r18novel Page 498
Page 498
Jiang Xiao frowned, and immediately thought of the guy whose face he had peed on in the toilet.
How can I find him?
The girl stretched out a trembling finger and pointed to a seemingly ordinary, yet overlooked, tombstone in the distance.
The moonlight seemed to deliberately avoid it, making it stand out conspicuously in the night.
“Let’s start from there. There’s a secret under that tombstone. I… I came from there too.” The girl’s voice gradually weakened: “But you must be careful. The guardian of the tombstone is very powerful. No… don’t underestimate him. You must get out of there before dawn.”
Jiang Xiao nodded, his gaze unwavering.
These eerie tombstones weren't there during the day, but they all appeared at night. There must be something very strange about them.
Jiang Xiao turned around and walked toward the lonely tombstone with piercing eyes, the fallen leaves rustling softly beneath his feet.
For some reason, the sound gradually deepened with the rhythm of the footsteps, as if playing a prelude to the story that was about to unfold.
The atmosphere in the funeral home was somewhat silent.
The curator seemed to be drinking tea casually, but he kept drinking cup after cup without getting tired, and he was clearly a little anxious.
The night watchman stood with his arms crossed, gazing intently at the pitch-black night outside, but his brow was furrowed, a stark contrast to his usual aloof demeanor.
Bao Lebin, an outsider, was openly pacing around the hall.
Jiang Xiao finally stood before the tombstone that seemed to whisper secrets. As soon as he approached, a chilling aura swept over him, causing him to involuntarily frown.
According to the old man, each tombstone is the final resting place of the deceased, silently guarding the peace of the body and soul.
Looking at the moss-covered tombstone, the inscriptions were long since blurred and illegible.
He reached out and gently brushed away the stubborn moss. In the dim moonlight, a line of almost illegible text finally revealed itself: "The place where the truth is buried."
These six short words struck Jiang Xiao's heart like a heavy hammer.
His thoughts raced between these few words, trying to decipher the hidden meaning behind them.
Finally, he took a deep breath and carefully began to feel along the edge of the tombstone with his hand.
After repeated checks, he finally discovered a tiny, almost negligible crack on the back of the tombstone.
He took several deep breaths, placed his palm on the crack in the tombstone, and pushed hard.
An ancient, mechanical sound rang out, and the tombstone slowly moved, revealing a narrow downward passage.
The passage was deep and dark, almost swallowing all light, but Jiang Xiao did not hesitate at all. He moved forward lightly and steadily, descending step by step into the underground secret passage.
After descending about three zhang (approximately 10 meters), Jiang Xiao's feet finally landed on solid ground.
There was a strange, fishy smell in the air, which made his body temperature rise involuntarily. At the same time, an ominous premonition that was hard to suppress began to rise in his heart.
Before me was a spacious basement, exuding an air of decay and antiquity, along with a familiar, fishy stench.
Torches were still burning on the surrounding walls, their light dancing and reflecting in Jiang Xiao's pupils.
"Strange, was this torch just wiped on?"
The seemingly cluttered basement was surprisingly filled with all sorts of items:
For example, abandoned furniture, faded photos, rusty tools, and densely packed documents placed in a corner.
He walked over and carefully picked up a yellowed document. It was covered with densely packed, mosaic-like text, most of which was illegible due to the erosion of time.
However, along the edge of the document, one name after another caught Jiang Xiao's attention, each name accompanied by a date. Jiang Xiao's heart trembled; could these names and dates be...?
Among those photos, one of them made him stop moving as if he had been electrocuted, because he unexpectedly discovered a familiar face—a beautiful female corpse?
Why is her photo placed under a tombstone so far from the funeral home?
Chapter 355 The Graveyard Guardian
Jiang Xiao felt a wave of dizziness and a sharp pain in his brain. He gripped the photo tightly, his expression filled with disbelief and shock.
strange?
I just can't understand it.
The female corpse that appeared in the funeral home had a photograph on it beneath the dark tombstone, suggesting it had been placed there long ago.
A feeling of being manipulated by the unseen forces welled up in Jiang Xiao's heart, and he began to wonder if all of this was an elaborately designed mystery.
He himself was the unwitting pawn.
He continued to peruse the documents, trying to piece together the complete information with his not-so-bright brain.
Below the photo, several lines of faded handwriting come into view, seemingly relating to transaction records of a mysterious organization, as well as a series of death dates.
From the intricate, spiderweb-like records, Jiang Xiao identified several names directly related to the funeral home.
Could there be some unknown connection between these people's deaths and the funeral home?
Are the night watchman, Bao Lebin, and the curator merely symbolic figures with hidden motives?
Jiang Xiao's alertness suddenly increased; he seemed to sense a slight disturbance nearby.
The wind howled, and the candle went out. All around was pitch black; in the gloomy air, every cell in his body screamed, a stark reminder of the danger lurking around him.
He swiftly drew his peach wood sword from his waist and cautiously drove away the unknown threat in the darkness.
My heart pounded like a war drum, and my whole body trembled with excitement as the blood surged through my veins.
He didn't like being led by the nose; he trusted his fists more than this nonsensical decryption.
As the ancients said: If a road is impassable, open it with your fists!
Time seemed to slow down dramatically, and in an instant, a slight sound came from the corner of the basement.
It sounded like frenzied applause, or like the agonizing cries at a funeral; the source of the sound was a small door concealed by candlelight.
Jiang Xiao approached silently, the warm air and dim light behind the small door conveying an alluring sense of security.
"I hate this kind of pretentious cerebral palsy the most; it makes me feel itchy all over."
Taking a deep breath, he stood with his sword drawn, and with his agile figure flashing past like lightning, Jiang Xiao broke through the door.
A blast of icy, yet odorless, cold air hit him, and the sight inside startled him.
"That's interesting."
There were no dangerous traps or ambushing enemies inside, as he had suspected.
Instead, it was a neat laboratory, with various instruments and equipment gleaming with the light of modern technology, and on one side of the table, neatly arranged were documents as red as blood.
Each document contains the deceased's specific information and the events that occurred before their death.
Those anonymous statistics ruthlessly reveal the dark methods hidden behind the end of each life.
In this so-called "burial ground of truth," every deceased life seems to be drawn into the vortex of the funeral home.
Who exactly needs to use death to achieve some ulterior motive?
His mind raced like lightning, a jumble of possibilities swirling and disrupting his thoughts.
Putting aside all his confusion, he knew he needed to return to the funeral home. Perhaps in some corner there, or even on some person, lay the key to the truth.
As Jiang Xiao organized the data, he cautiously withdrew from the laboratory. He knew that the tomb guardian might be watching his every move from the shadows.
Behind him, the sealed tomb passage closed silently, as if something was stepping on the branches, making a 'crunching' sound.
"That pungent stench is really strange."
Jiang Xiao turned around abruptly and saw a shadow that appeared unusually distorted under the light of the instrument.
What the hell?!
Anyone who has experienced mental illness knows that it's rare for something to shock someone with a mental illness.
But what was in front of me was far too abstract.
But unlike the corpse demons and soul guardians he had imagined, the monster in front of him did not have any "strange" aura; it seemed more like it had been cultivated by someone.
And it's big!
It's extremely large, probably four or five times the size of Jiang Xiao.
It moved at an astonishing speed, almost following in Jiang Xiao's footsteps. Every time it got close, you could feel the cracking sound of the air being pulled apart. Its powerful joints were strong enough to pierce through rocks.
"wipe!"
Seizing the opportunity to stab with a sword has absolutely no effect; the peach wood sword can only produce true damage and critical hits against strange and unusual targets.
Helpless, Jiang Xiao simply twisted him back behind his waist, intending to engage in close combat.
Inside the cramped laboratory, Jiang Xiao seemed to be dancing a deadly dance with this enormous creature.
"Damn it, you bastard, are you even human?!"
Animals and humans have different senses, especially since this thing is not stupid at all, and can even see through Jiang Xiao's clumsy feints and his plan to flank him.
The terrifying, spider-like creature didn't answer, but its gleaming eyes and upturned lips suggested it wasn't a mindless idiot. It also let out a mocking laugh at Jiang Xiao.
"Hehehe~"
'boom! '
"Are you laughing at my ass?!"