In a continuous, cloud-shrouded deep mountain range, a magnificent and grand Dao Palace lay quietly.
This Dao Palace covered an area of ten thousand acres, almost like a mountain city isolated from the world.
This grand Dao Palace was the Pure Yang Temple.
It was now nearing dusk, and the afterglow of the setting sun quietly enveloped the Pure Yang Dao Palace.
It gilded the flying eaves and upturned corners of the temple buildings within the palace, making the glazed tiles seem to burn with golden flames.
It also made the statues of the Heavenly Venerates within the temple appear even more solemn, dignified, and sacred.
Yet, beneath this vast and solemn Dao Palace, in a place unseen by anyone, there existed an even larger, but far from sacred, instead extremely eerie and sinister dark underground palace.
In this underground palace, thousands of Daoists were in various secret rooms, layer by layer, making all sorts of strange Magical Artifacts.
What was astonishing was that among the various Materials they used, there was a large amount of human bones, skin, limbs, and internal organs.
Even more horrifying was that these bloody items were clearly several sizes smaller than what a normal person's should be.
Therefore, these bloody items should all have come from... children.
"Junior Brother Wu Zhen."
In a certain secret room of the underground palace, a tall, thin Daoist who looked like an immortal asked the plump Daoist busy at the other end of the room, "Do you still have any child skulls over there?"
Wu Zhen, the Daoist, raised his head and asked curiously, "Senior Brother Jing Feng, what Magical Artifact are you refining that requires so many child skulls?"
"That's not important."
Jing Feng, the Daoist, waved his hand and said, "Just tell me if you have any."
"Not many left."
Wu Zhen, the Daoist, replied honestly, "Only five or six left. Do you still want them? If you do, I'll go back to my room to get them."
"Yes, of course, but it's a bit few."
Jing Feng, the Daoist, quickly replied, "I still need at least three hundred child skulls over here. Do you know who might have some?"
"Senior Brother Jia Chen should have quite a few."
Wu Zhen recalled, "I saw him bring back a large bag yesterday, all child skulls, but they seemed to be all dried ones, with few wet ones."
"Sigh~"
Jing Feng sighed, "Dried ones can make do. I'll just get more. Hmm~ I'll go borrow a few hundred from him now."
"He's not easy to talk to; you might not be able to borrow them," Wu Zhen said.
"Hmph~"
Jing Feng pouted, "I'll trade him ten sets of mother-child vengeful remains; he should be willing then, right?"
"Then he'd definitely be willing. How could he not want such a fine item as mother-child vengeful remains?"
Wu Zhen asked curiously, "But it seems the temple hasn't received any of these goods recently, has it? Where did you get them? Could it be—... did you harm the pilgrims who came to the temple to pray for blessings again?"
"No, no, no."
Jing Feng shook his finger, denying, "These fine items, ah, were obtained from the villages around our Daoist temple."
Then, he vividly recounted to Junior Brother Wu Zhen:
"Some time ago, every night, I would go to those villages, specifically to investigate which pregnant women were about to give birth.
After finding out, I would break into that family's home, extinguish their entire family in front of the pregnant woman, then perform a C-section to extract the child.
I would let her resentment fill her entire body, then kill her, and finally air-dry and cure both mother and child together. See, that's how I get these fine items."
"Wow, you're really quick with your hands."
Wu Zhen gave a thumbs-up in praise, "But Senior Brother, you're really brave. Didn't our master say not to cause trouble here in the Central Plains?
We are ostensibly a righteous sect. If we were discovered, it would have a bad impact."
"Hmph~ They're just a few bumpkin commoners. Killing them is killing them. No one will stand up for them."
Jing Feng said indifferently, "Besides, we've practiced Martial Arts for so many years, worked so hard for so many years. If we can't even commit rape, plunder, and indiscriminate murder, then what's the point of practicing?"
"That's true."
Wu Zhen deeply agreed, "I haven't killed an entire family in a long time; my hands are getting rusty. Tomorrow, I'll also find a village and get some fine items back."
After busy work and muttering for a while, a series of jingle bells rang outside the door.
"It's the closing bell. Phew~ Finally off work."
"Indeed, time flies when you're busy."
"First, punch out."
"Oh, right, I almost forgot. Otherwise, this whole day would have been for nothing."
The two Daoists tidied up their things, scanned their faces in front of a machine on the secret room wall, then opened the door and walked out of the secret room.
At this time, in the corridor outside, many Daoists who had heard the closing bell had already gathered, having walked out of their secret rooms.
These Daoists, chatting and laughing along the long corridor, walked to the dozen or so elevators of this underground palace, began to queue up to board, and returned to the surface in batches.
And when these thousands of Daoists had all reached the surface, preparing to return to their respective rooms, they discovered that the distant setting sun—...—had suddenly turned red.
No, it wasn't turning red.
It was a blood-red, enormous meteor, with its back to the brilliant setting sun, rapidly flying towards the Pure Yang Temple, and it flew faster and faster, and grew larger and larger.
Eventually, it became so large that all the Pure Yang Temple Daoists could clearly see that what was flying was not a meteor at all, but a gigantic, crimson skull, shrouded in deep blood-red light and eerie dark glow.
"Senior Brother Jing Feng, what, what is that thing?!" Wu Zhen, the Daoist, asked in a panic.
"I, I don't know!"
Jing Feng, the Daoist, stared blankly at the giant blood skull rapidly flying in the sky, and said in despair, "I only know that we are finished!"
At this moment, if one were to stand very far away and look towards this direction, one could see in the sky above that the blood-red giant skull, like a crimson mountain, was tearing through the firmament with world-destroying force, hurtling obliquely downwards towards the Pure Yang Temple.
Its speed was so incredibly fast that it even dragged out a glaring, crimson blood-light tail, as if to rip this entire sky and earth in half.
In an instant, the solemn Pure Yang Dao Palace, covering ten thousand acres below, entered its path of destruction.
Boom!!!
A deafening roar, followed by continuous tremors.
The giant blood skull, carrying the force of billions of tons, crashed down with a thunderous roar, instantly leveling all the halls and pavilions of the entire Pure Yang Dao Palace, turning them into dust, raising large clouds of dust and debris that obscured the entire sky, plunging this vast deep mountain into complete darkness and gloom.
Also beneath this gloom, the thick ground that had previously supported the entire Pure Yang Dao Palace was, at the same time, completely smashed, pierced, and torn open by the falling blood skull, exposing the layered, deep underground palace beneath it.
And this underground palace, which was several times larger than the Pure Yang Temple, also, under the impact of the falling blood skull, like layers of fragile biscuits, was almost instantly completely shattered and torn apart by the endlessly surging and spreading power, turning into gravel and dust finer than soil.
As for all the Pure Yang Temple Daoists, both above and below ground, regardless of their level as a Martial Artist, they were all turned into a sky full of blood foam and dust by this single impact of the blood skull, dying beyond any possibility of further death.
Thus, the Pure Yang Temple—...—its entire sect was annihilated.