The Six-Spoked Dharma Pestle in Crow's hand had already been thrown—he flung it at the forehead of the newly emerged creature. No one could tell how that thing's head was structured: it had no scalp, just a thin skull covering. Despite Crow's full-force strike, the golden-plated artifact's spiked tip merely sparked on contact. Under the flashlight beam from Hao Zhengyi, the blackened skull didn't even show a scratch.
But that strike did divert the monster's attention away from me and onto Crow. With a howl, the creature kicked back and lunged straight toward him. Just as it leaped into the air, its form suddenly vanished—but the sound of something heavy landing and springing up again could still be heard. The rapid sequence of sounds was clearly charging in Crow's direction.
Just then, Hao Zhengyi, standing beside Crow, flung a handful of white powder ahead of him. With a whoosh, a massive fireball erupted about a meter in front of Crow.
"Awooo!" With a scream of pain, the monster shot out from the flames. Fire engulfed its body, and it instantly lost all will to fight, thrashing wildly on the ground. It clearly had intelligence—enough to roll and press its body against the floor in an attempt to extinguish the flames.
At the same time, the other monster—the one I'd shot—suddenly let out a long, shrill cry. It was struggling violently, trying to rise, but my bolt had hit its spine. It had all the strength but couldn't move a muscle. Seizing the chance, I retrieved my crossbow and reloaded another bolt. As I did, Crow quickly walked over, shone his flashlight, and retrieved his Six-Spoked Dharma Pestle.
Whatever powder Hao Zhengyi had used, it worked in a disturbing way. The burning monster kept rolling, the flames seemed to go out, but the moment it stood—fwoom—the fire would reignite, like dead ash rekindled. Over and over, the flames died down only to flare back up again. And still, it didn't die.
Eventually, the creature seemed to go berserk. Ignoring the fire consuming it, it gave a guttural growl and lunged straight at Hao Zhengyi in what seemed like a final, desperate attack—a bid for mutual destruction.
Before it could reach him, Hao Zhengyi's hand was already at his lower back, reaching for something. But I didn't give him the chance to act. I squeezed the trigger—the bolt shot straight into the creature's back, once again pinning its spine. With a piercing scream, the monster crashed to the ground like a sack of meat, unmoving, letting the fire continue devouring it as it whimpered in agony. The passage echoed with its wailing cries.
After the beast collapsed, Hao Zhengyi let go of whatever he had behind his back. He glanced down to confirm the monster was no longer a threat, then looked up at me and said, "Didn't expect bringing you down here would actually prove useful."
Reloading my crossbow, I replied, "Don't mention it. Let's just say I'm repaying Crow for saving me earlier."
He gave a faint smirk but said nothing more, returning his gaze to the sizzling monster whose burning flesh was still crackling with oil.
At that moment, Yang Jun suddenly spoke to Hao Zhengyi. "You're not planning to keep it alive? At least you could try to learn something from it."
Hao narrowed his eyes and looked at him. "One is enough to figure things out. Two is a luxury. Besides..." He turned his gaze back to the burning, shrieking monster and added, "It's already in this state. What else could we possibly learn from it?"
Yang Jun didn't respond. He stared at the first monster for a moment in silence before slowly walking over and crouching beside it. "Dust to dust, ashes to ashes. Whatever sins you've committed in this life, you can repay them in the next."
As he spoke, Yang Jun raised his right hand. In his palm was a short dagger—and it looked oddly familiar. I instinctively reached for my lower back. Sure enough, my dagger was gone.
Yang Jun drove the blade silently into the creature's exposed heart. There was no resistance—no bones or flesh in the way. The tip sank in without a sound. "Nyeh—" The monster let out a strange cry from its throat. With its final breath, its limbs went stiff, then collapsed limply to the ground. Once he confirmed it was dead, Yang Jun stood and walked back to me.
Panting slightly, he handed the dagger back. "Take care of this thing. Lose it, and you'll wake up crying from your dreams."
Not if you don't steal it in the first place, I grumbled inwardly. Just like Yang Xiao, Yang Jun wasn't someone you could afford to offend. But that didn't matter now—because at the moment the monster died, I had clearly heard its last word: Nyeh.
If Hao Zhengyi and Crow weren't right next to me, I would've immediately asked what that cry meant. But given the situation, I could only nod vaguely and mutter, "Yeah... family heirloom. Locking it in the safe the moment we get back."
Unfortunately, Hao Zhengyi wasn't hard of hearing. The amusement vanished from his face as he looked coldly at Yang Jun and said, "Seems you know more than I do."
Without replying, he turned toward Crow, who had just walked back. Hao reached out and took the Six-Spoked Dharma Pestle from Crow's hand—then suddenly hurled it straight at the burning monster on the ground. The artifact stabbed clean into the creature's heart. As if giving its final words, the monster let out one last "Nyeh—" and moved no more.
Strangely enough, at the exact moment it died, the flames enveloping its body were suddenly snuffed out—poof—as if swept away by a sudden gust of wind.
I stared at the charcoal-like remains of the creature with a rising wave of nausea. Only when I saw Crow retrieve his Six-Spoked Dharma Pestle did I remember to walk over and pull the bolts from both monsters' spines. While fumbling around on the ground, I also found my lighter—though it felt damp, maybe soaked in monster saliva. The wind shield vent was all sticky, so I shook out the gunk. No point wasting something that still works.
After I finished packing up, Hao Zhengyi was still staring at Yang Jun. But unlike what I had imagined, he didn't say a word about the monsters or the "Nyeh." Instead, he looked at Yang Jun and said, "Looks like our path ahead is going to change a little."
Yang Jun didn't respond to this, but I had a bad feeling the moment I heard it. "President Hao, what do you mean? What kind of change?"
Hao Zhengyi's eyes shifted to me. He glanced at the crossbow in my hand and said, "You and Mr. Yang Jun will lead the way. Crow and I will follow behind."
At those words, I instinctively took a step back and glanced at Yang Jun, who still wore that indifferent expression. Since he didn't object, I couldn't stay quiet. "President Hao, are you joking? You want the two of us to take the lead? Then what are you and Crow here for? You two spent all this time preparing just to have someone else be the cannon fodder?"
While I was speaking, Hao Zhengyi acted like he didn't hear me at all. His eyes remained locked on Yang Jun, as if I were invisible. Only after I finished ranting did he suddenly toss his flashlight to me, then said to Yang Jun, "Mr. Yang, you're good to go?"
Yang Jun didn't even glance at me. "Would it make a difference if I said I wasn't?" And with that, he walked past Hao Zhengyi. As he moved by, he paused for a final glance at the mural above Hao Zhengyi's head, then stepped into the endless darkness ahead. He still looked a bit weak, but his stride was firm, showing no signs of struggling with blindness.
Watching his silhouette in the light, a thought suddenly popped into my head—could he actually see?
Hao Zhengyi and Crow only caught up after taking some photos of the monster corpses and the mural. On top of that, Crow had to keep installing those wall-mounted lights along the way. As a result, by the time they caught up, Yang Jun and I were already more than thirty meters ahead. Yet they didn't seem in a hurry to close the distance, deliberately keeping the gap. A few times I even slowed down for them, but Hao Zhengyi would just pretend to tie his shoe, clearly not interested in catching up.
I didn't know what game Hao Zhengyi was playing, but since they weren't rushing, I took the chance to lower my voice and ask Yang Jun, "Yang Jun, level with me—what was that thing yelling 'Nyeh' earlier? And what did you see through that gap where the deathly energy was leaking out? You fought so hard to get another look."
Yang Jun walked on as if he hadn't heard me at all. To be fair, of everyone in the Bureau, his temperament was probably closest to Wu Rendi's. He didn't want to talk, and I couldn't pester him like Sun Fatty would. So I let it drop. He kept walking, and I kept shining my flashlight ahead of him.
The four of us remained split into two teams, continuing down this eerie corridor. Fortunately, there were no forks in the road ahead. We walked for another half hour, still in utter darkness. The deeper we went, the more humid and colder it got. The Yin Convergence Point would occasionally send out blasts of bone-chilling wind. With each step, my confidence wavered. I kept scanning the air with my flashlight—its beam stretched more than a hundred meters ahead without ever hitting a wall. There was no end in sight.
"Yang Jun, where does this tunnel lead? Can you at least give me a clue so I can prepare myself?"
Just as I finished speaking, Yang Jun suddenly stopped. Before I could react, I noticed that my flashlight beam was finally cut off by a stone wall about fifty meters ahead. To the left was a dead end, and to the right, a bend in the corridor.
Though the bend had appeared, Yang Jun didn't move. Standing beside him, I noticed his backpack beginning to tremble—more and more violently. He opened it, and I quickly flashed my light inside. Curled up in there was a pitch-black creature, shuddering uncontrollably—Yang Jun's black cat. It looked just like when it had been terrified in the hotel. Since Sun Fatty used it to catch Zhang Rantian's secret, I hadn't seen it again. Though I knew it had always been in Yang Jun's bag, I hadn't expected it to be in such a state.
Seeing this, Yang Jun took the cat out. The moment it touched the air, it reacted like it had been shocked—its whole body arched, fur bristling from head to toe. It struggled frantically in his arms but was tightly held and couldn't break free.
The cat was clearly terrified of whatever was around that bend. I reacted quickly and whispered, "Something in there scared the cat this badly—what is it?"
I had asked casually, not expecting an answer, knowing Yang Jun's personality. But surprisingly, after watching the cat pant for breath, he said, "This is where the Nyeh was born."
"Born?" I repeated, confused. "Born... you mean the cat? Isn't this a Yin Convergence Point?"
Yang Jun nodded, eyes fixed on the cat. "Not it. This Yin Convergence Point was altered. Someone used the extremely Yin nature of this place to create a Nyeh."
He'd switched terms again, and I was even more confused. "Create? You mean the Nyeh was man-made?"
Still glancing at Crow behind us, who was squatting to fix another light, Yang Jun added, "Nyeh don't occur naturally. They're too unnatural, too defiant of the heavens. They can't be born spontaneously—they're artificially produced."
I seized the moment. "Then those two monsters earlier—were they Nyeh too?"
Yang Jun seemed to realize he was saying too much but continued anyway, "They were failed attempts—half-finished products that didn't come out right."
Something still bothered me. "You floated on that boat for so long—how do you know all this?"
He clammed up, but after a moment, he answered, "It got boring on the boat. I wanted to try making another Nyeh. I even asked your Director Wu to find methods for doing it."
"You wanted to make a Nyeh?" I stared at him.
He didn't seem to catch the implications in my tone and continued, "That's all I know. The rest doesn't concern you. Head back the way we came. When the others arrive, tell them what I told you. If it's not Wu Yedi or Yang Xiao, don't let them come down. They'll only get in the way."
He took off his backpack and handed it to me. "Take this little guy with you. If it stays here much longer, it'll die of fright."
I didn't take the pack, and said angrily, "If we're leaving, we leave together! If you hadn't taken in so much deathly energy, I wouldn't stop you. But in your condition, if I walk away now, it'll be your death sentence. Cut the talk, Yang Jun. I'm going all in this time. So what if it's a Nyeh factory? I've seen the real deal before—what's there to fear from a few defective ones?"
"A Nyeh factory? You're talking about Nyeh?" came a voice from behind. Startled, I realized Hao Zhengyi and Crow had approached without a sound.
I was caught off guard. Just as I was scrambling for an excuse, Yang Jun casually nodded. "Your ears work well. Yes, we were talking about Nyeh."
His openness surprised both Hao Zhengyi and me. With his usual attitude, he should've walked away. But not only did he acknowledge it—he offered more.
He looked at Hao and said, "You've known all along this isn't just an ordinary Yin Convergence Point, haven't you?"
Hao said nothing, eyes narrowed.
Yang Jun continued, "Your 'Hidden Atlas of Heaven' mentioned it, right? But I bet it didn't explain what was actually inside."
At this, Hao's face darkened, his gaze sharp.
Yang Jun added with a shrug, "The Hidden Atlas of Heaven isn't all that rare…"
Before he could finish, Hao's eyes narrowed to slits, and he squeezed out, "You… You've read the Hidden Atlas of Heaven?"
Yang Jun calmly nodded. "Glanced through it years ago. Honestly forgot most of it—wouldn't have remembered at all if you hadn't brought it up. Funny thing is, after breathing in that deathly energy just now, one passage came back to me... How did it go…"
He tapped his forehead and recalled, "This site may have been used by Song Dynasty's Dong Qichao—highly inauspicious. That's about right, isn't it?"