The Iron Claw Wolf stopped at the end of the passage, its front paws pressing down slightly as the red light in its eye sockets flickered erratically. The carved marks on the rock wall still pulsed, streaks of red rising and falling like heartbeats, casting the three of their faces into alternating shadow and light.
Chen Wuya stood at the forefront, residual warmth from the spread of Misaligned Waves lingering in his palm. He could feel a deep vibration in the air, like breathing from the depths underground. This frequency was extremely similar to the fluctuations produced when they had interfered with the elder earlier, but it was more regular, more ponderous.
"There are words on this wall." Mo Feng crouched down, his fingertips brushing across a crack. With his other hand, he took a yellowed animal hide from his robes and gently spread it on the ground. The hide was covered in dense markings—the very runes he had copied in Chapter 1153.
Bai Zhi said nothing. She merely held her flexible sword horizontally before her, her gaze sweeping the surroundings. She could smell a faint bloody tang, as if bloodstains long dried up had been awakened anew.
Mo Feng compared them for a moment, and his brow suddenly tightened. "No... the words on the cauldron wall are reversed."
"Reversed?" Chen Wuya stepped closer.
"Look at this symbol." Mo Feng pointed to the same pattern on the hide and the rock wall. "What I copied was a forward-facing structure, but this one is carved as a mirror image. It's like... it was written from the inside out."
Chen Wuya stared at those twisted lines, and a scene from his days studying at the academy suddenly flashed through his mind. He had always read passages backward; his teacher called him stupid,