The rumbling thunder followed the black clouds, and the earth trembled with it.
The two looked up in amazement. The black cloud in the air passed over the two of them and hovered above the city lord's courtyard. Small flashes of light appeared frequently in the cloud, and a flash of lightning was about to take shape.
"This is... Thunder Tribulation?" Gu Qingqiao asked in surprise.
"Oops!" The two turned around and ran back.
"Crack!" The strong lightning struck, and the thunder was deafening.
The two jumped over the half-bed courtyard wall, leaving the courtyard in a mess.
The hut had been scorched black by lightning and collapsed, and Xiaojie's cry came from the ruins. The two hurriedly removed the wooden blocks and stones, and half of the city lord's charred body was exposed.
"Xiaojie, child," the city lord said with difficulty, blood running down the corners of his mouth. She gently raised her uninjured hand and gently stroked Xiaojie's hair. The two of them found out that a broken puppet talisman was hanging around Xiaojie's neck.
The two were taken aback.
The resentful spirit is formed, it is already a monster. In the past few decades, she has integrated many souls of the living, not to mention the karma of the living, it is also a serious crime to give birth to countless souls. How can such a monster exist in the world? Sooner or later there will be a day of punishment.
And the "skilled man" used the formation technique to hide the location of the mountain city, and even gave it to the city lord's puppet charm.
With the puppet talisman on his body, he can prevent a catastrophe for the master. That person hopes that this puppet talisman will allow the resentful spirit to avoid the thunder calamity. It's just that he didn't expect that Mrs. Wen's love for her son was so eager that she brought the puppet talisman to her son's neck.
When the lightning struck just now, all creatures within the range of the thunder fire would be destroyed, but Xiaojie, a weak undead, survived because of the puppet talisman.
"Good boy," Wen Niang said with a smile on her face, "It's hard for you to accompany your mother for so many years, let's reincarnate! Find a good family and suffer less in the next life."
"Mother!" Xiaojie burst into tears.
Wen Niang turned around and nodded lightly towards Gu and Mu, and her body turned into countless light spots that dispersed with the wind.
Suddenly, there were countless cries in the city, and the undead of the children seemed to boil. Black shadows floated out from the small courtyards and gathered into a gentle face over the mountain city. That face reflected the sunlight, and cast his gaze to the mountain city for the last time, and then gradually faded away without a trace.
The enchantment outside the mountain city completely disintegrated.
"Ding~~" The crisp and melodious sound of hitting the bowl came, and a tall figure in a cassock came from the city gate.
The coming people strode meteors, their robes fluttered, and they came to the empty street to stand still.
It was only then that the two of them could see clearly that this monk was slender, with an old face like a ravine, his eyes like a deep pool, and his nose like a hook. In his big, well-jointed hand, he held a purple-gold bowl, and in the other hand, he held a string of Tridacula Buddha beads.
He stopped casually in the middle of the street, and he had the solemn feeling of Yuanzhi Yueting and Baoxiang.
The great monk glanced at the child spirits scurrying around in the street, lowered his brows and closed his eyes and proclaimed the Buddha's name: "Amitabha!" Then he flicked his fingers towards the golden bowl.
"Dang~~" This sound is like the morning bell of a Zen temple. The monk had powerful mana between his fingers, and all the child spirits only felt that the bell was deafening, and even the spiritual body trembled.
"When~~" The second bell rang, and the children were all quiet.
"Dang~dang~dang~dang~dang~" After the seven sounds, the originally panicked Tongling gradually showed a peaceful face. Xiaojie took a last look at the two of them, bowed his head, and then turned into a white light and disappeared into the air.
The child spirits in the city turned into thousands of strips of light, and even the sunlight was stunned for a while.
The mountain city collapsed inch by inch. More than a dozen mountain demons crouched on the ground and shivered.
The monk glanced at them and said, "Amitabha, you should be punished for waiting for the help of Zhou and you should be punished. You just obeyed orders and did not take the initiative to harm the world, so today I will spare you. Cultivation is not easy, you should do it yourself."
When all the demons heard this, they all knelt down, kowtowed respectfully to the monk, and was about to leave when the monk said, "Wait, those innocent women brought from down the mountain have been washed away by me just now. Memories, take them down the mountain."
The demons nodded again and again and took their orders away.
The big monk put away the purple-gold bowl and looked straight at Gu Qingqiao with his sharp eyes. Those eyes were like sharp knives, as if to open his stomach to see what was inside.
Gu Qingqiao only felt a coercion coming towards his face, and his body could not move immediately. At that moment, the feeling of being a knife and me being a fish was very clear. As long as the monk moved slightly, he could kill him like pinching an ant to death.
Gu Qingqiao was terrified, knowing that he had seen through his identity as a demon, but he insisted that he did not do anything wrong and refused to bow his head.
Just a few breaths of time, in Gu Qingqiao's view, it seems that several hours have passed. Finally, the monk withdrew his gaze and said to Gu Qingqiao: "You know that one thought becomes a Buddha and another one becomes a devil, right and wrong, success or failure, is all between you."
Gu Qingqiao nodded, the clothes behind him were soaked in cold sweat.
The great monk said: "Things in the world are easier to know than to do. Remember, if you make the wrong choice, no matter where you are, I will personally end you."
After he finished speaking, he took a deep look at the two of them and turned to walk in the direction he came from.
He walked unhurriedly, but shrank to an inch, and disappeared in the blink of an eye.
"Qingqiao! Xiyun!" The call came, and Su Yanjun and Qin Le rushed over.
"Are you all right?" Qin Le was sweating and his face was pale.
When the four of them met, it was an indescribable joy.
Seeing that the two of them were covered in dust and tired, Su Yanjun said with concern, "Looking at how you look, it must have been a lot of hard work. Let's go back to the town first. Elder Huang is still waiting in the post house."
The four returned to the inn together, and after a short rest, everyone gathered in Su Yanjun's room.
Gu Qingqiao told them what happened to them.
"It turns out to be like this," Qin Le said, "that resentful spirit was actually transformed by countless sad mothers. It's really pitiful."
Su Yanjun said: "The masters mentioned by the resentful spirits act mysteriously, but they don't know what their purpose is."
Mu Xiyun had already thought about this matter many times in his heart, and he first told everyone the doubts of the two, and then said: "Keeping the mountain city but not actively promoting this matter, I always feel that his purpose is not pure. From the current situation It seems that he doesn't care about Wen Niang's fate, even if he intends to protect Wen Niang, everything he does is to maintain the existence of Shancheng."
"This mountain city exists in the world, will it bring any benefits to people?" Qin Le asked.
After pondering for a while, Gu Qingqiao said hesitantly: "I can't think of the advantages for the time being, but there is one disadvantage."
Several people looked up at him.
Gu Qingqiao thought about his words and said: "The so-called expert once said that after the reconstruction of the mountain city, there are still a steady stream of children's spirits fleeing to the city. He said that because children are still being killed, the mountain city must be preserved , to leave evidence to the world."
Mu Xiyuan nodded and said, "But in fact, the child spirits in the city are enough to become evidence, we just need to find someone to witness."
"Yes," Gu Qingqiao said: "Then let's think in a different direction, what if it's not to preserve evidence, but the other way around?"
"The other way around?" Qin Le murmured, "retaining the evidence in reverse is... destroying the evidence!"
Su Yanjun also reacted, "So, that person intends to let the mountain city continue to absorb the child spirits who died of abuse, and then use the formation to hide the mountain city, so that the probability of being discovered will be much smaller. Then, this person must be It has a lot to do with people who kidnap and sell children and take blood for alchemy."
"Yes," Qin Le said immediately, "that city was originally used for alchemy. It is so hidden in the mountains, where would ordinary people find it? He knew this city from the beginning, and he went to investigate after the city was destroyed. He found out that it was the grievances of the mothers. Then he used Wen Niang's simplicity and love to fabricate lies, and asked Wen Niang to help him collect the dead souls. Pity the peasant girl, thinking that he has been doing good deeds."
The four of them kept discussing, but Huang Zelin remained silent, rubbing his long snow-white eyebrows with his right hand, wondering what he was thinking.
"Elder Huang," Gu Qingqiao called him softly, "Elder Huang?"
Huang Zelin came back to his senses, frowned and said, "It's unheard of for alchemists to concoct pills with blood. Although alchemists often use blood to concoct medicines, most of them are used as medicine leads. I've never heard of anyone using a lot of donated blood to make medicine." After he finished speaking, he Standing up, he shook slightly.
"Elder be careful!" Mu Xiyun stepped forward to help, but was pushed away by Huang Zelin. "I have to think about it." After speaking, he went straight back to his room.
Several people were a little confused, looked at each other for a while, Mu Xiyun asked: "By the way, how did you open the barrier of the mountain city? Who is that master?"
Su Yanjun said: "We received a message from my junior brother last night, Zhihe, and we set off immediately, but we encountered a maze in the mountains."
"Mmmm," Qin Le continued, "We spent more than an hour in the maze, and we finally found the exit of the maze, but we were blocked by a big rock."
"Is it the big stone that was blinded?" Mu Xiyuan asked, "I made a mark under the stone and went straight through it."
"Oh, we went straight through," Qin Le sighed, "but after we passed, we found that we were in Li County, a hundred miles away."
"Li County?" Gu Qingqiao's face was blank.
"Yeah," Qin Le showed a helpless expression, "we didn't know it at the time, we spent a night in the mountains looking for it and waited until dawn, or Senior Brother Su found something wrong with the clothes of the local woodcutter, we only found out after asking. , we were sent hundreds of miles away."
Su Yanjun also nodded, "Probably the time for you to go is just right, and we arrived late, the magic circle that hides the mountain city has already begun to take effect."
Gu and Mu were stunned. Gu Qingqiao then asked, "What about that great monk?"
"What great monk?" Su Yanjun said with a smile, "That's Master Huimo of Baotong Temple. Using the purple-gold bowl as a magic weapon, he can subdue and ward off countless demons. He is very respected by the world. Although people are... more serious, they are still Bodhisattvas. Heart. At that time, he was doing things for the villagers in Pingxian County. After learning what happened to us, he took the initiative to go with us. It was him who unlocked the magic circle and let us find the mountain city."
"Mmmm," Qin Le nodded vigorously and whispered, "When he used the barrier-breaking technique, he just tapped his right index finger, and the boulder immediately turned into powder. Then..." Qin Le said this, his eyes actually revealed A little scared.
"Then what happened?" Mu Xiyun poured him a cup of tea.
"Master Huimo said," Su Yanjun said with a smile: "The Qin family has been stationed in Linmoyuan for generations, and they must have some experience in the formation of the formation. The formation of the mountain city is not complicated. It should be untied."
"Then he stood behind me, waiting for me to clear the battle." Qin Le said pitifully.
The two of them couldn't help smiling. It was conceivable how nervous the fat boy was when the solemn master stood behind Qin Le.
"Qin Le is indeed very good!" Su Yanjun praised: "In less than a stick of incense, the enchantment was opened a crack. But I didn't expect that it immediately attracted thunder."
"Alas," Gu Qingqiao sighed, "After all, resentful spirits become demons, and heaven and earth cannot tolerate them. But her family's Xiaojie should have been saved, and it can be considered that her mother's wish has been fulfilled."
The four of them sighed for a while, and Su Yanjun said, "We've been delayed here for a few more days. Let's leave early tomorrow morning. You are tired these two days, so rest early."
At this time, the clerk from the inn came to ask if dinner was ready, whether to go downstairs to eat or bring it to the room. The four went downstairs and asked Xiao Er to bring Elder Huang to the room.
After dinner, the four of them went back to their rooms.
Mu Xiyuan returned to the room and closed the door with her backhand, but she didn't do anything else, she just quietly looked at the window.
The voices of Gu Qingqiao and Qin Le came from outside the door, and then the Gu Qingqiao next door closed the door.
Mu Xiyun walked to the table and poured two cups of tea.
The window lattice slammed softly, and the young man in black clothes had already entered through the window.
Mu Xiyun handed him a cup of tea and said with a smile, "I've been reborn once, but I haven't seen anything else, but my ability to turn windows has grown."