Chapter 237

Chapter 237

The moment I dashed into the tunnel, the nine flying-head creatures behind me immediately gave chase.

They hovered through the air, the spines and ribs trailing beneath their heads waving like octopus tentacles. The sight was indescribably eerie.

The tunnel was not particularly narrow, so I could run normally without ducking my head.

At the same time, I continued communicating with Roundy through our mental link.

“Stupid bird, they left me no choice. I ran into the tunnel on the east side.”

“What?! Wu, why did you go in there alone? It might be dangerous!”

Roundy’s surprised voice rang out in my mind.

I was at a loss for words.

“What else could I do? Nine flying-head creatures as strong as vicious corpses were attacking me from all sides. If I hadn’t entered the tunnel, I would’ve died anyway. I might as well come in and see what’s here. At least this can buy me some time. Once you and Old Cao arrive, hurry into the tunnel and find me.”

Fortunately, Roundy and I were mentally linked and could speak to each other across a distance. As long as we were not in the middle of an intense fight and too distracted to communicate, we could check on each other’s situations at any time.

Huff, huff, huff…

The flying-head creatures pursued me from behind, making a sound like living people taking deep breaths.

Now that they were no longer deliberately concealing their presence, the noise was quite loud. With all nine sounds mingling together, it was practically one enormous snore.

In the dark, deathly still underground space, it sounded eerie and grating.

Neither the beam of my flashlight nor the night vision I gained by covering my eyes with qi could show me more than a limited distance ahead. I could not see through the entire passage.

To avoid suddenly crashing into something dangerous, I did not dare use the light-footwork technique Eight Steps to Catch a Cicada. I simply ran at my normal speed.

That also meant I could not completely shake off those damned things. They stayed three to five meters behind me, pursuing me relentlessly.

“Damn! Why are these flying-head creatures so stubborn? I haven’t done a thing since barging in here. Chasing me for a while should’ve been enough, so why won’t they let me go?”

I was getting frustrated.

At the same time, I felt both shocked and worried.

I was shocked that such a long underground passage existed inside the mountain behind the school. It wound deep into the mountain, and there was no telling how far it extended or where it led.

I was worried that if the tunnel ended at a wall or some other dead end, I still would not escape having to fight all nine flying-head creatures head-on.

“Wu, how are you doing?”

“I’m still running through the tunnel! It’s really long. I think it goes all the way into the depths of the mountain behind the school. Those flying-head creatures are still chasing me.”

“Hold on! I’ve already flown onto the school grounds. I’ll be there to back you up any moment! Old Cao will be two or three minutes behind me.”

When it truly mattered, Roundy was still dependable.

Since it was a bird and could fly there in a straight line, it would probably take only a little over a minute to reach me from the school gate.

After we exchanged a few words, I suddenly felt a faint pain in my head. It was as though needles were pricking both temples, and specks of light flickered before my eyes.

“What’s going on?”

I was puzzled.

Communicating with Roundy through our mental link did consume some of my mental strength, but the amount was negligible. Even if we maintained long-distance mental communication for an hour, it might not leave me dizzy or seeing stars.

Yet we had only exchanged a couple of sentences!

Unless…

I was under a mental attack!

Alarmed, I looked back.

Sure enough, the flying-head creatures pursuing me from several meters away looked different than before. Bloodred light shone from their eyes, and their mouths gaped wide. Without the constraint of a living person’s lower jaw, their mouths could open as completely as a snake’s.

Faint gray vortices flickered in and out of sight inside their mouths. They seemed to be inhaling in my direction.

The moment I saw this, realization dawned on me.

“These flying-head creatures can directly attack a person’s soul? They can even suck someone’s soul straight out of their body from a distance! Is that how Wang Xinren died?”

I had already guessed the truth behind his death!

Last night, one of the flying-head creatures had most likely emerged from the stone wall beneath the overgrown grave for some reason–whether by accident or because of something I did not yet know–and sucked Wang Xinren’s soul out of the nearby student dormitory from a distance.

He was only an ordinary person, after all. Faced with something as sinister as a flying-head creature devouring his soul, he naturally had no power to resist.

He had probably died on the spot. Once a flying-head creature sucked away and devoured a person’s soul, that person was unquestionably dead.

If there was any consolation at all, perhaps it was that he had died without pain.

As for me, I was an esoteric practitioner with a considerable level of cultivation. I had also learned secret methods for strengthening the soul from Master, while internal martial arts themselves helped anchor the soul and calm the mind. With all those protections combined, there was no way these flying-head creatures could so easily suck my soul out from a distance!

But there were nine of them. With so many pulling at once, they could still make my head ache and leave me dizzy!

“Damn it! These things are truly sinister. They have hard, sharp spines they can use as whips, spears, and other weapons, and they can directly suck out people’s souls too? That’s absurd!”

I had no choice but to circulate the flow of qi from my dantian and divert part of it to protect my head. Only then did I counter the flying-head creatures’ soul-sucking technique.

Just then, I suddenly noticed a faint glow ahead…

A dim blue light came toward me.

And it grew brighter and brighter.

I also caught the scent of damp air flowing past my nose and felt a faint breeze brush my face.
Hm?

My heart jolted.

“Have I reached the end of the tunnel? There’s a broad patch of light, and the breeze means air is circulating… At least this isn’t a dead end blocked by a stone wall or the mountain itself. It should open into a spacious underground area, right? That’s good. At least I’ll have more room to maneuver and wait for Roundy and Old Cao.”

At that thought, my five toes abruptly clenched against the ground, tightening the muscles in my calves and thighs. I adjusted my breathing and shifted into the light-footwork technique Eight Steps to Catch a Cicada.

Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh!

My speed surged. I shot forward, widening the gap between me and the flying-head creatures behind me by a little.

Then I charged into an underground cavern at the end of the tunnel.

In an instant, it was as though I had entered a world shrouded in blue light!

“Incredible! There’s actually a natural light source in a cavern deep beneath the mountain?”

I was astonished.

But I had no time to look carefully, because the flying-head creatures behind me…

Uh, wait!

Why did it seem as though I could no longer hear those strange noises like someone breathing hard at close range?

While I was fleeing, that death-knell sound had followed me without pause.

Curious, I glanced back without slowing my steps.

All the flying-head creatures were hovering at the tunnel exit, bunched together as the spines hanging beneath their heads waved like tentacles.

They had actually stopped flying forward and did not enter this blue-lit cavern!

“Huh? What’s happening? Did these flying-head creatures stop chasing me?”

But I quickly realized that they might not dare enter this cavern!

Of course, it was also possible that the evil cultivator who had created them had ordered them not to enter the blue-lit cavern. In that case, their range was limited to the underground space beneath the overgrown grave and the tunnel running through the mountain.

“I hope it’s the second possibility. Otherwise, if even this many flying-head creatures are afraid to come in, I’ve only escaped the wolves to land in a tiger’s den!”

I felt rather helpless.

At that moment, Roundy’s voice sounded in my mind.

“Wu, you’re not dead yet, are you? Make a sound if you’re still alive. Your big brother is already above that miserable grave. I’m coming in right now!”

“You stupid bird, can’t you wish me well for once?”

I complained jokingly, then warned it,

“Fat bird, I’ve reached the end of the tunnel. It opens into an even larger underground cavern, and those flying-head creatures seem afraid to come inside. They’re all blocking the tunnel exit, so don’t try to force your way through alone! Wait beneath the grave for Old Cao, then come together.”

Roundy sounded surprised, but said it understood. It told me not to act rashly either and to be careful in everything I did.

Only then did I finally have time to cautiously examine the enormous underground cavern…

At first glance, its floor area was at least as large as the auditorium where our school held its arts performances–the equivalent of more than a dozen classrooms put together.

The cavern was only about seven or eight meters high, so the space felt oppressive overall.

Stalactites hung from the ceiling, while stalagmites rose from the ground below, interlocking like jagged teeth.

This was clearly a natural limestone cavern!

That astonished me even more. There was actually a limestone cavern beneath the mountain behind the school?!

“We learned in geography class that limestone caves are a feature of karst terrain. But strictly speaking, the area around eastern Sichuan and western Yu shouldn’t have karst terrain.”

I pondered this silently.

Still, perhaps small underground caverns could exist in isolated spots.

Geology was a broad field concerned with large-scale patterns, after all.

As I carefully examined the walls and ceiling of the underground cavern, I found the source of the blue radiance filling it–a strange blue bioluminescent plant growing on the rock walls!

The plants looked somewhat like clusters of moss, but their surfaces were smooth, with a texture resembling plastic. Their entire bodies emitted a deep blue glow…

A single clump of this mosslike plant did not give off much light, but it grew all over the walls and ceiling of the cavern. Together, they shed enough light to make the cavern dimly visible.

“Since this is a limestone cavern, there’s probably an underground water system nearby. That would explain why it’s so damp and why I can smell the faint moisture in the air.”

As I thought, I carefully walked around the cavern.

Sure enough!

I found an underground river in the cavern’s northeast corner.

The visible section was a little over one zhang wide and more than twenty meters long. It emerged from beneath a wet rock face on the cavern’s western side, flowed straight ahead, and disappeared beneath the mountain to the right.

The current was so slow that it made almost no sound. Otherwise, I would have noticed it as soon as I entered the cavern instead of having to search for it.

I shone my flashlight onto the underground river. The water was visibly crystal clear, yet its depths were impossible to see. Here in this subterranean world, it gave off a faintly uncanny air.

“From a geographical perspective, this underground river was probably formed by springwater that accumulated in the subterranean rock layers within the mountain. It then flows northeast through cracks in the rock and should eventually merge underground with the Chuan River.”

“But from the perspective of feng shui…”

I held my chin and frowned in thought for a moment.

“This should be an exceedingly rare… water dragon vein!”