115: Chapter 115 Her key is also a target

A hornet's nest.

No, it was even more absurd than a hornet's nest. He had directly poked a mechanical hive that had been sleeping for ten thousand years. Furthermore, the "worker bees" in this hive were each three zhang tall, and a single punch could pound a Golden Core Stage Cultivator into a meat patty.

The dark red light, like a living creature, spread wildly along the patterns on the ground. Wherever it passed, those chisel marks that had been dormant for untold years lit up one after another, like some ancient and lethal contagion, infecting every inch of the hall's floor within a few breaths.

In that instant, Shen Xiao's Silver Pattern perception captured a fact that made his back run cold...

These patterns were not decorations.

They were nerves.

The entire hall was a massive "living body" composed of rock and metal.

And those Puppets were merely the "limbs" extending from this living body.

His strike just now was like scratching an itch for a sleeping behemoth.

Then, the behemoth woke up.

"Creak... Creak... Creak..."

Dense, teeth-gritting sounds of metal friction erupted simultaneously from all directions.

Those Puppets that had originally hung their heads, as if in mourning, now all raised their heads in unison.

More than thirty pairs of dark red light points, like will-o'-the-wisps igniting in the darkness, were cold, hollow, yet carried a bone-chilling "focus."

They were "looking."

Not looking at Shen Xiao.

But looking at her.

"Their target is her! The Void is a beacon!"

The Light Cocoon's intent exploded in Shen Xiao's and Xia Lengbai's minds like an alarm.

The images transmitted by the intent were fragmented, yet enough for Shen Xiao to instantly understand what had happened...

In the eyes of these ancient machines, that "memory void" in Xia Lengbai's chest, left behind after being plundered by Shen Xiao, was like a lighthouse in the dark night, a cheat process in a game, or an illegal account in a banking System.

Their "rules" were simple: detect vulnerabilities, clear vulnerabilities.

And Xia Lengbai was the carrier of that vulnerability.

"Thump!"

The first Puppet took a step.

Its three-zhang-tall metal body carried the momentum to shake the earth with every step.

The metal sole, covered in ten thousand years of dust, stepped onto the ground, kicking up a visible wave of dust and emitting a dull, drum-like boom.

Following that, the second, the third...

"Thump! Thump! Thump! Thump!"

All the Puppets moved at once.

Their movements were surprisingly uniform, like thirty-plus fingers controlled by the same central nervous System, all clenching into fists simultaneously, slowly closing in on the same direction—the location where Xia Lengbai stood.

The roar of metal soles striking the ground merged into one, like a military parade that was ten thousand years late, except the "soldiers" being reviewed were currently locking their dark red light points onto a frail, pale-faced girl.

Xia Lengbai stood behind Shen Xiao, her left hand still covering her chest.

Her fingertips were trembling slightly, but her eyes were surprisingly calm.

Not the calmness of resignation.

But a kind of... calmness born from being pushed to the brink and deciding to go all in.

"Shen Xiao."

She spoke, her voice very soft, yet it was incredibly clear amidst the roar of the closing Puppets.

"You said that the 'gift' I gave you is always useful."

Shen Xiao did not turn back to look at her.

His Silver Pattern perception was scanning the entire hall at a frantic speed, trying to find the key nodes in those pattern networks, trying to calculate the shortest time for the Puppets to close in, and trying to construct a path in his mind... a path to reach that half-hidden stone door on the opposite side alive.

"Now it's my turn. The 'gift' you gave me should also come in handy."

Shen Xiao's Silver Pattern perception suddenly stalled.

He understood.

"Lure them into moving."

Shen Xiao spoke, his voice low, carrying an unquestionable decisiveness.

The Silver Patterns surged wildly within his body, no longer the cautious probing of before, but transforming into countless sharp silver threads, like an invisible scalpel, stabbing fiercely into the pattern network on the ground beneath his feet!

He did not attack the actual bodies of the Puppets that were closing in.

That was useless.

These Puppets were one with the entire hall; hitting them was like cutting off one's own fingers—painful, yes, but not fatal, and it would instead enrage the entire "machine body."

What he needed to do was disrupt.

The Silver Pattern threads pierced the nodes of the ground patterns, frantically outputting those irregular, chaotic pulse signals, just like splashing a basin of water onto the motherboard of a precision computer.

Hum...

The dark red light on the ground experienced a momentary disorder.

The Puppets that were closing in experienced a momentary stagnation in their steps, as if the instructions transmitted from the "central nervous System" had been interfered with.

That single instant was enough.

"Use your 'Void' and aim it at that door!" Shen Xiao shouted, pointing his finger toward the opposite side of the hall, at that half-hidden stone door covered in cobweb-like cracks.

Xia Lengbai did not hesitate.

She took a deep breath and abruptly withdrew the Tomb Guardian Seal's partial containment of the "Void" in her chest.

The ice-blue radiance still circled that emptiness, but it no longer attempted to "cover" it; instead, it transformed into some kind of... conductor.

A conductor that violently broadcast the information of the "Void's" existence outward.

Xia Lengbai raised her head, her gaze locked firmly onto that stone door.

The radiance of the Tomb Guardian Seal gathered in her palm, then, like a beam of light, shot straight toward the stone door.

The beam carried the aura of that "Void."

The "invalidity" judged by the Heavenly Dao rules.

The "vulnerability" left behind after being forcibly plundered.

The "illegal entry" in the eyes of the ancient defense System.

This beam was like a hacker holding a megaphone at the entrance of a banking System, shouting at the top of their lungs:

"Hey! I'm here! Come and catch me!"

The effect was immediate.

The brightness of all the Puppets' dark red light points surged in that instant, like lanterns being lit.

They all turned toward the stone door in unison.

Their movements were terrifyingly uniform.

The next moment.

"Thump-thump-thump-thump-thump!"

More than thirty Puppets, taking heavy, resolute steps, advanced toward the stone door.

They no longer paid attention to Shen Xiao, no longer paid attention to the Light Cocoon, and even abandoned the previous "encirclement" strategy; all firepower and all attention were concentrated on the source of the beam that carried the aura of the "Void."

As if something hidden behind that door made them so terrified that they had to mobilize their entire nest.

"Go!"

Shen Xiao grabbed Xia Lengbai's arm, and the Silver Patterns beneath his feet erupted violently!

In his Dantian, those Silver Pattern areas, already riddled with holes, were now burning at a speed bordering on self-destruction.

A tearing pain came from his Meridians, but Shen Xiao couldn't care about that.

Their figures were like a silver bolt of lightning, frantically weaving through the narrow gaps that appeared in the Puppet cluster due to their "unified turn"!

On the left, a Puppet's massive metal fist whistled past Shen Xiao's back, the air current from the punch making his clothes snap violently.

On the right, another Puppet subconsciously swung its arm in a horizontal sweep; Shen Xiao's Silver Patterns instantly distorted the gear rotation at the joints of that arm, causing the lethal strike to veer off by half a chi.

"Boom!"

The massive metal fist smashed into the ground less than a chi away from them; debris flew, and the shockwave made them both stumble.

Shen Xiao gritted his teeth, his Silver Patterns outputting frantically, pouring all the power he could muster into his legs.

His speed had reached its limit.

No, it had exceeded the limit.

His Meridians were burning, his Dantian was wailing, but he could not stop.

To stop was to die.

Thirty zhang.

Twenty zhang.

Ten zhang.

The stone door, they had arrived.

Shen Xiao slammed his palm against the half-hidden stone door.

"Bang!"

A dull sound echoed in the darkness.

The door did not budge.

"Damn it..."

Shen Xiao cursed under his breath, his Silver Pattern perception instantly probing inside the door; the information fed back made his heart sink: there was some extremely complex locking mechanism behind the door, and pure brute force could not break it at all.

"Let me."

Xia Lengbai's voice came from behind.

She let go of Shen Xiao's hand, stumbled forward a step, and pressed her left palm against the crack of the stone door.

The stabbing pain in her chest had become so intense it almost made her unable to breathe, but her eyes were increasingly cold and resolute.

The radiance of the Tomb Guardian Seal surged from her palm, no longer pure.

That ice-blue light was mixed with a trace of gray, as if it had been polluted.

That was the aura of the "Void."

The vulnerability of the Heavenly Dao rules.

The reverberations of a supporting character.

The blankness after being plundered.

These "illegal" auras, like venom, followed Xia Lengbai's palm, seeping deep into the crack of the stone door, spreading along the patterns inside the door.

Inside the stone door, a dull sound of mechanical gears turning could be heard.

Ancient gears meshed, and the sealed mechanism was forcibly activated.

The door slowly opened inward, creating a gap only wide enough for one person to pass through sideways.

Behind the gap was an even deeper darkness that seemed capable of devouring all light.

"Quick!" Shen Xiao whispered sharply.

He grabbed Xia Lengbai's waist, and they squeezed sideways through the narrow gap.

Just as their figures were about to disappear behind the door.

"Boom!!!"

A Puppet's massive metal palm slammed heavily against the edge of the stone door!

The stone door, thick enough to withstand a full-force blow from a Golden Core Stage Cultivator, groaned under the unbearable weight of that terrifying force.

The rock at the edge of the doorframe instantly shattered, and countless shards of stone flew like a rainstorm!

Shen Xiao felt a scorching wave of air strike from behind; debris grazed his back, leaving several stinging wounds.

But he did not look back.

They stumbled into the darkness behind the door, and behind them, the stone door slowly closed under inertia, sealing off those dark red light points, those cold metal behemoths, and those frantic mechanical roars.

Darkness.

Absolute darkness.

Shen Xiao knelt on one knee, gasping for air, but his Silver Pattern perception spread out to the surroundings at the very first moment.

The moment the tactile feedback returned, his pupils suddenly constricted.

This was not a passageway.

Not a corridor.

This... was a spherical space.