Fate Trading System – Chapter 237

Plan A

Mist Map 10

Lake

After resting briefly, Su Xin and the others began their ascent up the mountain.

The path wasn’t very difficult to walk because there were traces left by previous people, although those paths had become less distinct. Unknown grasses and tangled tree branches grew in the middle, covering the paths layer by layer, making it inconvenient to move forward. The edges of these plants bore serrations or barbs that could cut exposed skin. However, since it was currently summer and the sun was intense, wearing a jacket was extremely uncomfortable.

Either endure the heat or get scratched.

Su Xin and the others chose the former, putting on gloves and heading forward along the path.

They first reached the tomb where the Mist Map had been unearthed. That tomb had already been dug open. Going down inside, the space wasn’t very wide; it was clear this wasn’t the tomb of a particularly wealthy merchant family. If they had possessed significant financial resources, they should have been able to build themselves a larger burial chamber.

There were no traps inside; even if there had been, they would have been destroyed by those who came before.

The air was stuffy and carried an unidentifiable foul smell.

Only after walking closer did Su Xin realize the coffin had already been opened by someone. She couldn’t help but frown. Those archaeologists wouldn’t do something so presumptuous. Unscrupulous tomb raiders might open a coffin for things held in the deceased’s mouth, but even those tomb raiders would likely assess the scale. There was clearly nothing valuable in this tomb chamber, so it was unlikely they would go to the trouble of opening the coffin.

What surprised her even more wasn’t that the coffin had been opened, but that it was an empty coffin. It was completely bare inside, containing nothing at all.

With no valuable discoveries, Su Xin and Xiao Xiaoruo touched every stone slab in the tomb chamber but found nothing special; for instance, there were no carvings on the walls.

This was truly quite strange.

Because there were no artifacts or items representative of a specific era to determine the period, the identity of the tomb’s occupant was simply impossible to ascertain.

“Did you find anything valuable over there?”

“No.”

Xiao Xiaoruo shook her head, looking very disappointed as well.

“Has our clue trail ended here? What should we do next? Should we turn back the way we came?”

“No, I want to stay on this mountain a bit longer.”

“Then I’ll accompany you. Since I’m already here, it wouldn’t be right for me to go back alone.”

Xiao Xiaoruo adjusted her backpack.

“Alright then.”

Su Xin knew the entrance to the underground palace, so she headed directly towards that location.

Liao Qingjie trusted Su Xin more and followed her steps.

“There might be danger ahead. Be prepared.”

“Okay.”

Su Xin couldn’t be bothered to explain to Xiao Xiaoruo why she knew the location of the underground palace entrance so clearly and precisely; there was simply no point.

If she wasn’t suspicious, fine. If she was suspicious… Su Xin was just waiting for her to slip up¹.

The entrance to the underground palace looked very hidden; that area was already overgrown with weeds. Without careful attention, one would never know that beneath wasn’t solid earth, but rather bricks.

Wearing gloves, Su Xin pulled away the weeds on top, then used a tool to dig away the shallow layer of soil above, revealing the stone slab underneath.

“Let me.”

Liao Qingjie walked over, lifted the stone slab, which looked quite heavy, and placed it aside, revealing a pitch-black underground opening.

Xiao Xiaoruo looked somewhat astonished upon seeing this scene, but she didn’t say a word, seemingly accepting this reality very calmly.

Su Xin felt that Xiao Xiaoruo truly had the words “suspicious” written all over her face. If someone who didn’t know about this saw such a scene for the first time, how could they not be surprised? How could they not ask questions?

There were two possibilities. One was that this type of person was naturally calm, not prone to making a fuss, able to quickly accept anything, and disliked asking questions. The other possibility was that she already knew about this.

The atmosphere became very subtle.

“I’ll go down first,” Su Xin said, handing the bag she was holding to Liao Qingjie.

“I’ll go down first to check the situation. Throw the bag down to me from here. Once I confirm the surroundings are relatively safe, I’ll let you two come down.”

Su Xin said this facing Liao Qingjie, with Xiao Xiaoruo to her side. She gave Liao Qingjie a meaningful look²—you should understand what I mean, right?

Liao Qingjie blinked. Understood.

It was something like a slide, not stone steps. This meant it was only an entrance, not an exit; the exit was elsewhere.

If someone accidentally entered here, they might just wander in circles, never able to get out, because this slide couldn’t be climbed. It ran from the opening closely along the bottom of the passage, with a slight curve.

Su Xin slid down from the top in just a few seconds. Calculating the length of the slide based on her speed, Su Xin slid down holding a flashlight. Because the sliding speed was too fast, she couldn’t clearly see the situation on either side.

At the bottom of the passage, Su Xin shone the flashlight around, assessing the surroundings. It looked somewhat like a cramped shaft or narrow courtyard.

The bottom of the opening connected to a corridor wide enough for one person to pass through. Su Xin tentatively stepped inside, shining the flashlight down the path ahead. The beam didn’t land on anything, indicating this corridor was very long.

Su Xin shone the light along the sides of the corridor, wanting to see if there were any special clues on the stone walls.

The stone slabs were covered in moss; nothing could be seen clearly on them.

Ventilated, presence of water.

Liao Qingjie’s voice came from the opening above. Su Xin walked back out.

“It looks like there’s no danger for now. You two can come down. There’s a corridor to walk through.”

“Okay.”

The voice came from the opening, slightly distorted by the echo.

First, a backpack was thrown down, then a person slid down—it was Xiao Xiaoruo.

Su Xin went first, Liao Qingjie brought up the rear³.

This corridor wasn’t particularly narrow. Although it could only accommodate one person passing at a time, walking with a backpack was still manageable.

Su Xin continued to lead with the flashlight, Xiao Xiaoruo walked in the middle, and Liao Qingjie was at the back, occasionally shining her flashlight behind them to check the situation.

The further they went inside, the greater the humidity in the air became—it was something that could be clearly felt. There should be a sizable lake inside here, likely not far from the end of the corridor.

The long corridor reached its end, requiring a turn.

Su Xin constantly remembered to shine the flashlight around. The corridor after the turn was noticeably wider; the previous one could only fit one person, but this one could fit at least one and a half.

And the stone walls on both sides changed from having nothing, covered in indecipherable moss, to having something like murals.

Su Xin slowed her steps. Xiao Xiaoruo also slowed down, carefully examining the murals with her flashlight.

Su Xin looked for a long time. Some parts were hard to understand or see clearly, and she would deliberately stop to shine the flashlight on them to get a better look.

These murals weren’t difficult to understand; the general meaning seemed to narrate how a group survived.

There seemed to be traces of mythology here. A group was attacked by a demon god⁴, forcing them to migrate to another place. In the other place, the demon god still pursued relentlessly, inciting wars among them, causing their harvests to fail completely⁵, and gradually reducing their number of newborns. This was a terrifying situation, so they changed their faith, believing in a new deity.

That deity indeed began to protect them. The demon god never came to disturb them again, and their crop yields improved. They attributed all this to the deity’s power.

Believing it was the protection of their newly adopted deity, they began making offerings.

However, the situation seemed to change later on. The subsequent murals appeared to have been deliberately damaged, making them completely unclear.

Su Xin could only see a small figure lying in a pool of blood, surrounded by a crowd of people cheering and celebrating, with bonfires and other things present.

The corridor came to an end, but there was no path forward. It opened onto a wide, small lake, looking quite spectacular. The stone path was still some distance above the lake. If one accidentally fell from here, and the lake was deep enough, someone who wasn’t a good swimmer could potentially die.

Lord Fourteen, help me calculate the depth and width of this lake.

【600 meters wide, 6 meters deep.】

Acceptable.

Su Xin noticed similar stone paths on other stone walls across the lake. There were three in total, likely other entrances to this underground palace.

Who would imagine that such an unremarkable⁶ mountaintop would contain such a stunning scene inside?

“How are we going to get across?”

Liao Qingjie had also spotted the lake. The three of them stood sideways, looking at the situation before them.

This was indeed a significant problem. A lake this wide—swimming across was possible, but it would take at least five or six minutes. What about the supplies in their backpacks?

The sleeping bags were fine, but mainly the food inside, and some other things that couldn’t get wet. A waterlogged backpack would become extremely heavy.

This was certainly an issue.

“The sleeping bags we bought are waterproof. Let’s put some food and drinks inside them, along with some lighting equipment and tools. Each person carries some, distributed among us, and then we swim across together. You can swim, right?”

Su Xin looked at Xiao Xiaoruo.

“Yes.”

“Your stamina should be able to handle it, right? If you can’t manage, just stay here. If something happens in the water, we might not be able to save you.”

“I can do it,” Xiao Xiaoruo said affirmatively, taking her sleeping bag out of her backpack.

Su Xin shrugged. Alright.

The three began packing their things separately, carrying weights they could manage, tightly securing the contents of the sleeping bags with rope.

Su Xin had Fourteen scan the water; there were no strange creatures in it.

Using their tools for assistance, the three entered the lake.

At that moment, on the other side of the lake, a person appeared.

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