No one could've expected that the fall of the ancient city would result in the palace hall being damaged as well. After entering inside, only abysmal darkness awaited them. The despair filled screams of those who fell down kept echoing for a long, long time…
It seemed as if it was an endless abyss!
Those who were walking along the path felt goosebumps when they saw this scene, causing their legs to wobble in fear. Some of the cowards were frightened and lost strength, dropping to the ground in a powerless state. If it weren't for their good luck of stepping on the path, they would've fallen into the abyss.
The path before them had some places which were empty while some places existed. After passing through it, an age-old palace came into view. It looked pretty simplistic and had indistinct ancient designs on the walls which gave off a very mysterious feel as if it had survived through many great changes of time.
The party moved towards it.
"What's written on this wall?"
The design on this wall looked clearer, it consisted of patterns and characters and had a complicated attire on the carving.
"This dress looks like that of the soldiers from the Ming Dynasty."
Professor Xu came over with the support of another person. He looked carefully at the design on the wall then nodded, "Indeed, it's the formal dress worn by a General of the Ming Dynasty. It ought to be of a 5th Rank Garrison Commander. If I'm right, the person drawn here should be Wang Chonglin from back then."
"What do the characters say?"
"This isn't the writing of the Western Regions so I can't make sense of it. Hmm, how come there's a devil drawn on this side?"
Jiang Xiu couldn't make sense of it as well. He surmised that it must be the native script.
"I can tell you!"
All of them looked towards the source of the voice, Xie Ting, who had currently clenched her fists tightly as she shivered, "It says that the City Lord of the Ancient City encountered a branch of the Ming Dynasty's Army in the desert. They had fainted over there and severely dehydrated. He brought them to the Ancient City to save them but had never expected this would be the prelude to a nightmare."
Xie Ting continued, "These Ming Dynasty soldiers were amazed to find that the natives of the Ancient City possessed martial cultivation, even a 10-year-old child could easily defeat the strongest expert among them. They didn't dare imagine the consequences if such a race attacked the Ming Dynasty one day."
"General Wang, Wang Chongling, who was the Garrison Commander stationed at the Western Regions had given the order to bury this danger in its cradle before it matured. They knew very well that they weren't a match of the natives with regards to military force, so they decided to use poison. In spite of the City Lord saving those people, those demon-like Min Dynasty people poisoned the food during the natives' Holy Pilgrimage Festival then massacred the entire Ancient City with their blades."
After hearing this, everyone lowered their heads in shame.
"Back then, the Holy Woman who intended to make the pilgrimage, as well as a few people who were in charge of the festivities, had escaped this calamity as they were fasting."
Her gaze swept past Professor Xu, Specialist Qian as well as the students of the Imperial Capital.
"This is the truth you wished to discover. Now that you have found it, will you announce it to the world?"
Everyone kept silent.
"You won't."
Xie Ting's sight fell on the murals again. She continued reading, "The survivors decided to retaliate against the Ming Dynasty…" She suddenly stopped.
"Then?" Qiu Yinru asked her.
"Nothing. This is already the final mural."
Xie Ting was probably the descendant of those survivors. Though it wasn't clear what happened, by looking at her life track, it was clear that they had blended into the Han people in the end.
The mood became quite heavy momentarily.
This was out of everyone's expectations. The reason for the extinction of the Ancient City was the Ming Dynasty's army. Though the natives of Sahagan had saved them, they had slaughtered the natives. It was really quite ironical.
As the later generation of the Ming Dynasty, they felt ashamed because of their former generation elders!
In this world, humans always injured others for the sake of personal benefit.
Humans were so, so were Demons, as well as the Gods.
"What's that?"
"That should've been the Holy Woman's Altar mentioned in the murals!"
In the depths of the palace, the altar still existed in perfect condition.
"Looks like there's something written there?"
"Let's go take a look."
They made for the place when a bang sound resounded in the area. The entire altar began to shake continuously. It seemed as if the whole palace was shaking. The characters on the altar began to flicker, and the altar emanated a gentle radiance too.
"What's happening?"
"I'm unable to move."
Shrieks began to echo for a moment.
"Everyone, don't panic…"
"NOOOOOO…"
"AAAAHHHHHH…"
Along with sounds of stone crumbling, the entire altar dropped down at a rapid pace. Everyone screamed due to the feeling of weightlessness. They felt the stone supporting the altar up crumble followed by them falling down along with it.
"SAAAVVVEEEE MEEE-!"
Despair filled their hearts at this moment as they wondered whether they were going to fall to their deaths.
Splash!
The sounds of bodies falling into water echoed all over. It seemed as there was a river underneath them.
All of them fell into the river.
Jiang Xiu was the only exception. He slowly descended and stood on the water surface. Loud sounds originated beside him along with water splashing up 10 m high. The core part of the altar had also dropped into the river.
"Phew… That scared the heck out of me…"
Many of them relaxed. Fortunately, there was river underneath, or else they would have died.
They swam towards the shore.
After reaching the bank, they dropped on the ground in a weak, fatigued state. This close encounter with death had sapped them of their strength. They gasped for breaths and recovered their strength slowly.
"Xie Ting?"
Jiang Xiu swept past everyone but didn't find Xie Ting.
"I-I think - Kugh - I saw her fall beside me…" Qiu Yinru coughed while trying to speak. Her hair was wet and face pale.
"She didn't drown, right?"
No one had the answer to this question. Xie Ting wasn't an ordinary girl so she wouldn't have drowned, but sometimes, the mysteries of the world were at work. Jiang Xiu furrowed his brows then plunged into the river.
The river water was very chilling. Jiang Xiu's body felt cold and refreshing after entering the river, and at the same time, he saw a light radiate from the depths of the river. He saw Xie Ting lay underwater and it looked like she had fainted as she wasn't moving. Jiang Xiu went towards her but then suddenly felt dizzy and felt as if his consciousness was separating from this body.
He was startled and immediately fled upwards, came out of the water surface and took a deep breath. He scrunched his brows, feeling perplexed about the event.
He didn't ponder on it much as Xie Ting might drown if he hesitated any longer.
He plunged into the water again while taking preventive measures, but this time, he didn't feel dizzy like before. He swam towards Xie Ting and saw that her eyes were wide open as she made a great effort to reach out towards him with a pleading expression in her gaze.
It was a bizarre posture. It seemed as if some kind of unknown power was binding Xie Ting. Usually, if a person became conscious, it didn't make sense that they couldn't swim as they would at the very least try to struggle, but she was utterly still underwater.
Jiang Xiu grabbed her hand and made towards the water surface. Whoosh! He directly flew out and landed on the shore along with her.
Jiang Xiu felt extraordinarily fatigued and sat down on the ground along with Xie Ting while taking huge gasps of air. Xie Ting looked towards Jiang Xiu, "Big Brother Jiang, thank you…"
Jiang Xiu wore the same indifferent face as always, but the events just now were bizarre. He gazed at Xie Ting and discovered that she was gazing back at him ardently. It was full of gratefulness yet Jiang Xiu found this to be quite odd because Xie Ting called him 'Big Brother Jiang' just now. She had always called him 'Mr. Jiang' and in fact, their relationship wasn't that intimate that they could call each other 'Big Brother' and 'Sis.'
"Are you alright?"
Jiang Xiu released her hand and felt dazed for a moment. Xie Ting's left wrist was as spotless as snow, void of the Fire God's curse pattern.
Her curse is gone?
Yin-Yang Fire God's fury, crawl towards the Hell on the other shore; at another world, you shall rest forever.
Shouldn't it be removed only by going to another world?
"Lady Xie, quickly come over here and tell us what's the meaning of the characters on the altar?"
Xie Ting stood up and went over towards the broken altar. Her sight fell on the writing, "Sinners afflicted by the Fire God's fury, welcome the arrival of the Holy Woman; the two worlds have overlapped, when the time comes, the Ming Dynasty shall perish."
All of them were confused.
"What does that mean?"
Xie Ting shook her head as well, "I also don't know."
Professor Xu said, "Could it be a space-time intersection? Many researchers of Doomsday believe that Doomsday would occur due to a space-time intersection. At that time, the world would perish."
"That makes sense."
Li Chengzhi also commented on it, "This is the retaliation of the Sahagan natives against the Ming Dynasty. The Holy Woman's arrival… is there nothing else about it?" They would have passed it off as a story usually, but there was giant golden god outside so it was possible that the things written on mural could really happen."
"Nope. It isn't clear as the following parts are damaged due to the fall."