Chapter 18: Content of Punishment

Yang Zicang quickly closed the book, and the dizziness subsided a great deal.
“This must be good.”
Though he couldn’t understand it, he was certain that it recorded invaluable knowledge from another world; otherwise, it wouldn’t have been cast using this material. Every character on it was inlaid with silver wire, revealing how much effort the caster had invested.
After Putting the book away, Yang Zicang looked at a rusty, small door on the wall.
He pushed it, and the tightly sealed iron door let out a creaking sound. Luckily, it contained no time order.
After spending some effort breaking its lock, Yang Zicang pried off a cluster of faintly glowing magic crystals and, using their light, cautiously entered the narrow corridor.
The air was stuffy, and after walking for about ten minutes, another door appeared ahead. It was wide open, and the dark hall outside was swept by a dreary wind that blew in waves across the young man’s face.
[I, the Great Quadrilateral, sense a gloomy aura.]
Yang Zicang quickly crossed the gloomy passageway and headed toward the door ahead.
When he was just three or four steps away from the entrance, he suddenly felt a sense of panic. His steps involuntarily halted, and in the stillness, the sound of faint sobbing rose and fell indistinctly.
It sounded like the voice of a human woman, but… it was feeble and lifeless, as if it had been echoing through eternity.
An overwhelming sense of terror suddenly emerged, making Yang Zicang’s scalp tingle. Without hesitation, he turned around and sprinted back.
[The 41st Assessment Judge has marked the discarded mother of ‘Monster Blood’ for me.]
[Discarded Mother of Monsters, Abilities: Unknown. Discovered by: Candidate Yang Zicang.]
[If I eliminate it, the 41st Assessment Judge will grant me his own primary bloodline sculpture.]
Bloodline? Yang Zicang paused in shock, then immediately felt a chilling aura surging at his back.
The sound seemed distant yet near, distant as if at the horizon, yet near as if whispering right into his ear!
Forget the so-called bloodline or vessel, mother base or not.
YangZicang ran like a madman.
[The 41st Assessment Judge expects me to fight the ‘Mother Base’.]
Thump-thump, thump-thump.
This tunnel seemed endless, the sound growing clearer and closer, until finally, YangZicang even felt a shadowy figure beside him, running alongside in a frantic escape.
{Dad.}
A tender maiden’s anxious breath seemed to whisper in his ear, yet it carried a bone-chilling, eerie aura.
{Are you taking me to see Dad… Ask him, what did he make his daughter carry…}
{Why am I so cold… Why are the villagers afraid of me… Am I not the mother of the divine envoy… Am I really…}
{Why, when A-Lang just touched me, did he die…}
Countless bizarre murmurs rose from left and right, and what terrified YangZicang was that he could actually understand her words.
{Why do I feel like it’s been so long…}
Ahead, the light of a door appeared, and her weak voice grew a bit more cheerful, as if a long-standing hope was about to come true.
{Dad, after all these years, what are you still researching over there…}
Was that skeleton her father?
Gritting his teeth, YangZicang suddenly burst forward out of the room and turned around to close the door.
But in that instant, a chill ran through him as he realized the other side of this door was the eerie great hall he had just seen.
The tunnel had disappeared.
At this moment, the hall was filled with a dim, hazy blue light, in which a figure with an utterly weary expression hung suspended by chains of silver-white iron covered in talismans.
The clothes on the figure were already worn and shabby, rotting as if they had endured a thousand years.
Her belly bulged, more exaggerated than a ten-month pregnancy, stretched so thin that the skin was as delicate as silk, with various blood vessels spreading across it like magical patterns.
Inside that translucent skin was a curled-up figure about the size of a ten-year-old child. He appeared entirely human, except for a crimson tail coiled around himself.
The moment YangZicang looked at him, the “person” curled up inside the belly opened a blood-red compound eye on its buried face.
[I have been gazed upon by the Defender.]
YangZicang felt a deeper surge of some power suddenly emerge from the halo on his chest.
An intense urge for violence and bloodlust flooded his brain like an addiction; his eyes burned, and his mind felt as if it would explode.
A faint red glow emanated from the ring on his chest.
Bang!
YangZicang used all of his strength to slam the rusty iron door shut.
{Let me through…}
The mournful voice quickly faded, and all trace of eerie, ominous presence vanished instantly.
Yang Zicang was gasping heavily for breath.
Only then did he realize that this seemingly fragile iron door could actually block such an ominous aura.
“What a damned world this is.”
Wiping off his sweat, he ran his hand over the rust on the door, revealing fine gold wires embedded beneath it. “There’s something here?”
He wiped a few more times, uncovering the full pattern—a design reminiscent of a magical array. YangZicang, however, knew this array was no simple thing. As soon as he tried to memorize it, a wave of dizziness hit him, nearly causing him to pass out.
{Brother Yang, are you alright?}
“Y-yeah… I’m fine…”
YangZicang turned his head away and said, “I think I know why those monsters were chasing me so frantically. They were trying to stop me from coming here.”
That break was likely deliberately made by someone!
Now Liang Xi also understood that his survival was only because he hadn’t gotten close to that side; otherwise, facing those monsters, he wouldn’t have lasted more than a few seconds.
YangZicang found a rock to prop the door shut. After a moment of thought, still uneasy, he picked up a scrap of iron and laboriously carved onto a small stone slab:
—Beyond this door lies the woman who has long nurtured the “monster mother body.” Danger! Do not enter lightly!!!
Hoping this will serve as a warning to those who come later.
At that moment, a slightly eerie telepathic voice echoed:
[The 41st Assessment Judge regrets my cowardly choice.]
“What’s there to regret?” That guy only glanced outward from inside that woman’s body, and my model almost underwent some strange change.
[The 41st Assessment Judge initiates a vote for my sanction, with a ten-minute countdown.]
“?” Yang Zicang suppressed the urge to curse this unknown entity.
……
On the other side, Liang Xi’s heart pounded heavily.
His dream of earning timestreams here had been shattered; he was here purely by luck. Staying any longer, and he could die at any moment.
[Bro, what now? Is there any way out on your end?]
“I think I sense a flow of air. Wait a moment, let me see if the pipe I came from has a path leading elsewhere.”
Yang Zicang glanced at the glowing magic stones and asked, “What can these things be used for?”
{They can be used to craft equipment and also to build structures. Rumor has it that, combined with the headquarters’ blueprints, houses made from them are less prone to spawning evil nightmares. As for other uses, I don’t know}
As vague as Yao Qiming’s explanation. Clearly, the application of this stuff isn’t something an average person can grasp. Hard to say what grade these magic stones here are, but there’s at least enough to fill a hefty crate.
Yang Zicang pulled his focus back, raised the glowing magic stone, and walked back the way he came.
His steps were slow this time: he’d pause, close his eyes, and sense the airflow s around him—until, before long, he actually pinpointed the source of that faint, elusive breeze.
“This must be it.”
In the dim light, the young man raised the magic stone, now peering at a jagged piece of sheet metal high above through a hole near him. It was pitch black beyond.
{That opening’s too small, brother Yang}
Without Liang Xi needing to point it out, Yang Zicang could already see clearly that an ordinary person simply couldn’t pass through that small hole.
“This is trouble—monsters ahead, pursuers behind.”
And then there’s some kind of punishment waiting, whatever that might be.
On top of that, he had brought no food or water, because he had originally planned to just test the monsters’ strength. His other sidekick’s encounter with the sheer density of monsters had misled him.
{You can only get out once you’ve wiped them all out, Brother Yang. You can do it, right?}
A Liang spoke with anticipation.
[Voting for your punishment has concluded. Votes in favor: 5, Abstentions: 40. Result: Effective.]
“What? That actually passed? And so fast—only three or four minutes.” Yang Zicang was somewhat bewildered.
Suddenly, the unbroken Mental Link that Liang Xi has been maintaining with him cut off.
The light of the model on his chest automatically unfurled, diffused into the surrounding air, and vanished.
Yang Zicang waited nervously. Over a dozen seconds passed, yet still no investment or Mental Link came through.
“The punishment is that I cannot receive investment?”
Rumble…
Groan…
A strange noise came from the area where the rat monsters had gathered.
Yang Zicang walked toward the tunnel entrance. After taking a look, his hair stood on end. Below, their figures piled up densely.
However, when Yang Zicang appeared, they retreated en masse as if sentient, hiding their bodies out of sight.
“Is there a commander?”
A grave look came into Yang Zicang’s eyes.
Could it be that this monster nest has a leader with intelligence?
“Heh… but,” these creatures don’t know that I can make my attacks curve. Just as A Liang said, this counts as a good opportunity. Rough estimates suggest that the materials down there represent at least a thousand years of accumulated Chrono, waiting for my harvest.
Yang Zicang picked up some gravel, and after a faint silver light flickered in his hand, he tossed the stones down.
Bang!
The stones traced an arc, blasting straight into the duct, then slammed into an invisible barrier.
[Consumed Chrono: 500N.]
Yang Zicang’s heart tightened.
Just now, those stones were empowered with five hundred amplified Chrono, yet they were completely negated.
Suddenly, the voice of the [System/Model] came through.
[Punishment Content: Survive for fifteen minutes.]