I squinted at Ye Yang and squeezed out a sentence between my teeth, "Tell me earlier next time!"

If we weren't facing such a formidable enemy, I would have drawn my blade and chopped him up!

Mutual understanding... you have to give me a hint first, right?

Ye Yang rolled his eyes, his signature Ye Clan eye-roll, and kicked open the remaining half of the wooden door: "Let's go! You blockhead!"

Formidable enemy, formidable enemy... I can't kill him!

I kept repeating that sentence in my mind, following Ye Yang through the gap that had been blocked by the coffin and heading underground.

I originally thought that the passage would go deep into the earth, but I didn't expect that we would return to the surface after only walking a short distance.

The first thing I saw when I reached the ground was a large door standing in the open space. No matter how I looked at it, the shape of that door resembled an upside-down coffin.

Beyond the gate was an open space. It seemed harmless, but it was unusually quiet, as if no one had ever entered this area before.

Ye Yang looked up at the gate, seemingly talking to himself: "Coffin Gate, Coffin Gate. Coffin Gate within the Coffin Gate. Inside the gate, no one is seen; outside the gate, no soul is found."

"A tongue twister?" I looked at Ye Yang and said, "What are you talking about?"

Ye Yang said, "I'm reciting the incantation for entering the Coffin Gate. Legend has it that the eight major branches of the Coffin Gate do not allow anyone to enter easily. Unless you are a direct disciple of the eight major branches of the Coffin Gate, no one can easily enter the Coffin Gate."

"However, there is also a general outline for entering the Coffin Gate. It's that tongue-twister-like thing I just recited."

"If you walk according to that saying, as long as you walk correctly, the gatekeeper will regard the person entering as a disciple of the same origin, which can at least guarantee that they won't die upon entering."

Ye Yang said, "As long as we don't go into the gate, there won't be too much danger. You think about what that tongue twister means first."

"Looks like I'm needed this time!" I glared at Ye Yang unhappily.

Ye Yang ignored me and said to himself, "The first sentence is easy to explain. The two 'gates' that appear twice, one is the gate of the large door, and the other is the 'gate' as in sect. It means that the Coffin Gate is inside the large door."

"You're wrong!" I shook my head and said, "The first sentence is, 'Coffin Gate, Coffin Gate, Coffin Gate within the Coffin Gate.'"

"If it's just to emphasize that the sect is inside the mountain gate, there's no need to say 'Coffin Gate' twice at the beginning. People in the world of术道 (Shu Dao, the esoteric arts) aren't so bored that they'd write a rhyme and act cute with you."

"I think the secret of the Coffin Gate's incantation is that the large gate and the sect are parallel existences."

Ye Yang shot me a sideways glance: "You're just arguing!"

I wasn't arguing with Ye Yang. I really felt that the first sentence wasn't as Ye Yang explained it.

However, my explanation didn't seem to make much sense either.

I bypassed the first sentence and said, "The subsequent sentences are easier to explain. They mean that this gate is where Yin and Yang are divided. Only those who are ghosts outside the gate and humans inside the gate can walk through it safely."

Ye Yang suddenly looked up and said, "You're on to something!"

"Right!" I nodded slightly and said, "If this conjecture holds, it means that the direct disciples of the Coffin Gate must be of a half-ghost constitution. Also..."

I changed the subject and said, "Think about that guy called Niu Tianlu. Why would he abandon the Coffin Gate's secret methods to study the affairs of the dead? It's because he wanted to enter the Coffin Gate."

I said in a deep voice, "Is this the real purpose of Fang Xuan's performance of the 'Soul Transfer and Life Replacement Technique' in front of me? If he just wanted to trick us up here, he wouldn't need to go to so much trouble. A simple story would have been enough."

"The purpose of his acting out the Soul Transfer and Life Replacement Technique was actually to test whether we are descendants of the Coffin Gate?"

"Fang Xuan, that silly kid, has been tricked!"

I turned to look at the gate again and said, "I'll go in and try. You cover me."

After I took a step towards the gate, the Yin energy in my body began to circulate wildly, and I began to transform into a half-ghost state.

After two steps, my breathing completely stopped, and there was no Yang energy left in my body.

By the third step, my pulse and heartbeat had also disappeared, and my hands hanging by my sides had lost all color.

When I walked to the door, my pupils had already dilated, and there was no trace of vitality in my eyes. All that remained was the emptiness of a dead man.

After I passed through the gate, the ground beneath my feet suddenly sank, and everything below my knees was submerged in the soil.

Before I could exert any force to lift my feet, the soil on the ground suddenly pressed towards me. Fist-sized clods of earth began to pile up on my legs from my feet. In the blink of an eye, everything below my waist was buried in the soil.

I finally understood why there were so many graves at the entrance of Dead Man's Gulch. Those people were just like me now, buried alive in the soil and suffocated to death at the entrance of Dead Man's Gulch.

No matter how high the level of the corpse-controlling technique brought by the术士 (Shu Shi, occult practitioners), it was impossible for them to never touch the ground with their feet. Once the术士 (Shu Shi, occult practitioners) chose to set foot on the ground, the soil would entangle them like vengeful spirits until they were strangled to death.

The corpses in the graves at the entrance of Dead Man's Gulch were strange and varied because those people had struggled desperately before they died.

The soil buries the dead, and the coffin imprisons the living.

Now that I'm transforming Yin and Yang, will a coffin come at me head-on?