Dark Moon Era

Level 1 access?

Caught off guard, Tang Ling’s heart started to race.

If the 3D map, which was similar to a projection from Yang Kong’s educational projector, did not appear before his eyes, he might not have been able to understand what Level 1 access meant. Fortunately, with the appearance of the map, the mysterious voice linked the Level 1 access together, so he understood them clearly

What was the map before his eyes like? Extremely complicated and extremely huge like a giant maze with countless branches and numerous rooms, halls, and so on.

The whole structure of the map formed an abstract shape of a dragon from ancient Huaxia.

When the abstract Huaxianese dragon appeared, it was opaque gray in color. After he was granted the Level 1 access , the dragon claw turned from gray to gold.

The moment the gold color appeared, more information appeared in his mind as if someone had injected it into his brain. He understood that with Level 1 accessibility granted to him now, whenever he performed the hand gesture and generated the key, he would be allowed to enter the area of the dragon claw.

Conclusively, the gestures were not offensive. They were just gestures to generate the key for Level 1 access. However, as for where he really was or where the four dragon claws were, Tang Ling still had no idea. He did not even know what was the scale of the map.

The strange thing was that as the thought came into Tang Ling’s head, he saw one of the four dragon claws, or more precisely, the front left claw of the dragon, light up with a red dot. The red dot blinked, and beside it, another smaller map appeared in high resolution.

With his Precise Instinct, Tang Ling knew the small map was the 3D projection of the cave that he was currently in, displayed in high accuracy. In the smaller map, the red dot represented his current location.

Through the map, he noticed three golden halos behind the altar and deeper in the cave. They resembled three circulating doors. Other than that, above the little map was an ancient-looking icon of a lock that was currently half-unlocked.

After comparing the two maps, the meaning became clear.

The red dot on the dragon claw represented the cave and the small map provided him with the direction. What direction was that? It was the direction to the other three claw areas via the underground golden halos which were probably tunnels.

He would have to use the hand gesture to generate the key. However, the key only granted Level 1 access, which meant that the rest of the gray area was not accessible with the key at the moment.

As for the lock icon above the smaller map, Tang Ling had no idea what it represented, but attempting to find out would not hurt him either.

After all the information appeared before his eyes and in his mind. His heart raced so rapidly that it felt like it could explode.

All kinds of emotions such as excitement, feeling overwhelmed, shock, and disappointment, were at its highest point within him. The reason for his excitement and feeling overwhelmed was self-explanatory. Who would have thought that this little temple would just be a small dot in the dragon claw area? It would be a huge undertaking to expand the entire map and discover the great secrets hidden within!

From there, the disappointment came about. The map was too big to the point that he had doubts about whether he would be able to explore the entire map even if he dedicated his entire life to exploring.

With his Precise Instinct, he used the little temple as a reference for scaling and to roughly calculate the size of the dragon-shaped maze.

The answer he got was astounding. Based on the old civilization’s record of the planet size, the huge maze spanned across at least three large continents and even a part of the ocean!

In the current era, the geography of the planet had morphed, so trying to find out the other entrances to the maze via the old data with the land and the sea of the planet was a near-impossible task. For example, who would have expected one of the entrances to the maze to be located in a cave above the hill of the valley beside the grassland located in the Herrockey Mountain Ridge?

Other than that, there was the matter of accessibility. He had accidentally gained the Level 1 access. Otherwise, would he have to rely on the so-called Holy Blood pill to access this maze?

Judging from all the information at hand, the access granted to the Holy Blood pill was only limited to the entrance to the temple and access to the surface. It was not even the key for the Level 1 access.

The offering ceremony that the six villages held each year must have been a ceremony to protect this entrance.

Was there any other way to explore the maze?

it must be similar to how all mazes were explored. Starting from the temple, Tang Ling would have to go down all three paths behind the altar and find the right way to head to the next location. From there, he would have to repeat the process.

However, with only Level 1 access, he could not explore the whole maze because the dragon head, body, whiskers, and everything else was in gray.

Tang Ling was not greedy. Having the Level 1 access to this mysterious maze was already indescribable, coincidental and fortunate to him.

Just think about it. A small place like this had six unidentified liquified objects that could not be moved, a set of ridiculously powerful hand gestures, a bunch of silver eggs, and the existence of the tri-colored tree that had black and white leaves. Tang Ling especially could not forget about the tri-colored tree.

As for the one-legged bird sculpture, he did not really care. Strangely, halfway during his recovery, he noticed the bird sculpture standing on one leg, but it did not mean anything special. The bird might just be a symbolic existence for the villagers to worship.

His excitement piqued his urge to explore the unknown. After he stopped the hand gestures, the giant map was saved into his brain like a file and the smaller map remained before his eyes.

Tang Ling wanted to test out any potential privileges for having the Level 1 access. In fact, he wanted to try to lift the remaining five unidentified objects on the rack.

The answer was…no.

Sulking, he went behind the altar and shifted his attention to the set of hand gestures.

The answer was…still no.

He could no longer see the intricate energy flow in the hand gestures.

Stingy much! Tang Ling was a little agitated, but it was not difficult for him to realize that in order to bring the unidentified objects or the eggs, one must be stronger with a more powerful spirit.

Maybe he could see the energy flow in the hand gestures again with a more powerful spirit. Perhaps, after unlocking his first genetic lock and his blood changed for the stronger, he could lift the unidentified objects from the rack.

Tang Ling loved to deduce, but he was not able to figure out a way to take the eggs.

Nevertheless, he did not care much. The more the quantity, the lesser the value. It was a rule of nature. There were a few hundred silver eggs around him and a purple Udy crow was able to steal one due to some unknown reason, so the eggs could not possibly be anything of supreme value.

Unwilling to admit his sour grapes mentality, he walked to a corner behind the altar. The lower-left corner of the cave was facing the direction of the Goddess Tear Lake, and according to the indication of the minimap, there should be a golden halo around it.

Tang Ling raised his hand and the energy key appeared above his palm. Perhaps because his spirit solidified the energy key, it no longer dissipated.

He had no idea how to open the golden halo, and unlike the minimap where the golden halo was clearly displayed, the corner contained nothing but a normal cave wall. Not even a brick was spotted as it remained in its primitive form.

Therefore, Tang Ling could only search for it in the more traditional way. As he held the energy key tight, he realized that the feeling of holding it was somewhat strange. While the slight chill from it stated that it really existed, his grip on it was not really convincing.

Tang Ling touched the wall with the energy key, and upon contact, he felt a little vibration.

The dark cave was suddenly bathed in white light and three golden halos appeared in three different spots at the same time. A stone platform appeared in the center. Above it was a blue halo that formed the ancient-looking icon of the half-opened lock.

The super technology in the cave is really astonishing! Does it use the theory of light or waves? Or is it something else entirely?! 

What he saw completely surpassed the science from the old civilization and somewhat toppled the traditional way of how science worked.

Although Tang Ling was no scientist and might be excited, he was not capable of studying everything before his eyes. He looked at the spinning golden halo before him that resembled a vortex. Then, he inserted the energy key in an attempt to find out the contents.

When the energy key touched the spinning golden halo, it dissipated.

The golden halo spun even faster and faster, eventually turning into a golden blur. Then, as it defied the law of motion with its spinning, it suddenly stopped and scattered away, forming a decrepit stone door on the wall.

Is this…?

******

A thousand more kilometers away from the Raqir Plains of the Herrocky Mountain Ridge was a large safety village.

Its defenses, population, productivity, and all its other aspects were close to a safety sector, but it lacked a crucial item for it to be truly classified as a safety sector—the Sector Protection Machine.

If they could get their hands on a Sector Protection Machine, a new number would be assigned to the new safety sector. Therefore, the people of Scarn Safety Village longed for one for a long time.

Because of that, the village chief of Scarn Safety Village brought half of their Purple Moon Warriors along to the closest safety city—Snowy City.

Snowy City was once a safety sector but had been promoted to a city for less than 50 years. Therefore, there was a high chance for the city to have an extra Sector Protection Machine.

Why? A safety city no longer needed a Sector Protection Machine. Instead, it needed something of a higher tier, and that was the cold hard rule of the era.

The Sector Protection Machine that the city once used would soon be obsolete.

It was the third visit to Snowy City for the village chief of Scarn, and this time, regardless of the price, he was determined to get the Sector Protection Machine for his village.

“Chief, if you go in with such a mentality, we will be on the losing side in the upcoming negotiations.” Beside the village chief was a concerned Purple Moon Warrior who was watching over the villagers building the sleigh for travel purposes.

Snowy City was greedy. During the second negotiation, their demands were almost non-acceptable because it would cost Scarn Village their harvests from the past decade. The whole village would be left with minimal resources to barely sustain their daily lives, and they would probably starve.

This time, if the village chief was determined enough, by all means, the outcome would be self-explanatory.

“It’s fine, Garon! As the village chief, I cannot just look at short-term goals like 10 or 20 years. I must look at 50 or 100 hundred years ahead, and how we can develop from here! Suffering losses now isn’t the end. As long as our future generations can enjoy our sacrifice, I’ll be happy.” The village chief was a wise man. Otherwise, he would not have united the 18 villages in the icy plains in a mere 20 years and form the large safety village, Scarn.

“I trust you, Chief.” The Purple Moon Warrior showed respect through his gaze as he reminisced about the past. The thoughts in his mind were strengthened by the chief’s words and his concerns were discarded.

“Chief, the sleighs are all prepared and the Aska mane hounds are all in place,” said a villager who was drenched in sweat.

In the big icy plains that were frozen solid for eight months out of a year, sweating was not something easy, so the villager must have been through some tough work.

The chief tapped his shoulder as encouragement before he led the Purple Moon Warrior forward and gave the sleighs a final check.

To their surprise, a violent quake happened suddenly.

An earthquake? How is there an earthquake in the icy plains? That was the first thought the chief had.

He tried to warn the others, but before he could, the exacerbating quake threw him off his feet, causing him to fall into the snow. Thankfully, the Purple Moon Warrior beside him was fast enough. He held the chief in time and brought him to safety.

In the next second, a giant crack appeared in the ground where the chief had almost fallen. Then, it started to widen slowly.

As if it was covered in snow, the gray-white sky suddenly flashed with a blinding light. The villagers screamed and scattered away for cover though they were not overly frightened. The icy plain had no tall skyscrapers, only igloos, so they had no worries about collapsing buildings or a tsunami befalling them.

The only danger would be the crack in the ground, but it was not widening that quickly either.

Therefore, all the villagers, including the chief, calmed down after a quarter of a minute. They were in a safe place, waiting for the quake to be over. Strangely, the duration of the quake was very long, far longer than the villagers’ experience of such a phenomenon. It took a full five minutes for the quake to slowly slow down.

After five minutes of violent trembling, the cracks on the ground finally stopped, but during the five minutes, seven to eight huge cracks had appeared on the ground and some even traversed across the village.

Finally, after another 30 seconds, the quake died off.

The chief stood up right away and said loudly, “Purple Moon Warriors, high warriors, and all other warriors on duty, patrol the village quickly. Check on the villagers and help them if needed!”

The moment his voice subsided, everyone responded with a strange look because they heard something. Were they hearing things? Still, it sounded so real.

The roar of a tsunami was getting closer, but the closest seaside, the Floating Ice Sea, was at least 30 kilometers away from the village!