14: Chapter 14 Abandoned Mine Ritual

[ Hero Embryo Can Be Cast ]

Those five words on the furnace wall were like a red-hot nail, driving straight into Lu Jin's eyes.

The heat fissure was still exhaling.

The clusters of grey fire fungus in the cave pulsed in and out, their dark red fiery edges reflecting against the black stone walls, illuminating the entire underground outpost like a half-awakened ancient tomb.

The Transport Team had just dragged back Cheng Fang's remains; blood seeped down through the stone crevices, mixing into the tawan iron sand, and its color was quickly devoured.

Lu Jin stared at that line of text for three breaths, then raised his hand and pressed down.

"Seal the outer cave."

"Move all the black stone rings over."

"Keep the cores of the grey fire fungus."

A bone clacker smashed into the cave, and the rat swarm scattered with a roar.

The Digging Squad turned to the outer layer, narrowing the shallow caves all the way; anything that could collapse was collapsed, and anything that couldn't be was buried with false layers.

The Transport Team dragged the black stone rings dismantled from the well walls toward the heat fissure, their front paws treading on the ground and kicking up a layer of fine tawan iron sand.

The Ambush Squad crouched down along the dark fissures layer by layer, their crimson eyes fixed on every approach, their ferocity suppressed low, like blades hidden in the ash.

Lu Jin crouched down, pressing his fingers onto the grey, glossy glazed shell beside the heat fissure.

Hot.

Hotter than when he first entered the Abandoned Zone.

This thermal vein was constantly rising, as if there were a Fire Well underground, slowly pushing open a shell that had been sealed for many years.

The black fragment was also heating up through his clothes.

The wanji ember furnace hummed slowly, as if starving.

Lu Jin did not rush to open the furnace.

Casting a Hero Embryo was not like the spontaneous battle blessing from before.

If that mouthful of black fire wasn't fed enough, the embryo wouldn't form, and the pollution would emerge first.

By then, whatever crawled out of the underground cave might not even recognize him.

New words emerged on the furnace wall.

[ Medium-sized Offering Condition Verification In Progress... ]

[ Sacrificial Ground: Available ]

[ Tinder: Available ]

[ Life Embryo Container: Pending ]

[ Offering Pollution: High ]

[ Current Divine Power: Insufficient ]

The moment the last four characters lit up, the entire cave seemed to dim.

Lu Jin's gaze did not waver.

Insufficient; he had seen that long ago.

The battle at No. 9 Abandoned Well, entering the Unified Exam, opening the cave in the Abandoned Zone, plus the elimination battle just now—the divine power in his Sea of Consciousness was already as thin as the frost on a blade.

If he really forced it, he could hold out for at most half the ritual.

He took out the three blue point tokens he had scavenged from Cheng Fang's waist pouch and weighed them in his palm.

Light.

These things represented points, and also quotas.

Without hesitation, he turned and tossed them into the furnace opening.

Hiss.

As soon as the point tokens entered the furnace, the blue light instantly shattered into a string of tiny star-like specks, melting into the black fire.

The furnace wall gave no evaluation; it just caused the line [ Current Divine Power: Insufficient ] to flicker slightly, its color fading by a shade.

Still not enough.

Lu Jin fished out the remaining faith crystals and pressed them into his palm one by one.

The cold, hard crystals cracked between his fingers, and the fine divine essence pierced into his flesh like ice, only to be forcibly pressed into the altar by him.

The black stone rings around the heat fissure lit up in response, and rings of patterns crawled out along the ground, tracing the tawan iron sand into concentric grey-red patterns.

This place was naturally suited for sacrifice.

It was as if, many years ago, something had done the exact same thing here.

The Transport Team had already dragged the first batch of materials into place.

Cheng Fang's remains were placed on the outermost ring; half of him was charred black, but the human outline could still be discerned.

The tattered fire-starting flag was stuck diagonally into the corpse; the flag surface had been chewed to shreds, yet the red stone was still intermittently emitting fire.

The hard armor of the Armor-Splitting Rock Badger had been dismantled into four pieces and wedged into the four corners.

For the grey fire fungus clusters, only the deepest cores were kept; after peeling away the outer mycelium, the cores resembled dark red hearts wrapped in ash. When they were placed down, the entire stone ground trembled slightly.

The tawan iron sand was then spread into all the ring patterns.

The fine sand flowed along the stone grooves, becoming brighter the more it was spread. In the end, the entire abandoned pit sacrificial ground looked as if it had been lit up by a layer of thin, black-red fire.

The rat swarm slowly quieted down.

They gathered in the outer circle, crouching low, their tails pressed flat against the ground one by one.

The Red-Eyed Rat stood at the very front.

The old wound on its back had turned white, and its face was still stained with unlicked blood, but its eyes were terrifyingly bright.

It stared at the black furnace, and also at Lu Jin, not retreating a single step.

The furnace wall rang again.

[ Life Embryo Container Screening In Progress... ]

[ Screening Complete ]

[ High Compatibility Individual: 1 ]

A wisp of extremely thin black fire reached out from the furnace door, slowly pointing at the Red-Eyed Rat.

The surrounding rat swarm suddenly became chaotic.

A few adult Ambush Rats instinctively moved forward, as if wanting to block, or perhaps wanting to snatch.

Lu Jin raised his hand and pressed down, and the entire nest swarm fell into instant silence.

The Red-Eyed Rat did not retreat.

Instead, it took two steps forward, stepped into the innermost iron sand pattern, and looked up at Lu Jin.

There was no fear in those eyes.

There was fire, there was ferocity, and there was a strange focus, as if it understood that line of text, and as if it had been waiting for this moment for a long time.

Lu Jin looked down at it, and after a moment, reached out and pressed his hand onto its forehead.

It felt very hot.

"If you want to live more decently, get in."

The Red-Eyed Rat's ears twitched slightly, and a very low cry rolled out of its throat.

Like a response.

Lu Jin withdrew his hand, turned, and stood in the center of the sacrificial ground.

"Ignite the furnace."

Boom—

The wanji ember furnace opened completely.

The black fire did not rush upward; instead, like an inflowing tide, it spread out along the heat fissures, tawan iron sand, and black stone rings.

Cheng Fang's corpse was the first to dissolve, his skin and flesh curling into layers of black ash in the fire. The fire-starting flag followed, catching fire, and the fire patterns on the flag twisted and struggled like living things, emitting a string of shrill, ear-piercing cries.

The next moment, the whispers came.

"Stick the flag..."

"Burn in..."

"The points are mine..."

"Don't snatch... don't snatch mine..."

The voices were chaotic and fragmented, like countless mouths speaking right against his ears.

There were human voices, beastly panting, and even older, grinding sounds that didn't sound like they could come from living creatures at all.

The wind in the heat fissure suddenly became chaotic, the grey fire fungus cores all swelled up, and the dark red fiery edges suddenly brightened into a circle, making all the rats' eyes tremble.

A few Gray-tailed Burrowing Rats in the outer circle began to claw at their own faces.

It was as if they had heard something; their front paws clawed their eye sockets until they were bloody, and they let out shrill, broken cries.

Lu Jin spoke coldly: "Look up."

His divine sense pressed down with a roar.

Like a hand, it forcibly pressed the heads of the entire rat swarm toward the sacrificial ground.

"Listen to me."

"Don't listen to the fire."

As the words fell, the chaos was actually suppressed by a notch.

The Red-Eyed Rat stood in the innermost circle, the grey fire illuminating half its face.

It was not dragged away by the whispers; instead, its eyes became brighter and brighter, staring fixedly into the depths of the furnace door.

The black fire began to consume the second layer.

The Armor-Splitting Rock Badger's hard armor crackled as it burned, and the earthy-yellow divine patterns within the armor plates exploded one by one.

The moth sac burst immediately after, and swarms of fire-patterned moth shadows rushed out of the black smoke, circling the sacrificial ground frantically, like a small fire exploding within the cave.

The temperature of the heat fissure rose sharply.

The tawan iron sand was baked red, and wisps of grey-bright droplets began to seep out from the gaps in the black stone rings, as if mineral veins were melting.

Lu Jin's temples throbbed violently.

His divine power was dropping, dropping extremely fast.

The line of text on the furnace wall lit up again.

[ Divine Power Gap Widening ]

[ Pollution Rising ]

[ Life Embryo Stability: 31% ]

Too low.

If the pollution continued to rise, this ritual would collapse directly.

Lu Jin's eyes turned cold; he raised his hand and pressed it onto the edge of the furnace door, the old wound in his palm splitting open anew, and blood surged into it through his fingers.

Useless.

The black fire only brightened for an instant; the stability barely rose to three and a half percent before it started dropping again.

The whispers became heavier.

This time, it wasn't just by his ears; even the stone walls seemed to be speaking.

"Burn it into a dog..."

"Stick the flag, set the fire..."

"It understands; it should live for me..."

Rats in the outer circle began to become restless again.

An Ambush Rat suddenly went mad, turning its head to bite the neck of a companion nearby.

Another Transport Rat was more direct, pouncing on the pile of grey fire fungus cores that hadn't fully entered the furnace, as if it wanted to swallow the entire ritual in one gulp.

Lu Jin's expression turned fierce; he backhanded a press, directly shattering the head of the crazed Ambush Rat.

Blood splattered into the tawan iron sand ring.

The black fire trembled violently.

[ Sacrificial Blood Replenished ]

[ Life Embryo Stability: 38% ]

Lu Jin's breathing deepened.

It worked.

He shifted his gaze, looking directly at the batch of enemy rats and fallen rat corpses in the outer circle that hadn't been buried yet.

"The fallen return to the fire."

As the bone clacker fell, the Transport Team, as if struck by a whip, dragged the remains from the No. 9 Abandoned Well and the two elimination battles just now, sending them into the sacrificial ground in droves.

Dead Gray-tailed Burrowing Rats, mangled fire-dog meat chunks, broken armor, and severed claws were piled into the black fire layer by layer.

The fire grew instantly.

This time, even the heat fissure roared.

The grey fire fungus cores split completely in the fire, spewing out spore-flames thick enough to turn black, which intertwined with the black fire of the wanji ember furnace.

The entire abandoned pit sacrificial ground was illuminated in a highly unstable grey-red, as if it might collapse at any moment, or as if it might come alive at any moment.

The Red-Eyed Rat suddenly moved.

It didn't wait for Lu Jin's order; it stepped directly into the circle of fire at the very center.

One step.

Two steps.

The blood scabs on its fur curled up from the high temperature, but its nose tip didn't even twitch.

When it reached the furnace door, it looked back at Lu Jin.

That look was very brief.

Very deep.

It was like acknowledging a master, and also like asking for a name.

The black fire in Lu Jin's eyes finally sank to the bottom.

"Go."

The Red-Eyed Rat leaped, jumping directly into the furnace chamber.

Boom!

The entire abandoned pit sacrificial ground shook simultaneously.

The black fire surged backward, the heat fissure roared, and the ancient ring patterns on the black stone circles lit up one by one, as if some ritual buried underground for many years had been completely awakened by this leap.

The whispers of the grey fire fungus, the shrill cries of the fire-starting flag, and the lingering resentment of the corpses of the same tier all rushed into the furnace like madmen at this moment.

Lu Jin's Sea of Consciousness felt a sudden, sharp pain.

A strange scene even flashed briefly before his eyes.

Many, many crimson eyes kneeling deep in an underground cave, looking up at a cluster of grey fire.

The scene shattered after flashing for only an instant.

The words on the furnace wall were also jumping wildly.

[ Life Embryo Stability: 52% ]

[ 67% ]

[ 81% ]

[ Pollution Exceeded ]

[ Whispers Intrusion ]

A voice, too muffled to distinguish whether it was male or female, suddenly pressed against Lu Jin's ear and chuckled softly.

"Feed it a little more..."

"Feed it a little more, and it will be able to see deeper places for you..."

Lu Jin's eyes turned abruptly cold, and the black fragment on his chest suddenly became burning hot.

Hum.

A wisp of extremely thin dark red drilled out from the fragment and nailed directly into the center of the furnace door.

All whispers came to an abrupt halt.

The cave was as quiet as a death pit.

Only the fire remained burning.

One breath.

Two breaths.

Three breaths.

The black fire slowly shrank back into the depths of the furnace chamber, and the roar of the heat fissure also subsided bit by bit.

The tawan iron sand ring stopped flowing, and the grey fire fungus cores were left with only a few wisps of dark flames that hadn't been fully extinguished.

Lu Jin stood where he was, his forehead covered in cold sweat, and his palm still dripping blood.

The rat swarm in the outer circle prostrated themselves one by one; even the fiercest Ambush Squad of the Red-Eyed Rat pressed their noses to the ground.

The words on the furnace wall no longer jumped wildly.

They sank down line by line, as if eaten by something deeper inside.

Immediately after, from the innermost part of the furnace chamber, came a very light breath.

As if something had come alive in the ashes.

Lu Jin raised his head.

Deep in the black furnace, a pair of grey eyes slowly opened.