Chapter 1011 Inkist Thought

The tunnel was about three meters wide and five meters high, leading deep into the mountain, with no end in sight. Oil bowls were placed in the niches, and bean-like flames burned quietly.

Xiahou Aotian stood at the entrance, sniffed, and said,

"The oxygen content is high, the stench is faint, and the oil lamps are still burning, which means the air circulation system inside the mountain is working normally. There shouldn't be any poisonous gas or anything. We can enter."

He looked back at his teammates:

"Who of you will go in as cannon fodder? I'm a Scholar, responsible for strategizing."

Xiao Yuan suddenly said, "Since it's a city of mechanisms, there must be traps in the tunnel. We need a Sentinel to do on-site reconnaissance."

Everyone looked at Guan Ya. She was the only Sentinel present.

Guan Ya said coldly, "You can just say you want me to lead the way."

Xiao Yuan nodded slightly: "Then I'll have to trouble you."

Guan Ya simply said, "Heh~"

While the two were talking, Xiahou Aotian silently distributed the piston-type earphones to Sun Miaomiao and the others.

[Xiahou Aotian: Will these two women ruin things? I often see characters like this in movies and TV shows, jealous and making trouble at critical moments, sabotaging things. This is an S-level dungeon, and we can't afford to have such brain-dead supporting characters messing around, especially two of them.]

[Zhao Chenghuang: They can become Saints, they can't be mindless. Don't worry so much. But Yuan Shitianzun shouldn't have brought a woman with unclear relations when he brought his girlfriend. It's really unwise.]

[Sun Miaomiao: Yuan Shitianzun, that guy, is very smart when he's smart, and very idiotic when he's idiotic, especially when dealing with emotional issues.]

[Tianxia Guihuo: Probably doesn't have much dating experience. Heh, even if a college student is smart, he's only eaten ten years of meals. He can't do everything perfectly. He's far behind the seasoned veterans.]

[Xiahou Aotian: Although he's not old, he's quite the playboy. Yuan Shitianzun looks like a scumbag, but some girls just fly into the fire like moths. They're really brain-dead.]

[Sun Miaomiao: You're going too far. I don't like Yuan Shitianzun at all. Don't be sarcastic.]

[Zhao Chenghuang: Miaomiao, wait, he's not talking about you.]

Zhang Yuanqing dragged his exhausted body over and stared at their ears, "What are you whispering about behind my back?"

"Nothing!" Everyone took off their earphones and tacitly put them in their pockets.

At this time, Guan Ya, holding a Han-style octagonal bronze sword, strode into the tunnel first.

Fearing she might be in danger, Zhang Yuanqing quickly followed.

"Why is Xiao Yuan so angry today? Did she eat gunpowder?" He said to Guan Ya in a low voice, "Wife, don't be angry with her."

Guan Ya said lightly, "I'm not a Cancer, I won't be love-brained. Don't worry, I won't bother with her. As for you, we'll settle the score after we leave the dungeon." With a cold face, she walked through the gaps between the piles of corpses, occasionally kicking one and pushing another aside. After carefully examining the walls for a few minutes, Guan Ya looked at the team members who had followed in and said, "The dead here all have their backs facing up. They were killed while trying to escape. From the smooth cuts on the bones and the sword marks on the walls, we can judge that the enemy is a swordsman, or swordsmen, plural."

"These people all died at the entrance of the tunnel, which means the stone gate closes as soon as you enter the city of mechanisms. This tunnel is one-way. Either you clear the dungeon or you die."

Everyone frowned, their mood inevitably heavy.

Xiahou Aotian said, "Don't be intimidated by the S-level dungeon. Before we came, I read the papers in the dead family's database. There's an upper limit to the strength of this dungeon. We have level four and level five, but only Yuan Shitianzun is level six. In theory, the danger inside the city of mechanisms is at most Ruler-level, and definitely level one or two. Yuan Shitianzun can handle most of the levels before we encounter any real trouble."

Hearing this, everyone felt a little relieved.

Sun Miaomiao said in a low voice, "That's not right! I just looked at everyone's faces. Everyone except Yuan Shitianzun has a bloody disaster. Yuan Shitianzun is also shrouded in dark clouds, accompanied by blood. This means we could die at any time, and Yuan Shitianzun might be seriously injured or die."

Qian Yu Liang clenched her fists and muttered something in Japanese, as if to cheer herself up.

Princess Yin Yao raised her small loudspeaker, "Don't be careless. Yuan Shitianzun is just a Night Watcher after all, with limited abilities. He can withstand many dangers, but he may not be able to save us."

Zhang Yuanqing led the team forward, with everyone keeping a ten-meter distance from him.

After walking through the dark tunnel for more than ten minutes, Zhang Yuanqing suddenly stopped. Ahead stood two swordsmen wearing straw raincoats and bamboo hats.

They stood like statues facing the crowd, their heads lowered, the brims of their hats obscuring their faces.

"Yin Yao, go test them," Zhang Yuanqing said.

Princess Yin Yao immediately stepped forward and, when she reached Guan Ya, snatched the Han-style octagonal ancient sword from her hand, saying, "Lend me your sword."

She slowly approached the two swordsmen, the "zi" sound of electric current coming from her waist bag. Immediately, a clear singing voice echoed, " braving frost and snow, ten years to forge a sword, let me hold the pass alone, daring to keep ten thousand men from advancing!"

Yin Yao slapped the Mao Wang speaker backhanded, and it immediately shut up.

At this moment, the two bamboo-hatted swordsmen suddenly raised their heads, revealing black iron masks and a pair of red glowing eyes.

"Eyes of Bewitchment," Princess Yin Yao said, and she raised her hand and pressed her brow. With a "clang," she drew her sword, and the sound of several streaks of sword energy slicing through the air echoed shrilly.

Princess Yin Yao slowly raised her bronze sword and spun a sword flower. Ding, ding, dang, dang, sparks flew everywhere.

She swept her sword horizontally, deflecting the attack of one swordsman, and then, crouching low, she slipped silently to the other swordsman, pressing her palms against the swordsman's chest and suddenly exerting force. With a whoosh, both swordsmen flew out.

"Come back!" Zhang Yuanqing looked at his teammates, all of whom were at the peak of level 4, "Who of you wants to go?"

When the rewards are calculated, they are based on each person's contribution. Even if it's S-level, you won't get high experience points if you don't contribute along the way.

As soon as he finished speaking, a fireball shot out at the same time, exploding with a bang. Red Rooster and Tianxia Guihuo took the lead.

Immediately following were the sounds of gunfire, with Sun Miaomiao and Zhao Chenghuang providing remote shooting support. The tunnel was narrow, and it could not accommodate a melee of multiple people.

Seeing this, Guan Ya calmly took out her gun and fired shots. The five of them worked together and quickly took care of one swordsman.

Xiahou Aotian hurriedly stepped forward and removed the annoying straw raincoat and bamboo hat, revealing a badly damaged body. The swordsman's body was assembled from cast iron and wood.

"This is a puppet," Xiahou Aotian pried open the slightly recessed iron plate on the puppet's chest and tsked, "Wonderful, wonderful. The manufacturing process of this puppet is a bit ancient, but it can maintain operation for thousands of years. The wisdom of the ancients is truly amazing. Yuan Shi, collect them. I'll take them back and study them carefully."

In addition to the ancient craftsmanship, the materials on the puppets were also of high value.

Zhang Yuanqing took out Little Red Riding Hood and took away the puppet swordsman, reminding him, "Maintaining it for thousands of years is likely due to the magic bestowed by the Lingjing (Spirit Realm), not how amazing the puppet's craftsmanship is. Besides, is this thing useful to you? You're just a Alchemist, not a Refiner."

Xiahou Aotian raised his handsome face and said disdainfully, "You don't understand. Mechanism arts are a branch of refining arts. You don't need to reach the Ruler stage to learn them. The mechanism arts passed down from ancient times are divided into two major schools: the Mo family and Lu Ban. Lu Ban's mechanism arts later incorporated the curse spells of Spirit Masters and the Yang fire of Night Watchers' spirit talismans, and were called the Art of Suppression by later generations. The Mo family's mechanism arts slowly disappeared into history. When the ancient cultivators became extinct, the Art of Suppression was also lost. A few years ago, the official and Scholar families jointly set up a fund to promote ancient arts, but it eventually failed."

Sun Miaomiao asked with great interest, "Why?"

"Time is one aspect. Any technology relies on accumulation. Mechanism arts have long been lost. Without a teacher to teach, it takes more than ten years to even get started by studying on your own. The history of Lingjing Xingzhe (Spirit Realm Walkers) is only a mere century, and Lingjing families have only been around for nearly fifty years," Xiahou Aotian said with emotion. "On the other hand, mechanism arts are a branch of refining arts. For a Ruler, with the materials and time, wouldn't it be better to directly refine tools? Therefore, mechanism arts have not been promoted. A small number of people in the three major Scholar families who are obsessed with this path are still studying it, and they have indeed created many good things, but it's just too niche."

Tianxia Guihuo thought for a moment and said, "There might be a mechanism art manual here. When the time comes, the manual will belong to you, and you will provide the gang with mechanism weapons."

"As long as you pay, anything is fine." Xiahou Aotian's wallet was always tight.

The group continued forward and encountered "poison arrow" attacks, stone ball attacks, poison smoke attacks, and wraith attacks, overcoming many difficulties with near misses.

Finally, they walked out of the long tunnel and came to a huge stone cave. At the entrance of the stone cave stood a stone tablet with the words "Ming Gui" (Understanding Ghosts) and "Jie Yong" (Frugality) written in red.

The entire stone cave was about sixty square meters, with only one passage: one was the entrance, and the other was the exit facing the crowd.

The floor of the stone cave was a huge Bagua (Eight Trigrams) diagram. At the exit stood a three-meter-tall statue of a blue-faced, fanged demon.

The straight-line distance of a passage was only sixty meters. For everyone, it would take only a short time to cross it.

However, the ground carved with Bagua was covered with corpses and broken bones, indicating the deadly traps within the stone cave.

"What do Ming Gui and Jie Yong mean?" Red Rooster asked.

"Jie Yong means frugality, right? I don't know about Ming Gui," Sun Miaomiao said, looking like she didn't have a good education.

Only Xiahou Aotian, as the most knowledgeable person present, popularized the knowledge: "Ming Gui and Jie Yong are the ideas of the Mo family. Jie Yong means opposing extravagance and waste, saving expenses, and improving productivity. Ming Gui is more controversial, but the most accepted saying is that you should believe in ghosts and gods. Ghosts and gods clearly distinguish between good and evil, so you should have the world in your heart, fear the world, and not do bad things."

Tianxia Guihuo listened silently and examined the situation inside the stone cave. "More people have died here than outside. It's very dangerous. Same as always, use Yin corpses to test the way."

Zhao Chenghuang immediately took out a bronze box and used a spirit servant to control a terracotta warrior to enter the passage of the stone cave. As soon as it stepped into the center of the Bagua diagram, the Yin-Yang fish slowly rotated, and the blue-faced, fanged demon at the exit turned its head and stared at the terracotta warrior with a ghastly gaze.

Dong! Dong!

When the terracotta warrior took its third step, the Yin-Yang fish happened to finish rotating. The next second, the blue-faced, fanged demon shot out two beams of white light from its pupils.

Boom!

The terracotta warrior instantly exploded into pieces, scattering all over the ground.

The shattered stones trembled slightly and quickly gathered together, reforming into a terracotta warrior.

Zhang Yuanqing suddenly said, "Take a step forward!"

Zhao Chenghuang's spirit servant reconnected with the terracotta warrior and manipulated it to enter the Bagua diagram. It took a step, and the Yin-Yang fish in the center rotated again. When it finished rotating, the blue-faced, fanged demon shot out two beams of white light from its ferocious pupils, and the terracotta warrior exploded again.

After it was reformed again, Zhang Yuanqing said, "Retreat." The terracotta warrior retreated, and this time it was not attacked.

At this time, Zhang Yuanqing looked at his Sentinel girlfriend. Guan Ya had already discerned the pattern and said, "As long as something enters the stone cave, it will trigger the attack of the demon statue. You must cross the stone cave and reach the exit before the Yin-Yang fish completes a rotation. It's very difficult."

Red Rooster immediately said, "This is easy. I can just pass through with my Fire element."

"It's not that simple." Guan Ya looked at the broken bones inside the stone cave. The Mo sect was a family of immortals. Since they dared to come, they must have gathered a large number of ancient cultivators. Among these people, wouldn't there be Fire Masters? Dun (teleportation) techniques definitely won't work.

"Yuan Shi, use your spirit servant to try."

Zhang Yuanqing exhaled lightly, and a spirit servant, a slightly fat young man with his abdomen cut open, roared away, flying toward the exit at extreme speed.

The Taiji fish in the center of the Bagua diagram instantly completed a rotation, and the demon statue shot a black beam of light from its eyes, shining on the spirit servant.

The spirit servant let out a sharp, silent scream and disappeared into a cloud of black smoke, quickly dissipating into nothingness.

Zhang Yuanqing frowned.

Guan Ya nodded: "White light is for physical objects, black light is for spiritual entities. The faster the speed, the faster the Yin-Yang fish rotates. Dun techniques won't work either."

She suddenly took out a large-caliber pistol and pulled the trigger at the demon statue. As soon as the bullet left the barrel, the Taiji fish completed a rotation at a speed invisible to the naked eye, and then a flash of white light turned the bullet into dust.

"Anything that passes through the stone cave, no matter what it is, will be subject to a devastating attack," Guan Ya said, shaking her head.

"The attack intensity can directly kill level five. My terracotta warrior has good defense. Even level four Saints can't easily break it," Zhao Chenghuang said in a deep voice.

Red Rooster widened his eyes, "What do we do now?"

"Not necessarily," Tianxia Guihuo turned his head and said, "Look at the distribution of the skeletons. Several corpses approached the exit, which means they withstood the demon's attack several times and were one step away from success. How did they succeed?"

Sun Miaomiao's heart stirred: "Human wave tactics."

Tianxia Guihuo nodded: "That's right. Use Yin corpses and terracotta warriors as cannon fodder and we rush through."

He thought for a moment and said, "Zhao Chenghuang's terracotta warriors have 'self-healing' ability. Don't use Yin corpses yet."

With that said, he looked at Zhao Chenghuang.

The latter understood and extended black lines from his spirit servant's fingertips, probing into the bronze box.

One by one, black terracotta warriors emerged, twelve in total.

These terracotta warriors were all remodeled from the terracotta warriors in the underground palace.

Although Zhao Chenghuang didn't have so many Yin corpses, his terracotta warriors were stronger than ordinary level 4 Yin corpses.

"Dong, dong, dong..."

The twelve terracotta warriors marched into the stone cave in an orderly manner.

The Taiji fish rotated frantically, and beams of light shot out from the eyeballs of the demon statue, as fast as lasers.

Tianxia Guihuo pinched a fireball and threw it out with all his might.

Sun Miaomiao then performed Star Teleportation.

Firelight surged from Tianxia Guihuo's body, and starlight enveloped Sun Miaomiao.

The firelight went out, and the starlight dissipated, and the two were still standing in the same spot. But before the starlight and firelight enveloped them, the terracotta warriors in the stone cave had already been destroyed by the "laser."

"Unable to use skills..." Tianxia Guihuo's expression changed slightly. He seemed to remember something and suddenly looked at the stone tablet, "Forbidden... You can't use skills in the stone cave."

"The twelve Yin corpses lasted less than two seconds." Zhao Chenghuang's tone was more solemn than ever before.

The team fell silent for a moment.

However, something worse happened. Red Rooster pointed at the tunnel behind them and shouted, "There's poisonous fog!"

Everyone looked back and saw a large cloud of yellow-green smoke, like a thick fog, surging in.

For a time, the team was attacked from both sides.