Chapter 13: Crimson-clad Fairy Maiden
After the dark clouds dispersed, although strands of nether mist still drifted in the grave forest, it was no longer as all-encompassing as before, and the view became clearer and broader, giving a feeling of walking in a mass grave.
The grave mounds were all seven or eight meters high, scattered unevenly.
One stone tablet after another, ancient and heavy, towered much higher than Li Weiyi walking below.
Some tablets had ghost flags inserted in front, others had yin banners standing before them, emitting strange sounds in the wind.
What exactly were buried here?
Why bury them on a ship?
Was it to bring them back to their roots? Or was it a unique burial method?
How did they die? And who built the graves and erected the tablets for them? Where did the grave builders go?
The bronze ship exuded mystery everywhere, surely hiding an ancient and tragic story—unknown who forged it, unknown how glorious it once was, unknown why it lay dormant on Earth for a millennium.
Was it now returning to its point of origin?
Or was it to continue the ancient journey?
Li Weiyi, full of curiosity and thirst for knowledge, searched the grave forest for half an hour and finally heard the sound of a wind chime.
“Ding ding!”
The bone material wind chime hung on a blue stone tablet over three meters high, its sound crisp and pleasing.
Said to be white bone material, it was actually as crystalline and translucent as jade, engraved with unidentifiable secret script symbols.
The thread connecting the bells was woven from silver thread, immortal and unbroken after a millennium.
On the blue stone tablet was a portrait, unknown what pigment was used to draw it, with no fading at all, vividly colorful and lifelike.
In the portrait, auspicious clouds were brilliantly multicolored, and the celestial maiden was stunningly beautiful.
She stood on the clouds overlooking the mortal world like an immortal fairy, in bright red clothes, with cloud hair ornaments, her wondrous eyes so vivid it seemed she could step out from the stone tablet.
“Could the grave actually hold a former peerless immortal beauty?”
Li Weiyi’s gaze returned to the bone wind chime, wanting to take it down for study.
This should count as an immortal object too, right?
“Hua!”
His legs exerted force, leaping up.
Suddenly, the scalding hot qi flow from the sole of his right foot erupted, making his body light and floating, breaking through the wind, leaping straight to the top of the over-three-meter-high stone tablet.
He steadied himself unsteadily.
Li Weiyi held his breath and looked down at the height of a whole floor below, feeling utterly incredulous.
After cultivating to supernatural heights, could he now scale walls and leap roofs?
This feeling was too wonderful; anyone would feel their blood surging and high-spirited.
After calming his mood, Li Weiyi reached to pluck the wind chime. But as his hand just touched the bell bone piece, a dizzy sensation assaulted him, and before his eyes appeared a peerless beauty in red clothes, an immortal fairy.
Her graceful and stunning figure layered over endlessly, pressing down.
“Peng!”
Li Weiyi fell from the blue stone tablet, his head dizzying badly, as if he had ridden in a car on bumpy mountain roads for hours.
“This thing is indeed eerie, cannot touch it!”
If it were that easy to pick, the white bone wind chime would have been taken by other scientific expedition team members long ago, not waiting until now.
It was just that Li Weiyi was a person with extremely strong curiosity and desire to explore, so he couldn’t resist trying despite the risk.
Practicing the Jade Void Breathing Technique, he mobilized the scalding hot qi flow from the sole of his right foot along the silver veins surging toward his head; moments later, the dizziness vanished, and he recovered.
Li Weiyi respectfully bowed to the portrait on the blue stone tablet: “Junior unintentionally offended, please do not blame me, senior… Um, junior must retrieve the Dao Ancestor Tai Chi Fish and Yellow Dragon Sword, probably needing to offend once more. Senior is a heavenly immortal, surely won’t stoop to the level of a mere mortal, right?”
After Li Weiyi prudently bowed three times, he climbed the huge grave mound behind the blue stone tablet.
“Senior brother shouldn’t have buried it too deep… Found it!”
Li Weiyi searched inch by inch in the grayish-white grave soil, finally at the top of the grave mound touching a metal hard block. Brushing away the soil, it was indeed the Dao Ancestor Tai Chi Fish.
One green fish eye, one red fish eye, both only the size of beans.
As before, just an ordinary ancient ornament, no special spirituality evident.
“This fish eye is what they all want, the Buddha’s sarira, right? Its microscopic form really a planet?”
How to activate it?
Before Li Weiyi could put the Dao Ancestor Tai Chi Fish back around his neck, the wind chime on the blue stone tablet suddenly rang loudly, and a dangerous sensation making his hair stand on end assaulted him, like needles at his back, cold air enveloping.
Not good…
“Chi chi!”
No time to escape at all.
From the grave soil below, much black hair grew out, wrapping around his legs.
“Is this a corpse rising? But I clearly bowed just now… This senior is too petty, isn’t she?”
The black hair grew extremely fast, from wrapping his legs to his waist, spreading to his arms and head.
Li Weiyi mobilized the scalding hot qi flow from the sole of his right foot, surging to all thirteen silver veins throughout his body, erupting with the strongest power to tear and struggle.
He only held out for one breath’s time.
With a peng sound, he was pulled by the black hair to flip onto the ground, sinking toward the bottom of the grave soil.
Done for!
What exactly is going on?
Senior sister Cai and the others dug graves and made a mess, even more excessive, yet didn’t provoke such calamity. He was just here to retrieve his own things, how did he provoke such a terrifying evil thing?
Could it really be running into a petty ghost by mistake?
…
“Meng bro, Old Liu and them worked themselves half to death these seven days repairing the generator. You gotta tell Captain Gao to arrange two good meals for them; we have to celebrate today, right?”
Chen Hong followed behind Zhao Meng, pleading merits for the engineering technical team members.
“Naturally, it’s their top merit.”
Zhao Meng stepped into the cabin where the freezer room was, his expression changing instantly.
There, Old Liu and several engineering technical team members all lay unconscious on the ground, with only Xie Jin standing inside, hands behind his back.
The cabin was in disarray, lighting dim, but Xie Jin’s cold, smiling gaze was still clearly visible.
“Peng!”
A security team member, 8 meters tall and burly, ambushed at the left of the door, swung out a steel pipe, smashing heavily on the cabin door frame. Had Zhao Meng reacted a beat slower, his head would have been smashed.
“Ambush, get out quick.”
Zhao Meng reminded Chen Hong, immediately retreating from the freezer cabin, about to raise his gun to fight back.
Another security team member ambushed outside leaped out, hugging Zhao Meng’s upper body, torso, and both arms from behind, roaring low to slam him into the cabin wall.
But Zhao Meng had trained in martial arts since childhood and served years in the army, his reactions lightning fast.
Before being slammed, his legs first kicked the cabin wall, erupting force suddenly, and together with the security team member behind, the two crashed heavily to the ground.
After breaking free, Zhao Meng swiftly flipped his body, hammering a fist down like a mallet.
“Peng!”
The fist landed on the face, knocking out the security team member who had hugged him, blood flowing from that man’s mouth.
The steel pipe-wielding security team member rushed out, swinging heavily again.
Zhao Meng had no time to grab a gun, rolling forward, kicking in his crotch. Accompanied by a miserable scream, the steel pipe clanged to the ground, that security team member tremblingly kneeling with legs shaking.
As Zhao Meng picked up the steel pipe, he elbow-struck his temple, sending him flipping sideways to the ground.
Instantly taking out two ambush experts.
Before Zhao Meng could fully stand, the third lurker rushed out, using a taser gun, striking his back.
“Chi chi!”
Zhao Meng’s body trembled, muscles numb, unable to move.
And straight ahead, Xie Jin rushed forward swiftly, leaping off the ground, knee-driving into Zhao Meng’s heart with his body weight.
This was a flying knee strike!
Once hit, Zhao Meng’s ribs would shatter, heart chamber broken.
In this near-death crisis, Zhao Meng broke free from the taser gun behind, rolling sideways. Even though his whole body was now weak and powerless, under powerful survival will, he bit his tongue tip, mustering spirit forcefully, hurling the steel pipe in hand.
With a “peng” sound, the steel pipe hit the third ambusher’s hand, the taser gun dropping to the ground.
Zhao Meng smoothly picked up the rifle on the ground, chambering a round, aiming at the just-landed Xie Jin, face ruthless and cold, eyes brimming with killing intent.
“Peng!”
“Kacha…”
From the shadows behind, Chen Hong held a steel rebar, hands wrapped in black cloth, using all his strength to smash at Zhao Meng’s right arm near the shoulder.
Bone-cracking sound rang out.
Even Zhao Meng’s iron-tower-like mighty sturdy physique couldn’t withstand it; he roared in agonized pain, body crouching low, the rifle clattering to the ground.
He struggled not to fall, slowly turning, lips trembling, looking at Chen Hong with incredulous eyes.
No one knew Zhao Meng’s prowess better than Chen Hong, so striking must be without mercy.
Both fast and ruthless.
Chen Hong’s face now held no trace of sunny openness, only seriousness and ice-cold; the steel rebar swung again in his hand, smashing at Zhao Meng’s knees supporting his body.
“Peng!”
Kneecaps exploded, legs folding backward.
Zhao Meng could no longer stand, pain nearly fainting him. Chen Hong tossed the steel rebar to the ground, picked up the rifle instead, checked the ammo count, then fully relaxed.
Looking at Zhao Meng’s pale face and eyes of anger, confusion, unwillingness, Chen Hong felt deeply displeased, rebuking: “I know what you want to say, isn’t it all your fault?”
“Didn’t I suggest you lead the brothers to take out Gao Xin, then become captain of the research vessel yourself, even captain of the entire bronze ship? Then, everyone on the ship would obey us; make them do what, they must. Tell them to kneel, they wouldn’t dare stand.”
“Those useless elderly, weak, sick, and disabled should all be killed off early, wasting grain.”
“As long as we control supplies and their distribution, we can do whatever we want, survive to the end. But…”
“You’re too pedantic! No hero’s bearing or ambition at all, still bound by old rules. Since you won’t strike first, I have to. I don’t want to die.”
Xie Jin, quite wary, eyed the rifle in Chen Hong’s hand, smiling: “Well done. With Zhao Meng down, the rest on the ship are no threat. Give me the gun; I’ll report your top merit to my cousin.”
“Better for me to hold this gun temporarily.”
Chen Hong wasn’t stupid; he wouldn’t hand over the gun, guarding against Xie Jin while unbuttoning Zhao Meng’s outer garment.
After removing the outer garment, inside was a purple leather soft armor. At the heart was a blood-colored five-finger handprint pattern, palm with some strange scriptures, like a symbol of some mysterious organization.
Fingers touching the soft armor felt icy cool.
“This should be the corpse skin armor he stripped from those white bone humans; unrotted after a millennium, must be a treasure. No wonder he broke free from the taser gun.”
Chen Hong was delighted, stripping the corpse skin armor from Zhao Meng and putting it on himself.
The corpse skin armor seemed able to enlarge or shrink; though his build was far less massive than Zhao Meng’s, it fit snugly once worn.
Xie Jin knew he couldn’t take Chen Hong now, so suppressed his inner anger, saying warmly: “Quickly search; does he have the Buddha’s sarira?”
After groping once, Chen Hong’s face showed disappointment: “Probably the Buddha’s sarira is still with that junior disciple brother of his.”
The already resigned Zhao Meng heard this, his eyes instantly turning furious, roaring: “Chen Hong, if you dare harm my junior disciple brother, I will make sure you die without intact corpses.”
Chen Hong pitied him with a glance: “If you can stand, I’ll believe it. Meng bro, you taught me to dare act and dare fight, dare strike and dare clash, not to be an impotent ranter. How did you forget?”
Xie Jin walked over, stepping on Zhao Meng’s chest, twisting his sole with full force, leaning down with a cold laugh: “You’re so agitated; looks like the Buddha’s sarira is definitely with him, right?”
Zhao Meng didn’t know where the strength came from, using his uninjured hand to try propping up his body.
But how could he resist Xie Jin?
Chen Hong said: “Forget it, why bother with a cripple? We haven’t fully seized control yet; don’t waste time here.”
Xie Jin stared at Chen Hong walking out with the gun, squatted down, groping Zhao Meng’s body again.
Naturally finding nothing.
“Tie them all up, take them to the deck. Right, have you seen Cai Yutong?” Xie Jin didn’t have Xie Tianshu’s great ambition; in his eyes, capturing Cai Yutong was more important than anything, wouldn’t trade for the Buddha’s sarira.
A security team member said: “She seems to have gone with those graduate students to the planting area side; didn’t eat the breakfast with medicine.”
