Chapter 55 Calculations

A gecko slithered its way up, squirming onto my chest.

Less than twenty centimeters away, I could clearly smell the foul, fishy stench of the creature.

I shook my body hard, trying to fling the geckos off. But it was useless; not only did the geckos refuse to fall off, but in the struggle, I managed to knock the Gau box amulet from my neck right into my own face.

The small Gau box was made of metal, and striking me square in the face like that hurt quite a bit.

With a snap, the Gau box flew open.

Inside the box was a crumpled ball of yellow paper. I had carried it with me ever since Yao Yumen gave it to me, and faint traces of writing were visible on it.

Catching a corner of the paper ball in my teeth, I shook my head hard.

Soon, the yellow paper ball came undone in my mouth, and some pale yellow powder spilled out.

Strangely enough, the yellow powder wrapped inside the paper was colorless and odorless, but the moment the geckos crawling all over me smelled it, they instantly recoiled in rapid retreat, just like venomous snakes encountering realgar.

In less than two minutes, my body was completely clean—not a single gecko remained.

I looked down and saw two lines of small handwriting on the yellow paper. At first, they were blurry, but by biting the paper and whipping it back and forth to adjust the angle, I was finally able to read them clearly.

Written in red ink, the paper read: "Life and death are decreed by fate, wealth and honor rest with heaven. Beware of villains in the dark, watch for vermin in the light. Deep in the underworld palace, be cautious, oh be cautious."

Reading these words, mountainous waves rose in my heart!

The amulet Yao Yumen gave me contained a twenty-four-character prophecy! The woman seemed to have known the secret plan between me and my eldest and third brothers all along!

Could this woman actually tell the future?

That wasn't all.

I also discovered that embedded in the very bottom of the Gau box was an extremely thin razor blade, somewhat like the blades used for shaving, but much thinner and infinitely sharper.

Risking the danger of slicing open my mouth, I tried a dozen times in a row until I finally managed to flip the Gau box over and clamped my teeth directly onto the thin blade.

After using the blade to sever the ropes binding my upper body that were closest to me, I sat straight up. Then, holding the blade in my teeth once more, I cut the ropes on my feet.

There were still many geckos crawling on the ground, but my clothes were dusted with the medicinal powder from the Gau box, and none of the geckos dared to come too close to me. The moment I moved, they scurried into the darkness, or crawled back down into the deep pit.

I had seen people on television treating a dislocated arm, but professions are like mountains apart. I was not a doctor, and on TV people could snap their bones right back into place with a single click.

I had to slam myself against the wall, and every impact was agonizing.

Perhaps the amulet was protecting me, or perhaps it was just blind luck. After a few attempts, with a sharp click of bone, I actually managed to set it myself!

That was purely a lucky guess. I tried to reset my left arm as well, but it wouldn't work; I couldn't get it back in.

I looked down into the large pit. It was deep, pitch black, and a chilling wind blew up from the bottom, sending shivers down my spine.

Clutching my injured left arm and hiding the small razor blade in the palm of my hand, I tiptoed along, trying my best to make no sound as I cautiously felt my way forward.

Judging by the geological structure of the surrounding environment, the place I was in was still beneath Moth Mountain, likely inside some subterranean rock cave.

Pressing tightly against the wall to cloak myself in the shadows, I walked along the path for a few minutes when I suddenly saw a flickering fire ahead and faintly caught the sound of human voices.

I crept closer in stealth.

"Brother Chen, look at how brilliantly we pulled this off! If that dried corpse can really be resurrected by absorbing human blood, we're going to strike it rich! You know, Brother Chen, I heard the vice president of the Everlasting Society is dying, and his life is only being sustained by nutritional injections costing hundreds of thousands per shot. If we hand that dried corpse over to him, maybe you could get promoted from the Eight Lesser Sects to the Four Greater Sects, Brother Chen! And I could join the Everlasting Society too! Just thinking about it gets me fired up—we'll be able to walk sideways wherever we go! What kind of chicks wouldn't we be able to pull?"

"You punk! Do you only join the Everlasting Society to chase women? You're a grown man! Can't you aim a bit higher?"

"Hehe..."

A wretched chuckle drifted over: "My ambitions can't compare to yours, Brother Chen. You've got great skills; you can sell out the sworn brothers in your own gang without even blinking an eye. I'm different. My greatest wish in this life is just to marry a beautiful college student!"

"Kid, you only have an elementary school diploma, so why are you always dreaming about college beauties? Once you join the Everlasting Society, what do you even want to marry one for?"

"I... I'll make her read books to me every single night!"

"I'll... I'll just make her read *The Plum in the Golden Vase* to me every single night!"

"Get lost, you moron."

Listening to the conversation between these two made my blood boil. I had the urge to rush over right then and there and bleed them with my razor blade! Damn that bastard Chen Jiansheng; he had put on such a flawless act before. His acting skills were good enough to win an award.

Then I heard the two of them start discussing Sister Hong and me.

"Brother Chen, Old Sea Dog's mixed hypnotic incense really works. You saw it earlier too, didn't you, Brother Chen? Man, that hypnotic smoke rolled out, and the effect was top-notch!"

Chen Jiansheng laughed. "Old Sea Dog's stuff is indeed good. Earlier, I deliberately made Chen Hong and that kid eat the fruit, and combined it with this hypnotic incense to induce the faint. That's why the effect was so good!"

"Awesome, Brother Chen! We all had to take the antidote three days in advance for it to work, but you only arrived yesterday, so your antidote..."

Chen Jiansheng snapped his fingers with one hand and said smugly, "Kid, learn a thing or two. This is where your Brother Chen's brilliance lies. I set the trap in advance, mixing the antidote into the wine. That wine was stored in the soul jars of the sacrificial pit, and I had previously made it known that I loved to drink. Doesn't that mean everything fell into place seamlessly? Hahaha."

"You bastard!"

In my heart, I cursed every single ancestor of this old man eighteen generations back. If I hadn't been eavesdropping, I probably never would have known how Sister Hong and I had been set up.

The martial world is treacherous, and you can know a person's face without knowing their heart.

Just as Sister Hong said, not a single one of the Southern faction was any good!

Although some matters were still not entirely clear in my mind, I knew one thing: we had been framed. The group that teamed up with Chen Jiansheng to descend into the tomb, including the late pot-leader Chen, had all been schemed to death by Chen Jiansheng.

And the Everlasting Society backing this man was an organization I knew nothing about and didn't understand.

Sister Hong understood them, however, so I planned to save people first—rescue Sister Hong, and then figure out a way to find my eldest and third brothers and get them out as well.

Knowing I was weak in numbers, after they finished talking and left, I kept a safe distance and trailed behind them.

If there was no fire or flashlight here, the visibility was extremely low, which made it easier for me to hide. I sneaked along the entire way without either of the two noticing me.

I figured they must have thought I was already dead, or that I had been torn apart and eaten by the geckos, which was why they had let down their guard.

Thinking of this, my mind drifted back to Yao Yumen.

Her face surfaced in my mind, and my intuition told me this matter was probably far less simple than I imagined.

I followed them all the way for about half an hour.

Chen Jiansheng and the other man finally stopped.

I saw a very well-concealed stone cave entrance ahead, its opening covered with dry grass.

Pushing the dry grass aside, the two of them crawled in one after the other.

I waited in place for three minutes, then crouched low and crawled in after them.

The enemy had superior numbers, so I was extremely cautious. At the slightest sign of movement ahead, I would immediately hide.

Because I knew that I was now the last hope for our group, and I couldn't afford to be caught again.

The only advantage I had left right now was:

The enemy was in the light, while I was in the dark.