Chapter 99 Heading Straight to the Lair (Part Two)

Lin Mumu and Li Xi quickly realized the existence of Mianling, but unfortunately, they didn't communicate much and didn't find a way to prove who Mianling was.

The two kept a great distance apart, as if afraid to touch each other.

Li Xi was once Jiang Yan's subordinate and worked for him. From this perspective, Li Xi is also one of the murderers who killed Ji Shi. Lin Mumu really has no reason to give her a good look.

"Master Li has indeed turned over a new leaf, it's just a pity that Jiang Yan only learned of your betrayal before his death, it's rather pitiful."

Lin Mumu didn't turn around, but instead launched into a sarcastic remark at Li Xi behind him.

Li Xi was not angry, but simply said truthfully, "I have repaid all of Jiang Yan's kindness. Rest assured, I will never betray Immortal Venerable Chu again."

Lin Mumu snorted coldly: "What face does someone who has already betrayed his former master have to say such things? Besides, I've never heard of repaying a debt of gratitude with someone else's life before."

Li Xi took a deep breath and said, "I know you hate me. After this is over, you can do whatever you want with me."

"Heh, it's easy for Hall Master Li to say, but you are, after all, an elder of Changjin Mountain. Even if I wanted to do something to you, I would have to consider the face of Changjin Mountain. You must have thought of that long ago, didn't you?"

Li Xi: "Then what do you want?"

Lin Mumu suddenly stopped, looked around, gripped the sword in her hand tightly, and said, "Let's deal with what's in front of us first."

Her method of identifying the Mianling was simple and brutal: she drew her sword and slashed her wrist.

Li Xi was shocked: "What are you doing?!"

The smell of gushing blood immediately attracted Mianling. These creatures had a hint of green in their eyes and slowly walked towards her.

Seeing this, Lin Mumu immediately released Qingmu, letting Qingmu decapitate the group of things on its own, and then it obediently flew back into her hand.

Li Xi was still watching her hand, and immediately took out some hemostatic powder to apply the medicine for her.

It's true that spirits are attracted to blood, but only if they have a large amount of blood. No one would be foolish enough to use such a stupid method.

As soon as the hemostatic powder was opened, Li Xi saw Lin Mumu's wound slowly healing. Although the speed was not fast, it was not a normal phenomenon.

Lin Mumu was deliberately showing it to her, raising an eyebrow and asking, "So, what did you think of?"

"No." Li Xi put the hemostatic powder back in its packaging and walked forward without looking back.

"The renowned owner of Changjinshan Herbal Medicine Hall, wouldn't he know?"

Li Xi stopped in his tracks, but turned his back to Lin Mumu, not daring to turn around.

Lin Mumu walked slowly over, each step making a crisp sound as she stepped on the withered leaves.

"I am the Wood Spirit Core. I thought you should have guessed it long ago."

Li Xi's voice trembled slightly: "What good will it do me if I guess it? What benefit will it bring me?"

Lin Mumu curled her lips: "You're right, it won't do you any good."

Li Xi raised his eyes to meet her gaze: "If you truly possess the Wood Spirit Core, you should have done everything in your power to keep this secret, lest others covet it. Why are you so blatantly telling me this now? What exactly are you trying to achieve?"

Lin Mumu smiled at him, then slowly leaned close to her ear and whispered, "Because people who know too many secrets often don't live long."

Li Xi suddenly took half a step back, and said in a panic, "You want to kill me?"

"Don't forget! We're all in the same boat now. With me on our side, we'll have a better chance of defeating Zhao Yi!"

"Of course I know," Lin Mumu said calmly. "So it was just a joke with Hall Master Li, don't take it seriously."

Lin Mumu turned around and continued walking forward, ignoring the people behind her.

Li Xi's chest heaved violently. She didn't believe Lin Mumu would let her off so easily. But what was done was done, and she had no choice but to grit her teeth and move on.

—

Fifteen minutes later, Bai Qianfan and the others finally saw a glimmer of light. They quickly pulled Meng Yufeng over and pointed ahead, saying, "Look, isn't that the exit?"

Meng Yufeng exclaimed excitedly, "It seems so! Let's get out of here quickly!"

The exit looks close, but it's actually quite a distance to walk there.

Halfway there, Bai Qianfan suddenly noticed someone coming from behind him. He stopped to look and saw Chu Jianshan.

"Alright," Bai Qianfan rolled up his sleeves, ready for another round: "We just killed one, and now another imposter appears, huh?"

"Take this sword!"

Fang Lan swiftly lunged at Chu Jianshan with lightning speed, but was unexpectedly bounced back by a powerful spiritual force, landing diagonally at Bai Qianfan's feet.

Bai Qianfan stared wide-eyed as his sword flew back, and he roughly understood what was going on. Mianling wouldn't have such powerful spiritual energy; he had encountered the true form.

"Hehe..." Bai Qianfan fawned over him, but Cheng Yuan grabbed him by the back of the neck and pulled him away.

Bai Qianfan forced a smile and explained, "Um... I didn't see it clearly, I'm sorry!"

"Oh, I see," Chu Jianshan said, feigning sudden realization. "I thought you'd been annoyed with me for a long time."

Bai Qianfan nodded: "That's true."

Chu Jianshan kicked him in the shin with considerable force, so hard that Bai Qianfan couldn't even scream and could only grimace and clutch his leg.

Seeing Meng Yufeng and Dong Qi approaching, Chu Jianshan became curious and took the opportunity to ask, "How did you recognize them?"

“Oh, is that so?” Bai Qianfan blurted out, “I just asked him, Dong Qi has a… ugh!!”

Meng Yufeng kicked him in the other calf.

Chu Jianshan clicked his tongue twice and shook his head; even he felt a little pain just looking at it.

"You guys..." Bai Qianfan gritted his teeth, clutching his leg as he slowly squatted down.

Cheng Yuan asked, "Lin Mumu and Li Xi haven't arrived yet?"

"Here I am," Lin Mumu walked over from the other side, "Sorry to keep everyone waiting."

Chu Jianshan looked at her, nodded, and said, "Now that everyone's here, let's go out quickly."

The group followed him toward the exit.

"Wait...wait!" Bai Qianfan staggered after him, "How do you know they're the real ones?"

Chu Jianshan said, "No proof is needed."

You can tell from their expressions that Mianling wouldn't be able to portray human emotions so vividly.

"Why?!" Bai Qianfan was still unwilling to give up and tried to get closer, but Cheng Yuan blocked her way by stepping to the side.

Bai Qianfan rolled her eyes at him and muttered, "Stingy!"

This is especially true for men in love!

The group gradually reached the exit, and the moment they left the dense forest, they were shocked by the scene before them.

From a distance, it looks like a barren mountain, almost devoid of any vegetation, but upon closer inspection, one discovers that it is a mountain of corpses piled up with countless bodies.

Animals and humans alike, countless corpses lay piled upon each other, emitting a stench of decay, while crows cackled and circled low overhead.

"This..." Bai Qianfan was shocked: "Are you sure the Spirit Butterfly led us the right way?"

Meng Yufeng then remembered: "Oh right, where's the Spirit Butterfly?"

"Here."

Chu Jianshan raised his hand and caught the belatedly arriving spirit butterfly.

The butterfly's antennae trembled, then it flew back towards the mountain of corpses.

Chu Jianshan ordered, "Follow them."

Bai Qianfan: "You're really going?!"

"Hey! Wait for me!"

The fairy butterfly stopped in front of a cave entrance, unwilling to fly any further, as if something powerful had intimidated it.

The cave entrance was narrow, and the path led downwards. It was pitch black inside, and you couldn't see anything. You could only hear the echo of water dripping on the rocks; it was completely empty.

Chu Jianshan took a tinderbox, blew on it, and threw it into the cave entrance. After a while, the fire did not go out, so the group lined up to go in, with Bai Qianfan leading the way.

It wasn't that Bai Qianfan was particularly brave; it was simply because the cave was too small to easily use his spiritual power and could easily injure others. Bai Qianfan, on the other hand, had the most equipment, so if he encountered an emergency, he could at least escape.

Chu Jianshan followed the timid person in front of him, inching forward step by step. He couldn't help but sigh and said, "Bai Qianfan, are you sure you can do this?"

Bai Qianfan wanted nothing more than to turn around and spit on him: "When I said no, you didn't take back your decision!"

The light from the tinderbox was too dim, and there were too many loose stones underfoot, so he could only proceed cautiously step by step, slowly moving forward. He struggled for a long time before finally making it a few dozen meters, only to find that there was someone behind him who didn't know what was good for him.

Chu Jianshan was thinking of just tripping him up and making him roll down.

Suddenly turning his head, he saw something on the wall that seemed to reflect light slightly in the firelight.

"Bai Qianfan, wait!" He grabbed Bai Qianfan by the collar.

"What's wrong? What's wrong!" Bai Qianfan was startled and looked around to see if there was anything suspicious.

"You scared me to death! What is this?" Bai Qianfan leaned closer but didn't see anything on the wall.

However, he seemed to smell something.

"Chu Jianshan, don't you think it smells a little good?"

Chu Jianshan nodded: "I can smell it too."

He reached out to the wall, scooped out a little powder, and rubbed it repeatedly with his fingertips, but he still couldn't recognize what it was.

"Master," Cheng Yuan called out to him.

Just as Chu Jianshan looked over, Cheng Yuan grabbed his finger and gently wiped away the powder that had been applied.

"It's best not to touch anything here. If you really can't, let me handle it."

Bai Qianfan, who had just covered his hand in powder: "..."

Chu Jianshan smiled and said, "It's alright, this thing doesn't seem to be highly poisonous."

Bai Qianfan said, "It's not highly poisonous, it might be a mild hallucinogenic poison. I just don't know why they would put this on the wall. If they wanted to kill visitors, wouldn't it be better to just set up some traps?"

Lin Mumu said from behind, "I have a Mind-Clearing Pill here, infused with my spiritual power. Even if it's poisonous, it can temporarily relieve the suppression."

"Really!" Meng Yufeng was overjoyed: "Quickly, give me two."

"Hey! Don't be greedy," Bai Qianfan said, "One for each person is already tight enough, do you want two?"

"What are you thinking about?" Meng Yufeng rolled her eyes at him. "I'll give one to Aqi."

Bai Qianfan opened his mouth as if to speak, but the story of the buttocks and moles inexplicably surfaced in his mind again, so he reluctantly shut his mouth and continued forward with the torch in hand.

Although the path was long, it had no forks and wound its way to the center of a huge stone chamber.

There was a water trough along the wall. It had no source, yet it flowed and swirled around the circular stone chamber. It wasn't running water, but it was crystal clear.

Unlike the narrow path they had followed, the gates here were grand and imposing, all looking exactly alike, and were distributed around the stone chamber, making it difficult to tell which gate to take.

"One, two, three, four..." Meng Yufeng, having nothing better to do, counted the doors and exclaimed in shock, "Eight doors!! How are we supposed to get through?"

The number "eight" successfully caught Bai Qianfan's attention. People who are proficient in formations usually have some knowledge of the Eight Trigrams and the Book of Changes, and the arrangement here is also very typical. Obviously, it is meant to help them find a way out.

"What do you mean?" Chu Jianshan slowly walked towards Bai Qianfan, knowing in his heart that he should know about this.

Bai Qianfan sighed: "The order of the eight gates is fixed. In the earthly branch, starting from Kan Palace and ending at Qian Palace, they are Rest Gate, Life Gate, Injury Gate, Block Gate, View Gate, Death Gate, Shock Gate, and Open Gate. Life Gate is easy to find, but unfortunately, we are in the cave now, and we can't tell the direction at all."

Just when they were at their wits' end, a small, puzzled voice suddenly came from the corner.

Chu Jianshan looked over and saw Dong Qi squatting there, her fingers touching the flowing water in the sink.

"What's wrong?" Meng Yufeng walked over.

Dong Qi looked at him, her brows furrowing slightly: "Why isn't this water cold?"

Given the current season, it's a good thing the river isn't frozen; how could it not be cold?

Chu Jianshan strode over, wanting to reach out and try, but Cheng Yuan grabbed his wrist.

"Master, I'll do it."

Chu Jianshan nodded, and Cheng Yuan then lightly touched his hand with his fingertips, carefully feeling it.

Chu Jianshan asked, "How is it?"

Cheng Yuan shook his head.

Chu Jianshan asked in confusion, "It's the dead of winter, and it's not a hot spring, so how could the water not be cold?"

“It’s not that it wasn’t cold,” Cheng Yuan said, “but that you couldn’t feel the water at all.”

Chu Jianshan was shocked. There was no water here at all, so how could they have seen it?

Li Xi walked over and said, "It must be the hallucinogenic effect of the powder we just took. The eyes are the easiest to be deceived, so we could see the water. It's just a pity that we took the Qingxin Pill and weren't completely poisoned yet, so we still retained our sense of touch and couldn't touch the water."

Bai Qianfan was furious: "The Eight Trigrams Formation plus the Illusion Poison, they're trying to make us mistake the Gate of Death for the Gate of Life! Who could be so vicious! Even if all eight generations of their ancestors died, they wouldn't have come up with such a despicable trick!"

Fortunately, we weren't seriously poisoned.

Chu Jianshan looked at Bai Qianfan and asked, "Is there any way now?"

"Yes, there is, but..." he hesitated for a moment, "we have to take a gamble."

Meng Yufeng asked, "What method? You're not going to make us try them one by one, are you?"

Bai Qianfan smiled bitterly: "...It's pretty much the same."

Meng Yufeng was so angry he wanted to hit someone, and roared, "If you want to try, try it yourself! I'm not going!"

"Hey, don't get excited," Bai Qianfan comforted him. "There's a seven out of eight chance that as long as we don't reach the death gate, we can still come out alive. And once we get out, I can deduce which gate it is based on what's inside, and then find the life gate."

Meng Yufeng felt a chill and asked, "What if we reach the gate of death?"

Bai Qianfan instantly wiped the smile off his face: "He's doomed."

Meng Yufeng went over it again: "In other words, if you go through the Death Gate, you're guaranteed to die, but even if you don't go through the Death Gate, you might not be able to come out alive?"

Bai Qianfan looked at him and slowly nodded.