Chapter 464 - 431: Jade Skull
Chapter 464: Chapter 431: Jade Skull
Li Qian stared intently at the murals near the top, his brow slightly furrowed.
According to the murals, these humanoid monsters were completely frenzied. They seemed to lack all reason, attacking any living thing on sight.
Many Rong People and many Pet Beasts had died at the hands of these humanoid monsters.
Looking at these murals, Li Qian seemed to understand why the dog-like Pet Beasts that had escaped attacked them without hesitation.
His brow furrowed, Li Qian soon reached the top floor.
The space on the top floor wasn’t large, only about forty to fifty square meters.
Besides a skeleton, the space was empty.
That’s right. On the top floor of this central stone house sat a cross-legged skeleton.
This skeleton was different from others. It wasn’t a pure, ghastly white; a faint green luster shone through the white.
It was like jade.
Furthermore, based on the skeleton’s features, Li Qian could tell that these were the remains of one of the Rong People.
’Was that voice just now coming from it?’ Li Qian wondered, sizing up the Jade Skull before him.
"Come closer, human of the future!" Just as Li Qian was carefully observing the Jade Skull, the strange, telepathic voice sounded again.
Without a doubt, the voice was coming from the skeleton.
At this, a wary expression crossed Li Qian’s face.
He circled the Jade Skull, staring at it for another moment. Finally, he determined that the skeleton probably posed no threat.
With this in mind, he wasted no more time and reached out a hand to test it.
HISS!
Li Qian carefully controlled his finger as he touched the Jade Skull, feeling that nothing unexpected should happen.
After all, he had already touched it with a bamboo branch earlier, and nothing had happened.
That was what Li Qian thought. But the next moment, as his finger touched the Jade Skull, a chill, like an electric shock, instantly shot through his entire body, piercing every limb and bone.
Immediately after, Li Qian felt his consciousness slip into chaos. Everything became a muddled blur.
When light returned to his vision, a different scene had appeared.
Li Qian felt like a detached bystander, watching everything unfold.
A rift appeared out of thin air. Immediately, countless, densely packed, ink-black figures poured out of it.
Their strength was immense, and more importantly, they were fearless in the face of death. They would attack any person on sight—or to be more precise, any of the Rong People.
Countless Rong People were reaped like wheat, slaughtered in a frenzy. Blood flew everywhere in a scene of utter carnage.
The Rong People fell one by one. Cities and towns were massacred, left empty.
Even though he was watching from a third-person perspective, as if in a movie, Li Qian couldn’t help but frown at the scene.
’This is too brutal, too cruel.’
Suppressing his discomfort, Li Qian continued to watch.
Soon, he saw the counterattack.
The experts among the Rong People commanded their Pet Beasts.
One after another, large, mighty, and exceptionally spirited dog-like Pet Beasts leaped out to battle the black humanoid monsters.
As Li Qian watched, he discovered another characteristic.
Not only was the attack power of the pitch-black humanoid monsters astonishing, but their Life Energy was also terrifyingly formidable.
As long as they weren’t completely dismembered, they could keep fighting. Even with heads lopped off, limbs severed, or bodies cleaved in two, they would either regenerate or drag their broken forms back into the fray.
They were like immortal zombies.
The experts of the Rong Race—or, to be precise, the experts of this tribe—fought continuously against the pitch-black humanoid monsters, but fell one after another.
In the end, the strongest expert of the Rong Race led a group of his tribespeople in a final, decisive battle against the pitch-black humanoid monsters.
The battle was exceptionally brutal. All of the Rong People, including their leader, perished.
A remaining group of the Rong People, led by another expert, broke through the encirclement and fled their ancestral land.
Carrying the hope and the last embers of their race’s survival, they fled and fought, leaving a trail of blood in their wake.
Finally, knowing there was no hope of escape, the expert seemed to use some kind of Secret Technique, his body disintegrating into a mist of blood.
All the tribespeople, bathed in the blood mist, let out agonized roars.
Then, something bizarre and horrifying happened: the tribespeople began to slowly merge with their Pet Beasts.
Yes, a forced fusion.
A Pet Beast and a Rong Person, fused together.
After the fusion, Li Qian saw a tattoo of a dog-like Pet Beast’s head appear on the chest of every remaining Rong Person.
Finally, all the Rong People who had fused with the dog-like Pet Beasts turned into motes of light and vanished into the Dimensional Rift their expert had torn open.
’Hmm, this seems to be a kind of Soul Contract...’ Just as Li Qian was wondering what would happen next, the scene before him shattered like a broken mirror. After the vision collapsed, he found that in addition to this implanted memory, he had also gained knowledge of a new type of contract.
While Li Qian was still trying to make sense of it all, his vision returned, and he once again saw the Jade Skull.
Before Li Qian could observe it further, the Jade Skull instantly disintegrated into countless fragments and dust, like sand in the wind.
Enveloped in the dust, Li Qian seemed to hear one last phrase: "Find... contract! Find... contract..."
Furrowing his brow, Li Qian roughly understood the Jade Skull’s meaning. It wanted him to find the people with the dog-like tattoos on their chests and form a contract with them.
Looking at the spot where the Jade Skull had vanished without a trace, then glancing at the scene outside the stone house, Li Qian was momentarily at a loss for words.
Clearly, the Jade Skull was the remains of a Rong Race expert from the Fourth Epoch.
Some kind of spiritual imprint must have inhabited his remains—or perhaps, it was the expert’s lingering will.
Li Qian had touched that spiritual imprint and had seen scenes from the expert’s life.
It seemed those detestable humanoid monsters had destroyed their world.
They had tried to fight the monsters, but the final result was failure.
At the moment of life and death, the expert of the Rong Race from this tribe used a special Secret Technique to merge a portion of his people with their Pet Beasts, turning them into motes of light that rushed into a Dimensional Rift.
Li Qian guessed their intent was to preserve some embers of their race and civilization, allowing them to continue.
At this thought, Li Qian gave a slight nod.
In the future, if he ever did meet people with the dog-like Pet Beast tattoos on their chests, he would definitely try to form a contract with them as the expert had wished. But whether or not he would succeed was another matter entirely.