Praise Me

At dawn, mist rose through the forest.

Hu Liena woke first. She stayed still, brushing the tip of her tail lightly against the back of Xiao Ran's hand. He opened his eyes and saw her holding a finger to her lips. He nodded and spread Flowing Light Perception at its lowest power. There were no Soul Beasts within three miles. Not even insects.

It was too quiet.

They packed up and continued on. Hu Liena gave Xiao Ran a pill to suppress his aura and took one herself. The farther they went, the drier the trees became, their branches bearing fewer and fewer leaves, as though something had drained the water from their roots. The rotting leaves underfoot felt soft. Now and then, faint carvings appeared on exposed rocks, as if someone had drawn something there long ago, only for wind and rain to wear it almost beyond recognition.

At intervals, Xiao Ran released his spiritual power, keeping its range small and probing only a few hundred meters ahead. The heartbeat was still there, closer than yesterday but not too close. By his estimate, it was another thirty miles or so away.

After more than half a day's travel, the ground began to slope downward. There were more rocks around them and less soil. The carvings on those rocks grew denser and clearer. They were Soul Power patterns, much like those on the communicator Ghost Douluo had given him, but far rougher, like unfinished drafts.

"Stop."

Hu Liena stopped ahead of him. Her tail was not swaying loosely as usual. It was slightly taut, its tip raised in warning.

Xiao Ran stepped beside her. The ground ahead dropped away sharply into a vast circular depression, roughly three to four hundred meters across. Dense patterns covered the rock walls all around it, stretching from the rim to the bottom. A layer of dark red mist shrouded the floor, hiding whatever lay there. But the mist moved, brightening and dimming as if it breathed.

The heartbeat came from beneath that mist, dull and powerful. Each beat sent the faintest tremor through the ground under their feet.

"Two Soul Douluo," Hu Liena said softly.

Xiao Ran followed her gaze. At the edge of the depression, against the rock wall on their side, sat two human figures. They still wore the standard robes of Spirit Hall. The fabric had faded to gray but had not rotted. Their bodies were completely shriveled, skin clinging to bone like a wrapping of gray paper. Both corpses faced the depression, their hands hanging at their sides. Their posture was strange. They did not look as though they had died in battle; it was more as if they had walked here and sat down of their own accord.

Xiao Ran took two steps forward. Hu Liena did not stop him, but her tail settled against his wrist.

The corpses were too well preserved. More than ten years in the depths of a forest frequented by Soul Beasts, yet no scavenger had touched them. They had not decayed, and even their clothes had merely faded. That alone was unnatural.

Xiao Ran crouched to examine the first corpse's face. Its eye sockets were sunken and its lips cracked. He could not tell whether its expression had been pained or peaceful. His gaze moved down to the back of its neck.

A small patch of skin there was darker than the surrounding flesh, like a mark left by a burn after the scab had fallen away. It was tiny and crooked, shaped like a worm.

Xiao Ran froze. He took the Ultraman Tiga Card from inside his robe. The gold pattern on the silver card had grown again since yesterday and now covered a little over half its surface. He held the card close to the back of the corpse's neck and compared them.

They were not exactly the same, but their style was strikingly similar. The same winding lines, the same shifts in thickness. It was as if they depicted the same thing, except the mark on the corpse was unfinished, while the one on the card was complete.

"Do you recognize it?" Hu Liena asked.

"No." Xiao Ran stood and tucked the card back inside his robe. "But it's the same kind of pattern as the one on my card."

Hu Liena's ears twitched. She did not press him, but Xiao Ran felt her tail tighten slightly around his wrist. She, too, was trying to work out what it meant. Ghost Douluo had sent Xiao Ran here, and it had something to do with the pattern on the card. Two Soul Douluo had died here with similar marks on their bodies. Had Ghost Douluo sent Xiao Ran to investigate, or had he sent him to his death?

"Do we keep going?" Xiao Ran asked.

Hu Liena did not answer at once. She watched the dark red mist at the bottom of the depression, her fox eyes narrowing slightly. After a moment, she said, "On the back of the Parchment, it says, 'If you encounter the Sealed Land, retreat. Do not approach. Do not look.' We're standing right at its edge. Ghost Douluo wants us to leave."

"But you want to take a look inside."

"I want to know what's beneath that mist." Hu Liena turned toward him. "Don't you?"

Xiao Ran did. The Ultraman Tiga Card had grown warmer as they approached the depression. It was not hot, just warm, as though reminding him that something was down there. But Ghost Douluo's warning was clear. Do not approach. Do not look. The Titled Douluo had deliberately written it on the back of the Parchment, so small it was almost invisible. That meant he had not wanted the Pope to know he was warning Xiao Ran. What was he afraid of?

"We're not going down," Xiao Ran said. "But we can look around the edge. We won't touch the rock walls or go near the mist."

Hu Liena glanced at him, seemingly surprised. Then she nodded, and her tail loosened around his wrist.

They slowly circled the rim of the depression. The closer they came to it, the denser and more complex the patterns on the rock walls became. Xiao Ran noticed a rule to them: they had not been carved at random. They radiated outward from the bottom of the depression in widening rings, each with a different density and thickness. In some places, a line broke off halfway through, as though the carver had given up or something had interrupted them.

When they reached the far side, Hu Liena stopped. She crouched to inspect the ground and tapped the rock beneath her feet.

"Someone's been here," she said.

Xiao Ran went over. A small patch of rock had been cleared, with rotting leaves and gravel pushed aside to expose the surface beneath. A single character had been carved into it, its strokes deep, as though cut directly with Soul Power.

"Retreat."

The writing matched the message on the back of the Parchment: extremely fine strokes, though this time they were carved into stone. The edges of the cuts were pale, which meant they were recent—no more than a few months old.

"Ghost Douluo was here," Xiao Ran said.

Hu Liena shook her head. "It could have been someone else. Ghost Douluo isn't the only person in Spirit Hall who knows this place. After those two Soul Douluo died more than ten years ago, the Pope couldn't have sent only him to investigate."

She stood and looked around. The forest on the far side of the depression was denser and darker, its canopy completely blocking the sky. Behind them, along the way they had come, the withered trees stood farther apart, letting a few shafts of daylight through.

"It'll be dark soon," Hu Liena said. "Let's pull back and find somewhere to spend the night. We'll head home tomorrow."

Xiao Ran nodded. They started back at a much faster pace than they had come. Hu Liena stopped leaving markers along the way. She could not have said who might follow them anyway, and the markers were of no use now.