100: Chapter 100 The Stigmata Marsh is an Honest Man

The maintenance team spread out along both sides of the Seal walkway, each taking out spare rune carving knives and detection boards from their backpacks, and began checking those grayed, dim-lustered Seal runes section by section.

Old Zhou stood on a raised observation deck in the middle of the walkway, holding a purple clay teapot in his hand, his gaze sweeping down from the edge of the walkway across that skeletal swamp.

Xie Feng stood at the very front of the walkway, spreading his spiritual perception to its thinnest, penetrating layer by layer into the edges of the skeletal swamp.

Xie Feng was checking for contamination, looking for any Cthulhu-esque aura within this terrifying anomaly.

As the saying goes, prolonged illness makes one a doctor; Xie Feng's sensitivity to Cthulhu-esque things was absolutely second to none in Jiuzhou. Right now, he was just like the most sensitive detection reagent; as long as a Cthulhu-esque aura appeared, Xie Feng would be able to feel it.

As his spiritual power and magic slowly and cautiously spread out, Xie Feng was surprised to discover the rustic simplicity of the Shituolin Swamp before him.

There was none, not even a bit.

This Shituolin Swamp, from its bones and mire to the humus-filled scent permeating the air, was entirely a pure, native, Jiuzhou-local anomaly without any mixed-in foreign components.

Xie Feng was actually a bit moved; having undergone Transmigration to Jiuzhou for almost two years, it had been a long time since he had encountered a pure-blood native anomaly, and he almost wanted to squat down and pat the largest skeleton at the edge of the swamp, saying to it, "Brother, you're still the cleanest one."

The Shituolin Swamp was indeed attracted by the Cthulhu-esque aura on Xie Feng.

Xie Feng could sense that the uppermost layer of bones in the swamp slightly accelerated its writhing frequency when he approached the edge of the walkway. A few slender finger bones surged up from the depths of the swamp, extending halfway in his direction as if probing, or perhaps sniffing.

But the Seal barrier firmly locked this attraction within the skeletal swamp; the finger bones reached the edge of the Seal barrier only to be bounced back, falling into the pile of bones and getting re-buried by newly surged bone fragments.

Xie Feng stood at the edge of the walkway, the three-petaled firelight in his left eye contracting slightly, suddenly finding this Shituolin Swamp rather cute.

No cognitive pollution, no mark parasitism, no summoning chains, no rolling dice, no dropping forbidden books, no burrowing into people's eye sockets, no snatching heart locations—it just honestly stacked bones on the ground.

How nice.

For however long it had been stacking, it had stayed here for just as many years, suppressed by the Seal for just as many years, and it was still stacking bones.

Compared to Nyarlathotep, that Thousand-Faced God who threw modules all over the world, the Shituolin Swamp was simply like an old yellow ox in the fields, knowing only to keep its head down and work hard.

"Brother Xie! Brother Xie, quick, look! That stone tablet!"

Xu Liujing suddenly patted his shoulder from the side. The force wasn't heavy, but his excitement could be felt right through the robe and soft armor.

Xie Feng followed the direction he pointed, probing his spiritual perception downward.

Not far below the walkway, the skeletal swamp was churning. With a writhing motion even more violent than before, several layers of old bones were pushed aside, and a stone tablet slowly surged up from the depths of the skeleton, pushed to the very surface by the swamp's bone waves.

Several lines of characters were engraved on the surface of the stone tablet, every stroke penetrating deeply into the stone. Having undergone over a hundred years of repeated grinding and friction by the bones, they were still as clear as if they had just been carved yesterday.

"Those are the Dharma principle inscriptions left behind by several great Cultivators and Seal experts back then! When I was a child, I read this record in the case files of the Hall of Archives. It said that when the Shituolin Swamp Seal was first formed, a Seal Great Master left behind a stone tablet at the core of the Seal, inscribed with his ultimate understanding of the nature of anomalies. The case files said this Great Master left no name, and his Dharma principles have yet to be penetrated by anyone to this day—it is one of the major mysteries in the history of Jiuzhou's sealing arts."

The more Xu Liujing spoke, the more excited he became. By the end, he was practically itching to flip down from the walkway to take a closer look. Old Zhou ahead noticed the two people's commotion and also turned around.

Holding his purple clay teapot, he walked to the edge of the walkway and glanced down. The steam in the teapot's spout slanted slightly, and a moment later, he gave a soft acknowledgement.

"That's the tablet. When this old man was young, I also followed the people from the Hall of Archives here to study it a few times. The carvings are extremely deep, and the spiritual power was once extremely strong, but later it dissipated on its own as the Seal operated. It is indeed profound, and no one can solve it."

Xie Feng stared at that tablet for quite a while, then fell silent for a long time—long enough for Xu Liujing to repeatedly press him over and over again from the side.

"Brother Xie, can you discern any clues?"

Xie Feng didn't speak. He really could discern it, and furthermore, he even recognized it.

"Heh, what an idiot of an ancestor."

Engraved strikingly on the stone tablet were two vertical lines of Chinese characters:

"One, two, three, wooden man."

"What's engraved on this tablet is one, two, three, wooden man."

Xu Liujing widened his eyes. "What?!"

Xie Feng closed his eyes with an expression as if he had just eaten shit.

"'One, two, three, wooden man' is the rule of a game. I played it when I was a kid too. One person stands facing away from the others, shouts 'one, two, three, wooden man' and then suddenly turns around. The people behind run forward while his back is turned, and whoever moves when he turns around is out."

Xu Liujing's mouth hung open as he looked down at the stone tablet, then looked at Xie Feng, and then looked back at the stone tablet. The expression on his face transformed from shock to confusion, and from confusion to a blank bewilderment after having the doors to a brand new world opened for him.

Old Zhou stood on the observation deck for a moment, saying nothing. He merely lowered his head to look at his purple clay teapot, then looked at Xie Feng, before bringing the spout of the pot to his lips and taking a sip.

He probably felt that drinking tea was more appropriate than speaking at a time like this.

Xu Liujing, on the other hand, wore a look of utter shock, signaling that he was unwilling to believe such a bleak future—that the Senior he had idolized his entire life from childhood turned out to be a madman who would joke about such matters?!

"Impossible, the word count doesn't match! Didn't you see the inscrutable runes in the lower right corner?!"

"First, kid, those aren't runes; those are characters from my hometown."

"Second, they aren't profound either. This person's handwriting, just like mine, is pretty terrible."

Xie Feng slowly infused magic into the Night Demon's three eyes and gazed over.

In the lower right corner was prominently signed the name Liu Yanqing, followed by a line of small text:

"Junior, how is it? Ain't I awesome?!"

Xie Feng really couldn't take this shitpost-loving Senior Transmigrator anymore; this guy probably lost all his sanity value when he underwent Transmigration, yet happened to be outrageously overpowered.

There was no place in Jiuzhou he hadn't been to, no monster he hadn't provoked, and yet he could always retreat completely unscathed. What on earth was going on with this guy?!

"How is it?! I told you, how could a Great Senior be so unreliable?!"

Xu Liujing was still arguing strongly on grounds of reason.

"Heh... The lower right corner is just the signature and some boasting."

Xu Liujing looked back at Old Zhou. Old Zhou slowly averted his gaze and gave Xie Feng a look.

The general meaning was to leave the kid with some spiritual sustenance.

Xie Feng nodded.

"Actually, I was just talking nonsense earlier."

Unfortunately, Xu Liujing wasn't a fool either; he was only low in cultivation. He looked at the stone tablet, looked at Xie Feng, and then looked at Old Zhou.

The light in Xu Liujing's eyes vanished.

Xie Feng's heart trembled.

It's over, this kid is broken.