111: Chapter 111 The exit is at the end of the passageway

That cold was different from the malicious cold of the oil-paint swamp outside.

It was purer, more... clean.

It felt like the touch of metal that had been repeatedly wiped clean by time and oblivion.

The faint feedback from the Silver Pattern was mixed with a trace of an extremely faint, nearly dissipating sense of order.

It was not a trap... at least, not the common kind.

"Quick!" Shen Xiao said hoarsely, nudging Xia Lengbai with his shoulder.

Behind them, the shrill whistling of the turbulent energy had begun to weaken; that was not calm, but rather the sound of a more massive entity drawing breath.

Xia Lengbai did not hesitate any longer; dragging Shen Xiao, the two of them practically rolled into that narrow fissure.

Their bodies slammed against the hard, cold rock, the sensation so real it made one want to cry.

The nauseating, soft "intestinal ground" and viscous "oil paint" outside were finally shut out.

At the entrance of the fissure, the grey-black and dark-red light shadows twisted and devoured each other frantically, like an apocalyptic painting being burned by raging fire, but the sound was strangely dampened, leaving only dull, heart-palpitating thuds.

The Light Cocoon followed, floating in; its ice-blue radiance appeared somewhat cramped in the narrow space.

The patterns on its body were much dimmer than before, and the consciousness it transmitted contained only intermittent exhaustion, as if that warning just now had exhausted the strength it had accumulated for a long time.

Shen Xiao lay on the cold rock, gasping for air, every breath pulling at his chest with pain.

The Silver Pattern in his Dantian seemed completely dead, with only the fine, needle-like pain coming from the depths of the mark proving it hadn't completely gone on strike.

He managed to turn his neck, examining this unexpected shelter.

It was deeper than imagined.

It was not a simple fissure, but more like a downward-sloping passageway that had been forcibly "squeezed" out.

The width could barely accommodate one person sideways, and the height was insufficient to stand, requiring one to crawl forward.

What made his heart shudder the most was that the walls of the passageway were no longer the squirming, filthy "oil paint" from outside, but rather dark cyan, rough, primitive rock walls.

The rock walls were covered with extremely fine, yet exceptionally clear... chisel marks.

They were not naturally formed, but traces left by human effort, or perhaps some kind of intelligent creature.

They were extremely ancient, their edges worn smooth, but those trajectories carved into the rock still stubbornly remained.

Xia Lengbai had already half-knelt, her palm pressed tightly against the rock wall on the left.

The clear radiance of the Tomb Guardian Seal flowed out from her palm, like a living stream, carefully seeping into those chisel marks.

"There is something..." she whispered, her voice kept very low in the narrow space, "It's very faint... it's resonating."

The clear radiance spread along the chisel marks, like lighting up a dim, intermittent starlit path.

Those seemingly chaotic carvings, outlined by the light, faintly revealed a certain pattern, a certain... trajectory.

They were not carved randomly; it was more like they were recording, or... guiding?

Shen Xiao forced himself to stay alert, not daring to let the Silver Pattern release on a large scale, only condensing a few sensory threads thinner than hair to touch the rock wall as well.

The sensation fed back was ancient, cold, hard, and... a trace of an extremely faint aura of order that was of the same origin as the clear radiance of Xia Lengbai's Tomb Guardian Seal, yet even more archaic and desolate.

It was like the same piece of music, performed differently in different eras.

More importantly, the direction.

This secret passageway hidden within the walls of the pollution channel was not going straight ahead, but rather carried an extremely subtle curvature, paralleling... circumventing?

It did not delve into the dark core surging with mental waves and Echoes, but instead seemed to be avoiding it, seeking a relatively "clean" path within the thick "pollution layer."

The Light Cocoon hovered beside Xia Lengbai, as quiet as a truly inanimate object.

The ice-blue patterns steadily emitted a faint light, no longer guiding, just silent.

That urgent warning just now seemed to have drained its last remaining vitality.

"Crawl." Shen Xiao spat out a breath of turbid air mixed with blood foam, his voice dry.

Staying near the entrance was definitely not a wise move; those Echoes were temporarily attracted to each other and blocked by the turbulence, but who knew how long that could last?

Xia Lengbai nodded, said nothing more, and crawled toward the depths of the passageway first.

She shrank the radiance of the Tomb Guardian Seal to the smallest range, illuminating only a distance of two or three feet in front of her; the ice-blue halo lit up the chisel marks eroded by time on the rock wall, and also illuminated her pale, sweat-drenched profile.

Shen Xiao followed behind, using his hands and feet, the cold rock sensation coming through his clothes, bringing a sense of reality that was almost luxurious, in stark contrast to the filthy, elastic ground outside.

The passageway was exceptionally quiet, with only the heavy breathing of the two, the rustling sound of clothing rubbing against the rock, and the extremely slight humming emitted by the Light Cocoon as it hovered.

The mental pollution in the air had thinned significantly; at least there were no longer those pervasive whispers and illusions trying to bore into their brains.

After crawling for about half an incense stick of time—Shen Xiao estimated this based on the extremely faint, rhythmic stinging coming from the dead, silent mark of the Silver Pattern—the Xia Lengbai in front suddenly paused.

"We've reached the end." Her voice was even lower, carrying a hint of imperceptible tension.

Shen Xiao poked his head out slightly from her side to get a look.

The trajectory of the chisel marks was interrupted here.

The end of the passageway was not the exit or fork in the road they had expected, but a complete, seamless dark cyan rock wall.

A dead end.

Hope was like a punctured bubble, instantly deflated.

Shen Xiao's heart sank; the stinging of the Silver Pattern mark seemed to have become mocking.

But Xia Lengbai did not pull away immediately.

Her palm was still pressed against that blocked rock wall, the clear radiance of the Tomb Guardian Seal continuously pouring in.

Only then did Shen Xiao notice that the chisel marks had not truly disappeared.

They converged from all directions, finally forming an extremely complex, layered, circular indentation in the very center of the rock wall.

The indentation was heavily worn, many lines blurred, but the core structure was still barely discernible.

At this moment, with the infusion of Xia Lengbai's spiritual power, the center of that indentation was emitting a faint yet steady heat.

It was not an illusion; no matter how weak Shen Xiao's Silver Pattern perception was, he could still capture that abnormal temperature change being vaguely transmitted through the rock and air.

What made his scalp tingle even more was the reaction of the Light Cocoon.

The long-dormant Light Cocoon, in the moment the indentation began to heat up, shuddered violently!

The movement was small, but exceptionally clear in the narrow passageway.

The light of the ice-blue patterns suddenly flickered into chaos for a moment, and then, a complex emotion mixed with trepidation, pain, and... a trace of incredible, needle-sharp "anticipation," pierced Shen Xiao fiercely through that fragile mental connection.

It was afraid, and it was also... longing?

Xia Lengbai also noticed the abnormal movement of the Light Cocoon.

She did not look back, but her palm pressed against the indentation tightened further.

The output of the Tomb Guardian Seal's clear radiance suddenly increased!

Hum...

A vibration, so low it was almost inaudible yet reached straight into the depths of the Soul, came from deep within the rock wall.

The entire passageway, along with the rock beneath them, trembled slightly with it.

The temperature at the center of the indentation was rising rapidly.

A clear burning pain came from Xia Lengbai's palm; her skin felt as if it were about to be scalded by the heat transmitted through the rock.

But her five fingers were like hooks, gripping the edge of the indentation tightly, not pulling away by even a fraction.

The clear radiance poured in recklessly.

Shen Xiao wanted to speak, but his throat was choked by some invisible premonition.

He could only watch helplessly as the center of the circular indentation began to change color, shifting from dark cyan to a kind of... dim dark gold that seemed to have condensed countless years.

The Light Cocoon trembled even more violently, the emotions it transmitted leaving only pure, trembling palpitation.

The indentation burned Xia Lengbai's palm, but she did not let go.