102 Sacrifice Corridor 16 || Ghost Tree

Animals are born with an innate sense of alertness and can perceive changes in their surroundings more keenly than humans.

The crow was completely black, appearing glossy and shiny under the light. It stood on a stone tablet, tilting its head slightly, and looked at the two strangers who suddenly appeared before it with curiosity.

The two men subconsciously kept their distance from the crow, and only slowly approached the stone tablet after confirming that it was just an ordinary crow and not aggressive.

The tilted stone tablet bears traces of time, with countless tiny cracks covering the entire stone, and the words on it have been corroded to the point that only grooves remain.

This crow's eye was different from the others. It had only a single black dot, a tiny pupil about the size of a sesame seed, and the white of its eye almost took up the entire eye socket. Yan Shuang watched the black dot twirl back and forth in its eye socket, turning a few times before settling on her.

But the freeze time was very short. It seemed that after it confirmed who it was waiting for, it seemed to sense something, and the next second it flapped its wings and flew away in a hurry.

Yan Shuang didn't understand why the crow suddenly flew away. It had been waiting here for so long and was clearly not afraid of people, so why did it fly away just because it saw her?

Am I that scary? Even the crows couldn't stand it anymore. Yan Shuang fell silent for a moment and fell into self-doubt.

Jing Ning squatted down and stroked the words on the stone tablet that were difficult to read with the naked eye. His slender white fingers slowly moved along the grooves, and he said, "It's not afraid of you."

Yan Shuang also felt that it was mainly because she looked okay and was not at all ugly, and she couldn't scare away a bird.

If the crow is not afraid of him, then what is it afraid of?

Yan Shuang and Jing Ning fell silent at the same time, stopped what they were doing, and suddenly realized something.

They hadn't seen the monk since they entered for so long. Was it really just luck? They'd only guessed based on the situation at the bottom of the mountain that the monk had been there recently, so whether he'd actually been there was still unknown. Or perhaps the monk had been hiding in the shadows and following them?

Could it be... there was something behind them? The thing that Crow was afraid of was behind him?

That's why they flew away in a hurry.

Yan Shuang guessed it was. Even with his sharp ears, he could only pick up normal, subtle sounds. What if the monk was a ghost? From the moment they sneaked into the temple, the monk had noticed them and hadn't revealed himself until he led them to this place...

Jing Ning also said that the crow was not afraid of him. After the crow flew away, the two of them came to the same conclusion: there was really something behind them, and it was not him who scared the crow away, but the thing behind him.

Yan Shuang tensed her back stiffly and pursed her lips. "Are you turning back now?"

Jing Ning lowered his head, retracted his finger and said, "Back!"

Yan Shuang looked forward with a determined gaze. What he had to do was not only to prepare himself mentally, but also to plan an escape route in his mind. Even though there were weeds all around, he might miss a step if he wasn't careful.

The things behind them did not give the two of them much time to think. Yan Shuang roughly determined the direction and turned around suddenly.

There was nothing behind me except grass and trees.

The sun is the brightest at noon, and its rays shine on the mountain without reservation, exposing everything on the mountain. There is no shadow to hide, and no sound at all. This dead silence makes people feel an inexplicable fear and a chill on their backs.

Yan Shuang stared at the locust tree for a long time. Even the leaves did not move, and it was still in the same state as when he turned around.

The locust tree looks full of vitality, but it also seems eerie and dead.

He thought that a ghost or a monk would appear behind him, or at least something else, but when he turned around he saw only the locust tree, which made him hesitate.

The stillness of the locust tree made it impossible for him to confirm that it was the tree that scared away the crows, but at a glance there was only that locust tree.

Yan Shuang looked at the stone tablet again.

He didn't believe that it was just his own sensitivity. There must be something behind them, but he couldn't be sure what it was. He didn't dare to go forward rashly, so he had to turn his gaze back to where the crow had just stopped.

The crow was only standing at Yan Shuang's waist, and it was impossible for him to see farther than him, so the thing must be around and very close to him.

Yan Shuang looked back again.

There was still nothing behind me except the locust tree.

"There's a folk saying that magpies announce good news, crows announce bad news, and locust trees like shade, so ghosts are bred under them," Jing Ning said.

Hearing Jing Ning's words, Yan Shuang had two guesses. The crow had indeed cried, but the cry wasn't meant to attract them, but rather to warn them of the danger. Sophora trees, which favor shade, must have a strong yin energy. Furthermore, locust trees are large, and the crow's position just now happened to be facing the tree.

So the thing that scared away the crow was either the locust tree behind it or an evil spirit hiding in the locust tree.

After realizing this, whether to look back or not was no longer the point. There was only one road on the mountain, and they had to go down the mountain, so they had to pass by the locust tree behind them.

At this moment, Yan Shuang saw out of the corner of his eye that the branches behind him were growing and slowly moving towards them.

"Oh my god, a thousand-year-old tree with a ten-thousand-year-old spirit." Ye Jing'an exclaimed.

"Then what? Were you two caught?" Zhao Qifan opened his eyes wide and listened attentively.

"Are you treating this as a fairy tale?" Ye Jing'an patted his shoulder.

"Fairy tales are not this scary, otherwise the whole world would be full of violent terrorists now." Lin Haichen took over the conversation.

Yan Shuang held her forehead lightly, sighed, and continued, "No, we ran away."

Seeing the branches getting closer and closer to them, they realized that any hesitation would be disrespectful to their own lives, so they both ran forward.

Yan Shuang had already chosen the route, but the weeds were too tall, greatly hindering their progress.

The branches of the locust tree seem to have taken hormones and are growing endlessly.

Yan Shuang looked back several times and was almost poked in the eyes by tree branches.

"How long the hell will this thing take to run! It's like it's equipped with a locator!" He gasped and couldn't help but swear.

Jing Ning led the way, then turned a corner, took Yan Shuang's hand and fell into the grass beside him, saying hurriedly: "Hold your breath."

Before Yan Shuang's body could react, her brain had already received the command and the gate closed instantly.

The locust tree branch actually stopped, and stopped above the two of them, and they lost their direction for a moment.

The locust tree, without a target, did not stay for long. After a while, it retracted its branches, and the two were temporarily out of danger.

It was not until they were going down the mountain that Yan Shuang saw the tall trees and subconsciously held her breath.

"By the way, how do you know that holding your breath is useful?" Yan Shuang finally asked the question that she didn't have time to ask just now, which was also the question that others wanted to know.

"The locust tree is yin, and ghosts are nourished by yin energy. The most important thing in a living person is yang energy, and breathing is the simplest and most direct way to judge." Jing Ning explained.