Chapter 25: Professor?

  At noon, Jin Tianxing, who was still fast asleep, smelled a tempting aroma and his stomach growled. He quietly got up and walked to the kitchen, where he saw Chen Ya busy cooking. The aroma came from the pot on the stove. Jin Tianxing swallowed hard. "Auntie Chen, what delicious dish are you making? Do you need my help?"

  Chen Ya looked up and saw Jin Tian Xing staring straight at the pot, and smiled, "Looking at you, I know you're starving, dinner will be ready soon, no need for your help, get your stomach ready to eat."

  Jin Tianxing didn't say anything and just stood at the kitchen door, "Wait for the dishes to be ready and I'll help you carry them."

  Lan Xilin stretched her waist and came out of the bedroom, smelling the fragrance and shouting loudly, "Mom, you made three cups of chicken? It's been a long time since I've eaten it, let me have a taste first."

  Chen Ya pushed Lan Xinlin out, "You thought of me at this time, how did you push me out of your room in the morning? The kitchen is my territory, no entry for idle people."

  Lan Xilin felt extremely wronged and shouted towards the blue sky, "Dad, did you see that? Mom bullied me, and you're not even managing your wife!"

  "I didn't see anything, I didn't hear anything." Lan Tian ran quickly into the study.

  "It's really unfair." Lan Xinlin turned around and saw Jin Tianhang behind the kitchen door, her face flushed again. "Are you feeling better?"

  "I'm fine." Jin Tian Xing suddenly found Lan Xin Lin a bit cute, reached out and scratched her nose, the action was quite ambiguous, "Little glutton!"

  Lan Xilin's face suddenly turned red like a ripe apple, and she caught sight of Chen Ya smiling at her out of the corner of her eye. She let out an "aiya" and ran back to her bedroom.

  Jin Tian Xing Meng's consciousness returned to what he had just done, looking at Chen Ya who was smiling next to him, feeling a bit uneasy, and escaped the kitchen under the pretext of putting away bowls and chopsticks.

  This lunch was eaten in an eerie atmosphere, with no one speaking. Blue Heart Lin's face turned red as she lowered her head and continued to shovel rice into her mouth. Chen Ya kept putting dishes into Jin Tian Xing's bowl. Blue Sky had a faint smile on the corner of his mouth, looking at Jin Tian Xing with deep meaning. He knew that the two elderly people must have misunderstood his relationship with Blue Heart Lin, but he didn't know how to open his mouth to explain.

  "We still have things to do, let's go first!" Jin Tian Xing put down his rice bowl and Lan Xin Lin grabbed the black wooden box and pulled him away quickly.

  Chen Ya reminded the two of them, "Come back early tonight."

  As she walked out of the building, Lan Xinlin hastily let go of Jin Tianxing's hand, and her face became even redder.

  However, Jin Tianxing did not notice him. He saw a figure he had been waiting for a long time - the mysterious Huang Furen. He was hesitating back and forth at the intersection not far away, apparently having something to consider.

  "We can't let him run away again." Jin Tian Xing quietly walked to the back of Huang Fren's shoulder and patted it, shouting loudly, "What are you doing!"

  Huang Fēngzi was startled and took off running without even looking to see who it was. Fortunately, the two of them had been prepared ahead of time, and Lán Xīnlín had already circled around to block his path.

  "It's you two!" Huang Fengzi let out a mouthful of air. "You two scared me to death."

  Jin Tian Hang sneered and said, "If you haven't done anything wrong, why be afraid of ghosts knocking on the door? Are you being pursued by an enemy because of some evil deed?"

  "Or maybe they owe someone money and haven't paid it back yet, so the creditor is pressuring them."

  Huang Fēngzi looked around, saw no one was paying attention to him, and lowered his voice to say, "A big shot from the Zōng Tiān Group has arrived. They are plotting something big, possibly related to Guī Zhǒng."

  Jin and Lan were both taken aback, and Lan Xinlin hastily asked, "How did you know?"

  "I met some high-ranking members of the Zongtian Group by Poyang Lake, they must have come with some big shots. They're going to make a big move."

  Jin Tianxing vigilantly looked at Huang Furen and asked, "What kind of person are you?"

  Huang Fēngzi puffed out his chest and said seriously, "I was a history professor long ago, now I'm an occultist. My name is Huang Zhen, you can just call me Professor Huang."

  Jin Tian Xing looked up and down at Huang Zhen, whose hair was messy like a bundle of straw, his clothes were no better than those of a beggar on the street, and his cloth shoes had holes that exposed his toes. From head to toe, there wasn't a single place that looked like a professor. "You're still a professor? If you're a professor, then I'm Bill Gates and my dad is too."

  Huang Zhen didn't argue, and from his pocket he pulled out a red work permit. Jin Tianxing opened it and took a look, on which was written "Professor Huang Zhen of the History Department of Zhonghua University". The photo was indeed of Huang Zhen, wearing a suit, with his hair combed neatly, wearing glasses with golden frames, exuding an air of bookishness, looking just like a professor. "Are you really a professor?"

  Huang Zhendeyi said with a smile, "There is a code on the work permit. If you don't believe me, you can call Tsinghua University to verify."

  "We believe you are a professor, and also believe that you are an occultist." Lan Xinlin returned the work permit to Huang Zhen. "Let's talk about the main issue. How much do you know about the mysterious events of Guiyuan and Lao Ye Temple? And how did you come into contact with the Zongtian Group?"

  "This is going to be a long story, let's find a place to sit down and talk."

  "There's a small park near my home, there aren't many people at this time, let's go talk there."

  Huang Zhen agreed, and Lan Xinlin led the two into the park, sitting down in the most secluded corner. Lan Xinlin urged, "Now you can answer our questions, right?"

  Huang Zhen asked the two of them, "Do you believe in immortals?"

  Jin Tian Xing immediately replied, "I don't believe it, if there really were immortals, the world would have been in chaos long ago."

  Lan Xinlin was not as absolute as Jin Tianhang, "Maybe there is, I'm not sure."

  "I'm a professor of history at the University of China, and my research focuses on human origins and the development of primitive cultures. During an archaeological excavation, I discovered a bronze tripod from the Zhou Dynasty with over 100 inscriptions on it - previously, the most we'd found on any Zhou Dynasty bronze artifact was around 10-20 characters. I deciphered the inscriptions, which told of a powerful tribe in the Yangtze River region before the Zhou Dynasty, with advanced culture and massive cities where everyone had enough food and could live for hundreds of years. Other tribes called them 'immortals.' When I saw this information, I was ecstatic - no one had ever mentioned these immortals building massive cities before! If I could find it, this discovery would shock the world. So I concealed the information on the inscriptions and followed their directions to search for it. Although I didn't find the city built by the immortals, I did discover many stories of people becoming immortals through spiritual practices, as well as legends about ghost temples and old masters that piqued my interest. And so I stayed, transforming from a historian to an occultist."

  "We don't want to hear about your work experience, we want to know what's your relationship with Zongtian Group?"

  "Listen, young man, I'm going to tell you everything I know. I've come to find you all and share my story with you, so listen carefully. Five years ago, I noticed a series of mysterious disappearances in the waters around Lao Ye Miao Temple. Every now and then, a ship would vanish, always at a fixed time. The ships and people on board were never seen again, or they'd reappear in ordinary places where no one would notice. Five years ago, a man from Hong Kong came to me, claiming he had escaped from Lao Ye Miao waters. At first, I didn't believe him, but he showed me an antique that made me change my mind. The antique was a priceless treasure listed on the cargo manifest of the missing ship, Shinoda Maru. I asked him to tell me his story in detail, but instead, he asked me a question - the same one I just asked you: 'Do you believe there are supernatural beings in this world?'"

  "Could the person you're talking about be Zong Kuo, the big boss of the Zongtian Group?" Lan Xinlin exclaimed.

  "It's him."

  Jin Tian Xing then asked, "I'm curious as to how you replied to him at that time."

  "My answer was the same as yours, I don't believe in gods either. But he told me that there really are gods and he saw a three-eyed god. Under my strong request, he told me about his experience. Like most people who mysteriously disappear, he was also here for tourism and relaxation. The boatman was a newcomer from outside and didn't know the horror of the old temple, so he mistakenly took the boat in. The lake surface shook violently, and after a burst of white light, when he opened his eyes again, he found himself in a mysterious cave. He was extremely frightened, alone in the mountain cave exploring, after about a day's time, a three-eyed man found him and asked if he wanted to become immortal and live for hundreds of years. He agreed. The three-eyed man took him to see the other passengers on the tour boat, when he saw the treasure-filled Godo Maru, he had evil intentions in his heart. The three-eyed man assigned each person a separate small room, taught them the method of cultivation, left behind a small amount of clean water and food, and then left. He lived a rough life with coarse tea and plain rice, all wanting to leave, every time the three-eyed man came, he would get some information from his mouth, finally one day, let him know that there was an underground river in the mountain cave leading outside. He picked out small valuable treasures from Godo Maru, made a simple airbag with several empty bottles, and after equipping himself, he killed the three-eyed man with a stone and escaped from the underground river. The underground river had rapid currents and dense reefs, slightly careless would be crushed to death, extremely dangerous, but somehow he was lucky enough to escape alive from the underground river. He sold some of the antiques and returned to Hong Kong, quickly rising in the underworld, using several years' time to become the underground emperor of Hong Kong. This time, he found me hoping to cooperate with me, help him find a way back to the underground cave, crack the method of becoming immortal. This time, he wants to be an immortal god. I agreed, his financial resources and technology plus my brain, soon I discovered that the Ghost Hill and the underground cave are connected, the Ghost Hill is actually the entrance and exit of the underground cave."

  Upon hearing this, Lan Xinlin finally heard some useful information and said, "So to say that three years ago, the Zongtian Group clashed with the police in order to seize the cultural relics inside the Ghost Tomb, searching for clues to become an immortal and enter the cave. But wasn't the Ghost Tomb destroyed by explosives?"

  "It was because of this incident that I realized Zong Kuo's wild ambition. If he were to grasp the secrets of the Ghost Cave, or even the entire cave system, it would be an absolute disaster. So, I quietly destroyed the research materials and found an opportunity to escape. Although Zong Kuo knew that the Ghost Cave was a passage into the cave system, he didn't know the method. In the end, he brought in two experts, planning to sneak back into the cave through the underground river, but didn't realize that the river had already been blasted shut. He then forcibly dug out a new path from the Ghost Cave. The two experts went down and never returned, and Zong Kuo, in a fit of rage, destroyed the Ghost Cave. This Ghost Cave is very strange; when I went to investigate again after a year, the area that had been blasted was restored. Now, it seems that the Zong Tian Group is preparing to enter the Ghost Cave once more."

  Jin Tianhang said, "Two masters are dead. I saw the two corpses in the cave and they have become skulls. I don't know how they died. You have grasped so many situations, why didn't you report to the police?"

  Huang Zhen muttered in a low voice, "I said the police would believe it, do you think they believed that Zong Kuo and the police were making such a big fuss just to become immortal? You don't even believe it, why would the police?"

  Lan Xilin thought of her sister and asked, "Three years ago, you reminded me that something was fishy about my sister's plane crash. What exactly happened?"

  "After I escaped, I didn't want to give up, so I kept watching from a distance. The white light that hit the plane your sister was on might have been caused by two experts entering the cave and triggering some mechanism, which wasn't part of the normal activation rule that day."

  "Is my sister still alive?"

  "It should be alive, in my opinion that white light should be some kind of transmission device, combining Zong Kuo and your experience, everyone who disappeared in the white light should be in the cave."

  "Why didn't they escape? Zong Kuo was able to escape."

  "They probably... probably... want to become immortals. To be an immortal, one must abandon the seven emotions and six desires, so even if they could return, they wouldn't come back."

  Lan Xilin was moved, "To become an immortal, even familial relationships are unwanted, and humans are no better than beasts, what's the point of being an immortal?"

  Jin Tian Xing also roared, "Luo Yi loves me, she won't leave me, she must have been imprisoned by someone."

  Huang Zhen lowered his head and said, "I know who your wife is. She's on that plane. Becoming a god requires going through a stage of forgetting one's emotions. She found you for this purpose. She might have some connection with the Zong Tian Group. Weren't they the ones who burned down your new house?"

  Jin Tian Xing's face changed, "You're investigating me?"

  "We wouldn't dare to come find you two if we didn't investigate your situation clearly." Huang Zhen glanced at Lan Xinlin, then lowered his head and continued, "You can rest assured, I've long since cut ties with Zong Kuo. I can tell you everything I know."

  "Then you can tell me," said Lan Xinlin, looking at him.

  "From what I currently know, a group of people claiming to be gods have an unknown origin. They worship eyes and possess technology that surpasses our era. They built a massive base at the bottom of the lake and accept new members from time to time. Many people wanted to investigate but ended up returning with their feathers clipped, including your grandmother Cai Qingqing."

  Jin Tianxing placed the black wooden box in front of Huang Zhen, "Can you determine where that group of people came from through this thing?"

  Huang Zhen opened the box in confusion and saw the Tianyan token inside. His eyes suddenly emitted two sharp lights, and he exclaimed in surprise, "How did this thing end up in your hands?"

  "This has nothing to do with you, can you tell me through this thing that you can judge the origin of those people who claim to be gods?"

  Huang Zhen picked up the three-eyed Buddha's head and examined it repeatedly, then took out various instruments from his pocket to test it for a long time. He said helplessly, "This seems to be a memory body, and the material can't be clearly stated. From the carving craftsmanship, it can't be determined which dynasty's work it is. Through carbon 14 testing, it may be possible to accurately determine its age of creation, but it takes some time. We don't have time now, and we can't let the Zongtian Group get ahead of us in entering the ghost tomb. They might take action today."

  "I have an idea," said Blue Heart Lin.