Chapter 191 Sacred Cave

That feeling of being spied upon from all directions by a grand consciousness came and went quickly. By the time Hao Ren reacted, the sensation had already vanished, leaving only the goosebumps on his skin to remind him that it hadn't been an illusion. Lily, a girl with keen senses, immediately crowded around him, staring at his face. "Wow, Landlord, your fur's standing on end! Do it again, do it again…"

Hao Ren felt like he couldn't communicate with this husky, whose thought process was astonishingly strange and whose nerves seemed to be malfunctioning...

He casually pushed Lily aside, recalling the feeling just now and the feeling when he first entered the Twisted Woodlands, and finally confirmed that the two were the same. He looked at the huge, complex, and tangled roots in the cave, and felt more and more that they were emitting endless streams of thought. Recalling the legends about the dwarven miners digging out tentacles and going mad, and then thinking about Vivian's speculation... an ancient creature that had transcended the distinction between plants and animals, perhaps it had really noticed the arrival of his party.

Moreover, it was thinking, observing, but had not yet taken action.

"What's wrong?" Vivian noticed Hao Ren's movements, her concerned gaze falling on him.

Hao Ren recounted his feeling just now, looking at the others strangely. "Didn't you notice?"

"No," Becky scratched herself, goosebumps rising on her skin. "Don't scare us, this place is creepy enough..."

Exploring in such a gloomy cave deep underground had already made everyone highly nervous. Now, Hao Ren's mention of a huge consciousness covering the entire cave and spying on them made everyone feel uneasy, making Lily feel especially fluffy—because she was about to have another fur explosion.

This husky was really unlucky. Ever since coming to the Dream Plane, she had always encountered startling events. If she kept exploding like this, she really felt that she would eventually get a big, fluffy tail like a fox spirit... well, that seemed like a good thing too? A big tail!

"In any case, this place is very strange, so be careful," the bearded man said thoughtfully. He didn't regard this place as safe just because it was the sacred cave where the church originated. The more ancient and mysterious a place was, the more dangerous it was. He still knew this principle. It was just that as a devout believer, he regarded the dangers here as tests from the Goddess. "Everyone has a means of emergency escape, right? We have divine art teleportation."

"I brought a teleportation stone," the old werewolf, Ersson, nodded in response.

Hao Ren and the others were naturally even less worried. Their publicly stated identity was that of university scholars specializing in spatial magic, the kind who were particularly clumsy...

The team left the large cave in silence. The bearded man discerned the next route of advancement based on the knowledge he had obtained from ancient traditions, leading everyone into one winding cave after another. In the caves and grottoes further ahead, the shadows of those huge roots could be seen everywhere: some faintly emerged from the rocks, some pierced through the stone walls and lay across everyone's path, and some had even completely invaded the surrounding soil and rocks, the entire cave being formed by tangled roots.

This was an underground world completely ruled by tree roots. Hao Ren felt that he was gradually entering the heart of an ancient plant, and he could almost hear some kind of pulsation from the surrounding thick roots.

Just then, the front of the group suddenly lit up, and a stone door with obvious man-made traces appeared abruptly at the end of the cave.

This stone door was integrated with the surrounding cave walls, almost giving the illusion of being directly carved from the rock strata, which should be the result of earth-type mages fusing the stone door with the surrounding rocks. The stone door was five or six meters high and nearly ten meters wide, with chaotic and uneven patterned reliefs carved on the doorframe. Even after thousands of years, these reliefs had not diminished in the slightest. After seeing these patterns, Hao Ren first thought of the "sacred paintings" of the Radiant Church that he had seen in a small church, and he guessed that these patterns were what the Radiant Church used to symbolize the Goddess. The most special thing about this stone door was that it had no door panels at all: in the doorway, there was only a chaotic white mist. The mist filled the space, making it impossible to see the scene on the other side, and one could only vaguely sense a feeling of spatial distortion and displacement.

No matter what, Hao Ren had experienced teleporters from many brands, tried magical, technological, and knock-off versions, and even called himself the clumsy little prince of the spatial magic world, so he still had this ability to sense things—what was in front of him was a teleportation gate, and this was probably the core of the sacred cave.

Hao Ren and the bearded man's group had expected this, while the old werewolf, Ersson, who had always been kept in the dark, couldn't help but exclaim, "Man-made? Here..."

"I'm afraid we've encountered relics left behind by the early Radiant Church," the young monk among the ascetics said with certainty. "This is the Sacred Lake, so it's not strange to have some ancient relics. When the church was first established, it coincided with turbulent times, and underground strongholds were established in many places. Perhaps this is one that was abandoned."

This reason came right off the bat. Hao Ren's understanding of the glib tongues of these ascetics reached a new level: don't look at them usually being like wooden blocks, but as expected, they were from a religious background, and if they really started to talk, you might not be able to find seven or eight cross-talk comedians who were as quick-witted as these people...

Sure enough, the old werewolf didn't suspect anything else, but looked at the magic gate that was still operating with considerable fear: "This may be a spatial device, and if it's been in disrepair for a long time, rash contact... I'm afraid it will be teleported to some abandoned space, and we won't be able to get out."

The bearded man nodded, and seriously stepped forward to inspect the spatial gate. At the same time, a layer of light golden radiance surrounded him, faintly echoing the reliefs on the stone door. Then he stood up: "The spatial gate is operating normally, so it should still be usable. This is a sacred relic, and as believers, we would have no face to face the Goddess if we hesitated in front of the door. You can find another way, but we must go in and see."

As soon as these words came out, of course everyone said they wanted to go in and see. The bearded man took this opportunity to "remind" everyone: "Most of the internal teleportation gates left behind by the early church have some special features. They may randomly teleport people who fail some kind of test to other places, but it's basically harmless. If anyone finds themselves teleported away alone, don't panic. Follow the route with specific markings and you should be able to return here."

Hao Ren immediately knew that this sentence was for the old werewolf... The bearded man was not kind!

Facts proved that this was indeed the case. When everyone walked into the teleportation gate, Hao Ren only felt a slight dizziness. When the dizziness ended, the only people in front of him were the bearded man's group and his own companions. The old werewolf, Ersson, had been tricked and teleported to who knows where...

"Is it appropriate for us to trick a senior like that?" Hao Ren's expression was strange. He didn't mind getting rid of Ersson, the tail, but he felt that the dignified General Canglang had actually been tricked by a few words from the bearded man and teleported to who knows where, which felt very funny.

As a result, Vivian just waved her hand indifferently: "Anyway, I don't feel any pressure, just treat it as fooling a child."

Ersson, who was several hundred years old, should have just learned to walk upright if he was thrown to Vivian...

Hao Ren was speechless. The bearded man smiled: "It's okay, according to the records passed down, the cave he was sent to is very safe, and with his strength, he won't encounter any danger. Now we can seize the time to go to the depths of the sacred cave."

After passing through the teleportation gate, the group arrived at an unfamiliar cave. This cave was obviously several times wider than the tunnels they had passed through before. Huge roots and luminous fungi winding and growing could be seen everywhere on the surrounding stone walls, making the surroundings bright and also creating an extremely eerie atmosphere. Hao Ren couldn't help but reach out and touch a root that he passed by. He didn't know if it was an illusion, but he felt that this root was trembling slightly, expanding and contracting as if breathing at the same time.

But if he felt it carefully, it seemed like there was no movement at all.

"Why can only the Pope and a few ascetics come here?" Becky's face was full of nervousness. She was from a small background, and had never dared to touch such secrets that seemed extremely dangerous to her in the past. Now, as she gradually approached an ancient secret, she became more and more worried. "This is a secret that even the archbishop can't touch... Is it okay for us so-called 'Chosen Spirits' to know about it?"

"What are you worried about?" the bearded man asked without turning his head.

Becky said with a bitter face: "I'm afraid of being beaten to death after we go out..."

The bearded man: "...You're overthinking it. The main reason why this matter is kept secret is that the sacred cave contains secrets directly inherited from the Goddess, and many of these secrets are not suitable for direct publication. Only extremely steadfast believers and 'Chosen Spirits' from outside the world can accept these inheritances. They may overturn your cognition, and even bring power enough to change the world—just like when the first Pope obtained divine art in mortal form three thousand years ago and shocked the whole world, maybe we will find some new miracles in the core of the cave. We are here to discover them, and also to 'test' them, to say something extreme..."

The bearded man paused here, and then continued: "Even if we can't bear the inheritance of the Goddess and die, it's enough if only a few of us die."

Hao Ren understood why the bearded man would confidently lead such a team to the sacred cave: the people on the scene were either ascetics with firm beliefs, or "travelers" from outside the world. No matter how great the benefits or secrets were in the cave, he didn't have to worry about leakage.

If he were to bring any native of the Dream Plane here, even the king of Holletta, he would probably have to go through layers of tests, but for a group of passers-by who didn't belong to this world at all... the words "foreign household registration" were the most trustworthy reason!

This was the first time in his life that he felt that a foreign household registration was a good thing...

Just then, he noticed that the cave had reached its end, and ahead was a more brilliant light. At the same time, a sound like a heartbeat faintly came:

Dong... dong... dong...

(By the way, there are no double monthly tickets during the Spring Festival, so vote if you have monthly tickets =.=)