One person: Starting with the Snow Drinking Blade

Bald Bear ran in the middle, panting heavily, his searchlight waving back and forth, illuminating the winding passage ahead and the increasing amount of dimly glowing moss on the rock walls on both sides of the passage.

The "tap-tap" sound behind me was getting closer and closer.

Some monsters flank from the side, moving much faster than expected, traversing the rugged rocks as if they were flat ground. Feng Baobao had to frequently turn and parry; with each flash of her blade, a monster fell, but more monsters filled the gaps.

"There's a fork in the road ahead!" Wang Ye shouted. "Left or right?"

Nobody knows the answer.

Nie Lingfeng's gaze swept over the two forks in the road—the passage on the left was narrower, with obvious wet marks on the ground and water seeping from the rock walls; the passage on the right was wider, with a dry ground, but there was a faint, indescribable sweet smell in the air.

"Left!" he deduced. Moisture meant a water source, and water sources usually meant an exit or more space. Besides, that narrow passage was disadvantageous for monsters to flank.

The group turned onto the left fork in the road.

The pursuit from behind did not stop.

In the darkness, those scarlet eyes, like will-o'-the-wisps, gnawed at us from behind.

As Zhang Chulan ran, he threw palm grenades behind him. The white lightning exploded in the darkness, illuminating the dense, gray-white figures behind him—at least dozens, and the number was still increasing.

"Too many! We can't finish them all!" he shouted.

"Run deeper!" Nie Lingfeng's voice remained calm. "They won't dare chase us too deep."

"Why?" Zhang Chulan asked instinctively.

No one answered.

But the answer has already surfaced in everyone's mind—because deep down, there is something even more terrifying than them.

The group ran frantically along the slippery path. Slippery moss and seeping water lay beneath their feet, and several times someone nearly slipped and fell. Chen Duo, carrying Xiao Yun, ran in the middle, her movements remarkably steady, each step firmly planted on the dry rocks, as if she knew exactly where to avoid slipping.

The rock wall overhead lowered, from over ten meters to three or four meters, like a slowly closing mouth. The rock walls on both sides also narrowed, turning from a spacious cave into a narrow path that could only allow two people to pass side by side.

The "tap-tap" sound behind them gradually faded into the distance. It wasn't that they had given up, but rather that the passage was too narrow for them to surge forward at the same time. Several larger monsters were stuck in the narrow passage, letting out angry roars as they were trampled and torn apart by their brethren behind them.

As Wang Ye ran, he kept looking back: "Their numbers are decreasing—it's not that we've stopped chasing them, it's that the passage is limiting their numbers!"

But Nie Lingfeng's brows did not relax.

Because he felt—

Something's not right about the aura ahead.

That wasn't the smell of dampness, decay, or a monster's lair.

Rather, it was an ancient, deeper aura that instinctively instilled fear.

It was as if something, in the deepest darkness, was watching them.

Waiting for them.

The flashlight beam cast flickering spots of light in the deep, winding cave, barely dispelling the thick, inky darkness. The air was damp and chilly, carrying a heavy, earthy smell of rocks and groundwater, and... something even more indescribable, a strange, extremely unpleasant odor that seemed to be a mixture of old blood, decaying organic matter, and rusted metal.

The smell was as if something had been dead here for a long time, rotting for a long time, but had never been cleaned up. It was also as if some living thing had lived here for a long time, excreted for a long time, and fermented for a long time.

Beneath my feet lay a slippery, uneven rocky ground covered with a thick, slick layer of moss and unidentified dark fungi. The fungi were soft and limp, making a "plop, plop" sound underfoot, particularly eerie in the silent cave. Each sound felt like something being crushed and flattened beneath my feet.

"Holy crap... what kind of place is this? It's like a sewer, the kind that hasn't been cleared for centuries."

Zhang Chulan pinched his nose, carefully avoiding a pool of suspiciously colored, viscous liquid at his feet—the liquid was dark green, with an oily sheen on its surface, and emitted a pungent chemical smell. He swept his powerful flashlight among the jagged rocks and hanging stalactites, warily observing any possible movement.

Occasionally, the flashlight beam swept across the rock face, revealing obvious signs of human intervention—most of the metal pipes embedded in the rock had rusted and broken, exposing the reddish-brown iron rust at the fractures, looking like gruesome wounds. Broken cables dangled from the pipes, their copper cores exposed and blackened by oxidation. On another wall, there remained a blurry warning sign written in Russian, the red paint mottled like dried blood; only the words "Danger" and "No Entry" were barely legible.

Everything indicates that this place was once extensively renovated and utilized, but those renovations have now left only ruins, like a forgotten underground tomb.

"Stop talking nonsense and stick close."

The bald bear walking ahead spoke in a trembling voice. He held a flashlight in one hand and gripped a large-caliber pistol tightly in the other, muzzle down, his finger resting on the trigger guard, his knuckles white from the pressure. He was clearly terrified of the place, taking each step cautiously, his eyes constantly scanning the dark corners around him, as if some terrifying thing might leap out at any moment.

"Many places here have been modified by the council, with automated defense systems and... containment units installed. Although many years have passed, no one knows how many things are still 'alive'."

His voice was very low, as if he was afraid of disturbing something he shouldn't.

Nie Lingfeng walked at the front of the group.

Little Yun in his arms was wrapped tightly in a blanket, with only half of her face showing. The blanket was dark blue, thick and soft, making her look like a little silkworm.

Strangely, since entering the cave, Xiao Yun, who had always been lively and even a bit noisy, had become unusually quiet. She no longer looked around curiously, nor did she tug at Nie Lingfeng's collar or hair as usual. Instead, she pressed her little face tightly against Nie Lingfeng's chest, her big eyes wide open.

Her pupils seemed slightly dilated in the darkness, like two deep black holes, staring intently at the boundless darkness ahead. Her body was somewhat stiff, like a taut string, as if she were afraid of something.

Nie Lingfeng could feel her slightly accelerated heartbeat—much faster than usual, thumping wildly in her chest like a startled rabbit. There was also a barely perceptible tremor that traveled through the blanket to his chest.

This girl seems to have an instinctive, extraordinary vigilance and...fear towards the environment here.

"Xiaoyun, what's wrong? Are you scared?" Nie Lingfeng asked in a low voice, gently patting her back.

Xiaoyun didn't say anything.

She simply nestled her little head closer to his chest, like a kitten seeking warmth. Her small hands gripped his collar tightly, her nails leaving faint marks on his chest through the fabric.

Chen Duo walked slightly behind Nie Lingfeng. Seeing Xiao Yun's reaction, her brows furrowed slightly. Her usually expressionless face now held a hint of seriousness.

"Brother Nie, Xiaoyun seems a bit off," Chen Duo whispered.

"Yes, I can feel it." Nie Lingfeng nodded, his gaze sweeping more sharply across the front and his surroundings.

Xiaoyun's unusual behavior, and the lingering, unsettling sense of oppression in the cave, all indicated that this place was far from ordinary. That sense of oppression wasn't psychological; it was a real, pressing force from all directions, as if something unseen was watching them in the darkness, waiting for the right opportunity.

Moreover, the two groups from the Eagle Country and the Sakura Country who jumped down before them were completely nowhere to be seen or heard from, as if they had been completely swallowed up by the darkness.

This is not normal.

Even if they moved incredibly fast, it would be impossible for them to leave no trace in such a complex and dark environment. There were no footsteps, no voices, no flashlight beams, and no signs of any human activity.

"Master Wang, can you sense anything?" Nie Lingfeng asked Wang Ye, who was walking a little behind.

In this environment, Master Wang Ye's Feng Hou Qi Men (a form of divination) perception of "Qi" and "field" is often more reliable than that of the eyes and ears. The eyes can deceive, the ears can deceive, but the flow of Qi cannot.

Master Wang's expression was somewhat solemn. In his hand he held a simple compass—actually a manifestation of the Qimen Dunjia divination method, not a real compass, but a semi-transparent halo formed from the illusory images of the Eight Trigrams. The pointer on the halo was trembling slightly, its direction not fixed, swaying left and right, indicating that the surrounding earth energy and magnetic field were extremely chaotic.

"The earth's energy is stagnant, the magnetic field is disordered, and evil energy, death energy, resentment energy... and some kind of extremely chaotic and violent 'life' energy are mixed together, just like a pot of burnt poison."

He paused, as if carefully discerning the details hidden within the chaotic information.

"And..." He looked into the deeper darkness ahead, his brows furrowing even more. "There are strong residual energy fluctuations ahead, very fresh, probably just left behind, but... it's strange, as if something deliberately 'erased' them, intermittent and difficult to track. Those two groups of people have probably encountered something, or... are deliberately hiding their tracks."

"Ignore them, let's go our own way," Nie Lingfeng said in a deep voice.

Now that we're down here, the primary objective is to thoroughly investigate the situation below and prevent any potential dangers from being leaked. As for the people from the Eagle Nation and the Japanese Nation—if we encounter them, we'll deal with them; if we don't, as long as they don't cause any major trouble, we can leave them alone for now.

Of course, if they've already caused trouble... then we definitely need to go check on them.

The group continued onward in the darkness.