Bathing the Dragon Vein

A sharp blade. A sharp gaze.

The blade’s edge was already at Lin Mo’s eyes.

Lin Mo raised his hand and clamped five fingers around the back of the blade.

Before the edge could slice into his palm, the Five-Thunder Technique was already pressed against the blade. Fine arcs of lightning drilled along its patterns, forcing the filth hidden within out bit by bit.

“Hand it over!”

He yanked backward, and the blade tore free from its wielder’s grasp.

The contamination was isolated by the Five-Thunder Technique, and the mass of filth on the blade was forcibly peeled away.

The Dragon Vein Spirit was affected as well. It was like having a chunk of flesh cut from its body. A long roar echoed from beneath the entire altar.

It hurt.

It really, really hurt.

But Lin Mo didn’t stop.

There was no use trying to reason at a time like this.

When a child refused to listen, all you could do was give it a beating. That usually straightened things out.

“You... you carry a scent I recognize.”

The Dragon Vein Spirit’s voice pressed in from all directions. It was hoarse and chaotic, tainted with the greed brought on by the contamination.

“But I have to eat you!”

Black mist gathered frantically, taking shape.

Its outline resembled the dragons recorded in ancient Chinese texts: antlered horns, long whiskers, and five claws on each foot. The only difference was that its scales were completely smeared with black qi. From a distance, it looked filthy in a remarkably layered way.

Lin Mo took one look and grinned.

“Perfect timing. If you hadn’t shown yourself, I really would’ve had trouble getting my hands on you.”

He grabbed Zhafu and shot into the air with him.

The Dragon Vein Spirit opened its mouth, and baleful qi erupted from its throat, blasting straight toward Lin Mo’s face.

Lin Mo raised the Human Sovereign Banner.

The banner fluttered once, and all the baleful qi was sucked inside. It didn’t even get a chance to turn back.

But that wasn’t the end of it.

Lin Mo carried Zhafu down directly onto the Dragon Vein Spirit’s back.

He planted both feet firmly against its spine, his body holding steady against the dragon’s back.

“Transform!”

“Dragon Rider!”

This was the first time the Dragon Vein Spirit had ever been ridden by a human. It went completely berserk on the spot.

Its long body twisted and rolled, its tail sweeping across the edge of the altar and nearly snapping several stone pillars in two.

It wanted to throw Lin Mo off.

Lin Mo seized one of its horns with one hand and grabbed a blackened dragon scale with the other.

“I’m going to pull hard. Brace yourself.”

The moment the words left his mouth, he gave it a forceful yank.

The scale came up by the root. Black qi gushed from the wound, and the Dragon Vein Spirit let out a howl, its entire body twisting into a knot in midair.

This wasn’t dragon subjugation.

This was a live cupping treatment—an emergency one.

“Stop thrashing around.”

Lin Mo grabbed the dragon’s horn and wrenched its head to the left, forcibly turning it away just before it could smash into the iron cage.

The Dragon Vein Spirit roared, “Let go of me!”

It even tried to ram itself into the altar’s cage.

“Letting go isn’t an option.”

Lin Mo pulled off another dragon scale and slapped it into Zhafu’s body.

Zhafu’s entire body jerked. The contamination was forcibly stuffed inside him, leaving him looking as though he’d been marinated through and through.

These dragon scales were not real dragon scales. They were shells formed when the contamination wrapped itself around the Dragon Vein Spirit.

Erasing the contamination directly would injure the Dragon Vein Spirit.

The Five-Thunder Technique could isolate the contamination, but it couldn’t make it vanish out of thin air.

So Lin Mo could only pull off the scales.

And since Zhafu was a ready-made container, there was no reason not to use him.

Lin Mo grew more practiced with every motion.

Pull off a scale, slap down a palm.

Pull off another, slap down another palm.

The Dragon Vein Spirit went from furious rage at the beginning to struggling more sluggishly later on. Even its roars had lost their madness.

It began to distinguish where the pain was coming from—and who was actually saving it.

“Who... are you?”

Lin Mo didn’t answer directly. His hands never stopped moving.

“Stop asking questions. Your brain’s still filthy. We’ll talk after you’ve been washed.”

The Dragon Vein Spirit fell silent for a moment. Its body stopped crashing around wildly, though it still twitched occasionally from the pain.

That made things much easier.

Lin Mo held on to its horns and adjusted its direction, keeping it pressed over the altar so none of the contamination would fall outside.

The Five-Thunder Technique spread out in layers. Lightning patterns crawled along the dragon’s body, burrowing specifically into the places where the black qi was thickest.

Zhafu soon reached his limit.

His body had already been stuffed to capacity. Black lines writhed beneath his skin, and his entire body had swollen by a full size.

If not for the Golden Light Mantra, he probably would have exploded already.

Lin Mo knew he couldn’t force any more contamination into him.

The rest would have to be destroyed directly.

The Human Sovereign Banner could collect baleful qi, but it couldn’t indiscriminately absorb this kind of contamination. Baleful qi could still be refined. Contamination, on the other hand, was nothing but a rotten liability. Whoever took it in would be the one to suffer.

He used the Five-Thunder Technique to wrap up the contamination, crushing it into pieces clump by clump. Then he used human-sovereign qi to suppress the remains, preventing them from burrowing back into the Dragon Vein Spirit.

While searching through the contamination, Lin Mo carefully picked out two remnant souls.

“As expected, they were both in here.”

Holding the two remnant souls, Lin Mo felt considerably more at ease.

He separated them from the contamination and moved them into a safe space protected by the Five-Thunder Technique.

His movements became unusually gentle, as though he were afraid that using too much force would scatter the last traces of them.

He had always been like this. If there was something he wanted to do, he would do it.

Saving these two remnant souls was one of those things.

The Dragon Vein Spirit didn’t roar.

It asked in a low voice, “Who are they?”

Lin Mo put the remnant souls away.

“Two people who shouldn’t have been buried here.”

That was enough.

He wasn’t a saint, and he couldn’t be bothered to save every remnant soul.

But he had indeed seen the memories connected to them.

Once the remnant souls were safe, Lin Mo no longer had any reservations.

“All right. The next part is going to hurt a little more.”

The Dragon Vein Spirit fell silent for a moment, then lowered its head.

“Pull.”

“That’s more like it.”

Lin Mo raised his hand and pressed it against the dragon’s back, releasing all his spiritual power.

Large sections of black scales were peeled away. The contamination tried to burrow deeper into the Dragon Vein Spirit’s core, but the Dragon Vein Spirit had already regained some clarity. It gathered its own spiritual resonance and forced the filthy substance outward.

With human and dragon working together, their efficiency increased dramatically.

Inside the altar, the atmosphere began to clear.

Outside the altar, meanwhile—

Monster after monster was being pressed into the ground and rubbed into the dirt.

The Chrysanthemum School had been unwilling to use the true contamination on these creatures. Most of them had merely been transformed into monsters through baleful qi.

They looked terrifying, but against the vicious souls within the Human Sovereign Banner, they were nothing more than food delivered straight to the door.

In terms of numbers, they were no match for the banner’s family members.

In terms of strength, they were no match either. One after another, the vicious souls suppressed them, even tearing them apart completely.

The vicious souls had no particular technique when they attacked.

Their strategy was simple and direct.

If they could tear something, they tore it.

If they could twist it, they twisted it.

If they could stomp it, they stomped it.

The spectators standing at the edge of the altar wore expressions that were difficult to describe.

At first, they had still been worried that something might go wrong.

Now, however, they had front-row seats to a free, immersive 3D IMAX blockbuster.

And they didn’t even need to wear glasses.

Watching the monsters gradually being exterminated, Xie Yuling saw the danger around them shrinking as well. She cautiously stepped forward, trying to probe the situation inside with her divine sense.

After all, the person she was most worried about was Lin Mo.

“Hey, what are you doing?” Jiang Yunlu stepped forward.

“I want to see if Lin Mo’s all right in there.”

She closed her eyes, preparing to send her divine sense through.

But it was suddenly bounced back.

A voice reached everyone’s ears.

“Don’t worry, I’m fine. I’m giving the dragon vein a bath. I’ll be done soon.”

Hearing Lin Mo’s characteristically relaxed voice, everyone couldn’t help but breathe a sigh of relief.

Wang Keting even collapsed directly onto the ground.

Liu Zheng, meanwhile, began pulling out his camera and photographing the scene around them.

All this intelligence would have to be reported to the bureau.