Chapter 550

The temple Fang Chuanzong locked onto and the temple Liu Junyan passed through from the Wangsi City Formation Array earlier are about ten li apart, but their current situations are vastly different.

The temple Liu Junyan passed through is bustling with incense, while the one Fang Chuanzong locked onto is basically already in a state of disrepair.

In the usually quiet ancient temple, monks' chanting suddenly echoed, which inevitably puts one on alert.

Moreover, Fang Chuanzong's people have been lying in ambush there for several days already—how did those monks suddenly appear in the ancient temple?

Could it really be, as we previously thought, that there is a Formation Array connecting the two temples?

"Right, there's also this."

Hui Moqiong flipped through his phone, then handed it to me: "Old Fang conducted another archaeological survey of this ancient temple, discovering that it had been renovated; many years ago a fire broke out, and everyone inside—over a hundred people—perished."

This actually matches the Xuan Cat's background.

The Xuan Cat is a legendary disaster‑averting cat; it is said that the temple it once resided in caught fire back then.

"Because it's been too long, and the ancient temple is basically abandoned and forgotten, making archaeology difficult. This is a portrait of a monk from the ancient temple that Old Fang just obtained these two days; he wants you to examine the person he marked on it."

Hui Moqiong looked grave; I took the phone skeptically and enlarged the image.

The painting depicts monks holding a Dharma lecture at the ancient temple back then; the main scene shows seven monks, each seated in a different position.

The marked monk sits in the rear of the lower‑right seat, showing only a side profile.

Unless one is extremely familiar with this person, it would be impossible to identify him from just an aged, somewhat blurred painting and a side profile.

But at a glance I was still startled, unable to help exclaiming: "Kong… Kongji?"

An eye landed on the back of my hand, rolling around, also staring at the phone.

Liu Junyan directly pulled the car over to the roadside and leaned forward to look.

The conclusion was the same.

A Cheng: "That damned thing hasn't changed in all these years."

Yeah.

The Kongji in the image is exactly the same as the one we saw on Mount Song.

Liu Junyan pondered, then said: "If he really is Kongji, then that fire back then must be inseparably linked to him; given that no one survived, how Kongji managed to stay alive is all the more intriguing."

Yeah, there are too many possibilities.

Perhaps he was the arsonist, having left the ancient temple before the fire spread.

Or perhaps he was actually in the sea of fire, but there existed a secret passage beneath the temple, and he escaped through it?

No matter how Kongji managed to leave the fire scene unbeknownst to anyone, it shows one thing: what this fire was covering up.

"Xiao Jiu, call Old Fang back and ask about their current situation."

Liu Junyan said that, then moved to the back seat, and Hui Moqiong took over driving.

I called Fang Chuanzong using Hui Moqiong's phone, and he answered quickly.

It was quiet there; Fang Chuanzong spoke in a lowered voice: "Xiao Jiu Zhanggui, are you all okay?"

"We're fine."

I briefly summarized the situation in Wǎngsǐ Chéng: "Here we are basically like this; Wǎngsǐ Chéng has the Seven Halls Yama holding down the fort, and we plan to tidy up a bit before meeting up with you."

"You need to be quick," Fang Chuanzong said. "I feel the situation is a bit unfavorable."

Fang Chuanzong found something.

He said that because it's so ancient and located in a remote area, useful information is hard to come by.

But based on the limited data, after the fire at the ancient temple years ago, the local terrain seems to have changed—whether from an earthquake or someone tampering with a Formation Array is unknown.

The present ancient temple was later rebuilt; calling it a renovation is basically no different from reconstructing it.

A few years ago, some archaeologists intended to study this area, but for various reasons they never succeeded.

Fang Chuanzong privately contacted the relevant parties, only to be told that the eminent archaeology professor had passed away the year before; however, through his students we learned that the professor had once suspected that beneath this ancient temple and its backing mountain range lay a huge underground palace.

But before his death, the professor had ordered his students not to reopen this project, saying it was extremely dangerous and could cost lives.

A huge underground palace?!

This immediately reminded me of the temple interior scene I saw in the dream of the mysterious phoenix.

Could such a magnificent scene really be hidden underground?

Or… beneath the mountain?

Having gone through all that with Dìshì and his mother, I can now easily accept anything that feels extraordinary.

Under heaven, nothing is strange.

Moreover, the enemy we face is itself an extraordinary existence.

"Old Fang," Liu Junyan said after taking the phone, "these days you've been stationed there—have you run into Dībā pò and the Xuan Cat? They should have been tracking Kongji all along."

The sound of monks chanting coming from the ancient temple indicates that some plan of theirs has been set in motion.

If the ancient temple might be Kongji's main base, then the chance that he is currently inside it is high.

Wherever Kongji is, the Copper Coin Person and the Xuan Cat should also be there.

But Fang Chuanzong said that when the Copper Coin Person entered the Zàng Qū, he had received a message, yet afterwards he lost contact completely.

Liu Junyan's brows furrowed instantly: "How could they not have met up with you?"

Yeah.

Since their goals are the same, they entered the Zàng Qū one after another; they ought to have met by now.

Could the Copper Coin Person and the Xuan Cat have run into trouble?

Fang Chuanzong's tone also grew grave: "I'll try to contact them again; if I get any news, I'll let you know right away."

"Old Fang, you must be careful," I urged. "Besides Dìshì, they also have a shrike bird; she's very powerful and eats people…"

Fang Chuanzong chuckled, lowering his voice further: "Xiao Jiu Zhanggui, I've brought this team here with no thought of retreating mid‑battle; if I die, I'll drag these filthy things down with me. This time we've come not only with special weapons, but we've also brought two heavy weapons deployed nearby."

I sucked in a breath of cold air—such a big move?

Liu Junyan said: "If there really is an underground palace beneath the mountain range, Old Fang, heavy weapons would just be for show, but would instead cause panic in the surrounding area, even riots..."

Fang Chuanzong understands the situation here better than we do, he sincerely said: "So in the end, all my hopes still rest with you..."