Translator: Legge Editor: Legge
In the gloomy forest, the rustling leaves seed to suggest that there were so horrible creatures shuttling through the canopies. Everyone held their breaths as they kept their eyes on that strange, white figure in front of them. It was as though they were afraid that their “aura” would provoke it into attacking them.
Why was there a woman scratching a tree with her back facing them in a place like this? Nobody could understand it.
But the more they couldn’t explain it, the greater their fears.
Next to him, Ren Xiaosu found that Yang Xiaojin looked very nervous for the first ti. He could see her pursing her lips while her knuckles turned white from gripping the gun so tightly.
Xu Xianchu’s shadow clone was standing right in front of him. It seed that it was guarding against the woman in white in case she suddenly pounced at him. But in reality, that woman was still dozens of ters away from them.
“Should we take a detour?” Ren Xiaosu whispered, “She might not follow us.”
Just as he finished speaking, a strong wind gusted through the forest, and the woman in white seed to float up.
Xu Xianchu clenched his teeth and said, “We can’t avoid it. If sothing like a ghost can stop us here in our tracks, how do you expect to get to the Jing Mountains?!”
Xu Xianchu then commanded his shadow clone to move towards the woman in white as he followed closely. Ren Xiaosu and Yang Xiaojin gave each other a look. They did not expect Xu Xianchu to be so brave in this situation.
So people tended to make outrageous claims in normal tis but would get timid, nervous, or scared in the face of sothing serious. Others were different. The more dangerous a situation, the calr they would be. There was a kind of ferocity embedded in their bones!
“Let’s catch up,” Ren Xiaosu said.
A second later, Ren Xiaosu and Yang Xiaojin tacitly followed Xu Xianchu. As they were all in the sa boat now, they couldn’t let Xu Xianchu take on the risks by himself.
Liu Bu was trembling as he said, “What should we do? Should we follow them?”
“But what if sothing else like that also appears beside us?” Luo Xinyu said in fear. After that, she caught up to them with Wang Lei following close behind.
Seeing that he was all alone, Liu Bu got even more frightened. He whispered, “Wait for !”
Ren Xiaosu said to Xu Xianchu from behind, “Once you find that you’re no match for her, restrict her movents with your shadow clone and buy us so ti so that we can concentrate our firepower on her.”
Xu Xianchu, Ren Xiaosu, and Yang Xiaojin were all carrying guns. On the surface, this was the strongest direct form of attack they had. If this woman in white turned out to be unafraid of bullets, there was nothing more they could do!
Xu Xianchu answered softly, “OK... watch my back, and pay close attention to the surroundings.”
Ren Xiaosu was a little puzzled. Perhaps the people in the stronghold had not experienced life like those who lived in town, so they were more trusting of others than the refugees.
Living in town, there was even a need for soone to keep watch at night while they slept. People who grew up in such an environnt would never ask soone they barely knew to watch their backs.
Was that the difference between the town and the stronghold?
The three of them cautiously approached the woman in white. However, a strange feeling grew inside them the closer they approached.
Ren Xiaosu was initially crouching because this posture was the easiest for him to make a move. In the end, he slowly straightened up as he stood and said, “What the hell is this?”
Xu Xianchu was also confused. He commanded his shadow clone as it swayed towards the “woman in white” and “plucked” her down from the tree.
It was a... tattered, plastic, female doll, the type that looked inflatable.
“Uh...” Ren Xiaosu walked beside Xu Xianchu and looked at it for so ti. “What is this thing?”
“I don’t know,” Xu Xianchu said, shaking his head. As they had never seen this thing before, they all expressed their lack of knowledge. “But it looks to be in terrible condition.”
Ren Xiaosu asked, “Is this not sothing from the stronghold?”
“I’ve never seen it before in the stronghold,” Xu Xianchu denied again.
Everyone did not know whether to laugh or cry as they wondered what this doll was. They were just frightened by sothing as crappy as it! It wasn’t until they got close to it that they realized sothing was off!
“Wait a minute, there’s sothing else under the tree.” Ren Xiaosu happened to spot a tallic box that was caught within the knotted tree roots.
Ren Xiaosu took his dagger and poked the rusty box. As a result, the tallic box, which was already badly corroded, crumbled the mont the dagger touched it slightly.
The tallic box contained several light-red pieces of paper. When the tallic box crumbled, the pieces of paper also turned into powder along with it. In the blink of an eye, only one item was left from inside the tallic box.
It was a piece of green plastic. Rather, it was a piece of green paper wrapped between two plastic sheets. The green paper had mysterious twisting and turning patterns, not unlike tadpoles, printed on it.
“This...” Xu Xianchu was stunned as he looked at the “plastic sheet” in Ren Xiaosu’s hand. “Could this be sothing that was left behind by human civilization from before The Cataclysm? And that plastic doll too? It takes several hundred years for plastics to fully decompose, even if they’re buried underground. So while everything else has already decomposed, this thing was preserved.”
“But what’s this strange pattern on it? Is it hiding so kind of a secret?” Yang Xiaojin frowned and wondered about it.
“Don’t you all think it looks like a map?” At this mont, Liu Bu and the two who had rushed over said, “These symbols contained within the square grid are turning in all sorts of different directions. It looks just like a maze!”
Xu Xianchu and Ren Xiaosu’s eyes lit up. “Could this be a map of that mysterious city in the Jing Mountains?!”
“Eh?” Luo Xinyu said, “Look, there are so words on it.”
Due to the decomposition, the plastic sheet had discolored and yellowed. But after Luo Xinyu’s observation, they took notice and saw a small line of words below the mysterious pattern.
Ren Xiaosu carefully read aloud, “Please scan the QR code for paynt?”
The group was confused. “What’s a QR code? Who do we pay it to?”
“What? We still have to pay to get through the maze?”
Because knowledge of civilization had beco lost through the generations, nobody knew how so things worked during the Pre-Cataclysm tis. So of these practices had been abandoned by humans because they had no use for them, while others were forgotten during the Dark Age of Survival.
No one had seen these things in the stronghold or town before, so its function had beco a mystery.
In any case, it was not a map of a maze.
Ren Xiaosu looked at Xu Xianchu. “Are you sure there’s a mysterious city in that place? Can the mystery of the evolution really be found there?”
“If not, how do you explain the current changes occurring in the Jing Mountains?” Xu Xianchu asked.
“Indeed...” Ren Xiaosu said, “The mountains are always full of secrets, but I keep getting the feeling that the city might not be that mysterious....”
“Let’s go, we’ll only find out after we see it for ourselves.” Xu Xianchu carefully placed the QR code into his breast pocket as though he was afraid of damaging it.
“Should we take this tattered doll with us?” Liu Bu asked.
“Just bring it along, I guess. Who knows if it’ll be useful or not?” Xu Xianchu said.
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