Chapter 22: The Temple

Xu Qing was not unfamiliar with the night in the forbidden zone.

Whether it was the ruined city or this jungle.

He had lived in the former for more than ten days, and he had also experienced several nights in the latter.

At this moment, hiding in a tree crevice of a giant tree, he half-closed his eyes and silently breathed in the spiritual energy mixed with rich foreign matter in the forbidden zone while dozing.

After these spiritual energies entered his body, they were separated by the Haishan Technique. The pure part nourished his whole body, and the foreign part merged into his shadow.

Xu Qing had already become accustomed to this change.

He even had a faint feeling that cultivating in this forbidden zone, perhaps because of the shadow, or perhaps because of the danger of this place, he was always highly vigilant.

With high mental concentration, his cultivation speed had also improved a lot.

Now, he was not far from the fourth layer of the Haishan Technique.

"It's like sharpening a knife..." Xu Qing murmured in a low voice.

He didn't understand any great principles, but he remembered that the blacksmith outside the slums had once said to someone that a good knife needs a better whetstone to completely reveal its sharpness.

At this moment, the dangerous forbidden zone seemed to have become Xu Qing's whetstone.

In this sharpening cultivation, after a long time, Xu Qing, who had finished a cycle, opened his eyes silently.

He looked up, gazing at the darkness of the night outside through the tree crevice. In the night of the forbidden zone, the roars of beasts echoed from afar like the low chants of gods and demons.

The sense of chill was everywhere, invading all living things in this place, and also drilling into the tree crevice where Xu Qing was hiding, permeating his body.

Very cold.

This scene gave him the feeling of returning to the ruined city, and a touch of loneliness slowly permeated his body.

But Xu Qing was already very familiar with loneliness. Half an hour later, he closed his eyes again and continued to cultivate.

Just like that, time passed.

Because the resting place he found was very correct, this night was still safe. Only in the middle of the night, Xu Qing, who was cultivating, heard footsteps from outside.

Very messy, as if many people were walking in a line.

Xu Qing's expression tightened, his eyes narrowed, and he looked outside, but it was pitch black outside the tree crevice, and there was nothing.

But Xu Qing's heart sank violently, because the moment these footsteps came, the roars of beasts in the nearby jungle disappeared instantly, which caused Xu Qing's vigilance to rise suddenly.

He thought of the singing footsteps he had encountered last time, but the feeling he got at this moment was somewhat different.

"It doesn't look like the footsteps during the singing that day, and there is no singing."

Xu Qing analyzed rapidly and didn't act rashly, but forced himself to calm down, held his breath, and stared at the dark night outside.

Gradually, the footsteps became clearer, as if a group of people were walking in a line and gradually approaching.

At the same time, bursts of cold that exceeded the category of chill, as if they could freeze the body, also struck violently at this moment.

Xu Qing was not unfamiliar with this kind of cold. Whether it was the singing that day or the weird existences that appeared on those nights in the ruined city, the temperature they emitted was the same.

But the degree was different. The singing that day could freeze his soul, but the current cold only made his body uncomfortable and didn't reach the level of losing the ability to act.

"It's a similar existence to the weird things in the ruins!" After making a judgment, Xu Qing grabbed his iron skewer tightly, took a deep breath, restrained the fluctuations in his heart, and forced himself to close his eyes, not daring to open them.

Do not look, do not touch, do not encounter.

After Xu Qing closed his eyes, the footsteps suddenly became rapid and closer, as if countless people were circling the giant tree where he was.

Xu Qing's heart was shaken, and he tried hard to restrain the urge to open his eyes to see what the other party looked like.

Until... the moment the morning sun rose, the messy footsteps finally stopped circling and slowly moved away.

Day had broken.

Xu Qing didn't open his eyes immediately. He waited for a while before slowly opening his eyes and saw that there was a thick layer of ice at the mouth of the tree crevice where he was, and he himself was frozen inside.

Through the ice layer, sunlight fell on Xu Qing. He exhaled, pressed his left hand on the ice surface, and pushed violently. With a crackling sound, the ice layer shattered and fell to the ground.

Xu Qing climbed out slowly, first observing the surroundings, and saw that in the jungle, those wolf corpses that were still there yesterday had all disappeared, and on the ground... there were a large number of footprints.

They were human footprints.

Dense and numerous, as if hundreds of people had walked by.

Xu Qing had never heard of a scale of hundreds of people entering the forbidden zone together.

Especially... these footprints were really footprints, not shoe prints.

Xu Qing was silent. After a long time, he withdrew his gaze. Regarding the weirdness of the forbidden zone, he felt it more deeply. At this moment, taking advantage of the daylight, when the danger of the forbidden zone was less than at night, Xu Qing didn't give up exploring and left in a flash.

A few hours later, Xu Qing finally reached the furthest point their group had gone to last time, the small canyon where the Lei Ting team had picked Seven-Leaf Grass.

Inside the canyon, it was the same as when they left. Sunlight fell on the ground along the top formed by the vines and tree crowns above. Bursts of floral fragrance permeated, isolating the dangers of the outside world, as if it were a paradise.

Arriving here, Xu Qing breathed a sigh of relief slightly and looked up at the other end of the canyon, at the temple group that existed further away.

After gazing for a moment, Xu Qing withdrew his gaze, simply rested, moved his body, and headed straight for the temple group.

The jungle outside the canyon was more lush, and the sunlight here was also much less.

I don't know if it was because this ancient temple group still emitted the glory and pressure from their era, so when they left the canyon and approached, there was little danger.

The lush jungle seemed to have become much gentler in its aura.

Even in the jungle closest to the temple group, it was not much different from the trees Xu Qing saw outside. They were no longer ferocious, no longer pitch black.

And there were some Seven-Leaf Grass here, which were picked by Xu Qing.

Everything here made Xu Qing somewhat surprised, but his vigilance did not decrease, and he approached carefully.

Until another hour passed, when dusk was about to arrive, he walked out of the jungle and came to the front of this temple group.

There were few trees here, and sunlight fell over a large area, making Xu Qing's eyes somewhat dazed.

What entered his eyes were giant dome buildings that were dozens of zhang high.

Even if they collapsed, even if they were broken, even if they were covered in moss, the temples piled up with neat stones that were much larger than his body were full of a sense of vastness.

Walking inside, stepping on the broken giant bricks on the ground, it was as if Xu Qing had come to the kingdom of giants.

The ruins that could be seen everywhere, each piece emitted the meaning of ancient years, as if telling Xu Qing about their experiences.

Further ahead, there was also a collapsed statue.

The lower half of this statue was gone, turning into countless fragments that were difficult to piece together. The head was still complete, but its appearance was already blurry.

Despite this, its height was still more than thirty zhang. It could be imagined that before it collapsed, it was at least more than two hundred zhang.

Standing in front of it, Xu Qing's existence was very inconspicuous.

At this moment, the wind blew, like the sound of a Qiang flute, circling desolately, and as if isolating time and space, making the former glory only left for the gaze of later generations.

Xu Qing looked at the statue quietly and was silent for a long time.

He thought of the ruined city outside the slums. I don't know if in many years, the people of that era would be like him now, entering the forbidden zone carefully, looking at that city as if looking at history.

Half an hour later, Xu Qing withdrew his gaze and searched in this temple group, but didn't find the special stone Lei Ting had mentioned.

When he was in his residence, he had already consulted about it. This special stone would emit seven-colored light.

It seemed to grow naturally, and the time of its appearance had no pattern.

After finding nothing, Xu Qing felt some regret. His body leaped nimbly, and in a few leaps, he arrived at the top of a temple, where he looked around.

Behind him was the outer area of the forbidden zone jungle. Although he couldn't see the end, he could see part of it. And calculating the time, today was the fourth day mentioned by Bone Knife, who had bought insurance from him.

Yesterday, Xu Qing didn't see fog in the jungle, and today there was still none, so he didn't need to go save him.

So he turned to look at another direction of the temple group, which... was the depths of the forbidden zone jungle.

After pondering for a while, Xu Qing noticed that it was getting late. He prepared to explore the depths on a small scale, return before dark, rest here tonight, and return early tomorrow morning.

After having a plan, Xu Qing's body moved immediately, jumped off the temple, and moved forward toward the depths.

His nerves tightened strongly the moment he stepped into the depths of the jungle, and his vigilance and caution were heavier.

Because he knew that the danger level here was much greater than in the outer area.

In fact, it was indeed so. Only half an hour later, Xu Qing's figure reappeared in the temple area.

His complexion was gloomy, and lingering fear remained in his eyes.

But his leather bag was bulging, as if it had been filled.

He had only walked less than a mile before, and he saw quite a few Seven-Leaf Grass with years, which seemed not to have been picked for a long time, which surprised Xu Qing, because this kind of Seven-Leaf Grass with years was very valuable.

But when he was picking, he clearly felt that the richness of the foreign matter had doubled. If it weren't for his shadow being able to absorb it, anyone else would have been unable to move an inch.

And he also saw from afar the weird jellyfish he had seen in the forbidden zone last time...

And there were more than a dozen such jellyfish here, although they were much smaller, the cold aura on them was still very obvious.

Fortunately, these jellyfish were mostly hanging on the trees sleeping. After seeing them, Xu Qing avoided them carefully.

But as he moved forward, he had a very strong feeling that in the depths of this jungle, there were countless gazes, like substance, falling on him from unknown directions with greed.

All of this made Xu Qing feel like needles on his back.

And here, it was only the edge of the depths of this forbidden zone. Its inner range was larger, and it was impossible to imagine how many horrors existed.

Xu Qing did not dare to continue forward and retreated with a narrow escape.

Until he retreated to the temple area, the feeling of needles on his back dissipated.

It was as if this temple was a boundary, blocking the malice from the depths of the forbidden zone.

Xu Qing took a deep breath. Taking advantage of the sunset about to fall, in this last afterglow, he found a barely complete temple and stepped into it.

He found a stone crevice to drill into, preparing to spend the night.

Lei Ting had said that this place could briefly avoid danger.

He had also checked the inside of the temple. It was very empty, permeated with a thick sense of the passage of time. Whether it was the stone statue holding a knife enshrined in the main position, or the many human figures carved on the surrounding walls, they were all blurry in the quicksand of time.

At the same time, there were not many beast feces and traces in the temple.

If there were none at all, or if there were many, Xu Qing would not choose it.

Because this was not normal. Only when there were traces but not many, was it relatively safe.

After all, although the temple was in the jungle, there were very few trees here, so it was reasonable that beasts accustomed to jungle life did not come often.

Soon night arrived.

As the roars from outside emerged, Xu Qing breathed silently.

Time passed. Consistent with his judgment, in the temple group at night, there were few beasts. Although the roars were there, most of them came from afar.

But just like yesterday, when Xu Qing was breathing in the middle of the night, weird and messy footsteps appeared again!

The position where this appeared was outside the temple.

"Coming again?"

Xu Qing frowned. He didn't know why these footsteps appeared in the place where he was twice. He was vaguely uneasy. After thinking about it, he followed yesterday's method and didn't open his eyes.

It was just that this time, the footsteps didn't gradually move away like yesterday, but became more and more numerous.

As they gathered continuously, bursts of cold permeated, as if countless weird things were gathering outside the temple at this moment, wanting to invade the temple.

Xu Qing's heart sank. He gripped his iron skewer tightly, and his mind rapidly constructed the environment of this temple and the method of dealing with it once he encountered danger.

And just at this moment, the gathering sound of footsteps outside suddenly disappeared and became incomparably silent.

This silence didn't make Xu Qing breathe a sigh of relief, but instead gave him the feeling of a storm coming. All the hair on his body was about to explode. He vaguely felt that the weird things gathered outside the temple were hesitating whether to enter at this moment.

The next instant, in this silence, the weird things outside finally chose to step into the temple. Xu Qing heard the footsteps of stepping into the temple and stepping on the stone bricks.

Slap.

This sound was like a giant rock falling into Xu Qing's heart, making Xu Qing's heart sink. But at this moment, bursts of murmurs suddenly echoed in the temple, carrying incomparable holiness.

Even more, strands of golden light suddenly spread from the walls of the temple, illuminating the entire temple and also permeating where Xu Qing was, making the world he was closing his eyes under change from the original pitch black to shining with light in an instant.

And under this golden light, Xu Qing's eyes stung. For the first time, when encountering this kind of weirdness, he opened his eyes.

The new book has been released for a week, with nearly 90,000 words updated. This amount is not easy for a little Mengxin... Does everyone want to encourage it? ===== CHAPTER 23 =====