lcionline Chapter 520
Chapter 520
Following the direction the fat man pointed, through the more than half-meter-thick, exceptionally pure glacial ice, one could clearly see a twisted human figure frozen deep within the ice!
The man was wearing a thick, faded, tattered, and strangely styled leather coat. His body was curled up, and his facial expression was frozen in extreme pain and horror. His mouth was wide open, his eyes were bulging, and his skin was pressed tightly against his bones, showing a dry, dark brown color.
It was a mummified corpse that had been frozen for who knows how many years!
"Mummy?"
Wu Tianzhen frowned.
"Mummy?"
The fat man's voice suddenly rose eight octaves, and his face instantly blazed with an indescribable light, a mixture of ecstasy and greed, all his previous worries vanishing.
"What mummified corpse!"
Comrade Naïve, you need to improve your judgment!
This is clearly lying down... a million!
No, two million! Look!
This style of clothing is so old-fashioned!
"Just grab a jade pendant or thumb ring from someone's pocket, and we'll be rich!"
"You fatso!"
Are you crazy?
"You're still thinking about this at a time like this?"
Jie Xiaohua rebuked her sternly.
"Comrade Xiaohua, fortune favors the bold!"
This ice looks thick, it might be frozen solid!
The fat man wouldn't listen; his dream of becoming a millionaire had clouded his judgment.
Without saying a word, he quickly pulled out his multi-functional folding entrenching shovel from the side pocket of his backpack, swung it open with a "click," and muttered, "Sorry, brother, lend me some money for the trip," before swinging the shovel and fiercely chiseling at the ice layer above the frozen corpse!
"Fatty! Stop!"
Zhang Hao's stern shout and Yi Sa's exclamation rang out at the same time.
But it's too late!
"Crack!"
With the first shovel strike, ice shards flew everywhere, and a clear crack instantly spread out.
Unexpectedly, the ice layer seemed unusually fragile.
"Hey, it's pretty crispy!"
The fat man got even more excited and shoveled two more times hard into the crack.
"Snap! Crash—!"
A series of chilling cracking sounds rang out, as if an entire glass wall was collapsing!
The cracks created by the fat man's chisel spread wildly like a spider web, instantly covering the ice surface within a radius of several meters!
This is not a frozen, brittle thin ice at all, but an "ice cap" covering a huge, fragile underground cavity or crack!
"Oh no! It's hollow underneath!"
Zhang Hao's golden-red pupils contracted sharply as he instantly sensed the danger.
Before the words were even finished, a deafening rumble erupted—!!!
Like an earth dragon turning over, the entire ice surface beneath the fat man's feet collapsed with a deafening roar!
Huge blocks of ice mixed with snow cascaded down like a waterfall!
The collapse extended far beyond the fat man's striking point, instantly affecting the area where everyone was resting!
"run!"
Zhang Hao grabbed Huo Xiuxiu and Wu Tianzhen, who were closest to him, and tried to jump backward.
But the speed and extent of the collapse were beyond imagination!
The ice surface collapsed like dominoes, and cracks spread menacingly across the ground like black lightning!
The crowd instantly lost their footing!
"what--!"
"catch me!"
"Uncle!"
The terrified screams were drowned out by the tremendous sound of the collapse.
Just as Xie Xiaohua and Yi Sa helped Ding Yudie up, the ice beneath their feet suddenly cracked.
Zhang Qilin reacted the fastest, trying to grab the ice rock next to him, but the base of the ice rock also shattered instantly!
The fat man was the first to be hit, disappearing into the collapsed ice hole along with his shovel, leaving behind only a long, regretful cry of "My God!"
The world is spinning!
A cold air current carrying snow powder and ice chips rushed towards us!
Like dumplings being dropped into a pot, everyone was helplessly swept away by the collapsing ice and snow, plunging into the bottomless darkness below!
The time of the fall seemed to be stretched out, yet it also seemed to be only a moment.
His body kept crashing against the collapsing ice rocks and steep cave walls. His thick winter clothes were torn by sharp ice shards, and the biting cold and the excruciating pain from the impacts intertwined.
Finally, with a dull thud and a painful groan, the fall stopped.
All around was deathly silent, with only shards of ice and snow still falling softly.
"Cough cough... Damn..."
The fat man was the first to groan. He had been buried under a pile of broken ice and struggled to crawl out, looking disheveled and his entrenching tool was nowhere to be found.
"How is everyone...?"
Zhang Hao's voice rang out, tinged with suppressed pain.
He shielded Wu Tianzhen and Huo Xiuxiu, and the three of them fell onto a pile of relatively soft snow. Although they were dizzy, they did not seem to have any serious external injuries.
He quickly lit a powerful flashlight.
"I'm okay……"
Wu Tianzhen coughed.
"Jade Butterfly! Jade Butterfly!"
Yi Sa's anxious voice came through.
She and Xie Xiaohua shielded the unconscious Ding Yudie as they fell, and Xie Xiaohua is now struggling to push away the ice blocks pressing on her.
"Cough cough...I'm alright...Yudie is still breathing!"
Jie Xiaohua responded.
"Bro?"
Zhang Hao looked at another shadow.
Zhang Qilin rose from a pile of broken ice, his movements still swift and agile, though there was a noticeable cut on his arm, blood staining his sleeve. He didn't seem to care, but instead cautiously scanned his surroundings.
The beam of the powerful flashlight pierced through the thick darkness, illuminating their surroundings.
This is a huge, suffocating crack!
It was more than ten meters wide, and looking up, all one could see was a chaotic darkness. The ice hole from which they fell was just a blurry white dot at a great height.
The crack extends in both directions, equally deep and seemingly endless.
What truly sent chills down everyone's spines and made their blood almost freeze was the cracked walls!
Whether overhead, underfoot, or to the sides, as far as the eye can see, all the rocks and soil present a pure, pitch-black color that seems to absorb all light!
It wasn't the black of coal, nor the black of night, but a deathly, ominous, viscous blackness, an abyss blackness that seemed capable of devouring even the soul!
When the flashlight beam was shone on it, most of the light seemed to be absorbed by the strange black substance, illuminating only a very small area with great difficulty.
"This...this stone..."
Huo Xiuxiu's voice was choked with sobs as she gripped Wu Tianzhen's arm tightly.
"It's not a stone..."
Zhang Hao's voice was more solemn than ever before. His golden-red eyes were fixed on the surrounding black rock walls. The Primordial Qilin bloodline within him was issuing a frantic warning as if it had encountered a natural enemy, the burning sensation even overshadowing the pain of the fall. He slowly moved the beam of his flashlight.
When the beam of light swept across a relatively flat black rock wall on the side, everyone held their breath!
Where the light shone, it reached the interior of the pitch-black rock...
It was studded with countless distorted, blurry humanoid black shadows!
The dark figures were densely packed, layer upon layer, each with a different posture.
Some looked like they were struggling in pain, scratching upwards with their hands;
Some were curled up in a ball, as if enduring immense fear;
Some stood stiffly, their hollow "eyes" seemingly piercing through the rock, staring intently at the uninvited guests in the crack!
They have no physical form, no face, only pure humanoid silhouettes outlined by deeper darkness, like eternal imprints left after being swallowed by this eerie black rock!
An indescribable aura of coldness, despair, and resentment, like a tangible tide, silently surged in from all directions, instantly engulfing everyone!
The fat man's mouth gaped open; his earlier fantasy of becoming a millionaire was completely shattered by boundless fear, leaving only the chattering of his teeth.
What they fell into was not an ordinary mountain crevice, but a hellish abyss that had been completely corrupted by the power of that "ancient god" and had solidified countless tormented souls!
The dark shadows in the rocks seemed ready to break free and pounce from all directions at any moment!