The goat-men slaughtered each other, using their own kind to sacrifice to the idol of the Black Goat, with flesh, blood, and bones used as ornaments to fill the tribe.
But perhaps because the Black Goat had consumed the Other Shore Flower, their intelligence, while their physiques grew stronger, became increasingly dull.
If the Black Goat had not developed a problem, what would the goat-men tribe have become?
Perhaps they might have gradually come to master the Beast Pen Method...
Ren Qing grabbed a sacrificial goat-man and stored it into the Prison Within the Abdomen, then left the forested mountains.
He found the goat-man kneeling in the prison cell, both hands clutching its own throat.
Moments later, the goat-man began regressing into a wild beast, yet its body collapsed and exploded, finally turning to ash within the Flesh Furnace.
It was clear the source of the goat-men was the heavenly demon aura in the air.
No matter how many Ren Qing killed, the goat-men's numbers would multiply, pouring endlessly toward the city where the aura was denser.
He abandoned the idea of continuing to strike; besides, the Dream Seed was already saturated.
After Ren Qing returned to the city wall, the Restraint Officers had completely put away their earlier underestimation, proactively beginning to arrange techniques along the wall.
Even Ren Qing's section of the wall was covered with thorn-like techniques.
The Restraint Officers' eyes carried some complexity; after all, in their eyes, Ren Qing's earlier means of saving people must have carried some risk.
The protective artifact for the soul had been destroyed because of it.
Yan Feng could not help but feel ashamed.
Though it was mainly because his intelligence had been affected by the heavenly demon aura, the trouble was still something he had caused.
He straightforwardly came to Ren Qing to apologize.
"Brother Ren, I truly wronged you, I'm here to offer my apology."
He bowed respectfully, and as he had left the heavenly demon aura in time, the mutation on his body was gradually fading with time.
Ren Qing waved his hand; in truth, he hadn't even taken Yan Feng to heart, at the time, it had been more for the sake of collecting some heavenly demon aura.
Yan Feng still wanted to say something more.
Baa...
A heavy bleating sound was heard.
They subconsciously looked toward the Taisui Forest; the Black Goat there was level with the surrounding fungi, fully seven or eight meters tall.
With each breath, a large amount of heavenly demon aura leaked out.
But because it had consumed too many Other Shore Flowers, the Black Goat had clearly lost its reason, and its behavior became increasingly deranged.
And on either side of its back had grown multiple pairs of useless arms, proof that it could no longer completely absorb the remnant souls.
Song Zongwu and the others had their skin wrapped in paper, and with their Yin Runner Realm cultivation, only thus could they remain unharmed in the heavenly demon aura.
Ren Qing spoke: "You should go rest, the goat-men will be coming again soon, and in no small numbers."
Yan Feng nodded.
He too was aware, for the light of bonfires in the forest was becoming more and more conspicuous, even forming a great ring encircling the city wall.
Lin Cheng spat out crimson and said: "The number of goat-men now is... about seven thousand, in just half a day it's nearly increased tenfold."
Ren Qing sat cross-legged, his expression calm, actively communicating with the heavenly demon Dream Seed to digest the aura, able to feel that the grain-sized artifact's light was continually contracting and releasing.
Yan Feng quickly turned and left, and soon the news spread.
Not long after, the goat-men attacked again, densely packed like an army descending on a fortress.
But the goat-men's appearance had also changed: the black hair covering their bodies had thinned, their eyes were dull and lifeless.
Their expressions were ever more fervent, yet far less intelligent than before.
The goat-men clawed at the gaps in the stones with their fingers; even with mutilated bodies they still climbed upward, making the beast-form techniques of the Restraint Officers come into play.
It was clear that Li Tiangang's choice of Restraint Officers was very suitable for defending the city.
Only Ren Qing's displayed strength was somewhat beyond expectations.
The Restraint Officers guessed he had already completed a third strange transformation, after all, his chains, with just a simple swing, could cause massive casualties.
Because of Ren Qing's presence, they no longer held back in fear.
In such a situation, even though the goat-men's physiques had clearly been strengthened, they were still no match for the fully-prepared Restraint Officers.
Ren Qing continued harvesting heavenly demon aura and flesh.
The Fire Seed and heavenly demon Dream Seeds seemed about to give birth to something, progressing far faster than the Heavenly Dao Dream Seed.
When the siege, which lasted seven or eight hours, ended, it left behind thick piles of corpses, and dozens of carrion birds descended from the air to peck at them.
If not for the Restraint Officers being no ordinary people, they might well have contracted plague from it.
The Restraint Officers lay flat on the wall; they didn't even think of going indoors to rest, it wouldn't be long before the goat-men would come again.
In the following three days,
The goat-men attacked the wall without cease, their number reaching thirty to forty thousand, but as long as some were killed, the rest would flee in panic.
Their outward forms had also, like the Black Goat, developed many deformities.
The Restraint Officers waited in full battle readiness, but what came was the sound of slaughter from within the goat-men's tribe.
Perhaps under the Black Goat's influence, they began killing each other; the stench of blood was so strong it could be smelled even from afar.
After more than three hours, the forest returned to calm.
Lin Cheng's face was full of doubt; in his view, the goat-men's aura had suddenly vanished, as if completely extinct.
When the Restraint Officers came to ask him about it, learning this only made them more apprehensive.
Jiang Feng came up onto the city wall.
Through the eyeballs he had placed in the forest, he sensed something amiss, and could not help but shout: "Get ready, they're coming!!!"
A sea of blood surged forth.
Mixed within were fine bits of flesh flowing across the ground, making a sizzling sound upon contact with the techniques that had been arranged in advance.
The Restraint Officers no longer spared their techniques, wanting to block the spread of the blood, but it was like a cup of water on a burning cart of firewood.
By now the blood had already covered the corpses; severed limbs and broken flesh automatically pieced themselves together into one skinned goat-man after another.
Even when turned into minced meat, the skinned goat-men could reassemble in the blood.
The Restraint Officers felt as if their fists were hitting cotton, utterly without effect.
Inside the city, that Black Goat had also become twisted to the extreme.
As it devoured more and more of its own kind, it began to grow hundreds of useless limbs, and its head multiplied into five.
Song Zongwu could not avoid taking some injuries, but with paper affixed to his skin, he was able to forcibly staunch the bleeding.
Li Tiangang assisted from the side.
The blood soon flowed to the base of the city wall; the Restraint Officers were powerless to stop it.
Many Restraint Officers looked to Ren Qing with hope, but when they turned to see him, it seemed even he could do little against the blood.
No matter how his chains lashed about, the spread continued regardless.
Jiang Feng urgently reminded: "There are only two strange infants left, hold out for at most one more day."
Ren Qing pinched the bridge of his nose, feeling this task had been a pitfall, simply slacking off was impossible.
He might even have to pay a price.
At this rate, the Restraint Officers were bound to take casualties.
He suspected that because the Restraint Officers' Hall's appetite was too big, the Other Shore Flowers prepared for this summoning were more than in the first, causing the Black Goat to lose control.
Ren Qing shut his eyes tightly.
Under the moonlight, he suddenly vanished from where he stood.
The Restraint Officers didn't even notice anything unusual about him, only Lin Cheng noticed, but looked rather at a loss.
Just then, thick clouds covered the open ground around the city wall.
Fine rain began to fall.
Before the Restraint Officers could react, at the instant the raindrops touched the blood, flames ignited without cause, the air itself warping from the heat.
Immortal in the Mirror was an illusion both real and unreal; after advancing to the Ghost Envoy Realm, although still far from reality, the power it displayed was no less than before.
From within the blood came countless souls' miserable wails, and the momentum was halted in an instant.
The Restraint Officers froze for several breaths, then began a counterattack; without the blood, the skinned goat-men could no longer resurrect without limit.
Until the skinned goat-men were slaughtered to the last, the blood finally began to recede.
But just then, loud bleating came from within the city walls, one after another, continuing for a long time without ceasing.
Baa... Baa...
The Black Goat had reached its final stage.
Song Zongwu was covered in wounds, but with paper pressed to his skin, he forcibly stopped the bleeding.
"Li Tiangang, once it devours the last strange infant, you won't be able to seal it."
"No, I will."
Li Tiangang spoke calmly, but his face was slightly twisted.
Without hesitation, he tore the last sheet of paper, the Black Goat within broke free, and the two monsters immediately tore into each other.
The heavenly demon aura in the air grew even thicker.
The fungus-formed trees toppled one after another, but the vitality of the Taisui Forest was so great that in moments they grew back again.
Song Zongwu rested in this interval, stuffing all kinds of food into his mouth.
The surface of the Black Goat had already become a deformed ball of flesh, covered in the limbs of all kinds of goat-men, its mouth calling out something.
Suddenly the ground quaked.
Blood mixed with grass, wood, and rocks formed a giant skinned goat-man, striding toward the city.
The Black Goat had already decided the battle; it gulped down corpses in great bites, while unable to stop itself from vomiting blood.
The Other Shore Flower was exerting its effect of nurturing false souls, but to the Black Goat, which was already a remnant soul, the harm was immense, like carving flesh from the heart.
Thus it instinctively summoned the flesh and blood tainted with heavenly demon aura, to try to heal the injuries to its soul.
Li Tiangang said with some regret: "I'm starting to worry the Restraint Officers won't last until the sealing is done."
"How could that be? I brought Ren Qing here precisely as a precaution."
"To tell the truth, Li Tiangang, you've been a bit too extreme this time."
"I—"
Song Zongwu shook his head.
Then he could not help but roar: "Ren Qing, don't you dare hold back in the slightest, do you want me dead?!!"
Li Tiangang showed surprise.
The waning moon in the sky vanished.
A blood moon slowly rose from the horizon, and the howl of wolves was heard.
A huge ghost wolf stood atop the city wall, the blood moon seemingly its backdrop, its emanating aura taking solid form.
The belly of the ghost wolf faintly lit with fire, then smoke drifted from between its teeth, the heat of the Fire Seed already covering its whole body.
"This is—"
Song Zongwu grinned: "You've seen this before."
"The Taotie Method's Secondary Stomach, and the strange transformation branch's ability happens to be somewhat similar to Ksitigarbha, so it can control Supernatural Remnants."
Song Zongwu's tone carried a hint of pride, after all, Ren Qing was someone he had watched grow bit by bit; who would have thought that originally he had been just a Corpse Burner lying in prison feigning death.
Li Tiangang was speechless, that wasn't the answer you gave me when I asked you back then.
But with Ren Qing's talent, it shouldn't be long before the Restraint Officers' Hall gained another Yin Runner Realm, it was just that he had appeared too late.
Given the current situation in Xiangxiang, every moment had to be seized.