Chapter 58
Su Yun was not tired yet, so she waved her hand. She couldn't speak like a ghost underwater, so it was more convenient to use gestures.
Che Xuming also waved his hands. When they didn't need to breathe, their condition was much better than that of normal diving. In addition, the water had buoyancy, so swimming was not that difficult.
In order not to waste breath-holding pills, everyone continued to swim forward. As time went by, the feeling of water squeezing on the body became more and more obvious, causing another feeling of suffocation. It was not that one could not breathe, but the suffocation that the body naturally felt when a person was in a confined space.
Especially Su Yun, she was the first to show this abnormal reaction and was discovered by the ghost bride.
The ghost bride hurried over to support Su Yun: "Director, what's wrong with you?"
When the others heard the sound, they stopped quickly. The cave passage was quite spacious, so they all gathered around.
Su Yun gestured and mouthed that she was having trouble breathing. It was probably because the position here was too low and she was gradually feeling depressed. She had to find an exit as soon as possible. Staying in the water all the time was causing great damage to her body.
In this case, Yan Gui couldn't help but ask: "Director, where are the things?"
Hearing this, Su Yun looked at her and shook her head slightly. She knew that the ghost was asking about where the folding fan and the black and white dragon jade pendant had gone, but she still signaled her not to ask.
Yan Gui thought that Su Yun might have some plan, so he didn't ask any more questions and said to the others, "Let's go quickly. The curator's condition is not good."
When they were back on the road, the ghost bride and the sexy ghost pulled Su Yun along, preventing her from exerting any strength on her own, to prevent her from getting into a worse situation. The human body is too fragile, and sudden changes in the environment will cause unpredictable damage to the body.
After walking forward, they came to a fork in the road and the cook had to stop.
There are three forks in the road, all of the same size and with no apparent difference, as if they lead to different tombs.
The passage was quite spacious, so the cook made way for Lin Lang and Che Xuming. The two of them went over to check the entrance, and then Su Yun was pulled over.
The three forks in the road were bottomless. Even if you put the night pearl in, the visibility was very low. You couldn't see what was inside and couldn't find the mechanism. There was no special place around the cave entrance to provide clues.
Su Yunpiao observed from behind for a while, then raised his hand and pointed at the fork in the road.
"The curator said to choose the one in the middle, so let's go with the one in the middle, shall we?" The cook saw Su Yun's gesture and repeated it immediately.
The others looked at Su Yun, and Su Yun nodded slightly, proving that the cook was not wrong.
There is no way to find out why at the moment, so we can only keep moving forward.
After choosing the middle fork in the road, we walked for about two hours and arrived very smoothly at a spacious place with a little light. We all quickly floated upwards and soon broke through the water - when we reached the surface, everyone felt much more refreshed.
Su Yun was the most uncomfortable one being held underwater. After she surfaced, she immediately observed the surrounding environment.
The place where they came out of the water was an underground river with relatively high platforms on both sides where they could swim over to rest.
Su Yun picked a place at random and went ashore to lie on the ground to rest. After suddenly leaving the water, his whole body felt very heavy. The state of weightlessness made Su Yun almost unable to sit up.
When the others saw Su Yun running ashore, they hurried over too.
Che Xuming used the drying technique to dry his clothes directly on the shore, but it left a odor, so he couldn't help but use the cleaning technique, which made him feel much better.
Seeing that he had used a lot of Taoist magic, Lin Lang quickly used it on Su Yun to prevent her from getting hypothermia by continuing to wear wet clothes.
After her clothes were cleaned, Su Yun finally recovered. She sat up and let out a long breath: "I was almost suffocating down there, but luckily the road is not that long."
"Director Su, how do you know that taking the middle road will lead us to the mausoleum safely?" Che Xuming asked puzzledly, leaning against the wall.
"I don't know. I just felt uncomfortable underground, so I chose a compromise. Besides, considering the purpose of this sacrificial pit, the final result should be similar no matter which path we take." Su Yun answered casually and began to rummage through his Qiankun bag for something to eat to restore his strength.
Che Xuming looked at her speechlessly: "What if you choose a road with no exit?"
Su Yun raised his hand and patted Lin Lang on the shoulder: "We are blessed by God. If we make the wrong choice, let Lin Lang smash a way out of the underground river."
If they made the wrong choice, it would be similar to their previous plan, and Lin Lang would destroy part of the mechanism and force them to go to the underground sacrificial pit.
It's not a last resort. In fact, they shouldn't do this. After all, there are cultural relics underground and any damage is irreversible. None of them wants to do the same as those tomb robbers and destroy national cultural relics.
Originally, they just wanted to ask in the sacrificial pit whether there was any news about the wolf girl. It would be best if they knew. If not, they could just pick up some things in the sacrificial pit like those tourists and go back.
Su Yun had rested enough and stood up to look around.
Just now in the underground river, my vision was limited and I couldn’t see the whole picture clearly. Now that I have climbed onto the river bank, I can see the situation on both sides clearly.
There are huge spaces on both sides of the underground river, with no end in sight. It is like encountering a river in the rainforest on the ground, except that there is no sky above, only rock tops and some eternal lamps.
Su Yun looked up in surprise: "Eternal lamp? Hanging upside down?"
Following Su Yun's exclamation, the others immediately looked up and saw a bronze eternal lamp made in the shape of a fish with a curved hook. The curved hook was directly inserted into the rock wall above their heads, illuminating the main film platform as if it were daytime.
Even Che Xuming, who was leaning against the wall, stood up. He looked around and found that the place where he was leaning against was just a mountain wall that was not easy to break. It was more like a huge pillar than a wall, supporting the mountain from collapsing.
There are many styles of eternal lamps. The most common one is placed in the tomb and held up by a maid buried with the deceased, or stuck into the stone wall. Some tombs choose to have a maid statue holding the lamp, which is covered with phosphorus powder. When the tomb door is opened and air comes out, the eternal lamp will be ignited and reignited.
This name came about because the eternal lamp would light up every time the tomb door was opened.
As for the one used at funerals, it is not much different from this eternal lamp, but it is manually refueled and lit to prevent the light from going out.
If a tomb is filled with eternal lamps, there is only one possibility - to guide the way.
In funeral culture, the eternal lamp was originally used to guide the souls of the dead back home. Later, as tomb robberies occurred frequently, craftsmen made eternal lamps to guide tomb robbers into the mechanism and let them die inside.
Under your feet is the slowly flowing underground river, and above your head is a lamp that is always on every three to five meters. Both sides of the river bank are like mirrors, and every detail is almost the same. If you stare at it for too long, you will feel dizzy, as if someone hit you on the head with a club.
Che Xuming walked to Su Yun's side and said in a deep voice: "Is this similar to the choice we made in the underground river?"
There were three forks in the underground river, and Su Yun directly chose the middle one. He then followed the river to this place. In the middle was still the underground river, but on both sides were two identical platforms. He didn't know how wide or deep they were, nor did he know which way to go to reach the real sacrificial pit.
It seems that the choice has changed from one of three to one of two, but in fact it is still one of three. It just depends on whether they want to take the water route or search from the platforms on both sides.
Su Yun withdrew his gaze from the eternal lamps, raised his hand to cover his dizzy head, and asked Lin Lang: "Lin Lang, do you have a compass? Try to see if the eternal lamps are arranged according to the Five Elements and Eight Diagrams? Master Che, you should also try, those lamps may be a mechanism."
After hearing what Su Yun said, the two of them immediately took out their compasses and prepared to calculate. However, as soon as they took out the compass, the needle on it kept spinning in circles and couldn't stop at all.
After calming down and not feeling so nauseous, Su Yun put down his hand and went to look at the two people, only to be stunned where he was. Everyone was silently looking at the two compasses who looked like they had eaten Xuanmai. The silence was deafening.
"...It seems that the magnetic field is wrong. Master Che, you should think of another way." Su Yun signaled with his eyes frantically.
Che Xuming looked at her silently and put away his compass: "I'll try the Bagua method. I don't need the compass. Hey, I thought I wouldn't have to use this thing for the rest of my life after graduation."
Su Yun nodded: "I understand, I don't want to leave either."
None of the students wanted to go to school, and the two of them immediately developed a sense of mutual understanding.
Just when Che Xuming was about to draw a simple Bagua formation on the ground and then walk according to the position of the eternal lamp, Lin Lang stopped the two lazy students who had just started.
Lin Lang drew out his own natal sword: "Wait, is there something wrong with this light?"
Once they heard something was wrong, everyone couldn't help but look up. At this time, the eternal lamp above their heads seemed to have not changed at all, and there was nothing special about it.
"What's wrong?" Che Xuming stared at a lamp for a long time, but couldn't figure out what was wrong. Isn't it just a glowing light?
Su Yun used his fingers to block his scattered vision and stared at the nearest eternal lamp, narrowing his eyes slightly: "Second Master, light one down."
As soon as he finished speaking, the fire-making master threw out three silver needles, which accurately hit the curved hook of an eternal lamp. The silver needles and bronze rubbed against each other and sparks appeared. The three silver needles hit the right position and the curved hook was broken directly.
The fire-making master was about to reach out to catch it when he suddenly opened his eyes wide, grabbed Su Yun by the back of the collar and dragged him back. The others saw it and reacted quickly to avoid the place where the eternal lamp fell.
Bang——
The fish-shaped eternal lamp fell to the ground and exploded directly, with light spots scattering everywhere. It was not an oil lamp at all, but a glowing insect!
The insects were frightened and fled away, some even charged at people. Some of them ran into the underground river in a daze, were soaked in water, and became dark again, which was very strange.
Su Yun was not afraid of insects. When several insects ran in front of him, he stepped on one with his foot. After careful observation, he found that it was a centipede. It had so many legs that he couldn't count them at once. However, compared with the common black centipedes, the centipedes in this sacrificial pit were transparent. They only sparkled because their bodies were covered with something. Many centipedes gathered together looked like lights.
The fire-making master picked one up with a long silver needle, and after checking it, he said, "They seem to be covered with some heavy metal minerals. They can glow, but they are poisonous."
As soon as these words were spoken, everyone who was stepping on the centipedes on the ground instantly ran several meters away and killed the insects remotely.
Only Su Yun did not run away. She kicked the centipedes away and said, "There are so many centipedes here. Even if you kill these, there are still some above your head. If you stay here for too long, you will still get heavy metal poisoning. Moreover, they will obviously go into the underground river to move around and look for food. In other words, this underground river is extremely poisonous."
Now everyone has been separated by these running centipedes. Che Xuming, who is far away, even has to shout to speak. He said, "It's so poisonous! What should we do? Do we still have a direction?"
Su Yun tilted his head to look at the fire-making master who was still beside him and asked, "Second Master, what do you think?"
The fire-making master threw away the centipede on the silver needle and sighed: "Director, I'm not saying anything sarcastic, but I think that as a sacrificial pit, these methods are normal. As we go forward, the methods of killing will only become more numerous, faster, and more covert."
The design craftsmen originally wanted to make it impossible to return. The first level is a fork in the road. If you survive the more than two-hour long underground river and come to the area with centipede lights covered with heavy metals, you will have hallucinations and organ failure due to heavy metal poisoning. Even if you don't move forward, you will die in this place.
Now they have no choice. If they don’t want to die from heavy metal poisoning, they have to keep moving forward, or even move faster.
"What if there is a highly poisonous mechanism ahead?" Su Yun asked worriedly.
"Here, only you, Lin Lang, Master Che and the lily of the valley will be poisoned. Your body is incomplete, so you will be poisoned the first. In my opinion, the curator should complete your body as soon as possible." The fire-making master spoke in a low voice, his tone full of worry.
Su Yun lowered his eyes and thought for a while: "It's okay, it will be all right soon."
There were only a hundred centipedes in the eternal lamp, and some of them had already run away or died. So everyone gathered around Su Yun again, waiting for her to make a decision and see what to do. If she wanted to back out now, no one would blame her.
After standing there and thinking for a while, Su Yun said directly: "Master Che, Lin Lang, let's do it as soon as possible. This is heavy metal poisoning, and there may be other highly toxic devices behind. We can't delay, otherwise once too much toxin accumulates, it will be difficult to get out alive."
Che Xuming put away his playful look and started drawing the Bagua formation directly on the ground. That was the basic skill, but how much one could calculate depended on his own ability. Generally speaking, one had to compare it with a compass, which was more accurate. Without a compass, relying solely on formulas would not necessarily yield the correct result.
Lin Lang stood aside with a sword in hand, guarding against the eternal lights above his head. The centipedes were covered with heavy metal mineral powder, and it would be painful if any one of them fell off.
While the two were calculating the direction, Su Yun was also identifying the direction, and then walked to the underground river. Whether on the ground or underground, the direction of the river is very important, and the water flow generally only conforms to two rules.
It flows eastward to the sea and the water flows to the lower places.
Su Yun squatted down beside the underground river, observing the direction of the water flow, wondering whether it was going east or downward?
If it flows eastward, it would not be in line with the terrain of the dragon vein. According to the map they drew before they came, the dragon is actually facing southwest and northeast, and its eye is in the southwest. If it flows directly eastward, it would be equivalent to flowing out of the dragon vein.
Once the underground river flows out of the dragon vein, it will be difficult to operate the mechanism inside the sacrificial pit. In other words, if the underground river flows out of the dragon vein, it is very close to the exit and there will be a chance to leave.
Therefore, the direction of the underground river water must not be the exit, but must go deeper to lead the sacrifices and tomb robbers to the sacrificial pit.
Going the other way would probably be a dead end as we would only go deeper and deeper. The source of the underground river must be narrow and if we cannot go back, we would naturally die.
Su Yun had a plan in mind. He turned back to look at Lin Lang and the others and asked, "Have you guys figured it out? If it doesn't work, let's try walking along the river."
Lin Lang and Che Xuming didn't reply, they focused on looking at the Bagua formation on the ground. After a while, Che Xuming looked at Su Yun solemnly: "Director Su, this is a big problem, we have no direction."
Hearing this, Su Yun's heart sank, but he didn't show it on his face. He asked directly, "Tell me more about it."
"Lin Lang and I have walked through the Bagua formation. Logically, we should be able to calculate where the exit or entrance is, taking into account the direction and time. But the strange thing is that no matter how we calculate, it is a cycle."
"Loop means there is no result, and you can keep calculating. Another meaning is that you are trapped in a ghost wall. But if it is not a ghost wall, it can also be said to be... a maze." Su Yun recalled the analysis of similar hexagrams and sighed deeply in his heart.
Che Xuming nodded slightly: "Yes, if it is a maze, it is very difficult to find the exit and entrance. It is better to say that from the moment we entered this rain forest, we have already stepped into this huge sacrificial pit."
Isn't the rain forest a huge maze? Everyone who enters here will survive a narrow escape, and all of them can be used as sacrifices, to sacrifice to the rain forest, to sacrifice to the dragon veins, to sacrifice to... the gods buried deep underground.
Su Yun looked at the Bagua formation on the ground for a long time and said, "Let's light another lamp. This time, find a way to catch it and let it fall intact into the underground river, like a small boat. We will follow the centipede."
After hearing this, everyone's eyes lit up. Che Xuming said excitedly, "Yes, we are from outside and are not familiar with this place. The centipede fell into the river and ran so fast just now. Maybe it knows something. Whether we find the exit or the base camp, we will not lose out!"
It would be best if they could find an exit, which would be a way out. Even if they couldn't find it, they could follow the centipedes deeper into the pit. As long as they got close to the sacrificial pit, they might be able to find clues.
In order not to disturb the centipedes in the eternal lantern, it was the ghost bride who went to light the lantern this time. She used red silk thread to weave a net bag, cut the hook of the eternal lantern, and then slowly dropped the lantern onto the river like a puppet.
The eternal lantern looks like a fish. The extended tail of the fish is a curved hook, which can be used to hang up the lantern anywhere. The body of the fish looks like it is cut from the spine, and the teardrop-shaped lantern is filled with glowing centipedes.
When the lantern fell onto the water, the ghost bride retracted her red string. Everyone hurried to the river and stared at the centipede. They saw that the lantern sank a little, but was not completely submerged by the river water. As the river water floated forward, the centipede seemed to realize that it was in the wrong position and crawled around anxiously in the lantern.
At this moment, a sharp sound of breaking through the air came from the other side of the river. A white shadow broke the silence and headed straight for Su Yun's face. Before anyone could react, Su Yun raised his hand and grabbed the white shadow that was brushing against his cheek. The familiar touch made Su Yun raise his eyebrows slightly.
Before others could ask if Su Yun was alright, another fight broke out on the other side of the river, so intense that the surface of the river underground was shaking.
Su Yun slowly put down his hand and saw the familiar white-bone black-faced folding fan in his hand, but the black and white dragon jade pendant was missing. He let out a light sigh.
[End of Part 1]
Su Yun: I, Su Yunyun, will come back!
Considering my health reasons, I plan to divide it into two parts. I will stop here for the first part. I have a fever again and my eyes are red. I can’t stand it.
I will put a pre-collection notice for the second part in my column. After I finish writing Fei Fei, I will go home and ask the master to take a look before I start. I really like this subject and don’t want to finish it casually by cutting the outline. However, this book is indeed too harmful to my body, so according to the suggestion of my gay friend, I will divide it into two parts.
The first part stops before the main plot, and the second part is not expected to be long. There will be free chapters for everyone at that time as separate compensation.
I pray that my mom will find me a reliable master who won't lead me astray QAQ
Well, see you guys in the second part! Remember to add Yunyun to your collection!
Thanks for watching, happy reading.
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