Chapter 165: The White Corpse Turtle Immortal

Hearing those words, I felt the hair on my arms stand on end. No matter how I interpreted that sentence, it felt incredibly bizarre. It was clearly a statement of foresight. There was no way the news of me learning the Art of Mechanisms could have reached the Tian Family; at least, that was what I believed at the time.

But how did Tian Xiao know? How could he be so certain that I would eventually learn the Art of Mechanisms? Had my grandfather accidentally let it slip while he was drunk? But during those two years, we hadn’t had much contact with the Tian Family, and my grandfather had never gone drinking with Tian Xiao.

I was utterly perplexed. Then, I thought of the notebook in my backpack signed by my grandfather. I was willing to bet there was crucial information inside, but I couldn’t open it in front of Tian Xiaoqi. After some thought, I decided to wait for a better opportunity to look through it.

I shook my head, forcing myself to stop overthinking these matters. I took my flashlight and began inspecting the room alone. Tian Xiaoqi stopped talking and came over to help, holding the light and opening cabinets for me. Aside from the items on the desk, the cabinets were filled with similar jars, though these were several sizes larger than the small ones, resembling the large glass crocks used for snake wine back in my hometown.

Inside were peculiar turtles, the likes of which I had never seen. Their bodies were long, their skin was white, and their shells were a dull grey. I couldn’t tell if they looked this way because they had been soaking for too long or if that was their natural appearance. I found one that was relatively intact and used some strength to haul the glass jar out of the cabinet and onto the desk.

When the flashlight beam hit it, Tian Xiaoqi suddenly gasped. “Oh my! This… this is a White Corpse Turtle Immortal!”

I had no idea what species a “White Corpse Turtle Immortal” was supposed to be, so I asked her, “What do you mean? You recognize this corpse? What exactly is a White Corpse Turtle Immortal?”

Tian Xiaoqi explained, “The White Corpse Turtle Immortal was originally a species recorded in legends. It’s said that when a White Corpse Immortal ascends to immortality, they attach themselves to a turtle’s body. Carving away its flesh can grant a hundred years of life, and eating its meat can lead to ascension to immortality. The older generations passed these stories down, but no one has ever seen the creature’s true form. However, during the Republican era, a foreigner conducting an expedition in the mountains of China recorded this strange creature living in the crevices of the mountains in his journals.”

She glanced at me, then stared back at the jar on the desk. “I never expected this thing to actually exist.”

The White Corpse Turtle Immortal inside the jar was tied up like a Zongzi, but its body was fairly well-preserved. A thought suddenly struck me. These creatures clearly weren’t local; they must have been transported here in bulk from somewhere else. The formation of this place might be heavily connected to these turtles.

In my gut, I felt that the Nine Rings Project and Project 434 were linked. At that moment, I really wanted to take the White Corpse Turtle Immortal out of the jar to study it. Since the Project 434 personnel had captured so many of them and placed them here, was it safe to assume they were conducting research related to the so-called “ascension to immortality”?

If that was the case, was the nearby undersea tomb also related to “ascension to immortality”?

Just as I reached out to pull the stopper from the top of the jar, Tian Xiaoqi grabbed my hand. She shook her head frantically. “Don’t touch it! Legend says every scale and feather on a White Corpse Turtle Immortal is incredibly toxic. One touch means certain death. Even if it’s just a legend, you’d better not touch it with your bare hands.”

As she spoke, I scanned the surrounding desks out of the corner of my eye. There were no gloves or similar items kept here.

Only after looking around did I bring my gaze back, saying absentmindedly, “What else do the legends say? Did they mention whether these turtles can come back to life, too?”

“How did you know?” Tian Xiaoqi looked at me, blinking in confusion.

I was amused by her gullibility. I was about to turn around to tease her some more when I noticed her expression suddenly turn strange. I realized she wasn’t looking at me, but at the jar behind me containing the White Corpse Turtle Immortal.

Without time to think, I quickly shifted my right hand to the short dagger on my multi-purpose belt. Instead of turning around right away, I softly asked Tian Xiaoqi, “What is it?”

Tian Xiaoqi swallowed hard. “Something inside the jar… moved just now.”

I spun around to look at the glass jar. The moment my flashlight beam swept over, I locked eyes directly with the White Corpse Turtle Immortal, which had its head raised and was glaring fixedly at me.

Under the flashlight beam, its eyes glowed entirely green. How many years had this thing been soaking, and it was still alive?! Taking a closer look, I froze. Those didn’t look like turtle eyes at all. No matter how I looked at them, they were damn snake eyes!

Wait, had I misidentified it earlier?! Was this not a turtle in a shell, but a serpent inside a shell? That didn’t make sense—what kind of serpent was narrow at the front and wide at the back? Was this some kind of hybrid?

Before I could figure it out, the White Corpse Turtle Immortal suddenly slammed against the side of the jar. It was still bound by those ancient, tattered ropes, yet its strength was enough to make the jar lurch forward. It opened its bloody maw wide at me. I rushed forward to steady the jar, pushing it back onto the desk, terrified it would topple over from the impact.

The moment I touched it, the White Corpse Turtle Immortal inside struggled even more violently. Both Tian Xiaoqi and I scrambled back several paces in fright. This particular White Corpse Turtle Immortal was quite large, and even after years of being pickled, it was still incredibly intimidating. If it really was as toxic as Tian Xiaoqi said, it would be no joke if it broke free.

Just as we were watching, a massive boom suddenly echoed from the upper part of the structure. It caught me completely off guard. I lost my footing and fell straight to the floor. Tian Xiaoqi had been holding my arm; her stance was actually quite stable, but when I went down, I dragged her right down with me.

The two of us tumbled together. Before we could process what was happening, a crisp sound of glass shattering echoed nearby. I looked up, and great, the worst-case scenario had arrived: the White Corpse Turtle Immortal was already out of the glass jar!

Damn it! Who the hell was causing trouble underwater at a time like this? Was someone trying to get us fucking killed?!

I decisively drew the dagger at my waist, shoved Tian Xiaoqi off me, and shouted, “Get up! That turtle immortal thing got out!”

Tian Xiaoqi scrambled up. I could faintly feel the ground vibrating continuously. At the same time, the glass jars on the desks were shaking, clinking against each other with sharp, ringing sounds. We had no idea what was happening in the water. Was this an earthquake?

Right after that, I saw the White Corpse Turtle Immortal crouching on the ground, raising its head and baring rows of needle-like teeth at me first. I was less than three meters away from it, cursing inwardly. Who the hell categorized this thing as a turtle?! Look at it! What does it have to do with a turtle?

Right then, the White Corpse Turtle Immortal suddenly launched an attack at me. I rolled to the side, my head slamming into a desk leg so hard I grimaced in pain. Tian Xiaoqi, who had already steadied herself, had somehow pulled a jacket out of her bag. She wrapped it a few times around her arm and lunged at the White Corpse Turtle Immortal as it came for me.

She tackled the White Corpse Turtle Immortal to the ground in an instant. Still, Tian Xiaoqi was a girl after all, and her grip strength was on the weaker side. Once its shell was seized, the creature thrashed wildly, and the surrounding room shook more and more violently until the whole place began to quake. To make matters worse, the turtle’s shell was extremely slick, and it looked as though the jacket would be bitten through any second.

Ignoring the pain in my head, I threw caution to the wind and lunged forward too, knocking Tian Xiaoqi’s hands loose and grabbing the shell in her place. “Quick! Go! This place is about to collapse! Hiss!” I roared.

A sharp pain in the web of my thumb made me gasp. Turning my head, I saw that one of the White Corpse Turtle Immortal’s sharp teeth had driven straight into the webbing of my hand, tearing open a gaping hole. Cold air rushed into the wound, but despite the agony, I held tight to the creature.

Deep cracks began spreading rapidly from the base of the walls, opening with deafening reports that quickly climbed up toward the ceiling.

Tian Xiaoqi didn’t realize my hand was torn open. She rushed up to the door, checked the corridor, and turned back to yell, “Throw that thing away! The place is coming down! Water is already leaking in! We need to get back to the tomb complex quickly!”

Clamping both hands onto the White Corpse Turtle Immortal, I knew I couldn’t just toss it aside right now. It crawled exceptionally fast and possessed incredible jumping power. I had to shut the door behind us to keep it from leaping onto our shoulders and biting our necks while we were running for our lives.

“You go first! I’m right behind you!” I yelled at the top of my lungs, edging toward the doorway.

Tian Xiaoqi hesitated for a moment before stepping out and sprinting down the corridor, where water was already seeping through the walls. Seeing her leave, I swung my arm back with all my might and hurled the White Corpse Turtle Immortal toward the farthest wall near the ceiling. Buying myself that brief window, I slipped out the door and slammed it shut behind me.

Then I sprinted back down the corridor as fast as my legs would carry me. Ahead, Tian Xiaoqi was stomping her feet in frantic impatience before running back to grab me. We turned a corner and bolted up a stone staircase different from the one before. Tian Xiaoqi felt around, grabbed a stone, and gave it a pry. Loud rumbles of moving rock echoed up ahead. Scrambling up the stairs one after the other, we managed to squeeze into the dark opening at the top that connected back to the tomb complex.

I collapsed into the hole on my rear, drenched in sweat and covered in sticky slime. My vision swam with stars from sprinting so hard, and the moment I stopped, I couldn’t stop coughing. Rolling over as I hacked, I swept my flashlight over my left hand. The biting force of that White Corpse Turtle Immortal was horrifying; the flesh in the webbing of my hand was turned completely inside out. It had gone numb while I was running, but now it was a bloody, mangled mess.

As I was wondering how to treat it, Tian Xiaoqi poked her head out from behind me. Seeing my hand, she gasped sharply. She grabbed my wrist, pulled me into a sitting position, and began frantically digging through her backpack, her hands shaking so violently as she unzipped it that she started dropping things.

All I could do was try to comfort her, saying, “It’s fine. Someone up top should come rescue me soon. Though our current spot looks a bit tricky… I’m not in the original Side Chamber anymore, so meeting up might be tough. I still have three days’ worth of dry rations. If we ration them carefully, we won’t starve to death.”

Tian Xiaoqi gave me a glare, her eyes rimmed with red and full of anger. “This is a robber’s hole I found earlier, dug right alongside the Side Chamber! I only found the stone stairs down there because I accidentally triggered a mechanism. Stop trying to comfort me! Your hand is severely torn up. If you don’t regroup with your rescue team soon, you’re definitely going to die here!”

My entire hand was numb; I couldn’t feel a shred of pain. However, I could still feel the occasional spasm in my blood vessels. Tian Xiaoqi had probably been right: the White Corpse Turtle Immortal was indeed highly venomous.

I couldn’t see myself, but I imagined I looked terrible. Tian Xiaoqi looked at me, her voice bordering on tears. “If it wasn’t for me, you wouldn’t have lunged over.”

I didn’t care about that. At the time, my only thought was that at least one of us had to make it out alive. Now, I seemed to have a new understanding of this tomb.

“I’m not dead yet. There are so many mechanisms set up here, so I suspect…”

The moment I started to speak, my vision began to spin. My chest felt heavy, and it became increasingly hard to draw a breath. This was bad. Even after being soaked in formalin for so long, the venom was still this potent when it kicked in.

I couldn’t stay upright any longer and began to slump toward the ground. Tian Xiaoqi caught me. “Gan Ji!”

The ringing in my ears grew louder, and my body was no longer under my control. Yet at the same time, my mind became strangely clear. I managed to force out a few words, though I didn’t know if Tian Xiaoqi heard them before I lost consciousness entirely.

Still asking for comments and starfish! I want to reach ten thousand starfish. If you’re enjoying the read, please feel free to toss a few my way!