Chapter 164 The Palace

  Xiao Qi watched in horror as the dozen or so third-stage skeleton soldiers in front of him instantly turned into ice sculptures. Scared, he sat on the ground and kept retreating, thinking that an even more powerful monster had arrived.

  Han Ming flashed out from the shadows and came to Xiao Qi's side.

  "Ah, it's you..."

  Xiao Qi was slightly surprised to see that the kind person who had bought his dagger a few days ago had arrived.

  "Did you save me? Was it you who took action just now?"

  Xiao Qi asked excitedly.

  Han Ming smiled.

  "Why do you insist on entering that palace? What exactly is inside? Just now I heard you shouting for Mom. Is your mom inside?"

  Upon hearing Han Ming's question, Xiao Qi immediately hung his head low and remained silent.

  "A secret?"

  Han Ming asked.

  Xiao Qi shook his head and then nodded.

  "This place is extremely eerie. You should know that it's very difficult for the undead to evolve to the third stage. There must be something strange about this palace. Are you sure you want to enter?"

  "Can you take me in? Thank you so much."

  Xiao Qi was extremely excited.

  "Come with me. I'll take you in."

  "Okay!"

  Xiao Qi nodded repeatedly.

  Han Ming led Xiao Qi and slowly walked towards the palace. At this point, they were still about ten meters away from the palace.

  According to Han Ming's calculations, when they reached a distance of ten meters from the palace, another group of skeleton soldiers should appear, likely around third-stage fifth-rank.

  Sure enough, when they reached a distance of ten meters from the palace, the ground began to shift again.

  Xiao Qi quickly retreated two steps and tensely watched the ground in front of him.

  The surface of the earth shifted, and a dozen blood-red skeleton soldiers crawled out.

  "Third-stage fourth-rank... about what I expected."

  Han Ming nodded slightly.

  As soon as these dozen or so skeleton soldiers crawled out, they all attacked Han Ming and Xiao Qi.

  Han Ming interlocked his index finger and thumb, continuously firing off a dozen small water arrows.

  The water arrows sliced through the air, leaving faint white trails in the air due to the low temperature.

  With a whooshing sound, the water arrows hit five of the skeleton soldiers. Upon impact, the water arrows rapidly dispersed, forming a layer of dark blue water marks on the bodies of the five skeleton soldiers. The movements of these five skeleton soldiers immediately became extremely slow.

  The other seven or eight skeleton soldiers dodged Han Ming's first round of magical attacks.

  "Interesting."

  Han Ming smiled slightly. He quickly retreated two steps, condensed a water ball the size of a head with his left hand, and slapped it with his right palm, dispersing it into countless small droplets that showered towards the skeleton soldiers.

  Due to the dense concentration of droplets, some of them couldn't be dodged by the skeleton soldiers. A small portion of the droplets landed on the bodies of the skeleton soldiers, instantly forming dark blue water marks.

  "As expected of third-stage undead, the temperature that could have frozen them only managed to slow their movements. It seems that extreme cold is less effective against higher-ranked creatures." Han Ming thought to himself. If he increased his magical power, he could certainly freeze all these skeleton soldiers, but it would be a waste of magic power and not very wise.

  With the skeleton soldiers' speed slowed down, dealing with them became much easier.

  Han Ming didn't know if there were more formidable opponents waiting ahead, and perhaps many undead were ambushed inside the palace. With a quick turn of his mind, unwilling to waste more magic, he drew his battle axe from his waist and strode forward. The battle axe swung up and down, hitting each skeleton soldier and shattering them into pieces.

  "Let's go."

  Han Ming turned back and called out.

  Xiao Qi looked at Han Ming in shock, unable to believe his eyes, "You took care of such powerful undead in just a few moves?"

  "Undead are different from humans. They don't think and have no martial skills to speak of. Naturally, they're much easier to deal with."

  Han Ming explained as he led Xiao Qi towards the palace.

  The remaining ten meters didn't yield any more skeleton soldiers.

  The two walked up the steps in front of the palace and looked inside through the palace gate, but it was pitch black, and nothing could be seen.

  Han Ming casually took out several magic lamps and threw them into the palace, instantly illuminating a large area.

  "Wait for me at the door. I'll go in and take a look."

  After signaling Xiao Qi, Han Ming stepped into the palace first.

  The huge palace was empty, with nothing to be found. The air carried a musty smell, clearly indicating that no one had entered for a long time.

  Han Ming lifted a magic lamp and walked around the perimeter of the palace, noticing many paintings on the walls.

  Under the light of the magic lamp, Han Ming saw that the walls were adorned with a series of ancient bas-reliefs.

  The bas-reliefs depicted a series of miraculous scenes. Han Ming carefully observed and saw three gigantic ancient trees carved on the reliefs.

  Below the ancient trees stood a group of peculiarly shaped creatures.

  Among them, three bore a striking resemblance to the three children of the Tree of Life as seen in the documents.

  "It seems that these three ancient trees must be the legendary Tree of Life."

  Han Ming continued to observe closely.

  The scenes depicted in the bas-reliefs gradually changed, with more and more creatures appearing on the murals. Later on, for some reason, these creatures began to fight each other.

  The ancestor of the ancient dragon clan, Cangli, and the ancestor of the elf race, Molin, for some unknown reason, turned against each other. The two fought fiercely, causing mountains to collapse, rivers to fracture, thunder and lightning in the sky, and floods on the ground.

  Looking further, the scene changed again.

  The battle between the two seemed to have stopped at some point, and the ancestor of humans, Shana, stood alone in the open field, looking up at the sky, seemingly lost in thought.

  Han Ming continued to wander, and the scenes of the murals kept changing.

  When he reached the middle part, Han Ming suddenly noticed countless fine cracks appearing on the wall in front of him, shattering the complete bas-relief.

  Han Ming frowned slightly and reached out to touch the cracks.

  When his fingers touched the cold wall, his heart sank.

  "This... these cracks aren't on the wall!! They're on the mural!"

  Han Ming was shocked to discover that the cracks on the mural were so realistic that they almost deceived him.

  "In other words... the world depicted in this mural... has shattered!? What happened? Is the world depicted in this mural the same as the one I'm currently in? If not, why do the creatures in this mural look so similar to the ancestors of the creatures in this world? If it is the same world, according to the scenes depicted in the mural, my world should have already shattered. But clearly, the world I'm in now is intact."

  Han Ming was curious, and without stopping his steps, he continued to walk forward.

  However, the continuous murals suddenly disappeared, leaving a blank space on the wall ahead, an empty zone with nothing in sight.

  "How could this be?"

  Han Ming quickly walked another dozen steps, and suddenly, some things appeared on the wall in front of him. But this time, they were no longer murals but some strange symbols resembling writing. Moreover, these symbols seemed incomplete, with many parts damaged, leaving only a small portion that barely revealed their original form.

  Han Ming's head buzzed.

  "This... isn't this the writing on the parchment?"

  Han Ming hurriedly took out the parchment he had obtained from the auction house and compared the writing on the parchment with the symbols on the wall under the light. Upon closer inspection, they were indeed the same type of writing.

  "What does this writing say?"

  Han Ming thought for a while but had no clue. He quickly took out a jacket, pressed it against the wall, and used the water element in his hand to wet the jacket. The writing on the wall was then transferred onto the jacket.

  After preserving the jacket and the parchment, Han Ming continued forward.

  What he saw next were all damaged symbols that couldn't be recognized, and these symbols were few and far between. In the blink of an eye, he reached the end without seeing anything else.

  "The murals in the front depicted things intermittently, unable to connect coherently. And these symbols have been damaged, making it even harder to guess their true meaning. However, it seems that this palace is indeed very ancient. Otherwise, such ancient bas-reliefs and murals wouldn't have appeared."

  Han Ming reluctantly walked along the wall for a while but found that there was nothing else on the subsequent walls.

  "What exactly is this place?"

  Han Ming was puzzled.

  "Xiao Qi, come in."

  Han Ming called out.

  "Xiao Qi."

  "Xiao Qi?"

  After calling twice with no response, Han Ming quickly walked to the palace entrance and looked around, but there was no sign of Xiao Qi.

  "Damn it! Where did this kid go? Could he have entered on his own?"

  Han Ming hurriedly searched inside the palace.

  The palace was enormous, and after searching for over ten minutes, Han Ming still couldn't find any trace of Xiao Qi.

  "Xiao Qi!"

  Han Ming called out loudly. His voice echoed for a long time in the empty palace.

  Han Ming's head buzzed. No way! Could this kid have been taken away by something? He was anxious, quickly searching the palace and extending his water-type magic elements to increase his search range.

  As he gradually reached the center of the palace, he suddenly saw a huge black shadow over ten meters tall.

  "What is this?"

  Han Ming raised the magic lamp high, and the light shone over, revealing a gigantic demon-like statue.

  A naked woman, barely alive, was tied to the statue.

  "Who are you!? Is this Xiao Qi's mom?"

  Han Ming asked with a mix of surprise and worry.

  The woman slowly raised her head, her face as pale as white paper, devoid of any blood color.

  Hiss...

  Suddenly, a sound of water vapor rose from behind the statue.

  Han Ming felt a terrifying sensation that made his entire body tremble.

  He quickly moved behind the statue and saw a vast lake, so large that it couldn't be seen to the end with one glance.

  Han Ming hurriedly took out several magic lamps and threw them far away, each maintaining a distance of about fifty meters.

  Even so, he still couldn't see the edge of the lake.

  "This is impossible! There's no way this palace has enough space to accommodate a lake of this size. It doesn't make sense."

  Han Ming was baffled by the sight before him. The lake's area seemed to be more than ten times the size of the palace, which was against common sense.

  At the end of the lake was endless void and darkness, giving one the feeling that their soul was being sucked away upon looking at it.

  Han Ming was shocked and kept retreating, but for some reason, he always felt a cool breeze at the back of his neck, rhythmic like human breathing.

  Han Ming broke out in goosebumps and quickly turned his head back, only to see an empty space behind him. Not only was there no one, but the demon statue that had been there earlier with the tied woman was also gone.

  Han Ming's heart jolted, and he quickly turned back to look at the lake.

  What he saw almost made him vomit his bile.

  In the deep black lake, a pair of eyes too huge to describe were staring straight at Han Ming.

  Each eye was nearly a hundred meters in length, and if not carefully observed, it would be hard to tell that they were a pair of eyes.

  These huge eyes stared at Han Ming through the dark water, making his scalp tingle.

  "What... what is this thing? Just the eyes are this huge!"

  The pair of huge eyes blinked rapidly twice and then sank deeply into the black water.

  Boom...

  The huge palace began to shake, and small pieces of rubble and soil started falling from above.

  "What's happening??"

  Han Ming retreated in panic as a huge vortex began to form in the lake, with rings of black water spiraling downward.

  Creak... creak...

  Thin sounds came from all around.

  Han Ming quickly turned his head and saw that the bas-reliefs on the wall had started to wiggle. The creatures carved on the bas-reliefs seemed to come to life, constantly trembling.

  "This is bad!"

  Han Ming instinctively felt a sense of crisis and didn't care to find out what was happening. He quickly turned around and ran out of the palace.

  His feet had just stepped out of the palace gate when a loud rumble came from behind.

  The huge palace started to tremble and then suddenly floated into the air. With a flash of light, it disappeared, leaving behind a large open space.

  Han Ming stood there dumbfounded, stunned for a moment.