Li Shunxi and the other two were surrounded by the Black Whale gang members, having their weapons temporarily confiscated.

Especially Li Shunxi. When he saw the little girl bisected by Lusheng earlier, he felt extremely furious and indignant, thinking Lusheng was too cruel to even spare such a young little girl.

But before he could question it, the subsequent bizarre changes frightened him.

The terrifying melted face of the little girl in the flames made him shiver all over, extinguishing his earlier anger without a trace, replaced by fear and shock.

Only now being watched by the gang members did he better understand the meticulous arrangements by Lusheng. This guy had intended from the start to burn the entire Song Family Village! Hadn't he seen these gang members already prepared with bows, arrows and oil packs early on?

He figured out what Duan Meng'an and Ning San also realized regarding this point. The three simultaneously felt somewhat chilled inside. Before entering the village, Lusheng must have anticipated whether other people would go in. But even so, he still ordered burning down the village. Showing his extremely resolute and fierce temperament, very much unlike ordinary people.

Amidst fear and apprehension, Li Shunxi gazed blankly at the blazing mountain stronghold in a daze.

Ka cha!

A lightning flash followed by a pitter patter of raindrops.

The great flames still raged violently, but with the rain, it became slightly weaker.

"Retreat!" Lusheng turned his horse around, rushing towards Tiekuang Village.

The gang members also swiftly followed. No longer looking back at the burning Song Family Village.

Returning to Tiekuang Village, the heavy rains grew even heavier. Everyone settled inside the houses and Lusheng changed into dry clothes, rested to recuperate and took some medicinal powders to heal his injuries. By daybreak, he brought the Black Whale gang members back to Song Village again.

After dawn, the heavy rains also ceased.

Coming back to Song Village, all they saw left was a stretch of black burnt ruins of the collapsed stronghold. The great doors were also burnt into two pieces of charcoal, half hung by the entrance with white smoke still continuously billowing out from inside, seemingly places where the fires still weren't extinguished.

The tall surrounding walls were still standing, just covered all over with scorched black traces from the blaze. Over a hundred gang members dispersed all around, encircling Song Village about over twenty meters from the structures before everyone halted.

Lusheng took the lead on horseback, holding his saber heading towards the great doors. After an entire night's rest, his injuries had just about completely recovered. Now fully rested with restored vigor and valor, perfect timing to take action.

Li Shunxi also volunteered to follow along checking out the situation. Now walking behind Lusheng.

"Big brother Lu, with this massive fire burning everything, there probably isn't anything left inside the village. If I didn't guess wrong, that little girl should be a blood corpse." His deep voice resounded.

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"Blood corpse?" Lusheng heard this term for the first time.

He fiercely kicked the great doors open with a bang, striding inside.

"A blood corpse is a type of ghostly being condensed and formed from resentful bloody aura instead of something transformed from living people, an evolved type of ghost." Li Shunxi explained in low tones, "Last night, I specifically chatted an entire night with that scholar who escaped here. I happen to also understand some lip reading, so we could converse fine."

"Oh?" Lusheng glanced back, actually never expecting this guy to be so multi-talented.

Inside the village courtyard, everywhere was now charred black. The ground, walls, buildings all burnt to scalding temperatures with white smoke still continuously billowing out everywhere, indistinguishable between rainwater vapors or smoke.

The entire surface felt like stepping atop a heated furnace when walking over it.

Li Shunxi continued, "Outsiders all spread rumors saying that Song Yunjuan is the fifth younger sister of this village stronghold and the biological sister of that scholar Song Yuncheng. But after I asked Song Yuncheng, he said he completely didn't have any fifth sister at all. His family only consisted of himself and a younger brother, the rest of the three elder brothers and sisters emerged from nowhere! Even more horrifying is that he actually lived together with those things for a few years before discovering it!"

Lusheng felt a chill after hearing this, halting in his tracks.

"What does that mean? Could there be two more monsters in this village besides that Song Yunjuan?!"

"Unknown, but after discovering this horrifying truth, that scholar got his tongue sliced off by Song Yunjuan, that monster, and imprisoned in the household. Very strangely, the scholar said that everyday Song Yunjuan went to school and came back home to eat and sleep normally like an ordinary person. But whenever she fell asleep, she would abruptly rise up from the bed and completely transform into a terrifying homicidal maniac. He tried sneaking attacks to kill her multiple times during her lucid states but never dared to."

Li Shunxi frowned, "Seems like Song Yunjuan frequently talked to herself alone when no one else was around, not known what kind of conversation."

"Could it be consequences of him obsessively dabbling in mystic arts and alchemy?" Lusheng asked in his deep voice.

"Unknown. I also asked him this but he said that one day, he unintentionally discovered an ink black medicinal pill resembling glossy black jade inside a bird's nest in the nearby woods. He brought it back wanting to check if it was an alchemical elixir made by someone else yet never expected that medicinal pill to mysteriously vanish afterwards. Then abnormalities began emerging inside his household." Li Shunxi seriously answered back.

Pa!

Lusheng abruptly halted his steps, seemingly treading on something.

Lowering his head for an inspection showed it to be a handful of ink black woman's long hair.

Lusheng bent down using his saber tip to pick up the black hair, carefully examining it.

Suddenly his complexion drastically changed.

"Go!!"

Lusheng turned around sprinting towards the exit, seizing Li Shunxi by his collar and fiercely flinging him outside while also shooting out himself like a bolt of lightning!

Just exited brought enormous shock and alarm.

Behind them came muffled rumbling sounds of the pair of scorched black great doors previously seen fiercely slamming shut. Making it seem like something or someone powerfully swung them closed from inside.

Still maintaining forward momentum to stumble over ten meters across the ground outside before slowing to a halt, Lusheng tightly grabbed the somewhat disheveled Li Shunxi and peered back at the mountain village with an extremely gloomy gaze.

"This place, still remains very dangerous!"

"I understand now...this is a paranormal anomaly! It must be! My master mentioned this before, only paranormal anomalies would result in such events! Even massive fires can't eradicate blood corpses...." Li Shunxi's complexion drastically shifted with immense terror and panic on his face.

"What paranormal anomaly?!" Lusheng sternly shouted.

Li Shunxi gulped with an extremely tense stare focused on the tightly shut great doors of Song Village as if trying to penetrate inside.

"We should leave this area first before I explain!" His facial colors seemingly turning greenish.

Lusheng concentrated his vision upon Song Village. Now appearing even more collapsed and dangerous than before while doubly mystifying and alarming.

"Let's retreat first then." He glimpsed at the lock of woman's black hair still hanging on his saber tip which even the fires couldn't burn away.