treated corpses as a type of "material" for refining rather than seeing them as people.
Their expressions were cold and numb, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
Mo Hua frowned as he watched, even considering drawing reverse spirit patterns to destroy the Walking Corpse Village outright.
But after thinking about it, he restrained himself.
One must be patient and not act on impulse, as it could ruin greater plans.
The corpse refiners' reports mostly concerned trivial matters within the village and did not touch on the formation techniques used for corpse refining.
After listening for several days without gaining any clues, Mo Hua finally caught a break on the third day.
A corpse refiner lowered his voice and asked Zhang Quan, "Leader, do you want to send the corpses?"
Mo Hua's heart stirred at these words.
Send the corpses?
What corpses? Where would they be sent? Why send them? Could it be... to draw formations? Mo Hua recalled that some of the newly refined Walking Corpses did not have formations at their heart meridians.
Since they didn't have them, that meant someone had to draw them.
Sending the corpses... That meant it wasn't Zhang Quan himself doing the drawing, and it wasn't being done in the Walking Corpse Village. Instead, they were sending the corpses to someone else to draw the formations for them?
Mo Hua held his breath and focused his mind, eager to know where the corpses were being sent, to whom, and who was helping Zhang Quan with the formations.
However, Zhang Quan shook his head, "No need to send them."
The corpse refiner was slightly taken aback, then hesitated and said, "If we don't send them soon, it might be too late. Those zombies... we might not be able to control them..."
Zhang Quan's eyes turned cold, "If we can't control them, then dispose of them. Feed them to the other zombies. Do I need to teach you this?"
The corpse refiner quickly lowered his head and replied, "Yes."
After the corpse refiner left, Zhang Quan coldly hmphed and began to meditate.
Mo Hua, however, frowned.
This Zhang Quan was a little unpredictable.
(End of Chapter)
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