193: Chapter 193 Crisis

Lin Qing looked up and saw that the path he had come from was indeed gone; at the end of his line of sight stood a stone wall that had appeared out of nowhere.

Facing a life-or-death crisis, people were constantly shouting or screaming, and the passageway was extremely noisy.

Furthermore, since everyone's five senses had been weakened, even when those in the back shouted that there was no way out, those in the front could not hear them at all and kept pushing backward.

Before, when they were traveling normally, these Cultivators had been afraid of Lin Qing, so no one had dared to come within a three-meter radius of him.

But now, everyone was panic-stricken, and combined with the already dim environment, those returning from the front could not see who was standing in front of them.

Consequently, Lin Qing was jostled and shoved by the crowd, though pushing against him felt the same as pushing against the stone walls on either side.

Lin Qing felt no anger at being shoved, nor did he pay these people any mind, because he could see more than the others.

Not only had a stone wall suddenly appeared behind them, but it was also continuously advancing toward the crowd. However, this in itself was not the biggest issue; as long as they kept moving forward, the crisis was not immediately pressing.

The critical point was that he also saw the walls on both sides moving slowly; they were closing in toward the center. Although the movement was extremely slow at the moment, it could not escape Lin Qing's eyes.

This was a bit frightening, because Lin Qing did not know how long this passageway was, and he had to leave before the walls on both sides closed in completely.

Lin Qing's strength was naturally terrifying, but that was only in comparison to the Cultivators present; even if everyone attacked him at once, he could achieve absolute suppression.

But he was not confident enough to forcibly withstand the mechanisms, especially since these were the mechanisms of the Kunxu Immortal Sect Forbidden Ground.

After sensing the crisis, Lin Qing turned around again, facing the direction of the depths of the passageway. He reached out to push aside the crowd in front of him, lifted his feet, and continued walking deeper into the passageway.

Meanwhile, the rain of arrows from both sides did not stop. Many Cultivators lost their balance because of Lin Qing, and when faced with the incoming arrows, they lost the ability to dodge and were ruthlessly pierced through.

Of course, this group of Cultivators was not entirely incompetent.

Some of them had heard the shouting from behind and knew that the way they had come was already blocked.

Others, like Lin Qing, had squeezed their way out of the crowd from the back.

In any case, Lin Qing was not the only person advancing into the depths of the passageway.

Soon, only those moving in the same direction as him remained by his side, and he once again blended into the middle of the group.

By this time, the group, which had originally consisted of over a hundred people, had plummeted to fewer than fifty.

The rest had either fallen in the rain of arrows or were still pushing toward the entrance of the Forbidden Ground.

Afterward, they walked for a long distance, during which arrows continued to shoot out from the walls on both sides.

Lin Qing would sometimes pause his steps, sometimes tilt his head slightly, or sometimes suddenly shift his body, easily dodging the incoming arrows.

It wasn't until a cup of tea's time later that the group finally walked out of the arrow rain zone. By then, the number of people in the group had decreased by nearly ten, with the total count falling below forty, most of whom were God Realm Cultivators.

As for the nearly one hundred Tier 8 Cultivators, only a dozen or so remained in the same group as Lin Qing, and Lin Qing did not hold high hopes for the situation of those who were still pushing toward the exit.

In other words, the first trap of the Kunxu Immortal Sect Forbidden Ground had nearly wiped out the Tier 8 Cultivators from these super factions.

The atmosphere of the group was very heavy; having experienced the recent life-or-death crisis, everyone was silent.

The passageway was not a straight line; Lin Qing had known this for a long time.

Consequently, the group soon reached the curved section. Fortunately, although there were many curves, there was always only one path, and everyone continued to advance steadily along the passageway.

However, no one noticed that the few people at the very back of the group had disappeared at some point.

The smooth situation did not last long; after passing through more than a dozen curves, the group finally arrived at the first fork in the road.

This was a T-junction; directly in front of everyone was a wall, while the passageway extended to both sides. On the wall directly in front, there was a complex pattern that was circular in its entirety.

Lin Qing's gaze was unnaturally drawn to the pattern on the wall, and then the scene before his eyes suddenly began to change.

...

Beep—!

At a deserted intersection in the city suburbs, a dump truck flashed its blinding headlights and blared its deafening horn as it roared past Lin Qing.

After passing through the intersection, a head poked out from the driver's cab of the dump truck, the mouth opening and closing continuously as if hurling curses.

"Are you tired of living!"

Lin Qing looked up at the traffic light above the intersection and curled his lip.

"It was clearly him who ran the red light!"

Lin Qing did not choose to argue back, because the dump truck had already driven away.

He bent down to pick up the food delivery on the electric scooter's footboard, checked the address on it, placed the delivery back on the footboard, twisted the right handle, and sped off toward the address written on the delivery.

Lin Qing was twenty-five years old this year and was a food delivery driver.

He was also a college graduate and had held a few more formal jobs after graduation, but in the end, he could not escape the fate of wearing the yellow robe.

His home was not in this city; he came from a rural village. However, since the young people in his village were all developing their careers in big cities, he had simply stayed in this city after graduating from college.

His parents were naturally also from the countryside, but they were not in their hometown at the moment; instead, they were working at a construction site in a coastal city.

Like other migrant workers, they generally only returned to their rural hometown once a year for the Lunar New Year.

The next day, Lin Qing did not continue delivering food; instead, he bought a plane ticket and arrived in the coastal city. Come to think of it, this was Lin Qing's first time flying.

Although he had stayed here with his parents for a month during summer vacation in junior high school, he had always taken the bus back then.

As for the city where he worked, it was not far from his hometown, so there was no need to take a plane.

His parents rented a place in the countryside on the outskirts of the coastal city, where there were few buildings and the layout was not complex. Although his memory was a bit hazy, Lin Qing still managed to find the place his parents were renting before dark.

He stood at the doorway and waited for over ten minutes. In the hazy night, two familiar figures came swaying over.

The man had a thin and small build; he was shirtless, wearing rubber-soled shoes, and was holding a bottle of beer in his hand.

He knew that beer; because there was a brewery nearby, it was not expensive—only 1.5 yuan for 600 milliliters. He had run errands to buy it that summer, though he did not know if the price had gone up since then.

The woman was short and stout, holding two yellow safety helmets in her hands, her clothes covered in dust.

The two of them saw someone standing at the door of their house from far away, and before they could see clearly, a familiar voice came from the night.

"Dad, Mom."