Chapter 7: The Heavenly Eyes Formation

  After eating something, I took a photo of the stone tablet with the camera they brought in, and then sat down to chat with the old man. Su Yi, Wu Feng, and Wen Long were playing cards on one side, and it was surprising that there was a deck of cards here, which made me feel a bit uncomfortable at first. Later, I realized that Wen Long had been used to carrying something on his right leg when he was in the army, so he felt a bit uneasy if he didn't have anything tied to his right leg, and even walking would make him feel a bit awkward. So he tied some small things together into a small box and bound it to his right leg. This is convenient, I thought, wherever we go, we can play cards wherever we want.

  The old man chatted with me about things after I left, such as my parents' situation. When he heard that my parents had been abroad for many years, the old man hummed twice. I asked him again, but he didn't say anything. I wondered if there was something wrong between him and my parents back then. After chatting for a while, we ran out of things to talk about. I decided to end this long conversation, so I said: "Old man, since we came here with blood, will using blood somewhere open up an exit or something?"

  "What did you say?" The old man suddenly stared at me and asked.

  "I said... " I said cautiously: "If we drip some blood somewhere here, will it open an exit?"

  The old man suddenly jumped up and took two steps, saying: "Oh dear, conventional thinking is going to be the death of me."

  "I said: 'Old man, what's wrong?'"

  The old man said, "Wen Long and I didn't think of using blood because we didn't know how to get in here, so that formed our mindset. The key is Wu Feng and Su Yi, these two are used to listening to my orders, when I'm not around, they still think about something, but as soon as I am, they immediately become lazy. Stop messing around, let's start the experiment."

  We searched the entire space carefully on the ground, which wasted a lot of time, but no bloodstains were found. So we focused our attention on the stone monument, and there was clearly no bloodstain on it. With an experimental spirit, we dripped blood onto the monument and its base, with no reaction at all.

  Wu Feng looked and said: "Is it a swimming pool?"

  "My god, that pool of water, if you want to dye it red, I reckon you'd have to bleed someone directly into it. Whether one person is enough or not is a problem, but more importantly, it's running water, so the blood would probably be washed away."

  Wu Feng said: "Then we can only divide into regions, one person per region for the blood test. Fortunately, there are many of us."

  The old man put his hands behind his back, thought for a moment and said: "There's one more thing, that kind of plant."

  Wen Long said: "Old man, you're not mistaken, are you? The area of that plant is quite large, although it won't sweep away, but I think one person should be enough."

  The old man said: "Let's try it with a drop first."

  "Grow, grow." Wen Long said as he pricked his own finger and squeezed out blood to smear on the shiny plant on the wall.

  The silver light began to disappear, replaced by a red color produced from that drop of blood. First, the plants at the edge of the blood turned red, then the area grew larger and larger, but still emitted light. The silver light disappeared, followed by the red light, and the entire room became a bloody red color. It was a bit frightening. I felt Su Yi leaning in closer to me.

  "Wu Feng said: "Old man, what's this?""

  The old man said: "Does this plant have the ability to change color?"

  A "gurgling" sound came from the pool, and we found that the red color of the plant had extended into the water. The water in the pool was bubbling like it was boiling, but the water level hadn't dropped obviously.

  "What's going on? Is there an exit under the water?" Wen Long said.

  "It's impossible," said the old man. "Even if there is an exit down below, but if it's all water, we don't have any diving equipment and can't go down at all."

  Just as we were talking, we heard a "rumbling" sound coming from afar. We looked towards the source of the sound and saw that the stone monument had risen up, stopping about two meters higher than before. We clearly saw that under the monument was an empty space like a doorway. We all looked at Wen Long because this kind of exploration activity still suited his skills and abilities best. Wen Long turned on his flashlight and shone it into the empty space, took a look, and said: "It's another slide."

  "Are you going down or not?" I asked the old man, who was now in command here.

  "It's estimated that it won't work if we go down any further." Su Yi said, pointing to a place with her hand.

  We followed her finger and looked at the place where Wen Long wiped the blood. The plants there had started to change color again, but this time they didn't turn silver, but turned yellowish-brown, and no longer glowed. It felt like they were withering away. Moreover, that withered area was spreading rapidly, just like a countdown timer. I took in a breath of cold air, because I heard the faint "rumbling" sound of the stone tablet, and found it slowly descending.

  "Isn't it just once?" Wu Feng's voice was shaking a bit.

  The old man said firmly: "Get down quickly."

  Those people were clearly coordinating in an orderly manner, Wen Long jumped down first, he was the scout, and Lao Yezi was second. Wu Feng waved at me, and then jumped down third, I was considering whether to let Su Yi go down first when she grabbed me to the entrance of the cave, by this time the inside of the cave had become dark, it seemed that a large area of those plants had died, the stone tablet had descended to about one meter. Su Yi didn't give me a chance to speak, with one kick she kicked me down, at the same time I felt her sliding down from behind. Another roller coaster experience, another darkness.

  This time the duration was longer, about a few minutes, and I felt the slide slowing down, getting slower and slower. It seemed like it was almost over. After another few seconds, I fell again, holding my breath, ready to enter the water. "Plop", this time the falling time was obviously shorter than before, and I also heard a voice from below saying: "You damn well come down quickly, you're crushing me." A bad thought flashed through my mind, then I felt a weight on my body.

  "Sister, you're coming down too quickly." I was pressed so hard that I could only squeeze out these few words.

  Wu Feng's voice came from below, saying: "Are you daring or not? Come down first and then talk. I'm about to be crushed."

  At this time, a bright light came over, shining on our heads. Our eyes were a bit unaccustomed to it for a moment, but soon recovered. It was Wen Long's wolf eye flashlight, and next to him was the old man. The three of us struggled to get up. Looking around, this place is very large, should be a cave. The wolf eye flashlight mainly illuminated rocks.

  "What should we do now?" Wu Feng asked the old master.

  Wen Long said: "I think we should go in that direction." Wen Long pointed his flashlight in one direction.

  "Why?" Wu Feng asked.

  Wen Long turned off the flashlight, and we fell into darkness, but not complete darkness, because a faint silver light came from that direction. The old man's voice came from the darkness: "Let's go in that direction, let's take it one step at a time."

  Wen Long turned on the flashlight again and led the way in that direction. This time, Lao Yezi and I walked in second and third place, with Wu Feng bringing up the rear. As we walked, Wen Long reported on the situation, reminding us to watch our step here, there's a ditch over there, and so on. After walking for about 500-600 meters, Wen Long suddenly stopped.

  "What's going on?" asked the old man.

  Wen Long shone his flashlight on both sides and the top, saying: "You see, the top of the cave has become lower, and the distance between the two sides is also shorter. This suggests that there should be an entrance ahead."

  The old man patted his shoulder and said: "Let's keep going."

  After walking another 500-600 meters, a cave entrance indeed appeared in front of us. Wen Long turned off his flashlight, and from the entrance emitted a silver glow. We saw that unfamiliar plant again, emitting a silver light.

  Wen Long looked back at the old man, and the old man nodded slightly. Wen Long led the way into the hole. Here was another space, but it was a circular space that showed signs of artificial processing. The unknown plants covered the entire space. When I entered this space, my head immediately made a "buzzing" sound, accompanied by dizziness. It wasn't that my physical strength was failing me, but I saw eight identical holes on the walls around me.

  "I couldn't help but let out a loud shout: 'Heavenly Vision Formation of a Hundred Eyes!'"

  Behind me, Su Yu's kick made me stumble forward, and a voice came: "What are you yelling about? Don't block the way." I only then remembered that there were two people behind me who hadn't come in yet. When Wu Feng entered, he stuck something on the entrance of the cave, probably leaving a mark.

  Wen Long stopped and looked at me, saying: "What's up, what do you want to say?"

  I nodded and said: "That's a big deal. If we wander around, we'll really be dead for sure."

  Mr. Su looked at the entrance of the cave, and there were no glowing plants inside. The light could only shine in a little bit, giving off a somewhat eerie feeling. Mr. Su observed carefully and asked me, "What did you mean by 'Baiyan Tongtian Array' just now?"

  "What I mean is that this thing is extremely troublesome." I said, "This is one of the ancient array diagrams. I always thought it only existed in theory, but I didn't expect it to actually appear before my eyes."

  The old man asked: "What's the point of this? Tell me about it."

  Ancient formation charts are divided into two categories: dynamic and static. The so-called "dynamic" refers to the formation chart formed by people, which can change when launched, such as the well-known "long snake array". Of course, there is also a way to break the dynamic formation, because with so many people forming the formation chart, there must be weaknesses, and breaking through one point can break the dynamic formation. In those days of the Three Kingdoms period, Cao Ren set up the Eight Gates Golden Lock Formation, but was seen through by Xu Shu, allowing Zhao Yun to kill him thoroughly.

  But Jing is not that simple, Jing array is an array composed of natural substances, such as stones and so on. And Jing array is divided into Tian Di array and Ji Guan array, Tian Di array is a diagram that conforms to the principles of heaven and earth, if done well, it can even produce natural weather conditions, for example, when Zhuge Kongming set up the Eight Arrays Diagram by the river, Lu Xun was trapped inside, almost didn't come out, fortunately, Kongming's father-in-law led Lu Xun out and told him, "wherever you feel cool, stay there".

  Of course, there is another type of array, the organ array, which can really take lives. The hundred-eye sky-through array in front of us now is this kind of array, and it's also a top-notch one among its kind. The principle is simple: in a space with nine entrances, apart from one entrance and one exit, the remaining seven paths are all dead ends. Of course, don't think that you can just casually choose a path to walk through, because inside there are also life-threatening mechanisms, more importantly, on the so-called exit path, there are also mechanisms, they just aren't fatal. Of course, if you're lucky and find the exit path in one try, it's not a problem, but ancient people wouldn't let you pass that easily, because after walking through this passage, you'll face another choice of nine entrances, and there will be a total of nine such choices.

  The old man listened to my account and thought carefully about something, Wen Long said: "Will there be any mechanism?"

  I looked at Wen Long who was eager to try and said: "It's best not to try those mechanisms, I dare say that even if you're extremely capable, it's still impossible to pass."

  Wen Long said disdainfully: "Even if there are mechanisms, after thousands of years of history, they're probably all broken, what kind of impact can they have?"

  Wu Feng shook his head and refuted, "The wisdom of the ancients is far deeper than we imagine. Their techniques in preventing corrosion and rust are even more advanced than those of modern civilization."

  He said, "Indeed, their wisdom is beyond our imagination. For example, this Hundred Eyes Heavenly Formation, how many human and material resources do you think it would take to build such an underground formation? Yet the ancients were able to complete it, perhaps even with today's machinery we wouldn't be able to accomplish it."

  Wen Long said firmly, "Maybe we can try. I'll go take a look. After all, I've received professional training and have some defensive capabilities against those mechanisms. If I encounter any mechanisms, I'll come back, and if that's the case, everyone can think of another way."

  I shook my head and said: "Absolutely not, if you leave like this, then you will never be able to come back to this place again."

  "Wen Long asked in surprise: 'Why didn't anything happen when we came in through that passage just now?'"

  I said: "Because that is a necessary path, there's nothing to it, but if you walk on the road with mechanisms, I believe that the mechanism there must be a compound mechanism."

  Wen Long looked at me, sneered and said: "Maybe you can't get through, but I've received professional training. I dare to guarantee that I can dodge those traps and find a way back. How about it? Want to give it a try?"

  I looked at Wen Long, shook my head hard and said: "You can't do it, the compound mechanism is not as simple as you think. To put it simply, when you're walking in the middle, you trigger a mechanism, a hole opens underground, it's not very deep, but there are sharp nails inside, and they're coated with poison..."

  Wen Long hastily said: "Don't worry, when I step on that mechanism, I will naturally jump forward or backward and won't fall into this kind of trap."

  I nodded and said, "Yes, you're already dead. The compound mechanism is designed to trigger simultaneously in both the front and back directions when you step on it. For example, poison needles. At this moment, you would naturally jump forward or backward, and if you don't move, you'll fall into the pit. I can determine your death on the spot."

  "How is this possible..."