When Consort Qi was slain, amid the blood mist, thousands of blood-colored figures—some dense, some faint—all raised their heads and howled toward the sky.
In the air, a dozen red lanterns shook violently.
At the northwest corner of the imperial city, outside the city walls, a vast wave of thick blood light surged upward like a tidal wave.
From within came faint cries and sounds of fierce fighting.
The slaughter carried out by the Ghost Mother Sect against the servants was nearing its end.
Yin Yuan and Yin Xing stood on either side, clutching Lu Shan tightly, as if holding onto an oversized ginseng doll, afraid he might slip underground and escape.
The Empress Dowager and the Grand General watched Lu Shan with fiery eyes, looking as if he were a treasured son they’d lost for decades, eager to pull him into their arms.
Faintly, one could hear the Empress Dowager murmuring, “Good lad... What a pity. Surely, he will never want to enter the palace to serve me.”
Le Wu cast a sidelong glance at his sister and whispered, “It’s me... I wouldn’t want to either.”
Lu Shan stood stiff, unable to move an inch.
He alone understood how much energy Consort Qi’s body had contained—at least ten times thicker than that of the Green Sparrow.
That force crashed over him like a mountain storm.
Lu Shan had just increased the strength of the Twelve Standard Meridians threefold from an already unsurpassable base, yet this fresh tide of power battered him to the brink of shattering.
Thankfully, a jelly-like divine soul’s radiance in his mind was incredibly profound.
This vast and unusual energy was swiftly absorbed and purified by his soul light, transforming into clear droplets of water essence that flowed through his body, once again enhancing his muscles, skin, meridians, and vital organs from all angles.
The already several times stronger-than-usual Twelve Standard Meridians swelled, thickened, and became more resilient and spacious still.
Along with this, Lu Shan’s bodily functions shot up rapidly.
He wasn’t someone focused on physical cultivation, yet at this moment his body resembled those battle-forged warriors who had endured countless tortures and taken strange refining concoctions to strengthen their bodies—becoming powerful, mighty, and transcending the mundane.
His figure showed little change, still standing near nine feet tall.
Perhaps he grew half an inch taller? Such a small difference went unnoticed amid the thousands of ghostly howls surrounding him.
Yet beneath his skin, muscle strands, meridians, tendons, and blood vessels were now over ten times stronger.
He could feel a terrifying volcanic force hidden inside—just a slight swing of his arms could unleash a dreadful power that would crush everything before him to dust.
Lu Shan recalled some things he had once read in the archives of the Lai State Duke’s mansion about body-temperers in martial cultivation.
Before the founding of the Great Yin Dynasty, the highest standard a body-tempering martial artist could reach was the pure physical strength equivalent to ‘nine bulls and two tigers and one dragon’.
This was the absolute limit of mortal flesh’s pure physical power—unless one ascended to become those legendary beings who could fly through the heavens and vanish beneath the earth, no one could surpass that pure, raw strength of ‘nine bulls and two tigers and one dragon’.
Of course, in the Lai State Duke’s library, this was only a legend.
With the great changes in heaven and earth and the decline of martial ways, the ceiling of body tempering also steadily dropped.
One bull’s power here was compared to the mighty beast ‘Mountain-moving Barbarian Bull’, which weighed 129,600 lbs of pure brute force!
Slaying the Green Sparrow raised physical function by threefold.
Slaying Consort Qi strengthened the Twelve Standard Meridians several times again.
Lu Shan roughly estimated his current pure physical strength to be above three bulls but less than four bulls.
Compared to the legendary top body-tempering experts, his power was naturally negligible.
But in this era of martial decline, this sheer bodily strength was considered supreme.
In a fight against Xiong Dingtian, Lu Shan was confident he could pin him down with a single palm without even needing to use his soul light.
Taking a deep breath, his primal energy surged inside like rolling thunder.
His body was still rapidly transforming, so he remained stiff and unable to move.
He lifted his head and stared fiercely at the lingering blood mist ahead, bellowing, “This place is the imperial city of our Great Yin Martial Court! You foul demons dare cause chaos here and offend the emperor’s visage? Kneel and plead for mercy at once; you might yet live! If not... heh heh.”
At this moment, Lu Shan’s primal energy brimmed to its peak.
His roar sounded like a thunderclap, shaking the ground within several miles.
Yin Yuan laughed loudly, full of pride, pointing at the figures in the blood mist and proclaiming, “I am the Son of Heaven! If any of you have grievances, kneel down and submit a written complaint—I will see justice done.”
“But if you stubbornly rely on your demonic tricks to challenge the authority of Great Yin’s Heaven, don’t blame... my Heavenly Sun Marquis for slaughtering you all to the last, shattering your souls so completely even ghosts can’t form!”
Hearing this, Yin Yuan felt a rush of relief course through him.
Before, terrified senseless by these ghosts, trembling and silent, now seeing the two biggest ghost leaders slain by Lu Shan, and the remaining underlings, how could the majestic Emperor Jiayou be afraid?
Around the tent, the disorganized imperial guards and Feathered Forest troops hurried back, mustering their courage to form ranks outside once more.
Some large monks and old Taoist priests who had miraculously survived came shamelessly back, sagely gathering near statues of Buddha and gods where a faint light lingered and chanting sutras, though whether it helped was unknown.
Among them, a few shrewd old monks scolded their junior disciples, “That golden light must surely be the great power of our Buddhist patriarchs descending to exorcise demons!”
An old Taoist immediately retorted, “Nonsense! We Taoists have demon-subduing methods too! The golden radiance and purple aura were exactly the same as that golden light just now! You bald thieves stick gold foil to your Buddha heads, but they shouldn’t paste it on your own faces.”
Inside the blood mist, thousands of ghostly figures screamed in unison.
The blood energy and light from the northwest corner of the imperial city grew thinner.
The dozen red lanterns shook wildly as vast blood light fell like a torrential downpour.
The ghosts within the mist grew denser and firmer, gradually taking on the appearance of real human bodies.
They howled quietly, staggering step by step toward the tent, ready to fight desperately.
Yin Yuan, who moments ago was flamboyant and full of swagger, saw his bravado vanish without a trace.
He grabbed Lu Shan’s arm tightly and whispered, “Lu Qing… they’re coming again… again… hurry, hurry now!”
Lu Shan released his left hand, letting some powdered fragments of the lotus-shaped secret treasure trickle out through his fingers.
Beside the divine soul light in his mind, a pale golden ancient talisman slowly spun, pure and tranquil, containing a profound power of purifying evil spirits and dissolving all negative, wicked forces.
Lu Shan touched the talisman slightly with his soul radiance.
He immediately recognized the origin of this talisman.
It was a divine seed of transcendent power, refined through secret art by a true great master of Buddha’s teaching long ago, embedded into the lotus-shaped treasure for emergency protection.
But later generations, with the decline of martial arts and everything else, had long lost this secret art.
No one had been able to fully activate the treasure’s power for countless years.
Liu Wu could barely stir this talisman with his own essence blood.
Lu Shan clearly walked a different path.
Though he used soul radiance derived from mental visualization, that Buddhist route the talisman followed was not fully compatible with him.
Still, both were extraordinary forces.
Lu Shan’s soul light seemed at its core stronger and more fundamental than this Buddhist power, so activating the talisman through his divine light was still feasible—and overwhelmingly powerful.
The strange bodily transformation began to slow.
Seeing the blood mist creeping nearer from all sides, Lu Shan strode forward, leading Yin Yuan and Yin Xing out of the tent.
The Empress Dowager rose quickly, smiling softly. “Let us also see how Lu Qing exorcises demons and banishes monsters.”
Lowering her voice, she added, “The emperor is still narrow-minded. Tonight’s merits cannot be rewarded to a mere marquis alone, especially one with such divine power as Lu Qing—truly a unique rarity of the realm... A Wu, Yu Gongong, do you understand?”
Le Wu and Yu Sandou exchanged glances and nodded deeply.
Lu Shan had grasped the divine art of exorcising demons and slaying evil spirits.
No matter how he obtained it, he was now the realm’s sole possessor of such power.
At sixteen, with a martial cultivation peak at the Expansion of Meridian stage, such talent could never be secured with lofty titles and riches alone—it would keep one awake at night with unease.
Lu Shan stepped out of the tent, gazing toward the thick blood mist.
He swung his spear and a vast golden light swirled around it.
This time, Lu Shan directly activated the talisman with his divine soul light.
The ancient, plain talisman’s brilliance flared dramatically, its pure and serene Dharma light more than three times stronger than when he had relied on the lotus-shaped treasure.
The golden light curled and the spear became like a torch, spewing vast golden radiance that lit up several miles around.
Wherever the golden light touched, the blood mist instantly shattered.
Thousands of ghosts concealed within fragmented instantly.
Pure essence energy surged again and was rapidly absorbed by Lu Shan’s soul light.
Compared to Consort Qi and the Green Sparrow, the energy on these ghosts was negligible.
Even with thousands combined, they only helped stabilize Lu Shan’s rapidly rising foundation, but failed to push him to a further breakthrough.
Lu Shan raised his spear high, supported on either side by the Son of Heaven and Lan Cang King.
The Empress Dowager and Grand General followed closely behind.
Yu Sandou, Yu Changle, and many senior eunuchs carefully surrounded them.
With golden radiance blazing, Lu Shan led the group to swiftly march along the imperial city’s passage.
Where they passed, the blood mist wholly dissipated, and every trace of chill and darkness vanished.
Lu Shan made sure to purify the mouths of several deep wells.
When the Dharma light shone into the wells, terrible cries resounded from below.
Dark clouds billowed up but were quickly dissolved by the golden light.
The Empress Dowager shuddered, whispering to Yu Sandou, “Going forward, palace affairs must be tightened. Those cold-blooded scoundrels below—no matter how some palace maids or servants suffer, they must not be thrown into the wells!”
Drowning a few young eunuchs or palace maids every few days, or even occasional consorts ‘throwing themselves into wells’, was an everyday grim tradition of the imperial city.
But seeing Lu Shan’s efforts and the horrifying anomalies in the wells, the Empress Dowager resolved to reform these “dark and rotten customs.”
Unconsciously, Lu Shan and his entourage reached the rear garden, at the most secluded corner outside the cold palace gates.
This was the origin of the densest blood mist.
Amid flickering ghostly shadows, over ten thousand women stood silently before the cold palace gates, dressed in white clothes and shoes, some with snow-white hair and pale faces, expressionless as they watched Lu Shan and company.
It was the dead of night... the surrounding sound was filled with endless ghostly wails.
Though Lu Shan continuously wielded his pure Dharma light to cleanse the demonic aura, seeing these ‘residents’ of the cold palace made him shiver.
Instinctively, he took two steps back in tandem with Yin Yuan and Yin Xing, retreating to the Empress Dowager’s side.
Lu Shan murmured, “Divine power can only purify demons and ghosts... but these people... I implore Your Majesty’s wise judgment!”
The Empress Dowager looked on the women—some barely over twenty, some up to seventy or eighty years old—in silence for a moment and then lightly waved her hand.
“Sandou, arrange ample travel funds for them to leave the palace.”
“For those with family, have their loved ones take care of them.”
“For those without, assign them good estates in the imperial domain so they may live peacefully in their old age...”
(End of Chapter)