Human Faces Part 2

After all, he had said back then that he was born here. In terms of connection, his should be stronger.

Wu Xingxue pondered it over and could only think of one answer—it wasn't that the Forbidden Land had pulled Xiao Fuxuan in on its own, but that someone had tampered with things here, intending to pull Xiao Fuxuan into this Forbidden Land.

If that was the case, then it was rather thought-provoking...

In this world, how many people were there who could do such a thing to High Immortal Tianxiu?

While Wu Xingxue was mulling it over, he heard Xiao Fuxuan say, "You just said this is a Forbidden Land? Did you hear something?"

Wu Xingxue froze for a moment and wanted to say, 'You don't know?'

But then he realized that Xiao Fuxuan hadn't heard anything the innkeeper had said. Zuo Chunfeng's line from back then, "Fallen Flower Terrace once had a Divine Wood," was also something said hundreds of years ago; the person who heard it might not still remember. Even if they did, they might not have thought of this place.

Moreover...

Wu Xingxue gazed into the distance but didn't see even a single branch on the scorched earth. If he hadn't happened to recall Zuo Chunfeng's words, he wouldn't have thought this was the place where the Divine Wood was sealed.

And, though it was said to be sealed, he didn't see any kind of sealing technique. Besides the choking smoke and wind, the scorched earth could almost be considered peaceful.

"'The moment you came in, was this place already this deathly still?' Wu Xingxue asked."

Xiao Fuxuan hummed in agreement.

Wu Xingxue asked again, "You didn't trigger any formations or anything like that?"

Xiao Fuxuan: "No."

'This is strange,' Wu Xingxue thought. He remembered what Xiao Fuxuan had said earlier about "heavy killing intent" and asked, puzzled, "Then where is this killing intent you spoke of?"

Xiao Fuxuan seemed to choke for a moment, then said lightly, "I was scaring you."

Wu Xingxue: "?"

"Since you're already in..." Xiao Fuxuan seemed to have a bit of a headache. "Then there's nothing more to be said."

Through the wind and smoke, Wu Xingxue could vaguely see a blurry silhouette in the distance.

He narrowed his eyes and patted Xiao Fuxuan. "There... is that a building?"

Xiao Fuxuan: "It should be a temple. I was just about to go have a look."

Wu Xingxue: "And then?"

Xiao Fuxuan: "...And then I vaguely heard someone outside say, 'If we can't open a way, just make a bigger commotion.'"

Someone: "..."

Wu Xingxue was speechless for a moment, then raised a hand and gave Xiao Fuxuan a push forward. "Let's go, let's go, I won't talk anymore."

They passed through that strange, empty expanse of scorched earth and walked up to the dark silhouette.

Xiao Fuxuan was right. It was indeed a temple, standing strangely and solitarily upon the scorched earth. The exterior of the temple was made of dark, gloomy wood, but the shrine and floor inside were made of white jade.

On the shrine rested a small statue, also of white jade. Unlike common divine statues, it wasn't so solemn, restrained, or compassionate. It depicted a youth leaning against an extremely tall jade tree.

The statue had no carved face, so one couldn't tell what the youth looked like, but his figure alone was slender and upright. Behind the statue was a tablet with characters carved on it. At the very top should have been the youth's name.

It was a bit strange, it was called: Bai Jiang.

Just as Wu Xingxue was about to take the jade tablet to have a look, he suddenly heard a faint voice say, "Don't touch it, you'll die..."

Wu Xingxue's fingers paused.

The voice came from a strange place. He looked all around but couldn't find its source. Xiao Fuxuan flicked open the curtain of the offering table with his sword; beneath it, apart from a large vat filled with incense ash, there was no one hiding.

Wu Xingxue pondered for a moment and suddenly felt that something was wrong.

The voice didn't seem to be coming from the surroundings, but rather from...

Above.

His brow furrowed, and he looked up.

He saw that the high rafters of the temple were densely packed with human faces... as if the entire ceiling was hung with people, feet up, heads down, suspended right above them.

Wu Xingxue: "..."

He thought about it and felt that, given the scene, he could probably grab High Immortal Tianxiu's sleeve.

There were truly too many faces—men and women, old and young—and all of them were deathly pale. They swayed gently in the wind, and the ropes they hung from also creaked softly.

For a moment, it was impossible to tell which face had just uttered "Don't touch it, you'll die."

He and Xiao Fuxuan frowned as they looked up.

As they were searching, the faint voice sounded again, "This Forbidden Land, with its layers of blade and fire formations, and eighty-one bolts of Nine Heavens Profound Thunder, was actually broken through so quickly and cleanly..."

Wu Xingxue: "?"

He was stunned. "Blade formations, fire formations, Nine Heavens Profound Thunder? Where?"

The voice spoke again: "He finished breaking them. We all saw it."

It took Wu Xingxue a moment to react before he understood who the voice's "he" was referring to.

So he opened his mouth and turned to look at Xiao Fuxuan.

"You..." Wu Xingxue asked softly, "didn't you say that the moment you came in, this Forbidden Land was already deathly still?"

Xiao Fuxuan: "..."

"That there wasn't a single formation here, that you didn't see anything at all?"

"And that saying the killing intent was heavy was just to scare me."

A dense wave of sneers came from overhead. The faces grinned one after another, their voices as light as wind-blown catkins. "Fake."

"Fake."

"He lied to you."

...

It was indeed fake.

Upon entering, this Forbidden Land was a mountain of blades and a sea of fire, impenetrably dense, offering no room to breathe. Any weaker person who came here would find no hope of survival unless shielded by a human wall.

So much so that Xiao Fuxuan was completely unable to split off any Spiritual Sense to send a message to the person sleeping deeply in the inn.

It wasn't until most of the killing intent was broken that he could faintly detect a bit of the sounds from outside the Forbidden Land.

When he heard Wu Xingxue speaking with the Feng Clan members, Xiao Fuxuan was just deflecting the last few bolts of Profound Thunder. His long blade cleaved open the sea of fire, and with a formidable momentum, he blasted away the boundless Sword Qi, clearing away more than ten li of scarlet flames.

Only when the last spark of flame disappeared, the deadly place turning into scorched earth, with no more life-threatening killing moves in sight, did he flick the dust from his sword and dash over to the entrance of the Forbidden Land.

He naturally had no time to see what else was in this Forbidden Land, nor the leisure to pay attention to the shadowy temple, let alone figure out what this place was sealing.

He wiped away a stray ember that had splashed onto his jawbone with the back of his hand, sheathed his sword, and only then reached out to pull the person outside in.