The crowd kept moving forward. Shen Bai and Cheng Shuang exchanged a look and, with a silent understanding, continued on.
Before long, they were nearly out of Shengyun County.
Along the way, more and more townspeople would occasionally join the procession, trailing behind the crowd with dazed expressions.
The man in black led the way, deliberately taking a long detour to avoid the Government Office.
Furthermore, the Five-Heart Sect had misled the Government Office, diverting its attention to three days from now. Thus, despite leading several dozen people, they managed to go completely unnoticed by the authorities.
Before long, Shen Bai and Cheng Shuang, following from the rear, silently arrived at the edge of a desolate wilderness.
The wilderness stretched out before them, vast and open, with few trees to provide cover. It was the kind of place you could see across in a single glance.
Shen Bai was puzzled. 'If the Five-Heart Sect's lair is here,' he thought, 'it would be found far too easily.'
'They can't be that stupid.'
Shen Bai wasn't the only one; Cheng Shuang also found it perplexing.
Just then, the man in black up ahead suddenly moved.
The man in black plunged the long banner he held into the muddy ground. The skull atop it continued to whisper softly as he turned to survey the group of enthralled townspeople.
Out of the corner of his eye, Shen Bai caught a glimpse of the man's face.
It was a horrifying sight. A dense web of scars, like writhing centipedes, crawled across his face from forehead to chin.
In addition, there was a line of stitches running across the man's neck.
Had the stitches not been a faint white, they would have been impossible to spot in the darkness.
'Those stitches... Could it be that this head isn't his own?'
Shen Bai mulled it over.
He already knew something about the Five-Heart Sect's Cultivation Technique, which involved separating the limbs and head from the torso.
When an ordinary person began this Cultivation, if the first "heart" they manifested was the head, they would die instantly—just like Master Qian.
The lucky ones would start by cultivating their arms or legs, like the gaunt man they had encountered not long ago.
This man in black, however, had a head stitched on, which was clearly different from what the townspeople had described.
'The Five Heart Sect Leader also practices the Five Heart Technique, and because of this Cultivation, he needs to replace his limbs and head periodically.'
'Perhaps this man in black is practicing the same technique,' Shen Bai thought.
'As for this man's identity, he certainly isn't the Five Heart Sect Leader.'
'After all, for the Five Heart Sect Leader to have escaped from the Five Immortals Sect, he couldn't possibly be this foolish.'
Sure enough, when Shen Bai glanced over at Cheng Shuang, her expression was calm, confirming his suspicion that this was not the Sect Leader of the Five-Heart Sect.
At that moment, the corners of the man in black's mouth curled upward into a sinister smile as he slowly began to speak.
"I've gotten everything the Sect Leader wanted. Why isn't anyone here for the handoff?"
Though there was no one else here but the group of enthralled townspeople, the man in black spoke out loud.
The moment the man in black finished speaking, a crack appeared in the ground.
The crack immediately widened, the earth collapsing to either side until a staircase leading underground was revealed.
The stairway was pitch-black; an ordinary person would be completely blind upon entering.
As soon as the staircase appeared, an old woman's voice drifted up from the gloomy passage below.
"A job well done. The Sect Leader will reward you handsomely."
As the voice echoed, an old woman's head flew out of the dark passage.
The head was a horrifying sight, its face a mass of wrinkles and its mouth completely toothless.
Its disheveled silver hair hung about it in a tangled mess. If attached to a body, it might have passed for an ordinary old woman.
Upon the appearance of the old woman's head, a look of disgust flashed across the man in black's scarred face.
"Old hag, hurry up and get these people inside. I don't want to stay out here a moment longer."
With that, the man in black stepped into the dark passage and quickly vanished from sight.
Seeing this, Shen Bai thought to himself, 'How clever.'
'The guide and the person at the rendezvous are different. The Five Heart Sect Leader clearly doesn't trust these people, so he's stationed different individuals at each stage.'
Sure enough, the old woman's head began to murmur, the sound of her whispers indistinct.
But as she did, the black long banner dissolved into a puff of black smoke, which, along with the skull on top, was sucked into the old woman's mouth.
A moment later, the old woman's head floated down toward the dark passage below.
The surrounding group of enthralled townspeople began to walk with stiff gaits, following behind the head.
Shen Bai remained silent, not wanting to tip his hand, and continued to mimic their dazed state.
He and Cheng Shuang were both smart enough to know that revealing themselves now would only alert the enemy.
After all, the person in charge hadn't even appeared yet.
The two of them followed the procession, stepping into the dark passage.
As Shen Bai stepped inside, his eyes quickly adjusted to the darkness.
If a Cultivator couldn't even manage that, their Cultivation would have been for naught.
Once Shen Bai's eyes adjusted, he noticed the abnormalities within the dark passage.
The inside of the passage was a bloody, pulpy mess. The walls were covered in gore, and the ground was a morass of white bones and blood.
Looking around, he could see more than ten skeletons half-buried here.
Shen Bai thought of the recent deaths in Shengyun County and connected them to the evil deeds of the Five-Heart Sect.
He especially remembered the horribly contorted body of the five-year-old girl he had seen not long ago, and suddenly felt that all the beauty in the world was merely a veneer for the darkness hidden beneath.
With that thought, he prepared to continue deeper into the passage.
But at that very moment, the unexpected happened.
A black long banner shot straight toward Shen Bai.
Black Qi swirled around the banner, which glinted with a piercingly cold light.
Sensing the rush of wind and the imminent danger, Shen Bai drew his rusted longsword and swept it toward the banner.
With a surge of his blood and Qi, he parried the long banner. Only then did Shen Bai get a clear look at the situation.
The man in black was no longer a single person. His four limbs and head were floating independently in the dark passage, one hand gripping the long banner.
On the other side, the same had happened to the old woman.
Their torsos lay on the ground, while only their limbs and heads floated up and down like horrifying specters.
"This brat and that little missy... did you really think I'd be so easy to fool?"
The man in black's head let out a chilling laugh. "I noticed you two before you even entered. It just wasn't convenient to make a move in the county, so I decided to play along. Today, you both die here, and we'll put you to good use."
As soon as his voice fell, the man in black and the old woman launched their attack.
The old woman attacked Cheng Shuang, while the man in black went for Shen Bai.
Each of his limbs and his head moved with its own sinister purpose, instantly turning it into a one-on-five assault.
Shen Bai watched the head and limbs fly toward him, his expression calm as he raised his left fist.
A flicker of Buddha's Light shone from his fist, illuminating the darkness.