Chapter Nineteenth: The Ghost Mask Descends

  Several people stared at me, I don't know what they were worried about. After a while, one of them said to me: "Brother, when I pulled you up, there were many corpse shells emerging from your belly button and crawling out of your skin. Ah, your belly was all bloody back then! And even more corpse shells came flooding out of the burial pit below, a large patch of white, all covering your body, it seemed like you were about to turn into a white bone spirit! But Brother Fat thought of me as his brother and thought that maybe this thing would catch fire? Using dead horses as if they were live ones to treat an illness, he immediately took out solid fuel from the equipment package, broke off several pieces and threw them onto the pile of corpse shells covering my body. Just as he was about to light it, do you know what happened?"

  I was paralyzed from head to toe and could only weakly say: "I don't understand"!

  "Those shellfish all seemed to have met their nemesis, desperately retreating from the entrance of the cave. At that time, both Da Fu and I were stunned. You see, this thing is poisonous. When we fought against them earlier, just two or three of them could exhaust us, but you, with a large group of shellfish crawling on your body, except for the wound on your belly from being drilled by the shellfish before, didn't get any new injuries. Do you think this thing is afraid of you?" said You Shui Gu.

  I exerted all my strength to struggle and climb up, Da Fu Da Gui saw me and hurriedly helped me up, sitting on the ground. Now I feel dizzy all over, unspeakably tired, the only thing that works well is my brain, why are these shells afraid of me? Have I become a pest control star? This is good, in the future, go to the countryside and package dozens of acres of land, stand in the middle, and there will be no insects. I came back to my senses, huh? Why can't I feel any pain on my body now? I asked Da Gui to pull up my mountaineering clothes, Da Gui didn't understand, but still pulled up my clothes.

  "What...what...how is this possible?!" Oil Water Belly's face was filled with incredulity. Da Fu Da Gui also stared at me with wide eyes, and even I was shocked, but at that time, I clearly felt those shells drilling into my body, first a burning pain, then a piercing pain. But now, why are there no wounds? Is it because this thing drilled into my body? No? Oil Water Belly said before that these bugs crawled on the outside of my body, which means my wounds healed extremely quickly! In the past, when I was injured, I would be on the verge of death, but how did I recover instantly this time? My mind was a mess as I asked Oil Water Belly: "How long have I been unconscious?"

  Oil Water Belly took out a pull-up sleeve and looked at it, saying, "About half an hour"?

  Half an hour, being knocked unconscious or stunned by something, anyone would know that due to the brain's sudden and intense fluctuation, they definitely wouldn't wake up so quickly. Even with a good physique, it would take at least an hour! How did my body become so mysterious even to myself?

  I feel my body slowly regaining consciousness, and now I can control my limbs again. With great difficulty, I get up from the ground, my legs weakly swaying back and forth like a drunk person. After standing up, my body weakly walks around in circles to speed up blood circulation and recover faster. Five minutes later, my face is pale with weakness after being seriously injured, but there's no other feeling. Putting on my equipment pack again, I say: "Shouldn't we get going?"

  "Oil Water Belly looked at me with a strange gaze, somewhat like a human looking at their favorite ornament, and said: "Brother is indeed a rare person, the poisonous thing of Corpse Shell can't even hurt you, it's really impressive! If it were Fat Brother, he would have gone to see his ancestors already!" After joking for a moment, Oil Water Belly ordered Da Fu Da Gui to lead the way with the equipment pack. This cave entrance was not ordinary, the internal space was extremely large, about half the size of a basketball court. This time, Oil Water Belly took the lead, I walked in the middle, and on both sides of the stone wall were long murals, I estimated that they must be at least 18 meters long, leading all the way to a dark 30° upward stone staircase in front. Oil Water Belly suddenly let out a "hmm" sound, staring blankly at the mural on our left side, and following his gaze, I was also shocked: this stone wall had a group of black small people hanging on it, with a background that seemed to be a deep chasm caused by an earthquake or something, only to see a Corpse Shell lying at the bottom of the chasm. The other small people were painted in a very simple style, like matchstick figures, but the Corpse Shell was painted extremely meticulously. This Corpse Shell was clearly different from the ones in Pingpo Village, with a face that seemed to be smiling evilly, eyes shining with an eerie aura! The people surrounding it were all kneeling down, very devout! My gaze followed along and saw that after the Corpse Shell came out of the chasm, someone took out a bronze platform and began to perform a ritual, countless human heads flew out of the chasm, possessing the faces of the people kneeling around, and then those people slowly stood up, their faces suddenly having an additional terrifying and dark mask. In the mural, they were staring straight at us, I couldn't help but feel a chill run down my spine. Suddenly Oil Water Belly said: "So that's how it is!"

  We didn't understand what he was thinking, and we cast questioning glances at him. The oil lamp pointed to the content of the mural on the wall above, saying in a heavy tone: "It turns out that Xi Bi Shi is made by Guan Tou Tao, it seems that this Yao Wang is a very powerful Guan Tou Taoist!" I also know what Guan Tou Tao is, but I don't understand how to implement it specifically. Guan Tou Tao originated from Southeast Asia, which is the Guangxi, Yunnan and Sichuan regions, it's an ancient witchcraft that can save people's lives or kill them invisibly. Since there are more Guan Tou Taoists who kill than those who save, Guan Tou Tao has been a symbol of evil magic since ancient times.

  "What's the big deal?" I said.

  His face turned extremely solemn, the fatty flesh of his eyebrows squeezed into a "川" shape, he pointed at the stone steps and said: "Don't those masks look exactly like the ones in the murals?"

  I didn't realize it before, but the mask is exactly the same as the one in the mural: extremely long and thin, with a grotesque face like a gourd, two curved fangs on the chin, about 10 cm in length, and the entire mask is purple. Under the wolf's gaze, it looks eerie and ghostly. If these are the masks from the mural, then if we get close to them, we might become the people inside the mural.

  Dà Guì, an expert in this field, had long expected this and said to us in a hoarse voice: "Could it be that the old ghost of Yāo Wáng deliberately painted a mural with a few masks to scare us away, so we'd retreat without a fight?"

  Oil Water Belly stroked his chin, deep in thought. I was down for the first time and had no experience, so I could only wait for Oil Water Belly to speak up. "We three aren't newbies either, we've seen our fair share of things. Can a few masks really scare Brother Pang off? Da Gui, do you feel any life fluctuations from the masks?"

  Dà Guì shook his head, and Dà Fú, who had been silent for a long time, spoke up: "Boss, assuming these are evil spirits, but after thousands of years, they won't wake up so quickly. I feel that person is around us, maybe those corpses are what he released to try and get rid of us. If these masks are evil spirits, that person will definitely use the same trick again." Dà Fú's voice was also very old and worn out, it seemed that this pair of brothers also had a story behind them.

  "Right! Makes sense, we'll rush in now. Even if those masked men wake up and fly, they can't be faster than us running. You rich and powerful ones take the lead, sense where that person is and bring me and Brother Lu to charge over. At that time, give that idiot a fatal blow. What do you think, Brother Lu?"

  Three oil-water bellies stared at me, waiting for my decision. I'm a very meticulous person, and I immediately realized that something was off. There were still Liu Lao's people in front of us, they must have also come through here, but why are these masks still motionless? If Liu Lao's people had also entered the Demon King's tomb, if what Oil-Water Belly said was true, then "he" would definitely try to stop them from advancing. But if these were cursed objects, why hadn't they been triggered yet?

  I told my doubts to You Shui Du, they didn't think of this point, and looked at each other in dismay. Then You Shui Du asked Da Gui: "Are you sure the previous group of people entered this cave?"

  Dà Guì's tone was very firm as he said, "I can clearly feel the thermal magnetic field emitted by these five people, it's very strong."

  Five people! I was extremely shocked when Da Gui said this, and I didn't expect his special ability to be so powerful that he even knew the number of people. I suppressed the shock in my heart and tried to make myself look calm.

  Oil Barrel patted my shoulder, I thought he was going to install a bug on me again. A reverse grab hurt him so much that he yelled "Ahh! Brother, easy does it, this time it's not a bug!"

  Upon hearing this, I carefully examined my shoulders and indeed found nothing. Only then did I release my grip on You Shui's hand. You Shui grasped his aching right hand and said, "I was asking what Brother Lu plans to do now?"