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Chapter 148 The Secret Hidden in the Wilderness
"What was that sound just now?" Liu Shuyue looked curiously towards the inside of the bar. "It sounded like something fell over."

"Uh... let me see." To be honest, Chen Xuan was also startled. Although he didn't know why Lin Qing was hiding, it seemed that when faced with an unexpected situation, instinctively avoiding it was a natural choice. He pretended to look behind him and said, "Nothing, my clothes just fell off."

The clothes did fall off... because if they were to suddenly pop up out of nowhere, they would be very noticeable.

He bent down and carefully picked up the clothes, afraid of touching anything else. "What's wrong? Why are you looking for me at this hour? Want some late-night snacks?"

"It's still afternoon where I am," Liu Shuyue said seriously. "Some strange things have been discovered in the Wanshan Wilderness, and I'd like you to go and take a look."

"The vast wilderness of Wanshan?" Chen Xuan immediately became serious. That place was crucial to the survival of Mala Village, and there could be no mistakes. "Alright, let's go there now."

As the two arrived on the second floor, preparing to head from Fu Jiaolu's room 203 to Mala Village, Lin Qing suddenly emerged from her room. She was wearing pajamas, as if she had just gotten out of bed. "Hey, Shuyue's here! Long time no see."

"Hello, Miss Lin, I apologize for disturbing you this evening," Liu Shuyue said with a nod.

"It's only been a week, why are you greeting me like this again!" Lin Qing said, dissatisfied. "Wherever you go, I'll go with you, otherwise our relationship will fade."

“I have no problem with that, but what about the shop…”

Chen Xuan scratched his head. "Okay, wait for me a moment, I'll go close the shop."

Just a second ago, Lin Qing was still behind the bar. How did she run back to the second floor in the blink of an eye? And even Liu Shuyue didn't notice at all that someone had just passed by her.

He couldn't help but have more respect for optical stealth technology.

The journey to the depths of the mountains was not particularly difficult.

Today, Mala Village has carved out several gravel roads in the mountains, and the weeds and vines on the ground have been completely cleared away, making them even passable for four-wheeled carriages. Although these roads are no more than five miles long, they are a far cry from the barren mountains when we first arrived.

No wonder Liu Shuyue wanted an excavator.

Using excavators for this kind of clearing and leveling work is absolutely top-notch in terms of efficiency.

Now that the matter of the Immortal Alliance has come to an end, he has decided to inquire about the sale of construction machinery tomorrow.

Thirty minutes later, they arrived at their destination—a mountain pillar located on the edge of the reclaimed area. Whenever Chen Xuan saw these mountains, he felt a sense of novelty; they were like stalactites magnified a hundred times, standing tall under the blue sky and white clouds. Such a unique landscape was unlike anything he could find in the other world.

There's a sign standing by the hillside: No. 99.

There was clearly no path leading up the mountain, as evidenced by the ropes hanging from the rock face; everyone used these ropes to climb up and down. Liu Shuyue, of course, didn't need to climb. After activating a Wind Riding Talisman, she grabbed Chen Xuan with one hand and Lin Qing with the other, instantly soaring thirty-four meters high and disappearing into what appeared to be a shallow cave.

"Greetings, Immortal Master; greetings, Shopkeeper."

Several villagers were busy inside the cave, seemingly clearing away the rubble. Upon seeing Liu Shuyue and Chen Xuan, they immediately bowed in greeting.

"Don't worry about us, you guys continue." Liu Shuyue nodded, then said to Chen Xuan, "The place I want you to see is just ahead."

In fact, Chen Xuan had already seen it.

A large hole was blasted open in the wall, revealing a deeper interior space. At the edge of the hole, broken cement blocks, steel bars, and metal plates could be seen.

How did these things end up in the remote, desolate wilderness?

Chen Xuan immediately realized that this was the reason why Liu Shuyue had come to him—she believed that he was knowledgeable and experienced and must know why this place had become like this.

“Two days ago, the exploration team discovered that there was something special inside and reported it to me immediately.” Liu Shuyue pointed to the top of the breach, where there seemed to be a curved pipe. “After I entered the mountain through the secret passage, I did a quick search and confirmed that there were no demons. Only then did I have them use a thunderbolt talisman to blast open the mountain wall. Just as I thought… it’s not far from the cave entrance, about half an arm’s length away.”

Without a doubt, this is a trace of something man-made.

But the cement wall is just too ridiculous! Chen Xuan turned on his phone's flashlight and stepped into the cave entrance first.

The next second, he almost uncontrollably broke out in goosebumps.

The interior was surprisingly spacious, with smooth cement walls proving its construction was of exceptionally high quality, far exceeding anything the Great Qi Kingdom could achieve. Due to the poor lighting, he couldn't see every corner of the room clearly, but he conservatively estimated that it was perhaps over a thousand square meters in size.

"There are enclosed houses built in the mountains. Is this some kind of lost kingdom?" Lin Qing muttered.

"I'll go light the torches." Liu Shuyue summoned a Thousand Thoughts Sword, carried a burning fire talisman, circled the cave once, and lit the torch stand that had been prepared in advance. The lighting here was finally a little more sufficient.

Looking up, there were no caves made of stone, but rather a flat ceiling, which means that there were likely more than one such space.

Like the pioneers, Chen Xuan was also drawn to the square boxes placed on the ground.

"What it is?"

“The villagers initially thought it was a coffin, but after I checked, they were just some square iron boxes, not something used to put a dead person in,” Liu Shuyue replied.

"Haven't you opened it yet?"

"No, you can't see the latch on the surface. I was afraid of damaging its integrity, so I left it untouched."

Chen Xuan held up his phone and approached, circling one of the iron boxes. It looked almost welded to the ground, and its size was quite unusual, about two meters high, six or seven meters long, and more than a meter wide. If people were to be placed inside, four or five people could fit inside one box. It was only from a distance that they looked like coffins.

However, Chen Xuan couldn't immediately determine its exact nature. Just as Liu Shuyue had said, it lacked a clear opening and closing mechanism. The upper part was a lid, slightly wider than the lower part, and its appearance was flat and straight, without any handles or similar features. If it were truly made of steel, its enormous size would make it impossible to lift by hand.

There are four rows of these iron boxes, arranged in pairs, and they are placed quite neatly.

Should he resort to violence to destroy it? Chen Xuan considered for a moment and then temporarily suppressed the idea—before he had a clear understanding of the situation here, there was no need for him to be in such a hurry to cause trouble for a lump of iron.

"Look, there's something here that looks like a track!" Lin Qing suddenly discovered something new.

Chen Xuan looked in the direction she was looking and indeed found a groove embedded in the floor. However, the ground was covered with a lot of dust and dirt, so it was easy to miss if you weren't paying attention.

“This room is definitely not as simple as it appears to us now,” Chen Xuan said. “We’ll have to wait until we’ve thoroughly inspected the place to determine its exact purpose. I’ll prepare some lamps for lighting, and you can have the villagers clean the place first.”

“Okay,” Liu Shuyue replied.

"Also, there's probably more than one room in the mountain pillar. Let's explore the area first and see if there are any other passages."

Within minutes, Chen Xuan's prediction came true.

They found a door deep inside the room. And this door wasn't the typical house style; it even had a good seal, with a familiar rotary valve as the lock.

This is starting to get interesting.

The door wasn't locked, and Chen Xuan used a little force to push it open. Behind the door was a rather cramped space with only two paths: one led to a bottomless dry well, and the other connected to a staircase extending up and down.

Chen Xuan couldn't help but chuckle softly.

"What's wrong?" Liu Shuyue asked.

"It's nothing, isn't this the same as where we live? There's a skylight next to the stairwell. It seems that civil engineering experts in the multiverse would all think of the same thing."

He's confirmed it: there's a building hidden in this mountain!
(End of this chapter)