Chapter 29 – Sorrowful call
(TL By: PiggyBottle and 生豆)
The sound of flapping wings sped towards him, causing this quiet tribe ruin to rumble, Su Ming’s eyes flashed but he remained unmoving.
The sounds of flapping wings and hissing reached his ears but Su Ming knew how long the tunnel was. Although the sounds had arrived, the was still some time before the NightWings would make it back.
Although it was not much time, it was all the time he had left.
Without hesitating, Su Ming attentively inspected the writing where the skeletal finger was pointing towards.
“Oh heavens, why do you weep alone!”
The starting of the line of those words were flamboyantly written, showing the arrogant and overbearing style of writing, with one look Su Ming could not help but feel his pupils contract.
The meaning of the phrase Su Ming vaguely understood, but just vaguely. The sorrow and solitude engendered by those words left a deep impression on Su Ming.
“Oh heavens, why do you weep alone…” As Su Ming muttered, he gaze followed the lines of Mán characters.
“Those who seek my Mán
Coming from all eight directions,
Merge your blood with the flames,
At will,
Incinerate the Heavens.
When the blood moon rises,
Covering the land and skies……
This is the time to ponder
Kindle the blood flame
Nine is the Utmost
One is the pathway
Nine bows towards the Fire-Mán
Thus is the path of fire worship
Oh heavens, why do you suffer alone!” It was a row of words at the bottom, obviously carved by the same person. However, it was not a phrase of lamentation, hidden behind the words were complexity.
“Nine bows towards the Fire-Mán… Thus is the path of fire worship…” Su Ming’s brows furrowed. Those words were complex and difficult to understand. Reading it once again did not help him at all.
While he stood there thinking, the sounds of hissing and wings flapping coming from the tunnel got louder and louder. Su Ming’s eyes flashed, he knew that he cannot stay here any longer, nimbly he rushed towards the entrance of the cavern.
Very quickly he had arrived within the pa.s.sage, as he stood there the roaring in the grew. With one last look at the ancient tribal grounds, he rushed back into the tunnel.
As he ran he took constant note of the sounds getting louder, after running about another hundred feet he stopped and started digging into a crack in the tunnel wall.
Although the crack was not that large, Su Ming was fairly skinny and managed to squeeze himself inside. Squatting inside the small crevice he slowed his breathing and replaced some stones to use as cover. He looked out waiting silently as his heart pounded.
Breath by breath time pa.s.sed, after about ten breaths Su Ming already got the gooseb.u.mps as he saw the red mist explode into the tunnel, the piercing hisses rumbling as the red streaks rushed pa.s.sed him.
Those streaks were precisely the NightWings.
Observing these NightWings at such a distance made Su Ming’s heart race but he managed to not move his body the slightest, his eyes narrowed not letting out any reflections.
The number of NightWings were just too many, constantly whistling past him in the tunnel as he squat in the small crevice no more than half a feet away.
Su Ming’s right hand tightly gripping onto the axe till his knuckles turned white, at this point he could not even feel his heartbeat.
He stared at the NightWings rushing in, seeing their hideous faces, their flapping wings as they rushed pa.s.sed him completely ignoring the crack. Even so Su Ming did not slacken his guard, rather he became more vigilant.
Suddenly, he could hear the desperate cries of people. Su Ming’s eyes glanced past the crack as he saw several human shaped shadows out in the mist and they were dragged into the ancient tribal grounds.
In total there were nine people……
Amongst the nine, Su Ming were unable to identify all of them, but in one glance he managed to see a white dressed figure with a hopeless and hollow yet beautiful face.
“Its her!” Su Ming’s pupils shrank as he recognised her, that person in the white dress was the person they had previously encountered in the bazaar, the one who he and Lei Chan had encountered, Bai Ling!
Su Ming silently pondered.
As time slowly pa.s.sed, the cries in the tunnel gradually faded and even the red mist was partially dispersed. The NightWings most likely returned to their nests to sleep as the blood moon in the sky disappeared.
A warm sensation filled the air quickly dispersing the originally chill air, even the walls in the fissure started to feel warm. Suddenly some crackling sounds rumbled in the tunnel as more cracks appeared in the walls of the cave.
“So these cracks really were formed like this… …” Su Ming’s eyes flashed with understanding as he walked out of the crack he hid in. Standing in the pa.s.sage, he could feel the heat waves coming from the direction of the ancient tribal grounds as he started to immediately sweat.
Even the ground he was standing on was starting to rapidly heat up, standing on it he could feel his foot getting warmer. Su Ming could tell that if he were to stay here much longer the heat would reach a temperature he would not be able to survive in.
To leave or not to leave!
Su Ming’s face flashed with some uncertainty, suddenly some miserable screams resonated in the tunnels making his heart waver.
“Screw it, we already deceived her in the bazaar and since I somehow managed to run into her, if i were to leave her, my heart cannot… …” Su Ming was still a child with a pure heart after all. Taking a deep breath of this hot air, he ran back towards the source of the heat.
“If I can save you then I will! If i can’t then… at least i won’t have any regrets.” Su Ming ran forward decisively, clutching the axe in his hand tightly. As he approached the end of the tunnel he could feel the heat rise steeply.
Fortunately, this distance was fairly short. Not too long after, Su Ming managed to reach the end of this path, ignoring the heat from the rocks, he leaned on the edge of the tunnel as he peeked into the cavern.
With this once glance, his eyes started shimmering.
In the ancient tribal grounds in the cavern, attached to the large spikes were seven people struggling to get free on the brink of death.
These seven people were pierced by seven different spikes on their backs as blood flowed out of their wounds. However they were still alive, constantly screaming miserably as they felt their life drain away.
Those seven people without exception were all male, as Su Ming inspected them, he breathed a sigh of relief as he did not recognise any of them, meaning they were at least all not from the WuShan tribe.
But he could clearly see that their flesh and the spikes were slowly melting. As they melted a red lava could be seen to fill up the tribal grounds like an overflowing lake.
As he witnessed this, he let out a gasp, finally understanding what those spikes were for.
“This is a really strange place, perhaps the NightWings’ hibernation cycle and these spikes have something to do with each other!” Su Ming slowly made the judgement that these spikes would probably eventually start to form from magma for some unknown reason, after one night of the NightWings’ appearance they would then melt back into lava.
“Seeing the number of spikes here, probably after they completely melt they should fill the whole basin back up with lava and cover up all traces of this ancient tribal ground……”As Su Ming looked further up, he saw that in the center of the tribe was a red cut out hole in the trunk of a large tree.
This tree trunk seemed to be thawing in this strange basin with strange things moving around inside it. Only upon closer inspection did Su Ming realise that those small red marks were actually those NightWings.
The only difference was that those NightWings inside the tree when exposed, their faced were no longer savage, rather they had a painful, desolate and say expression.
They did not continue to hiss, rather they looked like they were silently weeping, there were also many NightWings making strange actions like constantly biting their paws and then wiping their eyes, but on thee fingers they bite apart there was not a hint of blood.
“Those NightWings, actually drilled themselves into the tree trunk! What are… that are they actually doing……” Su Ming stared at the tree trunk, feeling the heat become more and more intense, he is no longer able to lie on the floor.
“Since I can’t find her……forget it……” Su Ming shook his head, he already did what he can so he should start heading back out. But, as he was adjusting his body, he suddenly paused.
His gaze stopped, looking at the red tree trunk, two faced emerged from within the tree, one of which he did not recognise, the other was Bai Ling.
Bai Ling’s eyes were wide open while her gaze was empty, poignant and without a shred of life in them, as if having given up all hope of living.
Su Ming looked at that that face, and then looked at the magma slowly acc.u.mulating, the lazy from those melting spikes have already covered up almost half the houses in the tribe.
As he looked, he could only see the roofs of those stone houses in the tribe, most of which already started giving off a red hot glow.
“The NightWings’ appearance had something to do with the Blood Moon, should also have something to do with the heat here, they seem to fear the heat… … That is why only after it turns cold they are able to fly out to find food.
After they returned, they all quickly rushed into the tree trunk without a single one of them remaining outside, this seems to align with my judgement.” Su Ming didn’t act rashly, rather he stood there first a.n.a.lysing what he knew.
“Should be possible to rescue them… … only i need to wait a while more……” Su Ming stared at the tree and also the rising lava level in the basin.
After some time, the heat had risen even more, Su Ming stood there sweating non-stop, his skins also showing signs of cracking. Suddenly his eyes flashed as he released his blood qi, the power of his eleven blood veins surging forth within his body as he dashed ahead.
With his extreme speed, he reached the roof of one of the houses in an instant. The moment he landed his feet started sizzling as white smoke emerged, without stopping Su Ming quickly lept once more landing on another house, after a few more leaps he neared the red tree trunk.
In the instant he arrived, he could see the face next to Bai Ling suddenly let out a shrill cry as she suddenly withered into bones.
Her body absorbed into the tree trunk and some strange force drained out her lifeforce in an instant.