Chapter 342: Influence

Over on Hua Xiu Mountain God's side, after the Mountain and Water Deities had finished their discussions, received their benefits, and understood the situation, they no longer ate at the banquet. Leaving behind a table full of food and wine, they all rushed outside.

Once outside, they each displayed their Divine Ability.

Some transformed into their true monstrous forms, running swiftly.

Some rode the clouds and mist, half-flying and half-drifting away.

Others, who possessed Spiritual Artifacts, summoned Flying Swords or Cloud Boats and departed in a flash.

However, none could transform into a strange wind or directly escape into the earth's脉 like Hua Xiu Mountain God. This was a unique trait he possessed as a Mountain Spirit. Few could manifest such Divine Abilities at that time.

Watching the Mountain and Water Deities depart, Hua Xiu Mountain God turned to the three Human Race Shamanes: "Gentlemen, as Shamanes, your methods must be profound. How can you help that Invoker?"

The three Shamanes smiled and said: "We naturally have our own methods. While not as grand as the Mountain and Water Deities ', they are still presentable."

Upon hearing this, Hua Xiu Mountain God understood.

These methods couldn't be displayed publicly.

However, he acted magnanimously, waving his hand: "Then let us split up and search. If you find any clues, remember to come back here and leave the information in the Immortal Cave."

"We respectfully send off the Mountain God," the Shamanes immediately bowed, then watched Hua Xiu Mountain God leave.

They watched enviously as Hua Xiu Mountain God walked out, then shook his body, transforming into a strange wind, and departed freely.

After witnessing this technique, the three Shamanes began to whisper among themselves.

Let's look at these three.

One had dark skin, tall and strong, clearly someone who had done manual labor and practiced Body Refining cultivation methods, likely having worked his way up from the bottom.

Another looked like an ordinary person from the market, but he was bald. His eyes occasionally gleamed, indicating he was a Cultivator.

The third was a thin man who appeared to be in his fifties or sixties, but he had a large beard. His every movement subtly suggested he was the leader of this trio.

The strong man sighed, saying: "Such a technique is truly miraculous. To come and go as one pleases, unimpeded by walls or prisons, truly a method of the immortals."

"Alright, didn't those Mountain and Water Deities say? This one is a Mountain Spirit who became a god, inherently separated from monsters, and vastly different from us. Don't entertain such thoughts." The bald man pouted. While envious, his dominant emotion was jealousy.

It was merely a difference in origin, yet the other party possessed such magical techniques, and they were Innate. Even their lifespan was long.

As Innate Divine Spirits, even if their cultivation didn't reach longevity, they could live for thousands of years. Such a long lifespan significantly reduced their risks of advancement.

Unlike Human Race Cultivators, if their Aptitude was insufficient, they could die of old age if they weren't careful.

Or even more extreme, insect Cultivators, who truly raced against time. If they didn't reach a certain rank, they would die of old age within two or three years. The shortest lived for only a day, needing to reach a rank within that day to survive.

Innate Spirits were superior in cultivation. They possessed Divine Abilities even without cultivating.

"Alright, there's no point envying others. It's better to refine ourselves. If we can enter the gates of Shaman God Mountain, these are merely minor tricks." The thin middle-aged man interrupted their envious remarks.

Upon hearing the words 'enter the gates of Shaman God Mountain,' the other two also became excited, taking a deep breath, full of ambition.

The middle-aged man saw his companions' excitement and nodded, continuing: "If Hua Xiu Mountain God is correct, there's a prominent figure from Shaman God Mountain looking for someone to do something. If we handle this matter perfectly, perhaps we can receive a boost from that prominent figure during the outer sect assessment."

"Look, such pure Divine Qi, even if not used for cultivation, simply unleashed as a one-time Spiritual Artifact, it could probably easily kill an eighth-rank, and even a seventh-rank could resist it a bit. This shows that this Invoker's cultivation is definitely not low!"

What he said made the other two excited and eager to try.

The strong man nodded: "The old man is right. However, when it comes to finding people, we definitely can't compare to the Mountain and Water Deities . But if we're talking about divination, it means that even that Invoker's divination couldn't find his Dragon Steed. Can we find it?"

That powerful individual was also a Shaman. Even he needed to rely on the Mountain and Water Deities to search. So, it would be even more impossible for their own divination to find it.

The bald man pondered for a moment, then suddenly looked up: "Could it be that you, old man, have a secret technique?"

The old man chuckled upon hearing this: "Of course, otherwise, how would I dare to rope you two into taking on this task?"

He said: "I have a secret technique that can use memory as a guide to establish a connection, and then remotely sense the location. However, it requires someone who has seen that Dragon Steed before, to shed their blood, seize their brain, and sacrifice their soul, extracting their memory to create the guide."

"Is it that simple?" The strong man frowned, seemingly in disbelief.

"The old man wouldn't lie to us. We're brothers who've been through life and death together. Don't you trust him?" The bald man was a little displeased by the strong man's skepticism.

"It's not that I don't trust him, but it's too simple. I'm not entirely at ease." The strong man shook his head.

The middle-aged man merely smiled: "Whether it works or not, we'll only know by trying. Let's go find someone who has witnessed that Dragon Steed first."

"That's true, let's try it first." The other two also nodded, deciding to give it a try.

"Besides," the bald man chuckled, "this time, we're acting with the backing of this Invoker. We're not afraid of making a big fuss; we have support."

The other two also smiled, clearly understanding what he meant.

Since it was a command from a high-ranking Invoker, wouldn't it be acceptable for them to gain some benefits under this pretense?

Anyway, as long as the information could be found, the prominent figure wouldn't care too much.

From beginning to end, they had not the slightest doubt about the bloody nature of this technique.

Because there was no need.

Shaman Dao placed no restrictions on such things and didn't care about so-called good or evil. The good and evil of Shamanes purely depended on their own thoughts; this Dao itself placed no constraints on the Cultivator's behavior.

Good and evil themselves are meaningless under the entire natural law.

For example, when a tiger eats a deer, who is good and who is evil?

The answer is it doesn't matter.

There is no good or evil, no right or wrong. Shaman Dao views this equally; they don't care. They pursue the maintenance of the supreme law in this Universe. As for everything else, it is inherently a product of the natural operation under the supreme law.

Many high-ranking Shamanes would carefully cultivate a nascent world, becoming a being similar to a life-sower in that world, practically an Incarnation of goodness.

But at the same time, these 'Incarnations of goodness' would also casually bring an end to a world that was heading towards ruin, wiping out that world and the hundreds of billions of lives within it, simply because doing so could lead to the birth of a new world.

The Balancer of the Universe's laws, the Balancer of nature's laws, the convergence point of all communication.

Clues can also be seen from the Dao lineages of the three orthodox Shamanes.

Diviner is responsible for statistically calculating the laws of all things.

Invoker is the center of communication for all things, maintaining the balance between Heaven, Earth, Humans, Gods, and Ghosts through their own being.

Zong Ren promotes all laws, managing and summarizing existing matters.

In between, there are only cold, unfeeling natural laws and cosmic theorems; there is no room for things like good and evil to exist.

Of course, for high-ranking Shamanes, or Shamanes with self-awareness, there is no need to be constrained by good and evil. The motivation for their actions is inherently for the overall betterment of this Universe.

Therefore, wanton slaughter is not only meaningless but also has negative consequences. Thus, mid to high-ranking Shamanes, apart from being eccentric and insidious, actually don't have a reputation for being bloodthirsty.

However... it's limited to that.

The lack of bloodlust mainly applies to the upper-tier Shamanes, who have already understood many things, thus forming their own unique views on good and evil, and most are impartial.

However, among the lower-tier Shamanes, especially those rural wild Shamanes, the phenomenon of slaughter is quite severe.

Blood sacrifice, Gu refining, soul sacrifice, and corpse snatching are quite common, and a branch even developed from this, called Spirit Shaman, specializing in refining human souls and manipulating imps, deviating from the grand Dao and entering the realm of deviant minor Daos.

The grand Dao emphasizes the Dao, aiming to encompass this Heaven and Earth, to explore the ultimate truths of the Universe, and to interpret this entire Universe with its own Dao Orthodoxy and theories.

Minor Daos emphasize techniques, only caring about how to do one thing well, how to complete certain spells and techniques, such as brewing tea, practicing swordsmanship, taming beasts, or raising ghosts.

The Spirit Shaman lineage has long since deviated to the point of being a minor Dao, no longer caring about the core of Shaman Dao, but merely using Shaman Dao methods to command ghosts and spirits to satisfy their own selfish desires.

Unfortunately, whether it was the Snake Tail County Magistrate Li Qi once saw, or these three in front of him, they were all from the Spirit Shaman lineage.

This was also the most common and easily accessible Dao for rural wild Shamanes.

There was no other way; the entry was simple, and there were no requirements for one's Heart-Nature, just like cultivating martial arts with evil Qi...

As long as there were enough murders and enough souls, the speed of advancement would be very fast.

However, it cannot be said that true Shaman Dao is completely blameless. The fact that Spirit Shaman could develop to this extent is actually largely related to Shaman Dao's indulgence.

The indifference to the lower strata brought about by being neither good nor evil is the norm for Shaman Dao. Sometimes, indifference leads to indulgence.

As long as it doesn't affect the overall natural law, the great Shamanes are too lazy to even glance at a few sacrifices.

In nature, death and predation are perfectly normal. Even orthodox Shamanes would not concern themselves with these matters. Spirit Shaman are merely another type of predator.

Like now.

These three Ghost Shamanes began their predation.

How did they predate?

It's simple. Shaman God Mountain also has commoners, and not just commoners. Within Shaman God Mountain's territory, there are naturally bred demons, humans, and other races, forming a mixed society.

Shaman God Mountain's jurisdiction, similar to Tang Nation's territory, has its own unique ecology.

The three quietly came down the mountain and began searching for passersby.

At the foot of this mountain, there was a Human Race village.

Inside the village, people were celebrating.

One could see that the men in the village seemed to have caught a large wild boar. Everyone was very happy and lit bonfires.

Most of the buildings here were wooden, with only a few made of stone, looking like simple primitive tribes, or perhaps the Human Race from the primordial era.

Their clothes were also very simple, some made of linen, some of animal skin, but none had the fashionable feel of Tang Nation.

To compare, it was like modern society versus primitive society.

However...

Half of the people in the entire village were ninth-rank, and basically all adult males had successfully entered a rank.

Seemingly backward, but their cultivation was surprisingly high!

Because this was the heartland of Shaman God Mountain. Here, all things flourished, and humans were naturally the same.

Although there was fierce natural competition and predation, overall, it was developing in a good direction. Heaven and Earth Spiritual Qi was abundant, and various auspicious and divine phenomena emerged endlessly.

The total power of Shaman God Mountain was even stronger than Tang Nation.

Whether in terms of population or the number of experts, it surpassed Tang Nation.

However, internal strife was quite severe. Because there was no stable political power, people existed as individuals or groups, practicing slash-and-burn agriculture, living a not-so-modern life.

This arrangement made it difficult to unite all forces into one like Tang Nation.

However, productivity was absolutely not low.

There were Mountain and Water Deities everywhere, and relations between humans and gods were harmonious and friendly. They also maintained their distance, neither overly intimate nor estranged, so the weather was favorable, and coupled with the inherent strength of Heaven and Earth, food production was not inferior to Tang Nation.

And, although there weren't many Spiritual Artifacts, the demons or humans living in Shaman God Mountain's territory generally had better Aptitude and physical quality than people from Tang Nation.

They were born and lived in Shaman God Mountain, and unlike the people of Tang Nation, they did not plunder Heaven and Earth, so Spiritual Qi was abundant, and the physical functions of various races became strong under the nourishment of these spiritual sources.

In Shaman God Mountain's territory, the number of Innate Divine Spirits was much higher than in the outside world, and the probability of animals naturally transforming into demons was also much greater. The Human Race would also have their own characteristics depending on where they lived, such as those living in the mountains having Innate Divine Power and hard skin.

Those living in water could control water and breathe underwater from birth.

This was a natural effect produced after Heaven and Earth became strong.

This was also the future Shaman God Mountain pursued.

When the entire Universe, all world clusters, were like this, operating according to that supreme law, and the entire Heaven and Earth became stronger and stronger, eventually, all life would be able to become beings like Innate Divine Spirits, and the entire world would enter the supreme Perfection.

Seemingly backward, but not at all backward; progress was simply in other areas.

Inside the village, people greeted each other warmly.

Several hunched old men, puffing on large pipes, looked at the young man carrying the wild boar: "Oh, little tenth, you've had a great harvest this time!"

The young men also laughed: "Uncle, this time I didn't damage this hide. I stabbed it through the eye, but I'm afraid Grandma's favorite brain will be inedible!"

"No problem, no problem. Your Grandma has good teeth; she can eat meat too!"

The entire village was filled with joy.

However, at this very moment, the sky outside suddenly darkened.

Countless ghosts began to run!

The countless un-worshipped ghosts in the netherworld gathered.

There were those who died from weapons, those who died from water, fire, or bandits.

There were those who were forced to die for their wealth, those who died from their wives and concubines being forcibly taken.

There were those who died unjustly from legal punishments, those who died from epidemics during natural disasters.

There were those harmed by fierce beasts and poisonous insects, those who died from hunger and freezing.

Those three Ghost Shamanes summoned countless wronged ghosts, gathering them outside the village, obscuring the daylight!

And all of this was because of Li Qi's casual command, which gave them the audacity to assume authority.