Chapter 69: Rebelliousness And Face-to-face Ntr
After stepping into Seventh Rank, Liang Zhi Che’s strength had clearly improved significantly.
Whether it was crossbow bolt hidden arrows or rolling stone traps, Jiang Ce didn’t need to act; Liang Zhi Che blocked them all for him.
Jiang Ce only needed to pass through walls and absorb mercury poison; he didn’t need to worry about anything else.
Seeing this scene, he also felt somewhat emotional.
The sense of achievement from easily doing things that couldn’t be done before upgrading was probably quite wonderful.
Unfortunately, Jiang Ce had never encountered a true crisis; ordinary enemies were either one-shot killed or had such a huge strength gap that he couldn’t handle them at all and had to wait for others to resolve them, never feeling any substantial progress.
“Big Brother, you rest; I’ll go and come right back.”
Liang Zhi Che attentively had Jiang Ce sit down and went forward himself to face the two Eighth Rank zombies that had jumped out from the coffin that Jiang Ce had casually opened.
Watching the man and two corpses fighting inextricably for the moment, Jiang Ce felt somewhat melancholic.
“Zombies like this get one-shot instantly; there’s no fun in fighting for me. Being invincible is truly lonely.”
Not long after, Liang Zhi Che finished off the zombies and returned.
His clothes were already tattered, but his face showed unconcealable excitement.
“Seventh Rank compared to Eighth Rank is worlds apart. Before, to deal with two Eighth Rank ones, I’d probably have to use every trick up my sleeve.”
Jiang Ce nodded: “About the same for me.”
But he didn’t say the second half aloud; after all, I don’t know anything, so using one percent of my power to drown the opponent could be rounded up to using every trick up my sleeve.
“But zombies of this level appearing before even reaching the core area of the Great Tomb isn’t a good sign.”
Jiang Ce said alertly.
The originally excited Liang Zhi Che calmed down because of this, his mood somewhat heavy: “It feels like everyone underestimated the threat of this Great Tomb; maybe having some Blue Talisman holders would be better.”
“Who could have imagined that even Martial Uncle Xuan Qing suffered a loss here.”
Jiang Ce stood up and patted the dust off his butt:
“Doesn’t matter; we’ll run into Martial Uncle Xuan Qing once we get out.”
“What about the others?”
“Hard to say. If the others encounter worse situations than us, they might suffer losses, but with White Talisman as the last line of protection, they shouldn’t lose their lives.”
Jiang Ce patted Liang Zhi Che’s shoulder: “We’ve gone about halfway; let’s continue and rendezvous with them as soon as possible.”
“Okay.”
The two continued burrowing through walls, advancing in a straight line.
After reaching Seventh Rank, Liang Zhi Che was no longer threatened by the various traps in the labyrinth, and Jiang Ce didn’t need to divert attention to protect him; their forward speed had also increased significantly.
Along the way, besides some coffins used as traps, the two also saw quite a few people who had died on the road.
The decayed clothes on their bodies were from different eras; the earliest even wore armor, and the most recent wore hiking gear.
And this was merely the corpses seen while going in a straight line; who knew how many such corpses there were in the entire labyrinth.
Seeing just the tip of the iceberg, the two could hardly imagine how many people had perished here over the years of the Great Tomb’s existence.
When the two reached the end of the labyrinth, looking back, they could actually see the very first wall hole from the last wall hole.
“We must have passed through several hundred walls.” Liang Zhi Che sighed somewhat.
What Jiang Ce focused on was something else: “Turtle turtle, this straight?”
The end of the labyrinth was still a cave; the two exchanged a glance and unhesitatingly stepped into it.
Just after going in a dozen meters, suddenly, Jiang Ce stopped: “Wait a minute.”
Liang Zhi Che was startled, thinking something had gone wrong again: “What’s up?”
Jiang Ce returned to the labyrinth exit and carved a line of words on the wall using Righteous Qi infused with mercury poison.
Liang Zhi Che curiously came over and read it word by word: “Left Buddha, right Bodhisattva, Three Purities in the chest, seven-colored auspicious clouds on the head, feet treading nine-colored Buddhist lotus—the invincible True God whose divine might covers the world and merit is boundless has toured here.”
“Impressive, right?” Jiang Ce admiringly appraised his masterpiece and asked boastfully.
“A bit uncivilized, but…” Liang Zhi Che thought for a moment, then affirmed: “But I think it’s very commemorative, and it also mocks the builders here; it has the flavor of a strongman who stands firm like a clear breeze brushing the mountain peak no matter how strong they are.”
“You hit the nail on the head.”
Jiang Ce slapped his thigh, feeling like he’d met a kindred spirit across mountains and rivers: “Whether strong or not doesn’t matter; it’s all about the savage mockery. Carving words in someone else’s tomb is like leaving strawberries on someone else’s wife—it’s a beautiful thing!”
“I don’t understand, but I agree.” Liang Zhi Che clapped in support.
Ever since taking off thanks to Jiang Ce’s pointers, Liang Zhi Che had secretly resolved to stick with this Big Brother.
Could Big Brother’s words be wrong? No way!
If you think he’s wrong, it’s just because your realm is insufficient; he’s on the fifth layer, and you’re judging with first-layer understanding, so of course it’ll seem wrong.
“Your lack of understanding means you haven’t grasped the abstract deeply enough; look at more palaces, it’ll do you good.”
Jiang Ce stood with hands behind his back, exuding the air of a profound expert.
“I’ll remember that!” Liang Zhi Che took this as a precept and secretly noted this pointer.
The two walked in the darkness, carefully watching for changes in the surroundings while mutually praising each other—you call me a Buddhist Sect holy monk, I call you a Confucian Path genius—the atmosphere was full of mutual affection and like-minded harmony.
At this time, Liang Zhi Che suddenly remembered something and seriously reminded: “Big Brother, not sure if you’ve heard, but that Liang Zhi Zhou has now reached Seventh Rank, same realm as you; you must be careful of him scheming against you.”
“No worries.” Jiang Ce waved his hand grandly: “In the face of absolute power, all tricks are useless. I’m now Sixth Rank; I can recreate how I suppressed him back then.”
“As expected of Big Brother; godlike progress aside, you’re so tolerant too. If it were me, I’d have boasted about it long ago; my pattern is still too small.”
“Hey, if young people aren’t full of vigor, are they even young? I’ve just seen too much of people’s malicious hearts, so I value the trump cards that can turn the tables for me, pretending to be a fool outside. You know is fine; don’t spread it.”
“Big Brother, you’re soft-hearted, but I can’t stand to see you wronged. If that Liang Zhi Zhou tucks his tail and behaves, fine, but if he dares to challenge you again, hmph hmph.”
“Good little brother!” Jiang Ce said with double meaning.
“Big Brother!” Liang Zhi Che, not grasping the subtlety, responded moved.
After walking about half an hour, light finally appeared ahead; that soft glow shocked the two—Xuan Qing was right ahead!
Sure enough, just as they exited the tunnel, there was a cliff, and on the opposite side of the cliff, Xuan Qing and Liang Zhi Zhou were talking with worried expressions.
“Big Brother!”
Liang Zhi Zhou heard his own brother’s familiar voice and whipped his head around, looking toward the direction the voice came from.
He hadn’t panicked even when encountering the water ghost in the undercurrent earlier, but after coming out without seeing Liang Zhi Che, he was extremely worried, even somewhat despairing.
Only this call of Big Brother finally let him put down his suspended heart.
“Little brother!”
Liang Zhi Zhou was nearly moved to tears of joy, responding enthusiastically.
But the scene that followed petrified him in place.
He saw his long-awaited dear little brother glance at him disdainfully, then ask Jiang Ce with utmost respect:
“Big Brother, that Liang Zhi Zhou and Martial Uncle Xuan Qing are right over there; how do we get across?”
