Chapter 221 Animal Sacrifice
Tan Xiaohui quickly took out a Golden Coins Weapon and got ready.
Ye Shaoyang did not bring any weapons with him. The Daoist crafts were only effective on evil beings, so he decided to fight with bare hands.
"Cluck! Cluck! Cluck!" They heard the sound of a rooster's clucking somewhere nearby. Tan Xiaohui paused. She relaxed and pinched her nose and imitated a chicken clucking too.
Ye Shaoyang and Xiao Ma exchanged a look of surprise. The sound of clucking mimicked a rooster cluck.
Once Tan Xiaohui finished, they heard footsteps approaching.
"it's Xiao Ting," Tan Xiaohui walked out from the stone followed by Ye Shaoyang. A man and a woman came toward them. They were Wang Ting and Teng Yongqing.
Because of the location, they greeted each other quietly. Then, Wang Ting spoke to Tan Xiaohui, "Everything is ready. We hid them in a secret place, and we've been here since daytime. When we saw three figures coming up the mountain from far, we thought they were you, so we followed them here."
Tan Xiaohui nodded, "What have you observed?"
Wang Ting muttered to herself quite a long while before she phrased the words, "Twenty to thirty black witches are working down there. Jin Shuai sealed a portion of power from the Five Spirits Moving Mountain Formation in a Gu. Maybe because of his efforts, they appointed him as the head of the ritual ceremony. I saw him bringing a group of men, but I don't know what they are going to do next."
Ye Shaoyang felt relieved once he confirmed Jin Shuai was here. Jin Shuai, I traveled thousands of miles to find you. It's great that you're here.
"Do you know where they placed the coffin of Blood Gu Undead King?" asked Tan Xiaohui.
"In an open space deep in the valley. They set up a formation which is unknown to me. I think they will conduct the ceremony in a day or two."
While they were discussing, Xiao Ma suddenly whisper-shouted, "Someone is coming!"
All of them looked in the direction he pointed and saw a group of men dressed in black walking out of Dead Man Valley. They bent down to conceal themselves. As the men approached, they saw that each of the men had a different animal following them.
"What are they doing? Upgrading their meals?" Xiao Ma was shocked. "Chicken, duck, goose, pigeon, cow, goat, horse -- Eh? Why are the animals so obedient that they walked behind the men without a leash? The pigeon's even walking on the ground."
"The men applied Gu craft on them and took their souls away," answered Tan Xiaohui.
"Animals have --" Xiao Ma stopped and covered his mouth abruptly and showed funny face to Ye Shaoyang, "Hehe! I just remembered you told me that animals have Hun and Po, too. I can understand if they eat the first four animals, but I don't understand why they would want to eat a horse? I heard the meat tastes sour."
Ye Shaoyang glared at Xiao Ma, "What else do you know other than eating? And who told you that they were going to eat the animals?"
"They are used for--"
Tan Xiaohui finished his statement, "For sacrifice purposes. The highest ritual in Blood witchcraft needs four birds and four domestic animals."
As she said, the others exchanged looks with each other, and Tan Xiaohui continued saying in a lower voice, "They will sacrifice them to the Undead King!"
Ye Shaoyang examined the faces of the men. The youngest was around thirty years old while the most elderly had a long beard. There were two females among the men. They looked devoted, stared straight ahead and said nothing.
"Jin Shuai is not in the group."
Right after he said that another three men walked out of the entrance of Dead Man Valley. The leader wore a long gold robe, looking dignified except his face was covered with pimples.
"Pimples Jin!" Xiao Ma could not help but say aloud once he saw the leader.
Ye Shaoyang quickly covered his mouth and scolded, "Are you mad?!"
"Err..." Xiao Ma stared at Jin Shuai, feeling aggrieved, "Bored bastard! Covered with pimples! How could he feel no shame wearing such nice attire? I promise I will slap his face with my size forty-five shoes!"
Teng Yongqing frowned and asked, "Dude, what is the meaning of the metaphor?"
Xiao Ma's eyes rolled up, "With your IQ, it would be difficult for me to explain."
Teng Yongqing frowned heavily, "What? What do you mean by difficult to explain with my IQ?"
Xiao Ma sniggered, "Oh my! I give up." He turned around and asked, "Little Ye, shall we make a move now?"
Ye Shaoyang took a deep breath. Jin Shuai was his antidote. The moment he saw Jin Shuai, his mind had gone haywire. He wanted to capture him at once, spill his blood, and cure the Gu in him.
He went into deep thought. A moment later, he shook his head and said, "Our hiding place is too high. We can't jump down from here. Even if we kill him with a gun, his men might take his dead body away by the time we get to him. I suggest we continue to wait."
Wang Ting agreed with a nod, "It's true. It is a dead end in Dead Man Valley; once they enter, they can only exit through here. We'll have a lot of chances."
Jin Shuai led the two men in black robes into the valley. The two men pulled a handcart; inside it lay a tall man with a crew-cut man. A tattoo covered his chest up to his neck with a bird tail design wrapped around his right side from his chest to his shoulder blade.
All of them fixed their eyes on the man. He was a teenager around eighteen years old with a muscular body. His eyes were closed, and he lay motionless as if he had fainted.
A thick rope was wound around the teenage boy a few times and held him upright on the handcart. The two men in black slowly pulled the handcart into the valley.
"What's going to happen to that teenage boy?" Xiao Ma asked.
"I think he is one of the sacrifices," Tan Xiaohui breathed in deeply before she continued, "They are planning a living sacrifice! Using the blood of four birds and four domestic animals, a pet's soul, a follower's eye and the enemy's heart along with living sacrifice is the highest ritual in Blood witchcraft."
Ye Shaoyang mumbled, "That teenage boy is surely his enemy. They wouldn't need to tie him up if he was one of the followers. Wonder what's the background of that teenage boy."
After that, Ye Shaoyang and the others followed Jin Shuai toward the Dead Man Valley and tried to keep the same pace as them.
Ye Shaoyang looked around along the way, and out of his curiosity, he asked, "Why are they so confident that they have not arranged men to stand guard around the valley?"