Infinite Puzzle City

Chapter 514 Coffin (two chapters in one)

"what!!!"

The scream startled Xiao Ran and Liu Mu, who were climbing along the rope. Although there were loud gongs and drums around them, the scream could not escape Xiao Ran's ears and eyes.

Looking back suddenly, I saw San Ye crawling out of a yard, and finally fell to the ground with a bruised face. But San Ye didn't care about that, he got up from the ground and ran forward.

While running, he kept shouting: "It's not me, it's not me..."

Xiao Ran and Liu Mu looked at each other when they saw this.

"Something bad happened!"

Xiao Ran immediately stopped climbing up and threw the lion head to Liu Mu: "I'll go take a look."

As he said this, he jumped down, took two steps at a time, and jumped over the villagers. In a moment, he was next to the Third Master and reached out to grab the Third Master who was running away with his head down.

With a big hand, he grabbed the old man and lifted him up in the air like a chick. This time, Master San was so scared that he almost pissed himself.

"It's not me, it's not me, I didn't hurt you."

"Third Master!"

Seeing this, Xiao Ran called out "Hao Laosan". Only after hearing Xiao Ran's voice did Hao Laosan dare to raise his head and open his eyes.

"It's you!! Quick, run, we can't stay here anymore, leave now."

Hao Laosan shouted at Xiao Ran to hurry up, but Xiao Ran did not move, instead staring straight ahead.

"Third Master, who is he?"

Hearing Xiao Ran's question, the Third Master turned around suddenly and saw the door being slowly opened. A man covered in blood walked out from behind the door, his eyes fixed on Hao Lao San.

He was still shouting, "Hao Laosan, you made us suffer so much back then."

"Ah!! He...he is a demon...a ghost!!"

Hao Laosan looked at the face in front of him, which was both familiar and unfamiliar, with horror written all over his face.

Seeing this, Xiao Ran took out his guillotine and chopped off his head with one blow.

However, after the knife was chopped down, the head that rolled to the ground was split into two, and new flesh and blood quickly grew on the body, but the appearance had undergone new changes again.

A face that surprised Xiao Ran appeared in front of him.

It was a woman, who looked charming and seductive, but stared at Xiao Ran with a sinister and ferocious look on her face: "Stinky boy, we meet again."

"Xue Hongling??"

Looking at the face in front of him, Xiao Ran was suddenly very surprised.

This woman was none other than Xue Hongling, who was bitten to death by his corpse dog. Xiao Ran had almost forgotten about her, but he didn't expect to meet her again.

"It seems that this is not a ghost."

Xiao Ran didn't care about Xue Hongling in front of him. He was able to kill her when he just became a beginner, so it would be no problem for him to do so now.

only……

Xiao Ran looked at the guillotine in his hand, a moment of confusion appeared on his face.

Ever since the dragon energy transformed by the emperor was killed, a golden texture has appeared on the sword, and its murderous aura has increased instead of decreased. Even if it has not been activated by itself, it is still a powerful killing weapon that is enough to scare many evil spirits.

If the opponent is an evil ghost, this one blow will be enough to turn it into ashes.

But the other party didn't die, and Xue Hongling emerged. So... what on earth is this thing? ?

"Take your life!!"

"Hao Lao San!!"

Just as Xiao Ran was thinking, two figures in front of him pounced towards him with bared fangs and claws.

Xiao Ran frowned, but did not continue to attack. He grabbed Hao Laosan with one hand and quickly backed away, asking Hao Laosan: "What's going on? Where did this thing come from?"

Hao Laosan opened his mouth to say something, but when he looked up, his eyes suddenly caught the plum tree behind Xiao Ran, and his eyes widened: "You...you...behind you!!"

Hearing this, Xiao Ran looked back and saw a bright red plum on the plum tree gradually cracking open. An eyeball squeezed out from it and glanced at Xiao Ran.

Then Mei Zi's skin and flesh began to wriggle, and slowly cracked open to reveal the facial features centered on the eyes. Xiao Ran looked at this person's facial features and felt that they looked familiar. He took a closer look and said, "Shen Kuai Dao!!"

“Long time no see!!”

A ferocious smile appeared on his angular face. After greeting Xiao Ran, he began to grow his limbs and body rapidly.

Now Xiao Ran understood where this thing came from.

"Run!!!"

Liumu's shouting was heard in the distance. Xiao Ran looked back and saw that Liumu had climbed up the Tower of Babel. He was waving the lion head in his hand and shouting loudly at Xiao Ran.

Seeing Xiao Ran looking at him, Liumu hurriedly pointed to the left, as if reminding himself of something. Xiao Ran looked in that direction and his expression suddenly changed.

A breeze blew, causing the surrounding plum trees to tremble slightly. The originally green plums on them began to turn red rapidly. From a distance, it looked like a ball of fire spreading rapidly.

Seeing this, Xiao Ran grabbed Hao Laosan and jumped up, quickly running towards the direction of the lion dance Tower of Babel.

The terrain there is high, and you can climb up the Tower of Babel to take shelter temporarily.

When Xiao Ran moved, the surrounding plum trees seemed to come to life. The bright red plums suddenly opened their eyes and locked onto Xiao Ran and Hao Laosan.

Soon, several figures emerged from the plums and rushed towards the two of them.

Xiao Ran could recognize some of these people, but not others.

For example, several of them were martial artists who died at his hands. Most of them were killed by Xiao Ran in Mengchi, and some were initiates of the Changchun Society.

But Xiao Ran couldn't recognize more of them.

These people looked like ghosts but not ghosts, and they pounced towards Xiao Ran quickly.

Xiao Ran held a big knife and fought in all directions at night. The blade left an afterimage and chopped around. Suddenly, the knife light flashed and anyone who approached was cut into two halves or three pieces.

But the split figures were split into two, and their number increased.

What made Xiao Ran even more troublesome was that these figures would actually trigger a reaction from the plum tree, constantly giving rise to new figures.

As the saying goes, one gives birth to two, two gives birth to three, and the cycle continues endlessly, with the number increasing day by day.

When Xiao Ran rushed to the Tower of Babel, he found that the villagers who had just surrounded the Tower of Babel had disappeared. Not only the villagers, but even the lion dance teams had disappeared without a trace.

Seeing this, Xiao Ran's heart skipped a beat. A bad premonition came to his mind, and he hurriedly picked up Hao Laosan and jumped onto the Tower of Babel.

What was strange was that these figures surrounded the Tower of Babel, neither approaching nor climbing up, just surrounding them.

Seeing this, Xiao Ran asked Liu Mu, "Where are the villagers and the lion dance team?"

"It's gone. It disappeared in the blink of an eye."

Liumu shook his head: "This place is very evil. I was staring at them just now, but they disappeared in the blink of an eye."

Although these guys are ghosts, they probably don't have the ability to hide under Liumu's nose. But in just a moment, they completely disappeared without leaving any trace. This is what makes Liumu feel weird.

As the two were talking, they saw the area below was already filled with blood-red figures, densely packed and increasing in number.

Even the demon king Liumu couldn't figure out the mystery. He stared at it for a long time and couldn't help but praise: "This Plum Blossom Taoist is really different. His inferior skills have reached such a level. If he hadn't been born in the last days of the Dharma, he could have become a true immortal with just this skill."

Xiao Ran rolled his eyes at him and said, "You are a demon king, but you can't see this trick?"

"No, there are huge differences between the Tao, the Law, and the Arts. Innate beings learn the Tao, acquired beings learn the Law, and only those with inferior talents specialize in the Arts. The Tao follows nature and is inconceivable. Although the Arts have a form, they have not achieved anything."

Liumu said complacently with his hands behind his back.

He is not a congenital creature, and cannot be compared with the gods in heaven, but he is also an acquired immortal. He has his own magical powers. How can a mere technique, the worst of the worst, be worthy of his attention?

This is not Liumu's arrogance, it is a recognized fact.

Since ancient times, I have never heard of anyone who can achieve anything by relying solely on magic.

Even in Longhu Mountain and Zaoge Mountain, the Tao comes first before the skills.

There are some schools that put magic first, for example, the famous Shenxiao School, which was once extremely glorious and even surpassed the Longhu Xuanzong.

But the Shenxiao Sect no longer exists today. It is said that even the ancestral temple is left with only the ruins of walls and rotten tiles.

But this Taoist priest Plum Blossom has found a new way to master the art and has achieved such a level that even Liumu has to look at him with new eyes.

Xiao Ran ignored Liumu's mumbling nonsense and turned to look at Hao Lao San who was almost scared silly and asked: "Master San, now is the time for you to tell us the truth."

"The truth? What truth?"

Hao Laosan looked up at Xiao Ran with a confused look on his face.

"Well, if you don't tell me, I won't ask. But when disaster strikes, everyone will flee. Later, we will just accept our fate."

"Don't!!"

Hearing Xiao Ran's words, Hao Lao San's expression changed drastically, and he grabbed Xiao Ran's arm: "I'll tell you, I'll tell you, what do you want to hear? I'll tell you everything."

"Then let's start with how you knew this place."

"This……"

Hao Laosan looked embarrassed. Seeing this, Xiao Ran walked to the front and pointed down: "If you can't remember, we can't leave here today."

"I said, I said."

Hao Laosan waved his hand, poked his head out with a complicated look, looked at the figures that were still increasing below, sighed, pointed at the figure he summoned and said: "His name is Song Huan, we are his junior brothers"

In addition to this junior brother, there were three other people, Pan Xiaohuai, Qi Xia, and Liu Sanduo.

Including him, there are five people in total. In fact, they are all tomb robbers from the same school.

In his early years, he traveled all over the country and made a lot of money. Later, when Hao Laosan had made enough money, he returned home and prepared to live an honest life.

However, years of tomb robbing had infected Hao Laosan with negative energy, which entered his body and tormented him day and night.

Seeing that he was getting thinner and thinner, and his health was getting worse day by day, his father went to the ancestral grave, brought back a bright red plum, burned it, ground it into powder, and gave it to him to eat.

In just two days, not only did all the negative energy in his body disappear, but his whole person was reborn.

After much persuasion from his father, he found out that there was a Plum Blossom Manor behind the place.

As the saying goes, a dog will never change its nature. Hao Laosan stayed at home for a few years. After his father died, he saw the ceremonial gate during the burial. He started to pay attention to Meihua Manor. At that time, he contacted his four brothers and told them that there was a big tomb here. He asked them to pretend to be a prospecting team to rob the tomb and he would cover for them.

As a result, the four brothers either went crazy or died, and Hao Lao San was so scared that he never dared to attack Meihua Manor again.

Later, Hao Laosan found out that Meihua Manor was actually a haunted manor. No wonder it was so dangerous.

From then on, Hao Laosan never left the village in his life and stayed at home obediently.

"Originally, I had given up on this idea a long time ago, but I'm getting older and older, and my body is starting to hurt again. When you came to see me that day, the dog at the door of my house didn't even dare to bark. At that time, I knew that you were not an ordinary person. You have killed at least six or seven people, otherwise you wouldn't have such a strong murderous aura. So I thought about letting you..."

"You want me to take the blame for you, right?" Xiao Ran said on behalf of Hao Laosan.

"No, no, no, I'm just borrowing your murderous aura to suppress these little devils." Hao Laosan quickly shook his head to deny it.

Xiao Ran didn't say anything after hearing this. He squinted his eyes and thought for a while: "I think I understand what's going on."

"What??"

Liumu looked at Xiao Ran curiously.

But he found that Xiao Ran was also staring at him, which instantly gave Liumu a bad feeling.

"You get down!"

"what??"

Before Liumu could react to Xiao Ran's meaning, his body jumped down involuntarily. All of a sudden, the summoned figures rushed towards Liumu like crazy.

Liumu punched one by one. His strength was not great, but the figures transformed from these plums were surprisingly soft and rotten, and were often broken into pieces by just one punch.

But the strange thing was that the figure that was smashed by Liumu did not continue to split, but slowly healed itself again.

"Okay, come up."

Xiao Ran waved his hand, signaling Liumu to climb up again.

"What are you doing??"

Liumu didn't understand what Xiao Ran was trying to do. Why did he make him go down and come up again?

But Xiao Ran explained: "The Plum Blossom Taoist deliberately left a test, the purpose is to test whether I, the successor, am qualified."

The Plum Blossom Taoist founded his own school and passed down four traditions.

Soul, corpse, killing, and crossing.

The strange Merlin in front of him corresponds exactly to one of the spells, which is the Mirror of Evil, one of the last two spells in the Record of the Unraveling of Corpses.

The Mirror of Sin is an advanced version of the Corpse Pool. It can reflect the evil and guilt in one's heart and trigger the manifestation of one's own three corpse demons. The Merlin in front of him has the same effect. He can manifest the fruits of his own sins and show them through plums.

Xiao Ran asked Liumu to go down, but there was no reaction at all, which verified his guess.

Because Liumu is not a human but a demon, he is not affected by the Mirror of Evil.

Now that you know the test questions, the next thing will be much easier.

Xiao Ran looked at the Tower of Babel under his feet again.

The Tower of Babel is just a name. In fact, in the eyes of lion dancers, this thing is a tower, but in Xiao Ran's eyes, it is more like an altar for fighting.

The altar is ten feet high, and the Dharma rises one foot.

The higher the altar, the stronger the blessing to oneself.

This was clearly a trap designed by Plum Blossom Taoist, a test paper prepared specifically for himself.

"Have it!"

Xiao Ran's eyes lit up, he made seals with his hands and chanted a spell.

In an instant, wisps of corpse gas gushed out from Xiao Ran's body, flowing down along the Tower of Babel and falling to the ground, causing the entire village to tremble.

The rolling corpse gas then gushed out from the ground, turning into a pitch-black corpse pool with the Tower of Babel as its center.

"What a heavy corpse energy!"

Xiao Ran was a little surprised. He didn't expect that the corpse gas here was heavier than he expected. He couldn't help but think of the story that Liu Mu had told before, about the Plum Blossom Taoist killing people and planting trees.

It is estimated that there must be quite a few corpses buried under this mountain.

However, the heavier the corpse qi is, the better it is for me.

Xiao Ran then formed a seal with his fingers and said, "Start!"

Suddenly, the corpse gas surged, and three-foot waves rolled up on the ground. Then chains emerged from the corpse pool and coiled around the figures like hundreds of small snakes.

"Whatever you are, get out of here."

As Xiao Ran spoke, he put his palms together, and suddenly a crack appeared in the corpse pool, as if it was split apart by someone, and turned into a door. Behind the door was a bottomless abyss, which seemed to lead to an endless path.

This is the Yellow Springs Wrong Path, one of the eight secret techniques in the Zhou family's [Soul Crossing Technique].

Xiao Ran used the corpse pool to ward off evil spirits, and then used this technique to force open a door and send all these things in.

"Jingle Bell……"

Immediately afterwards, the chains were tightened, in order to pull all these ghost-like creatures in.

At this time, Liumu on the side was staring at the crack below, as if he was thinking about something. Just as he was slowly approaching the front, Xiao Ran's expression changed, and he suddenly lowered his head to look at the pool of corpses.

"wrong!"

Suddenly, a red light flashed under the corpse pool, and then the entire corpse pool began to rotate rapidly. The red light became brighter and brighter, and in a moment, the entire corpse pool turned blood red.

Liumu was stunned when he saw this and turned back to look at Xiao Ran: "What's going on?"

Xiao Ran was also stunned for a moment, but soon realized what was going on. He frowned and said, "It's broken!!"

I should have thought of it long ago. How could the test questions set by Taoist Plum Blossom be so simple?

He used the corpse pool to force these things away, but he didn't expect that the corpse pool was controlled by another force. Xiao Ran wanted to open the corpse pool, but it didn't work at all.

I saw flashes of blood below, and bursts of miserable wails could be heard from time to time.

"Oh!!"

Xiao Ran and Liu Mu were fine, but Hao Laosan on the side couldn't stand it anymore. The wailing made him feel like his brain was about to explode. He fell to the ground in pain, covering his head with his hands and began rolling on the ground.

Seeing this, Xiao Ran knew that if this continued, Hao Laosan would not be able to hold on, so he walked forward and knocked him unconscious with a knife.

"Hey, why is it this thing?"

Liumu stared at the ground below and suddenly said in surprise: "Spiritual Demon!! How could it be this thing?"

"What is a spirit-transforming demon?"

Xiao Ran walked over and looked down, only to see a few dark things vaguely emerging from below and climbing up quickly.
"If this thing comes up, you'll be in big trouble."

Liumu looked at the thing climbing up from below and explained to Xiao Ran, "This thing is notoriously difficult to deal with in the underworld. It has no intelligence and cannot be destroyed. It is invisible and intangible. Once you are touched, it will tear your soul off. Even if you don't touch it, as long as you are surrounded by them, they can continuously absorb your soul, so even if a ghost meets it, it will be a dead end."

After saying that, Liumu couldn't suppress the gloating smile on his face as he looked at Xiao Ran: "This thing is a well-known ghost in the underworld. If we run now, we still have a chance. Otherwise, if this thing climbs up, you will be dead."

Xiao Ran frowned when he heard this. He didn't expect it to be so tricky.

"If I run now, will this thing keep coming out from underneath me?"

"Of course, I'm afraid that the villages outside may not be able to be saved. As for Qingcheng Mountain, it depends on whether there are real masters in it. But I don't think it will be a big problem. Plum Blossom Taoist may have other backup plans."

Xiao Ran rolled his eyes when he heard that.

If this thing really gets out, even if only one gets out, the consequences for oneself will be serious.

Thinking of this, Xiao Ran snorted coldly: "Since Plum Blossom Taoist can let you out, I can send you back."

Hearing this, Liumu looked at Xiao Ran in surprise: "What are you going to do? Don't say I didn't warn you, this thing is not something you can deal with."

Xiao Ran ignored him and quickly took out a handful of Yin banknotes from the space and threw them out casually.

He had seen some special spells in the Zhou family's [Soul Crossing Sutra], which should be useful at this moment. What's more, he also has the help of the magic of exorcism and cursed objects. How would he know that he could not deal with it unless he gave it a try?

Thinking of this, Xiao Ran pinched a Yin banknote with his fingers and chanted a spell silently.

Suddenly, the Yin banknotes splashed in the air began to spin rapidly.

These Yin banknotes circled around the Tower of Babel, spinning rapidly, and finally attached to the rope, gradually forming a large net, blocking the entire corpse pool below.

"You are crazy! You are trying to stop a chariot with your bare hands. You are courting death!!"

Seeing Xiao Ran's actions, Liumu couldn't help but advise: "With your limited skills, I'm afraid you really can't suppress this thing."

"My skills are a little shallow, but I have this thing!"

Xiao Ran said this and took out the [Tongyou Seal] from the space. The heavy feel of it and the blessing of more than 30,000 good deeds gave him the courage to give it a try.

Without any activation, Xiao Ran directly placed the seal on the floor beneath his feet, using it as a talisman, and then used the magic of exorcism.

The evil spirits floating around began to gather rapidly towards Xiao Ran's body, and a faint luster began to flash on the small Tongyou Seal. The luster became stronger and stronger, and it started to float.

"Stop it for me!!"

Xiao Ran crossed his hands and pressed down hard.

A huge aura surged out from the Tongyou Seal, and then fell down heavily.

With a muffled "boom!" sound, a huge mark was stamped on the densely packed Yin banknotes, and at the same time, a powerful shock wave was rolled up, which blew away the spiritual demons that had already appeared.

"Wait, look what that is!!"

At this moment, Liumu suddenly noticed something and pointed down and shouted at Xiao Ran.

Upon hearing this, Xiao Ran looked down and saw that there seemed to be something in the abyss below the corpse pool. When Xiao Ran looked carefully, he found that the thing was hanging in the air, above the abyss, halfway below the corpse pool.

"it seems that……"

"coffin!!"

Xiao Ran's eyebrows moved, and he suddenly understood something, and said in surprise: "It's the coffin of the Plum Blossom Taoist! He hid himself in it? "

(End of this chapter)