"Wonderful," Han Yu said flatly seeing his 'handiwork'. "Now it looks like I tried to decorate it on purpose."
After several minutes of cleaning, he gave up. He sat down on the only relatively clean spot near the entrance and stared into the dim light. His mind wandered back to Ju Fan himself, the man whose identity he was now forced to assu.
"Ju Fan, what were you even doing here?" he wondered aloud. "Did you sleep in that blood pool? Was this so kind of ditation ritual? Or were you just clinically insane?"
He glanced at the blood pool again and frowned. "No. Even pigs would refuse to wallow in that."
The irony hit him then.
Back at the Twin Leaf Peak Sect, Han Yu had always thought his quarters were humble; too small, too plain, too ordinary. Now, looking at Ju Fan's lair, he felt like his old ho had been a palace fit for royalty. He would have gladly gone back and kissed the courtyard tiles.
He noticed the absence of even basic cultivation conveniences.
No spirit lamps. No cleansing formations. No fresh air talismans. Nothing. Ju Fan had lived like a primitive mortal who enjoyed suffering.
"Was he allergic to comfort?" Han Yu muttered. "Even a beggar from the market would pity this place."
He stared at the empty oil lamps lined up on the shelf and shook his head. "He didn't even use spirit lamps. What kind of self-respecting cultivator still uses oil lamps? He was a Core Condensation cultivator, not so dented cave hermit."
At that mont, Han Yu realized that pretending to be Ju Fan was going to be even harder than he thought. He had to live in this ss without drawing attention, clean it without being obvious, and sohow act like this was perfectly normal.
He looked around one more ti, sighed, and muttered, "All right. Fine. I'll survive. I've faced spirit beasts, deadly traps, and murderous sect elders. I can handle a slly cave."
A rat squeaked from the corner.
Han Yu's expression froze. Slowly, he turned his head toward the noise. Sothing small and furry darted across the floor and disappeared behind a cracked jar.
He sighed again. "Perfect. Just perfect. I have roommates now." He wondered if the rats here were as friendly as the ones from his sect.
He leaned against the wall, staring at the dim glow of the talisman light as it flickered against the bloody walls.
"This place," he muttered quietly, "is cursed."
And with that, he slumped down, arms crossed, wondering if this was the price of survival or just karmic punishnt for all his past lives. Either way, he knew one thing for certain... he was never going to look at the color red the sa way again.
After five minutes of resting which was more him trying to adapt to the state of the cave, Han Yu got up.
He stood in the middle of the disheveled cave, his expression a mixture of weariness and exasperation as he looked around at the disarray before him. The stench had faded sowhat after his earlier fanning efforts, though a faint tallic tang still lingered in the air, clinging to the back of his throat.
He rubbed his temples, trying not to imagine what kind of life Ju Fan had been living here.
Still, Han Yu had more important matters to deal with than the moral failings of his predecessor. If he was to survive in this place and blend in, he needed to understand the sect and its layout.
He began to search the cave properly, hoping to find sothing... anything that could help him make sense of this nightmare of blood, dust, and darkness.
After pushing aside a broken chair and a pile of strange bones that looked suspiciously humanoid, Han Yu noticed one of the shelves against the stone wall seed relatively untouched. Dust had gathered upon it, but unlike the rest of the cave, there were no stains or splashes of blood here.
The sight of sothing clean in this pigsty was almost miraculous.
Curiosity overcoming his disgust, Han Yu brushed off the dust and found several books and scrolls neatly stacked. The books had cracked spines and were bound in dark leather, while the scrolls were thick and tightly rolled, tied with faded crimson cords.
Han Yu blinked in surprise. "At least Ju Fan wasn't completely uncivilized," he muttered.
He picked up the first book and flipped through it. The pages were old but well-preserved, filled with clear writing.
The title made his brows lift: The History of the Slaughtered Moon Divine Blood Sect.
Han Yu's lips curled in amusent. "Perfect," he whispered. "Just what I needed."
He checked the others and found more treasures. There was a book detailing the hierarchy of the sect, one describing the major peaks and divisions, another about cultivation resources available to disciples, and a few that seed to be general guides on sect rules and conduct.
While they might not hold secret techniques or high-level martial manuals, to Han Yu, they were far more valuable at the mont. Knowledge was survival, and right now, he was a lamb wandering in a den of wolves.
Next, he turned his attention to the scrolls.
There were five of them in total, each roughly a ter wide and surprisingly heavy. He set the first one on the ground, undid the crimson cord, and unrolled it. The parchnt made a dry cracking noise as it spread out. Han Yu blinked as lines and markings appeared, drawn in precise ink strokes.
It was a map.
Not just any map, but a map of the Slaughtered Moon Divine Blood Sect itself.
Han Yu let out a quiet laugh of disbelief. "You have got to be kidding ."
He quickly unrolled the second scroll beside it, and then the third. As he placed them together, the layout began to form more clearly.
The maps were numbered, and when he pieced them together in the right order, the full scale of the sect ca into view. By the ti he finished laying out all five, the entire cave floor was nearly covered.
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