Chapter 22: Lost (2)

After walking through the long passage, the two of them arrived at a Stone Chamber again. Their original plan should have been to follow the rope back to see what was really going on.

But the newly appeared Stone Chamber presented them with another unexpected situation.

Inside the left passage of the new Stone Chamber—which they temporarily called Stone Chamber Two—a long rope extended into the dark passage. Zuo Qingcang frowned and tugged the rope in his hand; the rope in the passage ahead also moved.

The Old Man said in disbelief, “Did we come back again? Could it really be a space Dao Art?”

If the four passages of the Stone Chamber were called front, back, left, and right passages, then the scene before them appeared as if they had exited through the left passage of the Stone Chamber but then came out from the back passage.

Zuo Qingcang did not speak. He quietly walked to the spot where they had made a mark earlier; it was still empty.

The Old Man rubbed his temples and said, “Not only a space Dao Art, but something also erased our mark. There is something in this Stone Chamber!”

“I don’t think it’s necessarily a space Dao Art. Since you mentioned that it requires a huge amount of Spiritual Power, and you haven’t detected any artificially guided Spiritual Power here, then the possibility of a space Dao Art should be discussed last.”

Zuo Qingcang stroked his chin and said somewhat puzzled, “There are other ways to make the rope appear in front of us. For example, if the passage we walked through was curved, we might have thought we were walking straight, but it actually looped around at an angle hard for an ordinary person to notice, bringing us back here. That is also possible.”

“The problem is this mark.” Zuo Qingcang looked around and said, “The disappearance of the mark and the appearance of the rope—this is a contradiction, making it difficult for us to determine whether this is really the place we were at before.”

Even at this moment, Zuo Qingcang’s mental state remained calm, as if nothing in the world could make him lose his composure. The Old Man beside him listened to his analysis, and his agitated mood seemed to ease a little.

“Now, the appearance of this contradiction leads to two possibilities.

The first possibility is that this Stone Chamber, let’s call it the second Stone Chamber, is not the same place as the previous first Stone Chamber. Someone or something took the rope we left behind and then came around here. If that’s the case, it also means the passage is not a straight line back and forth; it might be curved or even winding, forming a Labyrinth together with many Stone Chambers.”

“If it’s the second possibility, then it means these two Stone Chambers are the same, but something erased the mark we made. However, similarly, for this possibility to hold, it means we looped back to the same Stone Chamber, indicating that the passages here are not straight either.”

As he spoke, Zuo Qingcang pulled with both hands and retrieved the rope: “So what we need to do next is to verify whether there’s a problem with the passages here. If there is, then we’ve found the reason we got lost before.”

What Zuo Qingcang kept to himself was that there was actually a more effective way to verify the situation: the two of them could split up, each holding one end of the rope, and then Zuo Qingcang would return to Stone Chamber One. But that would mean separating, and in an Ancient Tomb like this, splitting up was too dangerous, so Zuo Qingcang simply didn’t mention it.

Next, the two walked into the dark passage. They needed to determine whether the passage was straight.

This raised a question: how can a person confirm they are walking in a straight line? All human movement relies on vision and surrounding reference points to judge distance and position. Once eyes are closed, people often veer off course.

So, by themselves, humans cannot confirm whether they are walking straight in the dark.

But with tools, it’s much simpler. As Zuo Qingcang and the Old Man walked, they took out the Luminous Pearls from their robes and placed them along the path they passed. Basically, they put one down every twenty steps. When the two had walked two hundred steps along the passage, they had placed ten Luminous Pearls behind them.

This was thanks to Zuo Qingcang specifically requesting they carry several Luminous Pearls when they prepared them.

When the Old Man turned to look, he could see ten glowing dots arranged in the darkness, forming a straight line.

Yes, a straight line, perfectly straight without any curve. Seeing this, the Old Man’s face showed disappointment: “This passage has no problem.”

Zuo Qingcang nodded: “Then for now, the only possibilities we can think of are hallucinations or space issues.” But whether it was collective hallucination or space alteration, both were probably beyond their ability to handle.

At this moment, Zuo Qingcang suddenly thought: if the builder of the Ancient Tomb really intended to seal Shen Zong, then why make it so complicated?

He could have just buried the entire Ancient Tomb, or even built several more falling stone gates; that would have been much more effective than this incredibly complex Labyrinth. And this kind of complex Labyrinth, compared to permanent sealing, seemed more like a lock—one that makes it hard for others to enter but allows the owner to open it himself.

‘Did the person who built this Ancient Tomb consider that one day, they might enter this tomb again? If so, then the deepest part of this Ancient Tomb is not just Shen Zong’s corpse. There must be some benefit that makes people compelled to come.’

But after thinking about it, Zuo Qingcang stopped dwelling on it. Compared to guessing what might be in the Ancient Tomb, for the two of them, the most important thing now was figuring out how to get through this Labyrinth.

After hearing Zuo Qingcang’s judgment, the Old Man suddenly looked thoughtful and said, “Actually, besides space and hallucination, there’s another possibility: if this passage and the Stone Chambers could move, that could also create this effect?”

Zuo Qingcang immediately understood what he meant. If these Stone Chambers and passages formed a large mechanism similar to a Rubik’s Cube, causing the Stone Chambers and passages to move in ways hard for humans to detect, then that could indeed cause this situation.

Zuo Qingcang thought as he spoke: “Compared to a space Dao Art that requires a large amount of Spiritual Power, or the two of us suffering the same collective hallucination, this possibility seems more likely.”

The Old Man still had some doubts: “But if they move, what pattern do they follow? Why can’t we feel it?”

Zuo Qingcang suddenly remembered: “Do you remember those Corpse Fiends? If those grave-robbing Taoist Priests also died trapped here, then how did the Corpse Fiends manage to return to the entrance?”

“How did the Corpse Fiends go back?” Zuo Qingcang frowned: “What’s the difference between us and the Corpse Fiends?”