The Cycle of Reincarnation in the Four-Courtyard House: A Journey Through the Heavens

The room was filled with swirling, dark green poisonous fog that refused to dissipate. Three pitch-black skeletons lay on the ground, smashed to pieces, creating an extremely eerie and terrifying scene.

Li Xiao reached out and grabbed Evelyn, who was still shaken, and turned to leave the terrifying stone chamber filled with the aura of death.

The two continued along a secluded passageway, steadily making their way deeper into the ruins.

As the two passed a smooth stone wall, Evelyn's flashlight beam accidentally swept across a corner of the wall, and tiny specks of light suddenly refracted from the dark cracks in the stone wall, standing out in the dim environment and instantly catching her eye.

The sudden appearance of this tiny light instantly piqued Evelyn's curiosity.

She temporarily forgot the terrifying scene from earlier, subconsciously broke free from Li Xiao's hand, and slowly and curiously walked forward.

Only after getting closer, and with the help of the bright flashlight beam, could she see the entire stone wall clearly.

Within the grooves of the wall before us, there are more than a dozen crystals, all black and translucent, each shimmering with a faint, cold light. The interplay of light and shadow creates a deadly allure in the desolate underground ruins.

Evelyn had studied ancient Egyptian culture for many years, but she had never seen such a special crystal before, and her curiosity grew stronger.

She subconsciously raised her hand, her fingertips touching the cold, hard crystal surface. She applied slight pressure, wanting to dig out a piece completely to examine it closely.

Just as her fingertips gripped the edge of the crystal and she was about to exert force, a warm and powerful hand suddenly reached out, firmly grasped her wrist, and stopped her movement. The force was gentle but not easy to break free from.

Evelyn paused, turned around with a puzzled look on her face, her clear eyes filled with confusion as she stared blankly at the calm-looking Li Xiao, not understanding why he had suddenly stopped her.

Li Xiao's gaze fell on the stone wall covered with black crystals, and he asked her with a hint of seriousness in his voice, "Evelyn, do you know about the scarab beetle from ancient Egypt?"

"Scarab?"

These three words exploded in Evelyn's ears like a thunderclap. The curiosity that had been on her face vanished instantly, her fair cheeks drained of color, and her eyes were filled with fear and panic.

"You mean... these things are the legendary scarab beetles?"

Li Xiao nodded slowly, and said with certainty, "That's right, these things on the wall that look like crystals are scarabs that were sealed by ancient Egyptian priests using secret techniques."

The moment she received the definite answer, Evelyn recoiled as if struck by a venomous snake, abruptly withdrawing her hand and retreating rapidly.

The next instant, she threw herself into Li Xiao's warm embrace, clinging tightly to his waist, not daring to look at the stone wall again.

As a leading scholar deeply involved in the secret history of ancient Egypt, she knew better than anyone the horror and eeriness of the scarab beetle.

These venomous insects, found only in Egyptian royal tombs, are extremely vicious. Once awakened, they frantically burrow into the flesh of living people, gnawing away at the flesh and blood layer by layer, penetrating the muscle fibers, and finally burrowing into the skull to devour the brain.

According to ancient Egyptian historical records, the high priest Imhotep seduced the pharaoh's wife. After the affair was exposed, he conspired with the queen to murder Pharaoh Set I. In the end, he suffered the most cruel and inhumane punishment of being eaten by insects in ancient Egypt.

He was imprisoned alive in a stone coffin filled with countless bloodthirsty scarabs. In endless pain and despair, his flesh was gnawed away and his body devoured by thousands of poisonous insects, and he died after suffering extreme torment.

It was precisely because of this extreme resentment that he transformed into a malevolent and vengeful spirit after his death, lurking beneath Hamunaptra for three thousand years.

The terrifying legends surrounding the scarab beetle kept Evelyn from calming down.

Li Xiao's eyes remained completely calm, instead showing a hint of curiosity.

In the original series, the greedy warden caused the scarab beetles to hatch because he pried a piece of black crystal off the wall.

Finally, the scarab beetle gnawed through the warden's shoe and burrowed into his body. The beetle crawled upwards from his leg and into his brain, which led to the warden's death.

Li Xiao raised his hand, his fingertips slightly bent, forming a claw. A concentrated and powerful invisible spiritual force suddenly locked onto the entire stone wall in front of him, gently pulling it away from a distance!

hum-

A slight tremor suddenly rang out, and the dozen or so black crystals embedded in the grooves of the stone wall began to tremble violently, their eerie light flashing intensely, as if they had broken free from the shackles of a thousand-year-old seal.

In just a moment, the black crystals that were firmly embedded in the wall broke free from the stone wall and crashed onto the cold stone floor.

Click, click—

A series of crisp cracking sounds rang out as more than a dozen pieces of black crystal, as hard as jade, shattered one after another, their layers of crystal shell peeling away, completely removing the outer sealing crystal.

After the crystal shattered, its hidden form was completely exposed to the beam of the flashlight.

Inside each crystal is sealed a pure black beetle the size of a billiard ball.

The insect's body was jet black and shiny, and its shell looked very hard. The most terrifying thing was that there was a pair of ferocious mandibles growing at the corners of the insect's mouth. They were sharp and pointed, and they interlocked. Under the beam of the white flashlight, they reflected a cold metallic light, exuding a fierce and murderous aura.

This is the scarab beetle, the most terrifying undead insect in ancient Egypt.

Once freed from their seal, these scarabs, now exposed to the light of day, instantly began to revive. Naturally bloodthirsty and incredibly sensitive to the life force of living beings, they instantly locked onto Li Xiao and Evelyn, making them their sole targets.

Da da da!

A series of soft crawling sounds suddenly arose as more than a dozen ferocious scarabs, their legs flying, charged rapidly along the ground towards Li Xiao and his companion.

Facing these legendary, terrifying beetles up close, Evelyn's pupils constricted sharply. Her slightly calmed emotions were once again overwhelmed by extreme fear, and her face turned deathly pale. She instinctively buried her face in Li Xiao's arms, not daring to look up at him.

But just as the swarm of scarabs was about to reach the two of them, a sudden change occurred!

puff!puff!puff!

A series of muffled explosions rang out one after another. Without exception, all the rapidly charging scarabs were crushed into dust as if by some terrifying pressure. Even their incredibly hard shells could not withstand this crushing force!

In the blink of an eye, the once ferocious scarabs were all reduced to pools of dark red flesh, lying limp on the cold stone bricks, completely devoid of life.

When Evelyn witnessed all of this, she was so shocked that she couldn't close her mouth. She looked at the pile of debris, then at the man beside her, and in her heart, she regarded this mysterious and powerful man as a god.