I fabricated myths to guide the revival of spiritual energy.

At the edge of the desolate graveyard, a chilling wind swept through like a knife.

Several demon-suppressing envoys who had come with Shen Yanqiu stared with bloodshot eyes at the familiar boots. Some of them even had red eyes and were about to rush forward to pull their comrades out of the ground.

"Stop right there!"

Han Zhao suddenly took a step to the side, blocking their path like an iron tower, his voice cold and devoid of any warmth: "If you don't want them to die even faster, then pull your hands back!"

Shen Yanqiu's breathing was heavy and labored, and the veins on his forehead throbbed. Those who had been buried upside down in the depths were the elite troops of the General Flag Battalion, whom he had personally trained and who were his last remaining assets in this chaotic world. But he was, after all, a commander who had survived mountains of corpses and seas of blood, and he suppressed his out-of-control emotions, grabbing the subordinate who wanted to charge forward.

"Listen to him." Shen Yanqiu gritted her teeth, each word seeming to be squeezed out from between her teeth.

The team immediately entered the most professional probing phase.

Xie Wujiu silently glided to the very edge of the mass grave. There lay an ordinary man, upside down, his legs already turning blue, only his toes twitching weakly.

Xie Wujiu held the Yin Si seal in his left hand with the tattered paper figure, without touching it directly, but just gently swaying it from half a foot away.

A pale green halo appeared on the small seal.

"He's not dead yet." Xie Wujiu stared at the fluctuations in the halo, his voice dry and hoarse. "His soul fire is still inside his body. But... on the level of Yin law, his birth date, his aura, and even the shadow he casts on the ground no longer belong to a 'living person,' but have been registered as a 'thing in the grave' by this chaotic graveyard."

"In other words, they have already been written into the 'grave register' in advance."

Fang Bai stepped forward and flicked a palm-sized paper doll out of his sleeve. With a flick of his finger, the paper doll landed and grew in the wind, transforming into a human figure without facial features.

"Give it a try." Fang Bai manipulated the paper figure.

The paper doll walked stiffly to the commoner and bent down. The instant its hand grasped the commoner's ankle, nothing unusual happened. However, the moment the paper doll exerted force with its arms, attempting to "pull upwards,"...

"Whoosh!"

The shadow of the paper doll cast on the ground suddenly and eerily flipped over! The shadow seemed to have gained its own life, and grabbed the paper doll's ankle tightly.

With a "whoosh," the paper doll didn't even have time to struggle before it was dragged roughly into the grave soil by its own shadow and buried completely in an instant.

"What triggers the rule is not 'touching,' but 'pulling out.'"

Lu Yan gripped the array plate, his eyes fixed on the spot where the paper figure had vanished. A glint of light flashed in his eyes: "Between the person who was planted upside down and this gravesite, there exists an invisible 'grave registration line.' As long as this line remains unbroken, anyone attempting to pull a person out of the grave will be immediately deemed a 'scapegoat' by the rules of this cemetery, and the rescuer will be used to fill the vacant grave registration!"

The rules have been figured out. It's not a vengeful ghost claiming lives, but a vicious cycle of cause and effect.

"Save one peripheral target first to verify the solution," Han Zhao decisively ordered, opting not to launch a large-scale operation.

The group quickly selected a small flag used to ward off evil spirits at the edge of the mass grave. The official boots were still trembling extremely weakly, proving that the person had only one breath left.

"Let's do it."

Lu Yan took the initiative, forming a hand seal. Six specially made array needles transformed into six streaks of black light, and with a few "thuds," they accurately nailed the six points where the small flag was upside down.

"The energy flow is locked; the burial register line was forcibly severed by my array for a moment!"

"Up!" Fang Bai followed closely behind, slapping a "fake death talisman" covered with intricate cinnabar patterns onto the soil. The talisman instantly burst into flames, transforming into an empty, incorporeal shell of energy that forcefully squeezed into the formation to take the place of the demon-suppressing flag in the "grave register."

"Soul Suppression!" Xie Wujiu suddenly pressed down the Yin Si Small Seal from a distance, and a chilling power of Yin Si law tightly enveloped the soil, preventing the soul fire of the small flag from being forcibly pulled away by the grave soil the moment it was pulled out.

Tang Qinghe carried her medicine box, with silver needles already on her fingers, ready to provide emergency care at any time.

Xu Chenzhou drew his old iron sword and stood silently to the side, his eyes as cold as knives.

"Commander Shen, pull it out!" Han Zhao shouted.

Shen Yanqiu could no longer contain himself. He rushed forward, grabbed the flag bearer's ankles with both hands like iron clamps, took a deep breath, and pulled upwards with a sudden burst of strength!

"puff--"

A dull thud sounded as the earth broke open, and the demon-suppressing flag was forcibly pulled out of the grave!

Just as the little flag left the soil, a sudden change occurred!

Because the living were removed from the earth, the invisible line marking the grave site instantly snapped straight. Shen Yanqiu's shadow on the ground, like an enraged beast, suddenly reversed, transforming into a pitch-black ghostly claw that viciously grabbed at Shen Yanqiu's ankle!

"court death."

Xu Chenzhou's eyes turned cold, and the iron sword in his hand transformed into a streak of light.

"laugh!"

With a flash of sword light, the ghostly claw formed from the shadow was severed at the root and instantly vanished in a wisp of black smoke.

Shen Yanqiu staggered back three steps, then fell heavily to the ground while holding the little flag.

Xiao Qi was bleeding from all seven orifices from being crushed by the mud, his face ashen. Even more horrifying, his clothes were torn at the chest, and a deep, dark gray-black "grave" character was clearly branded on the skin above his heart!

Tang Qinghe pounced on him instantly, and three silver needles quenched with pure yang medicine were pierced into Xiaoqi's vital acupoints with extreme precision, forcibly keeping him alive until his last breath was released.

Xie Wujiu then stretched out his left hand, pressing two fingers like iron hooks onto the "grave" mark, and pulled it outwards sharply!

A thin, yellowish-brown thread, emitting a pungent, earthy smell, was forcibly pulled from the brand by Xie Wujiu. He then sealed the thread into a soul-binding token, and only then did the brand of the character "grave" stop festering.

The person has been saved!

The moment the thin, earthen-yellow line was pulled away and Xiaoqi's fate was completely erased from the "grave register".

Han Zhao, Xu Chenzhou, and the others simultaneously felt that the invisible heaviness pressing down on their souls had loosened slightly.

Although this loosening was not as drastic as when they killed the Crying Goddess, since they only saved one person, it was enough to prove that their strategic direction was correct!

"Cough...cough cough..."

With Tang Qinghe's emergency treatment, the demon-suppressing flag bearer coughed up two large mouthfuls of black blood mixed with mud and sand, and briefly regained consciousness.

"Sixth Brother! What happened? What exactly happened in the camp?!" Shen Yanqiu's eyes were filled with tears as he grabbed Xiaoqi's shoulder.

"Commander... Commander..." The junior officer's eyes were unfocused, and he breathed intermittently, revealing a chilling truth, "Three nights ago... the brothers were all asleep in the camp... suddenly, we heard the Commander's command..."

"The officer shouted... 'All battalion, listen up... Form ranks and proceed to the cemetery!'"

"Everyone thought it was an urgent military situation... so they all got up... but as soon as they stepped out of the camp gate, everyone's bodies went out of control... and we just... walked backwards step by step until we got here..."

Xiaoqi's eyes were filled with extreme fear as she gripped Shen Yanqiu's arm tightly: "Under the black wooden stake... there's a person... wearing very tattered mourning clothes... like a funeral director..."

In his hand... he held a yellowed booklet... and with each page he turned... a row of brothers in our camp... fell headfirst into the ground...

Before he could finish speaking, Xiaoqi's head lolled to the side, and he completely lost consciousness.

Everyone felt a chill run down their spines.

"The black wooden stakes and military flags are merely the outward appearance of the formation and a decoy." Lu Yan immediately extracted the core logic from these words, "What truly controls this chaotic graveyard is the 'grave register,' or 'book of burial,' held by that burial master!"

Rescue them one by one? Absolutely not. If they tried to pull them out using that complicated coordinated method, even if all ten of them worked themselves to death, they still wouldn't be able to save all three hundred elite soldiers. Instead, they would be worn down to death by the rules.

"We must cut directly into the depths of the chaotic graveyard and sever the main line of burial records near the black wooden stake." Han Zhao stood up, looking at the black wooden stake that was faintly visible in the thick fog, his eyes revealing a murderous intent.

Count me in.

Shen Yanqiu drew his demon-suppressing sword from his waist. This seasoned commander's voice was as cold as ice. "These are my soldiers. I must personally lead them home."

Han Zhao glanced at Shen Yanqiu and did not refuse: "Okay. But you must follow my orders and are not allowed to rescue anyone without my permission."

"it is good."

Without lingering, the group maintained a tight defensive formation and advanced directly towards the black wooden stake at the deepest part of the mass grave.

This was an extremely arduous march.

As they ventured deeper into the area, the legs of the people lying upside down along the way seemed to sense the presence of living beings and began to twitch violently in unison.

From underground came a dense, chilling chorus of muffled shouts.

"Save me... Commander, save me..."

"My son...come quickly and help your mother..."

"Commander-in-Chief, heed my command! Slay the invading enemy!"

Some of these voices were desperate cries for help, some were imitations of the calls of loved ones, and some even imitated the authoritative military orders issued by the flag officer! They were trying to disturb the minds of the crowd and induce them to lose control and touch those legs.

Han Zhao's face was as cold as iron, ignoring the sounds and not pausing in his tracks. Shen Yanqiu gritted her teeth, forcing herself not to look at the familiar official boots on both sides of the road, even biting her lips until they bled.

When they finally passed through the layers of miasma and stood outside the huge black wooden stake, everyone gasped.

Only upon closer inspection did they see the true meaning behind the upside-down military flag.

That wasn't just an ordinary upside-down banner. The surface of the banner was densely covered with the birth dates and military numbers of the three hundred elite demon-suppressing soldiers, written in dark red cinnabar. And in the very center of the banner, a phantom image of the Demon-Suppressing Bureau's official seal, radiating a dense aura of death, was prominently displayed!

Looking at the military flag, Meng Changlu said in a deep voice, "That burial master used the 'military order' of the flag officer, along with this military flag whose cause and effect have been altered, to forcibly borrow the fortune of the Great Yu Dynasty's Demon Suppression Division and transfer the military registers of these three hundred elite soldiers into the 'grave registers' of this chaotic graveyard."

"They were deceived by this double standard. According to the rules, they weren't dead, but rather the 'guardians of the graveyard'!"

This method of manipulating the rules is more insidious and malicious than the "name" system of the Weeping Goddess. It exploits the obedience of soldiers, turning living people into nourishment for the graveyard.

"Lu Yan, record the array patterns. Prepare to break the array." Han Zhao suppressed the turmoil in his heart and immediately gave the order.

Holding the array plate, Lu Yan cautiously took half a step forward, preparing to probe the earth vein patterns around the black wooden stake.

At that moment, a sudden change occurred!

The soil directly beneath the black wooden stake suddenly began to churn and swell violently, like boiling water.

Immediately afterwards, with a muffled "plop," a withered, deathly gray hand suddenly burst out of the grave!

In that withered hand, he held a damp, yellowish-brown old booklet that smelled strongly of earth.

On the cover of the old booklet, three large characters were written crookedly in some dark brown paint:

The Book of Returning to the Land.

With the discovery of this old booklet, from the depths of the mass grave came an extremely old, hoarse voice, as if its throat were stuffed with mud and sand. The voice seemed to crawl from the very depths of a coffin, carrying a despairing sigh that echoed through the miasma:

"Born in a chaotic world, no one will collect the corpses."

"It would be better to be buried in the earth and find peace sooner."