Chapter 684
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Chapter 684: A Scam!?
“One minute left.” Fang Yu glanced at the time on his phone, then looked toward the stone platform ahead.
He sensed a faint array power emanating from the ground in front of the stone platform.
That position seemed to have a small formation array arranged!
As the time drew closer to ten o’clock, the surroundings grew increasingly quiet.
Toward the end, almost everyone seemed to hold their breath, with only slight sounds of wind audible.
Soon, the time reached ten o’clock sharp.
“Whoosh!”
Above the platform, right over the heads of the representatives from various families, a brilliant seven-colored light appeared.
Everyone looked up, watching the light in the sky with extreme excitement.
Fang Yu frowned slightly as he observed this seven-colored light.
The light continued to radiate, and in its center, a graceful figure slowly took shape.
Soon, this figure formed completely, with seven-colored light surrounding her.
As the brightness of the seven-colored light gradually diminished, the true form within slowly revealed itself.
Qin Yao, the Divine Lady!
Today, the Divine Lady Qin Yao wore a white gauze dress, with a style and aura completely different from yesterday.
But her face was still covered with a thin veil, revealing only her eyes.
Her long hair fell to her waist, floating with the wind.
“Greetings to Divine Lady Qin Yao!” Below, all the family representatives, including the Yuan couple and the Fu couple, lowered their heads, clasped their hands, and greeted her in unison.
Their posture was very humble.
Divine Lady Qin Yao floated in midair, truly like an unworldly fairy, her gaze ethereal, sweeping over the crowd below without any emotion.
Then, she noticed the only two people in the crowd who hadn’t lowered their heads: Fang Yu and Bai Ran.
These two were staring directly at her.
Divine Lady Qin Yao’s eyebrows furrowed slightly, but she didn’t seem to mind too much.
“Thank you all for coming to today’s sacrificial ceremony,” Divine Lady Qin Yao said in a melodious voice.
The family representatives below finally raised their heads.
“Now, the sacrificial ceremony officially begins,” Divine Lady Qin Yao said.
As soon as she finished speaking, she raised her right hand and gently waved it forward.
From under her sleeve, specks of light scattered and fell downward.
The starry light fell onto the stone platform below, seemingly triggering some mechanism, suddenly bursting into dazzling brightness!
Many people turned their heads away to prevent their eyes from being injured by the strong light.
But at this moment, Fang Yu stared intently at the stone platform ahead.
He clearly saw a shadow slowly expanding within the light!
Several seconds later, as the light dispersed, the shadow materialized!
A humanoid statue!
“This is… the humanoid statue I saw yesterday at the top floor of the Sand God Temple with my Eye of Insight,” Fang Yu thought, his eyes flickering.
But the statue before him was different from what he had seen yesterday.
The statue he saw yesterday had its head covered with black cloth.
But the statue before him now had no covering on its head.
It was an ordinary male face.
His hands were raised, palms joined, forming some complex gesture.
Fang Yu had noticed this yesterday but hadn’t studied it carefully.
Now, seeing the statue again, Fang Yu paid close attention to this gesture.
“This gesture… seems to be forming a seal? But what’s the significance of sculpting it this way?” Fang Yu frowned.
The appearance of the statue caused exclamations from the distant crowd.
Such a large statue appearing out of thin air.
This scene was already shocking enough for most people.
“Please, honored guests, present your offerings,” Divine Lady Qin Yao spoke again from midair.
Offerings?
Fang Yu saw the family representatives in front of him taking out their prepared offerings from their storage pouches and walking toward the statue.
When they reached about ten meters from the statue, the group stopped with remarkable coordination, forming a queue.
The first to step out of the queue were the Yuan couple, Yuan Chenglong and Fu Zhaorong.
Hand in hand, Yuan Chenglong held a gift box in his left hand, walked to the statue, and placed the box on the ground in front of the stone platform beneath the statue.
Then, the two knelt down and kowtowed to the statue before them.
After three kowtows, they raised their heads, closed their eyes, and with devout expressions, seemed to be making wishes.
About three seconds later, they stood up.
“Whoosh!”
At this moment, the strangely positioned hands of the statue before them emitted a white light.
“Plop!”
Then, a not-too-thick book fell from between the hands.
Yuan Chenglong immediately extended both hands to catch the book, his face filled with excitement.
“Thank you, Sand God, for your bestowal…” Yuan Chenglong and Fu Zhaorong bowed together, speaking respectfully and gratefully.
At this time, the common people watching from a distance all widened their eyes and let out exclamations of surprise.
“The rumors are true! The Sand God has manifested!”
“If you offer gifts to the Sand God statue and wish for what you want, the Sand God will bestow divine objects!”
“My goodness… it’s actually true… I want to go up there too…”
Exclamations of extreme envy and amazement came from the crowd.
By now, Yuan Chenglong and Fu Zhaorong had returned to the crowd.
Next to step forward were the Fu couple, Fu Yousheng and Yuan Jiangmei.
The two repeated what the Yuan couple had done before.
After presenting their offerings and making wishes, the statue’s hands once again emitted light.
“Plop!”
This time, what fell down was not a book, but a cold-gleaming dagger!
Fu Yousheng picked up the dagger, held it in his hand, briefly examined it, and then hurriedly bowed in gratitude.
“This is too magical… can you really get whatever you wish for?” Bai Ran said in a shocked voice.
Fang Yu looked at the statue in front, then turned to look in the direction of the returning Yuan Chenglong couple.
With his incredible eyesight, he could see that the book in Yuan Chenglong’s hand had four characters on the cover that read ‘Pure Way of Dao’.
“This is a book of magical techniques,” Fang Yu’s eyes flickered as he looked at Fu Yousheng, “That’s a dagger… indeed different items.”
“From their expressions, it’s clear they got what they wanted. However…”
“Interesting.”
Fang Yu raised his eyes to look at the statue in front, then looked up at Divine Lady Qin Yao floating in midair in her flowing dress.
At this time, the third person stepped forward.
This person was from the Cheng family of West City, also a top-tier family.
Following the same procedure as before, the Cheng family head made a devout wish after placing his offering.
But this time, although the statue’s hands emitted light, no item fell.
After waiting for a while, the Cheng family head’s face turned pale. He shook his head with a sigh of resignation, bowed, and said, “I deeply apologize for not being able to present an offering that pleases the deity… This is my failure… Please believe that next time I will surely prepare a better offering…”
Seeing this, the distant crowd erupted in another wave of exclamations.
So it wasn’t guaranteed to receive a bestowal just by presenting an offering!
To receive the Sand God’s bestowal, one needed to present an offering that it favored!
The Cheng family head returned to the crowd, and some began to comfort him.
“Master Cheng, there’s no need to be too dejected. If you didn’t receive a bestowal this time, you surely will next time.”
“Yes, next time I will definitely prepare better offerings, even bringing out family heirlooms!” the Cheng family head said with determination.
But apart from the few who offered comfort, most of the other family representatives’ eyes flashed with schadenfreude.
The divine objects bestowed by the Sand God would very likely change a family’s strength.
The Cheng family’s failure to receive a bestowal this time gave other families a chance to catch up!
At this moment, Fang Yu looked at the statue with a playful expression.
He wasn’t entirely sure before.
But after seeing the Cheng family head’s outcome, he could basically confirm that the so-called sacrificial ceremony was actually a large-scale activity to collect valuables, perhaps even a scam!
Fang Yu had basically figured out the trick behind it.
Next, one family representative after another stepped forward, presenting carefully prepared offerings.
Through devout wishes, some received bestowals, while others did not.
Those who received bestowals had faces beaming with excitement, while those who didn’t wore worried expressions and sighed with disappointment.
These two emotional reactions were quite distinct, continuously alternating on each person’s face over the next period of time.
