Volume 2 Return to the Continent Chapter 73 The Undying Stone

  "Legend has it that the Undying Stone was brought back by King Mu of Zhou from his travels to the Western Regions, a divine stone capable of making one's soul immortal after death." The old eunuch's eyes were filled with fervent heat.

  "But it is also a genuine evil stone. In the fifty years of life, how can there be eternal immortality? Not dying and not being destroyed is actually an evil path that reverses heaven and earth. For example, zombies are indestructible, souls disappear, and any form of longevity has its drawbacks. That is to say, there is no eternal life without paying a price. Anyone who covets the magical power of the Undead Stone will be controlled by its power and pay an unimaginable price.

  Cai Lingyu's gentle voice whispered: "We have come to this stone, as long as one person has greed for the Undead Stone and wants to use it to achieve immortality, we can never leave here. Because human choices come from greed, and greed determines a person's fate. No matter where we go, as long as we think about immortality, we will unconsciously return here, back to the face of the Undead Stone."

  Following Cai Lingyue's train of thought, I said in amazement: "From a physiological perspective, the goal of human struggle is reproduction. However, from a psychological perspective, it is the fear of death and the desire to live, that is, to live well and live as long as possible. Only by living can we have all possibilities. If everyone's subconscious mind regards eternal life as their greatest desire, then the place where the elixir of immortality is located will be the destination that everyone pursues. Since the purpose of human life is already in front of us, where else can we go?"

  "So we'll never be able to get out of here, this time we're dead for sure."

  "What does it matter, as long as we linger by its side, you and I will be immortal, as long as we don't kill ourselves, we'll never die." The corpse is actually the happiest person here.

  Then nobody spoke, their faces were solemn.

  The scene fell into an eerie silence, until...

  "What's going on, you guys? I don't understand a word! Are you bullying me because I didn't read much?! Barza got angry: "I'm asking, this broken stone is so ordinary, why do you say it's a divine stone? Are you kidding me?! All treasures are obtained by digging or robbing, I've never seen any treasure popping out of the ground on its own!"

  As he spoke, with his hands tied behind him, he walked up to the Life and Death Stone and kicked it hard with one foot.

  Everyone is now very annoyed, and no one stopped it.

  Bang... the Undying Stone of Rebirth... shattered.

  "What the hell have you done!" The old man's hands and feet were icy cold.

  We were shocked to discover that the stone cracked open with countless fine lines, leaking out a yellow light source.

  Then, more and more fine lines appeared, like the cracking of eggshells, with a crackling sound, after which the outer shell of the stone completely shattered and fell off.

  A huge crystal clear pale yellow amber appears before our eyes.

  Inside the amber, a man with an unusual appearance was squatting. I took a glance and my heart was racing wildly, this person looked exactly the same as the god on the scorpion's back that I saw inside the golden pyramid.

  "This is the true face of the Undying Stone...". Tian Wenliang swallowed his saliva.

  Bei Chuan glared at Balza: "Tall guy, you should believe it this time."

  The true face of the "Undying Stone" is a massive piece of amber that was formed in ancient times. Inside, it seals a perfectly preserved corpse of an early human being.

  "Who is this person?" I asked.

  "I don't know, maybe it's an unlucky egg that was accidentally wrapped in tree resin for nearly ten thousand years, or perhaps it's the source of this undying stone's mysterious power... which would make it a divine spirit from ancient times!" Cai Lingyu replied, himself also uncertain.

  The old eunuch again shamelessly crawled onto the amber stone, his withered skin like that of an ancient tree constantly rubbing against the surface of the stone, a lewd expression on his face as if he was being obscene, drooling: "Rubbing off the immortal aura!"

  Everyone was stunned by the magic of amber.

  I was much calmer, and thought to myself: "Could it be that the man sealed in amber is the brother of the god on the scorpion's back, also known as the other twin child from the golden pyramid mural? I've found both main characters from the murals. This forest should also be a place where those underground civilizations existed and were active."

  Balza came to from the initial shock and said, "This person's movements are too calm, it doesn't seem like they were suddenly sealed in unexpectedly, otherwise there should be signs of struggle. It's more like he was dead and then someone made him into amber... Ah, how do I put it, yes, embalmed!"

  Balza said so, I interjected: "So to say, this amber is equivalent to a crystal coffin?"

  "Burial ground?" Cai Lingyu's eyebrows jumped, and he immediately shook his head, saying in a low voice: "The direction is not right, it can only be one of the accompanying burial pits."

  Cai Lingyu's words did not escape my ears, and I immediately asked: "Anyway, you can't get out of here, and you'll die sooner or later. Can you just tell me what this place is?"

  Cai Lingyu was silent for a while, and just when I thought there was no hope, she suddenly spoke up and said: "This is a graveyard, the owner of the graveyard is called... Xu Fu."

  "Isn't that Xu Fu who cheated Qin Shi Huang out of his money and then sold 5,000 boys and girls into slavery?" I, Tian Wenliang, Balza, even the old eunuch were all stunned.

  "Not bad, it's Lord Xu Fu." said Kitakawa no Kami with reverence.

  "Xu Fu, with the help of the Qin dynasty's power, gathered almost all the materials about immortality since pre-Qin times, including this 'Rebirth and Immortality Stone'! Cai Lingyu paused for a moment before continuing: "He escaped from Qin Shi Huang's control, crossed over to Japan in the east, and after the fall of the Qin dynasty and the establishment of the Western Han, he secretly returned with his people to their hometown, where he built his own mausoleum. It is buried with all the treasures that are beyond one's wildest imagination from his lifetime."

  "Are you here to search for treasure again?" I blurted out.

  "Hehe, what about you guys?" Cai Lingyu smiled beautifully.

  I looked at Tian Wenliang and saw him shrug his shoulders: "The top didn't explicitly say so." Anyway, we didn't believe a word he said.

  "If it's about eternal life information, no one with power and influence wouldn't be moved by this." I was enticed in my heart, this temptation is really too great.

  We went out again and again, but every time we came back to the starting point. Whether running or walking, the final outcome was surprisingly consistent. We simply couldn't leave this place.

  "Come one by one!" Cai Lingyu commanded.

  She pointed at one of her men and told him to leave.

  An hour later, this person returned here with a bewildered face.

  Then he tried five or six people in a row, with the same result.

  "You bunch of greedy pigs seeking eternal life!" Kitaoji was furious, and Kikyo used a move from the Eastern Sword Technique called "Yanfen" to cut off some Japanese men's hair, saying: "A warrior must have a determination to die, only with a heart full of death can you walk out of here!"

  After finishing speaking, he snorted disdainfully and ridiculed everyone, swaggering out alone.

  An hour later, he walked back with a dead face.

  Without making a sound, he sat down at the foot of a big tree and fell fast asleep. I thought to myself, it seems that your martial arts skills have also been practiced on pigs.

  "Now we're stuck in a deadlock." Cai Lingyu's thinking was very clear, she said to us several captives. Apparently, she didn't think his ability under him was high except for killing people.

  "As long as you're afraid of death, you can't leave this place. But the more you can't leave, the less likely you are to die. However, once time has passed for a very long while, normal people will get tired of this dull life and lose their longing for immortality. That's when it's a good opportunity to leave. Cai Lingyu sighed bitterly: "However, this cycle might be very long, lasting dozens or even hundreds of years. Because no one knows whether leaving the influence range of the Reincarnation Stone will cause immediate aging and death. Deepening fear may prevent us from taking that final step."

  "Has anyone discovered a strange phenomenon?" Xie Ba suddenly said, breaking his silence. I looked at him curiously, knowing from our previous conversation that he was the one who had mistakenly entered here this morning and was caught by Cai Lingyu.

  "What?" Balza asked.

  "We are not the first batch of people to come here. It's impossible that only our group has entered the range of Wusong Shitou, if someone came before us, why didn't we discover them?" Xie Bao said.

  I was shocked by what I heard: "They either killed themselves or were killed, died without a whole body, or... they escaped from here!"

  All of a sudden, we regained our hope of escaping.

  Then several of us gathered together to think hard, Cai Lingyu wrote down the ideas we came up with on the ground one by one, and after discussion, it was found that none of them were feasible.

  "If it were dead, I could get out." I stuck out my tongue and asked the old eunuch, "Can you knock someone to death, but they're actually not dead, and then come back to life after a while, is that okay?"

  The old eunuch pouted and said, "Little rabbit, once you're dead, you're dead. You can't come back to life. My turtle breath is just a fake death, it's just that my metabolism has been reduced to the lowest value necessary to sustain life."

  "Relying solely on human power, we can't get out. As long as it's a person, they will eventually walk back by themselves." Tian Wenliang sighed.

  "Damn it, what to do?" Balza was sulking, we were all frowning and worried. He looked at the birds flying in the sky and sighed: "If only I could turn into a grassland eagle, I could fly wherever I want, no need to be trapped in this broken place."

  "Even if you turn into a plane, you'll still crash here, unless you turn into air or fart and get let out! Hahaha... I can only rely on telling low-class jokes to ease the tense atmosphere."

  "Human power is insufficient, and can only rely on the objective forces of nature without subjective emotions." Cai Lingyue came to this conclusion.

  I narrowed my eyes, gazed at the sky, and recalled Barza's words. After a moment of contemplation, I suddenly felt a spark in my mind, and an immature idea popped out of my brain.

  "Maybe we can try being birds..." I muttered.

  ……

  Three days later, everyone worked together to cut down all the big trees within a fifty-meter radius.

  I modified my unopened parachute, using a large number of thin wooden strips as a frame, and made two simple large gliders. Others used tent canvas to make relatively rough versions.

  "I hope your idea works." Cai Lingyu's eyes sparkled as she spoke to me.

  I also dare not guarantee it, pointing to the sky: "The planning of a thing is in man's hands, but its success is in heaven."

  Everything is ready, only waiting for the east wind.

  We anxiously waited for seven days and finally encountered a day with strong winds.

  I and Cai Lingyu sat on either side of a large hang glider. As the leader, I took the lead to set an example.

  I was untied, and a faint body fragrance wafted from Cai Lingyu's body, startling me.

  "Let's go!" Several of the Dragon Squad members shouted, heaved their hang gliders over their heads and took off in a mad dash, while another group held onto a rope and ran forward like they were flying kites.

  Tried three times, fell three times.

  The fourth time, a strong gust of wind suddenly rose. I and Cai Lingyu flew up!

  The higher I go, the stronger the wind is today, and my face hurts from being blown by the strong gusts.

  At an altitude of two hundred meters, the rope broke.

  We glided along the paraglider's descent trajectory, drifting eastward.

  Not long after, it had already left a distance of hundreds of meters from the Wuyinshi stone, without any tendency to fly back.

  I'm finally relieved, it's been over 10 days, I've finally escaped.

  At this time, not far away, the high mountain where the person was located revealed its true appearance.

  We're falling down there fast.