Chapter 273: Chapter 272 Black Mountain Stronghold_1

Mo Hua looked on in utter shock.

“Black Mountain Stronghold!”

In the depths of Big Black Mountain, there was actually a stronghold!

The ancient gate of the mountain stronghold seemed to have existed for a hundred years.

The door was splattered with bloodstains, likely from beheading victims and the splashing of blood, which, over the years, had created a nauseating smell of decay.

It looked both sinister and eerie.

“At midnight, present a head to ask the way.”

Mo Hua silently recited in his mind.

To present a head to ask the way, that is the meaning: to kill and behead, using the severed head as a token of introduction, and then the gates of Black Mountain Stronghold would appear.

The appearance of the gate also signified that the sin cultivators within the stronghold accepted you.

Indeed, moments later, accompanied by an ancient and nauseating creaking sound, the gates of Black Mountain Stronghold slowly opened.

The fat cultivator’s face showed a crazed joy as he straightened his Taoist robe and then stepped into Black Mountain Stronghold.

After he entered Black Mountain Stronghold, the creaking sound resumed, and the gates slowly closed and then gradually vanished.

The fat cultivator had also completely disappeared without a trace.

Mo Hua’s eyelid twitched.

So this was how one entered Black Mountain Stronghold…

Hidden so deeply, it’s no wonder that for so many years, no one discovered it.

And it seemed that those who could enter Black Mountain Stronghold were truly all sin cultivators with blood on their hands.

At least this fat one was no good thing.

With six lives on his hands, he turned suddenly on those he had called brothers, swift and ruthless, a sword through the chest, utterly unexpected.

He befriended the thin cultivator simply to bring an alive “token of introduction.” When the time came to chop off the head, it would serve to ask the way into Black Mountain Stronghold.

He probably never gave a second thought to the decapitated thin cultivator.

The path of cultivation is perilous, and the hearts of men, unfathomable.

Mo Hua had witnessed this once more and took it deeply to heart.

With unfamiliar cultivators, it’s always better to be on guard, especially with the ones you hardly know. You can know their faces but not their hearts.

At the same time, Mo Hua had also learned something.

If one must act, it should be like the fat cultivator did, catching the victim off guard.

“What should I do next?” Mo Hua frowned in thought.

Should he sneak in for a look?

This Black Mountain Stronghold was a bit mysterious; without seeing what was inside, he felt somewhat uneasy.

At the very least, get a rough idea of how many sin cultivators there were inside.

Take a stealthy glance without alarming anyone…

Mo Hua silently thought to himself.

But how to sneak in?

Mo Hua was somewhat troubled.

There must have been a Concealment Formation laid over the gate of Black Mountain Stronghold, more densely arranged than the mountain paths between the cliffs.

Without a careful scan with Divine Sense, one would not notice it at all.

Now that the gate was closed and the concealment gone,

unless someone else “presented a head to ask the way,” it likely wouldn’t open again. Surely Mo Hua couldn’t just throw a head in to knock on the door…

Besides, entering from the front, even if Mo Hua could conceal himself, he might still be detected.

Once discovered, it would be dangerous.

“What to do?” Mo Hua pondered.

Even though the gate of Black Mountain Stronghold had disappeared, its outline still emerged in Mo Hua’s Sea of Consciousness.

Peering at Black Mountain Stronghold with his Divine Sense, Mo Hua’s thoughts raced, gradually forming a plan.

In the path of Tao cultivation, everything relies on formations, especially cultivation buildings.

Although Black Mountain Stronghold was sinister and mysterious, it didn’t appear out of nowhere; it was a cultivation construction built by cultivators, with its concealment, defense, early warning, and other building functions all dependent on formations.

Moreover, there must have been a skilled Formation Master inside the stronghold; if so, then the stronghold might have been built entirely based on formations.

Since it relied on formations, there would be a way to solve the problem.

Mo Hua’s greatest skill was, of course, formation techniques.

Still maintaining his stealth, he strolled around the entrance of the Black Mountain Stronghold for a while and had a rough guess in his mind.

The Black Mountain Stronghold was built against the mountain with its sides embraced by mountainous terrain; there was an entrance constructed in the gap, and there should also be high walls on both sides.

Mo Hua climbed along the mountain peaks on both sides and, indeed, saw the tall walls.

The entrance was concealed by a Concealment Formation, but the side walls weren’t.

He assumed that it was because the Concealment Formation was difficult to study and draw, so it could only cover the facade, and it wasn’t feasible to completely hide the side walls as well.

Mo Hua heaved a sigh of relief; it seemed that while the level of the Formation Master was high, it wasn’t that high yet.

He guessed he was only a tiny bit stronger than himself…

Apart from the Concealment Formation drawn on the entrance, the formation techniques on the two high walls mainly focused on defense and early warning.

The defensive formations included the Earth Stone Formation, the Earth and Wood Formation, and some Solid Earth Formations, mostly Compound Formations, with a few Single Formations mixed in.

There were some formations on the wall that Mo Hua had never seen before, but their formation patterns were somewhat similar to the Compass Parent-Child Formation, and they were also Golden Series Compound Formations.

Therefore, Mo Hua speculated that these should be early warning class formations.

Concealment in front to prevent detection, with defense and early warning on the sides, carefully guarding against stealth attacks from cultivators.

Mo Hua nodded, finding the formation design quite rational.

It should be sufficient to prevent ordinary cultivators, and even average Formation Masters probably wouldn’t notice any flaws.

However, Mo Hua personally designed and painted all the formations for Tongxian City’s largest Refinery Shop and Alchemist’s Business, having a thorough understanding of formations used in premium buildings.

The formations at the Black Mountain Stronghold were ingeniously designed, but due to limited vision and scope, it was still built like a sneaky stronghold, and many of the formations were obviously coarse.

In Mo Hua’s eyes, there were many loopholes.

Furthermore, the stronghold’s formations were likely painted by this Formation Master alone.

It took a long time to paint them from start to finish, with new and old formations overlapping, some even conflicting, just barely strung together.

For ordinary Formation Masters, painting formations is quite slow.

For someone like Mo Hua, who painted formations daily, had an intimate knowledge of them, and with heightened Divine Sense from studying Heaven Yan Jue, they could paint extremely fast—which is quite rare.

It was normal for one person to paint to such an extent.

But as such, the loopholes in the entire set of formations were even more.

Mo Hua was relieved, some areas of this Formation Master’s skills were indeed inferior to his own.

Mo Hua circled around twice more, roughly got a handle of these formations, and then found a weak spot to sit cross-legged, taking out pens and ink from his Storage Bag.

The best way to deal with formations was to unravel them.

Breaking formations would make too much noise, and with Mo Hua’s current cultivation, he wouldn’t be able to break through the stronghold’s formations.

Moreover, unraveling a formation was what best demonstrated a Formation Master’s prowess.

This is what Mr. Zhuang told him, and Mo Hua remembered it clearly.

After that, Mo Hua started unraveling the formations.

He first unraveled the early warning formations to prevent being detected by the cultivators inside, and then using the mutual counteraction of formation patterns, he unraveled all the connected Earth Stone and Earth and Wood Formations in front of him.

This small block of formations was independent and not integrated into the surrounding Compound Formations, so when it was deactivated, it wouldn’t be discovered.

After unraveling the formations, the formation patterns briefly flickered before turning gray, losing their efficacy.

The wall corner, serving as the formation media, also withered due to the ineffectiveness of the formation patterns, becoming loose and soft.

Mo Hua then used his Divine Sense to perceive his surroundings, making sure no one was around, and quietly took out a small dagger to dig at the wall corner bit by bit.

Master Chen had crafted a Thousand Jun Stick for Mo Hua, and feeling unsatisfied, had indeed especially refined a small dagger for him to use in peeling fruit.

The small dagger was just perfect for digging at the wall corner now.

Mo Hua would dig for a while, then rest, projecting his Divine Sense to confirm there were no people around, before continuing to dig.

After an unknown amount of time, he finally managed to dig a hole through the wall corner, creating a small opening.

Mo Hua was covered in dirt, only his eyes shining brightly.

“Success!”

He could now slip in to take a look!

Mo Hua was young and had a small stature; the hole was just the right size and also unlikely to be noticed.

Mo Hua rested again, waiting for his strength and Spiritual Power to recover, reapplied the Concealment Technique, activated the Concealment Formation, made sure his preparations were thorough, and then cautiously crawled in through the hole.

Under the dark night sky, in the eerie depths of the mountains,

Young Mo Hua infiltrated the Black Mountain Stronghold unnoticed by gods and ghosts alike.

With the construction of Black Mountain Stronghold two or three hundred years ago, it also welcomed its first little cultivator who didn’t use the main gate.