"It seemed like I heard you mention Miao Family Village? Is it the one near Tufang Mountain?" Yuan Ming realized he had lost his composure and quickly reined in his emotions before asking.

"You heard wrong. It's Miao Hua Village under Qingao Mountain. The person who reported the Wild Man news, Haku, is from there," a man said with a sheepish smile.

"Oh, then I must have heard wrong," Yuan Ming said with a smile, nodding his head.

He appeared calm on the surface, but inside, a storm was brewing—the village Hu Zha and his team were about to slaughter was actually Hagon's hometown.

"You all stay here and keep watch. I'm going out for a walk," Yuan Ming said as he stood up and left without waiting for a response.

Once out of sight of those men, Yuan Ming immediately used his Divine Soul Skill "Far Travel." Three black ravens formed from his soul power silently flew out from his brow and swept away in different directions.

At this moment, Yuan Ming couldn't afford to worry about the consumption of his soul power. He only wanted to quickly find the trail of Hu Zha and his group.

The three ravens flew low, weaving through the mountains and forests.

Soon, one of the ravens found a group of messy footprints in a patch of forest, among which three sets were big and deep, while one set was smaller and shallower by comparison.

This matched the characteristics of three men from the Beast Slave Hall with that gaunt man.

As Yuan Ming headed in that direction, he recalled the three soul crows.

Fortunately, during his time as a Fur Beast Slave, he had accumulated a great many tracking skills for pursuing Fierce Beasts, quickly following Hu Zha and his group's trail.

After about half an hour, Yuan Ming finally saw from afar a village with many wooden fence-style buildings nestled under a green mountain peak.

They were seven or eight miles apart, but the sounds of pitiful wailing were already drifting over.

Hu Zha and his team had already started killing people.

Yuan Ming's heart tightened, and he hurriedly donned the White Ape Beast Skin, took a running jump, and, adopting a beast's pose, he rushed recklessly toward the village.

If it were just ordinary Southern Border People, Yuan Ming might have been able to prioritize his self-preservation and return home, forcing himself not to intervene, but when it involved Hagon's family, he could no longer care about that.

A man's promise is worth its weight in gold. Having promised to check on Hagon's daughter, he couldn't just look on nor ignore her life being in danger.

With the roaring wind by his ears, Yuan Ming charged all the way to the entrance of the village and saw from afar a body, pierced through the chest and hung on an old tree outside the village.

Yuan Ming stopped, took off the White Ape Beast Skin, and upon closer inspection, realized the body was Haku's.

His eyes were wide open, and his face, twisted with fear, regret, and unwillingness, had frozen that way, but it was already too late.

Yuan Ming felt no sympathy for him and immediately rushed into the village.

Along the way, houses had already started to catch fire, and the ground was littered with charred, dismembered bodies.

"Ding Dong"

Suddenly, the sound of a bell rang out.

Yuan Ming instantly turned his head and sprinted toward the source of the sound.

In one corner of the village, under a tall kapok tree.

The thatch on an old straw hut had already caught fire, and thick black smoke rose like a demonic dragon, soaring into the sky.

A woman in a green-blue coarse cloth robe crouched under the tree, holding a six- or seven-year-old girl in her arms, trembling uncontrollably.

The woman's head was wrapped in a black cloth, her skin reddish-black, not particularly beautiful but with delicate features, and her dark eyes were filled with terror.

She clutched the child in her arms tightly, pressing the girl's head against her chest to prevent her from looking outside.

Ten steps away from them, seven or eight bodies of men and women were piled up, blood flowing everywhere.

The bare-chested Hu Zha, holding a silver-white bell, was shaking it.

Within the "Ding Dong" sound, he was collecting Residual Souls into it.

His face showed no emotion, nor did his heart stir. Having done such things often, he felt these dead people were no different from snakes and bugs by the roadside.

Hu Zha nodded toward someone beside him, signaling him to finish off the mother and daughter under the tree as well.

This trip here, they hadn't found many strong Fur Beast Slave embryos, but fortunately, they had gathered enough souls.

As long as the task was completed well, there shouldn't be any other problems.

The man stepped forward, holding a curved knife, arrived under the tree, and without a word, raised his weapon to strike.

With this one strike, he would send the mother and daughter to meet the king of hell together.

Just as the cold light of the curved knife flashed and it was about to fall, a desperate shout came: "Don't..."

The man paused, and turning his head along with a puzzled Hu Zha, they saw Yuan Ming running toward them rapidly.

"Junior Brother Yuan, what are you doing?" Hu Zha asked curiously.

"Don't kill them yet, I still have something to ask," Yuan Ming shouted as he arrived beside Hu Zha.

Hu Zha, puzzled, asked, "What could you possibly have to..."

Before he could finish, he saw a flash of cold light suddenly appear on the hand Yuan Ming was reaching toward his shoulder.

Suddenly, a bronze longsword materialized.

Hu Zha thought Yuan Ming was going to pat his shoulder, so he wasn't on guard.

By the time he realized something was wrong, it was already too late, and the cold light of the Green Fish Sword swept across his neck.

He only felt a chill at his throat, and his entire head had already flown up.

A handful of fresh blood spurted up like a fountain, reaching a height of two hours, and then turned into a blood rain, falling down.

"What have you done?" the man with a scar on his face following not far behind suddenly cried out in shock.

Before he could finish speaking, he had already fled in panic.

Yuan Ming had long since used his Shadowless Step, his figure flashed, and he appeared behind him, kicking him in the back, kicking him flying out, crashing to the ground.

He stepped forward quickly, stomping heavily on the scar-faced man's back.

The scar-faced man felt a bitter taste in his throat as if his bile was being stomped out, and he hastily pleaded, "Don't, don't kill me... "

"Where's the other one?" Yuan Ming asked sternly.

"He... he couldn't hold back and found two women, went off to enjoy himself," the scar-faced man hastily replied.

"Where?" Yuan Ming asked.

The scar-faced man shakily lifted a hand and pointed towards the other side of the distant village.

"I'm asking you, what is done with the souls that your Beast Slave Hall takes after killing people?" Yuan Ming continued to ask.

"All... all were handed over to the Sect," the scar-faced man hurriedly said.

"Don't be evasive. I am asking what does the Sect use them for?" Yuan Ming barked.

"This... I don't know. Each time, it's Captain Hu Zha who personally delivers them; we just follow along on external matters and can't manage what happens afterwards," said the scar-faced man bitterly.

Upon hearing this, Yuan Ming stabbed his long sword downward, directly piercing the scar-faced man's heart.

Afterward, he lifted his long sword and shook off the blood that soaked it.

Yuan Ming glanced at the distant village and then at Hu Zha's corpse, hesitated for a moment, but still chose to go to Hu Zha's corpse first.

The mother and daughter cowering under the cotton tree, having already been frightened, cried out uncontrollably upon seeing Yuan Ming approaching with his sword.

Yuan Ming immediately sheathed his sword, and gestured with his hand for them to quiet down.

The woman, with a somewhat weathered face, could only suppress her fear while covering her daughter's mouth.

Yuan Ming approached Hu Zha's head, grabbed the braid on top of it, and lifted it up.

Then, his gaze sharpened, and a dark light shone at his forehead. A raven's head peeked out from it, pecking gently at the void in front of it.

Immediately following, its head pulled back, and an invisible thread was drawn out from Hu Zha's forehead.

A vague, gray shadow was pulled out from it, floating in the air, wobbling like a rootless duckweed, looking just like the figure of Hu Zha.

When this soul was pulled out, the mountain wind blew around it, immediately causing it to shiver as if it was shivering from cold, and the gray mist around it seemed blown away, quickly making the shadow grow fainter.

Seeing this, Yuan Ming immediately activated his Divine Soul Power, Soul Feeding.

The raven at the center of his forehead blurred, turning into a black vortex, from which a twisting force of attraction emanated, dragging Hu Zha's Residual Soul into it as a stream of black mist.

Soon after, the black mist disappeared.

In Yuan Ming's Sea of Consciousness, a black mist appeared out of nowhere, and then condensed into a vague human figure.

His thoughts moved, and from his Sea of Consciousness, the Divine Soul Power divided into three black ravens, which pounced on the vague figure, tearing and devouring it in an instant, leaving nothing behind.

As Hu Zha's Residual Soul was devoured, fragments of intermittent memories began to appear in Yuan Ming's Sea of Consciousness.

In a chaotic space, Yuan Ming's thoughts merged with Hu Zha's body, seeming to become one. However, his thoughts could not control that body but only watched the body's actions from Hu Zha's perspective.

In one of the fragments, Hu Zha, holding a curved knife in a dimly lit environment, beheaded one Wild Man after another, shaking the silver-white bell, and taking their souls away.

In another fragment, Hu Zha, along with disciples of the Beast Slave Hall, held large bowls, reveled in drinking, embraced slippery-skinned, red-naked girls in their arms, their laughter unrestrained.

Yuan Ming pushed through the thick fog, seeking to find the memory he was searching for.

Suddenly, he felt his thoughts being pulled by something, rushing out swiftly and crashing into a fragment.

Then, he saw a familiar figure appearing in the memory, Elder Saren.

He was the elder in charge of the Beast Slave Hall.

"The souls collected this time will be delivered by you to the Refining Furnace Hall, personally handed over to the Second Cave Master, and you must not err," inside a grand hall, Elder Saren stood with his hands behind his back, issuing the command.

"Yes," Hu Zha replied and then turned to leave.

Yuan Ming's thoughts followed Hu Zha's body, heading towards the mountain where the Fire Refining Hall was located.

Along the way, holding Elder Saren's token, he encountered no obstacles, smoothly reaching the back mountain of the Refining Furnace Hall.

There stood an independent courtyard, similar to the bamboo courtyard of the Three Cave Masters but built even more beautifully and imposingly, with a stele standing outside the great doors, inscribed with the words "Pill Cabin."

Just as Yuan Ming's thoughts were about to follow Hu Zha into the courtyard, the memory fragments he was seeing suddenly began to crumble piece by piece, and all images dispersed like snowflakes until they disappeared.

All of Hu Zha's memory fragments dissipated, leaving no trace.

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