Chapter 292: Run! (3/10, Autumn Subscription)

Ni Dongmei's voice came through once more, but like a bad signal, broken and intermittent.

"We can't get out, we can't get out of the ruins! Ni Dongmei, hurry and think of something for us!"

Fang Yue shouted quickly, but the meatball had gone silent.

He tried walking a few steps, searching for a better signal position, but there was no further response.

The four of them could only stare at each other blankly.

"Captain Ye, what do we do? Do we wait here for rescue?"

"I agree! Let's just wait here, it's safe! We don't know what the situation is in the other rooms."

"No, Ye Ge, we have to figure out a way out ourselves. Just sitting around waiting for Lady Ni Dongmei's news—who knows how long that would take. If she could enter the ruins, she would have gone in long ago. There's no need at all to have me come here to get the thing."

Hearing Weiba's words, Hai Ming immediately switched sides: "Right, Goddess Weiba is right! We'll rely on ourselves and find a way out!"

This made Liao Moran stomp her foot in frustration—turns out whatever Weiba says gets a free extra vote of support, how utterly sycophantic!

Fortunately, the one with the final say was Fang Yue.

The three looked at Fang Yue, but Fang Yue didn't rush to decide; he was still thinking.

……

Mo Cun.

Qing Ya Xiao Ke Zhan.

"Found it! She did it! They did it!"

Ni Dongmei sprang to her feet, pacing back and forth in the room.

Her mind raced as she gnawed on her finger.

"Could the prophecy of the Pillar of Fortune be coming true on those two?"

"And that thing... that's something absolutely crucial! It must be brought out safely!"

"Damn it! Do I really have no choice but to just wait?! Just wait for them to come out of the ruins! I can't even contact them again!"

A moment ago, she had been able to sense the connection between that thing and the meatball, barely managing to break through the ruins' blockade for a short while.

But it was useless—that bit of time wasn't nearly enough to explain anything.

"Huanggui Yiji, Huanggui Yiji... that guy's already become a Huanggui, why does he still care so much about his own wealth!"

The Huanggui Yiji was fraught with danger.

Its most notable feature was that, depending on the strength of those who entered the ruins, those eerie things left behind by Lord Mo Qing would copy the intruder's strength and grow rapidly.

If she were to enter the Huanggui Yiji, then what she'd have to face was a copy of herself at full power! Fighting a full-power version of herself with just a clone—that would simply be seeking death.

But if the intruders were only of Acquired Second-rate or Acquired Third-rate strength, or even Unranked, then those eerie things would at most copy Third-rate Realm strength, and use that as a base to begin rapidly growing stronger.

If there were multiple intruders, the strongest among them would be used as the standard for copying.

Of course, according to their Extreme Ice Sect's secret intelligence, those eerie things also had an upper limit on their strength—at most they wouldn't exceed Lord Mo's peak strength.

It's just that a being like Lord Mo, even his peak strength was far beyond anything Ni Dongmei could dream of matching, so it was no different from having no limit at all.

To bring out what they wanted from such ruins, only juniors could go!

"Weiba, with your words, you'll definitely make it out! I've watched your aptitude with my own eyes, the secret method I taught you is also awakening your potential, and with that thing's help, you'll definitely make it out! Bring that thing out!"

……

Huanggui Yiji.

After pacing the hall back and forth twice without being able to contact Ni Dongmei again, Fang Yue gave up.

It seemed he could only rely on himself.

After handing the Silver Ball to Weiba and telling her to notify him the moment she found anything, Fang Yue led the group back to the original Bronze Room.

Fang Yue figured that however they had come in was probably how they could get back out.

Then he jumped into the lake, swam a few laps, and climbed back ashore in frustration.

"No discoveries at all. We'll have to go find new rooms and explore for an exit."

The four set out again. While wandering the hall earlier, they had already discovered that the entire hall actually had six rooms.

The Bronze Room, the Shuilian Room, and four other pitch-black rooms with no lighting—fortunately, all four of these rooms had their doors wide open.

Thinking of the artificial anomaly they'd encountered before, and the many treasure chests still tightly locked in the Shuilian Room, Fang Yue had an uneasy feeling.

He numbered the remaining four rooms based on the Bronze Room, from farthest to nearest.

Fang Yue and the others headed toward the first room.

Walking into the room, the four stayed as close together as possible, using the Fluorescent Bead for light.

But strangely, the glow emitted by the Fluorescent Bead couldn't project far at all, as if the surrounding darkness could absorb light, swallowing up the glow from all four of their beads.

They continued deeper and quickly realized something was off.

"This room... it's huge!"

"Yeah, we've been walking in a straight line this whole time, but we still haven't seen any walls or anything."

That's right—apart from the bronze floor beneath their feet, there were no walls to be seen, nor any other objects.

And as they pressed deeper, the light from the entrance behind them gradually shrank, like a great door about to close.

"Ye Ge?"

"Hold on."

Fang Yue understood what Weiba meant, but he didn't rush to retreat out of the dark room. Instead, he activated his Blazing Fire Heart Method.

Boom!!

Flames shot skyward, instantly dispersing the darkness in a ring around them.

The next moment, Fang Yue and the others all froze.

Because the dark room was, in fact, very small.

Under the flame ignited by burning lifespan, the entire room was as bright as daylight.

The room that had seemed infinitely vast moments ago now revealed itself to be barely over a hundred square meters.

And the room was truly empty—only bronze walls surrounded them.

"This room is so small… then what were we doing just now? Walking in place?"

Fang Yue felt a chill run down his back, when suddenly Liao Moran let out a startled cry.

"Shadows! Ye Ge, look at the ground—our shadows!"

Shadows?

Fang Yue looked down—and his pupils contracted sharply.

His shadow appeared to have gained autonomy, writhing and gnawing desperately at the point where it connected to the soles of his feet.

The other three were in similar states, but Hai Ming was the worst—his shadow had already broken free from his body and was fleeing outward.

In a flash, Hai Ming's face turned as pale as paper as he looked up at Fang Yue and the others.

"M-my shadow… ran away!"

The three faces turned grim; Tail quickly shouted, "Ye Ge, extinguish the flame! Quick! No light, no shadow!"

No light, no shadow?

Fang Yue wasn't convinced—this was a weird world after all.

Maybe without light you just couldn't see the shadow—but that didn't mean the shadow wasn't there!

Still, Fang Yue immediately followed Tail's advice and extinguished the flame.

Darkness returned.

Even the Fluorescent Bead was temporarily put away.

Whether because they could no longer see their shadows or not, the three clearly sighed in relief—except Hai Ming, whose face was twisted in a look of helpless despair.

"Run! Let's get out of here!"

ps: Same as always—if you didn't sleep, it still counts as today.

(End of Chapter)