Urban Martial Saint

The Werewolf Statue’s lifelike eyes, along with the dried blood at the corner of its mouth, made Ye Qing not dare to underestimate it. He circled around the Werewolf Statue twice, yet failed to discover any other special features.

Ye Qing stood where he was and pondered for a while, then chose to first go around the Werewolf Statue and head deeper into the Cave. Although he knew in his heart that this Werewolf Statue definitely had something wrong with it, he still didn’t dare to mess with it recklessly.

This Cave was about the same size as the Shandong outside; to walk through the entire Cave would take some time. Luckily, those Werewolves from before had all been completely dealt with by Ye Qing, so as he walked inside the Cave he wouldn’t be attacked by them. Moreover, drifting inside the Cave was that glowing orb, which illuminated everything around; Ye Qing could clearly see the situation inside the Cave, and didn’t need to grope around in here like a blind man.

This Cave only had one exit, which was the Stone Corridor Ye Qing had entered through earlier. However, after a careful inspection, Ye Qing discovered that on the surrounding stone walls of the Cave there should originally have been several other exits, only they had all been sealed off by huge boulders.

This situation left Ye Qing a bit puzzled. If this Cave had other exits, then it wouldn’t match the layout of a Nine Palaces and Eight Trigrams Formation. After all, there was only one way out of a Nine Palaces and Eight Trigrams Formation, the other doors were simply dead ends. Since there were actually other exits in this Cave, they shouldn’t have been dug out when Guiguzi built the tomb back then. It seemed that when Guiguzi constructed this Nine Palaces and Eight Trigrams Formation, this Cave had already existed long before, and it even had several exits. In order to maintain the pattern of the Nine Palaces and Eight Trigrams Formation, Guiguzi had deliberately sealed those exits, which led to the situation now.

After walking for a while along the stone wall at the edge of the Cave, Ye Qing suddenly discovered some faint traces on a section of the wall, as if someone had once carved something into the rock. Only, too much time had passed, and these carvings had already been buried under dust. If not for the light within this section of stone wall, and Ye Qing’s careful observation, he definitely wouldn’t have been able to see these marks.

Ye Qing walked up to the stone wall and carefully examined those carvings, then reached out and wiped the dust off the surface. Sure enough, just as he had expected, once the dust was wiped away, more carvings were revealed—turning out to be some carved scroll-like images, along with some extremely strange characters.

As for these characters, Ye Qing certainly did not recognize them. However, Ye Qing had a habit: whenever he encountered writing he couldn’t read, he would take out his notebook and copy them down; once he got out, he might be able to find someone who knew these characters.

While copying the text, Ye Qing also carefully studied those murals. Calling them murals was a bit much; they were more like the marks primitive people carved into stone to record events. The drawings were very simple, but Ye Qing could still barely make out that many of the figures in these murals were the same kind of Werewolves he had just encountered. And the key point was that the content of the murals was entirely about Werewolves slaughtering humans.

Looking at these murals, Ye Qing couldn’t help but furrow his brows tightly. The methods these Werewolves used against humans were extremely cruel. Judging from the murals, the Werewolves completely treated humans as food that could be enjoyed at will. The content didn’t just show how Werewolves attacked humans, it even showed the process of them devouring humans, giving one a hair-raising feeling. In the hands of these Werewolves, humans were like pigs and sheep, to be butchered at their leisure and eaten as food. And the ancient humans, under the slaughter of these Werewolves, basically had no ability to resist at all—after all, the Werewolves’ strength was simply too terrifying.

There were many murals. As Ye Qing walked, he kept wiping the dust off the stone wall, revealing all of them. After looking for a while, Ye Qing suddenly saw, among these murals, a Werewolf that looked somewhat familiar. This Werewolf was very large, being worshipped by many other Werewolves, and looked like the king of this pack!

Staring at the Werewolf King on the mural, Ye Qing’s heart suddenly stirred. He turned his head to look at the distant Werewolf Statue. The appearance of that Werewolf Statue and the Werewolf King in the murals were almost exactly the same! Could it be that this Werewolf Statue was precisely the Werewolf King depicted on the murals?

This discovery shocked Ye Qing greatly. If that was really the case, then what had happened just now was easy to explain. No wonder those Werewolves had fought so desperately to protect this Werewolf Statue—after all, this Statue was the king among Werewolves and was probably the object of faith for all the Werewolves here!

Carefully comparing the Werewolf Statue and the Werewolf King in the murals, Ye Qing took a deep breath and continued to look further down. The contents below were even more extensive. After a Werewolf King appeared among the Werewolves, their overall strength naturally rose drastically, and they became even more savage in their slaughter of humans. Yet not long after, the style of the murals suddenly changed; they actually started showing scenes of humans fighting the Werewolves. Although the murals were drawn very simply, Ye Qing could still tell that the people fighting the Werewolves should be rather powerful figures, actually able to battle the Werewolves to a standstill.

Later, the Werewolf King personally took the field and killed many of these human experts, and humanity was almost driven to extinction. At that very moment, an extremely powerful figure emerged among the humans, holding an ancient-looking Longsword. Although the mural was very simple, just looking at that Longsword made Ye Qing feel an uncontrollable urge to bow down and worship. With just a few strokes, the Longsword seemed to possess endless might, as if it could make all under heaven submit!

Ye Qing’s heart pounded wildly. He had seen a fair number of Famed Instruments, and the most powerful ones he knew were the Sun Shooting Bow and the Tianzhu Sword currently strapped to his back. Yet the aura of the Sun Shooting Bow and the Tianzhu Sword, compared with this Longsword, were worlds apart. This Longsword seemed to be a born king, a sovereign before whom all Famed Instruments under heaven should submit. The drawing was simple, but its aura was something no other Famed Instrument could hope to match!

What exactly was this Longsword?

Ye Qing’s heart was filled with shock and doubt. As he continued looking down, the scenes became more complex. The man holding the Longsword led a group of people who beat the Werewolves so badly that they fled in disarray, finally escaping into a Cave where they temporarily avoided that crisis.

Seeing this, Ye Qing’s heart stirred. He hurriedly looked around, carefully examining the current Cave. Although the murals were very simple, Ye Qing could still tell that the Cave he was in right now was exactly the Cave the Werewolves had finally fled into!

This discovery left Ye Qing even more astonished. So the location of the Tomb of Ghost Valley Master was actually near this Werewolf Cave? But then, why had Guiguzi chosen such a place? And what exactly was the origin of these Werewolves? Judging by the age of the murals, that era was definitely very far from the present. Also, what connection did these Werewolves have with the Church?

After seeing this, Ye Qing only had more questions in his heart. Moreover, there wasn’t much more content later on; the main focus was on the Werewolves hiding inside the Cave, and then it simply stopped. How this Werewolf Statue had come to be, and how this Cave became one of the doors within the Tomb of Ghost Valley Master—none of that was mentioned, which was truly strange.

Ye Qing checked a few more sections of the nearby stone wall, wiping away the dust, but didn’t find any more similar murals. In other words, in this Cave there was only this one section of wall with murals; no other place had such carvings. So if Ye Qing wanted to learn what happened next, it was basically impossible.

In this short period, Ye Qing had more or less finished examining the Cave. Although the Cave was large, it was very empty inside. Ye Qing walked around it twice and didn’t find anything that could be the Tomb of Ghost Valley Master. Inside this Cave, there were only these Werewolves and that Werewolf Statue. And there weren’t even any mechanisms here. This Werewolf Cave seemed to be merely a gathering place for the Werewolves and had nothing to do with the Tomb of Ghost Valley Master at all.

Having found nothing inside the Cave, Ye Qing slowly made his way back to the side of the Werewolf Statue. He had already confirmed that this Werewolf Statue was the Werewolf King from the murals, and that this Werewolf King was extremely cruel, having killed many people in the past.

Looking at the Werewolf Statue again, Ye Qing felt an extra trace of anger in his heart. However, he didn’t pay too much attention to the Statue itself; instead, he raised his head to look at the glowing orb not far above it, radiating Golden Light.

This orb was extremely strange. It actually floated in midair and illuminated the entire Cave. Leaving aside how it could keep hovering in the air like this, just the fact that it had been able to emit light for so long already shocked Ye Qing greatly. One had to know, this Cave was separated from the modern era by several thousand years. Even a Luminous Pearl couldn’t possibly shine for so long. What exactly was the origin of this orb? And why had it been floating above the Werewolf Statue all this time?

After a moment of silence, Ye Qing thought again of the Tomb of Ghost Valley Master. Since this Cave lay within the bounds of the Tomb of Ghost Valley Master and was even one of the doors in the Nine Palaces and Eight Trigrams Formation, then it must have been left behind by Guiguzi. Guiguzi was the greatest Great Saint of the Taoist Sect in several thousand years; there was certainly some deeper meaning in the things he left. Could it be that there was something special about this Statue and the glowing orb in midair?