Chapter 723: Lin Jin's Suspicions
Unable to bear the excruciating pain torturing him from the inside, the immortal only wanted Lin Jin to relieve him right now so he could be free from it all.
And so, he honestly answered all the questions Lin Jin had for him.
The stubborn immortal Lin Jin previously interrogated hadn't told him much, or perhaps knew only a little, offering him limited to no help. This newly captured immortal actually knew quite a bit, successfully satiating Lin Jin's 'thirst for knowledge'.
For example, the question of how many immortals the Beast Deity Cult had in total.
At first, Lin Jin assumed there were many, but that wasn't actually true. They only had nine immortals in total. Excluding the three he had slain a few days ago and the one earlier, only five immortals were left now.
Among them included this one who was being interrogated.
Of the other four, one was a profound immortal, so in other words, the entire Beast Deity Cult had two profound immortals. Having killed one of their body profound immortals, Lin Jin had caused quite a huge damage to the Beast Deity Cult's forces.
However, the remaining profound immortal was not to be underestimated as he was the cult's leader and his strength remained unknown. Also, the Beast Deity Cult now resented Lin Jin and had intentions of killing him off immediately. One of their purposes for invading Daluo Temple was to seek revenge as they used to have grudges against Daluo Temple dating way back since the immortal era. The other reason was that Daluo Temple possessed an 'Immortal Expiation Sutra' that could release an immortal's soul from purgatory. Their plan was to use the sutra to remove the immortal corpse stuck inside Patriarch Xue Pao's body.
With this, Patriarch Xue Pao could unleash his true strength.
After listening to these answers, Lin Jin knew what was going on.
At the prime of his strength, Patriarch Xue Pao was Rank 7, putting him at profound immortal level. With this, the Beast Deity Cult would still have two profound immortals. No doubt, the fact that Lin Jin had killed one of their body profound immortals induced fear in both the Beast Deity Cult and Patriarch Xue Pao, so they wanted to fight Lin Jin together. With two against one, their chances at victory would soar.
After learning it all, Lin Jin suppressed his anger to ask, "You could have just come and taken the sutra. Why did you have to kill the people here? Even if your Beast Deity Cult had conflicts with Daluo Temple, that was an issue for the past generation. The occupants of Daluo Temple are all mortal now. Why did you have to be so merciless?"
The immortal showed a look of contempt.
"Mortals are merely ants. During the peak era of immortals, we never had to question whether it was right or wrong to kill mortals, much less when we have a grudge against Daluo Temple."
In other words, he didn't think this was an issue at all.
Lin Jin couldn't suppress his intention to kill after hearing this. He pressed his hand down and the ghost worms began gnawing at the immortal. Amidst his own tragic screams, the immortal was devoured by the ghost worms.
With this, Lin Jin had killed three beings of immortal rank in a row. He managed to replenish the number of ghost worms previously lost, even getting an extra.
As the blood ghost flowed back to him, Lin Jin looked to the Buddhist pagoda forest nearby.
That was a forbidden area in Daluo Temple where even regular monks of the temple weren't allowed inside. Many of the pagodas enshrined the ashes and sarira of past Daluo Temple high monks, so the area was also known as the Sarira Pagoda Forest.
Yet, the place was now shrouded in miasma and a thick sense of blood.
"After killing the people here, they're ruining their sacred land. This Beast Deity Cult is horrible," Lin Jin commented. He urged Jin Chi and Shang'er to be careful before they went over together.
They had to be alert.
After all, the Beast Deity Cult still had another profound immortal with them, and Patriarch Xue Pao might already have started releasing the immortal corpse's soul.
No, not started. It had been more than one day now so Patriarch Xue Pao might even have recuperated from the removal and regained his profound immortal strength.
Should they meet, they would be facing two profound immortals and three half immortals.
In terms of battle force, Lin Jin's faction was at a clear disadvantage. Moreover, this profound immortal might even be stronger than the body profound immortal Lin Jin had fought.
Their probability of losing was too great.
Lin Jin had to take this into consideration and plan his options.
They definitely had to run, but any transmission or teleportation spells didn't work inside these black clouds. If they attacked the enemy now, they might not be able to escape the pursuit of two profound immortals.
Of course, it was also possible that Patriarch Xue Pao hadn't succeeded in removing the immortal corpse. If that were the case, he was only at average half immortal strength now so Shang'er could probably handle him.
Together with Jin Chi, they might just have a chance. Anyway, Lin Jin was confident if their opponent was only one profound immortal.
If this was the case, now was the best time to eliminate the enemy. If they won, it didn't matter if they couldn't annihilate the enemy's entire force or kill their profound immortal.
Because according to Lin Jin's estimation, losing twice would deal a huge blow to the Beast Deity Cult so the remaining immortals wouldn't be a threat to worry about. He could afford to let the profound immortal live too since he had experience in killing one before.
Still, there was yet another possibility to this all.
That was, Patriarch Xue Pao having already removed the immortal corpse from his body, and worse, finding two profound immortals already waiting for him the instant he charged over.
Lin Jin wasn't being a worry-wart, but how could the enemy be oblivious to his presence when he had barged through the black clouds just now?
Also, when he used spells on the two immortals earlier, although he had tried to do it as quickly and discreetly as possible, he couldn't hide the spirit energy flow and spell wavelengths.
So why didn't the enemy stop him from killing the two immortals?
Perhaps they were buying time and couldn't afford to send clones.
And this would give Lin Jin a good chance to sneak an attack on them, increasing the rate of success, even securing a win.
Such thoughts may be a little extreme, but when humans were given a winning chance, they would want to try even if it meant taking risks.
From his interrogation of the immortal earlier, Lin Jin learned that Patriarch Xue Pao and the Beast Deity Cult leader were in the midst of releasing the immortal corpse's soul.
Speaking of which, the person who put the immortal corpse inside Patriarch Xue Pao was really amazing. To think that he managed to successfully restrain Patriarch Xue Pao like that. Looks like it was not only able to attract the immortal devouring beast, but the corpse itself must have belonged to a powerful immortal.
Lin Jin knew his thoughts were running wild now.
He glanced at the deepest part of the pagoda forest and pondered before making a decision.
He had to be steadfast.
The more crucial the timing, the more careful they had to be. Especially when they knew the enemy still had a powerful profound immortal in their ranks.
If he charged over recklessly, he might get himself caught in a trap.
Although that probability was low, it still existed. It might even be highly probable judging from some of the details. The Beast Deity Cult was strong, obviously. When the five-nation coalition dealt with Jade Dragon and Heavenly Spiral's reinforcements, they didn't even use the black clouds or send immortals. So why must they do so for Daluo Temple?
There should have been an easier way instead of going through all this.
Now that they sealed up Daluo Temple with the black clouds, it felt as if they were intentionally sharing their location so Lin Jin could find them.