Chapter 179: The Builder

The moment I crawled into the hole, a chilling draft snaked down my collar. I rubbed my arms and scrambled forward a few steps. The interior of the Stone Tortoise Mouth was absolute darkness. I hadn’t been crawling long before my flashlight flickered and died. I figured I’d dropped it one too many times; it was about time for it to be scrapped anyway.

There were four of us and three flashlights left. Even without mine, I had Lu Ayao’s light ahead to guide the way, so I wasn’t too afraid. I tossed my broken flashlight aside and kept crawling.

The air around us was freezing. Once we were all inside, the Stone Tortoise Mouth shut automatically. This nearly scared He Yu, who was bringing up the rear, to death. He instinctively lunged forward, slamming his head into Tian Xiaoqi. She hadn’t braced herself properly and was knocked right into me.

I turned back to catch Tian Xiaoqi and snapped at He Yu, “What the hell are you doing back there?”

“No, wait, why did that door just close on its own? It almost clipped my ass! Is this thing smart enough to have motion sensors?” He Yu scooted forward a bit more, trying to get as much distance as possible from the Stone Tortoise’s mouth.

I looked at the now seamless door, recalling the mechanics of such traps. I reached out and tugged on Lu Ayao’s sleeve ahead of me. “The door’s closed. Does that mean we can only go forward and can’t turn back?”

“What do you mean? You two make yourselves clear,” He Yu demanded, having overheard us.

Lu Ayao nodded at me. “This door can only open and close once. Once it’s shut, it can’t be opened a second time. We can only crawl forward now.”

Before I could say anything, He Yu let out a groan from the back. “What kind of shitty path are you two leading us on? Where do you get this confidence? Only forward and no retreat? What if there’s something up ahead? We’ll be trapped in this hole with no way out!”

I looked at Lu Ayao. He was perfectly calm, as if he had anticipated this long before we entered. Furthermore, he seemed to have his own unique insights into the Yin-Yang Thirteen Palaces.

He had no reason to lead us to our deaths in this hole. Since he had brought us into a tunnel where there was no turning back, I assumed this was the safest method he could devise at the moment.

“He Yu, stop cursing for a second. There might be another way to look at the door closing,” I said, trying to soothe him.

“Like what? We’re about to suffocate in a hole. What other way is there?”

I replied, “Doesn’t your family always say ‘misfortune is that upon which fortune leans, and fortune is that in which misfortune hides’? Good and bad luck are intertwined. It might not be a bad thing that the Stone Tortoise Mouth closed after we crawled in.”

“How could this be a good thing? All I know is that if there’s something ahead, or if the oxygen runs out, we won’t even have a chance to run. We’ll just be stuck in this damn hole waiting to die,” He Yu argued.

I continued, “Think about it. If the Stone Tortoise Mouth stayed open, those White Corpse Turtle Immortals would have swarmed us eventually. They might have even crawled into the hole to bite us. That’s when we’d really be trapped and dead. With the mouth closed, it eliminates one threat. At least the White Corpse Turtle Immortals can’t get in here now.”

He Yu had seen the lethality of those White Corpse Turtle Immortals firsthand, so he hesitated. “Well… if you put it that way, I guess…”

Lu Ayao tugged my sleeve, signaling me to keep moving. I readjusted my posture and resumed the laborious crawl through the tunnel. The four of us began to move once more.

Crawling through such a low tunnel is a true test of willpower. Sometimes I feel this kind of movement builds character more than long-distance running. It doesn’t just test your bones; it tests your endurance.

The further we went, the steeper the incline became. When we hit an uphill stretch, everyone gritted their teeth and pressed against the stone walls, terrified that a slip of the hand or foot would send them sliding into the person behind. Getting hit here was no joke, so the conversation quickly died out.

Once the steep slope ended and the terrain leveled out again, Lu Ayao, who was scouting in the lead, slowly came to a stop. I breathed a private sigh of relief, glad that he still had enough humanity in him not to completely ignore our physical limits.

“Damn it, how much longer? Something’s wrong with this hole, guys. While we were crawling, I kept feeling like someone was blowing on my ass. It was freezing.” He Yu scratched his head, leaning his whole body against the tunnel wall to rest.

Tian Xiaoqi cursed He Yu for being a shameless pervert, then turned her head away and leaned closer to me.

“Hey, I’m telling the truth! How the hell is that being a pervert?” He Yu protested from the back of the line.

I assumed he was just hallucinating from the exertion. I turned to Lu Ayao and asked, “What kind of tunnel is this exactly? We can’t tell our bearings in here. Which way are we even crawling?”

Lu Ayao backed up two or three steps and pulled out a knife to scratch two lines into the ground. I immediately recognized that he was drawing a river or a canal.

“The waterproof layering here was built very thick. On top of the original burial layer, they added at least two more layers of waterproofing, forming the outermost barrier. It’s unrealistic to try and blast our way straight up through the waterproof layers. We need to find the thinnest point in the tomb to use the explosives,” Lu Ayao explained.

He Yu let out a dry laugh and patted his empty pockets. “You’ve got to be joking. I thought we were just coming down to find Xiao Yao and then heading back up. Who knew you two would suddenly go crazy and dive this deep? I didn’t bring a single spark of gunpowder this time. The only thing I have that can burn is this half-piece of Black Hoof Iron.”

Lu Ayao glanced at him. “It’s fine. I brought some.”

He Yu, who had been leaning listlessly against the wall, sat bolt upright. His eyes gleamed with a predatory light. “I didn’t realize you were holding out on us!”

I smiled and reached back to pat He Yu, trying to calm him down.

Then I turned back to Lu Ayao. “When they did waterproofing in ancient times, the layer should have covered the entire tomb. Are you saying we need to enter the core Main Hall? Because the Main Hall was built earliest, the surrounding stone is more brittle, and even if it was repaired later, it won’t withstand explosives? Is that what you mean?”

Lu Ayao nodded. “It’s just a guess. We won’t know for sure until we actually enter the Main Hall.”

He pointed to the lines on the ground. “There used to be a moat above our heads, but it should be completely dried up by now. The entire riverbed presses down on the Stone Tortoise. We are currently inside the belly of this Stone Tortoise. This tortoise connects the Yin-Yang Thirteen Palaces to the Main Hall. To reach the Main Hall, we have to crawl through the tortoise’s belly. This is also our only possible way out.”

Tian Xiaoqi, who had been listening quietly, suddenly spoke up. “How do you know all this so clearly? You said the Stone Tortoise Mouth only opens and closes once, which means we’re the first people to enter here in centuries. And no matter how fast you are, you couldn’t have scouted the moat above. How did you reach these conclusions?”

Lu Ayao instantly lowered his knife. He looked at Tian Xiaoqi behind me with an incredibly flat, unreadable gaze. Now that Tian Xiaoqi had mentioned it, I began to have my doubts as well. Lu Ayao had always possessed a deep understanding of tomb structures, but it shouldn’t be so profound that he could deduce the layout of a burial site this easily.

Tian Xiaoqi was unnerved by Lu Ayao’s stare and quietly tugged at the corner of my clothes.

The silence was becoming awkward. I was caught right between Lu Ayao and Tian Xiaoqi. Even the usually talkative He Yu wasn’t helping to break the tension. I couldn’t even turn around to give him a look. All I could do was shift my position between them, sit cross-legged, and give a forced laugh.

“Old Lu, look, we haven’t been prying into your business. You said we needed to enter the tunnel, and we followed you right in. Since you’re so certain this tunnel leads to the Main Hall, I imagine the reason behind it isn’t something worth hiding. If you explain everything clearly, it’ll give us some peace of mind while we’re crawling through here.”

Lu Ayao shifted his gaze toward me and said calmly, “I didn’t say we still had a long way to crawl because I was afraid telling you now would scare you.”

The moment Lu Ayao said that, I glanced at Tian Xiaoqi out of the corner of my eye. Lu Ayao wasn’t like He Yu; He Yu would intentionally create a terrifying atmosphere in a tomb just to tease me, but Lu Ayao didn’t do that. He meant exactly what he said. If even he thought the reason was frightening enough to scare us, it had to be serious.

Suddenly, I found myself not wanting to hear the reason anymore. If I had another chance, I would definitely just keep my head down and crawl without listening to a single word.

But Lu Ayao didn’t give me a second chance to choose. He said, “The ancestors of the Lu Clan were involved in the design and construction of this tomb.”