I think in the novel, LWJ had already captured the hand in the Mo village and only sent his juniors to Dafan Mountain for night hunt when they heard about the soul-consuming goddess or something that haunt Dafan Mountain.
It's different from the anime as in the anime they said they missed the chance to capture the hand.
In novel, the hand was already captured by Lan Zhang before they (the students and Lan Zhang) went to the mountain and faced off with the goddess statue. The goddess statue was fueled by human desire from all the wishes and thus it became alive. I think the Manhua is following the novel more than the anime.
When the sect people fight the multi-handed goddess did she have the hand found because I read the novel and I’m still confused... ( ̄∇ ̄")