Chapter 446: Screen

Mo Hua concentrated, his eyes bright, staring at Zhang Quan.

He wanted to see how Zhang Quan would set up the altar, how he would sacrifice the bell, and what ancestor image he would worship.

Also, where exactly would Zhang Quan set up this altar?

Mo Hua searched the entire Row Corpse Village but found no sign of an altar.

Zhang Quan instructed a corpse cultivator:

"Go prepare the offerings."

The corpse cultivator received the order and withdrew. After a while, he brought in a bandit. The bandit was holding a clay jar filled with blood-water.

Zhang Quan nodded, and then the secret room door closed.

Afterward, he checked around again to make sure there were no "outsiders." Then, with a solemn expression, he walked toward a screen.

The screen was old and worn, leaning against the wall, with a dry ink landscape painted on it.

Zhang Quan formed a few seals and muttered something.

The ink on the screen became misty, with ripples appearing one after another. Finally, it disappeared, revealing a cave entrance.

Mo Hua was slightly surprised.

There was actually a secret room within this secret room?

He hadn't discovered it himself.

It seemed he had underestimated Zhang Quan.

This Zhang Quan had many hidden secrets...

Mo Hua thought to himself.

Behind the screen was yet another secret room.

Mo Hua was perched on a beam, so his view wasn't good. He could only glimpse a corner of the room inside and couldn't see the full layout.

But even this corner showed that the interior was luxuriously decorated, with gloomy candlelight, various strange and evil furnishings, and a platform draped with gold-yellow fabric.

Mo Hua changed beams again, clinging to the wood, hanging upside down, and cautiously peering inside.

This time, he saw things more clearly.

There was indeed an altar inside.

A painting was enshrined on the altar.

It was a bit far away, and he couldn't see it very clearly. Mo Hua also didn't dare to stare, only taking a quick glance before averting his eyes.

Offerings were placed on the platform.

However, they were not proper offerings.

Three dishes were presented: one with hand bones, one with foot bones, and the middle one with a skull.

He didn't know if they were the bones of innocent cultivators or Zhang Quan's ancestors.

Candles were also lit on the altar.

The candles were white, the flames were eerie green, and the candle oil flowed like human tears, dripping and congealing at the bottom of the platform.

Mo Hua guessed this should be corpse oil.

Besides that, there were some strangely shaped objects.

Mo Hua was not a corpse cultivator and couldn't understand them.

And below the altar, a coffin was also displayed.

This coffin was snow-white.

Its material was neither wood nor stone, neither copper nor iron.

Mo Hua examined it for a long time and finally realized it should be a bone coffin.

He was slightly surprised.

Could this bone coffin also be used for refining corpses?

But for refining corpses in a bone coffin, what kind of corpse was it?

He had only heard of walking corpses, iron corpses, copper corpses, silver corpses, and gold corpses. He had never heard of bone corpses...

What use could a zombie with only bones have?

Mo Hua complained inwardly.

Just then, he saw Zhang Quan and the several corpse cultivators kowtowing in front of the altar and muttering incantations, saying things like:

"Petty ones invade, ancestor shows divine power..."

"Borrow my divine sense, sacrifice and refine the copper bell..."

"...Copper bell drinks blood, corpse bones remain not..."

"When with white bones, offer to former teacher, when with human knowledge, offer as feast."

"Zhang family ancestors above, later generation disciple Zhang Quan, kowtow!"

Mo Hua listened and frowned slightly.

Zhang family ancestors?

Then this painting must enshrine the Zhang family's forefathers.

They were both forefathers and ancestors.

That should mean the Zhang family obtained this corpse refining method from their ancestral generation and then opened a coffin shop, passing it down through generations.

Then, "Borrow divine sense, sacrifice copper bell, with human knowledge, offer feast."

Mo Hua was a bit confused as he listened.

At this moment, Zhang Quan opened the bone coffin, grabbed the bandit who had delivered the blood-water with his pale palm, and threw him into the bone coffin.

The bandit struggled, but he was no match for Zhang Quan, who was in the foundation-building stage. He couldn't break free and was shut alive into the bone coffin.

He begged and pleaded inside the coffin, his fingers tearing at the coffin walls, emitting miserable sounds.

Moments later, the shouting stopped, and there was no movement inside the bone coffin.

Zhang Quan opened the coffin lid again. The bandit was already lifeless, his eyes wide with terror, but not moving.

His hands were covered in bloodstains from tearing, and his fingernails had all fallen off.

But besides that, his whole body had no wounds.

He just died like that, stagnant.

It was as if his soul had been eaten directly.

A chill went through Mo Hua's heart, and then he suddenly understood.

The so-called "Borrow divine sense, sacrifice copper bell."

It should refer to borrowing the divine sense of the Zhang family ancestors to sacrifice and refine the copper bell, enhancing its ability to control corpses.

Among these several corpse cultivators, Zhang Quan was a foundation-building cultivator, so controlling an iron corpse was naturally no problem.

Except for Zhang Quan, the other corpse cultivators were only at the peak of the ninth layer of Qi Refining.

It was indeed a bit difficult for them to control an iron corpse with strength close to the foundation-building stage.

Only through this method could they borrow divine sense and let the divine sense of the Zhang family ancestors attach to the copper bell through sacrifice and refinement to help them control corpses.

"With human knowledge, offer feast."

This meant using human divine sense to feed the Zhang family ancestors.

On the surface, the high altar was the offering platform, and the white bones were the offerings.

In reality, the bone coffin was the offering platform, and the divine sense of living people was the offering.

"So to say, this painting of the Zhang family ancestors is actually a... visualization diagram?"

Mo Hua's thoughts shifted slightly, and he blinked.

The bandit was used as an offering. His divine sense was eaten, and he died in terror.

Zhang Quan grabbed the bandit out of the bone coffin and threw him aside, instructing:

"Later, take him to feed the corpses."

And then he muttered something mysterious again. After muttering, he took out a copper bell with strange blood-colored patterns from his storage bag.

It was the control corpse bell Mo Hua had been longing for!

Mo Hua's eyes lit up.

If his speculation was correct, a first-grade twelve-patterned spirit pivot array was inscribed inside the control corpse bell.

He had to find a way to steal this copper bell!

And that visualization diagram, he had to find a way to steal that too!

But how to steal it?

Under Zhang Quan's watchful eyes, it probably wouldn't be easy to act.

Mo Hua frowned and calculated.

And that Zhang Quan was still sacrificing the bell in front of the altar.

He took out three iron cups and placed them on the platform. Then he put the copper bell into a cup and poured the blood-water into the cup.

The blood-water slowly seeped into the copper bell.

Again, it was like the copper bell was drinking blood.

Mo Hua lay on the beam, his thoughts racing.

"Should I go outside and make some noise to lure Zhang Quan out..."

"Or call little senior brother and little senior sister and just take it by force?"

Before Mo Hua could decide, there was movement outside the door. Someone anxiously shouted:

"Boss!"

Zhang Quan was a bit impatient.

The person outside said loudly: "Boss, something big has happened!"

Zhang Quan, in the middle of sacrificing the bell, cursed under his breath and instructed a nearby corpse cultivator:

"Go see what happened."

The corpse cultivator received the order and went out. When he returned, his expression was panicked:

"Big Boss, it's not good!"

Zhang Quan frowned, "What the hell do you mean it's not good??"

"Just... it's all broken! None of them work..."

Zhang Quan felt his blood rush up, followed by a burst of piercing pain in his heart.

He said incredulously:

"How can none of them work?"

"It seems... it was tampered with by someone..."

Zhang Quan's heart turned icy cold.

He originally thought that relying on the array, Row Corpse Village would be easy to defend and difficult to attack, enough to keep enemies out.

Once he finished sacrificing the bell and awakened the iron corpse, he could go out and kill to his heart's content.

At worst, guarding the village with the array would be no problem.

But he never expected that the arrays he had painstakingly built were all broken?

Without arrays, Row Corpse Village would have no external barriers.

It would be much easier for others to attack.

But... how was that possible?

Zhang Quan suppressed the shock and anger in his heart and said: "I'll go see."

But he had only walked a few steps before frowning again.

Sacrificing the bell at the blood altar still needed some time to be completed.

Someone needed to watch this altar, but he was not at ease letting others guard it.

Corpse cultivators were naturally cold and indifferent.

Not just him, all corpse cultivators were like that.

In this village, he didn't trust anyone.

Zhang Quan's gaze swept across the several corpse cultivators in the room, looking at them one by one.

When the other corpse cultivators met his gaze, they all silently lowered their heads, not daring to make eye contact.

Zhang Quan coldly snorted and slowly said:

"You all follow me and go out together to see."

A corpse cultivator's gaze flickered slightly, and he asked in a low voice:

"Boss, does this sacrificial altar need someone to guard it..."

Zhang Quan's gaze turned cold, "You want to stay?"

The corpse cultivator immediately panicked and said: "Dare not."

Zhang Quan chuckled sinisterly, "You all go out. I will close the door and seal the array. Not even a mosquito can fly in, you need not worry."

"Yes."

That corpse cultivator lowered his head and agreed, his expression a bit disappointed.

Several corpse cultivators, carrying the bandit's corpse, walked out of the secret room.

Zhang Quan was the last to leave.

As he left, he sealed the screen.

He formed some seals and recited some incantations. The ink painting on the screen changed, turning back into a dry ink landscape diagram.

Zhang Quan still wasn't at ease. He checked everywhere several times before finally feeling relieved and carefully walked out the door.

Before going out, he also locked the door.

Mo Hua stayed on the beam, not moving.

Indeed, after a while, Zhang Quan walked back again.

He checked the room again, and only after confirming there were no traces of outsiders did he breathe a sigh of relief, heavily lock the door, and his footsteps gradually faded away.

Mo Hua hummed inwardly:

"Trying to fool me with this little trick?"

Zhang Quan's every move was within his divine sense perception.

Mo Hua's divine sense confirmed that Zhang Quan had indeed walked far away. Only then did he lightly and agilely drop from the beam.

The room was quiet, and there was no special aura on the screen.

It looked just like an ordinary screen.

Mo Hua studied the screen for a bit and suddenly understood.

This screen was actually a high-grade spirit tool, and its refining method was very special, no wonder it could hide from his perception.

It was estimated to be worth quite a few spirit stones...

"How did Zhang Quan get it?"

Mo Hua was a bit curious.

Was it stolen, robbed, given by others, or passed down by his ancestors?

But now was not the time to dwell on this.

He had to find a way to open the screen first, enter the sacrificial altar, and steal the copper bell.

Mo Hua remembered what incantations Zhang Quan recited and what seals he formed before entering the screen, which caused the ink painting on the screen to dissolve and reveal the cave entrance.

Mo Hua then imitated him, forming seals, stomping his feet, and muttering a string of gibberish.

He didn't know what he was muttering himself, purely trying his luck.

But obviously, this was not a matter of luck.

The screen didn't move at all.

Mo Hua scratched his head.

Not right...

But he couldn't go find Zhang Quan and ask him to demonstrate again what seals to form and what incantations to recite.

Mo Hua frowned and thought for a bit.

He remembered what Mister Zhuang said, that all things have their appearance and their essence.

Forming seals and reciting incantations were just the appearance.

Their essence was the operation of inner spiritual power.

So, this screen also had the essence of spiritual power operation.

And on spirit tools, the array controlled the operation of spiritual power.

Mo Hua looked carefully again and finally found subtle array patterns on the four feet and edges of the screen.

These array patterns were extremely small and obscure.

What was more troublesome was that Mo Hua didn't recognize them.

Even with his divine sense, after deducing and calculating the complete array patterns, Mo Hua still didn't know what array it was.

He could only roughly speculate based on his knowledge of arrays.

The array on this screen should be related to sound and manifestation.

Reciting incantations was sound, and forming seals was manifestation.

Only by reciting the correct incantations and forming the correct seals, with both sound and actions correct, could the array be activated.

But what specific array principles were used, whether it involved the Five Elements or other array rules, Mo Hua was not clear.

"Arrays are profound and vast. It seems I still have much to learn..."

Mo Hua took out paper and pen, first recording the array patterns, deciding to slowly comprehend and research them when he had time later.

(End of this chapter)