My family tree hollow connects to the modern era : Chapter 25

While the mountain was sealed off to search for spiritual items, besides the stationed military and the cultivators responsible for the search, there were also background support personnel. For instance, some were in charge of overall planning and coordination. Since the mountain was so vast, a carpet search had to be efficient, and designing such plans behind the scenes naturally required experienced and skilled individuals.

Others were responsible for daily life. With several tents pitched, people were naturally needed to handle the food and drink.

Seeing Bai Zhizhi playing with the fish, Jiang Lin remembered that the head chef in the kitchen back there was exceptionally good at grilling fish, which was why he had asked him if he wanted to eat.

The head chef was of course delighted to grill fish for them. These were cultivators, and making friends with them could only bring benefits.

Grilling fish was the head chef’s signature skill. The fish, pan-fried and grilled before being served, carried a nose-catching aroma, with crispy skin and sweet, tender meat. Paired with a special sauce, it tasted so good that Bai Zhizhi almost couldn’t resist pulling out some spiritual beast meat for him to grill. If ordinary fish could taste this good, the flavor of spiritual fish would definitely be even better.

Just as they were enjoying their meal, Yue Yanting and Ren Dao’an ran over quickly: “Jiang Ge, we found something!”

Jiang Lin put down his chopsticks, stood up, and walked over: “What did you find?”

Yue Yanting handed a pocketful of ginseng that looked like wild weeds to Jiang Lin, explaining: “An Ge found several ginseng plants near a mountain crevice. They looked like they had been gnawed on by some animal, with their roots entirely dug up. Thinking they probably wouldn’t survive, he just dug them up and brought them back. After digging up the ones on the outside, there was still one left deep inside the stone wall crevice.”

Ren Dao’an added: “I tried to use spiritual energy to pull out the ginseng from the stone crevice, but to my surprise, the spiritual energy was absorbed the moment it probed inside.”

Just then, Yue Yanting had found him and told him about the painting of the lady and the key treasure, which made him realize instantly that this area was very likely the place they were looking for.

Jiang Lin said to Yue Yanting: “Go call Xiao Yu over, we are going up to take a look.”

Bai Zhizhi, holding his unfinished fish, also followed them because he had to go and keep watch.

After marking out the key restricted area, Jiang Lin and Xiao Yu each took a few people up the mountain.

The mountain crevice Ren Dao’an had discovered was located where two mountains joined. The gap was extremely narrow, so tight that even a skinny child could not pass through, making it completely impossible to enter.

Without waiting for Jiang Lin to make a move, Xiao Yu took two steps forward and shot a bolt of spiritual energy toward the crevice. That spiritual energy did not penetrate the entire mountain gap; instead, it dissolved and vanished right in the middle, as if sucked away by something inside.

Xiao Yu looked at Jiang Lin, and Jiang Lin pulled out the key. Almost instantly, waves of spiritual energy surged out of the key, and the entire key was pulled by a powerful external force, flying up into midair.

Standing behind Xiao Yu, Xu Mo quickly took out an instrument to record the scene, making it convenient for future research and review.

The spiritual energy inside the key poured out as if it were endless, and the escaping energy gradually formed an array formation in midair. The massive array was being filled by the spiritual energy from the key at a speed visible to the naked eye. Once the array was fully formed, a gap opened up in the center of the giant circular formation, though the white light inside was so piercing that it was impossible to peer into it.

Jiang Lin glanced at Xiao Yu, who nodded back at him before turning to Xu Mo: “Notify the bureau and have them send people over. Old Jiang and I will go inside to investigate.”

Xu Mo nodded: “Be careful, you two.”

Jiang Lin said: “Dao’an will go in with me. Yanting, you guard the outside. He’er’s people have been keeping an eye on our movements here, so this can’t be hidden. I’m leaving the outside to you guys.”

Bai Zhizhi, who had been standing alongside them, said with annoyance: “You guys are so wordy. I’m going in first to see what kind of place this is.”

With that, he dashed in first. Worried there might be danger inside, Jiang Lin quickly followed him, with Xiao Yu right behind him and Ren Dao’an chasing in immediately after.

Passing through the gap of white light, the group landed on a pile of rubble. It was very obvious they had entered a secret realm. The spiritual energy here was much richer than outside, but as far as the eye could see, there was not a trace of green, only rocky walls and rubble.

Jiang Lin took a step forward and grabbed Bai Zhizhi: “No one knows what the situation is inside. Don’t run around blindly. If there are ferocious beasts inside, we might not be able to deal with them.”

Bai Zhizhi said: “I am not running around blindly. This place is so desolate, just stones. Can there really be treasures here?”

Ren Dao’an kept a wary eye on his surroundings, his brow slightly furrowed: “Are these stones just ordinary stones, or are they like the previous water spirit crystal, merely covered by a stone shell?”

Hearing this, Xiao Yu picked up a stone from the ground and squeezed it hard. The entire stone was crushed to powder, but there was nothing inside; it was just an ordinary stone.

“Could it be that the spiritual energy here was too scarce, causing the entire energy field to become desolate and ruined?”

This was not impossible. Some secret realms had been over-harvested and eventually collapsed, while other secret realms, perhaps having lost the support of their core power, could no longer grow any spiritual items. Even if they didn’t collapse, they became barren lands.

While they were observing their surroundings, Bai Zhizhi looked down at his own feet. Noticing his movement, Jiang Lin asked: “What is it?”

Bai Zhizhi stamped his foot on the ground, and then flicked out a Thousand Feather Fan. Once the feather fan unfolded, it instantly grew massive under the activation of Bai Zhizhi’s spiritual energy. The next second, Bai Zhizhi flew up, sat on the fan, and rose into the sky.

Just as the three men below were wondering about his actions, they felt the ground beneath them shaking, almost losing their balance and falling over.

All three were highly experienced cultivators, and realizing the danger instantly, they pulled out their respective weapons and searched for stable spots to jump to.

Soon, they realized they couldn’t jump away at all. No matter where they leaped, the movement beneath their feet grew larger and larger, because the place they were standing on was not a pile of rubble at all, but rather the body of a giant beast.

The giant beast, which had been fast asleep, detected four unfamiliar auras. Seeing these four intruders stepping on its back, it lashed its tail in anger.

When the tail, as slender yet thick as a giant snake, swept over, the three men dodged in different directions, practically scrambling to escape. Yet the giant beast was simply too massive, looking like an enormous snake; with a single roll or turn of its body, it could squeeze them to the point where they had nowhere to run.

Bai Zhizhi called out from above: “It’s coming from the left, the left!”

Xiao Yu didn’t realize Bai Zhizhi was warning him and assumed he was talking to Jiang Lin. As a result, he was nearly crushed to death by the giant snake rolling to the left, luckily saved just in time by Jiang Lin’s quick hand.

Bai Zhizhi sighed: “Oh dear, I even warned you about the left.”

Ren Dao’an made several successive leaps, stepping onto the giant snake’s body to run over to Jiang Lin’s side. In a situation like this, their chances of winning were only high if the three of them combined their attacks.

Bai Zhizhi called out: “The tail is coming!”

Jiang Lin pivoted his body and raised his long sword to block. With a loud bang, the sword blade clashed against the snake’s tail, feeling as if it had struck an incredibly hard rock. His palm was shocked to the point of numbness, almost sending the long sword flying out of his hand, yet the snake’s tail suffered no damage at all.

Watching the giant snake seem to wake up completely, its body wrapping tighter and tighter toward their direction, Xiao Yu said with a solemn expression: “This giant beast’s defense is too strong.”

Up until now, they hadn’t even clearly seen what this giant beast actually was, only feeling that its shape resembled a snake, but it had no snake scales, only hard, protruding stones piece after piece.

Ren Dao’an looked up and shouted to Bai Zhizhi: “Zhizhi, stop watching the show and pull us up!”

Bai Zhizhi shook his head helplessly: “You guys are really useless.”

Despite his complaints, he still threw down a white silk ribbon: “Hold on tight.”

The three of them immediately grabbed the white silk ribbon, and Bai Zhizhi pulled up hard, dragging them onto his feather fan.

The giant snake below followed the scent and raised its head, opening its massive mouth. The two rows of sharp fangs on the top and bottom made everyone’s scalp tingle.

Ren Dao’an sucked in a breath: “If this thing takes a bite, a person could be swallowed whole.”

Jiang Lin scanned the snake’s body, searching for its weak spot. With such a massive snake coiled at the entrance, they wouldn’t be able to explore this secret realm deeply unless they dealt with it.

Xiao Yu clearly didn’t agree with facing it head-on: “I think we should retreat first. This snake is too big; what grows on its body are stones, not scales, and we don’t even know if its weak spot is actually vulnerable. My portable camera has already recorded it, let’s go out and figure out a plan.”

Jiang Lin reminded him: “The gate at the entrance is supported by the key. The key was filled with spiritual energy. How many times do you think the spiritual energy capable of supporting the closing and opening of such a large secret realm can withstand being drained by entering and leaving?”

Whether to leave or to continue was not a question Ren Dao’an needed to ponder. He only needed to keep his eyes on the giant beast below.

Sensing their presence above by tracking their scent, the giant beast suddenly reared up. The stones previously piled on its body crashed down, and with the snake raising only half its body, it almost managed to bite them in midair.

Ren Dao’an hurriedly cried out: “Fly higher quickly, it’s about to reach us!”

Seeing that running away like this wouldn’t work, Jiang Lin gripped his long sword tightly and said to Ren Dao’an: “You guys find an opportunity to look deeper inside. Inspect as much as you can, don’t force it, and retreat immediately if you encounter danger.”

Before Jiang Lin could jump down, Bai Zhizhi grabbed him by the collar: “Why make it so complicated? Watch me.”

Saying this, he took out a small porcelain vial from his storage device. Opening the small vial, he casually waved his hand and scattered the medicinal powder inside. As the powder drifted away with the wind, the great stone snake, which had been opening its giant mouth and chasing the Thousand Feather Fan for a bite, froze and then let out a sneeze.

The three humans on the Thousand Feather Fan: “…” It was their first time seeing a snake sneeze.

The next second, having finished sneezing, the giant snake pulled its body back and thrashed on the ground a couple of times, seemingly trying to rub off the scent it had caught. Finding that it couldn’t be rubbed off, it twisted its body and crawled away.

The massive stone snake crawled along the scattered rocks and into the rolling, rocky hills, finally disappearing into a lake until it was out of sight.

The three on the feather fan turned their heads in unison to look at Bai Zhizhi.

Bai Zhizhi put away the porcelain vial: “Beast-repelling powder. As long as they don’t have a strong desire to attack and haven’t tasted blood, any demon beast can be driven away.”

Ren Dao’an swallowed hard: “Are the raw materials for this rare? Can we make it?”

If they had this, wouldn’t they be able to travel without obstacles when entering energy fields containing ferocious beasts?

Bai Zhizhi shook his head: “Obviously not. Just one ingredient inside, the hundred-beast grass, is a thousand-year-old spiritual medicine. Do you guys have that?”

Hundred-beast grass had a thousand-year medicinal property, but the main function of this grass was to repel beasts; it didn’t have much other use and didn’t require much spiritual energy. Therefore, in some herb gardens with abundant spiritual energy, as long as an array was laid down, a crop could be harvested every ten years or so, making it incredibly cheap.

However, these humans didn’t know this, and Xiao Yu looked especially pained: “You scattered an entire bottle of such a precious thing just like that?!”

Bai Zhizhi replied: “Otherwise? You guys couldn’t beat that big guy anyway.”

That was a stone python. Despite its massive size and terrifying appearance, covered in grotesque rocks that made it look fierce, it was actually a very gentle demon beast. This time, it only had a bit of a temper because they had woken it up from its sleep. Normally, as long as you didn’t provoke it, it wouldn’t launch an attack.

Even if it did attack, it would eat you if it won, and walk away if it lost, rather than fighting to the death, making it quite gentle.

Just as Bai Zhizhi planned to control the Thousand Feather Fan to fly down, Xiao Yu suddenly pointed at the large lake where the stone python had disappeared: “Look over there quickly!”

Hearing this, Jiang Lin and Ren Dao’an looked over, only to see something golden faintly reflecting in the lake water.

Jiang Lin patted Bai Zhizhi: “Zhizhi, fly over.”

Bai Zhizhi snorted and didn’t move. Could just anyone order him around?

Jiang Lin added: “We are also looking for treasure for you.”

Bai Zhizhi let out an “oh,” having almost forgotten that he got thirty percent of the things inside, and only then did he control the spiritual fan to fly over.

Once they reached the lakeside, the three men jumped off the fan, and Bai Zhizhi also landed lightly. Xiao Yu waded straight into the lake and picked up an ugly stone. Ren Dao’an took a closer look: “Gold? Could this be a gold nugget?”

Jiang Lin said: “No, this is wire gold ore, a type of ore with very high gold content, showing very obvious particles of natural gold on it. This kind of ore has become a rare item in today’s over-mined environment.”

Nowadays, the gold that could still be mined on the market required step-by-step processes to be extracted from ore, and a ton of rock might not even yield a gram of gold. Wire gold ore like this was practically a collector’s item.

The eyes of the three men turned toward the large mountain on the other side of the lake. The presence of this stone in the lake proved that there should be more than just this one piece of wire gold ore here; these stones could only have fallen from the mountain and sunk into the water.

Bai Zhizhi followed their gaze toward that mountain: “What are you looking at?”

Ren Dao’an replied: “Looking at wealth.”

Bai Zhizhi didn’t understand: “This kind of stone?”

Ren Dao’an said: “Not the stone, but the gold inside the stone.”

Bai Zhizhi was even more confused: “But isn’t gold worthless to you guys here?”

The gold leaves he had refined himself weren’t even highly regarded by the auction house.

Knowing his grievance over the gold leaves, Jiang Lin smiled and said: “A single gold leaf might not have high value, but a mountain of gold is definitely worth a lot.”