Volume Three — The Fox Immortal’s Tomb Chapter Forty-Five — A Sudden Turn of Events

After listening to my explanation, the two of them closely followed behind me. I crouched down and began carefully searching the ground for the inscriptions.

According to the records in my copy of *Twenty-Four Mountains Feng Shui Arts*, breaking the Five Elements Departing Evil Formation requires finding six symbols. The first symbol resembles the character for "seal" (章), but on its right side, there is also a shape like the character for "already" (已).

I searched the ground meticulously, and after quite a while, I finally found the first symbol.

I said to the two men beside me, "Breaking this formation isn't that difficult. The only strict rule is that we must destroy the symbols in their precise numerical sequence."

With that, I pulled two black markers from my backpack and handed them to each of them. Then, I found a small piece of cardboard in my pack and handed it to Xu Tian, saying, "Old Xu, copy these six symbols onto this piece, and make sure you get the sequence right."

Xu Tian nodded. Meanwhile, Li Kun took his marker and drew a large circle around the symbol, writing a bold number one inside it. Fearing it might not be clear enough, Li Kun traced over the number several times before finally feeling satisfied.

Seeing that Xu Tian had also copied the symbol onto the cardboard, I resumed my search.

The process of finding all six symbols did not take too long. After about ten minutes or so, the few of us had successfully recorded all of them.

I checked the symbols Xu Tian had noted on the cardboard and nodded in approval. I trusted Xu Tian completely, which was why I had him make the copy before going to search the other burial chamber. If I had sent Li Kun to do it, who knew what kind of trouble might happen; even if Li Kun knew what the runes looked like, I doubted he would even be able to find them.

Once both Li Kun and Xu Tian had recorded the symbols, I turned to them and said, "Let's take out our phones and synchronize our times. Old Xu, it will take us about twenty minutes to walk back to our burial chamber, and then roughly another half hour to locate the runes."

With that, all three of us pulled out our phones to check the time. Seeing that it was exactly twelve o'clock, we nodded to one another. Xu Tian said, "Then let's set the time for twelve-forty. At twelve-forty-one, we destroy the first symbol, and then cross off one symbol every minute. It will only take us six minutes in total to break this grand formation."

Hearing Xu Tian's plan, Li Kun and I both nodded. I told Li Kun, "Old Li, wait here. Old Xu and I are heading back."

Li Kun nodded, and then the three of us—Xu Tian, Da Gou, and I—turned around and walked back toward the previous burial chamber.

Originally, we wanted to use flashlights or communication devices to stay in touch, but being deep inside the mountains and underground, there was not a single bar of cellular signal. We had no choice but to do it this way. If we had walkie-talkies, why would we need to go through all this trouble?

When the three of us returned to the first burial chamber, Xu Tian stayed behind, while Da Gou and I continued on toward the burial chamber on the left.

During the time Da Gou and I were walking back, Xu Tian had already found all six symbols and noted them all down. Knowing their exact locations, Xu Tian held his phone and waited quietly as the seconds ticked away. At the same time, Li Kun had also memorized the exact position of each symbol, and both of them were now waiting for the appointed time to arrive.

When Da Gou and I returned to the burial chamber, I checked my watch and saw it was already twelve-twenty-five. With only fifteen minutes left until our agreed time, I didn't dare waste a single minute and hurriedly searched the ground for the six runes. By the time I had memorized all six of them, the time had finally arrived.

Da Gou glanced at his wristwatch, his eyes darting anxiously toward the stone coffins on either side of the burial chamber. When the hands hit twelve-forty, Da Gou even forgot to breathe, his eyes fixed unblinkingly on my movements.

Li Kun gripped a three-edged military dagger, staring fixedly at the stone tiles. On the other side, Xu Tian had initially brought a crowbar, but fearing his physical strength might not be enough to shatter the carvings on the stone tiles, he stood up, gripped an Type 87 assault rifle with both hands, and kept his eyes glued to his watch.

As for me, I tightened my grip on the Soul-Slaying Blade, my eyes locked relentlessly on the stone tiles at my feet. The moment the time arrived, I would strike without hesitation and completely destroy the stone tiles.

Right as the clock struck twelve-forty, all three of us drew in a deep breath and began destroying the runes on the ground using our respective methods.

Xu Tian pulled the trigger, and the muzzle of the Type 87 erupted in a continuous stream of fire. The stone tiles on the ground instantly shattered into flying debris.

Seeing that the time had come, I gripped the Soul-Slaying Blade and slashed fiercely down at the rune on the ground. The moment the blade struck the stone tile, it cut through it as if it were soft tofu, splitting the tile right down the middle. Without daring to lower my guard, I pressed down hard with my arm, scattering the fragments of the rune completely.

Meanwhile, Li Kun gripped his three-edged military dagger and stabbed it viciously into the stone tile beneath him. To Li Kun's absolute shock, however, the tile didn't budge even a fraction of an inch from the blow.

Seeing this, Li Kun had no time to second-guess himself. A pitch-black, bone-chilling aura abruptly surged into his eyes, and two piercing beams of black light shot directly out from his pupils toward the rune on the ground. Following a deafening explosion, the stone tile was blasted into two dark, jagged craters, and the runes upon it vanished entirely without a trace.

After finishing this, Li Kun didn't even dare to take a full breath. He hurriedly glanced toward the stone coffins on either side. After waiting a few seconds and seeing no movement from the coffins, Li Kun collapsed onto the ground and began to pant heavily.

"Damn it," Li Kun gasped, "that scared the hell out of me."

No sooner had he spoken than he remembered the second rune had to be broken immediately. He scrambled back to his feet and ran toward the location of the second rune not far away.

Because time was terribly tight—only a meager sixty seconds—Li Kun arrived at the second rune with no time to spare for elaborate actions. Glancing at the phone in his palm, he saw the time had already ticked over to the forty-second mark. Without a second thought, he aimed his blood-red eyes at the stone tile on the ground, and two more beams of black death aura shot forth.

Following another thunderous blast, the stone tile shattered violently, sending shards and dust flying all over the floor.

After completing that, Li Kun sprinted toward the third stone tile. Only after standing firm at the third spot did he finally have a brief second to glance around.

By the time the few of us had destroyed the fourth rune, Li Kun turned his head toward the fifth stone tile, but the ground was already buried beneath a thick layer of rubble and dense clouds of dust.

Relying entirely on his memory, Li Kun looked toward the fifth stone tile. Spotting the time, he directed his blood-red eyes toward the approximate position of the fifth rune and unleashed another burst of black light. Under the glare of this black light, the ground of the burial chamber he was in was now completely obscured by broken stones and dust, leaving no trace of the carved runes visible.

Realizing this, Li Kun felt a sudden surge of dread in his heart. He could still roughly find the fifth rune by memory, but in the span of just a few minutes, panic had completely overtaken him, and he had entirely lost track of where the sixth rune was located.

Anxious, Li Kun scanned the ground frantically, gritted his teeth, and took a deep breath. Suddenly, a violent surge of black death aura erupted from all around his body, swirling into a raging vortex.

Checking the time once more, Li Kun sprinted toward the entrance of the tunnel. Seeing that the time had run out, his eyes flashed brilliantly. A tangible, swirling black vortex materialized inside the burial chamber, spinning like a tornado. It slowly shifted its trajectory from vertical to horizontal, eventually lying flat.

With a fierce roar from Li Kun, the massive, physical black vortex blasted straight toward the center of the burial chamber where the runes were carved.

Wherever the black vortex passed, the black stone tiles on the ground were violently ripped up, and the carved runes were utterly pulverized. The burial chamber was filled with a dense, suffocating wave of black death aura. In the wake of the vortex, layers of thick frost rapidly formed across the floor, the walls, and even the vaulted ceiling above, blanketing the entire burial chamber in the blink of an eye.

As the vortex surged rapidly forward, it slammed violently into the front wall of the burial chamber. Amidst a deafening crash, the wall began to crack apart, and a massive fissure split open across the ceiling, instantly spiderwebbing across the entire chamber.

Realizing things had gone terribly wrong, Li Kun shouted in panic and bolted toward the tunnel like his life depended on it. The very second he stepped out of the burial chamber, he heard a thunderous roar behind him as thick clouds of dust engulfed the entire passageway.

Now surrounded by billowing dust, Li Kun felt his throat grow bone-dry. After coughing heavily a few times, he quickly pulled the collar of his shirt up to cover his mouth and nose, but his legs never stopped running for a second, terrified of being buried alive inside the tunnel.

Over on Xu Tian's end, everything had gone smoothly, but where Da Gou and I were, the situation was far from ideal.

Just moments prior, after destroying the fifth carved rune, I had taken a step forward to walk toward the sixth.

As I stood with both feet over the final carved rune, eyes fixed on the phone in my hand as I waited for the final minute to tick down, I suddenly felt the temperature in the entire burial chamber plummet to freezing point. At that instant, Da Gou's voice rang out from behind me—not calling my name, but letting out a sound of agonizing pain.