PD -Chapter 184 Secret of the Living Sacrifice

“Can you tell us what actually happened?” I asked the disheveled stranger.

The man frowned at me, as if sorting through his memories. After a long silence, he finally began to speak—about himself, Dragon Elephant Village, and everything tied to the mountain deity.

In truth, the entire story was largely what I had already suspected. That earthen hut had once been a mountain god temple…

But in the past, the temple had been far more glorious than it was now. It wasn’t until before liberation, when war broke out, that the place gradually fell into ruin and was never repaired again.

The strange man, Old Li, had been an orphan since childhood, taken in by his master. His master had once been the temple’s caretaker. Before liberation, the temple also served another function—it was a mortuary.

Old Li’s master was not only the caretaker of the temple, but also the one who buried the dead.

When his master was dying, he passed down the caretaker’s role to him—and told him a secret.

Every so often, he was to bury one male and one female corpse under the hill beneath the mountain god temple. This, he said, was an offering to the mountain god.

His master also told him that in the past, sacrifices had been living humans. But times had changed, and the mountain god had gradually been forgotten. Only the temple caretaker still remembered the tradition… so instead of killing people, unclaimed corpses were used as offerings.

After his master’s death, Old Li strictly followed this instruction without the slightest neglect. But after liberation, life became more peaceful, and naturally there were fewer and fewer deaths.

Eventually, even the mountain temple itself was torn down, leaving only the earthen hut. The offerings to the mountain god were cut off completely.

Even without corpses to use, Old Li still obeyed his master’s last instructions. Every so often, he would use animals hunted from the mountain as substitutes, placing them inside the hut as offerings.

Then, one night over twenty years ago, he once again carried a wild rabbit to the hut for sacrifice—only to discover a couple near the foot of the mountain: the owner of a gas station and his wife.

Old Li saw with his own eyes that they were attempting to harm the couple and rob them. The couple fled into the forest by chance and ended up at the hut—but in the end, they were still killed by the gas station owner.

Both of them had their throats slit. Dark red blood flowed across the ground toward the hut. Inside the hut, there was dried straw on the floor. After being soaked in blood, the straw actually gathered together and formed a human shape, holding an iron hook that Old Li had once left there for hanging game. It staggered out.

Old Li had been hiding nearby, watching everything unfold. When that horrifying scene appeared, he was nearly scared to death.

The straw figure staggered out, raised the hook, and was about to strike the gas station owner.

At first, Old Li thought they were doomed once they encountered this monster. But unexpectedly, the couple collapsed to their knees in terror, begging for mercy.

The owner even seemed to have heard of the mountain god legend. While kowtowing, he desperately begged for forgiveness, and even promised that he would bring more living people here as offerings in the future.

The eerie straw figure actually paused mid-air, then leaned in and whispered something into their ears.

After that, it turned around and used the iron hook to drag the two corpses back into the hut, where it slowly “enjoyed” them.

Terrified, Old Li quietly fled. From that day on, he never returned to offer sacrifices again.

But after that, disappearances around Dragon Elephant Village began to increase—especially among traveling couples passing through from outside the region.

Old Li knew, without a doubt, that this was the doing of the gas station owner and his wife.

However, after human sacrifices began, the entire village started to change. From a poverty-stricken backwater, it rapidly improved, as if it had been put on a high-speed train of development.

Later, when the national road was built and travel became easier, many villagers began opening roadside businesses.

In this godforsaken mountain village, business was unexpectedly booming. Soon, many people simply moved down from the mountains and built houses along the roadside.

Of course, Old Li had tried many times to tell others about what he had witnessed back then. But to his shock, the interests of the entire village had long become tied to the ritual of human sacrifice.

If he tried to expose the gas station owner, he would be threatening everyone’s livelihood. As a result, he was labeled a madman and a lunatic. Even when he repeatedly went to authorities, no one believed him.

Soon, the old village was left with only Old Li. He struggled to survive alone until now… though he had also, on several occasions, unknowingly or deliberately saved people who were meant to be sacrificed.

What he never expected was that one day, he himself would be tied up and sent here as an offering.

“At midnight, that straw figure will awaken,” Old Li pointed toward the ceiling of the cellar.

I ran my hand along the cellar wall and looked upward, thinking hard. I tried to use spiritual energy to make my hands and feet stick to the wall and climb up…

But after climbing about two-thirds of the way, the bullet wound in my shoulder began to throb painfully. My limbs started to tremble, and in the end, I failed.

The best method would have been wind-type techniques—using spiritual energy to lift myself into the air. But with my current strength, there was no way I could activate such a spell.

Right now, I could probably only manage the Golden Light Spell.

I pulled out several talismans I carried with me—demon-breaking charms—and infused them with spiritual energy before throwing them upward, trying to break the cellar cover…

But the lid seemed extremely heavy. The talismans struck it with dull banging sounds, yet it didn’t budge at all.

I cursed myself for being useless. With the little spiritual energy I had left, I was barely even capable of lighting up the dark like a weak bulb.

I began regretting bringing Tang Shanshan into this situation when I had no real ability to protect her.

This time, I was going to drag her down with me again.

Tang Shanshan seemed to sense what I was thinking. She tightly grabbed my hand, as if trying to comfort me.

But at that moment, the previously silent Zhenzhen suddenly let out a piercing scream.

All of us were startled. I frowned and asked what was wrong.

“Something… something is grabbing my leg!”

Her voice trembled. At that moment, she seemed frozen in place, as if paralyzed.

I immediately bent down, trying to illuminate her feet with my glowing hand—but then Tang Shanshan also let out a soft cry.

Frowning, I turned to look—and saw something suddenly winding around her arm.

I quickly tried to grab it with my hand infused with spiritual energy, but I was hit too.

My legs suddenly felt as if they were wrapped by a giant python. My entire body pitched forward and collapsed.

Even stranger, Old Li beside me had already been lifted up against the wall by some unknown force.