Fabre in Sacheon’s Tang Novel - Chapter 296

Chapter 296
Of course. Here is the paraphrased chapter, adhering to all your requirements.

***

When the Five Venoms Sect subjugated the Blood Cult, they were unable to immediately seize every one of its branches scattered throughout the Central Plains.
While the main headquarters may have been conquered, the numerous covert outposts established across the region could not be taken over simultaneously.
These branches had been set up in secrecy to evade the notice of the martial world, and knowledge of their locations was confined to the Blood Cult’s highest echelons—making it impossible for the Five Venoms Sect to quickly identify them all.
Furthermore, the constant surveillance by the Martial Alliance made moving large forces into the Central Plains a difficult endeavor.
Nevertheless, by infesting the captured Blood Cult leadership with parasites and forcing them to talk, the Five Venoms Sect gradually uncovered the positions of many branches, stealthily sending their own operatives to assume control of the larger ones.
A number of Blood Cult members, however, managed to evade the Five Venoms Sect’s net.
These were the branches that had gone to ground after learning of the attacks on others.
There were also the deep-cover spies operating within the Central Plains, agents who communicated solely with a handful of top commanders at the main headquarters; they were fortunate enough to remain beyond the Five Venoms Sect’s reach.
Months prior, the exposure of a Blood Cult mole within the Martial Alliance had led to the complete destruction of the Wuhuan branch. This event shattered their foundation for moving into the Central Plains and cost many Cult members their lives. Ironically, it also turned out to be their salvation.
As the branch near Wuhuan was compromised and the Martial Alliance initiated a purge of Blood Cult agents, most spies cut all ties with the headquarters and disappeared, enabling a significant number to avoid being captured by the Five Venoms Sect.
Among those who vanished was Nan-hwa, the Vice Commander of the Blood Cult’s Blood Shade Unit.
Her duty, along with a dozen underlings, had been to collect intelligence across Hebei and Shandong—territories housing factions like the Taesan Sect, the Hwangbo Clan, the Shandong Ak Clan, the Jinju Eon Clan, and the Peng Clan—and relay it to the main headquarters.
This position allowed Nan-hwa to quickly learn of the Wuhuan branch’s exposure. She severed communication with the headquarters and disappeared with her subordinates.
Though perhaps “disappeared” is not quite accurate—it would be more truthful to say she simply stayed in place.
There was no pressing need to flee, as the headquarters had never been told their current covers. They just continued living where they were.
The area they inhabited was a group of small villages in Hebei.
Since she and her operatives were already spread out among these hamlets, blending in as ordinary villagers was effortless.
The risk of discovery was virtually nonexistent.
Her Soul-Snaring Technique ensured the villagers believed she was the village head’s daughter-in-law, so no one had any cause for suspicion.
The powerful compulsion of her technique made the villagers genuinely accept her as one of them.
It was during this time, after months without any word from her superiors, that an emergency directive arrived through an alternative, secret channel.
“Lay down your life for His resurrection.”
Nan-hwa was horrified by this command.
To sacrifice one’s life for His resurrection—this was an order issued only when the Blood Cult faced utter extinction, a command for the last remaining members to ensure the survival of its legacy.
It was an admission that the Cult itself was beyond saving, and that those left alive must dedicate themselves to reviving the Blood Demon, the ultimate aspiration of the Blood Cult.
She knew this order had been given only once before, when the Cult was originally expelled from the Central Plains. This was its first issuance since.
“I can’t believe this! Go and check the status of the headquarters immediately!”
“At once, Vice Commander!”
Nan-hwa could not accept that the Cult was nearing destruction.
She promptly sent four of her remaining subordinates, who were dispersed in nearby villages, to investigate the main headquarters. Months later, a single one returned.
“Ugh… The Cult has been conquered by the Five Venoms Sect!”
The returning warrior reported in a voice thick with agony.
“Conquered?!”
“They used a poison that could overcome Blood Cult members to subdue all the elders and warriors. They made them swallow parasites and now keep them as slaves.
The brothers who went with me were found by those Five Venoms fiends… and because they were not deemed strong enough, they were thrown to venomous beasts right there! Khrrk… khrrk!”
“What—what is wrong with you?!”
“F-Forgive me… Vice Commander… Blood Reigns Beneath Heaven!”
—SPLAT!
He uttered the Cult’s final salute… and then his head burst apart.
A hideous insect squirmed out from within his shattered skull.
—CRUNCH!
“You Five Venoms scum… you damned parasites!”
Consumed by fury at her subordinate’s horrific fate, Nan-hwa ground the insect into a pulp.
In her rage, she made a resolve to disobey the Cult’s final order.
Never before had she defied a command, but the fury that overwhelmed her after witnessing her subordinate’s death was too powerful to contain.
“Five Venoms Sect… I vow I will not die until I have destroyed you first!”
Revenge.
This vendetta would only be settled with blood.
Let some other soul lurking in the shadows take up the mission to resurrect the Blood Cult.
No—if she could destroy the Five Venoms Sect, that act in itself would be preserving the Cult’s legacy.
But her martial power was insufficient. To achieve her vengeance, she needed to grow stronger.
And for a member of the Blood Cult, there was only one way to gain power.
By consuming vast quantities of human blood.
And so, she began slowly harvesting blood from the villagers she lived among.
Thanks to the Soul-Snaring Technique already affecting everyone, drawing blood was not a challenge.
“Just you wait…”
Employing the methods she had mastered, she made tiny cuts on their necks or wrists to draw a small amount of blood each day. She continued this ritual for several months.
But the blood she gathered was limited, and as it was not from martial artists, her cultivation progressed more slowly than she desired.
Then, alarming rumors reached her, fueling her anxiety.
“They say two hundred of our brothers were wiped out assaulting the Sacheon Tang Clan?”
She had been gradually increasing her cultivation by consuming villager blood when she heard the shocking news of Blood Cult members being annihilated in an attack on the Tang Clan.
“Yes, Vice Commander. I overheard it from some warriors while selling charcoal to the Ak Clan.”
“Do you know which brothers they were?”
“No, I could not discover that.”
A team had been sent to retrieve the Blood-Water Venom Claw from the Tang Clan, but it was never meant to be a full-scale battle. And with only two hundred people?
It made no sense.
As she turned the bizarre report over in her mind, she reached a conclusion.
“What in the world is happening?”
“The Five Venoms swine clearly used our brothers as expendable pawns in some scheme!”
Based on the report her subordinate died to deliver, the Blood Cult was entirely enslaved by the Five Venoms Sect’s parasites.
The Cult would never have willingly sent two hundred of its own to die. This had to be a sacrificial move by the Five Venoms Sect for some hidden purpose.
Hearing this, Nan-hwa’s anger and worry grew more intense—and she began taking even larger amounts of blood than before.
The longer she waited, the more of her brothers would be sacrificed.
Eventually, after pushing her blood harvesting to its extreme, the villagers began to exhibit clear signs of anemia.
It was at this point that events took an unforeseen turn.
“How peculiar… it seems everyone in the village is afflicted by anemia.”
One day, a traveling physician, offered lodging for the night, checked the villagers’ pulses and recommended herbs to treat anemia.
The visit appeared harmless, concluding with the physician offering his advice.
But shortly afterward, government officials appeared.
Their arrival made Nan-hwa concerned that she might have to abandon the village.
However, even a cursory examination would reveal this was not a sickness.
She did not feel particularly threatened by simple officials. Yet after observing the symptoms, the officials summoned government soldiers.
No—those wretched officials had declared it an epidemic without conducting a proper investigation.
They did not even enter the village, merely putting on a show of inspecting it from the outside before reporting a potential outbreak.
“Damn it… It seems I must tidy up here and find a new location.”
“Understood, Vice Commander. I will also alert the others nearby who are gathering blood to make ready.”
The situation was attracting far too much notice.
Just as Nan-hwa decided she could stay no longer and must dispose of the evidence and depart, it happened.
She intended to leave the next day—but before she could, the most frail of the villagers she had been feeding on abruptly died. Instantly, the village was placed under quarantine.
Only the day before, they had been permitted to go to nearby fields or mountains, but now, not a single person was allowed to step beyond the village borders.
‘Damn it… Why does everything continue to go awry…?’
She thought matters had already escalated terribly—until they became even worse.
That was when the Immortal of Medicine and the Immortal of Herbs arrived.
“We are saved!”
“They say the Immortal of Medicine is here!”
“T-The Immortal of Medicine?”
“Yes! He came with the Immortal of Herbs! Madam, we are saved!”
“W-With the Immortal of Herbs as well?”
Events were swiftly moving toward the most disastrous conclusion.
***
Those who arrived in the village were the Immortal of Medicine, the Immortal of Herbs, and what appeared to be a young boy—likely the grandson of one of the two.
He was clad in crimson armor, the sort bestowed only upon someone immensely treasured.
This indicated they were clearly his protectors.
But more critically, Nan-hwa was thrown into a panic by the arrival of the two legendary healers.
‘This is terrible… a catastrophe.’
For a very good reason—her communication with her subordinates had been severed the moment government soldiers surrounded the village.
If they were merely incompetent officials, she might not have been concerned. But these were the Immortal of Medicine and the Immortal of Herbs—figures famous throughout the martial world for their expertise. If anyone could recognize the signs of deliberate blood drainage, it would be them.
The situation was a hopeless snarl. Discovery felt inevitable.
Nervous and desperate, Nan-hwa made a reckless decision.
If things had come to this, she would simply take them both.
‘If I am to be exposed regardless, I will harvest the essence from both their blood and use it to achieve a breakthrough!’
When the Blood Cult’s Wuhuan branch was eradicated after a spy was found in the Martial Alliance, she and her subordinates had hidden. That was what had saved them from the Five Venoms Sect.
She wondered if this, too, might be a twisted stroke of fortune.
It was said the martial prowess of the Immortal of Medicine and Immortal of Herbs was not exceptionally high—only around the peak level.
Nan-hwa herself had recently attained the peak level by drinking blood.
If she could eliminate one of them, she could use the villagers already under her Soul-Snaring Technique and her own martial skills to overcome the other.
If villagers died while resisting, so much the better—they would still provide sources of blood essence.
She decided to use the village chief to follow the boy, who had gone off alone to gather medicinal herbs.
The pretext of helping carry herbs was ideal.
As they walked along a narrow path through the woods, she observed the boy moving with a blank look on his face.
The moment was perfect.
“Young master?”
The boy turned his head with a vacant expression when Nan-hwa called to him.
Wearing a brilliant smile, Nan-hwa unleashed her Soul-Snaring Technique.
Then came his bewildered reply.
“Huh…”
“You are now caught in my Soul-Snaring Technique. There is no escape. Hehe.”
With a cold smirk, Nan-hwa plunged into the boy’s mental world to plant a command.
“When you awaken… you will stab your grandfather for me.”
***
As Nan-hwa entered the boy’s mental space, she encountered an odd resistance.
Normally, entering the mind of a common person was a simple matter—but this time, it felt… obstructed.
There was a strange barrier, as if she were pushing against something dense.
She attributed it to the boy’s youth. But the instant she opened her eyes within his mental landscape—
The environment mirrored a lush tropical jungle, identical to the Blood Cult’s main headquarters.
Yet that was not what seized her attention.
Nan-hwa found herself completely surrounded.
Seven women stood in a circle around her, and behind each one loomed the indistinct forms of enormous venomous beasts.
The boy lay behind them, the only one not accompanied by a spirit beast.
A cold voice cut through the air from the woman positioned in front of him.
“You. This appears to be So-ryong’s mind. What are you doing here?”
“W-Well, you see…”
Nan-hwa stammered, overwhelmed by the crushing pressure.
A red-haired girl glared at her and yelled.
—Tssr! That woman looked at Daddy and made him go all spacey! She said something about a Soul-Something!
Killing intent erupted.
A wave of pressure beyond imagination crashed down on Nan-hwa, stealing her breath.
—Grrr… Then this is undoubtedly her doing. You! What did you do to So-ryong?! If you have harmed him, you will not depart from here alive!
—Tsstsstsr. Cheongwol, let’s just injure her now!
—Tssrt! Yes! How dare she lay a hand on Daddy?!
—Shiaa. Should we begin by tearing off her arms and legs?
—Piii? Food?
—Gulp.
Nan-hwa swallowed with difficulty.
To think this boy’s mind contained such monstrous entities… He could not be human.
It appeared this would be Nan-hwa’s final day.