441: Chapter 441 The Truth About the Blood Moon

Before the last syllable of Tao Zhe's words could even fade, the figure of the Randan Spirit suddenly shuddered.

Su Mingyuan glanced at him and simply let out a helpless sigh.

He turned back and said to Tao Zhe, "In the last few paragraphs you read, the Six Demonic Sects joined forces to set up a grand Formation in the core area. Are there any records of this Formation in the chronicles? Name, principles, structure, anything."

Tao Zhe was still holding the Jade Slip. Hearing this, he immediately put the Jade Slip back into the slot on the wall and then scanned the neighboring slots.

The chronicles only recorded events, not techniques.

If there was detailed information about the Formation, it should be in another section.

He walked quickly to the wall on the left.

The classification labels on this wall were different from those on the chronicles' side; the labels read things like "Formation," "Restriction," and "Talisman."

Tao Zhe's gaze swept from the very top row down to the middle, and then stopped.

He reached out and pulled out a Jade Slip, channeled spiritual energy into it, scanned it for a few seconds, shook his head, and put it back.

He pulled out another one, scanned it for two seconds, and put it back.

The third one.

His finger paused on the Jade Slip and didn't move.

Then he turned around, the expression on his face completely different from when he was reading the last volume of the chronicles.

"Found it."

He walked back with the Jade Slip in hand and stood in front of Su Mingyuan.

"This Jade Slip was not written by a chronicler, but is the personal notes of an Elder. He observed the Formation set up by the Demonic Path during the battle and made very detailed records."

Su Mingyuan said, "Read it."

Tao Zhe closed his eyes, read for a few seconds, and spoke.

"This Elder's exact words are as follows. He said that the Six Demonic Sects each sent two Soul Transformation Stage Cultivators, twelve in total, to simultaneously activate the Formation in four directions of the core area of the Danding Heavenly Palace. When the Formation was initiated, he witnessed the entire process from the courtyard wall of the Elder Hall."

Tao Zhe paused for a moment and then continued reading.

"The twelve people each occupied a node, first using their own blood Qi as a guide to pour into the Formation bases buried underground beforehand. The Elder did not know when the Formation bases were buried; he speculated that it had already been completed before the frontal assault on the mountain. After all the Formation bases were activated, red lines began to light up on the ground between the twelve nodes, converging from the nodes toward the center, ultimately forming a complete diagram of the Formation in the very center of the Danding Heavenly Palace."

"This Elder used four words to describe the scene at that time."

Tao Zhe opened his eyes, looked at Su Mingyuan, and said:

"A rain of blood falling from the sky."

No one spoke in the Scripture Pavilion. The pale yellow light of the illumination stones shone on everyone's faces; no one moved.

Tao Zhe continued reading.

"Once the Formation was activated, the corpses of all the Cultivators who had already died in battle within the entire area of the Danding Heavenly Palace began to undergo changes. This Elder saw with his own eyes a corpse lying less than thirty feet from him, its flesh and blood drained in an extremely short period of time. It didn't rot, nor did it dissolve. It was directly dragged away by a force. The flesh and blood detached from the bones, turning into a red mist that rose into the air, and then flowed along those red lines on the ground toward the center of the Formation."

Tao Zhe scanned further.

"This Elder attempted to destroy the Formation lines beneath his feet, but it was useless. The Formation lines were carved extremely deep underground; the red light visible on the surface was merely the outward manifestation of the Formation's operation, not the Formation itself. He struck down with all his might, blasting a crater in the ground, but the Formation was completely unaffected."

"After that, he wrote down the name of the Formation."

Tao Zhe's reading speed slowed down.

"The Soul-Eating Array. An ancient secret Formation of the demonic Sects, its ranking is no longer verifiable, but it is clearly recorded in Demonic Path texts. This Elder had once read fragments about this Formation in a captured Demonic Path Incomplete Manual. At the time, he thought it was just a legend, but he never expected to see the real thing with his own eyes."

He completely recounted the next section in the Jade Slip.

"The core function of the Soul-Eating Array is to absorb the flesh, blood, and essence of all deceased creatures within its coverage area. The absorbed energy does not dissipate; it is continuously accumulated, compressed, and converted by the Formation. Once the accumulated energy reaches a critical point, the Formation will undergo a qualitative change."

"What qualitative change?" Su Mingyuan asked.

Tao Zhe looked at the Jade Slip and read the next section aloud.

"The Elder's exact words were that after the qualitative change, the Soul-Eating Array would no longer only absorb the dead. Its range would expand, its absorption efficiency would skyrocket, and even living people would not be able to escape. Everything with flesh and blood within the Formation's coverage, whether alive or dead, would be drained bit by bit. The speed varied depending on one's cultivation; the lower the cultivation, the faster they would be drained. A normal person might only need a few breaths of time."

Han Li's fingers tightened, and she did not let go of the strap of her Storage Pouch.

Tao Zhe finished reading the last paragraph of the Jade Slip.

"At the end of his notes, this Elder wrote a speculation. He said that the energy absorbed by the Soul-Eating Array would ultimately condense above the center point of the Formation. The final scene he saw from the courtyard wall was that the sky above the entire Danding Heavenly Palace had turned dark red, with all the red mist converging toward a single point in the sky."

Tao Zhe lowered the Jade Slip from his forehead.

"And with that, the content of this Jade Slip ends."

The stone chamber fell silent for a long time.

Su Mingyuan stood in place, not moving.

He was thinking.

A dark red sky. A bright spot suspended in the air. Releasing energy at fixed intervals, driving the skeletons across the entire land to reanimate.

Isn't that exactly the Blood Moon?

That Blood Moon hanging in the sky of the Skeleton World, appearing once every twelve hours.

It was not a naturally occurring celestial body in this world.

It was the Formation core of the Soul-Eating Array.

One hundred years ago, in order to force the Danding Heavenly Palace to hand over the Calamity Body, the Six Demonic Sects set up this Soul-Eating Array.

The Formation drained the flesh and blood of everyone in the Sect, accumulating a massive amount of energy, and eventually spiraled out of control.

The Formation core rose into the sky and became the Blood Moon.

Every time the Blood Moon rose, it was the Formation releasing a wave of accumulated Devilish Qi.

The Devilish Qi poured into the skeletal corpses on the ground, making them move once again.

Rising for twelve hours, setting for twelve hours.

Cycle after cycle, for a hundred years now.

Su Mingyuan turned to the Randan Spirit.

The old man floated in midair, his translucent figure even fainter than when they had first entered.

He had remained silent all this time, hanging his head and staring at the ground.

Su Mingyuan did not ask how he felt.

Instead, he asked, "Senior Randan, do you know anything about this Soul-Eating Array?"

The Randan Spirit raised his head.

"I am the artifact spirit of the pill king cauldron, not a Formation Master. As for things like the Soul-Eating Array, I heard of the name when I was alive, but I have never come into contact with it."

He paused.

"However, there is one thing I can be sure of."

"Speak."

"Since the Soul-Eating Array has a Formation core, it must have Formation bases. The Formation core is in the sky, and the Formation bases are in the ground. If you want to resolve this Formation, attacking the Formation core is useless. That Blood Moon has accumulated a hundred years of energy; with your current cultivation, you can't cause even the slightest bit of damage to it."

Su Mingyuan said, "Can't cause damage? That's not necessarily true!"

"Tao Zhe, connect me to the Rocket Artillery Unit!"