Chapter 231

When Uncle Ming told us about Ah Xiang's past, he actually mentioned that the method used by her biological parents came from Tibetan secret texts, which must be related to the "Later Life Reincarnation Sect." During the British invasion of Tibet, they looted a large number of precious cultural relics and classics, and the encrypted scriptures of the "Later Life Reincarnation Sect" flowed overseas at that time, which is not surprising. The book Uncle Ming holds about glacial crystal corpses has had a similar fate, but although Uncle Ming is sharp-minded, he does not know the detailed origin of this "eye" mystery. He himself said that when he mentioned these things, he thought that the ancient text regarded by modern people as a secret method for opening the heavenly eye might be related to "A Luo Hai Cheng." After the fall of the Demon Kingdom, the practice of eye worship in Tibet became rare, so this mysterious method of silent heavenly eye opening is very likely what the Demon Kingdom used to screen ghost mothers. Although it can no longer be verified, it can definitely be said that at least this secret method also originated from and evolved in the Kalamaili region.

I couldn't help but admire Shirley Yang's attentiveness even more. She had already noticed some clues, and her earlier question to Uncle Ming about Ah Xiang's past was precisely to understand the secret hidden in this giant statue from another angle. The blood lines on Ah Xiang's pupils almost match the totems here, and there is some kind of microsecond connection between them. The striking mark on the stone gate, the stone pillars in the underground canyon, these gloomy, oppressive stone huts, and Ah Xiang pointing at the wall saying there is a woman inside—once these clues are sorted out, perhaps we can know the truth of this place.

Although we think this place might have been used to imprison and kill women who did not develop ghost eyes, I have had a big doubt since the beginning that I never got a chance to tell Shirley Yang: if the goal is to kill these people, why go to the trouble of building such a massive project? Is it similar to the old customs of the Central Plains dynasties, where criminals had to wait until autumn for execution? That seems completely unnecessary. If this giant statue took several hundred years to build, what is it actually used for?

Now that we are trapped in a desperate situation, I still hope for a turn of events, and Shirley Yang has not given up her belief in survival. As long as we figure out what kind of place this space is, we might find a way out. Although I know there is no escape route here unless a miracle occurs, waiting to die is even worse. Just then, I heard the sound of poisonous snakes slithering on the stone slabs, and within less than half an hour, they had caught up with us. There is only one entrance here, and although the stone slabs block it for now, preventing the snakes from coming in for a short time, how long can we last without food or water?

When everyone heard that the snake swarm had reached the level beneath our feet, seeing those black snakes made everyone feel chilled, and it was inevitable that some panic arose. Uncle Ming also had no mood to continue talking about Ah Xiang's affairs. I advised him, saying, "We've blocked all the roads, so these poisonous snakes won't be able to come up for a while. Uncle Ming, please continue telling us about those two times Ah Xiang bled tears—what exactly happened? She just bled tears again—could there be some similarity?"

Upon hearing me say that, Uncle Ming felt it made sense and said, "Even until now, I still often have nightmares about those events. Back then, after making a fortune, I wanted to buy a decent house. I saw one with a good environment and location, exquisite style, and a fair price—it was almost settled. Since the whole family went together, I brought my two sons and Ah Xiang with me. Unexpectedly, when Ah Xiang saw the house, her eyes immediately filled with two streams of blood tears."

Uncle Ming knew that Ah Xiang would feel fearful and uncomfortable in places with heavy yin energy, so he hesitated slightly in his heart, postponed buying the house for a few days, and used that time to find people to inquire about the property's background. The owner was a wealthy widow who had lived there in seclusion for over a decade, living quietly and peacefully, with no troubles. But a few days ago, she suddenly died. She had no relatives, and even the few cats she kept died for no reason on the same day. Moreover, both people and cats died with bleeding from the seven orifices, yet it was not poisoning, and the police never disclosed the cause of death to the public.

Another time, Uncle Ming once collected a porcelain jar with a white, translucent body, round and smooth, with a white glaze that faintly flashed yellow sprouts. The decoration was the Eight Treasures of Sea Beasts, and there were some special flower prints on the inside of the lid. However, this item was fished out of the sea by fishermen, then passed through various hands to Hong Kong. Its surface was severely eroded by seawater, and many coral cocoons hung on the outside, covering all its original advantages, so it was worth very little. But the jar was still fairly well preserved, mainly because it contained many human skulls. Since everyone in the trade knows that Uncle Ming's antique business mainly deals in "antiques" and he is very interested in ancient corpses, they didn't know whether these skulls were worth collecting, so they brought them to him for a look. Uncle Ming had never seen such a thing before—fished out of the sea? What would storing so many dead people's skulls be used for? But seeing that this object is several hundred years old, it must have some origin, though he had never seen anything like it, so he couldn't be sure. Fortunately, it wasn't expensive, so he casually paid a few coins and kept it. Just as he reached his doorstep, Ah Xiang bled tears again. Uncle Ming recalled the previous incident, didn't dare to go home, and wanted to quickly find a place to throw the thing away. But then he thought, after all, he had spent money to acquire it—throwing it away would be a waste. Even selling it at the original price would be acceptable. So he went to an antique shop run by an acquaintance. The shop owner was very experienced. As soon as he saw Uncle Ming carrying the porcelain jar in, he almost beat him up, then dragged him to a secluded place to bury the jar, before telling him: "Are you trying to sell this to me to harm my whole family? Do you know what this is? According to the Ming Dynasty law, those sentenced to death by lingchi must have even their bone fragments erased after being sliced thousands of times. The Ministry of Punishments must order the executioner to grind the bones and scatter the ashes. That is, after the flesh is sliced away, heavy tools must still be used to crush the bone framework into powder. But executioners in the Ministry of Punishments are mostly hereditary, passing the skill from father to son, not to daughters. They all have a very secret rule: after the lingchi execution, they secretly keep the skull, place it in a porcelain bottle, and seal it. Only after the executioner dies do his descendants throw the bottle into the sea. Why do they do this? How do the Ministry of Punishments executioners nourish these death row inmates' skulls? All of this cannot be verified. In fact, these practices only became known after the Republic of China adopted execution by firing squad. The jar you collected contains all the major punishments this executioner carried out in his lifetime. This object carries too much lethal energy and easily invites bloodshed disasters. Those who don't know the way of nourishing bones—who would dare to keep it at home?"

After Uncle Ming briefly recounted these two incidents, Ah Xiang again showed that sign near the statue, and her lost, soul-less appearance was something we had never seen before. So we said this place must be filled with heavy yin energy and cannot be lingered in. But with so many poisonous snakes below, where else can we go if we don't stay here?

I nodded and understood: the inside of the statue must have seen many deaths, and they were terrible. Thinking back to Ah Xiang's strange behavior just now—she said that inside the giant statue, from the third layer upward, almost every stone wall has a woman embedded in it. If a person endures excessive fright, they either suffer a nervous breakdown or become numb. I looked at the surrounding black stone walls. If what Ah Xiang said is true, just imagining our situation makes me feel suffocated. How many dead people are there in this place?

But what I find strange is that the stone caves inside the statue are all of one piece, not built by layering stone bricks, so it's impossible for corpses to be inside the walls. Plus, the walls are all lacquer-black, so no human-shaped outlines can be seen on them. The more I thought about it, the stranger it seemed. I reached out and touched the wall behind me. If there really is a woman executed and hidden in this wall, where would she be concealed?

I casually stroked the wall lightly and immediately felt many shallow chisel marks on it, as if some kind of symbol had been carved. But since all the stones are black, if you just look with your eyes, you won't notice anything carved on the wall. Moreover, unless you deliberately inspect it, you might not even notice those ancient, chaotic chisel marks. I immediately told the others about this discovery—it seems the walls in these stone caves really do have problems.

Upon hearing this, Uncle Ming immediately became alert and hurriedly asked, "Are there maps of secret passages carved on the wall?" I didn't answer, because at this moment we still needed to stay rational. We are at the top of the giant statue, like standing on a high tower—this area is only enough to advance or retreat. Where would there be a secret escape passage? However, the symbols carved on the stone wall might possibly record some information about repelling snakes or the like. I know this chance is slim, and even if such information exists, it might not be understandable to anyone. But still, my hope for survival increased a little.

To make the chisel marks on the black stone wall visible, Shirley Yang collected some whitish fine ash nearby and applied it to the carved areas on the stone wall. Gradually, whitish lines appeared before everyone's eyes—extremely uneven lines, roughly sketched into some bizarre patterns. Some of the chisel marks have worn down and become blurred, but the only image we can clearly recognize is a woman carving on the wall. It seems the markings on this wall were all made by women. The chisel marks on this wall are really too unclear, so we had to go look for other wall marks. Almost every wall has similar chisel symbols and pictures, but the technique and clarity clearly show they were not made by the same person, nor from the same time period. However, the content they record is largely the same: endless repetitions of the act of carving the wall.

After examining the walls of four or five stone caves, we finally saw the full content of the stone carvings and could confirm that each wall's carving was made by a different woman. Since there is no other related evidence, we can only make subjective guesses: they were all women who did not develop "ghost eyes," and they were all imprisoned here. Each had to carve on the wall the most deeply impressed event from her life as a testament for the afterlife, then pierce her own eyes and smear the blood from her eyes onto the carved patterns and symbols—thus completing the final journey of her life. Finally, the female corpses, already blinded, were tied to the stone pillars in the canyon, where they were devoured by black snakes, becoming sacrifices under the rule of religious theocracy.

Shirley Yang seemed lost in thought, gently stroking the wall carved with the souls of those unfortunate women. Uncle Ming, seeing the stone carvings on the wall, only saw the bloodshed and cruelty of ancient religious rule, with no information useful for our escape. He immediately felt deflated, restless and anxious, pacing back and forth in the stone cave.

Shirley Yang suddenly said "Huh," and told me: "It's strange—some of the stone carvings hide a special mark……very hidden, this mark looks like……"

I was about to ask her what she had discovered when Pangzi suddenly shouted: "Oh no, we need to run up quickly—the stone slabs can't hold back the poisonous snakes anymore!" I turned toward the sound and saw that the several large stone slabs blocking the entrance had suddenly collapsed. The leading large snake sprayed red liquid from its mouth, which fell to the ground and immediately sprouted fast-withering red toxic fungi. After the toxic fungi withered and rotted, they had a corrosive effect. Sometime ago, they began corroding the stone until it became rotten and crumbly. Swarms of black snakes followed, surging forward. A slightly smaller black snake moved the fastest—it arched its body and sprang forward like a black lightning bolt. Pangzi had sharp eyes and quick hands. He saw the snake leaping in midair, raised his hand, and swung the engineer's shovel. The steel shovel struck the snake's head squarely with a solid blow—the sound was like hitting a pile of iron filings. The snake's skull shattered instantly, but the black meat eye on its head was also smashed, spraying countless drops of black toxic juice. Pangzi quickly dodged backward. The toxic juice splashed onto the ground, giving off wisps of poisonous smoke.

Everyone's faces turned pale as more black snakes came surging forward in waves. Although we knew the upper level was also a dead end, with fire at our eyebrows, we had no choice but to retreat upward. In the blink of an eye, I noticed Shirley Yang still staring at the wall symbols, completely dazed, unaware of the sudden changes around her. I rushed over, grabbed her arm, pulled her, and ran. Shirley Yang only came to her senses after I yanked her, and as she ran, she said: "That's a curse—it's the curse those women placed on A Luo Hai Cheng……"