A huge altar made of huge stones was laid out with many of the dead beasts that the villagers hunted.
Fresh blood still flowed from the wounds of the flesh, dripping down through the cracks of the huge stones.
Even though Ye Yun had read of such bloody sacrificial scenes four or five times, he was still shocked.
As expected of the Great Wasteland!
Today's grand extravagance was his first in this world.
Could it be that Stone Village had encountered some happy event today?
He used his Divine Sense to make sense of what was happening. He explored the willow tree's branch, the altar made of stones, and the villagers.
Today's sacrificial offering seemed to be different from previous ones. The sacrificial items were split into two, and one side of the altar was piled up with stones to form a platform to place more desolate beast meat.
The villagers began to perform the sacrificial ritual, as they continued placing the prey that they had caught today on the sacrificial altar.
Ye Yun's curiosity continued to grow.
After the sacrificial items were placed, the village chief organized the people in the village to kneel and pray.
"I hope that the willow tree guardian spirit can protect our village. If you have any needs, please accept our offerings." The chief had a solemn expression as he sincerely spoke to the willow tree.
"Hmm... It seems to be the same as before." Ye Yun muttered.
After the prayer ended, the sacrificial offering came to an abrupt end. Ye Yun started to feel bored and no longer had any interest to observe the crowds.
But then, the village chief knelt facing the willow tree once again.
"The people of Stone Village would also like to pray and offer the sacrifices to the new guardian spirit. If the new guardian spirit decides to settle down here, I hope that you can freely enjoy your portion of the offerings too."
Ye Yun was slightly dumbfounded.
What was going on? A new guardian spirit had appeared? But there weren't any other guardian spirits mentioned in the novel.
"What kind of guardian spirit could have such a divine ability to stay by the Willow Deity?"
Could he have remembered wrongly? He recalled the contents of the book again, but he still couldn't remember reading about another powerful guardian spirit.
The sacrificial offerings of the villagers of the desolate Stone Village continued and Ye Yun started to feel a surge of energy through his body.
What was going on?
Could it be that because he had taken root next to the Willow Deity he also had a share of the sacrificial offerings to the tree?
Ye Yun was still trying to figure out the source of the mysterious and sudden surge in energy through his body when the system's sudden notification echoed in his ears.
[Beep beep, the host did not check in today. Do you want to check in?]
The mechanical voice pulled Ye Yun's thoughts towards it.
But Ye Yun did not reply. Instead, he pondered for a moment and decided to ask about the energy surging in his body.
"System, what is this energy that surged into my body?"
[The host is the grass rooted next to the willow tree. During the sacrificial ceremony of the village, you can share the Willow Deity's Sacrifice Acceptance Ability.]
"What? This was possible too?" Ye Yun was secretly delighted. He was openly taking advantage of the Willow Deity's perks.
After knowing the source of the energy, Ye Yun said, "Hurry up and check me in"
[The host has checked in today. As the host has obtained the Sacrifice Acceptance Ability, the desolate beast's blood essence will be rewarded. It can be used to temper the body!]
Following the system's voice, the villagers witnessed the blood essence flowing out of the sacrificial offering through the gaps of the altar and slowly converging around the willow tree's roots.
"Is this the willow tree's doing? It seems that the theory of two guardian spirits has been debunked." The village chief looked at the altar and could not help but sigh.
In the end, the desolate Stone Village had just the willow tree guardian spirit. Perhaps the willow tree guardian spirit reacted slower than other guardian spirits in terms of accepting sacrificial offerings. The village chief continued stroking his beard, deep in thought.
"I was right, wasn't I, Village Chief? How could there be two guardian spirits?" asked Huang Linhu.
"After so many years, the willow tree guardian spirit has finally accepted our sacrificial offering." Huang Feijiao stared at the scene before him and sighed.
For decades, the willow tree guardian spirit had protected Stone Village from the intrusions of the desolate beasts from the forest but never touched their sacrificial offerings. It was normal for the villagers to worry.
Now that they had witnessed the willow tree guardian spirit accepting their sacrificial offering, the knot in their hearts finally loosened and they felt relieved.
"In that case, Village Chief, the second theory is true. The Willow Deity has been recovering and revealed its presence through the awakening of the two Green Scaled Eagle eggs' ancient inheritance," said Huang Linghu.
The village chief nodded and instructed the others to retrieve the offerings to be split up among them. Once all the blood had been drained and the meat cleaned, the offerings could be consumed.
They would also collect the remaining blood essence to be used by the children to temper their bodies.
The villagers got busy. No one noticed that the blood essence that had been flowing from the altar had eventually seeped into the slightly-glowing green grass.
The green glow started to turn quasi-purple as the blood essence continued fusing with the grass. The glow intensified and eventually emitted a mysterious light.
The roots of the grass extended and finally touched the willow tree's.
——
Ye Yun resumed the cultivation of the Art of Nine Revolutions Essence as he absorbed the blood essence. As such, his cultivation increased by leaps and bounds as if he was taking stimulants.
Unfortunately for him, the Sacrifice Acceptance Ability was going to be the most advantageous reward for Ye Yun for a while because he had not received another despite checking in daily after that.
Dissatisfied, Ye Yun quickly summoned the system.
"System, what's wrong with you? Why are you so selfish? What happened to my check-in rewards?"
Rather than a voice reply, the system simply displayed the virtual screen in front of him.
[Host: Ye Yun
Identity: Nine Heavens Jasper Grass
Status: Intermediate Sprout
Acquired Items: Art of Nine Revolutions Essence, Breath Concealing Technique, Sacrifice Acceptance Ability (can be obtained multiple times)
Influence: 1
Grade: Ordinary Rank 5
Ability: Divine Healing, Sacrifice Acceptance Ability (to heal others)]
Ye Yun felt helpless as he looked through his own attributes.
Nothing much had changed in the past half month.
In the end, Ye Yun decided to ignore the system and continue cultivating. After all, the most reliable person was oneself.
However, after possessing the Sacrifice Acceptance Ability, he could absorb some blood essence every day to increase his cultivation. This was not bad.
Nothing major happened in the following days. The village was still peaceful and Ye Yun had still been absorbing and refining the blood essence daily to get another breakthrough in his cultivation.
He was also accumulating the Sacrifice Acceptance Ability daily, but he still wasn't sure how to use it exactly.
After a few months of cultivation, he had successfully extended his roots far enough to intertwine with the willow tree's which moved like a snake, strong and resilient, as they spread into the deep soil. The willow tree's roots were akin to the giant hands of the heavens, tightly holding onto the earth.
Now that their roots had intertwined, it was hard to discern whose was whose.
Once, when Ye Yun was taking a break and had nothing else better to do, he decided to use his Divine Sense to check out how deep and widespread the magnificent willow tree's roots had grown. It turned out that the web of the willow tree's root system had gone as far as the entire area under Stone Village.
Compared to the willow tree's roots, Ye Yun's roots were nothing.
Ye Yun sighed when he realized how big the difference in potential was between him, a mortal, and the willow tree, a divine being. Even if the willow tree ended up like him, having to cultivate from scratch, it would be able to reach far greater heights in far less time than him.