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墨書 Inktalez
"What do you want to do?" I shouted at Uncorrupted Bones, realizing that I was no match for him, so there was no need to hold back. Perhaps my fierce demeanor intimidated him, as Uncorrupted Bones timidly replied, "Don't be afraid! Don't be afraid... I won't harm you..."
"Fine! Just watch and see if I can do it!" Zhengyang and I stared at Uncorrupted Bones, waiting to see what trick he would pull. He still wore that ghostly expression!
"Take me with you to find the princess's enemy; I want to deal with it myself," Uncorrupted Bones said, pointing at me with a finger, his eyes fixed intently on me.
"No way, no way!"
"Is there no room for negotiation?" Upon hearing this, I refused to budge.
According to the records in Mausoleum Secrets, "Broken Surface Pattern emerges from Uncorrupted Bones; the Corpse Qi is extremely heavy. Once contaminated, it cannot be removed. Long-term contact with Uncorrupted Bones not only leads to contamination by Corpse Qi but also continuous bad luck." With such a dangerous entity, how could I dare to bring him along?
"Very well! Then your friends can die!"
"My friends? What a joke! Do you even know who my friends are?" I thought to myself. "You can keep boasting; who knows where my friends are?" I looked at Uncorrupted Bones as he coldly smiled and pointed at the Bronze Chest on the ground, seemingly indicating that they were all inside the boxes. Upon closer inspection of each box, they all appeared nearly identical, each numbered with Chinese characters from one to fourteen.
"Isn't this the Nine Palaces arrangement?" Suddenly, I had an idea!
The layout of this tomb chamber resembled a Nine Palaces formation, with positions two and four as shoulders and six and eight as feet. The upper nine and lower one were set in place, while left seven and right three were arranged accordingly. Among them, four Bronze Boxes were located at positions two, eight, seven, and nine—this was the so-called formation eye. This kind of layout is known as a shared operation setup. The four boxes needed to be arranged in such a way that the sum of their numbers equaled fifteen in order to successfully uncover the secret of rearranging the Nine Palaces. For instance, arranging eight, five, seven, three, six, four, one, two into one through eight would be akin to cracking a combination lock; there are countless different permutations for those eight digits.
All three of my friends had gone missing simultaneously, yet there were fourteen Bronze Boxes. This meant that eleven of them were empty or contained other monsters. If we could decipher the Nine Palaces puzzle and open the boxes in order, we might find our teammates in three of them; the others would either contain monsters or be empty.
How could one distinguish between reality and illusion? If these Bronze Boxes were empty, that would be fine. But if they were all filled with monsters... that would be terrifying. It was like Schrödinger's cat; whether you opened it or not, the cat would die either way. My math skills weren't great; staring blankly at the Nine Palaces grid left me utterly perplexed.
"Your three friends have been captured by that guy. Fortunately, I placed Killing Intent on them; otherwise, they would have been dead long ago!" Uncorrupted Bones seemed to show some eagerness to please.
"You must have put them in there!" I retorted angrily.
"Heh heh! To tell the truth, my accounting skills are nearly zero; I can't handle this brainy game! That guy stuffed your three friends into three of those boxes. If you can solve it, they'll be saved; if not... well then you'll be out of luck!"
I felt overwhelmed by such a complex problem. Initially hoping for straightforward guidance from Uncorrupted Bones, it turned out that combining our brains only led us further into confusion.
At this moment, Zhengyang finally spoke up. "What's wrong? Can't you figure this out?" I had to admit that I truly couldn't handle it; this was too mentally taxing for me. Zhengyang chuckled at my predicament and said, "Wear nine and step on one; right three and left seven; two and four are shoulders; six and eight are feet."
I suddenly realized that whether it was nine squares or fifteen squares, we only needed to focus on nine of them. Regardless of whether the nine squares were arranged horizontally, vertically, or diagonally, the sum of the three numbers would always equal fifteen.
Following this principle, I pulled out a piece of paper from my backpack and sketched a diagram for solving the box puzzle. It looked something like this:
10, 14, 11
04, 09, 0
0, 05, 07
08, 01, 06
1, 1
With determination, I arranged the Bronze Chest according to the current numbering: the first row became ten, fourteen, eleven; the second row four, nine, two; the third row three, five, seven; the fourth row eight, one, six; and the fifth row twelve and thirteen. This successfully led me to identify the four boxes that were most suspicious: four, two, eight, and six. Since the Magic Square was created based on the River Diagram, there were only four positions available to fill in.
I stood up and paced around the room for a few moments, staring at box number four. I truly hesitated to act recklessly and asked Zhengyang, "Do you think there's someone inside this box?"
"Let's open it and see!" Upon hearing that, I was taken aback. Open it? Why even ask?
I examined the reliefs on the Bronze Box. I had no idea how to proceed. The reliefs were not typical bronze patterns like dragons or ivy; instead, they resembled a child's doodles—winged pigs, neckless giraffes, and four-legged snakes—strange and bizarre creatures. From my personal experience, I couldn't decipher these drawings. My intuition told me that this box was anything but ordinary.
"How do we open this box? I have no clue!" Zhengyang muttered to himself. I cursed inwardly, thinking that even flipping a coin seemed easier than solving this puzzle! I would rather tackle a math problem about seven sheep and eight pigs on a boat than deal with this treasure chest task. If we failed to open it correctly, it could cost us our lives!
Suddenly, a flash of inspiration struck me. I recalled a story from the Indian epic Mahabharata. It told of a great war between two branches of the ancient Indian Pandava Clan: the Kuru Clan and the Pandava Clan. This war was vast in scale and involved many kings and deities fighting on both sides; its brutality was rarely seen in history. Historians have verified that this great battle had some factual basis. In recent years, scholars revisiting this epic discovered descriptions of various high-tech weapons and flying machines within it—far beyond what one would expect from its time period and even advanced by today's standards.
Could it be that this box contained an abstract masterpiece depicting prehistoric animal genetic modifications by an ancient master like Picasso? That absurd thought flashed through my mind but was quickly dismissed. Gritting my teeth, I decided to go for it. I grabbed box number four and pulled with all my might; with a creak, the lid easily opened... "What the hell? Is this some kind of joke?"
Inside lay a person curled up motionless. Upon closer inspection, I recognized Dong Tong. She was completely still. I checked her nostrils with my fingers—she was still breathing but clearly unconscious. Together with Zhengyang, we carefully lifted her out and placed her on an empty box nearby so she could lie flat and rest.
Next, I approached box number two and examined it closely from top to bottom. This box had no patterns at all; its surface was smooth as a mirror reflecting my image. A Three-Spring Lock hung from it. With a swift stroke of my sword, I broke the lock. Suddenly, sounds of knocking echoed from inside—thud thud thud—was there a ghost? I jumped back in surprise. Was it human or ghost inside? After hesitating for a moment, I decided to assert dominance by shouting loudly, "Are you human or ghost?"
A few muffled sounds came from within as the entire box shook slightly before a foul odor wafted out. Realizing something was wrong made me think twice: "This stench is so strong; what on earth has happened here?"
According to records in Mausoleum Secrets, certain Demons' corpses would rapidly undergo decay upon contact with Yang Qi, leading to internal organs corroding instantly while emitting terrible odors. A corpse that could produce such foulness could almost certainly be identified as either undead or cursed...
"Hey, open the box quickly!" My heart raced as I heard the voice. "Damn! It has enough intelligence to distinguish between genders!" The voice came again, clearer this time, and I thought, "Isn't that Bald Qiang's voice?" Realizing it was my teammate, I hurriedly pried open the box. This guy was pinching his nose inside. "Bald Qiang, your fart is way too stinky! I thought it was a corpse transformation; you scared me to death!"
"Hahaha!" Bald Qiang chuckled awkwardly.
"I don't know! In my daze, I seemed to hear some fighting sounds. When I woke up, everything around was pitch black. Damn it, I thought there was a power outage! I stretched and realized I was surrounded by walls. So, I knocked three times out of frustration and then punched it!" No wonder there were sounds of knocking coming from inside. I planned to pull him out of the box, but halfway through, he got stuck!
He awkwardly admitted, "I haven't been watching my diet lately and gained several pounds."
I cursed him in my heart, "You're a pig! How dare you gain weight!" But at this moment, there was no time to argue with this pig; I had to muster all my strength to pull him out. Even Zhengyang came over to help tug at him.
Bald Qiang let out a roar, and his previously pale face turned beet red! He released a few more loud farts. "Alright! I've lost a few pounds. Xia, give it another try!" The stench made my face turn green as I pinched my nose and reached out to pull him. Finally, I managed to yank Bald Qiang out.
"Damn it, I'm the first person in history to fart my way to freedom!" His words made me laugh; honestly, I was curious about how he got stuffed in there in the first place. Bald Qiang exhaled deeply after getting out of the box and collapsed onto the ground, unconscious. People often faint after being overly stimulated; once they relax, it's easy for them to pass out. It wasn't a big deal, so I didn't bother with him.
Now only two boxes remained: number eight and number six. One contained Big Mouth Lee, while the other was either empty or held a monster. Which one would be opened depended purely on luck. Big Mouth Lee wasn't exactly well-liked, but he had genuinely helped me before; I couldn't just stand by and watch him die! As for betraying my teammates, that was something I would never do. I looked at Zhengyang, who smiled and said, "Zi, you need to learn to stand on your own two feet; you can't rely on others for everything! When the mountain falls, it falls hard!"
I understood Zhengyang wanted to give me a chance; if things went south, at least someone strong would be there to support me...
I stood before the two boxes, torn between choices! The Uncorrupted Bones sat on the bronze coffin with a dazed expression; indeed, its intelligence wasn't high enough for commands. Otherwise, having cultivated Uncorrupted Bones wouldn't leave it in such a pitiful state. Right now, I couldn't be bothered with it. The remaining two Bronze Boxes had identical patterns and even showed the same degree of wear around their edges; if not for their numbers, nine out of ten people would likely confuse them.
Should I choose number eight or number six? Whatever! Eight is considered lucky; I'll go with number eight!
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