374: Chapter 374 Entering the World of Skeletons

[00:00:58]

Su Mingyuan's voice came through the communicator.

"Chen Rong, Lin Wan."

"Here." Both of their voices replied simultaneously.

"One minute," Su Mingyuan said. "We only have one minute. Everyone must pass through within sixty seconds."

The communicator went silent for a moment.

Then Chen Rong spoke up.

"Understood."

"I'll go in first."

He stood before the gate, only two steps away from that white portal.

It was one and a half meters high and less than a meter wide.

He was one meter eighty-two tall, so he had to lower his head slightly to pass through.

[00:00:52]

Chen Rong took a deep breath.

He glanced at Lin Wan beside him.

"Lin Wan, follow me in two seconds."

"Mm."

Then he took that step.

The portal swallowed his figure instantly.

Without a sound, he just disappeared like that.

Lin Wan watched the portal silently, counting the time for the transmission in her heart.

One second.

Two seconds.

She took a deep breath and stepped into the gate as well.

On the other side.

The moment Chen Rong landed, his first reaction was to assume a combat stance—this was his instinct as a Foundation Establishment Cultivator.

Then, his Divine Sense rapidly spread out.

A fragrance wafted through the air.

It was a heavy, dense aroma mixed with the scents of countless medicinal herbs, pressing down on his breath.

But beneath the medicinal fragrance, there was another smell.

A thick, bloody stench.

The ground.

Chen Rong stepped on something.

It wasn't soil, nor was it stone, but partially weathered bone.

He looked down and saw a human skeleton lying beside his feet.

The gray-white bones had a faint layer of golden light attached to them.

One hand of the skeleton reached upward, fingers clenched, holding something gray and nondescript.

Chen Rong took a deep breath.

This was his first time stepping into an Otherworld, and he had immediately encountered such a terrifying scene.

He shook his head, casting aside the agitation in his heart, and then looked around.

He saw that the sky of this world was gray-white.

There was no sun, but a dim, yellowish light seeped evenly from the entire sky, like an eternal dusk.

Bones were everywhere on the ground.

Not just a few scattered pieces, but the kind that covered the entire land.

Large bones were like beams and pillars, half-buried in the soil; small bone fragments were like pebbles, crunching when stepped on.

Some bones were piled into small hills, while others were stuck in the mud like withered tree trunks.

In the distance of this world, there was a massive mountain.

The mountain was very high, and the peak was obscured.

Above the mountainside, palaces were stacked layer upon layer, like a tiered cake.

Each layer emitted a dim, faint light, like a candle flame about to go out.

Chen Rong just watched.

Two seconds later, footsteps came from behind.

The moment Lin Wan landed, she, like Chen Rong, was also somewhat surprised.

"Chen Rong."

"Mm."

"Is it safe?"

"Safe for now," Chen Rong said. "But don't let your guard down. Later, you protect Group Leader Su and the others, and I'll lead the way."

Lin Wan walked to Chen Rong's side.

Her gaze also fell on that mountain in the distance.

She was silent for a long time.

Then she said, "I feel like this world isn't very safe."

Chen Rong turned to look at her.

"How do you know?"

"Just look at these bones," Lin Wan said. "Bones are everywhere here."

Chen Rong nodded and said nothing more.

Su Mingyuan was the third to enter.

He first glanced at Chen Rong and Lin Wan, then spoke into the communicator.

"Tao Zhe."

There was no response from the communicator.

Su Mingyuan paused and tried again.

"Tao Zhe, please answer if you receive this."

Silence.

There was no "no signal" prompt in the communicator, just complete silence—as if the signal had been thoroughly swallowed by something.

Su Mingyuan had no choice but to put away the communicator.

He looked at Chen Rong and Lin Wan.

"Communication has failed."

Both nodded simultaneously; they had obviously tried it when they first arrived.

"Completely disconnected from the Main World?" Lin Wan asked.

"Yes," Su Mingyuan said. "From this second on, we will be isolated and helpless in this world."

He showed no emotion, and neither did Chen Rong or Lin Wan.

Behind them, the portal flickered again.

The fourth person landed.

This person was named Han Li, also an owner of an SSS-grade Root Bone with impressive talent. She possessed a Wood-attribute Spiritual Root and had reached the Realm of a Fifth-rank Great Grandmaster Martial Artist in a short time, equivalent to a Qi Refining Peak Cultivator in the cultivation Realm.

She was naturally interested in vegetation, so she became a student of Sun Liang from the Yaowu World, learning herb cultivation and Alchemy techniques.

After landing, Han Li frowned, immediately sensing that something was wrong with this world.

Then she took a deep breath, twitched her nose twice, and her brows furrowed.

Su Mingyuan watched her, his face showing confusion: "Han Li, did you find anything?"

Han Li shook her head and said uncertainly, "Group Leader, the air composition of this world is abnormal."

Su Mingyuan turned his head: "Where is it abnormal?"

"Besides the thick bloody stench, this world is full of medicinal herb scents, like the aroma of herbs, and there's more than one kind," Han Li said. "But look at this world; it doesn't look like it has any life, including plants, yet there is the scent of herbs, so it's very abnormal."

After saying this, she crouched down, picked up a bit of powder from the soil beside her, and held it under her nose to smell.

Then she licked her fingertip with the tip of her tongue.

After licking it, she froze for a moment.

"What's wrong?" Su Mingyuan asked.

Han Li didn't answer immediately.

She rubbed the remaining powder on her fingertip in her palm, smelled it again, and then looked up.

"This soil has the scent of 'Nine-Origin Herb'," she said.

"What is Nine-Origin Herb?"

"Master mentioned it," Han Li said, referring to Sun Liang. "Nine-Origin Herb is a medicinal material used for Alchemy. It has long been extinct in the Yaowu World, but there is one stored in the Cang City treasury, and Master once showed it to me."

Su Mingyuan was taken aback.

"Nine-Origin Herb?"

Han Li stood up and brushed the dirt off her hands.

"It's the main ingredient for the rejuvenation pill," she said. "Without the Nine-Origin Herb, the rejuvenation pill cannot be refined. The batch of rejuvenation pills used for your father earlier were all stock from Perfected Lord Yushou's Storage Pouch; we couldn't refine a single one ourselves, precisely because we lacked this ingredient."

Su Mingyuan's mind went "buzz."

rejuvenation pill.

That was the Medicinal Pill that caused his father's pancreatic cancer lesion to shrink by 61 percent.

That was the Medicinal Pill that Academician Zhang Chengzhi had bowed to him in the conference room, begging him to let more people use.

That was the Medicinal Pill he had always wanted to mass-produce but had been stuck on due to raw Materials.

"Are you sure?" Su Mingyuan asked.

"I wouldn't mistake this scent," Han Li said. "Master let me smell the dried leaves of the Nine-Origin Herb back then. The scent is very unique—sweet with a hint of bitterness, and bitter with a hint of fishiness; once you've smelled it, you can't forget it. The residual concentration in this soil is very high, which means this herb didn't just grow a few stalks here and there; this was a place where it once grew in large areas."

Su Mingyuan took a deep breath, and a wave of heat surged in his chest.

"Han Li, do you mean—"

He paused to organize his thoughts.

"This world has the Nine-Origin Herb, and the quantity might be huge?"