Wizard: Starting with Dealing with Magical Plants

Chapter 247 In-Depth

Lorin opened his eyes and looked at the incubator.

The silvery sheen of the silvery lily seedlings seemed to be somewhat suppressed, but it was still bright. The leaves pointed to a wider passage on the left side of the corridor, and the resonance they conveyed was clearer than when they were outside.

That's it.

He took a deep breath and stepped into the black stone peaks.

Upon entering the corridor, an absolute sense of silence immediately enveloped you.

The subtle friction of boots on the smooth stone floor became exceptionally clear, yet carried an unreal sense of remoteness.

The light quickly dimmed, with only a sliver of dark red sky overhead barely outlining the jagged contours of the stone peaks and the shadows of the bottomless passage.

The detector's energy readings began to fluctuate slightly and irregularly, and the spatial stability indicator hovered around the safety threshold.

The environment here is indeed extremely unstable.

Rowling walked very slowly, taking each step carefully.

He focused part of his attention on the direction the moonflower was pointing, while using the other part to perceive the subtle changes in the surrounding space and the flow of energy.

The passage was initially fairly straight, but soon a fork appeared.

The black stone walls are all the same, without any obvious landmarks, making it easy to get lost.

Every so often, Rolin would use his star power to carve a very faint arrow mark on the stone wall, a mark that only he could sense, and then activate the next energy beacon.

After walking for about an hour, they had ventured into the inner corridor for about ten miles. The surrounding environment grew increasingly silent, and even the sound of their own footsteps seemed to be absorbed more deeply.

The direction of the moonflower began to subtly shift, tilting to the right towards a narrower gap where the light was almost completely obscured.

Rolin stopped in front of the gap.

The gap was only wide enough for one person to pass through sideways, and it was pitch black inside. The signal from the detector immediately became garbled upon entering.

He took out a piece of luminous crystal and infused it with a wisp of star power.

A soft white light appeared, but the light seemed to be quickly swallowed up by the surrounding darkness, illuminating only a few steps ahead.

Without much hesitation, Luo Lin squeezed into the gap.

The stone wall was cold and smooth, clinging tightly to the body.

The passage is not straight, but curves downwards with a gentle slope.

The air was even colder, carrying a musty smell of dust and—a trace of extremely faint, unnatural energy residue?

After walking down about 100 meters, the crevice suddenly opened up, leading to a small natural stone cave.

In the center of the cave stands a short, black stone pillar, only half a person's height. On the surface of the pillar are carved some ancient symbols that are so badly weathered that they are hard to recognize.

At the foot of the stone pillar, there were several fossilized, possibly bone fragments.

Has anyone been here before?

Or—not human?

Rowling crouched down and carefully examined the fossil fragments.

The fragments were small and had a peculiar structure, unlike any known biological skeleton.

He scanned it with a detector, and the residual energy reading was almost zero, but material analysis showed that it was extremely old.

The resonance of the moonflower seedlings became slightly stronger here, but it did not point to the stone pillar, but rather to an inconspicuous corner half-hidden by rubble on the other side of the cave.

Luo Lin walked over and carefully cleared away the rubble.

On the exposed rock face behind, a faint, extremely dark, pale blue pattern that almost blends into the rock can be vaguely seen.

The pattern is very broken, with only a few curved lines and half of an incomplete geometric shape remaining.

The style is somewhat similar to the glowing new patterns seen in the outpost footage, but it is more ancient and somber.

Could it be that something similar was active here a long time ago?

Or are these patterns part of an ancient structure that simply became ineffective and faded over time?

Luo Lin carefully recorded the shape of the remaining patterns.

This might be a clue.

Finding nothing further in the cave, he continued forward, following the direction indicated by the moonflower.

The journey ahead was even more arduous. The passage was sometimes wide and sometimes narrow, sometimes requiring climbing, and sometimes wading through icy, seemingly endless underground streams.

Moreover, the appearance of liquid water in the Scorching Hell is strange in itself.

The field of silence always exists, suppressing perception and energy.

The feeling of spatial instability came and went. On two occasions, Rolin keenly noticed subtle folds in the spatial structure of the passage ahead and avoided them in time, thus preventing the triggering of unknown risks.

Baha remained quietly perched on Rollin's shoulder or flew ahead to explore, its biological instincts and keen vision proving more useful than many instruments in this environment.

Once, it suddenly let out a sharp cry, and Rowling immediately stopped. He saw several almost transparent threads hanging silently from the top of the passage ahead, emitting faint spatial distortion ripples.

Those are extremely dangerous remnants of a spatial rift; once touched, the consequences are unpredictable.

Guided by Moonflower, his own caution, and Baha's warnings, Rowling slowly but steadily made his way through the maze.

About two more hours passed, and according to the beacon's records and his own estimation, he had gone more than forty miles into the corridor.

The silence here is so intense it's almost unsettling; even thought seems to slow down.

The detector became completely useless, with only static on the screen.

Just when he thought he would have to search aimlessly for a long time, the passage ahead suddenly came to an end.

No, it's not the end, but rather the passage merges into a relatively open valley?

Before us lies a massive, bowl-shaped depression surrounded by countless black stone peaks, possibly several kilometers in diameter.

The valley floor is flat and covered with a layer of grayish-white fine sand.

Most striking of all are the three enormous black stone pillars that lean distinctly towards the center of the valley, arranged in a triangle with their tops almost touching.

"A bowl-shaped depression surrounded by three sloping stone pillars!"

The place mentioned in the arbitrator's clues!

Luo Lin's spirits lifted, and he quickly walked to the edge of the valley and looked down.

The resonance of the silver flower seedling suddenly intensified, and the silver light spilled outward uncontrollably, with the leaves pointing straight towards the center of the valley, towards the three leaning stone pillars.

At the same time, Rolin also felt the Arbitrator's Communication Crystal in his arms heat up slightly.

There must be something there.

Instead of rushing directly into the valley, he carefully moved along the edge of the valley to find the best observation and entry point.

The silence of the valley seemed even stronger; the greyish-white sand at the bottom appeared calm, but in such places, calm often meant greater danger.

After circling around to the other side of the valley, Roland suddenly stopped.

Below him, at the base of a stone wall near the edge of the valley, an area several meters square was clearly covered with those intricate patterns that flowed and changed, emitting a faint blue and silvery-white light!

These patterns were clearer and more complete than he had seen in the outpost footage, forming a huge, strange pattern full of geometric beauty, with what appeared to be a groove or interface-like structure at the center.

Beside these luminous patterns, on the grayish-white sand, there were some fresh, unnatural traces.

Those are... footprints?

They are not exactly footprints, but more like the regular imprints left by some kind of multi-legged arthropod or mechanical device.

The marks are very fresh, definitely no more than two days old.

Besides him, there were other "things" that also came here, and their target also seemed to be these glowing patterns.

Rowling's heart sank slowly.

It seems that the depths of the silent corridors indeed hold more than just ancient, sealed secrets.