Chapter 285 : The Altar Totem
"And what if it is?" The merperson's attitude was cold and arrogant. Despite his enchanting beauty, he provoked anger in everyone's hearts.
The cultivators had just experienced a fierce battle, the murderous aura not yet dissipated from their bodies. Combined with the anxiety-inducing experiences on the island that kept them constantly on edge, this single sentence instantly ignited everyone's emotions. Some cursed aloud, others questioned loudly, and those with explosive tempers grabbed whatever they could find and hurled it at the merperson, as if venting their emotions.
Naturally, such attacks were ineffective—the merperson avoided them with the slightest shift of his body. Setting aside the curses, he heard the crowd's questions, among which the most common concerned their spiritual power, asking if he was responsible for its depletion.
The merperson didn't answer, merely giving a light snort of derision.
Jiang Mo saw his eyes suddenly turn cold, and just as she mentally exclaimed "Not good," the cultivators within the barrier collapsed limply. Looking around, besides the natives who obediently lowered their heads, few remained on their side—apart from herself and Yun Qingyue, only Zhu Baiyi, Qingyu, Tan Xin, and Huineng were left standing. All other cultivators had fallen.
Witnessing this familiar scene, Jiang Mo couldn't help but curse inwardly. The merperson had barely made a move, yet the situation had instantly reversed. Given the current circumstances, if those natives all counterattacked together, she and the few others would likely perish here!
Instinctively, Jiang Mo stepped forward half a pace, once again attempting to shield Yun Qingyue.
However, this time she had barely moved before Yun Qingyue grabbed her arm. Though Yun Qingyue said nothing, her grip was extremely tight. Jiang Mo tried to break free but couldn't, finally conceding to stand shoulder to shoulder with her Senior Sister.
Others saw their struggle but had no attention to spare for it. Everyone's focus was entirely on the merperson. What little awareness remained was used to watch the nearby natives, fearing they might suddenly counterattack, catching them off guard... but they didn't. Even though they had killed many natives earlier, and now that the situation had reversed, those natives surprisingly remained motionless.
Zhu Baiyi took everything in, frowning as she looked at the merperson: "What exactly do you want to do?"
The merperson still maintained his cold smile, as if it were his only expression, but his gaze toward the cultivators was extremely cold: "What I want to do, you'll know soon enough." After saying this, he suddenly commanded: "Capture them all!"
With these words, the previously motionless natives immediately sprang into action, pouncing toward the few remaining cultivators with the agility and ferocity of tigers and leopards.
The battle that had been evenly matched now became overwhelmingly one-sided with so many cultivators gone. Even though those remaining were no ordinary characters, they found themselves surrounded. After nearly half an hour of fighting, they were captured one by one. Ropes of unknown material bound their hands and feet as they were pushed down among the group of cultivators.
Those who had been conscious remained so, while those unconscious were still in that state. Fortunately, those awake were clear-headed, and though they glared at the merperson with hatred, no one dared curse or shout.
The merperson approached to inspect his spoils, then with a wave of his finger in midair, a water sphere rapidly condensed from the moisture-rich barrier and floated before him. With another pinch of his fingers, two drops of crimson blood appeared at his fingertips, which he flicked into the water sphere. The deep red quickly diluted to pale pink, then further diminished until it completely dissolved into the water within a breath or two.
Having done this, he withdrew his hand and coldly ordered those around him: "Make them drink it."
༻༺❀༻✧⋆｡°✩☽༓☾✩°｡⋆✧༺❀༻༺
For sacrificial ceremonies, some require specific dates, while others do not.
Jiang Mo and the others' luck was hard to gauge as good or bad—the sacrifice the merperson had prepared for them was of the latter type. Originally, it would have taken more time to capture all the cultivators on the island, but Jiang Mo and her companions had delivered themselves, saving the merperson considerable effort. He cared nothing for the natives' casualties. After feeding merperson blood to everyone, he led these controlled individuals through a transportation array to the hidden sacrificial altar.
Merperson blood had the effect of confusing the mind. Once consumed and fallen into a dream state, the body and soul would separate. Regardless of how high the victim's cultivation was, without external help, breaking through the dream state through sheer willpower was a thousand-to-one rarity.
Understanding these effects, neither the merperson nor the natives maintained much vigilance over these cultivators who had consumed merperson blood.
However, established understandings are often broken—at the very least, Jiang Mo wasn't controlled by the merperson blood. She kept her eyes closed, feeling herself being lifted and then set down. Secretly opening her eyes to a slit, she saw that the scene before her had completely changed.
The primitive native village was gone, replaced by a flat sacrificial altar built of massive stone blocks. Directly in her line of sight stood a gigantic pillar over a hundred feet tall. The pillar was carved with a totem—a merperson with a human upper body and fish tail standing on ocean waves, hands raised high in offering, holding something aloft. What exactly it signified remained unclear.
Jiang Mo secretly shifted her gaze and discovered that the pillar wasn't alone. Not far away stood another, which also vaguely bore a totem, though from her current angle she couldn't see it clearly. She guessed that these pillars might tell a story through their carvings and that this must be the sacrificial altar her master had mentioned. But why hadn't her master mentioned the story carved on the altar pillars?
Could it have been too dark when they visited, preventing them from seeing it? Or perhaps they had been in a hurry and hadn't observed carefully?
Jiang Mo instinctively felt that this story must be quite important, possibly related to the merperson's current actions. However, now wasn't the time for hasty moves, so she didn't rush to action, merely continuing to wait for events to unfold.
Events progressed quickly. After all the hundreds of captured cultivators had been brought to the altar, those spirit beasts that had been captured earlier and confined in stone chambers were also brought out one after another. But while the cultivators were temporarily free from mortal danger, the same couldn't be said for the spirit beasts. They were brought to the altar, their throats cut to drain their blood. Accompanied by the final cries of these spirit beasts, large amounts of fresh blood poured down, yet surprisingly little actually flowed into the altar.
An altar large enough to hold hundreds of people was naturally expansive, and the blood from these spirit beasts was like a drop in the bucket. So the natives, with the professionalism of butchers, pushed beast after beast onto the platform, slaughtering and bleeding them in one fluid motion.
Jiang Mo noticed that although not much blood flowed into the altar, and although the natives were only responsible for cutting throats, the speed at which the beasts lost blood was extremely fast. The blood in their bodies seemed to surge out uncontrollably, rapidly filling the small gaps on the altar. Until the blood was completely drained, the entire beast would shrivel up as if sucked dry, then be unceremoniously kicked off the altar by the natives...
This cycle repeated. When hundreds of spirit beasts had perished, even if each beast could only provide limited blood essence for the altar, the combined contribution of hundreds had a significant effect.
At the very least, Jiang Mo could now see, with a downward glance, that threads of blood had begun to spread across the altar beneath her.
A sense of unease rose in her heart, and she finally remembered the system she had once again forgotten: "System, help me check what's happening. And those pillars—what stories are carved on them?"
The system extended its feelers to investigate before telling her: "Host, there's a formation on this altar, and those blood threads are almost completing its pattern. As for the totems on the pillars, they seem to tell a story... The sky split open, and many strange monsters appeared. These monsters slaughtered living beings and were extremely cruel. A merperson offered something unknown, then the sky, which had been continuously producing monsters, closed up. The merperson, having lost something, fell and sank to the bottom of the sea."
It was a clichéd story, typical of ancient mythology, but Jiang Mo found it vaguely familiar as she listened. However, having heard various myths before, the sense of déjà vu was strong, so she didn't think much of it.
As for the formation on the altar, she could tell with absolute certainty that it was meant for sacrifice!
At that moment, the final spirit beast was bled, and the fine threads of blood on the altar finally connected. The previously still blood suddenly began to radiate brilliance, casting a crimson hue on Jiang Mo's mask.
Perhaps because the formation had been activated, the merperson, who hadn't been present earlier, appeared again. He looked at the formation on the altar and at those unconscious people within it, his eyes reflecting not fanaticism but coldness and even hatred.
After a brief inspection, he lifted his eyelids and ordered the natives: "Continue!"
With all the prepared spirit beasts already slaughtered, this continuation was naturally directed at the captured cultivators... Sure enough, as the merperson's words fell, those natives who had been busy for so long showed not the slightest hesitation. Each grabbed an unconscious cultivator nearby, and raising their bone knives, prepared to cut their throats just as they had done with the beasts.
Seven or eight natives acted simultaneously, meaning seven or eight cultivators faced imminent death. Among them were both righteous and demonic cultivators, some whom Jiang Mo didn't recognize, others she had spent days with on the island, and one was even a Xuanqing Sect disciple.
As the future guardian divine beast of the Xuanqing Sect, combined with her past human life, Jiang Mo naturally couldn't sit by and watch these people be slaughtered for their blood, as she had watched the beasts before. She suddenly sprang up like a carp leaping, directly meeting the merperson's gaze. He first showed some surprise, then gave a cold laugh, his icy eyes looking over as if watching a clown performing tricks.
Jiang Mo had her pride too, and being looked at with such contempt immediately aroused her anger. The system, as if enjoying the show, clamored in her consciousness: "Host, beat him up! This fish's expression is so punchable!"
With the system's encouragement, Jiang Mo did indeed prepare to act. She struggled with her hands and feet only to realize why the merperson wore such an expression—the ropes binding her limbs were of unknown material, extraordinarily tough, and her struggle failed to break them. This had clearly been within his expectations, allowing him to watch her actions as if enjoying a show.
But to think this alone could restrain Jiang Mo? Impossible!
With a roaring "Awoooo," a tiger's roar shook the ears, and after a flash of white light, an enormous white tiger suddenly appeared...