The Long-Buried Seeds

Mo Chen's fingers stopped in the gap of the base.

"Brother Lu... look here." His voice was low, the probe light flickering in the dust. "There seems to be something down there..."

Lu Yuan took a few steps forward and crouched down. Lin Xiao silently approached, his amber pupils slightly contracting in the dim light. Shi Jian took a half step back, a phantom of Rock Shield appearing in front of him, turning towards the entrance of the hall and the deeper darkness.

At the bottom edge of the base, a piece of metal remnant about half a person's height was pried open, revealing something embedded in the floor—a two-foot square metal box lid, its surface covered in dust, but with faint, dense dark gold lines still visible.

These are not decorative patterns. They are runes. They share the same origin as the massive array on the wall, but are more intricate and dense, forming an independent closed loop. After thousands of years, those lines still retain a dim, firefly-like energy glow.

Mo Chen gasped. "Sealing runes? Energy locks?"

Lu Yuan didn't answer. He leaned closer, his fingertips hovering an inch above the rune lines, moving slowly. He was "reading" the trajectory of the residual energy flow and the resonance between the nodes.

Time passed in deathly silence. Only the suppressed breathing of a few people and the faint, pulsating Soul Power deep within could be heard.

Finally, Lu Yuan's finger stopped at the intersection of lines in the upper left corner of the cover plate.

"It's not a lock," he said, his voice hoarse with thought. "It's a ' Key.' An ancient energy resonance verification mechanism. An incorrect input will trigger self-destruction."

Mo Chen's eyes widened. "Then how do we open it?"

"The Key is hidden in the residual rhythm of the wall array's operation." Lu Yuan turned to the dark gold array. "Help me record it. Uncle Mo, on the east and north walls, record the sequence and interval of the runes lighting up. Lin Xiao, you have good hearing, catch the changes in the 'humming' frequency as energy flows through the nodes. Shi Jian, be on alert."

The command was straightforward.

Mo Chen pulled out a charcoal pencil and a crumpled piece of parchment and rushed to the wall. Lin Xiao listened intently, his amber vertical pupils faintly appearing. Shi Jian nodded heavily, and the Rock Shield solidified completely.

Lu Yuan closed his eyes, his Soul Power perception spreading out like Spiderweb.

He started trying.

The first Soul Power, as thin as a hair, gently tapped on a starting point. The rune showed no reaction. The second wisp, slightly faster in frequency and accompanied by a slight tremor, caused a short line three inches away from the point of impact to flicker faintly before going out.

There's hope.

Like the most patient craftsman, Lu Yuan probed little by little, adjusting the frequency and changing the sequence. His Soul Power was slowly and steadily depleted, and fine beads of sweat appeared on his forehead. He failed, adjusted, failed again, and adjusted again.

I don't know how many times I've tried.

When a wisp of Soul Power, carrying a specific spiraling vibration frequency, precisely "knocked" on an inconspicuous intersection point slightly to the lower right of the center of the cover plate—

The dark gold runes on the entire cover plate suddenly lit up simultaneously!

A soft, ancient golden glow spread rapidly along the runic lines, illuminating each node and outlining a dazzlingly complex three-dimensional energy structure. The massive dark golden array on the wall seemed to be activated, simultaneously shimmering with a dim halo. The entire rotunda was enveloped in a hazy golden mist.

A deep, rumbling sound, as if coming from the depths of the earth, arose.

Mo Chen's mouth gaped open. Lin Xiao's entire body tensed. Shi Jian's phantom Rock Shield trembled with a buzzing sound.

Lu Yuan held his breath.

The golden glow lasted for about three breaths.

Then, all the light faded simultaneously, and the buzzing stopped abruptly.

The hall returned to darkness.

But in the center of the lid, the dark gray container bulged out and silently sank half an inch. Then, the entire metal lid slid silently to one side along its perfectly sealed edge.

The box was opened.

An indescribable odor wafted out—the faint fishy smell of old animal hide mixed with strange ink, and a wisp of cold energy sealed away for countless years.

The probe light shone inside.

The interior of the box was not spacious, and it was lined with a dark brown animal hide mat. On the mat, several scrolls made of the same colored animal hide and bound with dark silver silk thread were neatly arranged, along with three grayish-white crystals the size of pigeon eggs, lying quietly in the recesses of the animal hide.

There was no gold or silver, no precious stones.

Mo Chen was stunned. "That's... that's it?"

Lu Yuan took a deep breath, his fingertips trembling slightly. He carefully enveloped his palm with his Soul Power and remotely picked up the top scroll.

The scroll felt slightly heavy in my hand, and the animal hide was rough and tough. I untied the threads and slowly unfurled it.

On the dark brown leather surface, densely packed ancient characters are written in deep blue, seemingly still-wet "ink." The characters are distorted and bizarre, resembling a combination of primitive hieroglyphs and abstract lines. Interspersed among them are simple patterns and diagrams of energy flow.

Lu Yuan's gaze swept over them quickly.

Fragments of forbidden documents from his past life vaguely corresponded to the ancient symbols before him. He could barely make out the fragmented concepts:

"Origin... Energy Tide... Observation Records..."

"Life imprint... resonance attempt... failure..."

"Rules... Shackles... are everywhere..."

"Blue Silver... Sketch... Connect Nodes..."

He caught his breath.

The finger hovered over the middle of the scroll. There was a simple sketch depicting the form of a plant. The main stem was weak, but the branches and leaves were unusually complex, extending outwards into countless fine branches, each branch ending in a tiny point of light. The points of light were connected to each other by extremely fine threads, forming a vast and hazy network.

Next to the sketch, several illegible symbols were marked in even more hastily written text, but the outline of one of the symbols... bore a striking resemblance to the shape of Blue Silver Grass leaf.

Lu Yuan's heart pounded violently in his chest.

He suppressed his surging thoughts, quickly put away the scroll, and carefully picked up the other two. The contents were similar, both being incomplete research notes, recording vague conjectures and failed experiments about the nature of Soul Power, the connection between life imprints and the rules of heaven and earth. The language was obscure and the information was fragmented, but each fragment was like a Key, knocking on the still-forming conjectures in his mind.

Finally, he looked at the three grayish-white crystals.

The crystal lay still, its color dull and without luster, its surface covered with fine, Spiderweb- like cracks. As soon as Lu Yuan's Soul Power sensed it approaching, he felt a needle-like warning of danger. The crystal contained some kind of extremely pure, yet unknown and extremely unstable primordial energy.

On the edge of one of the crystals, on the animal hide, was written a small, ancient word in the same deep blue ink:

"Source Seed".

Beside it were smaller fragments of annotations. "Communication... Origin Heaven and Earth... Remnants of Failure... Danger... Keep Out..."

Mo Chen leaned closer and whispered, "Brother Lu, what's this? An antique soul crystal?"

"It's not a soul crystal." Lu Yuan shook his head, his voice low. "It's something much older and more dangerous. A 'seed' left behind after an ancient Soul Master failed to touch some kind of ' Origin.' Or rather, 'remains.'"

He carefully wrapped the three "Source Seed" crystals and several animal hide scrolls in layers of Soul Power, storing them in the innermost leather pouch of his body. His movements were slow and solemn, as if he were holding a fragile dream or a burning coal.

The gains were enormous. These ancient notes, especially the fragments about "Rule Shackles" and "Origin Energy," coincided with his previous conjectures, providing vague evidence from a more distant era. Although the three "Source Seed" crystals were terrifyingly dangerous, the unknown primordial energy sealed inside might be the catalyst for the "quality" he needed to overcome the bottleneck in his research.

Temptation and risk, a mix of fire and ice.

He just tightened the drawstring on the leather bag.

Lin Xiao suddenly raised his hand, clenching his fist – a secret signal for everyone to fall silent.

His amber, vertical pupils were sharp as knives, turning towards the unexplored dark passageway deep within the hall. His ears twitched very slightly, and the claw marks on his face tightened.

Lu Yuan froze instantly.

In the deathly silence, only the occasional crackling of torches could be heard.

Then, they all heard it.

From the depths of the dark passage came extremely faint sounds, sounds that could never be made by a group. The rustling of heavy bodies covered in scales or hard shells rubbing against the rough stone walls, interspersed with intermittent low hisses, as if squeezed out from narrow throats.

The sound was moving, getting closer, with a clear direction—towards the core energy room.

Shi Jian's face turned pale instantly. The phantom of the Rock Shield leaned forward slightly, and he forced out a breath. "This is bad... The noise from opening the box just now... may have alerted the 'native inhabitants' here."

Before he could finish speaking...

In the deep, impenetrable darkness of the passageway, a few eerie green lights suddenly appeared without warning.

Not just one or two, but several pairs, each the size of a lantern, suspended in the darkness, swaying slowly up and down, like the cold, merciless eyes of a giant creature.

Immediately afterwards, a clearer, more chilling, low roar, accompanied by a stench, boomed from the depths of the passageway, instantly filling the entire silent hall.

The roar contained undisguised ferocity and hunger.

Clearly, this ancient ruin, which has slumbered for countless years, was never an unclaimed place.