Chapter 32#

Luoying Valley.

After several more days of torment, the group of heroes who were originally full of ambition were now in a sorry state. Especially those who prided themselves on their noble status, they dared not open their clothes and sit on the ground like others, so they had to sweat profusely under the scorching heat, half full and half hungry, with unspeakable feelings.

The originally mottled golden roof of the main hall unexpectedly attracted everyone’s attention. Hua Qianjue held a jar of good wine, sitting lazily on the high eaves, pointing and sneering arbitrarily while drinking heavily, provoking the fatigue and frustration in everyone’s hearts to the limit. Those who rushed up first to compete with the demon were all killed by Hua Qianjue with cruel methods. Because of this, in addition to enduring the scorching weather and the consumption of dry food, the crowd now also had to endure the stench emitted by the scattered corpse pieces on the ground.

The pitch-black huge hole in the main hall was also peeked at from time to time. But the news that the life and death of those highly respected sect leaders were still unknown was enough to stop others from approaching that trap hiding infinite opportunities and slaughter.

The crowd suddenly became chaotic. Everyone saw the abbot, who supported everyone’s hope of treasure hunting, walking slowly with a young man in white easily carried in his hand. The heir of the Golden Saber Ruan family was following behind the abbot with a smile. People clamored for a while and gradually began to cheer.

Hua Qianjue watched them approach with a sneer, but in just an instant, his face changed. The unconscious young man in white, his sleeve corners and hem were covered with mud. His ink-black hair fell from the detached jade crown, wrapping his body like black flames. Even if he couldn’t see the face clearly, how could he not know who that person was?

“You—” Hua Qianjue stood up from the eaves. Before he could say anything, he saw the abbot walk to the front of the hall, chant a Buddha’s name, and say loudly: “Fortress Master Hua, after discussing with Benefactor Ruan, we both thought that since the Fortress Master insists on not telling the way of the underground palace truthfully, we have to resort to this bad plan. As the saying goes, tiger poison does not eat its seeds—”

Speaking of this, he suddenly exerted force and threw the young man in his hand from outside the hall into the deep pit inside the hall from a distance. As soon as this change occurred, everyone was dumbfounded. Hua Qianjue leaped down from the eaves, stepped forward a few steps, and looked at the terrifying deep pit like a beast’s mouth, his face both shocked and angry. The abbot retreated a few steps and laughed low: “Your son doesn’t even know about the treasure, presumably he doesn’t know the way of this underground palace either. This trip is full of dangers. If Fortress Master Hua doesn’t go down to take care of him, I’m afraid the little benefactor Hua will be more ill than good.”

Hua Qianjue squeezed out a few slight gasps from between his teeth. After a long time, he laughed slowly and loudly: “What a young bald donkey, to have such a scheme! Those whatever sect leaders are running around like headless flies down there at this moment. If we lead the way down there, with their shrewdness, they might be able to follow all the way and find a way out…”

While saying this, he raised his sleeve, and a spark shot straight out of his sleeve through the eaves tiles, blooming into huge fireworks in the air. With this signal, a large number of Futu Fortress disciples suddenly appeared at the valley entrance, firmly guarding the entrance. On the high mountains around, an astonishing number of Futu Fortress disciples, each holding a giant bow, pointed their arrows at the crowd in the valley.

Hua Qianjue hissed and laughed: “I, Hua, distracted your attention just to wait for all the disciples to arrive. I originally wanted to let you live a few more days, wait for you to be exhausted, and then fire ten thousand arrows at once. But now you are seeking death yourselves. You cut off my son’s way of life, I won’t let you live either!”

The abbot’s face was solemn, and he shouted angrily: “Why do you have to bully people too much? I just want to save the sect leaders now. What do you mean I cut off your son’s way of life?”

Hearing this, Hua Qianjue gradually sneered: “But I might as well tell you, this underground palace actually has no way out. The entrance is the exit. Abbot, I will trouble you to pull us up later.”

As he spoke, he leaped into the deep pit and was swallowed by the pitch-black deep pit in the blink of an eye.

Ruan Xiyu, who had been following the abbot, heard this and suddenly said to the slightly stunned abbot in astonishment: “Bad, Abbot, look there—” The abbot was startled and hurriedly looked in the direction Ruan Xiyu pointed. Unexpectedly, with this distraction, Ruan Xiyu circulated ten percent of his internal energy, pushed hard behind him, and pushed him into the pit unprepared at the edge of the pit. Everything happened in a flash of lightning. The abbot fell down before he could even let out a cry of surprise.

Only then did Ruan Xiyu sneer, chanting in a low voice: “Father, Mother, Xiyu has finally avenged you today for the hatred of these righteous people causing your tragic deaths!”

No one expected that Shen Pinzhen concealing the truth about the escort silver that day would actually lead to such an outcome. Ruan Xiyu was seen laughing while finding various heavy objects to cover the hole, then peeking out of the hall from the door. Seeing arrows raining down outside and corpses all over the ground, he took out two Thunder Galls from his sleeve. While covering his face with his sleeve, rolling into the pile of corpses, and even casually moving a hedgehog-like corpse to cover himself as a shield, he threw the Thunder Galls into the main hall.

The Thunder Galls exploded as soon as they touched the ground. In an instant, fire broke out everywhere. This once glorious palace began to collapse with huge, continuous explosions. One sound followed another, deafening and enlightening. It wasn’t until half a cup of tea later that it completely quieted down. Broken walls, ruins, stone pillars, and rubble mixed with countless earth and ash formed a huge hill, completely burying the entrance to the underground palace, which was also the only exit.

Hua Jinian opened his eyes in severe pain, but only saw darkness filling his eyes. He covered his head and wanted to stand up, but stumbled and fell again. The pain was simply like being thrown down from a high altitude by someone, every bone hurting.

Where is this? He asked in his heart, trying hard to adapt his eyes to the darkness. Just then, a hand suddenly reached out from the side and held his hand. In great shock, just as Hua Jinian was about to shake it off forcefully, he heard a very familiar voice say in his ear: “It’s me.”

Hua Jinian was stunned, feeling that hand tighten a bit more. While he was uneasy in his heart, this hand was like a handful of clear spring water in the desert, making him completely comfortable, sweeping away the troubles of the past few days. Haven’t seen him for two years. When he first met the person beside him, he was still a child under ten years old. Time flew, and now he was a twenty-year-old young man. In such a long period in between, that tall figure remained in the deepest part of his memory like a shadow.

“Where is this?” Hua Jinian couldn’t speak for a moment. After forcing himself to speak, he found that even his voice was hoarse. Unknowingly, he had already held the man’s hand back, as if that hand was his only reliance.

Hua Qianjue exerted a little force, helped him up, and replied softly: “This is the underground palace of Futu Fortress.” Hua Jinian looked confused. His eyes could vaguely distinguish the man’s perfect chiseled face in the darkness, and he immediately asked: “What do you mean? What underground palace? You know… how to get out, right?”

Hua Qianjue laughed low: “I know the way, that’s right, but…” But don’t know the way out. The man thought, and suddenly changed the subject: “Why did you come here?”

Hua Jinian was stunned and said in astonishment: “Didn’t you call me back? Su Meiniang sent me the things…”

Hearing this, Hua Qianjue sneered incessantly and said: “How could I let you come here? It’s extremely dangerous at this time, I couldn’t avoid you in time.”

Hearing this, Hua Jinian only felt a chill rising from his heart, murmuring: “She lied to me. Could it be that she actually betrayed Futu Fortress?” He had suffered great changes and always hated betrayal deeply. Thinking of this, his heart was full of anger and hatred, and he couldn’t help but have killing intent towards Su Meiniang, which also planted a bitter fruit.

Hua Qianjue thought for a moment, felt that this matter didn’t make sense, and was about to point it out. Unexpectedly, at this time, Hua Jinian added another sentence: “I came back this time and caused you a lot of trouble again, right.” In the darkness, the man saw the young man looking up at him with a gaze containing a bit of self-mockery, a bit of indifference, mixed with a little anger and sorrow. Even the hands that were originally supporting each other separated.

Hua Qianjue also felt a basin of cold water poured down in his heart, and immediately sneered: “Correct, correct. Every time you and I meet, it’s wonderfully harmonious.” Speaking of this, he suddenly grabbed the young man’s shoulder fiercely and said coldly word by word: “Don’t think your wings are hard now and talk to me in this tone. There are heavy traps everywhere here. If you make any more trouble, you and I could die here at any time.”

Hua Jinian smiled disdainfully: “You are alarmist again. You know the way, and I won’t drag you down. Could it be that knowing there are traps, we would still forcefully crash into them to seek death?”

Hua Qianjue laughed low: “Arrogant before the smell of mother’s milk is dry. I see you don’t understand your situation yet.” As he spoke, he reached out and groped carefully on the stone wall beside him for a while, took down a torch inserted obliquely on the stone wall, and took out a fire starter from his bosom with the other hand to light the torch.

The discomfort of darkness being suddenly dispelled was too strong. Hua Jinian blinked several times before seeing clearly where he was. It was just a corridor in the dim underground palace, both wide and long. The stone walls were carved with ancient and huge patterns and sacrificial texts with unclear meanings. The ceiling was clearly high, but it gave people an extremely creepy sense of oppression, as if it would collapse at any time. Identical forks were distributed on both sides of the corridor, winding and turning.

If all this was not enough to make Hua Jinian shudder, then when he saw the thing at the end of the corridor, everything was different. There lay a corpse. Dry and terrible blood stains extended all the way to their feet, as if it had been savagely dragged from where they stood to the end of the corridor not long ago. Hua Jinian had seen the death appearances of countless people, but never would his hair stand on end like at this moment. What kind of corpse was that—the flesh on the face was fragmented piece by piece, the eyes were only two blood holes, most of the right face was white bone with even the pink tendons licked away. Starting from the ribs, the skin was torn off forcefully, half-connected to the body like a half-draped outer robe, and the flesh under the skin was gnawed away again without a mouthful left. The right leg was simply broken and taken away, leaving only an empty trouser leg.

What was terrible was not only his hideous death appearance, nor the eyes that seemed unable to close forever as if dying with grievances, nor the fresh corpse and the blood stains that had dried not long ago, but that half face—the face of a sect leader who once commanded the wind and clouds in the Jianghu.

“Sure enough, couldn’t hold out.” Hua Qianjue sneered.

“What do you mean?” Hua Jinian only felt a chill rising from his spine, and subconsciously held Hua Qianjue’s hand again.

Hua Qianjue laughed low at him: “Don’t you know? Five days ago, I pushed the sect leaders of the six major sects down. For five days, they had no water, no food, couldn’t find a way out, and finally one day…”

“I don’t want to listen anymore!” Hua Jinian’s face changed, covering his ears. The man chuckled, gently pushed away his hands covering his ears, and continued to laugh: “You must listen. I must let you know that in this underground palace, at this time, besides us, there are six—no, five beasts mad with hunger. They are not ordinary people, but sect leaders whose martial arts have reached the realm of perfection. If you are not careful, besides possibly being trapped to death, beaten to death, or shot to death by mechanisms, you might also fall into their hands, like this… eaten without even eyeballs left.”

Hua Jinian’s teeth began to chatter. He pretended to be calm and reached out, trying to share a little heat under the torch, while holding the man’s hand more firmly, and asked in a low voice: “We avoid them and then escape, this should be fine, right.”

Hearing this, unexpectedly Hua Qianjue smiled and shook his head, whispering: “You are wrong. We are not trying to escape them, but to catch them faster, drink all their blood, eat all their flesh, leaving not even bones. Only in this way can there be hope of survival in this underground palace with no way out.”

Hua Jinian almost vomited. He shook his head in disbelief, his eyes slowly filled with stubbornness that couldn’t agree. He shook his head and slowly retreated backward, but seemed to bump into something, so he screamed. Hua Qianjue was also startled, raised the torch and shone it quickly behind, seeing a person standing behind Hua Jinian.

Hua Jinian dared not look back, so he asked with a pale face: “Who is it? Which sect leader has arrived?”

The person behind sighed faintly and whispered: “Little Benefactor Hua need not be afraid, it is this poor monk.”

Under the candlelight, the young abbot stood there quietly. A Buddha mark on his forehead was as bright as fire, solemn and dignified, seeming to dispel a bit of the surrounding ghostly aura. Hua Qianjue looked him up and down quietly, but made no further move. At this moment, is this person an enemy or a friend?