Way of the Devil

The preaching session lasted more than two hours. After it was completed, Lu Sheng exchanged the Scarlet River Seed’s wave aura with the iron man before leaving the Preaching Path as the iron man looked at him with some reluctance to part.

Lu Sheng passed through the Transport Formation and returned to the main city. Lu Sheng found an inn and stayed the night.

Early next morning, he passed through an exclusive Transport Formation for the Red Moon Disciples. From a hotel in the main city, he was transported to the dedicated spot where he was supposed to meet Master Red Moon. It was a spacious hall that resembled a church.

Lu Sheng sat on one of the pews and kept his gaze level. He observed the peculiar blood-colored patterns and photos on the wall.

This hall was built crudely. The patterns and pictures on the walls around him were blurred out by now. Some of them were even missing certain parts.

The floor was covered in dust. The ceiling flickered with the glow of formations. Only a small portion of them was still working. They managed to keep the aura of the visitors concealed.

The semi-transparent ghost of a middle-aged man sat at Lu Sheng’s right.

On Lu Sheng’s left, there was a young, pretty girl who appeared normal enough.

Naturally, if one ignored the locusts that kept swarming in and out of her nostrils and ears—only then was she truly an ordinary beautiful girl.

‘These aren’t the people who signed up in the first place,’ Lu Sheng commented in his mind.

He touched the Scarlet River Seed on his arm.

To plant this seed, he forcefully tore his own skin and placed a larva-like object into his body.

The larva was dead, but it contained all kinds of functions.

One of them was like a positioning system. If the owner was willing, he could pick a Red Moon disciple with whom he had exchanged the Scarlet River Seed’s aura and send him his own location. At the same time, the owner could include a short message as well.

Also, as the proof of identity of the Red Moon Disciples, the Scarlet River Seed could be used to seal contracts, deals, and temporarily allow the user to lend their powers across different worlds.

In other words, the Red Moon Disciples only had the power to do inter-world businesses because of it.

This was especially true for the function of lending their power across worlds. After entering into contracts with other living beings, as long as the Red Moon Mark was left on the target, the disciple would be able to temporarily lend a portion of his power to the target.

Lu Sheng caressed his Scarlet River seed. With his spirit-prompting threads and Yang Essence, Lu Sheng could tell that this object was ancient and had a long history.

While his mind wandered, a blurry, gray figure slowly appeared in the empty space of the hall in front.

The figure quickly materialized. It was a man with long black hair and a small beard. He wore bright red robes. Once he steadied himself, he casually placed a humanoid sculpture he was carrying on the ground before himself.

“We’re on a tight schedule. Hurry up, everyone,” the man reminded them. “Master Red Moon isn’t going to shine on you lot alone. There are many more new recruits awaiting Master’s attention.”

He placed the sculpture before everyone. It was a sculpture of a cold-faced old man in black robes. The old man’s eyes were the only thing that flickered with weak red light.

“Repeat after me!” The man turned around and bowed toward the sculpture. “Oh great Master Red Moon, your radiance illuminates the entire Libra City. Your benevolence fills us with gratitude. From here on out, we shall offer up our lives to the eternal Red Moon. We will give everything we have to seek the ultimate burning.”

“Oh great Master Red Moon, your radiance illuminates…”

The people in the pews repeated his words loudly.

Lu Sheng mouthed the words and matched his pace with the others. He could sense that with the reverberation of their voices, the sculpture sent out hints of complicated information which flowed into the Scarlet River Seed in his arm.

They finished the simple statement quickly. The flow of information stopped as well.

Lu Sheng extended his spirit into the Scarlet River Seed and started to inspect this message.

The Red Moon’s inheritance was direct. The information was in fact Red Moon’s method, known as the Scarlet River Method. This method was not the main cultivation method, but a special auxiliary method.

It enabled the cultivator to gather Spiritual Energy continuously and cultivate it into a scarlet jade. The scarlet jades would collectively form a flowing river and eventually become a ceaselessly flowing scarlet river within the cultivator’s body.

The flow of the scarlet river would scrub the cultivator’s physical body and spirit, making them tougher and stronger, eventually shaping the Scarlet Temple Body.

This stage corresponded to the various levels from the Human Level to the Snake Level. In a way, the cultivator would have another ace-in-the-hole move, and a powerful one at that.

According to Lu Sheng’s judgement, this method’s might was only slightly inferior to his Eight-Headed Devil Way’s. However, it was much easier to cultivate it.

‘As expected of the method given by Master. It’s quite detailed. Let’s see what kind of requirements they have after this.’ Lu Sheng finished checking the information, and saw that the middle-aged man had already hoisted the sculpture; his figure started fading away.

“You are all members of the Red Moon Disciples. Every disciple must take part in the concerted hunt at least once per year. Don’t forget that.” The man left them with a final message, and vanished from the hall.

“Concerted hunt?” Lu Sheng glanced at the newly transmitted message.

The gist of it was that as a Red Moon disciple, it was permissible to ignore a fellow disciple even when he was in trouble. However, if anyone killed a fellow disciple, the other disciples would be permitted to kill this killer, and they would receive a reward from Master Red Moon.

Killing the killer who killed their fellow disciple—this was referred to as concerted hunt. Every disciple had to take part in a concerted hunt at least once a year. Naturally, they could choose not to take part—all they had to do was pay a fee, and they would be exempted from it.

“This must be a rule established in line with Libra City’s notion of fairness…” Lu Sheng understood.

After the man left, the other humans, demons, ghosts, and monsters got up to their feet. They left the hall hastily.

There was a handful of them who took their time with unhurried movements, such as Lu Sheng. It was clear that they were all very confident in themselves.

“With this protective talisman, let’s see what that old fart can use against me!” At this moment, the ghost beside him started cursing under his breath with a ferocious expression.

Lu Sheng merely glanced at him and said nothing. He then walked out of the hall.

The sun was shining brightly outside. It was as warm as in spring.

He walked along the edge of the shadow in the corridor and went to his left.

In no time, he found a huge book of stone in what seemed like a small garden.

Some people were reading the stone book carefully, but their expressions were sour.

Lu Sheng walked over and scanned its contents.

It was a list of hiring fees which some of the more powerful Red Moon disciples had written. If they hired someone among themselves, both client and mercenary would be able to earn contribution points.

Besides that, there was also a stone plate on the side. Lu Sheng walked over and scanned its contents. He quickly found what he wanted.

It was a list of prices of various cultivation methods in contribution points and ice money.

In the lower ranks of the Scarlet River cultivation method, the cultivator would be at the Snake Level once the Scarlet River was formed.

Then came the middle ranks. The cultivator would start extracting star core power. This stage was equivalent to a Weapon Master and a Divine Lord.

Beyond that was the cultivating the full moon, which was equivalent to a Weapon Grandmaster and the Illusion Realm.

The final stage was the high ranks, which was equivalent to Void Underworld.

‘What I need now is the cultivation method regarding the full moon. It costs quite a lot of contribution points.’

Lu Sheng took a look at the contribution points required for the full moon. 500,000 contribution points. It could also be converted to 5,000,000 ice money.

‘I like this identity. Everything’s related to money. As long as I have enough money, I can buy anything.’

The only thing he was worried about was that the seller might be holding back on this cultivation method.

‘Forget it. I’ll worry about those things on a later date. I’m a citizen now. I should find a place to stay in the main city.’

Lu Sheng left the great hall and went through a series of Transport Formations. After a dozen trips, he was finally back at the main city.

He had more than 70,000 ice money with him. After considering a few choices, he selected a house with a courtyard further away from the main city and paid for it in full.

After he bought the house, all he had left was a few hundred ice money. Everything returned to what it was like before he achieved his breakthroughs.

However, it was fortunate that the business deals in the main city were fair. The marketplaces were extremely advanced. Lu Sheng did not have to worry about being unable to sell his products.

He sold the chunk of platinum he’d obtained from the armor world for more than 2,000 ice money. Then, he bought some materials he needed for an Arrival Formation.

Then, he closed his doors and started another Arrival in his own house.

He needed the Arrivals to gather resources badly. Hence, he did not choose some weak world for this upcoming trip. Worlds like that were sparse in energy density and had quick flow of time, but other than obtaining improvements by ranking up his spirit from the assimilation, there was no way he could gain any more resources.

The last world he Arrived in was an apt example. Lu Sheng had Arrived in a rabbit’s body. In the end, he could not bring anything back.

It was because the energy level of that world was too low.

This time, Lu Sheng adjusted the time flow ratio to 1:3.

This meant that a day in the main city was equivalent to three days in the other world.

It would be highly possible for him to Arrive in a world that was similar to the main world.

Then, in the final stages of preparation, he had someone gather information in Great Song on the Yellow Springs Planet.

The human traffic in Libra City was high. Although the Yellow Springs Planet was slightly remote, there was still a huge amount of information coming from there. There were also many who went to the Yellow Springs Planet for their medicinal supplies. Lu Sheng had some of them bring back a messenger doll back to the Yellow Springs Planet.

The doll would only have to be placed in a general vicinity or area, and would automatically find its own target by searching for the target’s aura. Then, it would self-destruct after it accomplished its task of delivering the message.

This way, the security of the message was extremely high.

After making the necessary preparations, Lu Sheng started setting up and activating his final Arrival Formation.

He invested everything he had into this formation. More energy was needed for him to connect to worlds with higher energy levels.

If he could not gain enough to reimburse his investments, he would be incurring a huge loss.

Also, Lu Sheng had to be careful that this upcoming world would not be as easy as the other world he travelled to before this. The difference in the time flow was not huge. This meant that it was highly possible for there to be some peak being more powerful than Lu Sheng residing in the world there.

If he were to be found out accidentally, the consequences would be catastrophic.

For that, Lu Sheng made proper preparations both internally and externally. After adjusting his body and mind for five days, he decided to activate the formation.

This was a gamble. If he failed, he would be starting again with zero resources. He would also be losing precious time.

After all, the difference in time flow was different now. If he took his time like before, he might not be able to reap any benefits now.