Chapter 47: Accidentally Entering Prison

  The journey ahead became even more difficult, and Liu Yi's physical strength was also severely depleted. Professor Zhou Tao may not be heavy, but at this moment, he was like a mountain, pressing down on Liu Yi.

  Liu Yi inched forward bit by bit, his arms had long been rubbed raw, and at this moment, under the increasing pressure, he was rubbing against the ground even more fiercely, with fresh blood dripping drop by drop into the black hole.

  He gritted his teeth and crawled on with effort.

  Professor Zhou Tao, who was on his back, felt his breathing getting heavier and said in a low voice: "Why don't you just put me down? I won't hold you back!"

  "It's just the beginning now, the road ahead needs you!" Liu Yi's voice was low, but his tone was firm and not to be refused.

  The more they crawled forward, the more dead poachers they encountered. When Liu Yi came across a body, he would climb over it and continue on his way without stopping for a moment.

  One corpse, two corpses, three, four, five, six corpses...

  Liu Yi estimated that just in this section of the narrow mountain path they had experienced, about twenty poachers had died. It seemed that apart from the members led by Huang Huzi and Huang Pangzi, there was another group of outlaws, and it was likely that when Huang Huzi was chased by Liu Yi and others into the Death Valley, he had merged with another group of outlaws.

  Liu Yi guessed in his heart: "These several unaffiliated individuals should all belong to the Ma family's criminal gang."

  He guessed it right, and that's the fact. The Ma family gang has more than a hundred people, who were hired by a mysterious foreign sorcerer this time to join the treasure hunting team. There is also a crucial factor here, which is that the leader of the Ma family gang claims to be a descendant of Ma Bufang, so it's possible that he has clues about Ma Bufang's previous treasure hunt in the holy land. Therefore, it makes sense for him to collude with foreign forces this time.

  Liu Yi thought to himself as he crawled forward with his head down, not knowing how long he had been crawling when he suddenly felt a lightness on his body, followed by the sound of "thud" hitting the ground. He was startled and quickly went to take a look.

  But then he saw Professor Zhou Tao leaning against him, his hand touching the wall of the cave and muttering: "It seems like there's a stone gate here!"

  Unbeknownst to them, the place they were in had become spacious enough for two people to crawl side by side, but it was still so low that everyone was bumping their heads and climbing, and because this change took place in a subtle and imperceptible way, no one noticed anything unusual.

  It was Professor Zhou Tao, who was crawling on Liu Yi's body, moving forward while borrowing the light from Liu Yi's arm lamp to feel the subtle changes and observing the stone walls on both sides, that discovered a hidden door here.

  Everyone behind stopped, taking advantage of Liu Yi and Professor Zhou Tao's research on the hidden door, they took the opportunity to lie down on the ground, resting their heads on their arms, taking a temporary rest.

  A hidden door was embedded in the stone wall, with a faint vertical mark on either side of the door and a small hole in the middle, which seemed to be a keyhole. When Liu Yi saw this, he suddenly remembered the stone key they had found in the belly of the "Black Widow" spider, so he took out the key and inserted it into the hole with a try-it-out mentality.

  Every stitch is in place, every radish has its own hole.

  Liu Yi was delighted in his heart and habitually turned to the right to open the door with a hidden lock, but it wouldn't budge. He then turned to the left, but still couldn't turn it!

  "Damn it!" Liu Yi cursed, just as he was about to give up and pull out the key. But then, the key suddenly turned three circles to the left in the dark hole, and then three circles to the right. After that, the secret door quickly retracted to both sides, opening like a sliding door! And the key fell to the ground.

  Liu Yi picked up the stone key and quickly led the way in, followed by cheers from the crowd as they crawled in one after another.

  Whatever happens next is better than being stuck in this dump.

  That place is too suffocating, it's so suffocating that you'd rather die.

  The dark entrance was not deep, only about two meters in length. They crawled in and out, entering a stone cave.

  They let out a collective sigh of relief as the suffocating feeling was greatly alleviated, and then they heard the secret door slam shut with a loud bang.

  Malacca smiled and said: "This stone gate is probably a cheating window opened by the little Sakyamuni of ancient times, right?"

  "Heaven knows!" Liu Yi muttered to himself and stood up.

  The place where they were was dark and humid, with a faint breeze blowing in, which felt much more comfortable than the dry and stuffy feeling of the sheep's intestine-like cave. Liu Yi, who had a keen sense of smell, faintly smelled the stench mixed in the wind.

  Generally speaking, corpse qi is divided into three types:

  The first is the corpse gas emitted by a person before death, this kind of corpse gas is like the magnetic field inside the human body, which can't be seen, touched or smelled, but crows can feel its existence. This is also why when a person is about to die, there are usually crows falling around, making loud noises, and therefore people call it the mourning bird.

  The second kind of corpse qi is what ordinary people can smell, the foul odor emitted when a person's body rots after death.

  The third kind of corpse energy is more eerie, referring to the kind of ethereal "dead bone energy" that forms after a person has been dead for many years and has turned into white bones. It's a smell like rotting tree roots mixed with soil from a distant era, and it was this third kind of corpse energy that Liu Yi smelled.

  Liu Yi was born with a sense of smell that was different from others. According to his master, Xuan Yun Dao Chang, he had a natural "ghostly sense of smell", and with time, he would definitely open up his "ghostly eyes".

  This statement is quite mysterious. Generally speaking, there are two types of divine eyes: one is the heavenly eye that can observe immortals and demons, and the other is the ghostly eye that can see ghosts and demons. The kind of great spiritual power possessed by Erlang Shen and Sun Wukong belongs to the category of heavenly eyes.

  Ghost eye usually refers to being able to see things that ordinary people can't see, such as ghosts and spirits, which is quite eerie.

  But this remark was met with Liu Yi's scorn, what a joke!

  So when Mount Tai's Xuan Yun Dao Zhang passed on his ghost-catching skills to him, he was refused by this guy with the excuse of "science above all", and the characteristics of these three corpse energies were personally told to him by Xuan Yun Dao Zhang at that time.

  But now Liu Yi is different from before, he has made up his mind that after going out this time, he must take some time to find his master and make up for his lessons. However, what he didn't think of was that the time left for him was not much!

  Liu Yi shouted: "Everyone be careful, there may be something unclean appearing here!"

  Lu Zonghan furrowed his brow and said, "Generally speaking, an old mansion that has been uninhabited for over a hundred years will always have a kind of inexplicable eerie atmosphere. But in this ancient cave, why don't I get this feeling?"

  Malacca smiled and said: "Don't be suspicious of gods and ghosts, no one has died here, how can there be a gloomy atmosphere?"

  Lu Zonghan glanced at Malacca and said slowly, "Heaven is yang, earth is yin. This underground place that's who-knows-how-many meters deep, if there wasn't any yin energy it wouldn't be possible. This is too abnormal!"

  Anyway, this guy just feels that something is wrong with this place, but he can't put his finger on what's wrong.

  Malacca ignored him, snatched the backpack from his hand and rummaged through it for food.

  Then everyone began to adjust before continuing to move forward.

  During this time, Liu Yi asked Keke Xi: "Do you know where this place is? Are there any legends about this place in your tribe?"

  Korksi leaned against the wall of the cave, sitting in the shadow of his flashlight, shaking his head slowly and saying: "Legend has it that the stone key inside the Black Widow's belly is the key to opening the last layer of the great gate of the Goat Jade Palace, but you used it to open a small door. This is too incredible! We may have stumbled into some mysterious place by mistake!"

  After adjusting, they continued on their way, and the road they walked was sloping downward, unknown how many kilometers deep into the ground.

  Not long after they left, numerous small caves of various sizes appeared on both sides of the stone cave. Everyone was curious and checked them one by one, only to find that these caves of different sizes were actually ancient prisons for detaining prisoners.

  Inside, the furnishings are simple, with stone pillars, chains and iron fences. Apart from this, there are also a few white bones.

  Liu Yi curiously asked Ke Xixi: "Why is there a prison in this holy land?"

  "You ask me, who am I supposed to ask?" Koxing said discontentedly.

  Liu Yi felt very helpless about this, and everyone was guessing blindly while staring at both sides and moving forward.

  "Just then, Ma Liu pointed ahead and shouted: 'Monster!'"

  Everyone was shocked and stopped in their tracks, looking forward to see two small eyes emitting yellow light suspended in the air about a hundred meters away in the darkness.

  "Whoa!" Liu Yi shone his flashlight at the creature, and saw a blurry black shadow flash by. The creature darted into a hole on the right side, its speed was very fast, and it vanished in an instant. However, everyone still caught a glimpse of its long tail under the light.

  "Perhaps it's a giant rat or some kind of pangolin monster!"

  It's probably just these two animals that would appear in a place like this, it definitely wouldn't be just one big tiger.

  Load bullets, distribute guns, line up on the left side and proceed with caution.

  "Absolutely it's a rat, nothing else, if it were something else that would be even more disastrous!"

  If it were a mouse, then this would be like a big tiger-sized mouse, how could it be so easily dealt with!

  "Wait!" cried Korksi, who was sandwiched in between the ranks.

  Everyone suddenly stopped in their tracks.

  "He slowly said: 'Do you still remember the secret of the great war of Qiangguo that I told you?'"

  Everyone's heart rose with a bad premonition. Liu Yi, who was quick-witted, instantly thought of the words he had said before and slowly spoke them out: "Among the twelve tribes, the only one that did not betray us is the Lingmou Qiang people, who have always been notorious for their ill repute. But their fate was a tragic one - it's said they were cursed, transformed into rats, forever sealed away in an unknown place, never to see the light of day again!"

  Ma Liu said: "So this is where the traitors are holding the Lingmou Qiang people captive?"

  Lu Zonghan said, "It must be so, if the legend is accurate. Then the strange creature we just saw must have been a mouse! Now there's no need to worry, even if it was a giant mouse, it would still be easy to deal with!"

  Korksi sneered and said: "Ordinary mice are naturally easy to deal with, I'm afraid the mice here aren't that easy to handle!"

  Malacca laughed and said: "The ancestors of the old fish have all been killed, what's there to fear from a single mouse?"

  "Advance!" Liu Yi ignored their debate and gave the order!